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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/1853-0.txt b/1853-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3260daf --- /dev/null +++ b/1853-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7765 @@ +Project Gutenberg’s The Ninth Vibration And Other Stories, by L. Adams Beck + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Ninth Vibration And Other Stories + +Author: L. Adams Beck + +Release Date: August, 1999 [Etext #1853] +Posting Date: November 18, 2009 +Last Updated: October 31, 2016 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NINTH VIBRATION *** + + + + +Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer + + + + + +THE NINTH VIBRATION AND OTHER STORIES + +By L. Adams Beck + + + + +CONTENTS: + + THE NINTH VIBRATION + + THE INTERPRETER A ROMANCE OF THE EAST + + THE INCOMPARABLE LADY A STORY OF CHINA WITH A MORAL + + THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN A STORY OF BURMA + + FIRE OF BEAUTY + + THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL + + “HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!” + + “THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY” + + + + +THE NINTH VIBRATION + +There is a place uplifted nine thousand feet in purest air where one +of the most ancient tracks in the world runs from India into Tibet. +It leaves Simla of the Imperial councils by a stately road; it passes +beyond, but now narrowing, climbing higher beside the khuds or steep +drops to the precipitous valleys beneath, and the rumor of Simla grows +distant and the way is quiet, for, owing to the danger of driving horses +above the khuds, such baggage as you own must be carried by coolies, and +you yourself must either ride on horseback or in the little horseless +carriage of the Orient, here drawn and pushed by four men. And presently +the deodars darken the way with a solemn presence, for-- + + “These are the Friars of the wood, + The Brethren of the Solitude + Hooded and grave--” + +their breath most austerely pure in the gradually chilling air. Their +companies increase and now the way is through a great wood where it +has become a trail and no more, and still it climbs for many miles and +finally a rambling bungalow, small and low, is sighted in the deeps of +the trees, a mountain stream from unknown heights falling beside it. And +this is known as the House in the Woods. Very few people are permitted +to go there, for the owner has no care for money and makes no provision +for guests. You must take your own servant and the khansamah will cook +you such simple food as men expect in the wilds, and that is all. You +stay as long as you please and when you leave not even a gift to the +khansamah is permitted. + +I had been staying in Ranipur of the plains while I considered the +question of getting to Upper Kashmir by the route from Simla along the +old way to Chinese Tibet where I would touch Shipki in the Dalai +Lama’s territory and then pass on to Zanskar and so down to Kashmir--a +tremendous route through the Himalaya and a crowning experience of +the mightiest mountain scenery in the world. I was at Ranipur for the +purpose of consulting my old friend Olesen, now an irrigation official +in the Rampur district--a man who had made this journey and nearly lost +his life in doing it. It is not now perhaps so dangerous as it was, and +my life was of no particular value to any one but myself, and the plan +interested me. + +I pass over the long discussions of ways and means in the blinding heat +of Ranipur. Olesen put all his knowledge at my service and never uttered +a word of the envy that must have filled him as he looked at the +distant snows cool and luminous in blue air, and, shrugging good-natured +shoulders, spoke of the work that lay before him on the burning +plains until the terrible summer should drag itself to a close. We had +vanquished the details and were smoking in comparative silence one night +on the veranda, when he said in his slow reflective way; + +“You don’t like the average hotel, Ormond, and you’ll like it still less +up Simla way with all the Simla crowd of grass-widows and fellows out +for as good a time as they can cram into the hot weather. I wonder if I +could get you a permit for The House in the Woods while you re waiting +to fix up your men and route for Shipki.” + +He explained and of course I jumped at the chance. It belonged, he said, +to a man named Rup Singh, a pandit, or learned man of Ranipur. He had +always spent the summer there, but age and failing health made this +impossible now, and under certain conditions he would occasionally allow +people known to friends of his own to put up there. + +“And Rup Singh and I are very good friends,” Olesen said; “I won his +heart by discovering the lost Sukh Mandir, or Hall of Pleasure, built +many centuries ago by a Maharao of Ranipur for a summer retreat in the +great woods far beyond Simla. There are lots of legends about it here in +Ranipur. They call it The House of Beauty. Rup Singh’s ancestor had been +a close friend of the Maharao and was with him to the end, and that’s +why he himself sets such store on the place. You have a good chance if I +ask for a permit. + +“He told me the story and since it is the heart of my own I give it +briefly. Many centuries ago the Ranipur Kingdom was ruled by the Maharao +Rai Singh a prince of the great lunar house of the Rajputs. Expecting +a bride from some far away kingdom (the name of this is unrecorded) +he built the Hall of Pleasure as a summer palace, a house of rare and +costly beauty. A certain great chamber he lined with carved figures of +the Gods and their stories, almost unsurpassed for truth and life. So, +with the pine trees whispering about it the secret they sigh to tell, +he hoped to create an earthly Paradise with this Queen in whom all +loveliness was perfected. And then some mysterious tragedy ended all +his hopes. It was rumoured that when the Princess came to his court, +she was, by some terrible mistake, received with insult and offered the +position only of one of his women. After that nothing was known. Certain +only is it that he fled to the hills, to the home of his broken hope, +and there ended his days in solitude, save for the attendance of two +faithful friends who would not abandon him even in the ghostly quiet of +the winter when the pine boughs were heavy with snow and a spectral moon +stared at the panthers shuffling through the white wastes beneath. Of +these two Rup Singh’s ancestor was one. And in his thirty fifth year +the Maharao died and his beauty and strength passed into legend and his +kingdom was taken by another and the jungle crept silently over his Hall +of Pleasure and the story ended. + +“There was not a memory of the place up there,” Olesen went on. +“Certainly I never heard anything of it when I went up to the Shipki +in 1904. But I had been able to be useful to Rup Singh and he gave me a +permit for The House in the Woods, and I stopped there for a few days’ +shooting. I remember that day so well. I was wandering in the dense +woods while my men got their midday grub, and I missed the trail somehow +and found myself in a part where the trees were dark and thick and the +silence heavy as lead. It was as if the trees were on guard--they stood +shoulder to shoulder and stopped the way. Well, I halted, and had a +notion there was something beyond that made me doubt whether to go on. +I must have stood there five minutes hesitating. Then I pushed on, +bruising the thick ferns under my shooting boots and stooping under the +knotted boughs. Suddenly I tramped out of the jungle into a clearing, +and lo and behold a ruined House, with blocks of marble lying all about +it, and carved pillars and a great roof all being slowly smothered +by the jungle. The weirdest thing you ever saw. I climbed some fallen +columns to get a better look, and as I did I saw a face flash by at the +arch of a broken window. I sang out in Hindustani, but no answer: only +the echo from the woods. Somehow that dampened my ardour, and I didn’t +go in to what seemed like a great ruined hall for the place was so +eerie and lonely, and looked mighty snaky into the bargain. So I came +ingloriously away and told Rup Singh. And his whole face changed. ‘That +is The House of Beauty,’ he said. ‘All my life have I sought it and in +vain. For, friend of my soul, a man must lose himself that he may find +himself and what lies beyond, and the trodden path has ever been my +doom. And you who have not sought have seen. Most strange are the way +of the Gods’. Later on I knew this was why he had always gone up yearly, +thinking and dreaming God knows what. He and I tried for the place +together, but in vain and the whole thing is like a dream. Twice he has +let friends of mine stay at The House in the Woods, and I think he won’t +refuse now.” + +“Did he ever tell you the story?” + +“Never. I only know what I’ve picked up here. Some horrible mistake +about the Rani that drove the man almost mad with remorse. I’ve heard +bits here and there. There’s nothing so vital as tradition in India.” + +“I wonder’. what really happened.” + +“That we shall never know. I got a little old picture of the +Maharao--said to be painted by a Pahari artist. It’s not likely to be +authentic, but you never can tell. A Brahman sold it to me that he might +complete his daughter’s dowry, and hated doing it.” + +“May I see it?” + +“Why certainly. Not a very good light, but--can do,” as the Chinks say. + +He brought it out rolled in silk stuff and I carried it under the +hanging lamp. A beautiful young man indeed, with the air of race +these people have beyond all others;--a cold haughty face, immovably +dignified. He sat with his hands resting lightly on the arms of his +chair of State. A crescent of rubies clasped the folds of the turban and +from this sprang an aigrette scattering splendours. The magnificent hilt +of a sword was ready beside him. The face was not only beautiful but +arresting. + +“A strange picture,” I said. “The artist has captured the man himself. +I can see him trampling on any one who opposed him, and suffering in the +same cold secret way. It ought to be authentic if it isn’t. Don’t you +know any more?” + +“Nothing. Well--to bed, and tomorrow I’ll see Rup Singh.” + +I was glad when he returned with the permission. I was to be very +careful, he said, to make no allusion to the lost palace, for two women +were staying at the House in the Woods--a mother and daughter to whom +Rup Singh had granted hospitality because of an obligation he must +honor. But with true Oriental distrust of women he had thought fit to +make no confidence to them. I promised and asked Olesen if he knew them. + +“Slightly. Canadians of Danish blood like my own. Their name is Ingmar. +Some people think the daughter good-looking. The mother is supposed +to be clever; keen on occult subjects which she came back to India to +study. The husband was a great naturalist and the kindest of men. He +almost lived in the jungle and the natives had all sorts of rumours +about his powers. You know what they are. They said the birds and beasts +followed him about. Any old thing starts a legend.” + +“What was the connection with Rup Singh?” + +“He was in difficulties and undeservedly, and Ingmar generously lent +him money at a critical time, trusting to his honour for repayment. Like +most Orientals he never forgets a good turn and would do anything for +any of the family--except trust the women with any secret he valued. The +father is long dead. By the way Rup Singh gave me a queer message for +you. He said; ‘Tell the Sahib these words--“Let him who finds water in +the desert share his cup with him who dies of thirst.” He is certainly +getting very old. I don’t suppose he knew himself what he meant.” + +I certainly did not. However my way was thus smoothed for me and I took +the upward road, leaving Olesen to the long ungrateful toil of the man +who devotes his life to India without sufficient time or knowledge to +make his way to the inner chambers of her beauty. There is no harder +mistress unless you hold the pass-key to her mysteries, there is none of +whom so little can be told in words but who kindles so deep a passion. +Necessity sometimes takes me from that enchanted land, but when the +latest dawns are shining in my skies I shall make my feeble way back to +her and die at her worshipped feet. So I went up from Kalka. + +I have never liked Simla. It is beautiful enough--eight thousand feet +up in the grip of the great hills looking toward the snows, the famous +summer home of the Indian Government. Much diplomacy is whispered +on Observatory Hill and many are the lighter diversions of which Mr. +Kipling and lesser men have written. But Simla is also a gateway to many +things--to the mighty deodar forests that clothe the foot-hills of the +mountains, to Kulu, to the eternal snows, to the old, old bridle way +that leads up to the Shipki Pass and the mysteries of Tibet--and to the +strange things told in this story. So I passed through with scarcely a +glance at the busy gayety of the little streets and the tiny shops +where the pretty ladies buy their rouge and powder. I was attended by +my servant Ali Khan, a Mohammedan from Nagpur, sent up with me by Olesen +with strong recommendation. He was a stout walker, so too am I, and an +inveterate dislike to the man-drawn carriage whenever my own legs would +serve me decided me to walk the sixteen miles to the House in the Woods, +sending on the baggage. Ali Khan despatched it and prepared to follow +me, the fine cool air of the hills giving us a zest. + +“Subhan Alla! (Praise be to God!) the air is sweet!” he said, stepping +out behind me. “What time does the Sahib look to reach the House?” + +“About five or six. Now, Ali Khan, strike out of the road. You know the +way.” + +So we struck up into the glorious pine woods, mountains all about us. +Here and there as we climbed higher was a little bank of forgotten +snow, but spring had triumphed and everywhere was the waving grace of +maiden-hair ferns, banks of violets and strangely beautiful little wild +flowers. These woods are full of panthers, but in day time the only +precaution necessary is to take no dog,--a dainty they cannot resist. +The air was exquisite with the sun-warm scent of pines, and here and +there the trees broke away disclosing mighty ranges of hills covered +with rich blue shadows like the bloom on a plum,--the clouds chasing the +sunshine over the mountain sides and the dark green velvet of the robe +of pines. I looked across ravines that did not seem gigantic and yet the +villages on the other side were like a handful of peas, so tremendous +was the scale. I stood now and then to see the rhododendrons, forest +trees here with great trunks and massive boughs glowing with blood-red +blossom, and time went by and I took no count of it, so glorious was the +climb. + +It must have been hours later when it struck me that the sun was getting +low and that by now we should be nearing The House in the Woods. I said +as much to Ali Khan. He looked perplexed and agreed. We had reached +a comparatively level place, the trail faint but apparent, and it +surprised me that we heard no sound of life from the dense wood where +our goal must be. + +“I know not, Presence,” he said. “May his face be blackened that +directed me. I thought surely I could not miss the way, and yet-” + +We cast back and could see no trail forking from the one we were on. +There was nothing for it but to trust to luck and push on. But I began +to be uneasy and so was the man. I had stupidly forgotten to unpack +my revolver, and worse, we had no food, and the mountain air is an +appetiser, and at night the woods have their dangers, apart from being +absolutely trackless. We had not met a living being since we left the +road and there seemed no likelihood of asking for directions. I stopped +no longer for views but went steadily on, Ali Khan keeping up a running +fire of low-voiced invocations and lamentations. And now it was dusk and +the position decidedly unpleasant. + +It was at that moment I saw a woman before us walking lightly and +steadily under the pines. She must have struck into the trail from +the side for she never could have kept before us all the way. A native +woman, but wearing the all-concealing boorka, more like a town dweller +than a woman of the hills. I put on speed and Ali Khan, now very tired, +toiled on behind me as I came up with her and courteously asked the +way. Her face was entirely hidden, but the answering voice was clear and +sweet. I made up my mind she was young, for it had the bird-like thrill +of youth. + +“If the Presence continues to follow this path he will arrive. It is not +far. They wait for him.” + +That was all. It left me with a desire to see the veiled face. We passed +on and Ali Khan looked fearfully back. + +“Ajaib! (Wonderful!) A strange place to meet one of the purdah-nashin +(veiled women)” he muttered. “What would she be doing up here in the +heights? She walked like a Khanam (khan’s wife) and I saw the gleam of +gold under the boorka.” + +I turned with some curiosity as he spoke, and lo! there was no human +being in sight. She had disappeared from the track behind us and it was +impossible to say where. The darkening trees were beginning to hold the +dusk and it seemed unimaginable that a woman should leave the way and +take to the dangers of the woods. + +“Puna-i-Khoda--God protect us!” said Ali Khan in a shuddering whisper. +“She was a devil of the wilds. Press on, Sahib. We should not be here in +the dark.” + +There was nothing else to do. We made the best speed we could, and the +trees grew more dense and the trail fainter between the close trunks, +and so the night came bewildering with the expectation that we must pass +the night unfed and unarmed in the cold of the heights. They might send +out a search party from The House in the Woods--that was still a hope, +if there were no other. And then, very gradually and wonderfully the +moon dawned over the tree tops and flooded the wood with mysterious +silver lights and about her rolled the majesty of the stars. We pressed +on into the heart of the night. From the dense black depths we emerged +at last. An open glade lay before us--the trees falling back to right +and left to disclose--what? + +A long low house of marble, unlit, silent, bathed in pale splendour and +shadow. About it stood great deodars, clothed in clouds of the white +blossoming clematis, ghostly and still. Acacias hung motionless trails +of heavily scented bloom as if carved in ivory. It was all silent as +death. A flight of nobly sculptured steps led up to a broad veranda and +a wide open door with darkness behind it. Nothing more. + +I forced myself to shout in Hindustani--the cry seeming a brutal outrage +upon the night, and an echo came back numbed in the black woods. I tried +once more and in vain. We stood absorbed also into the silence. + +“Ya Alla! it is a house of the dead!” whispered Ali Khan, shuddering at +my shoulder,--and even as the words left his lips I understood where we +were. “It is the Sukh Mandir.” I said. “It is the House of the Maharao +of Ranipur.” + +It was impossible to be in Ranipur and hear nothing of the dead house +of the forest and Ali Khan had heard--God only knows what tales. In his +terror all discipline, all the inborn respect of the native forsook him, +and without word or sign he turned and fled along the track, crashing +through the forest blind and mad with fear. It would have been insanity +to follow him, and in India the first rule of life is that the Sahib +shows no fear, so I left him to his fate whatever it might be, believing +at the same time that a little reflection and dread of the lonely forest +would bring him to heel quickly. + +I stood there and the stillness flowed like water about me. It was +as though I floated upon it--bathed in quiet. My thoughts adjusted +themselves. Possibly it was not the Sukh Mandir. Olesen had spoken of +ruin. I could see none. At least it was shelter from the chill which is +always present at these heights when the sun sets,--and it was beautiful +as a house not made with hands. There was a sense of awe but no fear as +I went slowly up the great steps and into the gloom beyond and so gained +the hall. + +The moon went with me and from a carven arch filled with marble tracery +rained radiance that revealed and hid. Pillars stood about me, wonderful +with horses ramping forward as in the Siva Temple at Vellore. They +appeared to spring from the pillars into the gloom urged by invisible +riders, the effect barbarously rich and strange--motion arrested, struck +dumb in a violent gesture, and behind them impenetrable darkness. I +could not see the end of this hall--for the moon did not reach it, but +looking up I beheld the walls fretted in great panels into the utmost +splendour of sculpture, encircling the stories of the Gods amid a +twining and under-weaving of leaves and flowers. It was more like a +temple than a dwelling. Siva, as Nataraja the Cosmic Dancer, the Rhythm +of the Universe, danced before me, flinging out his arms in the passion +of creation. Kama, the Indian Eros, bore his bow strung with honey-sweet +black bees that typify the heart’s desire. Krishna the Beloved smiled +above the herd-maidens adoring at his feet. Ganesha the Elephant-Headed, +sat in massive calm, wreathing his wise trunk about him. And many more. +But all these so far as I could see tended to one centre panel larger +than any, representing two life-size figures of a dim beauty. At first +I could scarcely distinguish one from the other in the upward-reflected +light, and then, even as I stood, the moving moon revealed the two as +if floating in vapor. At once I recognized the subject--I had seen it +already in the ruined temple of Ranipur, though the details differed. +Parvati, the Divine Daughter of the Himalaya, the Emanation of the +mighty mountains, seated upon a throne, listening to a girl who played +on a Pan pipe before her. The goddess sat, her chin leaned upon her +hand, her shoulders slightly inclined in a pose of gentle sweetness, +looking down upon the girl at her feet, absorbed in the music of the +hills and lonely places. A band of jewels, richly wrought, clasped the +veil on her brows, and below the bare bosom a glorious girdle clothed +her with loops and strings and tassels of jewels that fell to her +knees--her only garment. + +The girl was a lovely image of young womanhood, the proud swell of the +breast tapering to the slim waist and long limbs easily folded as she +half reclined at the divine feet, her lips pressed to the pipe. Its +silent music mysteriously banished fear. The sleep must be sweet +indeed that would come under the guardianship of these two fair +creatures--their gracious influence was dewy in the air. I resolved that +I would spend the night beside them. Now with the march of the moon dim +vistas of the walls beyond sprang into being. Strange mythologies--the +incarnations of Vishnu the Preserver, the Pastoral of Krishna the +Beautiful. I promised myself that next day I would sketch some of the +loveliness about me. But the moon was passing on her way--I folded the +coat I carried into a pillow and lay down at the feet of the goddess and +her nymph. Then a moonlit quiet I slept in a dream of peace. + +Sleep annihilates time. Was it long or short when I woke like a man +floating up to the surface from tranquil deeps? That I cannot tell, but +once more I possessed myself and every sense was on guard. + +My hearing first. Bare feet were coming, falling softly as leaves, but +unmistakable. There was a dim whispering but I could hear no word. I +rose on my elbow and looked down the long hall. Nothing. The moonlight +lay in pools of light and seas of shadow on the floor, and the feet drew +nearer. Was I afraid? I cannot tell, but a deep expectation possessed +me as the sound grew like the rustle of grasses parted in a fluttering +breeze, and now a girl came swiftly up the steps, irradiate in the +moonlight, and passing up the hall stood beside me. I could see her +robe, her feet bare from the jungle, but her face wavered and changed +and re-united like the face of a dream woman. I could not fix it for +one moment, yet knew this was the messenger for whom I had waited all +my life--for whom one strange experience, not to be told at present, had +prepared me in early manhood. Words came, and I said: + +“Is this a dream?” + +“No. We meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is true.” + +“Is a dream never true?” + +“Sometimes it is the echo of the Ninth Vibration and therefore a +harmonic of truth. You are awake now. It is the day-time that is the +sleep of the soul. You are in the Lower Perception, wherein the truth +behind the veil of what men call Reality is perceived.” + +“Can I ascend?” + +“I cannot tell. That is for you, not me. + +“What do I perceive tonight?” + +“The Present as it is in the Eternal. Say no more. Come with me.” + +She stretched her hand and took mine with the assurance of a goddess, +and we went up the hall where the night had been deepest between the +great pillars. + +Now it is very clear to me that in every land men, when the doors of +perception are opened, will see what we call the Supernatural clothed +in the image in which that country has accepted it. Blake, the mighty +mystic, will see the Angels of the Revelation, driving their terrible +way above Lambeth--it is not common nor unclean. The fisherman, plying +his coracle on the Thames will behold the consecration of the great new +Abbey of Westminster celebrated with mass and chant and awful lights +in the dead mid-noon of night by that Apostle who is the Rock of the +Church. Before him who wanders in Thessaly Pan will brush the dewy +lawns and slim-girt Artemis pursue the flying hart. In the pale gold of +Egyptian sands the heavy brows of Osiris crowned with the pshent will +brood above the seer and the veil of Isis tremble to the lifting. For +all this is the rhythm to which the souls of men are attuned and in that +vibration they will see, and no other, since in this the very mountains +and trees of the land are rooted. So here, where our remote ancestors +worshipped the Gods of Nature, we must needs stand before the Mystic +Mother of India, the divine daughter of the Himalaya. + +How shall I describe the world we entered? The carvings upon the walls +had taken life--they had descended. It was a gathering of the dreams men +have dreamed here of the Gods, yet most real and actual. They watched in +a serenity that set them apart in an atmosphere of their own--forms of +indistinct majesty and august beauty, absolute, simple, and everlasting. +I saw them as one sees reflections in rippled water--no more. But +all faces turned to the place where now a green and flowering leafage +enshrined and partly hid the living Nature Goddess, as she listened to +a voice that was not dumb to me. I saw her face only in glimpses of an +indescribable sweetness, but an influence came from her presence like +the scent of rainy pine forests, the coolness that breathes from great +rivers, the passion of Spring when she breaks on the world with a wave +of flowers. Healing and life flowed from it. Understanding also. It +seemed I could interpret the very silence of the trees outside into the +expression of their inner life, the running of the green life-blood in +their veins, the delicate trembling of their finger-tips. + +My companion and I were not heeded. We stood hand in hand like children +who have innocently strayed into a palace, gazing in wonderment. The +august life went its way upon its own occasions, and, if we would, we +might watch. Then the voice, clear and cold, proceeding, as it were, +with some story begun before we had strayed into the Presence, the whole +assembly listening in silence. + +“--and as it has been so it will be, for the Law will have the blind +soul carried into a body which is a record of the sins it has committed, +and will not suffer that soul to escape from rebirth into bodies until +it has seen the truth--” + +And even as this was said and I listened, knowing myself on the verge of +some great knowledge, I felt sleep beginning to weigh upon my eyelids. +The sound blurred, flowed unsyllabled as a stream, the girl’s hand grew +light in mine; she was fading, becoming unreal; I saw her eyes like +faint stars in a mist. They were gone. Arms seemed to receive me--to lay +me to sleep and I sank below consciousness, and the night took me. + +When I awoke the radiant arrows of the morning were shooting into the +long hall where I lay, but as I rose and looked about me, strange--most +strange, ruin encircled me everywhere. The blue sky was the roof. What I +had thought a palace lost in the jungle, fit to receive its King should +he enter, was now a broken hall of State; the shattered pillars were +festooned with waving weeds, the many coloured lantana grew between the +fallen blocks of marble. Even the sculptures on the walls were difficult +to decipher. Faintly I could trace a hand, a foot, the orb of a +woman’s bosom, the gracious outline of some young God, standing above a +crouching worshipper. No more. Yes, and now I saw above me as the dawn +touched it the form of the Dweller in the Windhya Hills, Parvati the +Beautiful, leaning softly over something breathing music at her feet. +Yet I knew I could trace the almost obliterated sculpture only because +I had already seen it defined in perfect beauty. A deep crack ran across +the marble; it was weathered and stained by many rains, and little ferns +grew in the crevices, but I could reconstruct every line from my own +knowledge. And how? The Parvati of Ranipur differed in many important +details. She stood, bending forward, wheras this sweet Lady sat. Her +attendants were small satyr-like spirits of the wilds, piping and +fluting, in place of the reclining maiden. The sweeping scrolls of a +great halo encircled her whole person. Then how could I tell what this +nearly obliterated carving had been? I groped for the answer and could +not find it. I doubted-- + + “Were such things here as we do speak about? + Or have we eaten of the insane root + That takes the reason captive?” + +Memory rushed over me like the sea over dry sands. A girl--there had +been a girl--we had stood with clasped hands to hear a strange music, +but in spite of the spiritual intimacy of those moments I could not +recall her face. I saw it cloudy against a background of night and +dream, the eyes remote as stars, and so it eluded me. Only her presence +and her words survived; “We meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is +true.” But the Ninth Vibration itself was dream-land. I had never heard +the phrase--I could not tell what was meant, nor whether my apprehension +was true or false. I knew only that the night had taken her and the dawn +denied her, and that, dream or no dream, I stood there with a pang of +loss that even now leaves me wordless. + +A bird sang outside in the acacias, clear and shrill for day, and this +awakened my senses and lowered me to the plane where I became aware of +cold and hunger, and was chilled with dew. I passed down the tumbled +steps that had been a stately ascent the night before and made my way +into the jungle by the trail, small and lost in fern, by which we had +come. Again I wandered, and it was high noon before I heard mule bells +at a distance, and, thus guided, struck down through the green tangle +to find myself, wearied but safe, upon the bridle way that leads to Fagu +and the far Shipki. Two coolies then directed me to The House in the +Woods. + +All was anxiety there. Ali Khan had arrived in the night, having found +his way under the guidance of blind flight and fear. He had brought the +news that I was lost in the jungle and amid the dwellings of demons. It +was, of course, hopeless to search in the dark, though the khansamah and +his man had gone as far as they dared with lanterns and shouting, +and with the daylight they tried again and were even now away. It was +useless to reproach the man even if I had cared to do so. His ready plea +was that as far as men were concerned he was as brave as any (which +was true enough as I had reason to know later) but that when it came to +devilry the Twelve Imaums themselves would think twice before facing it. + +“Inshalla ta-Alla! (If the sublime God wills!) this unworthy one will +one day show the Protector of the poor, that he is a respectable person +and no coward, but it is only the Sahibs who laugh in the face of +devils.” + +He went off to prepare me some food, consumed with curiosity as to my +adventures, and when I had eaten I found my tiny whitewashed cell, for +the room was little more, and slept for hours. + +Late in the afternoon I waked and looked out. A low but glowing +sunlight suffused the wild garden reclaimed from the strangle-hold of +the jungle and hemmed in with rocks and forest. A few simple flowers had +been planted here and there, but its chief beauty was a mountain stream, +brown and clear as the eyes of a dog, that fell from a crag above into +a rocky basin, maidenhair ferns growing in such masses about it that +it was henceforward scarcely more than a woodland voice. Beside it two +great deodars spread their canopies, and there a woman sat in a low +chair, a girl beside her reading aloud. She had thrown her hat off and +the sunshine turned her massed dark hair to bronze. That was all I could +see. I went out and joined them, taking the note of introduction which +Olesen had given me. + +I pass over the unessentials of my story; their friendly greetings and +sympathy for my adventure. It set us at ease at once and I knew my stay +would be the happier for their presence though it is not every woman one +would choose as a companion in the great mountain country. But what +is germane to my purpose must be told, and of this a part is the +personality of Brynhild Ingmar. That she was beautiful I never doubted, +though I have heard it disputed and smiled inwardly as the disputants +urged lip and cheek and shades of rose and lily, weighing and +appraising. Let me describe her as I saw her or, rather, as I can, +adding that even without all this she must still have been beautiful +because of the deep significance to those who had eyes to see or +feel some mysterious element which mingled itself with her presence +comparable only to the delight which the power and spiritual essence of +Nature inspires in all but the dullest minds. I know I cannot hope to +convey this in words. It means little if I say I thought of all quiet +lovely solitary things when I looked into her calm eyes,--that when she +moved it was like clear springs renewed by flowing, that she seemed the +perfect flowering of a day in June, for these are phrases. Does Nature +know her wonders when she shines in her strength? Does a woman know the +infinite meanings her beauty may have for the beholder? I cannot tell. +Nor can I tell if I saw this girl as she may have seemed to those who +read only the letter of the book and are blind to its spirit, or in the +deepest sense as she really was in the sight of That which created her +and of which she was a part. Surely it is a proof of the divinity of +love that in and for a moment it lifts the veil of so-called reality and +shows each to the other mysteriously perfect and inspiring as the world +will never see them, but as they exist in the Eternal, and in the sight +of those who have learnt that the material is but the dream, and the +vision of love the truth. + +I will say then, for the alphabet of what I knew but cannot tell, that +she had the low broad brows of a Greek Nature Goddess, the hair swept +back wing-like from the temples and massed with a noble luxuriance. It +lay like rippled bronze, suggesting something strong and serene in its +essence. Her eyes were clear and gray as water, the mouth sweetly curved +above a resolute chin. It was a face which recalled a modelling in +marble rather than the charming pastel and aquarelle of a young woman’s +colouring, and somehow I thought of it less as the beauty of a woman +than as some sexless emanation of natural things, and this impression +was strengthened by her height and the long limbs, slender and strong as +those of some youth trained in the pentathlon, subject to the severest +discipline until all that was superfluous was fined away and the perfect +form expressing the true being emerged. The body was thus more beautiful +than the face, and I may note in passing that this is often the case, +because the face is more directly the index of the restless and unhappy +soul within and can attain true beauty only when the soul is in harmony +with its source. + +She was a little like her pale and wearied mother. She might resemble +her still more when the sorrow of this world that worketh death should +have had its will of her. I had yet to learn that this would never +be--that she had found the open door of escape. + +We three spent much time together in the days that followed. I never +tired of their company and I think they did not tire of mine, for +my wanderings through the world and my studies in the ancient Indian +literatures and faiths with the Pandit Devaswami were of interest to +them both though in entirely different ways. Mrs. Ingmar was a woman who +centred all her interests in books and chiefly in the scientific forms +of occult research. She was no believer in anything outside the range +of what she called human experience. The evidences had convinced her of +nothing but a force as yet unclassified in the scientific categories and +all her interest lay in the undeveloped powers of brain which might be +discovered in the course of ignorant and credulous experiment. We met +therefore on the common ground of rejection of the so-called occultism +of the day, though I knew even then, and how infinitely better now, that +her constructions were wholly misleading. + +Nearly all day she would lie in her chair under the deodars by the +delicate splash and ripple of the stream. Living imprisoned in the +crystal sphere of the intellect she saw the world outside, painted in +few but distinct colours, small, comprehensible, moving on a logical +orbit. I never knew her posed for an explanation. She had the contented +atheism of a certain type of French mind and found as much ease in it as +another kind of sweet woman does in her rosary and confessional. + +“I cannot interest Brynhild,” she said, when I knew her better. “She has +no affinity with science. She is simply a nature worshipper, and in such +places as this she seems to draw life from the inanimate life about her. +I have sometimes wondered whether she might not be developed into a kind +of bridge between the articulate and the inarticulate, so well does she +understand trees and flowers. Her father was like that--he had all sorts +of strange power with animals and plants, and thought he had more than +he had. He could never realize that the energy of nature is merely +mechanical.” + +“You think all energy is mechanical?” + +“Certainly. We shall lay our finger on the mainspring one day and +the mystery will disappear. But as for Brynhild--I gave her the best +education possible and yet she has never understood the conception of a +universe moving on mathematical laws to which we must submit in body and +mind. She has the oddest ideas. I would not willingly say of a child of +mine that she is a mystic, and yet--” + +She shook her head compassionately. But I scarcely heard. My eyes were +fixed on Brynhild, who stood apart, looking steadily out over the snows. +It was a glorious sunset, the west vibrating with gorgeous colour spilt +over in torrents that flooded the sky, Terrible splendours--hues for +which we have no thought--no name. I had not thought of it as music +until I saw her face but she listened as well as saw, and her expression +changed as it changes when the pomp of a great orchestra breaks upon the +silence. It flashed to the chords of blood-red and gold that was burning +fire. It softened through the fugue of woven crimson gold and flame, to +the melancholy minor of ashes-of-roses and paling green, and so through +all the dying glories that faded slowly to a tranquil grey and left +the world to the silver melody of one sole star that dawned above the +ineffable heights of the snows. Then she listened as a child does to +a bird, entranced, with a smile like a butterfly on her parted lips. I +never saw such a power of quiet. + +She and I were walking next day among the forest ways, the pine-scented +sunshine dappling the dropped frondage. We had been speaking of her +mother. “It is such a misfortune for her,” she said thoughtfully, “that +I am not clever. She should have had a daughter who could have shared +her thoughts. She analyses everything, reasons about everything, and +that is quite out of my reach.” + +She moved beside me with her wonderful light step--the poise and balance +of a nymph in the Parthenon frieze. + +“How do you see things?” + +“See? That is the right word. I see things--I never reason about them. +They are. For her they move like figures in a sum. For me every one of +them is a window through which one may look to what is beyond.” + +“To where?” + +“To what they really are--not what they seem.” + +I looked at her with interest. + +“Did you ever hear of the double vision?” + +For this is a subject on which the spiritually learned men of India, +like the great mystics of all the faiths, have much to say. I had +listened with bewilderment and doubt to the expositions of my Pandit +on this very head. Her simple words seemed for a moment the echo of his +deep and searching thought. Yet it surely could not be. Impossible. + +“Never. What does it mean?” She raised clear unveiled eyes. “You must +forgive me for being so stupid, but it is my mother who is at home with +all these scientific phrases. I know none of them.” + +“It means that for some people the material universe--the things we see +with our eyes--is only a mirage, or say, a symbol, which either hides +or shadows forth the eternal truth. And in that sense they see things as +they really are, not as they seem to the rest of us. And whether this is +the statement of a truth or the wildest of dreams, I cannot tell.” + +She did not answer for a moment; then said; + +“Are there people who believe this--know it?” + +“Certainly. There are people who believe that thought is the only real +thing--that the whole universe is thought made visible. That we create +with our thoughts the very body by which we shall re-act on the universe +in lives to be. + +“Do you believe it?” + +“I don’t know. Do you?” + +She paused; looked at me, and then went on: + +“You see, I don’t think things out. I only feel. But this cannot +interest you.” + +I felt she was eluding the question. She began to interest me more than +any one I had ever known. She had extraordinary power of a sort. Once, +in the woods, where I was reading in so deep a shade that she never +saw me, I had an amazing vision of her. She stood in a glade with the +sunlight and shade about her; she had no hat and a sunbeam turned her +hair to pale bronze. A small bright April shower was falling through the +sun, and she stood in pure light that reflected itself in every leaf and +grass-blade. But it was nothing of all this that arrested me, +beautiful as it was. She stood as though life were for the moment +suspended;--then, very softly, she made a low musical sound, infinitely +wooing, from scarcely parted lips, and instantly I saw a bird of azure +plumage flutter down and settle on her shoulder, pluming himself there +in happy security. Again she called softly and another followed the +first. Two flew to her feet, two more to her breast and hand. They +caressed her, clung to her, drew some joyous influence from her +presence. She stood in the glittering rain like Spring with her birds +about her--a wonderful sight. Then, raising one hand gently with the +fingers thrown back she uttered a different note, perfectly sweet and +intimate, and the branches parted and a young deer with full bright eyes +fixed on her advanced and pushed a soft muzzle into her hand. + +In my astonishment I moved, however slightly, and the picture broke up. +The deer sprang back into the trees, the birds fluttered up in a hurry +of feathers, and she turned calm eyes upon me, as unstartled as if she +had known all the time that I was there. + +“You should not have breathed,” she said smiling. “They must have utter +quiet.” + +I rose up and joined her. + +“It is a marvel. I can scarcely believe my eyes. How do you do it?” + +“My father taught me. They come. How can I tell?” + +She turned away and left me. I thought long over this episode. I +recalled words heard in the place of my studies--words I had dismissed +without any care at the moment. “To those who see, nothing is alien. +They move in the same vibration with all that has life, be it in bird +or flower. And in the Uttermost also, for all things are One. For such +there is no death.” + +That was beyond me still, but I watched her with profound interest. She +recalled also words I had half forgotten-- + + “There was nought above me and nought below, + My childhood had not learnt to know; + For what are the voices of birds, + Aye, and of beasts, but words, our words,-- + Only so much more sweet.” + +That might have been written of her. And more. + +She had found one day in the woods a flower of a sort I had once seen +in the warm damp forests below Darjiling--ivory white and shaped like a +dove in flight. She wore it that evening on her bosom. A week later she +wore what I took to be another. + +“You have had luck,” I said; “I never heard of such a thing being seen +so high up, and you have found it twice.” + +“No, it is the same.” + +“The same? Impossible. You found it more than a week ago.” “I know. It +is ten days. Flowers don’t die when one understands them--not as most +people think.” + +Her mother looked up and said fretfully: + +“Since she was a child Brynhild has had that odd idea. That flower is +dead and withered. Throw it away, child. It looks hideous.” + +Was it glamour? What was it? I saw the flower dewy fresh in her bosom +She smiled and turned away. + +It was that very evening she left the veranda where we were sitting in +the subdued light of a little lamp and passed beyond where the ray cut +the darkness. She went down the perspective of trees to the edge of he +clearing and I rose to follow for it seemed absolutely unsafe that she +should be on the verge of the panther-haunted woods alone. Mrs. Ingmar +turned a page of her book serenely; + +“She will not like it if you go. I cannot imagine that she should come +to harm. She always goes her own way--light or dark.” + +I returned to my seat and watched steadfastly. At first I could see +nothing but as my sight adjusted itself I saw her a long way down the +clearing that opened the snows, and quite certainly also I saw something +like a huge dog detach itself from the woods and bound to her feet. It +mingled with her dark dress and I lost it. Mrs. Ingmar said, seeing my +anxiety but nothing else; “Her father was just the same;--he had no fear +of anything that lives. No doubt some people have that power. I have +never seen her attract birds and beasts as he certainly did, but she is +quite as fond of them.” + +I could not understand her blindness--what I myself had seen raised +questions I found unanswerable, and her mother saw nothing! Which of us +was right? presently she came back slowly and I ventured no word. + +A woodland sorcery, innocent as the dawn, hovered about her. What was +it? Did the mere love of these creatures make a bond between her soul +and theirs, or was the ancient dream true and could she at times move +in the same vibration? I thought of her as a wood-spirit sometimes, an +expression herself of some passion of beauty in Nature, a thought of +snows and starry nights and flowing rivers made visible in flesh. It is +surely when seized with the urge of some primeval yearning which in +man is merely sexual that Nature conceives her fair forms and manifests +them, for there is a correspondence that runs through all creation. + +Here I ask myself--Did I love her? In a sense, yes, deeply, but not in +the common reading of the phrase. I have trembled with delight before +the wild and terrible splendour of the Himalayan heights-; low golden +moons have steeped my soul longing, but I did not think of these things +as mine in any narrow sense, nor so desire them. They were Angels of the +Evangel of beauty. So too was she. She had none of the “silken nets and +traps of adamant,” she was no sister of the “girls of mild silver or of +furious gold;”--but fair, strong, and her own, a dweller in the House of +Quiet. I did not covet her. I loved her. + +Days passed. There came a night when the winds were loosed--no moon, +the stars flickering like blown tapers through driven clouds, the trees +swaying and lamenting. + +“There will be rain tomorrow.” Mrs. Ingmar said, as we parted for the +night. I closed my door. Some great cat of the woods was crying harshly +outside my window, the sound receding towards the bridle way. I slept in +a dream of tossing seas and ships labouring among them. + +With the sense of a summons I waked--I cannot tell when. Unmistakable, +as if I were called by name. I rose and dressed, and heard distinctly +bare feet passing my door. I opened it noiselessly and looked out into +the little passage way that made for the entry, and saw nothing but +pools of darkness and a dim light from the square of the window at the +end. But the wind had swept the sky clear with its flying bosom and was +sleeping now in its high places and the air was filled with a mild moony +radiance and a great stillness. + +Now let me speak with restraint and exactness. I was not afraid but felt +as I imagine a dog feels in the presence of his master, conscious of a +purpose, a will entirely above his own and incomprehensible, yet to +be obeyed without question. I followed my reading of the command, +bewildered but docile, and understanding nothing but that I was called. + +The lights were out. The house dead silent; the familiar veranda +ghostly in the night. And now I saw a white figure at the head of the +steps--Brynhild. She turned and looked over her shoulder, her face +pale in the moon, and made the same gesture with which she summoned her +birds. I knew her meaning, for now we were moving in the same rhythm, +and followed as she took the lead. How shall I describe that strange +night in the jungle. There were fire-flies or dancing points of light +that recalled them. Perhaps she was only thinking them--only thinking +the moon and the quiet, for we were in the world where thought is the +one reality. But they went with us in a cloud and faintly lighted our +way. There were exquisite wafts of perfume from hidden flowers breathing +their dreams to the night. Here and there a drowsy bird stirred and +chirped from the roof of darkness, a low note of content that greeted +her passing. It was a path intricate and winding and how long we went, +and where, I cannot tell. But at last she stooped and parting the boughs +before her we stepped into an open space, and before us--I knew it--I +knew it!--The House of Beauty. + +She paused at the foot of the great marble steps and looked at me. + +“We have met here already.” + +I did not wonder--I could not. In the Ninth vibration surprise had +ceased to be. Why had I not recognized her before--O dull of heart! That +was my only thought. We walk blindfold through the profound darkness of +material nature, the blinder because we believe we see it. It is only +when the doors of the material are closed that the world appears to man +as it exists in the eternal truth. + +“Did you know this?” I asked, trembling before mystery. + +“I knew it, because I am awake. You forgot it in the dull sleep which we +call daily life. But we were here and THEY began the story of the King +who made this house. Tonight we shall hear it. It he story of Beauty +wandering through the world and the world received her not. We hear it +in this place because here he agonized for what he knew too late.” + +“Was that our only meeting?” + +“We meet every night, but you forget when the day brings the sleep of +the soul.--You do not sink deep enough into rest to remember. You float +on the surface where the little bubbles of foolish dream are about you +and I cannot reach you then.” + +“How can I compel myself to the deeps?” + +“You cannot. It will come. But when you have passed up the bridle +way and beyond the Shipki, stop at Gyumur. There is the Monastery of +Tashigong, and there one will meet you-- + +“His name?” + +“Stephen Clifden. He will tell you what you desire to know. Continue on +then with him to Yarkhand. There in the Ninth Vibration we shall meet +again. It is a long journey but you will be content.” + +“Do you certainly know that we shall meet again?” + +“When you have learnt, we can meet when we will. He will teach you +the Laya Yoga. You should not linger here in the woods any longer. You +should go on. In three days it will be possible.” + +“But how have you learnt--a girl and young?” + +“Through a close union with Nature--that is one of the three roads. But +I know little as yet. Now take my hand and come. + +“One last question. Is this house ruined and abject as I have seen it in +the daylight, or royal and the house of Gods as we see it now? Which is +truth?” + +“In the day you saw it in the empty illusion of blind thought. Tonight, +eternally lovely as in the thought of the man who made it. Nothing that +is beautiful is lost, though in the sight of the unwise it seems to die. +Death is in the eyes we look through--when they are cleansed we see Life +only. Now take my hand and come. Delay no more.” + +She caught my hand and we entered the dim magnificence of the great +hall. The moon entered with us. + +Instantly I had the feeling of supernatural presence. Yet I only write +this in deference to common use, for it was absolutely natural--more so +than any I have met in the state called daily life. It was a thing in +which I had a part, and if this was supernatural so also was I. + +Again I saw the Dark One, the Beloved, the young Krishna, above the +women who loved him. He motioned with his hand as we passed, as though +he waved us smiling on our way. Again the dancers moved in a rhythmic +tread to the feet of the mountain Goddess--again we followed to where +she bent to hear. But now, solemn listening faces crowded in the shadows +about her, grave eyes fixed immovably upon what lay at her feet--a man, +submerged in the pure light that fell from her presence, his dark face +stark and fine, lips locked, eyes shut, arms flung out cross-wise in +utter abandonment, like a figure of grief invisibly crucified upon his +shame. I stopped a few feet from him, arrested by a barrier I could not +pass. Was it sleep or death or some mysterious state that partook of +both? Not sleep, for there was no flutter of breath. Not death--no rigid +immobility struck chill into the air. It was the state of subjection +where the spirit set free lies tranced in the mighty influences which +surround us invisibly until we have entered, though but for a moment, +the Ninth Vibration. + +And now, with these Listeners about us, a clear voice began and stirred +the air with music. I have since been asked in what tongue it spoke and +could only answer that it reached my ears in the words of my childhood, +and that I know whatever that language had been it would so have reached +me. + +“Great Lady, hear the story of this man’s fall, for it is the story of +man. Be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them light.” + +There was long since in Ranipur a mighty King and at his birth the wise +men declared that unless he cast aside all passions that debase the +soul, relinquishing the lower desires for the higher until a Princess +laden with great gifts should come to be his bride, he would experience +great and terrible misfortunes. And his royal parents did what they +could to possess him with this belief, but they died before he reached +manhood. Behold him then, a young King in his palace, surrounded with +splendour. How should he withstand the passionate crying of the flesh or +believe that through pleasure comes satiety and the loss of that in the +spirit whereby alone pleasure can be enjoyed? For his gift was that +he could win all hearts. They swarmed round him like hiving bees and +hovered about him like butterflies. Sometimes he brushed them off. Often +he caressed them, and when this happened, each thought proudly “I am the +Royal Favourite. There is none other than me.” + +Also the Princess delayed who would be the crest-jewel of the crown, +bringing with her all good and the blessing of the High Gods, and in +consequence of all these things the King took such pleasures as he +could, and they were many, not knowing they darken the inner eye whereby +what is royal is known through disguises. + +(Most pitiful to see, beneath the close-shut lids of the man at the +feet of the Dweller in the Heights, tears forced themselves, as though +a corpse dead to all else lived only to anguish. They flowed like +blood-drops upon his face as he lay enduring, and the voice proceeded.) +What was the charm of the King? Was it his stately height and strength? +Or his faithless gayety? Or his voice, deep and soft as the sitar when +it sings of love? His women said--some one thing, some another, but none +of these ladies were of royal blood, and therefore they knew not. + +Now one day, the all-privileged jester of the King, said, laughing +harshly: + +“Maharaj, you divert yourself. But how if, while we feast and play, the +Far Away Princess glided past and was gone, unknown and unwelcomed?” + +And the King replied: + +“Fool, content yourself. I shall know my Princess, but she delays so +long that I weary.” + +Now in a far away country was a Princess, daughter of the Greatest, +and her Father hesitated to give her in marriage to such a King for all +reported that he was faithless of heart, but having seen his portrait +she loved him and fled in disguise from the palaces of her Father, and +being captured she was brought before the King in Ranipur. + +He sat upon a cloth of gold and about him was the game he had killed in +hunting, in great masses of ruffled fur and plumage, and he turned the +beauty of his face carelessly upon her, and as the Princess looked upon +him, her heart yearned to him, and he said in his voice that was like +the male string of the sitar: + +“Little slave, what is your desire?” + +Then she saw that the long journey had scarred her feet and dimmed her +hair with dust, and that the King’s eyes, worn with days and nights of +pleasure did not pierce her disguise. Now in her land it is a custom +that the blood royal must not proclaim itself, so she folded her hands +and said gently: + +“A place in the household of the King.” And he, hearing that the Waiting +slave of his chief favorite Jayashri was dead, gave her that place. So +the Princess attended on those ladies, courteous and obedient to all +authority as beseemed her royalty, and she braided her bright hair so +that it hid the little crowns which the Princesses of her House +must wear always in token of their rank, and every day her patience +strengthened. + +Sometimes the King, carelessly desiring her laughing face and sad eyes, +would send for her to wile away an hour, and he would say; “Dance, +little slave, and tell me stories of the far countries. You quite unlike +my Women, doubtless because you are a slave.” + +And she thought--“No, but because I am a Princess,”--but this she did +not say. She laughed and told him the most marvellous stories in the +world until he laid his head upon her warm bosom, dreaming awake. + +There were stories of the great Himalayan solitudes where in the winter +nights the white tiger stares at the witches’ dance of the Northern +Lights dazzled by the hurtling of their myriad spears. And she told +how the King-eagle, hanging motionless over the peaks of Gaurisankar, +watches with golden eyes for his prey, and falling like a plummet +strikes its life out with his clawed heel and, screaming with triumph, +bears it to his fierce mate in her cranny of the rocks. + +“A gallant story!” the King would say. “More!” Then she told of the +tropical heats and the stealthy deadly creatures of forest and jungle, +and the blue lotus of Buddha swaying on the still lagoon,--And she spoke +of loves of men and women, their passion and pain and joy. And when she +told of their fidelity and valour and honour that death cannot quench, +her voice was like the song of a minstrel, for she had read all the +stories of the ages and the heart of a Princess told her the rest. And +the King listened unwearying though he believed this was but a slave. + +(The face of the man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights twitched +in a white agony. Pearls of sweat were distilled upon his brows, but +he moved neither hand nor foot, enduring as in a flame of fire. And the +voice continued.) + +So one day, in the misty green of the Spring, while she rested at his +feet in the garden Pavilion, he said to her: + +“Little slave, why do you love me?” + +And she answered proudly: + +“Because you have the heart of a King.” + +He replied slowly; + +“Of the women who have loved me none gave this reason, though they gave +many.” + +She laid her cheek on his hand. + +“That is the true reason.” + +But he drew it away and was vaguely troubled, for her words, he knew +not why, reminded him of the Far Away Princess and of things he had long +forgotten, and he said; “What does a slave know of the hearts of Kings?” + And that night he slept or waked alone. + +Winter was at hand with its blue and cloudless days, and she was +commanded to meet the King where the lake lay still and shining like an +ecstasy of bliss, and she waited with her chin dropped into the cup of +her hands, looking over the water with eyes that did not see, for her +whole soul said; “How long O my Sovereign Lord, how long before you know +the truth and we enter together into our Kingdom?” + +As she sat she heard the King’s step, and the colour stole up into her +face in a flush like the earliest sunrise. “He is coming,” she said; and +again; “He loves me.” + +So he came beside the water, walking slowly. But the King was not alone. +His arm embraced the latest-come beauty from Samarkhand, and, with his +head bent, he whispered in her willing ear. + +Then clasping her hands, the Princess drew a long sobbing breath, and he +turned and his eyes grew hard as blue steel. + +“Go, slave,” he cried. “What place have you in Kings’ gardens? Go. Let +me see you no more.” + +(The man lying at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights, raised a heavy +arm and flung it above his head, despairing, and it fell again on the +cross of his torment. And the voice went on.) + +And as he said this, her heart broke; and she went and her feet were +weary. So she took the wise book she loved and unrolled it until she +came to a certain passage, and this she read twice; “If the heart of +a slave be broken it may be mended with jewels and soft words, but the +heart of a Princess can be healed only by the King who broke it, or in +Yamapura, the City under the Sunset where they make all things new. Now, +Yama, the Lord of this City, is the Lord of Death.” And having thus read +the Princess rolled the book and put it from her. + +And next day, the King said to his women; “Send for her,” for his heart +smote him and he desired to atone royally for the shame of his speech. +And they sought and came back saying; + +“Maharaj, she is gone. We cannot find her.” + +Fear grew in the heart of the King--a nameless dread, and he said, +“Search.” And again they sought and returned and the King was striding +up and down the great hall and none dared cross his path. But, +trembling, they told him, and he replied; “Search again. I will not lose +her, and, slave though be, she shall be my Queen.” + +So they ran, dispersing to the Four Quarters, and King strode up and +down the hall, and Loneliness kept step with him and clasped his hand +and looked his eyes. + +Then the youngest of the women entered with a tale to tell. “Majesty, +we have found her. She lies beside the lake. When the birds fled this +morning she fled with them, but upon a longer journey. Even to Yamapura, +the City under the Sunset.” + +And the King said; “Let none follow.” And he strode forth swiftly, white +with thoughts he dared not think. + +The Princess lay among the gold of the fallen leaves. All was gold, +for her bright hair was out-spread in shining waves and in it shone the +glory of the hidden crown. On her face was no smile--only at last was +revealed the patience she had covered with laughter so long that even +the voice of the King could not now break it into joy. The hands that +had clung, the swift feet that had run beside his, the tender body, +mighty to serve and to love, lay within touch but farther away than the +uttermost star was the Far Away Princess, known and loved too late. + +And he said; “My Princess--O my Princess!” and laid his head on her cold +bosom. + +“Too late!” a harsh Voice croaked beside him, and it was the voice of +the Jester who mocks at all things. “Too late! O madness, to despise +the blood royal because it humbled itself to service and so was doubly +royal. The Far Away Princess came laden with great gifts, and to her the +King’s gift was the wage of a slave and a broken heart. Cast your crown +and sceptre in the dust, O King--O King of Fools.” + +(The man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights moved. Some dim word +shaped upon his locked lips. She listened in a divine calm. It seemed +that the very Gods drew nearer. Again the man essayed speech, the body +dead, life only in the words that none could hear. The voice went on.) + +But the Princess flying wearily because of the sore wound in her heart, +came at last to the City under the Sunset, where the Lord of Death rules +in the House of Quiet, and was there received with royal honours for in +that land are no disguises. And she knelt before the Secret One and in +a voice broken with agony entreated him to heal her. And with veiled and +pitying eyes he looked upon her, for many and grievous as are the wounds +he has healed this was more grievous still. And he said; + +“Princess, I cannot, But this I can do--I can give a new heart in a new +birth--happy and careless as the heart of a child. Take this escape from +the anguish you endure and be at peace.” + +But the Princess, white with pain, asked only; + +“In this new heart and birth, is there room for the King?” + +And the Lord of Peace replied; + +“None. He too will be forgotten.” + +Then she rose to her feet. + +“I will endure and when he comes I will serve him once more. If he will +he shall heal me, and if not I will endure for ever.” + +And He who is veiled replied; + +“In this sacred City no pain may disturb the air, therefore you must +wait outside in the chill and the dark. Think better, Princess! Also, +he must pass through many rebirths, because he beheld the face of Beauty +unveiled and knew her not. And when he comes he will be weary and weak +as a new-born child, and no more a great King.” And the Princess smiled; + +“Then he will need me the more,” she said; “I will wait and kiss the +feet of my King.” + +“And the Lord of Death was silent. So she went outside into the darkness +of the spaces, and the souls free passed her like homing doves, and she +sat with her hands clasped over the sore wound in her heart, watching +the earthward way. And the Princess is keeping still the day of her long +patience.” + +The voice ceased. And there was a great silence, and the listening faces +drew nearer. + +Then the Dweller in the Heights spoke in a voice soft as the falling of +snow in the quiet of frost and moon. I could have wept myself blind with +joy to hear that music. More I dare not say. + +“He is in the Lower State of Perception. He sorrows for his loss. Let +him have one instant’s light that still he may hope.” + +She bowed above the man, gazing upon him as a mother might upon her +sleeping child. The dead eyelids stirred, lifted, a faint gleam showed +beneath them, an unspeakable weariness. I thought they would fall +unsatisfied. Suddenly he saw What looked upon him, and a terror of +joy no tongue can tell flashed over the dark mirror of his face. He +stretched a faint hand to touch her feet, a sobbing sigh died upon his +lips, and once more the swooning sleep took him. He lay as a dead man +before the Assembly. + +“The night is far spent,” a voice said, from I know not where. And I +knew it was said not only for the sleeper but for all, for though the +flying feet of Beauty seem for a moment to outspeed us she will one day +wait our coming and gather us to her bosom. + +As before, the vision spread outward like rings in a broken reflection +in water. I saw the girl beside me, but her hand grew light in mine. I +felt it no longer. I heard the roaring wind in the trees, or was it a +great voice thundering in my ears? Sleep took me. I waked in my little +room. + +Strange and sad--I saw her next day and did not remember her whom of all +things I desired to know. I remembered the vision and knew that whether +in dream or waking I had heard an eternal truth. I longed with a great +longing to meet my beautiful companion, and she stood at my side and I +was blind. + +Now that I have climbed a little higher on the Mount of Vision it seems +even to myself that this could not be. Yet it was, and it is true of not +this only but of how much else! + +She knew me. I learnt that later, but she made no sign. Her simplicities +had carried her far beyond and above me, to places where only the winged +things attain--“as a bird among the bird-droves of God.” + +I have since known that this power of direct simplicity in her was why +among the great mountains we beheld the Divine as the emanation of +the terrible beauty about us. We cannot see it as it is--only in some +shadowing forth, gathering sufficient strength for manifestation from +the spiritual atoms that haunt the region where that form has been for +ages the accepted vehicle of adoration. But I was now to set forth to +find another knowledge--to seek the Beauty that blinds us to all other. +Next day the man who was directing my preparations for travel sent me +word from Simla that all was ready and I could start two days later. I +told my friends the time of parting was near. + +“But it was no surprise to me,” I added, “for I had heard already that +in a very few days I should be on my way.” + +Mrs. Ingmar was more than kind. She laid a frail hand on mine. + +“We shall miss you indeed. If it is possible to send us word of your +adventures in those wild solitudes I hope you will do it. Of course +aviation will soon lay bare their secrets and leave them no mysteries, +so you don’t go too soon. One may worship science and yet feel it +injures the beauty of the world. But what is beauty compared with +knowledge?” + +“Do you never regret it?” I asked. + +“Never, dear Mr. Ormond. I am a worshipper of hard facts and however +hideous they may be I prefer them to the prismatic colours of romance.” + +Brynhild, smiling, quoted; + + “Their science roamed from star to star + And than itself found nothing greater. + What wonder? In a Leyden jar + They bottled the Creator?” + +“There is nothing greater than science,” said Mrs. Ingmar with soft +reverence. “The mind of man is the foot-rule of the universe.” + +She meditated for a moment and then added that my kind interests in +their plans decided her to tell me that she would be returning to +Europe and then to Canada in a few months with a favourite niece as her +companion while Brynhild would remain in India with friends in Mooltan +for a time. I looked eagerly at her but she was lost in her own thoughts +and it was evidently not the time to say more. + +If I had hoped for a vision before I left the neighbourhood of that +strange House of Beauty where a spirit imprisoned appeared to await the +day of enlightenment I was disappointed. These things do not happen as +one expects or would choose. The wind bloweth where it listeth until the +laws which govern the inner life are understood, and then we would not +choose if we could for we know that all is better than well. In this +world, either in the blinded sight of daily life or in the clarity of +the true sight I have not since seen it, but that has mattered little, +for having heard an authentic word within its walls I have passed on my +way elsewhere. + +Next day a letter from Olesen reached me. + +“Dear Ormond, I hope you have had a good time at the House in the Woods. +I saw Rup Singh a few days ago and he wrote the odd message I enclose. +You know what these natives are, even the most sensible of them, and you +will humour the old fellow for he ages very fast and I think is breaking +up. But this was not what I wanted to say. I had a letter from a man I +had not seen for years--a fellow called Stephen Clifden, who lives in +Kashmir. As a matter of fact I had forgotten his existence but evidently +he has not repaid the compliment for he writes as follows--No, I had +better send you the note and you can do as you please. I am rushed off +my legs with work and the heat is hell with the lid off. And-” + +But the rest was of no interest except to a friend of years’ standing. I +read Rup Singh’s message first. It was written in his own tongue. + +“To the Honoured One who has attained to the favour of the Favourable. + +“You have with open eyes seen what this humble one has dreamed but +has not known. If the thing be possible, write me this word that I may +depart in peace. ‘With that one who in a former birth you loved all is +well. Fear nothing for him. The way is long but at the end the lamps of +love are lit and the Unstruck music is sounded. He lies at the feet of +Mercy and there awaits his hour.’ And if it be not possible to write +these words, write nothing, O Honoured, for though it be in the hells my +soul shall find my King, and again I shall serve him as once I served.” + +I understood, and wrote those words as he had written them. Strange +mystery of life--that I who had not known should see, and that this man +whose fidelity had not deserted his broken King in his utter downfall +should have sought with passion for one sight of the beloved face across +the waters of death and sought in vain. I thought of those Buddhist +words of Seneca--“The soul may be and is in the mass of men drugged and +silenced by the seductions of sense and the deceptions of the world. +But if, in some moment of detachment and elation, when its captors and +jailors relax their guard, it can escape their clutches, it will seek at +once the region of its birth and its true home.” + +Well--the shell must break before the bird can fly, and the time drew +near for the faithful servant to seek his lord. My message reached him +in time and gladdened him. + +I turned then to Clifden’s letter. + +“Dear Olesen, you will have forgotten me, and feeling sure of this I +should scarcely have intruded a letter into your busy life were it not +that I remember your good-nature as a thing unforgettable though so many +years have gone by. I hear of you sometimes when Sleigh comes up the +Sind valley, for I often camp at Sonamarg and above the Zoji La and +farther. I want you to give a message to a man you know who should +be expecting to hear from me. Tell him I shall be at the Tashigong +Monastery when he reaches Gyumur beyond the Shipki. Tell him I have the +information he wants and I will willingly go on with him to Yarkhand +and his destination. He need not arrange for men beyond Gyumur. All +is fixed. So sorry to bother you, old man, but I don’t know Ormond’s +address, except that he was with you and has gone up Simla way. And of +course he will be keen to hear the thing is settled.” + +Amazing. I remembered the message I had heard and this man’s words +rang true and kindly, but what could it mean? I really did not question +farther than this for now I could not doubt that I was guided. Stronger +hands than mine had me in charge, and it only remained for me to set +forth in confidence and joy to an end that as yet I could not discern. I +turned my face gladly to the wonder of the mountains. + +Gladly--but with a reservation. I was leaving a friend and one whom I +dimly felt might one day be more than a friend--Brynhild Ingmar. That +problem must be met before I could take my way. I thought much of what +might be said at parting. True, she had the deepest attraction for me, +but true also that I now beheld a quest stretching out into the unknown +which I must accept in the spirit of the knight errant. Dare I then +bind my heart to any allegiance which would pledge me to a future +inconsistent with what lay before me? How could I tell what she +might think of the things which to me were now real and external--the +revelation of the only reality that underlies all the seeming. Life can +never be the same for the man who has penetrated to this, and though it +may seem a hard saying there can be but a maimed understanding between +him and those who still walk amid the phantoms of death and decay. + +Her sympathy with nature was deep and wonderful but might it not be that +though the earth was eloquent to her the skies were silent? I was but +a beginner myself--I knew little indeed. Dare I risk that little in a +sweet companionship which would sink me into the contentment of the +life lived by the happily deluded between the cradle and the grave and +perhaps close to me for ever that still sphere where my highest hope +abides? I had much to ponder, for how could I lose her out of my +life--though I knew not at all whether she who had so much to make her +happiness would give me a single thought when I was gone. + +If all this seem the very uttermost of selfish vanity, forgive a man who +grasped in his hand a treasure so new, so wonderful that he walked +in fear and doubt lest it should slip away and leave him in a world +darkened for ever by the torment of the knowledge that it might have +been his and he had bartered it for the mess of pottage that has bought +so many birthrights since Jacob bargained with his weary brother in +the tents of Lahai-roi. I thought I would come back later with my +prize gained and throwing it at her feet ask her wisdom in return, for +whatever I might not know I knew well she was wiser than I except in +that one shining of the light from Eleusis. I walked alone in the woods +thinking of these things and no answer satisfied me. + +I did not see her alone until the day I left, for I was compelled by the +arrangements I was making to go down to Simla for a night. And now the +last morning had come with golden sun--shot mists rolling upward to +disclose the far white billows of the sea of eternity, the mountains +awaking to their enormous joys. The trees were dripping glory to the +steaming earth; it flowed like rivers into their most secret recesses, +moss and flower, fern and leaf floated upon the waves of light revealing +their inmost soul in triumphant gladness. Far off across the valleys +a cuckoo was calling--the very voice of spring, and in the green world +above my head a bird sang, a feathered joy, so clear, so passionate that +I thought the great summer morning listened in silence to his rapture +ringing through the woods. I waited until the Jubilate was ended and +then went in to bid good-bye to my friends. + +Mrs. Ingmar bid me the kindest farewell and I left her serene in the +negation of all beauty, all hope save that of a world run on the lines +of a model municipality, disease a memory, sewerage, light and air +systems perfected, the charted brain sending its costless messages to +the outer parts of the habitable globe, and at least a hundred years +of life with a decent cremation at the end of it assured to every +eugenically born citizen. No more. But I have long ceased to regret +that others use their own eyes whether clear or dim. Better the merest +glimmer of light perceived thus than the hearsay of the revelations of +others. And by the broken fragments of a bewildered hope a man shall +eventually reach the goal and rejoice in that dawn where the morning +stars sing together and the sons of God shout for joy. It must come, for +it is already here. + +Brynhild walked with me through the long glades in the fresh thin air +to the bridle road where my men and ponies waited, eager to be off. We +stood at last in the fringe of trees on a small height which commanded +the way;--a high uplifted path cut along the shoulders of the hills and +on the left the sheer drop of the valleys. Perhaps seven or eight feet +in width and dignified by the name of the Great Hindustan and Tibet Road +it ran winding far away into Wonderland. Looking down into the valleys, +so far beneath that the solitudes seem to wall them in I thought of all +the strange caravans which have taken this way with tinkle of bells +and laughter now so long silenced, and as I looked I saw a lost little +monastery in a giant crevice, solitary as a planet on the outermost ring +of the system, and remembrance flashed into my mind and I said; + +“I have marching orders that have countermanded my own plans. I am to +journey to the Buddhist Monastery of Tashigong, and there meet a friend +who will tell me what is necessary that I may travel to Yarkhand and +beyond. It will be long before I see Kashmir.” + +In those crystal clear eyes I saw a something new to me--a faint smile, +half pitying, half sad; + +“Who told you, and where?” + +“A girl in a strange place. A woman who has twice guided me--” + +I broke off. Her smile perplexed me. I could not tell what to say. She +repeated in a soft undertone; + +“Great Lady, be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them light.” + +And instantly I knew. O blind--blind! Was the unhappy King of the story +duller of heart than I? And shame possessed me. Here was the chrysoberyl +that all day hides its secret in deeps of lucid green but when the night +comes flames with its fiery ecstasy of crimson to the moon, and I--I had +been complacently considering whether I might not blunt my own spiritual +instinct by companionship with her, while she had been my guide, as +infinitely beyond me in insight as she was in all things beautiful. I +could have kissed her feet in my deep repentance. True it is that the +gateway of the high places is reverence and he who cannot bow his head +shall receive no crown. I saw that my long travel in search of knowledge +would have been utterly vain if I had not learnt that lesson there and +then. In those moments of silence I learnt it once and for ever. + +She stood by me breathing the liquid morning air, her face turned upon +the eternal snows. I caught her hand in a recognition that might +have ended years of parting, and its warm youth vibrated in mine, the +foretaste of all understanding, all unions, of love that asks nothing, +that fears nothing, that has no petition to make. She raised her eyes to +mine and her tears were a rainbow of hope. So we stood in silence that +was more than any words, and the golden moments went by. I knew her now +for what she was, one of whom it might have been written; + + “I come from where night falls clearer + Than your morning sun can rise; + From an earth that to heaven draws nearer + Than your visions of Paradise,-- + For the dreams that your dreamers dream + We behold them with open eyes.” + +With open eyes! Later I asked the nature of the strange bond that had +called her to my side. + +“I do not understand that fully myself,” she said--“That is part of the +knowledge we must wait for. But you have the eyes that see, and that is +a tie nothing can break. I had waited long in the House of Beauty for +you. I guided you there. But between you and me there is also love.” + +I stretched an eager hand but she repelled it gently, drawing back a +little. “Not love of each other though we are friends and in the future +may be infinitely more. But--have you ever seen a drawing of Blake’s--a +young man stretching his arms to a white swan which flies from him on +wings he cannot stay? That is the story of both our lives. We long to +be joined in this life, here and now, to an unspeakable beauty and power +whose true believers we are because we have seen and known. There is no +love so binding as the same purpose. Perhaps that is the only true love. +And so we shall never be apart though we may never in this world be +together again in what is called companionship.” + +“We shall meet,” I said confidently. She smiled and was silent. + +“Do we follow a will-o’-the wisp in parting? Do we give up the substance +for the shadow? Shall I stay?” + +She laughed joyously; + +“We give a single rose for a rose-tree that bears seven times seven. +Daily I see more, and you are going where you will be instructed. As you +know my mother prefers for a time to have my cousin with her to help her +with the book she means to write. So I shall have time to myself. What +do you think I shall do?” + +“Blow away on a great wind. Ride on the crests of tossing waves. Catch a +star to light the fireflies!” + +She laughed like a bird’s song. + +“Wrong--wrong! I shall be a student. All I know as yet has come to me +by intuition, but there is Law as well as Love and I will learn. I have +drifted like a happy cloud before the wind. Now I will learn to be the +wind that blows the clouds.” + +I looked at her in astonishment. If a flower had desired the same thing +it could scarcely have seemed more incredible, for I had thought her +whole life and nature instinctive not intellective. She smiled as one +who has a beloved secret to keep. + +“When you have gained what in this country they call The Knowledge of +Regeneration, come back and ask me what I have learnt.” + +She would say no more of that and turned to another matter, speaking +with earnestness; + +“Before you came here I had a message for you, and Stephen Clifden +will tell you the same thing when you meet. Believe it for it is true. +Remember always that the psychical is not the mystical and that what we +seek is not marvel but vision. These two things are very far apart, so +let the first with all its dangers pass you by, for our way lies to the +heights, and for us there is only one danger--that of turning back and +losing what the whole world cannot give in exchange. I have never seen +Stephen Clifden but I know much of him. He is a safe guide--a man who +has had much and strange sorrow which has brought him joy that cannot be +told. He will take you to those who know the things that you desire. I +wish I might have gone too.” + +Something in the sweetness of her voice, its high passion, the strong +beauty of her presence woke a poignant longing in my heart. I said; + +“I cannot leave you. You are the only guide I can follow. Let us search +together--you always on before.” + +“Your way lies there,” she pointed to the high mountains. “And mine to +the plains, and if we chose our own we should wander. But we shall +meet again in the way and time that will be best and with knowledge +so enlarged that what we have seen already will be like an empty dream +compared to daylight truth. If you knew what waits for you you would not +delay one moment.” + +She stood radiant beneath the deodars, a figure of Hope, pointing +steadily to the heights. I knew her words were true though as yet I +could not tell how. I knew that whereas we had seen the Wonderful in +beautiful though local forms there is a plane where the Formless may be +apprehended in clear dream and solemn vision-the meeting of spirit with +Spirit. What that revelation would mean I could not guess--how should +I?--but I knew the illusion we call death and decay would wither before +it. There is a music above and beyond the Ninth Vibration though I must +love those words for ever for what their hidden meaning gave me. + +I took her hand and held it. Strange--beyond all strangeness that that +story of an ancient sorrow should have made us what we were to each +other--should have opened to me the gates of that Country where she +wandered content. For the first time I had realized in its fulness the +loveliness of this crystal nature, clear as flowing water to receive and +transmit the light--itself a prophecy and fulfilment of some higher race +which will one day inhabit our world when it has learnt the true values. +She drew a flower from her breast and gave it to me. It lies before me +white and living as I write these words. + +I sprang down the road and mounted, giving the word to march. The men +shouted and strode on--our faces to the Shipki Pass and what lay beyond. + +We had parted. + +Once, twice, I looked back, and standing in full sunlight, she waved her +hand. + +We turned the angle of the rocks. + +What I found--what she found is a story strange and beautiful which +I may tell one day to those who care to hear. That for me there were +pauses, hesitancies, dreads, on the way I am not concerned to deny, +for so it must always be with the roots of the old beliefs of fear and +ignorance buried in the soil of our hearts and ready to throw out their +poisonous fibres. But there was never doubt. For myself I have long +forgotten the meaning of that word in anything that is of real value. + +Do not let it be thought that the treasure is reserved for the few or +those of special gifts. And it is as free to the West as to the East +though I own it lies nearer to the surface in the Orient where the +spiritual genius of the people makes it possible and the greater and +more faithful teachers are found. It is not without meaning that all the +faiths of the world have dawned in those sunrise skies. Yet it is within +reach of all and asks only recognition, for the universe has been the +mine of its jewels-- + + “Median gold it holds, and silver from Atropatene, Ruby and + emerald from Hindustan, and Bactrian agate, Bright with beryl + and pearl, sardonyx and sapphire.”-- + and more that cannot be uttered-- + the Lights and Perfections. + +So for all seekers I pray this prayer--beautiful in its sonorous Latin, +but noble in all the tongues; + +“Supplico tibi, Pater et Dux--I pray Thee, Guide of our vision, that +we may remember the nobleness with which Thou hast endowed us, and that +Thou wouldest be always on our right and on our left in the motion of +our wills, that we may be purged from the contagion of the body and the +affections of the brute and overcome and rule them. And I pray also +that Thou wouldest drive away the blinding darkness from the eyes of our +souls that we may know well what is to be held for divine and what for +mortal.” + +“The nobleness with which Thou hast endowed us-” this, and not the +cry of the miserable sinner whose very repentance is no virtue but the +consequence of failure and weakness is the strong music to which we must +march. + +And the way is open to the mountains. + + + + +THE INTERPRETER A ROMANCE OF THE EAST + + +I + +There are strange things in this story, but, so far as I understand +them, I tell the truth. If you measure the East with a Western foot-rule +you will say, “Impossible.” I should have said it myself. + +Of myself I will say as little as I can, for this story is of Vanna +Loring. I am an incident only, though I did not know that at first. + +My name is Stephen Clifden, and I was eight-and-thirty; plenty of money, +sound in wind and limb. I had been by way of being a writer before the +war, the hobby of a rich man; but if I picked up anything in the welter +in France, it was that real work is the only salvation this mad world +has to offer; so I meant to begin at the beginning, and learn my trade +like a journeyman labourer. I had come to the right place. A very +wonderful city is Peshawar--rather let us say, two cities--the +compounds, the fortifications where Europeans dwell in such peace as +their strong right arms can secure them; and the native city and bazaar +humming and buzzing like a hive of angry bees with the rumours that +come up from Lower India or down the Khyber Pass with the camel caravans +loaded with merchandise from Afghanistan, Bokhara, and farther. And +it is because of this that Peshawar is the Key of India, and a city +of Romance that stands at every corner, and cries aloud in the +market--place. For at Peshawar every able-bodied man sleeps with his +revolver under his pillow, and the old Fort is always ready in case it +should be necessary at brief and sharp notice to hurry the women and +children into it, and possibly, to die in their defense. So enlivening +is the neighbourhood of the frontier tribes that haunt the famous Khyber +Pass and the menacing hills where danger is always lurking. + +But there was society here, and I was swept into it--there was chatter, +and it galled me. + +I was beginning to feel that I had missed my mark, and must go farther +afield, perhaps up into Central Asia, when I met Vanna Loring. If I say +that her hair was soft and dark; that she had the deepest hazel eyes +I have ever seen, and a sensitive, tender mouth; that she moved with a +flowing grace like “a wave of the sea”--it sounds like the portrait of a +beauty, and she was never that. Also, incidentally, it gives none of her +charm. I never heard any one get any further than that she was “oddly +attractive”--let us leave it at that. She was certainly attractive to +me. + +She was the governess of little Winifred Meryon, whose father held +the august position of General Commanding the Frontier Forces, and her +mother the more commanding position of the reigning beauty of Northern +India, generally speaking. No one disputed that. She was as pretty as +a picture, and her charming photograph had graced as many illustrated +papers as there were illustrated papers to grace. + +But Vanna--I gleaned her story by bits when I came across her with the +child in the gardens. I was beginning to piece it together now. + +Her love of the strange and beautiful she had inherited from a young +Italian mother, daughter of a political refugee; her childhood had +been spent in a remote little village in the West of England; half +reluctantly she told me how she had brought herself up after her +mother’s death and her father’s second marriage. Little was said of +that, but I gathered that it had been a grief to her, a factor in her +flight to the East. + +We were walking in the Circular Road then with Winifred in front leading +her Pekingese by its blue ribbon, and we had it almost to ourselves +except for a few natives passing slow and dignified on their own +occasions, for fashionable Peshawar was finishing its last rubber of +bridge, before separating to dress for dinner, and had no time to spare +for trivialities and sunsets. + +“So when I came to three-and-twenty,” she said slowly, “I felt I must +break away from our narrow life. I had a call to India stronger than +anything on earth. You would not understand but that was so, and I had +spent every spare moment in teaching myself India--its history, legends, +religions, everything! And I was not wanted at home, and I had grown +afraid.” + +I could divine years of patience and repression under this plain tale, +but also a power that would be dynamic when the authentic voice called. +That was her charm--gentleness in strength--a sweet serenity. + +“What were you afraid of?” + +“Of growing old and missing what was waiting for me out here. But I +could not get away like other people. No money, you see. So I thought I +would come out here and teach. Dare I? Would they let me? I knew I was +fighting life and chances and risks if I did it; but it was death if I +stayed there. And then--Do you really care to hear?” + +“Of course. Tell me how you broke your chain.” + +“I spare you the family quarrels. I can never go back. But I was +spurred--spurred to take some wild leap; and I took it. Six years ago I +came out. First I went to a doctor and his wife at Cawnpore. They had +a wonderful knowledge of the Indian peoples, and there I learned +Hindustani and much else. Then he died. But an aunt had left me two +hundred pounds, and I could wait a little and choose; and so I came +here.” + +It interested me. The courage that pale elastic type of woman has! + +“Have you ever regretted it? Would they take you back if you failed?” + +“Never, to both questions,” she said, smiling. “Life is glorious. I’ve +drunk of a cup I never thought to taste; and if I died tomorrow I should +know I had done right. I rejoice in every moment I live--even when +Winifred and I are wrestling with arithmetic.” + +“I shouldn’t have thought life was very easy with Lady Meryon.” + +“Oh, she is kind enough in an indifferent sort of way. I am not the +persecuted Jane Eyre sort of governess at all. But that is all on the +surface and does not matter. It is India I care for-the people, the sun, +the infinite beauty. It was coming home. You would laugh if I told you +I knew Peshawar long before I came here. Knew it--walked here, lived. +Before there were English in India at all.” She broke off. “You won’t +understand.” + +“Oh, I have had that feeling, too,” I said patronizingly. “If one has +read very much about a place-” + +“That was not quite what I meant. Never mind. The people, the +place--that is the real thing to me. All this is the dream.” The sweep +of her hand took in not only Winifred and myself, but the general’s +stately residence, which to blaspheme in Peshawar is rank infidelity. + +“By George, I would give thousands to feel that! I can’t get out of +Europe here. I want to write, Miss Loring,” I found myself saying. “I’d +done a bit, and then the war came and blew my life to pieces. Now I want +to get inside the skin of the East, and I can’t do it. I see it from +outside, with a pane of glass between. No life in it. If you feel as you +say, for God’s sake be my interpreter!” + +I really meant what I said. I knew she was a harp that any breeze would +sweep into music. I divined that temperament in her and proposed to use +it for my own ends. She had and I had not, the power to be a part of all +she saw, to feel kindred blood running in her own veins. To the average +European the native life of India is scarcely interesting, so far is it +removed from all comprehension. To me it was interesting, but I could +not tell why. I stood outside and had not the fairy gold to pay for my +entrance. Here at all events she could buy her way where I could not. +Without cruelty, which honestly was not my besetting sin--especially +where women were concerned, the egoist in me felt I would use her, would +extract the last drop of the enchantment of her knowledge before I went +on my way. What more natural than that Vanna or any other woman should +minister to my thirst for information? Men are like that. I pretend +to be no better than the rest. She pleased my fastidiousness--that +fastidiousness which is the only austerity in men not otherwise austere. + +“Interpret?” she said, looking at me with clear hazel eyes; “how could +I? You were in the native city yesterday. What did you miss?” + +“Everything! I saw masses of colour, light, movement. Brilliantly +picturesque people. Children like Asiatic angels. Magnificently scowling +ruffians in sheepskin coats. In fact, a movie staged for my benefit. I +was afraid they would ring down the curtain before I had had enough. It +had no meaning. When I got back to my diggings I tried to put down +what I had just seen, and I swear there’s more inspiration in the +guide-book.” + +“Did you go alone?” + +“Yes, I certainly would not go sight-seeing with the Meryon crowd. Tell +me what you felt when you saw it first.” + +“I went with Sir John’s uncle. He was a great traveler. The colour +struck me dumb. It flames--it sings. Think of the grey pinched life in +the West! I saw a grave dark potter turning his wheel, while his little +girl stood by, glad at our pleasure, her head veiled like a miniature +woman, tiny baggy trousers, and a silver nose-stud, like a star, in one +delicate nostril. In her thin arms she held a heavy baby in a gilt cap, +like a monkey. And the wheel turned and whirled until it seemed to be +spinning dreams, thick as motes in the sun. The clay rose in smooth +spirals under his hand, and the wheel sang, ‘Shall the vessel reprove +him who made one to honour and one to dishonour?’ And I saw the potter +thumping his wet clay, and the clay, plastic as dream-stuff, shaped +swift as light, and the three Fates stood at his shoulder. Dreams, +dreams, and all in the spinning of the wheel, and the rich shadows of +the old broken courtyard where he sat. And the wheel stopped and the +thread broke, and the little new shapes he had made stood all about him, +and he was only a potter in Peshawar.” + +Her voice was like a song. She had utterly forgotten my existence. I +did not dislike it at the moment, for I wanted to hear more, and the +impersonal is the rarest gift a woman can give a man. + +“Did you buy anything?” + +“He gave me a gift--a flawed jar of turquoise blue, faint turquoise +green round the lip. He saw I understood. And then I bought a little +gold cap and a wooden box of jade-green Kabul grapes. About a rupee, all +told. But it was Eastern merchandise, and I was trading from Balsora and +Baghdad, and Eleazar’s camels were swaying down from Damascus along the +Khyber Pass, and coming in at the great Darwazah, and friends’ eyes met +me everywhere. I am profoundly happy here.” + +The sinking sun lit an almost ecstatic face. + +I envied her more deeply than I had ever envied any one. She had the +secret of immortal youth, and I felt old as I looked at her. One might +be eighty and share that passionate impersonal joy. Age could not wither +nor custom stale the infinite variety of her world’s joys. She had a +child’s dewy youth in her eyes. + +There are great sunsets at Peshawar, flaming over the plain, dying in +melancholy splendour over the dangerous hills. They too were hers, in +a sense in which they could never be mine. But what a companion! To +my astonishment a wild thought of marriage flashed across me, to be +instantly rebuffed with a shrug. Marriage--that one’s wife might talk +poetry to one about the East! Absurd! But what was it these people felt +and I could not feel? Almost, shut up in the prison of self, I knew what +Vanna had felt in her village--a maddening desire to escape, to be a +part of the loveliness that lay beyond me. So might a man love a king’s +daughter in her hopeless heights. + +“It may be very beautiful on the surface,” I said morosely; “but there’s +a lot of misery below--hateful, they tell me.” + +“Of course. We shall get to work one day. But look at the sunset. It +opens like a mysterious flower. I must take Winifred home now.” + +“One moment,” I pleaded; “I can only see it through your eyes. I feel it +while you speak, and then the good minute goes.” + +She laughed. + +“And so must I. Come, Winifred. Look, there’s an owl; not like the owls +in the summer dark in England-- + + “Lovely are the curves of the white owl sweeping, Wavy in the +dark, lit by one low star.” + +Suddenly she turned again and looked at me half wistfully. + +“It is good to talk to you. You want to know. You are so near it all. I +wish I could help you; I am so exquisitely happy myself.” + +My writing was at a standstill. It seemed the groping of a blind man +in a radiant world. Once perhaps I had felt that life was good in +itself--when the guns came thundering toward the Vimy Ridge in a mad +gallop of horses, and men shouting and swearing and frantically urging +them on. Then, riding for more than life, I had tasted life for an +instant. Not before or since. But this woman had the secret. + +Lady Meryon, with her escort of girls and subalterns, came daintily past +the hotel compound, and startled me from my brooding with her pretty +silvery voice. + +“Dreaming, Mr. Clifden? It isn’t at all wholesome to dream in the East. +Come and dine with us tomorrow. A tiny dance afterwards, you know; or +bridge for those who like it.” + +I had not the faintest notion whether governesses dined with the family +or came in afterward with the coffee; but it was a sporting chance, and +I took it. + +Then Sir John came up and joined us. + +“You can’t well dance tomorrow, Kitty,” he said to his wife. “There’s +been an outpost affair in the Swat Hills, and young Fitzgerald has +been shot. Come to dinner of course, Clifden. Glad to see you. But no +dancing, I think.” + +Kitty Meryon’s mouth drooped like a pouting child’s. Was it for the lost +dance, or the lost soldier lying out on the hills in the dying sunset. +Who could tell? In either case it was pretty enough for the illustrated +papers. + +“How sad! Such a dear boy. We shall miss him at tennis.” Then brightly; +“Well, we’ll have to put the dance off for a week, but come tomorrow +anyhow.” + + +II + + +Next evening I went into Lady Meryon’s flower-scented drawing-room. The +electric fans were fluttering and the evening air was cool. Five or +six pretty girls and as many men made up the party--Kitty Meryon the +prettiest of them all, fashionably undressed in faint pink and crystal, +with a charming smile in readiness, all her gay little flags flying in +the rich man’s honour. I am no vainer than other men, but I saw that. +Whatever her charm might be it was none for me. What could I say to +interest her who lived in her foolish little world as one shut in a +bright bubble? And she had said the wrong word about young Fitzgerald--I +wanted Vanna, with her deep seeing eyes, to say the right one and adjust +those cruel values. + +Governesses dine, it appeared, only to fill an unexpected place, or make +a decorous entry afterward, to play accompaniments. Fortunately Kitty +Meryon sang, in a pinched little soprano, not nearly so pretty as her +silver ripple of talk. + +It was when the party had settled down to bridge and I was standing out, +that I ventured to go up to her as she sat knitting by a window--not +unwatched by the quick flash of Lady Meryon’s eyes as I did it. + +“I think you hypnotize me, Miss Loring. When I hear anything I +straightway want to know what you will say. Have you heard of +Fitzgerald’s death?” + +“That is why we are not dancing tonight. Tomorrow the cable will reach +his home in England. He was an only child, and they are the great people +of the village where we are the little people. I knew his mother as one +knows a great lady who is kind to all the village folk. It may kill her. +It is travelling tonight like a bullet to her heart, and she does not +know.” + +“His father?” + +“A brave man--a soldier himself. He will know it was a good death and +that Harry would not fail. He did not at Ypres. He would not here. But +all joy and hope will be dead in that house tomorrow.” + +“And what do you think?” + +“I am not sorry for Harry, if you mean that. He knew--we all know--that +he was on guard here holding the outposts against blood and treachery +and terrible things--playing the Great Game. One never loses at that +game if one plays it straight, and I am sure that at the last it was joy +he felt and not fear. He has not lost. Did you notice in the church +a niche before every soldier’s seat to hold his loaded gun? And the +tablets on the walls; “Killed at Kabul River, aged 22.”--“Killed on +outpost duty.”--“Murdered by an Afghan fanatic.” This will be one memory +more. Why be sorry.” + +Presently:-- + +“I am going up to the hills tomorrow, to the Malakhand Fort, with Mrs. +Delany, Lady Meryon’s aunt, and we shall see the wonderful Tahkt-i-Bahi +Monastery on the way. You should do that run before you go. The fort is +the last but one on the way to Chitral, and beyond that the road is so +beset that only soldiers may go farther, and indeed the regiments escort +each other up and down. But it is an early start, for we must be back in +Peshawar at six for fear of raiding natives.” + +“I know; they hauled me up in the dusk the other day, and told me I +should be swept off to the hills if I fooled about after dusk. But I +say--is it safe for you to go? You ought to have a man. Could I go too?” + +I thought she did not look enthusiastic at the proposal. + +“Ask. You know I settle nothing. I go where I am sent.” She said it with +the happiest smile. I knew they could send her nowhere that she would +not find joy. I thought her mere presence must send the vibrations of +happiness through the household. Yet again--why? For where there is no +receiver the current speaks in vain; and for an instant I seemed to see +the air full of messages--of speech striving to utter its passionate +truths to deaf ears stopped for ever against the breaking waves of +sound. But Vanna heard. + +She left the room; and when the bridge was over, I made my request. Lady +Meryon shrugged her shoulders and declared it would be a terribly dull +run--the scenery nothing, “and only” (she whispered) “Aunt Selina and +poor Miss Loring?” + +Of course I saw at once that she did not like it; but Sir John was all +for my going, and that saved the situation. + +I certainly could have dispensed with Aunt Selina when the automobile +drew up in the golden river of the sunrise at the hotel. There were only +the driver, a personal servant, and the two ladies; Mrs. Delany, comely, +pleasant, talkative, and Vanna-- + +Her face in its dark motoring veil, fine and delicate as a young moon in +a cloud drift--the sensitive sweet mouth that had quivered a little when +she spoke of Fitzgerald--the pure glance that radiated such kindness to +all the world. She sat there with the Key of Dreams pressed against her +slight bosom--her eyes dreaming above it. Already the strange airs of +her unknown world were breathing about me, and as yet I knew not the +things that belonged unto my peace. + +We glided along the straight military road from Peshawar to Nowshera, +the gold-bright sun dazzling in its whiteness--a strange drive through +the flat, burned country, with the ominous Kabul River flowing through +it. Military preparations everywhere, and the hills looking watchfully +down--alive, as it were, with keen, hostile eyes. War was at present +about us as behind the lines in France; and when we crossed the Kabul +River on a bridge of boats, and I saw its haunted waters, I began to +feel the atmosphere of the place closing down upon me. It had a sinister +beauty; it breathed suspense; and I wished, as I was sure Vanna did, for +silence that was not at our command. + +For Mrs. Delany felt nothing of it. A bright shallow ripple of talk was +her contribution to the joys of the day; though it was, fortunately, +enough for her happiness if we listened and agreed. I knew Vanna +listened only in show. Her intent eyes were fixed on the Tahkt-i-Bahi +hills after we had swept out of Nowshera; and when the car drew up +at the rough track, she had a strange look of suspense and pallor. I +remember I wondered at the time if she were nervous in the wild open +country. + +“Now pray don’t be shocked,” said Mrs. Delany comfortably; “but you two +young people may go up to the monastery, and I shall stay here. I am +dreadfully ashamed of myself, but the sight of that hill is enough for +me. Don’t hurry. I may have a little doze, and be all the better company +when you get back. No, don’t try to persuade me, Mr. Clifden. It isn’t +the part of a friend.” + +I cannot say I was sorry, though I had a moment of panic when Vanna +offered to stay with her--very much, too, as if she really meant it. So +we set out perforce, Vanna leading steadily, as if she knew the way. +She never looked up, and her wish for silence was so evident, that I +followed, lending my hand mutely when the difficulties obliged it, she +accepting absently, and as if her thoughts were far away. + +Suddenly she quickened her pace. We had climbed about nine hundred feet, +and now the narrow track twisted through the rocks--a track that looked +as age-worn as no doubt it was. We threaded it, and struggled over the +ridge, and looked down victorious on the other side. + +There she stopped. A very wonderful sight, of which I had never seen the +like, lay below us. Rock and waste and towering crags, and the mighty +ruin of the monastery set in the fangs of the mountain like a robber +baron’s castle, looking far away to the blue mountains of the Debatable +Land--the land of mystery and danger. It stood there--the great ruin +of a vast habitation of men. Building after building, mysterious and +broken, corridors, halls, refectories, cells; the dwelling of a faith so +alien that I could not reconstruct the life that gave it being. And all +sinking gently into ruin that in a century more would confound it with +the roots of the mountains. + +Grey and wonderful, it clung to the heights and looked with eyeless +windows at the past. Somehow I found it infinitely pathetic; the very +faith it expressed is dead in India, and none left so poor to do it +reverence. + +But Vanna knew her way. Unerringly she led me from point to point, and +she was visibly at home in the intricacies. Such knowledge in a young +woman bewildered me. Could she have studied the plans in the Museum? +How else should she know where the abbot lived, or where the refractory +brothers were punished? + +Once I missed her, while I stooped to examine some scroll-work, and +following, found her before one of the few images of the Buddha that the +rapacious Museum had spared--a singularly beautiful bas-relief, the hand +raised to enforce the truth the calm lips were speaking, the drapery +falling in stately folds to the bare feet. As I came up, she had an air +as if she had just ceased from movement, and I had a distinct feeling +that she had knelt before it--I saw the look of worship! The thing +troubled me like a dream, haunting, impossible, but real. + +“How beautiful!” I said in spite of myself, as she pointed to the image. +“In this utter solitude it seems the very spirit of the place.” + +“He was. He is,” said Vanna. + +“Explain to me. I don’t understand. I know so little of him. What is the +subject?” + +She hesitated; then chose her words as if for a beginner;--“It is the +Blessed One preaching to the Tree-Spirits. See how eagerly they lean +from the boughs to listen. This other relief represents him in the state +of mystic vision. Here he is drowned in peace. See how it overflows from +the closed eyes; the closed lips. The air is filled with his quiet.” + +“What is he dreaming?” + +“Not dreaming--seeing. Peace. He sits at the point where time and +infinity meet. To attain that vision was the aim of the monks who lived +here.” + +“Did they attain?” I found myself speaking as if she could certainly +answer. + +“A few. There was one, Vasettha, the Brahman, a young man who had +renounced all his possessions and riches, and seated here before this +image of the Blessed One, he fell often into the mystic state. He had a +strange vision at one time of the future of India, which will surely be +fulfilled. He did not forget it in his rebirths. He remembers-” + +She broke off suddenly and said with forced indifference,--“He would sit +here often looking out over the mountains; the monks sat at his feet to +hear. He became abbot while still young. But his story is a sad one.” + +“I entreat you to tell me.” + +She looked away over the mountains. “While he was abbot here,--still a +young man,--a famous Chinese Pilgrim came down through Kashmir to visit +the Holy Places in India. The abbot went forward with him to Peshawar, +that he might make him welcome. And there came a dancer to Peshawar, +named Lilavanti, most beautiful! I dare not tell you her beauty. I +tremble now to think-” + +Again she paused, and again the faint creeping sense of mystery invaded +me. + +She resumed;-- + +“The abbot saw her and he loved her. He was young still, you remember. +She was a woman of the Hindu faith and hated Buddhism. It swept him down +into the lower worlds of storm and desire. He fled with Lilavanti and +never returned here. So in his rebirth he fell-” + +She stopped dead; her face pale as death. + +“How do you know? Where have you read it? If I could only find what you +find and know what you know! The East is like an open book to you. Tell +me the rest.” + +“How should I know any more?” she said hurriedly. “We must be going +back. You should study the plans of this place at Peshawar. They were +very learned monks who lived here. It is famous for learning.” + +The life had gone out of her words-out of the ruins. There was no more +to be said. + +We clambered down the hill in the hot sunshine, speaking only of the +view, the strange shrubs and flowers, and, once, the swift gliding of a +snake, and found Mrs. Delany blissfully asleep in the most padded corner +of the car. The spirit of the East vanished in her comfortable presence, +and luncheon seemed the only matter of moment. + +“I wonder, my dears,” she said, “if you would be very disappointed and +think me very dense if I proposed our giving up the Malakhand Fort? The +driver has been giving me in very poor English such an account of the +dangers of that awful road up the hill that I feel no Fort would repay +me for its terrors. Do say what you feel, Miss Loring. Mr. Clifden can +lunch with the officers at Nowshera and come any time. I know I am an +atrocity.” + +There could be only one answer, though Vanna and I knew perfectly well +the crafty design of the driver to spare himself work. Mrs. Delany +remained brightly awake for the run home, and favored us with many +remarkable views on India and its shortcomings, Vanna, who had a sincere +liking for her, laughing with delight at her description of a visit of +condolence with Lady Meryon to the five widows of one of the hill Rajas. + +But I own I was pre-occupied. I knew those moments at the monastery had +given me a glimpse into the wonderland of her soul that made me long +for more. It was rapidly becoming clear to me that unless my intentions +developed on very different lines I must flee Peshawar. For love is born +of sympathy, and sympathy was strengthening daily, but for love I had no +courage yet. + +I feared it as men fear the unknown. I despised myself--but I feared. +I will confess my egregious folly and vanity--I had no doubt as to her +reception of my offer if I should make it, but possessed by a colossal +selfishness, I thought only of myself, and from that point of view could +not decide how I stood to lose or gain. In my wildest accesses of vanity +I did not suppose Vanna loved me, but I felt she liked me, and I believe +the advantages I had to offer would be overwhelming to a woman in her +position. So, tossed on the waves of indecision, I inclined to flight. + +That night I resolutely began my packing, and wrote a note of farewell +to Lady Meryon. The next morning I furiously undid it, and destroyed the +note. And that afternoon I took the shortest way to the sun-set road to +lounge about and wait for Vanna and Winifred. She never came, and I was +as unreasonably angry as if I had deserved the blessing of her presence. + +Next day I could see that she tried gently hut clearly to discourage our +meeting and for three days I never saw her at all. Yet I knew that in +her solitary life our talks counted for a pleasure, and when we met +again I thought I saw a new softness in the lovely hazel deeps of her +eyes. + + +III + + +On the day when things became clear to me, I was walking towards the +Meryons’ gates when I met her coming alone along the sunset road, in the +late gold of the afternoon. She looked pale and a little wearied, and I +remembered I wished I did not know every change of her face as I did. It +was a symptom that alarmed my selfishness--it galled me with the sense +that I was no longer my own despot. + +“So you have been up the Khyber Pass,” she said as I fell into step at +her side. “Tell me--was it as wonderful as you expected?” + +“No, no,--you tell me! It will give me what I missed. Begin at the +beginning. Tell me what I saw.” + +I could not miss the delight of her words, and she laughed, knowing my +whim. + +“Oh, that Pass!--the wonder of those old roads that have borne the +traffic and romance of the world for ages. Do you think there is +anything in the world so fascinating as they are? But did you go on +Tuesday or Friday?” + +For these are the only days in the week when the Khyber can be safely +entered. The British then turn out the Khyber Rifles and man every crag, +and the loaded caravans move like a tide, and go up and down the narrow +road on their occasions. + +Naturally mere sightseers are not welcomed, for much business must be +got through in that urgent forty eight hours in which life is not risked +in entering. + +“Tuesday. But make a picture for me.” + +“Well, you gave your word not to photograph or sketch--as if one wanted +to when every bit of it is stamped on one’s brain! And you went up to +Jumrood Fort at the entrance. Did they tell you it is an old Sikh Fort +and has been on duty in that turbulent place for five hundred years And +did you see the machine guns in the court? And every one armed--even the +boys with belts of cartridges? Then you went up the narrow winding track +between the mountains, and you said to yourself, ‘This is the road of +pure romance. It goes up to silken Samarkhand, and I can ride to Bokhara +of the beautiful women and to all the dreams. Am I alive and is it +real?’ You felt that?” + +“All. Every bit. Go on!” + +She smiled with pleasure. + +“And you saw the little forts on the crags and the men on guard all +along the bills, rifles ready! You could hear the guns rattle as they +saluted. Do you know that up there men plough with rifles loaded beside +them? They have to be men indeed.” + +“Do you mean to imply that we are not men?” + +“Different men at least. This is life in a Border ballad. Such a life as +you knew in France but beautiful in a wild--hawk sort of way. Don’t the +Khyber Rifles bewilder you? They are drawn from these very Hill tribes, +and will shoot their own fathers and brothers in the way of duty as +comfortably as if they were jackals. Once there was a scrap here and +one of the tribesmen sniped our men unbearably. What do you suppose +happened? A Khyber Rifle came to the Colonel and said, ‘Let me put +an end to him, Colonel Sahib. I know exactly where he sits. He is my +grandfather.’ And he did it!” + +“The bond of bread and salt?” + +“Yes, and discipline. I’m sometimes half frightened of discipline. It +moulds a man like wax. Even God doesn’t do that. Well--then you had the +traders--wild shaggy men in sheepskin and women in massive jewelry of +silver and turquoise,-great earrings, heavy bracelets loading their +arms, wild, fierce, handsome. And the camels--thousands of them, some +going up, some coming down, a mass of human and animal life. Above +you, moving figures against the keen blue sky, or deep below you in the +ravines. + +“The camels were swaying along with huge bales of goods, and dark +beautiful women in wicker cages perched on them. Silks and carpets from +Bokhara, and blue--eyed Persian cats, and bluer Persian turquoises. +Wonderful! And the dust, gilded by the sunshine, makes a vaporous golden +atmosphere for it all.” + +“What was the most wonderful thing you saw there?” + +“The most beautiful, I think, was a man--a splendid dark ruffian +lounging along. He wanted to show off, and his swagger was perfect. Long +black onyx eyes and a tumble of black curls, and teeth like almonds. +But what do you think he carried on his wrist--a hawk with fierce yellow +eyes, ringed and chained. Hawking is a favourite sport in the hills. Oh, +why doesn’t some great painter come and paint it all before they take to +trains and cars? I long to see it all again, but I never shall.” + +“Why not,” said I. “Surely Sir John can get you up there any day?” + +“Not now. The fighting makes it difficult. But it isn’t that. I am +leaving.” + +“Leaving?” My heart gave a leap. “Why? Where?” + +“Leaving Lady Meryon.” + +“Why--for Heaven’s sake?” + +“I had rather not tell you.” + +“But I must know.” + +“You cannot.” + +“I shall ask Lady Meryon.” + +“I forbid you.” + +And then the unexpected happened, and an unbearable impulse swept me +into folly--or was it wisdom? + +“Listen to me. I would not have said it yet, but this settles it. I want +you to marry me. I want it atrociously!” + +It was a strange word. What I felt for her at that moment was difficult +to describe. I endured it like a pain that could only be assuaged by +her presence, but I endured it angrily. We were walking on the sunset +road--very deserted and quiet at the time. The place was propitious if +nothing else was. + +She looked at me in transparent astonishment; + +“Mr. Clifden, are you dreaming? You can’t mean what you say.” + +“Why can’t I? I do. I want you. You have the key of all I care for. I +think of the world without you and find it tasteless.” + +“Surely you have all the world can give? What do you want more?” + +“The power to enjoy it--to understand it. You have got that--I haven’t. +I want you always with me to interpret, like a guide to a blind fellow. +I am no better.” + +“Say like a dog, at once!” she interrupted. “At least you are frank +enough to put it on that ground. You have not said you love me. You +could not say it.” + +“I don’t know whether I do or not. I know nothing about love. I want +you. Indescribably. Perhaps that is love--is it? I never wanted any one +before. I have tried to get away and I can’t.” + +I was brutally frank, you see. She compelled my very thoughts. + +“Why have you tried?” + +“Because every man likes freedom. But I like you better.” “I can tell +you the reason,” she said in her gentle unwavering voice. “I am Lady +Meryon’s governess, and an undesirable. You have felt that?” + +“Don’t make me out such a snob. No--yes. You force me into honesty. +I did feel it at first like the miserable fool I am, but I could kick +myself when I think of that now. It is utterly forgotten. Take me and +make me what you will, and forgive me. Only tell me your secret of joy. +How is it you understand everything alive or dead? I want to live--to +see, to know.” + +It was a rhapsody like a boy’s. Yet at the moment I was not even ashamed +of it, so sharp was my need. + +“I think,” she said, slowly, looking straight before her, “that I had +better be quite frank. I don’t love you. I don’t know what love means +in the Western sense. It has a very different meaning for me. Your voice +comes to me from an immense distance when you speak in that way. You +want me--but never with a thought of what I might want. Is that love? I +like you very deeply as a friend, but we are of different races. There +is a gulf.” + +“A gulf? You are English.” + +“By birth, yes. In mind, no. And there are things that go deeper, that +you could not understand. So I refuse quite definitely, and our ways +part here, for in a few days I go. I shall not see you again, but I wish +to say good-bye.” + +The bitterest chagrin was working in my soul. I felt as if all were +deserting me-a sickening feeling of loneliness. I did not know the man +who was in me, and was a stranger to myself. + +“I entreat you to tell me why, and where.” + +“Since you have made me this offer, I will tell you why. Lady Meryon +objected to my friendship with you, and objected in a way which-” + +She stopped, flushing palely. I caught her hand. + +“That settles it!-that she should have dared! I’ll go up this minute and +tell her we are engaged. Vanna-Vanna!” + +For she disengaged her hand, quietly but firmly. + +“On no account. How can I make it more plain to you? I should have gone +soon in any case. My place is in the native city--that is the life I +want. I have work there, I knew it before I came out. My sympathies are +all with them. They know what life is--why even the beggars, poorer than +poor, are perfectly happy, basking in the great generous sun. Oh, the +splendour and riot of life and colour! That’s my life--I sicken of +this.” + +“But I’ll give it to you. Marry me, and we will travel till you’re tired +of it.” + +“Yes, and look on as at a play--sitting in the stalls, and applauding +when we are pleased. No, I’m going to work there.” “For God’s sake, how? +Let me come too.” + +“You can’t. You’re not in it. I am going to attach myself to the medical +mission at Lahore and learn nursing, and then I shall go to my own +people.” + +“Missionaries? You’ve nothing in common with them?” + +“Nothing. But they teach what I want. Mr. Clifden, I shall not come this +way again. If I remember--I’ll write to you, and tell you what the real +world is like.” + +She smiled, the absorbed little smile I knew and feared. I saw pleading +was useless then. I would wait, and never lose sight of her and of hope. + +“Vanna, before you go, give me your gift of sight. Interpret for me. +Stay with me a little and make me see.” + +“What do you mean exactly?” she asked in her gentlest voice, half +turning to me. + +“Make one journey with me, as my sister, if you will do no more. Though +I warn you that all the time I shall be trying to win my wife. But come +with me once, and after that--if you will go, you must. Say yes.” + +Madness! But she hesitated--a hesitation full of hope, and looked at me +with intent eyes. + +“I will tell you frankly,” she said at last, “that I know my knowledge +of the East and kinship with it goes far beyond mere words. In my case +the doors were not shut. I believe--I know that long ago this was my +life. If I spoke for ever I could not make you understand how much I +know and why. So I shall quite certainly go back to it. Nothing--you +least of all, can hold me. But you are my friend--that is a true bond. +And if you would wish me to give you two months before I go, I might do +that if it would in any way help you. As your friend only--you clearly +understand. You would not reproach me afterwards when I left you, as I +should most certainly do?” + +“I swear I would not. I swear I would protect you even from myself. I +want you for ever, but if you will only give me two months--come! But +have you thought that people will talk. It may injure you. I’m not worth +that, God knows. And you will take nothing I could give you in return.” + +She spoke very quietly. + +“That does not trouble me.--It would only trouble me if you asked what +I have not to give. For two months I would travel with you as a friend, +if, like a friend, I paid my own expenses-” + +I would have interrupted, but she brushed that firmly aside. “No, I must +do as I say, and I am quite able to or I should not suggest it. I would +go on no other terms. It would be hard if because we are man and woman I +might not do one act of friendship for you before we part. For though I +refuse your offer utterly, I appreciate it, and I would make what little +return I can. It would be a sharp pain to me to distress you.” + +Her gentleness and calm, the magnitude of the offer she was making +stunned me so that I could scarcely speak. There was such an +extraordinary simplicity and generosity in her manner that it appeared +to me more enthralling and bewildering than the most finished coquetry +I had ever known. She gave me opportunities that the most ardent lover +could in his wildest dream desire, and with the remoteness in her eyes +and her still voice she deprived them of all hope. It kindled in me a +flame that made my throat dry when I tried to speak. + +“Vanna, is it a promise? You mean it?” + +“If you wish it, yes. But I warn you I think it will not make it easier +for you when the time is over. + +“Why two months?” + +“Partly because I can afford no more. No! I know what you would say. +Partly because I can spare no more time. But I will give you that, +if you wish, though, honestly, I had very much rather not. I think it +unwise for you. I would protect you if I could--indeed I would!” + +It was my turn to hesitate now. Every moment revealed to me some new +sweetness, some charm that I saw would weave itself into the very +fibre of my I had been! Was I not now a fool? Would it not being if the +opportunity were given. Oh, fool that be better to let her go before she +had become a part of my daily experience? I began to fear I was courting +my own shipwreck. She read my thoughts clearly. + +“Indeed you would be wise to decide against it. Release me from my +promise. It was a mad scheme.” + +The superiority--or so I felt it--of her gentleness maddened me. It +might have been I who needed protection, who was running the risk of +misjudgment--not she, a lonely woman. She looked at me, waiting--trying +to be wise for me, never for one instant thinking of herself. I felt +utterly exiled from the real purpose of her life. + +“I will never release you. I claim your promise. I hold to it.” + +“Very well then--I will write, and tell you where I shall be. Good-bye, +and if you change your mind, as I hope you will, tell me.” + +She extended her hand cool as a snowflake, and was gone, walking swiftly +up the road. Ah, let a man beware when his wishes fulfilled, rain down +upon him! + +To what had I committed myself? She knew her strength and had no fears. +I could scarcely realize that she had liking enough for me to make the +offer. That it meant no shade more than she had said I knew well. She +was safe, but what was to be the result for me? I knew nothing--she was +a beloved mystery. + + “Strange she is and secret, Strange her eyes; her cheeks are +cold as cold sea-shells.” + +Yet I would risk it, for I knew there was no hope if I let her go now, +and if I saw her again, some glimmer might fall upon my dark. + +Next day this reached me:--Dear Mr. Clifden,-- + +I am going to some Indian friends for a time. On the 15th of June I +shall be at Srinagar in Kashmir. A friend has allowed me to take her +little houseboat, the “Kedarnath.” If you like this plan we will share +the cost for two months. I warn you it is not luxurious, but I think you +will like it. I shall do this whether you come or no, for I want a quiet +time before I take up my nursing in Lahore. In thinking of all this will +you remember that I am not a girl but a woman. I shall be twenty-nine my +next birthday. Sincerely yours, VANNA LORING. + +P.S. But I still think you would be wiser not to come. I hope to hear +you will not. + +I replied only this:--Dear Miss Loring,--I think I understand the +position fully. I will be there. I thank you with all my heart. +Gratefully yours, STEPHEN CLIFDEN. + + +IV + + +Three days later I met Lady Meryon, and was swept in to tea. Her manner +was distinctly more cordial as she mentioned casually that Vanna had +left--she understood to take up missionary work--“which is odd,” she +added with a woman’s acrimony, “for she had no more in common with +missionaries than I have, and that is saying a good deal. Of course she +speaks Hindustani perfectly, and could be useful, but I haven’t grasped +the point of it yet.” I saw she counted on my knowing nothing of the +real reason of Vanna’s going and left it, of course, at that. The talk +drifted away under my guidance. Vanna evidently puzzled her. She half +feared, and wholly misunderstood her. + +No message came to me, as time went by, and for the time she had +vanished completely, but I held fast to her promise and lived on that +only. + +I take up my life where it ceased to be a mere suspense and became life +once more. + +On the 15th of June, I found myself riding into Srinagar in Kashmir, +through the pure tremulous green of the mighty poplars that hedge the +road into the city. The beauty of the country had half stunned me when +I entered the mountain barrier of Baramula and saw the snowy peaks that +guard the Happy Valley, with the Jhelum flowing through its tranquil +loveliness. The flush of the almond blossom was over, but the iris, like +a blue sea of peace had overflowed the world--the azure meadows smiled +back at the radiant sky. Such blossom! the blue shading into clear +violet, like a shoaling sea. The earth, like a cup held in the hand of a +god, brimmed with the draught of youth and summer and--love? But no, for +me the very word was sinister. Vanna’s face, immutably calm, confronted +it. + +That night I slept in a boat at Sopor, and I remember that, waking at +midnight, I looked out and saw a mountain with a gloriole of hazy silver +about it, misty and faint as a cobweb threaded with dew. The river, +there spreading into a lake, was dark under it, flowing in a deep smooth +blackness of shadow, and everything awaited--what? And even while I +looked, the moon floated serenely above the peak, and all was bathed in +pure light, the water rippling and shining in broken silver and pearl. +So had Vanna floated into my sky, luminous, sweet, remote. I did not +question my heart any more. I knew I loved her. + +Two days later I rode into Srinagar, and could scarcely see the wild +beauty of that strange Venice of the East, my heart was so beating +in my eyes. I rode past the lovely wooden bridges where the balconied +houses totter to each other across the canals in dim splendour of +carving and age; where the many-coloured native life crowds down to the +river steps and cleanses its flower-bright robes, its gold-bright brass +vessels in the shining stream, and my heart said only--Vanna, Vanna! + +One day, one thought, of her absence had taught me what she was to me, +and if humility and patient endeavor could raise me to her feet, I was +resolved that I would spend my life in labor and think it well spent. + +My servant dismounted and led his horse, asking from every one where the +“Kedarnath” could be found, and eager black eyes sparkled and two little +bronze images detached themselves from the crowd of boys, and ran, fleet +as fauns, before us. + +Above the last bridge the Jhelum broadens out into a stately river, +controlled at one side by the banked walk known as the Bund, with the +Club House upon it and the line of houseboats beneath. Here the visitors +flutter up and down and exchange the gossip, the bridge appointments, +the little dinners that sit so incongruously on the pure Orient that is +Kashmir. + +She would not be here. My heart told me that, and sure enough the boys +were leading across the bridge and by a quiet shady way to one of the +many backwaters that the great river makes in the enchanting city. There +is one waterway stretching on afar to the Dal Lake. It looks like a +river--it is the very haunt of peace. Under those mighty chenar, or +plane trees, that are the glory of Kashmir, clouding the water with deep +green shadows, the sun can scarcely pierce, save in a dipping sparkle +here and there to intensify the green gloom. The murmur of the city, the +chatter of the club, are hundreds of miles away. We rode downward under +the towering trees, and dismounting, saw a little houseboat tethered to +the bank. It was not of the richer sort that haunts the Bund, where the +native servants follow in a separate boat, and even the electric light +is turned on as part of the luxury. This was a long low craft, very +broad, thatched like a country cottage afloat. In the forepart lived the +native owner, and his family, their crew, our cooks and servants; for +they played many parts in our service. And in the afterpart, room for a +life, a dream, the joy or curse & many days to be. + +But then, I saw only one thing--Vanna sat under the trees, reading, or +looking at the cool dim watery vista, with a single boat, loaded to the +river’s edge with melons and scarlet tomatoes, punting lazily down to +Srinagar in the sleepy afternoon. + +She was dressed in white with a shady hat, and her delicate dark face +seemed to glow in the shadow like the heart of a pale rose. For the +first time I knew she was beautiful. Beauty shone in her like the flame +in an alabaster lamp, serene, diffused in the very air about her, so +that to me she moved in a mild radiance. She rose to meet me with both +hands outstretched--the kindest, most cordial welcome. Not an eyelash +flickered, not a trace of self-consciousness. If I could have seen her +flush or tremble--but no--her eyes were clear and calm as a forest pool. +So I remembered her. So I saw her once more. + +I tried, with a hopeless pretence, to follow her example and hide what I +felt, where she had nothing to hide. + +“What a place you have found. Why, it’s like the deep heart of a wood!” + +“Yes, I saw it once when I was here with the Meryons. But we lay at the +Bund then--just under the Club. This is better. Did you like the ride +up?” + +I threw myself on the grass beside her with a feeling of perfect rest. + +“It was like a new heaven and a new earth. What a country!” + +The very spirit of Quiet seemed to be drowsing in those branches +towering up into the blue, dipping their green fingers into the crystal +of the water. What a heaven! + +“Now you shall have your tea and then I will show you your rooms,” she +said, smiling at my delight. “We shall stay here a few days more that +you may see Srinagar, and then they tow us up into the Dal Lake opposite +the Gardens of the Mogul Emperors. And if you think this beautiful what +will you say then?” + +I shut my eyes and see still that first meal of my new life. The little +table that Pir Baksh, breathing full East in his jade-green turban, set +before her, with its cloth worked in a pattern of the chenar leaves +that are the symbol of Kashmir; the brown cakes made by Ahmad Khan in +a miraculous kitchen of his own invention--a few holes burrowed in the +river bank, a smoldering fire beneath them, and a width of canvas for +a roof. But it served, and no more need be asked of luxury. And Vanna, +making it mysteriously the first home I ever had known, the central +joy of it all. Oh, wonderful days of life that breathe the spirit of +immortality and pass so quickly--surely they must be treasured somewhere +in Eternity that we may look upon their beloved light once more. + +“Now you must see the boat. The Kedarnath is not a Dreadnought, but she +is broad and very comfortable. And we have many chaperons. They all +live in the bows, and exist simply to protect the Sahiblog from all +discomfort, and very well they do it. That is Ahmad Khan by the kitchen. +He cooks for us. Salama owns the boat, and steers her and engages the +men to tow us when we move. And when I arrived he aired a little English +and said piously; The Lord help me to give you no trouble, and the Lord +help you! That is his wife sitting on the bank. She speaks little but +Kashmiri, but I know a little of that. Look at the hundred rat-tail +plaits of her hair, lengthened with wool, and see her silver and +turquoise jewelry. She wears much of the family fortune and is quite +a walking bank. Salama, Ahmad Khan and I talk by the hour. Ahmad comes +from Fyzabad. Look at Salama’s boy--I call him the Orange Imp. Did you +ever see anything so beautiful?” + +I looked in sheer delight, and grasped my camera. Sitting near us was a +lovely little Kashmiri boy of about eight, in a faded orange coat, and +a turban exactly like his father’s. His curled black eyelashes were +so long that they made a soft gloom over the upper part of the little +golden face. The perfect bow of the scarlet lips, the long eyes, the shy +smile, suggested an Indian Eros. He sat dipping his feet in the water +with little pigeon-like cries of content. + +“He paddles at the bow of our little shikara boat with a paddle exactly +like a water-lily leaf. Do you like our friends? I love them already, +and know all their affairs. And now for the boat.” + +“One moment--If we are friends on a great adventure, I must call you +Vanna, and you me Stephen.” + +“Yes, I suppose that is part of it,” she said, smiling. “Come, Stephen.” + +It was like music, but a cold music that chilled me. She should have +hesitated, should have flushed--it was I who trembled. So I followed her +across the broad plank into our new home. + +“This is our sitting-room. Look, how charming!” + +It was better than charming; it was home indeed. Windows at each side +opening down almost to the water, a little table for meals that lived +mostly on the bank, with a grey pot of iris in the middle. Another +table for writing, photography, and all the little pursuits of travel. +A bookshelf with some well--worn friends. Two long cushioned chairs. +Two for meals, and a Bokhara rug, soft and pleasant for the feet. The +interior was plain unpainted wood, but set so that the grain showed like +satin in the rippling lights from the water. + +That is the inventory of the place I have loved best in the world, but +what eloquence can describe what it gave me, what its memory gives me to +this day? And I have no eloquence--what I felt leaves me dumb. + +“It is perfect,” was all I said as she waved her hand proudly. “It is +home.” + +“And if you had come alone to Kashmir you would have had a great rich +boat with electric light and a butler. You would never have seen the +people except at meal--times. I think you will like this better. +Well, this is your tiny bedroom, and your bathroom, and beyond the +sitting--room are mine. Do you like it all?” + +But I could say no more. The charm of her own personality had touched +everything and left its fragrance like a flower--breath in the air. I +was beggared of thanks, but my whole soul was gratitude. We dined on +the bank that evening, the lamp burning steadily in the still air and +throwing broken reflections in the water, while the moon looked in upon +them through the leaves. I felt extraordinarily young and happy. + +The quiet of her voice was soft as the little lap of water against +the bows of the boat, and Kahdra, the Orange Imp, was singing a little +wordless song to himself as he washed the plates beside us. It was a +simple meal, and Vanna, abstemious as a hermit never ate anything but +rice and fruit, but I could remember no meal in all my days of luxury +where I had eaten with such zest. + +“It looks very grand to have so many to wait upon us, doesn’t it? But +this is one of the cheapest countries in the world though the old timers +mourn over present expenses. You will laugh when I show you your share +of the cost.” + +“The wealth of the world could not buy this,” I said, and was silent. + +“But you must listen to my plans. We must do a little camping the +last three weeks before we part. Up in the mountains. Are they not +marvellous? They stand like a rampart round us, but not cold and +terrible, but “Like as the hills stand round about Jerusalem”--they are +guardian presences. And running up into them, high-very high, are the +valleys and hills where we shall camp. Tomorrow we shall row through +Srinagar, by the old Maharaja’s palace.” + + +V + +And so began a life of sheer enchantment. We knew no one. The visitors +in Kashmir change nearly every season, and no one cared-no one asked +anything of us, and as for our shipmates, a willing affectionate service +was their gift, and no more. Looking back, I know in what a wonder-world +I was privileged to live. Vanna could talk with them all. She did not +move apart, a condescending or indifferent foreigner. Kahdra would +come to her knee and prattle to her of the great snake that lived up on +Mahadeo to devour erring boys who omitted their prayers at proper Moslem +intervals. She would sit with the baby in her lap while the mother +busied herself in the sunny bows with the mysterious dishes that smelt +so savory to a hungry man. The cuts, the bruises of the neighbourhood +all came to Vanna for treatment. + +“I am graduating as a nurse,” she would say laughing as she bent over +the lean arm of some weirdly wrinkled old lady, bandaging and soothing +at the same moment. Her reward would be some bit of folk-lore, some +quaintness of gratitude that I noted down in the little book I kept for +remembrance--that I do not need, for every word is in my heart. + +We rowed down through the city next day--Salama rowing, and little +Kahdra lazily paddling at the bow--a wonderful city, with its narrow +ways begrimed with the dirt of ages, and its balconied houses looking +as if disease and sin had soaked into them and given them a vicious +tottering beauty, horrible and yet lovely too. We saw the swarming life +of the bazaar, the white turbans coming and going, diversified by the +rose and yellow Hindu turbans, and the caste-marks, orange and red, on +the dark brows. + +I saw two women--girls--painted and tired like Jezebel, looking out of +one window carved and old, and the grey burnished doves flying about +it. They leaned indolently, like all the old, old wickedness of the East +that yet is ever young--“Flowers of Delight,” with smooth black hair +braided with gold and blossoms, and covered with pale rose veils, and +gold embossed disks swinging like lamps beside the olive cheeks, the +great eyes artificially lengthened and darkened with soorma, and the +curves of the full lips emphasized with vermilion. They looked down +on us with apathy, a dull weariness that held all the old evil of the +wicked humming city. + +It had taken shape in those indolent bodies and heavy eyes that could +flash into life as a snake wakes into fierce darting energy when the +time comes to spring--direct inheritrixes from Lilith, in the fittest +setting in the world--the almost exhausted vice of an Oriental city as +old as time. + +“And look-below here,” said Vanna, pointing to one of the ghauts--long +rugged steps running down to the river. + +“When I came yesterday, a great broken crowd was collected here, almost +shouldering each other into the water where a boat lay rocking. In it +lay the body of a man brutally murdered for the sake of a few rupees and +flung into the river. I could see the poor brown body stark in the boat +with a friend weeping beside it. On the lovely deodar bridge people +leaned over, watching with a grim open-mouthed curiosity, and business +went on gaily where the jewelers make the silver bangles for slender +wrists, and the rows of silver chains that make the necks like ‘the +Tower of Damascus builded for an armory.’ It was all very wild and +cruel. I went down to them-” + +“Vanna--you went down? Horrible!” + +“No, you see I heard them say the wife was almost a child and needs +help. So I went. Once long ago at Peshawar I saw the same thing happen, +and they came and took the child for the service of the gods, for she +was most lovely, and she clung to the feet of a man in terror, and the +priest stabbed her to the heart. She died in my arms. + +“Good God!” I said, shuddering; “what a sight for you! Did they never +hang him?” + +“He was not punished. I told you it was a very long time ago. Her +expression had a brooding quiet as she looked down into the running +river, almost it might be as if she saw the picture of that past misery +in the deep water. She said no more. But in her words and the terrible +crowding of its life, Srinagar seemed to me more of a nightmare than +anything I had seen, excepting only Benares; for the holy Benares is a +memory of horror, with a sense of blood hidden under its frantic crazy +devotion, and not far hidden either. + +“Our own green shade, when we pulled back to it in the evening cool, was +a refuge of unspeakable quiet. She read aloud to me that evening by the +small light of our lamp beneath the trees, and, singularly, she read of +joy. + +“I have drunk of the Cup of the Ineffable, I have found the key of the +Mystery, Travelling by no track I have come to the Sorrowless Land; very +easily has the mercy of the great Lord come upon me. Wonderful is that +Land of rest to which no merit can win. There have I seen joy filled +to the brim, perfection of joy. He dances in rapture and waves of form +arise from His dance. He holds all within his bliss.” + +“What is that?” + +“It is from the songs of the great Indian mystic--Kabir. Let me read you +more. It is like the singing of a lark, lost in the infinite of light +and heaven.” + +So in the soft darkness I heard for the first time those immortal words; +and hearing, a faint glimmer of understanding broke upon me as to +the source of the peace that surrounded her. I had accepted it as an +emanation of her own heart when it was the pulsing of the tide of the +Divine. She read, choosing a verse here and there, and I listened with +absorption. + +Suppose I had been wrong in believing that sorrow is the keynote +of life; that pain is the road of ascent, if road there be; that an +implacable Nature and that only, presides over all our pitiful struggles +and seekings and writes a black “Finis” to the holograph of our +existence? + +What then? What was she teaching me? Was she the Interpreter of a Beauty +eternal in the heavens, and reflected like a broken prism in the beauty +that walked visible beside me? So I listened like a child to an unknown +language, yet ventured my protest. + +“In India, in this wonderful country where men have time and will for +speculation such thoughts may be natural. Can they be found in the +West?” + +“This is from the West--might not Kabir himself have said it? Certainly +he would have felt it. ‘Happy is he who seeks not to understand the +Mystery of God, but who, merging his spirit into Thine, sings to +Thy face, O Lord, like a harp, understanding how difficult it is to +know--how easy to love Thee.’ We debate and argue and the Vision passes +us by. We try to prove it, and kill it in the laboratory of our minds, +when on the altar of our souls it will dwell for ever.” + +Silence--and I pondered. Finally she laid the book aside, and repeated +from memory and in a tone of perfect music; “Kabir says, ‘I shall go +to the House of my Lord with my Love at my side; then shall I sound the +trumpet of triumph.’” + +And when she left me alone in the moonlight silence the old doubts came +back to me--the fear that I saw only through her eyes, and began to +believe in joy only because I loved her. I remember I wrote in the +little book I kept for my stray thoughts, these words which are not mine +but reflect my thought of her; “Thine is the skill of the Fairy Woman, +and the virtue of St. Bride, and the faith of Mary the Mild, and the +gracious way of the Greek woman, and the beauty of lovely Emer, and the +tenderness of heart-sweet Deirdre, and the courage of Maev the great +Queen, and the charm of Mouth-of-Music.” + +Yes, all that and more, but I feared lest I should see the heaven of joy +through her eyes only and find it mirage as I had found so much else. + +SECOND PART Early in the pure dawn the men came and our boat was towed +up into the Dal Lake through crystal waterways and flowery banks, the +men on the path keeping step and straining at the rope until the bronze +muscles stood out on their legs and backs, shouting strong rhythmic +phrases to mark the pull. + +“They shout the Wondrous Names of God--as they are called,” said Vanna +when I asked. “They always do that for a timid effort. Bad shah! The +Lord, the Compassionate, and so on. I don’t think there is any religion +about it but it is as natural to them as One, Two, Three, to us. It +gives a tremendous lift. Watch and see.” + +It was part of the delightful strangeness that we should move to that +strong music. We sat on the upper deck and watched the dream--like +beauty drift slowly by until we emerged beneath a little bridge into the +fairy land of the lake which the Mogul Emperors loved so well that they +made their noble pleasance gardens on the banks, and thought it little +to travel up yearly from far--off Delhi over the snowy Pir Panjal with +their Queens and courts for the perfect summer of Kashmir. + +We moored by a low bank under a great wood of chenar trees, and saw the +little table in the wilderness set in the greenest shade with our chairs +beside it, and my pipe laid reverently upon it by Kahdra. + +Across the glittering water lay on one side the Shalimar Garden known +to all readers of “Lalla Ruhk”--a paradise of roses; and beyond it +again the lovelier gardens of Nour-Mahal, the Light of the Palace, that +imperial woman who ruled India under the weak Emperor’s name--she whose +name he set thus upon his coins: + +“By order of King Jehangir. Gold has a hundred splendours added to it by +receiving the name of Nour-Jahan the Queen.” + +Has any woman ever had a more royal homage than this most royal +lady--known first as Mihr-u-nissa--Sun of Women, and later, Nour-Mahal, +Light of the Palace, and latest, Nour-Jahan-Begam, Queen, Light of the +World? + +Here in these gardens she had lived--had seen the snow mountains change +from the silver of dawn to the illimitable rose of sunset. The life, the +colour beat insistently upon my brain. They built a world of magic where +every moment was pure gold. Surely--surely to Vanna it must be the same. +I believed in my very soul that she who gave and shared such joy could +not be utterly apart from me? Could I then feel certain that I had +gained any ground in these days we had been together? Could she still +define the cruel limits she had laid down, or were her eyes kinder, her +tones a more broken music? I did not know. Whenever I could hazard a +guess the next minute baffled me. + +Just then, in the sunset, she was sitting on deck, singing under her +breath and looking absently away to the Gardens across the Lake. I could +catch the words here and there, and knew them. + + “Pale hands I loved beside the Shalimar, + Where are you now--who lies beneath your spell? + Whom do you lead on Rapture’s roadway far, + Before you agonize them in farewell?” + +“Don’t!” I said abruptly. It stung me. + +“What?” she asked in surprise. “That is the song every one remembers +here. Poor Laurence Hope! How she knew and loved this India! What are +you grumbling at?” + +Her smile stung me. + +“Never mind,” I said morosely. “You don’t understand. You never will.” + +And yet I believed sometimes that she would--that time was on my side. + +When Kahdra and I pulled her across to Nour-Mahal’s garden next day, how +could I not believe it--her face was so full of joy as she looked at me +for sympathy? + +“I don’t think so much beauty is crowded into any other few miles in +the world--beauty of association, history, nature, everything!” she said +with shining eyes. “The lotus flowers are not out yet but when they come +that is the last touch of perfection. Do you remember Homer--‘But whoso +ate of the honey-sweet fruit of the lotus, was neither willing to bring +me word again, nor to depart. Nay, their desire was to remain there +for ever, feeding on the lotus with the Lotus Eaters, forgetful of all +return.’ You know the people here eat the roots and seeds? I ate them +last year and perhaps that is why I cannot stay away. But look at +Nour-Mahal’s garden!” + +We were pulling in among the reeds and the huge carven leaves of the +water plants, and the snake-headed buds lolling upon them with the +slippery half-sinister look that water-flowers have, as though their +cold secret life belonged to the hidden water world and not to ours. But +now the boat was touching the little wooden steps. + +O beautiful--most beautiful the green lawns, shaded with huge pyramids +of the chenar trees, the terraced gardens where the marble steps climbed +from one to the other, and the mountain streams flashed singing and +shining down the carved marble slopes that cunning hands had made to +delight the Empress of Beauty, between the wildernesses of roses. Her +pavilion stands still among the flowers, and the waters ripple through +it to join the lake--and she is--where? Even in the glory of sunshine +the passing of all fair things was present with me as I saw the empty +shell that had held the Pearl of Empire, and her roses that still bloom, +her waters that still sing for others. + +The spray of a hundred fountains was misty diamond dust in the warm air +laden with the scent of myriad flowers. Kahdra followed us everywhere, +singing his little tuneless happy song. The world brimmed with beauty +and joy. And we were together. Words broke from me. + +“Vanna, let it be for ever! Let us live here. I’ll give up all the world +for this and you.” + +“But you see,” she said delicately, “it would be ‘giving up.’ You use +the right word. It is not your life. It is a lovely holiday, no more. +You would weary of it. You would want the city life and your own kind.” + +I protested with all my soul. + +“No. Indeed I will say frankly that it would be lowering yourself to +live a lotus-eating life among my people. It is a life with which you +have no tie. A Westerner who lives like that steps down; he loses his +birthright just as an Oriental does who Europeanizes himself. He cannot +live your life nor you his. If you had work here it would be different. +No--six or eight weeks more; then go away and forget it.” + +I turned from her. The serpent was in Paradise. When is he absent? + +On one of the terraces a man was beating a tom-tom, and veiled women +listened, grouped about him in brilliant colours. + +“Isn’t that all India?” she said; “that dull reiterated sound? It +half stupefies, half maddens. Once at Darjiling I saw the Lamas’ Devil +Dance--the soul, a white-faced child with eyes unnaturally enlarged, +fleeing among a rabble of devils--the evil passions. It fled wildly +here and there and every way was blocked. The child fell on its knees, +screaming dumbly--you could see the despair in the staring eyes, but +all was drowned in the thunder of Tibetan drums. No mercy--no escape. +Horrible!” + +“Even in Europe the drum is awful,” I said. “Do you remember in the +French Revolution how they Drowned the victims’ voices in a thunder roll +of drums?” + +“I shall always see the face of the child, hunted down to hell, falling +on its knees, and screaming without a sound, when I hear the drum. But +listen--a flute! Now if that were the Flute of Krishna you would have to +follow. Let us come!” + +I could hear nothing of it, but she insisted and we followed the music, +inaudible to me, up the slopes of the garden that is the foot-hill of +the mighty mountain of Mahadeo, and still I could hear nothing. And +Vanna told me strange stories of the Apollo of India whom all hearts +must adore, even as the herd-girls adored him in his golden youth by +Jumna river and in the pastures of Brindaban. + +Next day we were climbing the hill to the ruins where the evil magician +brought the King’s daughter nightly to his will, flying low under a +golden moon. Vanna took my arm and I pulled her laughing up the steepest +flowery slopes until we reached the height, and lo! the arched windows +were eyeless and a lonely breeze blowing through the cloisters, and the +beautiful yellowish stone arches supported nothing and were but frames +for the blue of far lake and mountain and the divine sky. We climbed +the broken stairs where the lizards went by like flashes, and had I the +tongue of men and angels I could not tell the wonder that lay before +us,--the whole wide valley of Kashmir in summer glory, with its scented +breeze singing, singing above it. + +We sat on the crushed aromatic herbs and among the wild roses and looked +down. + +“To think,” she said, “that we might have died and never seen it!” + +There followed a long silence. I thought she was tired, and would not +break it. Suddenly she spoke in a strange voice, low and toneless; + +“The story of this place. She was the Princess Padmavati, and her home +was in Ayodhya. When she woke and found herself here by the lake she was +so terrified that she flung herself in and was drowned. They held her +back, but she died.” + +“How do you know?” + +“Because a wandering monk came to the abbey of Tahkt-i-Bahi near +Peshawar and told Vasettha the Abbot.” + +I had nearly spoilt all by an exclamation, but I held myself back. I saw +she was dreaming awake and was unconscious of what she said. + +“The Abbot said, ‘Do not describe her. What talk is this for holy men? +The young monks must not hear. Some of them have never seen a woman. +Should a monk speak of such toys?’ But the wanderer disobeyed and spoke, +and there was a great tumult, and the monks threw him out at the command +of the young Abbot, and he wandered down to Peshawar, and it was he +later--the evil one!--that brought his sister, Lilavanti the Dancer, to +Peshawar, and the Abbot fell into her snare. That was his revenge!” + +Her face was fixed and strange, for a moment her cheek looked hollow, +her eyes dim and grief-worn. What was she seeing?--what remembering? Was +it a story--a memory? What was it? + +“She was beautiful?” I prompted. + +“Men have said so, but for it he surrendered the Peace. Do not speak of +her accursed beauty.” + +Her voice died away to a drowsy murmur; her head dropped on my shoulder +and for the mere delight of contact I sat still and scarcely breathed, +praying that she might speak again, but the good minute was gone. She +drew one or two deep breaths, and sat up with a bewildered look that +quickly passed. + +“I was quite sleepy for a minute. The climb was so strenuous. Hark--I +hear the Flute of Krishna again.” + +And again I could hear nothing, but she said it was sounding from the +trees at the base of the hill. Later when we climbed down I found she +was right--that a peasant lad, dark and amazingly beautiful as +these Kashmiris often are, was playing on the flute to a girl at his +feet--looking up at him with rapt eyes. He flung Vanna a flower as we +passed. She caught it and put it in her bosom. A singular blossom, three +petals of purest white, set against three leaves of purest green, and +lower down the stem the three green leaves were repeated. It was still +in her bosom after dinner, and I looked at it more closely. + +“That is a curious flower,” I said. “Three and three and three. Nine. +That makes the mystic number. I never saw a purer white. What is it?” + +“Of course it is mystic,” she said seriously. “It is the Ninefold +Flower. You saw who gave it?” + +“That peasant lad.” + +She smiled. + +“You will see more some day. Some might not even have seen that.” + +“Does it grow here?” + +“This is the first I have seen. It is said to grow only where the gods +walk. Do you know that throughout all India Kashmir is said to be holy +ground? It was called long ago the land of the gods, and of strange, but +not evil, sorceries. Great marvels were seen here.” + +I felt the labyrinthine enchantments of that enchanted land were closing +about me--a slender web, grey, almost impalpable, finer than fairy silk, +was winding itself about my feet. My eyes were opening to things I had +not dreamed. She saw my thought. + +“Yes, you could not have seen even that much of him in Peshawar. You did +not know then.” + +“He was not there,” I answered, falling half unconsciously into her +tone. + +“He is always there--everywhere, and when he plays, all who hear must +follow. He was the Pied Piper in Hamelin, he was Pan in Hellas. You +will hear his wild fluting in many strange places when you know how to +listen. When one has seen him the rest comes soon. And then you will +follow.” + +“Not away from you, Vanna.” + +“From the marriage feast, from the Table of the Lord,” she said, smiling +strangely. “The man who wrote that spoke of another call, but it is the +same--Krishna or Christ. When we hear the music we follow. And we may +lose or gain heaven.” + +It might have been her compelling personality--it might have been the +marvels of beauty about me, but I knew well I had entered at some mystic +gate. A pass word had been spoken for me--I was vouched for and might go +in. Only a little way as yet. Enchanted forests lay beyond, and perilous +seas, but there were hints, breaths like the wafting of the garments of +unspeakable Presences. My talk with Vanna grew less personal, and more +introspective. I felt the touch of her finger-tips leading me along +the ways of Quiet--my feet brushed a shining dew. Once, in the twilight +under the chenar trees, I saw a white gleaming and thought it a swiftly +passing Being, but when in haste I gained the tree I found there only +a Ninefold flower, white as a spirit in the evening calm. I would not +gather it but told Vanna what I had seen. + +“You nearly saw;” she said. “She passed so quickly. It was the Snowy +One, Uma, Parvati, the Daughter of the Himalaya. That mountain is the +mountain of her lord--Shiva. It is natural she should be here. I saw her +last night lean over the height--her face pillowed on her folded arms, +with a low star in the mists of her hair. Her eyes were like lakes of +blue darkness. Vast and wonderful. She is the Mystic Mother of India. +You will see soon. You could not have seen the flower until now.” + +“Do you know,” she added, “that in the mountains there are poppies of +clear blue--blue as turquoise. We will go up into the heights and find +them.” + +And next moment she was planning the camping details, the men, the +ponies, with a practical zest that seemed to relegate the occult to the +absurd. Yet the very next day came a wonderful moment. + +The sun was just setting and, as it were, suddenly the purple glooms +banked up heavy with thunder. The sky was black with fury, the earth +passive with dread. I never saw such lightning--it was continuous and +tore in zigzag flashes down the mountains like rents in the substance +of the world’s fabric. And the thunder roared up in the mountain gorges +with shattering echoes. Then fell the rain, and the whole lake seemed to +rise to meet it, and the noise was like the rattle of musketry. We were +standing by the cabin window and she suddenly caught my hand, and I +saw in a light of their own two dancing figures on the tormented water +before us. Wild in the tumult, embodied delight, with arms tossed +violently above their heads, and feet flung up behind them, skimming the +waves like seagulls, they passed. Their sex I could not tell--I think +they had none, but were bubble emanations of the rejoicing rush of the +rain and the wild retreating laughter of the thunder. I saw the fierce +aerial faces and their inhuman glee as they fled by, and she dropped my +hand and they were gone. Slowly the storm lessened, and in the west the +clouds tore raggedly asunder and a flood of livid yellow light poured +down upon the lake--an awful light that struck it into an abyss of fire. +Then, as if at a word of command, two glorious rainbows sprang across +the water with the mountains for their piers, each with its proper +colours chorded. They made a Bridge of Dread that stood out radiant +against the background of storm--the Twilight of the Gods, and the +doomed gods marching forth to the last fight. And the thunder growled +sullenly away into the recesses of the hill and the terrible rainbows +faded until the stars came quietly out and it was a still night. + +But I had seen that what is our dread is the joy of the spirits of the +Mighty Mother, and though the vision faded and I doubted what I had +seen, it prepared the way for what I was yet to see. A few days later we +started on what was to be the most exquisite memory of my life. A train +of ponies carried our tents and camping necessaries and there was a +pony for each of us. And so, in the cool grey of a divine morning, with +little rosy clouds flecking the eastern sky, we set out from Islamabad +for Vernag. And this was the order of our going. She and I led the way, +attended by a sais (groom) and a coolie carrying the luncheon basket. +Half way we would stop in some green dell, or by some rushing stream, +and there rest and eat our little meal while the rest of the cavalcade +passed on to the appointed camping place, and in the late afternoon we +would follow, riding slowly, and find the tents pitched and the kitchen +department in full swing. If the place pleased us we lingered for some +days;--if not, the camp was struck next morning, and again we wandered +in search of beauty. + +The people were no inconsiderable part of my joy. I cannot see what they +have to gain from such civilization as ours--a kindly people and happy. +Courtesy and friendliness met us everywhere, and if their labor was +hard, their harvest of beauty and laughter seemed to be its reward. The +little villages with their groves of walnut and fruit trees spoke of no +unfulfilled want, the mulberries which fatten the sleek bears in their +season fattened the children too. I compared their lot with that of +the toilers in our cities and knew which I would choose. We rode by +shimmering fields of barley, with red poppies floating in the clear +transparent green as in deep sea water, through fields of millet like +the sky fallen on the earth, so innocently blue were its blossoms, +and the trees above us were trellised with the wild roses, golden and +crimson, and the ways tapestried with the scented stars of the large +white jasmine. + +It was strange that later much of what she said, escaped me. Some I +noted down at the time, but there were hints, shadows of lovelier things +beyond that eluded all but the fringes of memory when I tried to piece +them together and make a coherence of a living wonder. For that reason, +the best things cannot be told in this history. It is only the cruder, +grosser matters that words will hold. The half-touchings--vanishing +looks, breaths--O God, I know them, but cannot tell. + +In the smaller villages, the head man came often to greet us and make +us welcome, bearing on a flat dish a little offering of cakes and fruit, +the produce of the place. One evening a man so approached, stately +in white robes and turban, attended by a little lad who carried the +patriarchal gift beside him. Our tents were pitched under a glorious +walnut tree with a running stream at our feet. + +Vanna of course, was the interpreter, and I called her from her tent as +the man stood salaaming before me. It was strange that when she came, +dressed in white, he stopped in his salutation, and gazed at her in +what, I thought, was silent wonder. + +She spoke earnestly to him, standing before him with clasped hands, +almost, I could think, in the attitude of a suppliant. The man listened +gravely, with only an interjection, now and again, and once he turned +and looked curiously at me. Then he spoke, evidently making some +announcement which she received with bowed head--and when he turned to +go with a grave salute, she performed a very singular ceremony, moving +slowly round him three times with clasped hands; keeping him always on +the right. He repaid it with the usual salaam and greeting of peace, +which he bestowed also on me, and then departed in deep meditation, his +eyes fixed on the ground. I ventured to ask what it all meant, and she +looked thoughtfully at me before replying. + +“It was a strange thing. I fear you will not altogether understand, +but I will tell you what I can. That man though living here among +Mahomedans, is a Brahman from Benares, and, what is very rare in India, +a Buddhist. And when he saw me he believed he remembered me in a former +birth. The ceremony you saw me perform is one of honour in India. It was +his due.” + +“Did you remember him?” I knew my voice was incredulous. + +“Very well. He has changed little but is further on the upward path. I +saw him with dread for he holds the memory of a great wrong I did. Yet +he told me a thing that has filled my heart with joy.” + +“Vanna-what is it?” + +She had a clear uplifted look which startled me. There was suddenly a +chill air blowing between us. + +“I must not tell you yet but you will know soon. He was a good man. I am +glad we have met.” + +She buried herself in writing in a small book I had noticed and longed +to look into, and no more was said. + +We struck camp next day and trekked on towards Vernag--a rough march, +but one of great beauty, beneath the shade of forest trees, garlanded +with pale roses that climbed from bough to bough and tossed triumphant +wreaths into the uppermost blue. + +In the afternoon thunder was flapping its wings far off in the mountains +and a little rain fell while we were lunching under a big tree. I was +considering anxiously how to shelter Vanna, when a farmer invited us to +his house--a scene of Biblical hospitality that delighted us both. He +led us up some break-neck little stairs to a large bare room, open to +the clean air all round the roof, and with a kind of rough enclosure on +the wooden floor where the family slept at night. There he opened our +basket, and then, with anxious care, hung clothes and rough draperies +about us that our meal might be unwatched by one or two friends who had +followed us in with breathless interest. Still further to entertain us +a great rarity was brought out and laid at Vanna’s feet as something +we might like to watch--a curious bird in a cage, with brightly barred +wings and a singular cry. She fed it with fruit, and it fluttered to her +hand. Just so Abraham might have welcomed his guests, and when we left +with words of deepest gratitude, our host made the beautiful obeisance +of touching his forehead with joined hands as he bowed. To me the whole +incident had an extraordinary grace, and ennobled both host and guest. +But we met an ascending scale of loveliness so varied in its aspects +that I passed from one emotion to another and knew no sameness. + +That afternoon the camp was pitched at the foot of a mighty hill, under +the waving pyramids of the chenars, sweeping their green like the robes +of a goddess. Near by was a half circle of low arches falling into +ruin, and as we went in among them I beheld a wondrous sight--the huge +octagonal tank or basin made by the Mogul Emperor Jehangir to receive +the waters of a mighty Spring which wells from the hill and has been +held sacred by Hindu and Moslem. And if loveliness can sanctify surely +it is sacred indeed. + +The tank was more than a hundred feet in diameter and circled by a +roughly paved pathway where the little arched cells open that the +devotees may sit and contemplate the lustral waters. There on a black +stone, is sculptured the Imperial inscription comparing this spring to +the holier wells of Paradise, and I thought no less of it, for it rushes +straight from the rock with no aiding stream, and its waters are fifty +feet deep, and sweep away from this great basin through beautiful low +arches in a wild foaming river--the crystal life-blood of the mountains +for ever welling away. The colour and perfect purity of this living +jewel were most marvellous--clear blue-green like a chalcedony, but +changing as the lights in an opal--a wonderful quivering brilliance, +flickering with the silver of shoals of sacred fish. + +But the Mogul Empire is with the snows of yesteryear and the wonder has +passed from the Moslems into the keeping of the Hindus once more, and +the Lingam of Shiva, crowned with flowers, is the symbol in the little +shrine by the entrance. Surely in India, the gods are one and have no +jealousies among them--so swiftly do their glories merge the one into +the other. + +“How all the Mogul Emperors loved running water,” said Vanna. “I can see +them leaning over it in their carved pavilions with delicate dark faces +and pensive eyes beneath their turbans, lost in the endless reverie of +the East while liquid melody passes into their dream. It was the music +they best loved.” + +She was leading me into the royal garden below, where the young river +flows beneath the pavilion set above and across the rush of the water. + +“I remember before I came to India,” she went on, “there were +certain words and phrases that meant the whole East to me. It was an +enchantment. The first flash picture I had was Milton’s-- + + ‘Dark faces with white silken turbans wreathed.’ + +and it still is. I have thought ever since that every man should wear a +turban. It dignifies the un-comeliest and it is quite curious to see how +many inches a man descends in the scale of beauty the moment he takes it +off and you see only the skull-cap about which they wind it. They wind +it with wonderful skill too. I have seen a man take eighteen yards of +muslin and throw it round his head with a few turns, and in five or six +minutes the beautiful folds were all in order and he looked like a king. +Some of the Gujars here wear black ones and they are very effective and +worth painting--the black folds and the sullen tempestuous black brows +underneath.” + +We sat in the pavilion for awhile looking down on the rushing water, and +she spoke of Akbar, the greatest of the Moguls, and spoke with a curious +personal touch, as I thought. + +“I wish you would try to write a story of him--one on more human lines +than has been done yet. No one has accounted for the passionate quest +of truth that was the real secret of his life. Strange in an Oriental +despot if you think of it! It really can only be understood from the +Buddhist belief, which curiously seems to have been the only one he +neglected, that a mysterious Karma influenced all his thoughts. If I +tell you as a key-note for your story, that in a past life he had been a +Buddhist priest--one who had fallen away, would that in any way account +to you for attempts to recover the lost way? Try to think that out, and +to write the story, not as a Western mind sees it, but pure East.” + +“That would be a great book to write if one could catch the voices of +the past. But how to do it?” + +“I will give you one day a little book that may help you. The other +story I wish you would write is the story of a Dancer of Peshawar. There +is a connection between the two--a story of ruin and repentance.” + +“Will you tell it to me?” + +“A part. In this same book you will find much more, but not all. All +cannot be told. You must imagine much. But I think your imagination will +be true.” + +“Why do you think so?” + +“Because in these few days you have learnt so much. You have seen the +Ninefold Flower, and the rain spirits. You will soon hear the Flute of +Krishna which none can hear who cannot dream true.” + +That night I heard it. I waked, suddenly, to music, and standing in the +door of my tent, in the dead silence of the night, lit only by a few low +stars, I heard the poignant notes of a flute. If it had called my name +it could not have summoned me more clearly, and I followed without a +thought of delay, forgetting even Vanna in the strange urgency that +filled me. The music was elusive, seeming to come first from one side, +then from the other, but finally I tracked it as a bee does a flower by +the scent, to the gate of the royal garden--the pleasure place of the +dead Emperors. + +The gate stood ajar--strange! for I had seen the custodian close it that +evening. Now it stood wide and I went in, walking noiselessly over the +dewy grass. I knew and could not tell how, that I must be noiseless. +Passing as if I were guided, down the course of the strong young river, +I came to the pavilion that spanned it--the place where we had stood +that afternoon--and there to my profound amazement, I saw Vanna, leaning +against a slight wooden pillar. As if she had expected me, she laid one +finger on her lip, and stretching out her hand, took mine and drew me +beside her as a mother might a child. And instantly I saw! + +On the further bank a young man in a strange diadem or miter of jewels, +bare-breasted and beautiful, stood among the flowering oleanders, one +foot lightly crossed over the other as he stood. He was like an image +of pale radiant gold, and I could have sworn that the light came from +within rather than fell upon him, for the night was very dark. He held +the flute to his lips, and as I looked, I became aware that the noise +of the rushing water was tapering off into a murmur scarcely louder than +that of a summer bee in the heart of a rose. Therefore the music rose +like a fountain of crystal drops, cold, clear, and of an entrancing +sweetness, and the face above it was such that I had no power to turn my +eyes away. How shall I say what it was? All I had ever desired, dreamed, +hoped, prayed, looked at me from the remote beauty of the eyes and with +the most persuasive gentleness entreated me, rather than commanded to +follow fearlessly and win. But these are words, and words shaped in the +rough mould of thought cannot convey the deep desire that would have +hurled me to his feet if Vanna had not held me with a firm restraining +hand. Looking up in adoring love to the dark face was a ring of woodland +creatures. I thought I could distinguish the white clouded robe of a +snow-leopard, the soft clumsiness of a young bear, and many more, but +these shifted and blurred like dream creatures--I could not be sure of +them nor define their numbers. The eyes of the Player looked down upon +their passionate delight with careless kindness. + +Dim images passed through my mind. Orpheus--No, this was no Greek. +Pan-yet again, No. Where were the pipes, the goat hoofs? The young +Dionysos--No, there were strange jewels instead of his vines. And then +Vanna’s voice said as if from a great distance; + +“Krishna--the Beloved.” And I said aloud, “I see!” And even as I said it +the whole picture blurred together like a dream, and I was alone in the +pavilion and the water was foaming past me. Had I walked in my sleep, I +thought, as I made my way hack? As I gained the garden gate, before me, +like a snowflake, I saw the Ninefold Flower. + +When I told her next day, speaking of it as a dream, she said simply; +“They have opened the door to you. You will not need me soon. + +“I shall always need you. You have taught me everything. I could see +nothing last night until you took my hand.” + +“I was not there,” she said smiling. “It was only the thought of me, and +you can have that when I am very far away. I was sleeping in my tent. +What you called in me then you can always call, even if I am--dead.” + +“That is a word which is beginning to have no meaning for me. You have +said things to me--no, thought them, that have made me doubt if there is +room in the universe for the thing we have called death.” + +She smiled her sweet wise smile. + +“Where we are death is not. Where death is we are not. But you will +understand better soon.” + +Our march curving took us by the Mogul gardens of Achibal, and the +glorious ruins of the great Temple at Martund, and so down to Bawan +with its crystal waters and that loveliest camping ground beside them. +A mighty grove of chenar trees, so huge that I felt as if we were in a +great sea cave where the air is dyed with the deep shadowy green of the +inmost ocean, and the murmuring of the myriad leaves was like a sea at +rest. I looked up into the noble height and my memory of Westminster +dwindled, for this led on and up to the infinite blue, and at night +the stars hung like fruit upon the branches. The water ran with a great +joyous rush of release from the mountain behind, but was first received +in a broad basin full of sacred fish and reflecting a little temple of +Maheshwara and one of Surya the Sun. Here in this basin the water lay +pure and still as an ecstasy, and beside it was musing the young Brahman +priest who served the temple. Since I had joined Vanna I had begun with +her help to study a little Hindustani, and with an aptitude for language +could understand here and there. I caught a word or two as she spoke +with him that startled me, when the high-bred ascetic face turned +serenely upon her, and he addressed her as “My sister,” adding a +sentence beyond my learning, but which she willingly translated +later.--“May He who sits above the Mysteries, have mercy upon thy +rebirth.” + +She said afterwards; + +“How beautiful some of these men are. It seems a different type of +beauty from ours, nearer to nature and the old gods. Look at that +priest--the tall figure, the clear olive skin, the dark level brows, the +long lashes that make a soft gloom about the eyes--eyes that have the +fathomless depth of a deer’s, the proud arch of the lip. I think there +is no country where aristocracy is more clearly marked than in India. +The Brahmans are aristocrats of the world. You see it is a religious +aristocracy as well. It has everything that can foster pride and +exclusiveness. They spring from the Mouth of Deity. They are His word +incarnate. Not many kings are of the Brahman caste, and the Brahmans +look down upon them from Sovereign heights. I have known men who would +not eat with their own rulers who would have drunk the water that washed +the Brahmans’ feet.” + +She took me that day, the Brahman with us, to see a cave in the +mountain. We climbed up the face of the cliff to where a little tree +grew on a ledge, and the black mouth yawned. We went in and often it was +so low we had to stoop, leaving the sunlight behind until it was like +a dim eye glimmering in the velvet blackness. The air was dank and +cold and presently obscene with the smell of bats, and alive with +their wings, as they came sweeping about us, gibbering and squeaking. +I thought of the rush of the ghosts, blown like dead leaves in the +Odyssey. And then a small rock chamber branched off, and in this, lit by +a bit of burning wood, we saw the bones of a holy man who lived and died +there four hundred years ago. Think of it! He lived there always, with +the slow dropping of water from the dead weight of the mountain above +his head, drop by drop tolling the minutes away: the little groping feet +through the cave that would bring him food and drink, hurrying into +the warmth and sunlight again, and his only companion the sacred Lingam +which means the Creative Energy that sets the worlds dancing for joy +round the sun--that, and the black solitude to sit down beside him. +Surely his bones can hardly be dryer and colder now than they were then! +There must be strange ecstasies in such a life--wild visions in the +dark, or it could never be endured. + +And so, in marches of about ten miles a day, we came to Pahlgam on the +banks of the dancing Lidar. There was now only three weeks left of the +time she had promised. After a few days at Pahlgam the march would turn +and bend its way back to Srinagar, and to--what? I could not believe it +was to separation--in her lovely kindness she had grown so close to me +that, even for the sake of friendship, I believed our paths must run +together to the end, and there were moments when I could still half +convince myself that I had grown as necessary to her as she was to me. +No--not as necessary, for she was life and soul to me, but a part of her +daily experience that she valued and would not easily part with. That +evening we were sitting outside the tents, near the camp fire, of pine +logs and cones, the leaping flames making the night beautiful with gold +and leaping sparks, in an attempt to reach the mellow splendours of the +moon. The men, in various attitudes of rest, were lying about, and one +had been telling a story which had just ended in excitement and loud +applause. + +“These are Mahomedans,” said Vanna, “and it is only a story of love and +fighting like the Arabian Nights. If they had been Hindus, it might +well have been of Krishna or of Rama and Sita. Their faith comes from an +earlier time and they still see visions. The Moslem is a hard practical +faith for men--men of the world too. It is not visionary now, though it +once had its great mysteries.” + +“I wish you would tell me what you think of the visions or apparitions +of the gods that are seen here. Is it all illusion? Tell me your +thought.” + +“How difficult that is to answer. I suppose if love and faith are strong +enough they will always create the vibrations to which the greater +vibrations respond, and so make God in their own image at any time or +place. But that they call up what is the truest reality I have never +doubted. There is no shadow without a substance. The substance is beyond +us but under certain conditions the shadow is projected and we see it. + +“Have I seen or has it been dream?” + +“I cannot tell. It may have been the impress of my mind on yours, for I +see such things always. You say I took your hand?” + +“Take it now.” + +She obeyed, and instantly, as I felt the firm cool clasp, I heard the +rain of music through the pines--the Flute Player was passing. She +dropped it smiling and the sweet sound ceased. + +“You see! How can I tell what you have seen? You will know better when I +am gone. You will stand alone then.” + +“You will not go--you cannot. I have seen how you have loved all this +wonderful time. I believe it has been as dear to you as to me. And every +day I have loved you more. I depend upon you for everything that makes +life worth living. You could not--you who are so gentle--you could not +commit the senseless cruelty of leaving me when you have taught me to +love you with every beat of my heart. I have been patient--I have held +myself in, but I must speak now. Marry me, and teach me. I know nothing. +You know all I need to know. For pity’s sake be my wife.” + +I had not meant to say it; it broke from me in the firelight moonlight +with a power that I could not stay. She looked at me with a disarming +gentleness. + +“Is this fair? Do you remember how at Peshawar I told you I thought it +was a dangerous experiment, and that it would make things harder for +you. But you took the risk like a brave man because you felt there were +things to be gained--knowledge, insight, beauty. Have you not gained +them?” + +“Yes. Absolutely.” + +“Then, is it all loss if I go?” + +“Not all. But loss I dare not face.” + +“I will tell you this. I could not stay if I would. Do you remember the +old man on the way to Vernag? He told me that I must very soon take up +an entirely new life. I have no choice, though if I had I would still do +it.” + +There was silence and down a long arcade, without any touch of her hand +I heard the music, receding with exquisite modulations to a very great +distance, and between the pillared stems, I saw a faint light. + +“Do you wish to go?” + +“Entirely. But I shall not forget you, Stephen. I will tell you +something. For me, since I came to India, the gate that shuts us out at +birth has opened. How shall I explain? Do you remember Kipling’s ‘Finest +Story in the World’?” + +“Yes. Fiction!” + +“Not fiction--true, whether he knew it or no. But for me the door has +opened wide. First, I remembered piecemeal, with wide gaps, then more +connectedly. Then, at the end of the first year, I met one day at +Cawnpore, an ascetic, an old man of great beauty and wisdom, and he was +able by his own knowledge to enlighten mine. Not wholly--much has come +since then. Has come, some of it in ways you could not understand +now, but much by direct sight and hearing. Long, long ago I lived in +Peshawar, and my story was a sorrowful one. I will tell you a little +before I go.” + +“I hold you to your promise. What is there I cannot believe when you +tell me? But does that life put you altogether away from me? Was there +no place for me in any of your memories that has drawn us together now? +Give me a little hope that in the eternal pilgrimage there is some bond +between us and some rebirth where we may met again.” + +“I will tell you that also before we part. I have grown to believe that +you do love me--and therefore love something which is infinitely above +me.” + +“And do you love me at all? Am I nothing, Vanna--Vanna?” + +“My friend,” she said, and laid her hand on mine. + +A silence, and then she spoke, very low. + +“You must be prepared for very great change, Stephen, and yet believe +that it does not really change things at all. See how even the gods pass +and do not change! The early gods of India are gone and Shiva, Vishnu, +Krishna have taken their places and are one and the same. The old +Buddhist stories say that in heaven “The flowers of the garland the +God wore are withered, his robes of majesty are waxed old and faded; +he falls from his high estate, and is re-born into a new life.” But he +lives still in the young God who is born among men. The gods cannot die, +nor can we nor anything that has life. Now I must go in.” + +I sat long in the moonlight thinking. The whole camp was sunk in sleep +and the young dawn was waking upon the peaks when I turned in. + +The days that were left we spent in wandering up the Lidar River to the +hills that are the first ramp of the ascent to the great heights. +We found the damp corners where the mushrooms grow like pearls--the +mushrooms of which she said--“To me they have always been fairy things. +To see them in the silver-grey dew of the early mornings--mysteriously +there like the manna in the desert--they are elfin plunder, and as a +child I was half afraid of them. No wonder they are the darlings of +folklore, especially in Celtic countries where the Little People move in +the starlight. Strange to think they are here too among strange gods!” + +We climbed to where the wild peonies bloom in glory that few eyes see, +and the rosy beds of wild sweet strawberries ripen. Every hour brought +with it some new delight, some exquisiteness of sight or of words that +I shall remember for ever. She sat one day on a rock, holding the +sculptured leaves and massive seed-vessels of some glorious plant that +the Kashmiris believe has magic virtues hidden in the seeds of pure rose +embedded in the white down. + +“If you fast for three days and eat nine of these in the Night of No +Moon, you can rise on the air light as thistledown and stand on the peak +of Haramoukh. And on Haramoukh, as you know it is believed, the gods +dwell. There was a man here who tried this enchantment. He was a changed +man for ever after, wandering and muttering to himself and avoiding all +human intercourse as far as he could. He was no Kashmiri--A Jat from the +Punjab, and they showed him to me when I was here with the Meryons, and +told me he would speak to none. But I knew he would speak to me, and he +did.” + +“Did he tell you anything of what he had seen in the high world up +yonder?” + +“He said he had seen the Dream of the God. I could not get more than +that. But there are many people here who believe that the Universe as +we know it is but an image in the dream of Ishvara, the Universal +Spirit--in whom are all the gods--and that when He ceases to dream we +pass again into the Night of Brahm, and all is darkness until the Spirit +of God moves again on the face of the waters. There are few temples to +Brahm. He is above and beyond all direct worship.” + +“Do you think he had seen anything?” + +“What do I know? Will you eat the seeds? The Night of No Moon will soon +be here.” + +She held out the seed-vessels, laughing. I write that down but how +record the lovely light of kindliness in her eyes--the almost submissive +gentleness that yet was a defense stronger than steel. I never knew--how +should I?--whether she was sitting by my side or heavens away from me in +her own strange world. But always she was a sweetness that I could not +reach, a cup of nectar that I might not drink, unalterably her own and +never mine, and yet--my friend. + +She showed me the wild track up into the mountains where the Pilgrims go +to pay their devotions at the Great God’s shrine in the awful heights, +regretting that we were too early for that most wonderful sight. Above +where we were sitting the river fell in a tormented white cascade, +crashing and feathering into spray-dust of diamonds. An eagle was +flying above it with a mighty spread of wings that seemed almost +double-jointed in the middle--they curved and flapped so wide and free. +The fierce head was outstretched with the rake of a plundering galley as +he swept down the wind, seeking his meat from God, and passed majestic +from our sight. The valley beneath us was littered with enormous +boulders spilt from the ancient hollows of the hills. It must have +been a great sight when the giants set them trundling down in work +or play!--I said this to Vanna, who was looking down upon it with +meditative eyes. She roused herself. + +“Yes, this really is Giant-Land up here--everything is so huge. And when +they quarrel up in the heights--in Jotunheim--and the black storms +come down the valleys it is like colossal laughter or clumsy boisterous +anger. And the Frost giants are still at work up there with their great +axes of frost and rain. They fling down the side of a mountain or make +fresh ways for the rivers. About sixty years ago--far above here--they +tore down a mountain side and damned up the mighty Indus, so that for +months he was a lake, shut back in the hills. But the river giants are +no less strong up here in the heights of the world, and lie lay brooding +and hiding his time. And then one awful day he tore the barrier down and +roared down the valley carrying death and ruin with him, and swept away +a whole Sikh army among other unconsidered trifles. That must have been +a soul-shaking sight.” + +She spoke on, and as she spoke I saw. What are her words as I record +them? Stray dead leaves pressed in a book--the life and grace dead. Yet +I record, for she taught me what I believe the world should learn, that +the Buddhist philosophers are right when they teach that all forms of +what we call matter are really but aggregates of spiritual units, and +that life itself is a curtain hiding reality as the vast veil of +day conceals from our sight the countless orbs of space. So that the +purified mind even while prisoned in the body, may enter into union with +the Real and, according to attainment, see it as it is. + +She was an interpreter because she believed this truth profoundly. She +saw the spiritual essence beneath the lovely illusion of matter, and the +air about her was radiant with the motion of strange forces for which +the dull world has many names aiming indeed at the truth, but falling--O +how far short of her calm perception! She was indeed of a Household +higher than the Household of Faith. She had received enlightenment. She +beheld with open eyes. + +Next day our camp was struck and we turned our faces again to Srinagar +and to the day of parting. I set down but one strange incident of our +journey, of which I did not speak even to her. + +We were camping at Bijbehara, awaiting our house boat, and the site was +by the Maharaja’s lodge above the little town. It was midnight and I was +sleepless--the shadow of the near future was upon me. I wandered down to +the lovely old wooded bridge across the Jhelum, where the strong young +trees grow up from the piles. Beyond it the moon was shining on the +ancient Hindu remains close to the new temple, and as I stood on the +bridge I could see the figure of a man in deepest meditation by the +ruins. He was no European. I saw the straight dignified folds of the +robes. But it was not surprising he should be there and I should have +thought no more of it, had I not heard at that instant from the further +side of the river the music of the Flute. I cannot hope to describe +that music to any who have not heard it. Suffice it to say that where +it calls he who hears must follow whether in the body or the spirit. Nor +can I now tell in which I followed. One day it will call me across the +River of Death, and I shall ford it or sink in the immeasurable depths +and either will be well. + +But immediately I was at the other side of the river, standing by the +stone Bull of Shiva where he kneels before the Symbol, and looking +steadfastly upon me a few paces away was a man in the dress of a +Buddhist monk. He wore the yellow robe that leaves one shoulder bare; +his head was bare also and he held in one hand a small bowl like a +stemless chalice. I knew I was seeing a very strange inexplicable +sight--one that in Kashmir should be incredible, but I put wonder aside +for I knew now that I was moving in the sphere where the incredible may +well be the actual. His expression was of the most unbroken calm. If I +compare it to the passionless gaze of the Sphinx I misrepresent, for the +Riddle of the Sphinx still awaits solution, but in this face was a noble +acquiescence and a content that had it vibrated must have passed into +joy. + +Words or their equivalent passed between us. I felt his voice. + +“You have heard the music of the Flute?” + +“I have heard.” + +“What has it given?” + +“A consuming longing.” + +“It is the music of the Eternal. The creeds and the faiths are the words +that men have set to that melody. Listening, it will lead you to Wisdom. +Day by day you will interpret more surely.” + +“I cannot stand alone.” + +“You will not need. What has led you will lead you still. Through many +births it has led you. How should it fail?” + +“What should I do?” + +“Go forward.” + +“What should I shun?” + +“Sorrow and fear.” + +“What should I seek?” + +“Joy.” + +“And the end?” + +“Joy. Wisdom. They are the Light and Dark of the Divine.” A cold breeze +passed and touched my forehead. I was still standing in the middle of +the bridge above the water gliding to the Ocean, and there was no figure +by the Bull of Shiva. I was alone. I passed back to the tents with the +shudder that is not fear but akin to death upon me. I knew I had been +profoundly withdrawn from what we call actual life, and the return is +dread. + +The days passed as we floated down the river to Srinagar. On board the +Kedarnath, now lying in our first berth beneath the chenars near and yet +far from the city, the last night had come. Next morning I should begin +the long ride to Baramula and beyond that barrier of the Happy Valley +down to Murree and the Punjab. Where afterwards? I neither knew nor +cared. My lesson was before me to be learned. I must try to detach +myself from all I had prized--to say to my heart it was but a loan +and no gift, and to cling only to the imperishable. And did I as yet +certainly know more than the A B C of the hard doctrine by which I +must live? “Que vivre est difficile, O mon cocur fatigue!”--an immense +weariness possessed me--a passive grief. + +Vanna would follow later with the wife of an Indian doctor. I believed +she was bound for Lahore but on that point she had not spoken certainly +and I felt we should not meet again. + +And now my packing was finished, and, as far as my possessions went, the +little cabin had the soulless emptiness that comes with departure. I was +enduring as best I could. If she had held loyally to her pact, could +I do less. Was she to blame for my wild hope that in the end she would +relent and step down to the household levels of love? + +She sat by the window--the last time I should see the moonlit banks and +her clear face against them. I made and won my fight for the courage of +words. + +“And now I’ve finished everything--thank goodness! and we can talk. +Vanna--you will write to me?” + +“Once. I promise that.” + +“Only once? Why? I counted on your words.” + +“I want to speak to you of something else now. I want to tell you a +memory. But look first at the pale light behind the Takht-i-Suliman.” + +So I had seen it with her. So I should not see it again. We watched +until a line of silver sparkled on the black water, and then she spoke +again. + +“Stephen, do you remember in the ruined monastery near Peshawar, how I +told you of the young Abbot, who came down to Peshawar with a Chinese +pilgrim? And he never returned.” + +“I remember. There was a Dancer.” + +“There was a Dancer. She was Lilavanti, and she was brought there to +trap him but when she saw him she loved him, and that was his ruin and +hers. Trickery he would have known and escaped. Love caught him in an +unbreakable net, and they fled down the Punjab and no one knew any more. +But I know. For two years they lived together and she saw the agony in +his heart--the anguish of his broken vows, the face of the Blessed One +receding into an infinite distance. She knew that every day added a link +to the heavy Karma that was bound about the feet she loved, and her soul +said “Set him free,” and her heart refused the torture. But her soul was +the stronger. She set him free.” + +“How?” + +“She took poison. He became an ascetic in the hills and died in peace +but with a long expiation upon him.” + +“And she?” + +“I am she.” + +“You!” I heard my voice as if it were another man’s. Was it possible +that I--a man of the twentieth century, believed this impossible thing? +Impossible, and yet--what had I learnt if not the unity of Time, the +illusion of matter? What is the twentieth century, what the first? +Do they not lie before the Supreme as one, and clean from our petty +divisions? And I myself had seen what, if I could trust it, asserted the +marvels that are no marvels to those who know. + +“You loved him?” + +“I love him.” + +“Then there is nothing at all for me.” + +She resumed as if she had heard nothing. + +“I have lost him for many lives. He stepped above me at once, for he was +clean gold though he fell, and though I have followed I have not found. +But that Buddhist beyond Islamabad--you shall hear now what he said. It +was this. ‘The shut door opens, and this time he awaits.’ I cannot yet +say all it means, but there is no Lahore for me. I shall meet him soon.” + +“Vanna, you would not harm yourself again?” + +“Never. I should not meet him. But you will see. Now I can talk no more. +I will be there tomorrow when you go, and I will ride with you to the +poplar road.” + +She passed like a shadow into her little dark cabin, and I was left +alone. I will not dwell on that black loneliness of the spirit, for +it has passed--it was the darkness of hell, a madness of jealousy, and +could have no enduring life in any heart that had known her. But it was +death while it lasted. I had moments of horrible belief, of horrible +disbelief, but however it might be I knew that she was out of reach for +ever. Near me--yes! but only as the silver image of the moon floated in +the water by the boat, with the moon herself cold myriads of miles away. +I will say no more of that last eclipse of what she had wrought in me. + +The bright morning came, sunny as if my joys were beginning instead of +ending. Vanna mounted her horse and led the way from the boat. I cast +one long look at the little Kedarnath, the home of those perfect weeks, +of such joy and sorrow as would have seemed impossible to me in the +chrysalis of my former existence. Little Kahdra stood crying bitterly on +the bank--the kindly folk who had served us were gathered saddened and +quiet. I set my teeth and followed her. + +How dear she looked, how kind, how gentle her appealing eyes, as I drew +up beside her. She knew what I felt. She knew that the sight of little +Kahdra crying as he said good--bye was the last pull at my sore heart. +Still she rode steadily on, and still I followed. Once she spoke. + +“Stephen, there was a man in Peshawar, kind and true, who loved that +Lilavanti who had no heart for him. And when she died, it was in his +arms, as a sister might cling to a brother, for the man she loved had +left her. It seems that will not be in this life, but do not think I +have been so blind that I did not know my friend.” + +I could not answer--it was the realization of the utmost I could hope +and it came like healing to my spirit. Better that bond between us, +slight as most men might think it, than the dearest and closest with a +woman not Vanna. It was the first thrill of a new joy in my heart--the +first, I thank the Infinite, of many and steadily growing joys and hopes +that cannot be uttered here. + +I bent to take the hand she stretched to me, but even as they touched, +I saw, passing behind the trees by the road, the young man I had seen +in the garden at Vernag--most beautiful, in the strange miter of his +jewelled diadem. His flute was at his lips and the music rang out sudden +and crystal clear as though a woodland god were passing to awaken all +the joys of the dawn. + +The horses heard too. In an instant hers had swerved wildly, and she lay +on the ground at my feet. The music had ceased. + +Days had gone before I could recall what had happened then. I lifted +her in my arms and carried her into the rest-house near at hand, and +the doctor came and looked grave, and a nurse was sent from the Mission +Hospital. No doubt all was done that was possible, but I knew from the +first what it meant and how it would be. She lay in a white stillness, +and the room was quiet as death. I remembered with unspeakable gratitude +later that the nurse had been merciful and had not sent me away. + +So Vanna lay all day and through the night, and when the dawn came again +she stirred and motioned with her hand, although her eyes were closed. +I understood, and kneeling, I put my hand under her head, and rested it +against my shoulder. Her faint voice murmured at my ear. + +“I dreamed--I was in the pine wood at Pahlgam and it was the Night of No +Moon, and I was afraid for it was dark, but suddenly all the trees were +covered with little lights like stars, and the greater light was beyond. +Nothing to be afraid of.” + +“Nothing, Beloved.” + +“And I looked beyond Peshawar, further than eyes could see, and in the +ruins of the monastery where we stood, you and I--I saw him, and he lay +with his head at the feet of the Blessed One. That is well, is it not?” + +“Well, Beloved.” + +“And it is well I go? Is it not?” + +“It is well.” + +A long silence. The first sun ray touched the floor. Again the whisper. + +“Believe what I have told you. For we shall meet again.” I repeated-- + +“We shall meet again.” + +In my arms she died. + +Later, when all was over I asked myself if I believed this and answered +with full assurance--Yes. + +If the story thus told sounds incredible it was not incredible to me. +I had had a profound experience. What is a miracle? It is simply the +vision of the Divine behind nature. It will come in different forms +according to the eyes that see, but the soul will know that its +perception is authentic. + +I could not leave Kashmir, nor was there any need. On the contrary I saw +that there was work for me here among the people she had loved, and my +first aim was to fit myself for that and for the writing I now felt +was to be my career in life. After much thought I bought the little +Kedarnath and made it my home, very greatly to the satisfaction of +little Kahdra and all the friendly people to whom I owed so much. + +Vanna’s cabin I made my sleeping room, and it is the simple truth that +the first night I slept in the place that was a Temple of Peace in my +thoughts, I had a dream of wordless bliss, and starting awake for sheer +joy I saw her face in the night, human and dear, looking down upon +me with that poignant sweetness which would seem to be the utmost +revelation of love and pity. And as I stretched my hands, another face +dawned solemnly from the shadow beside her with grave brows bent on +mine--one I had known and seen in the ruins at Bijbehara. Outside and +very near I could hear the silver weaving of the Flute that in India is +the symbol of the call of the Divine. A dream--yes, but it taught me to +live. At first, in my days of grief and loss, I did but dream--the days +were hard to endure. I will not dwell on that illusion of sorrow, now +long dead. I lived only for the night. + + “When sleep comes to close each difficult day, + When night gives pause to the long watch I keep, + And all my bonds I needs must loose apart, + Must doff my will as raiment laid away-- + With the first dream that comes with the first sleep, + I run--I run! I am gathered to thy heart!” + +To the heart of her pity. Thus for awhile I lived. Slowly I became +conscious of her abiding presence about me, day or night It grew +clearer, closer. + +Like the austere Hippolytus to his unseen Goddess, I could say; + + “Who am more to thee than other mortals are, + Whose is the holy lot, + As friend with friend to walk and talk with thee, + Hearing thy sweet mouth’s music in mine ear, + But thee beholding not.” + +That was much, but later, the sunshine was no bar, the bond strengthened +and there have been days in the heights of the hills, in the depths of +the woods, when I saw her as in life, passing at a distance, but real +and lovely. Life? She had never lived as she did now--a spirit, freed +and rejoicing. For me the door she had opened would never shut. The +Presences were about me, and I entered upon my heritage of joy, knowing +that in Kashmir, the holy land of Beauty, they walk very near, and lift +up the folds of the Dark that the initiate may see the light behind. + +So I began my solitary life of gladness. I wrote, aided by the little +book she had left me, full of strangest stories, stranger by far than +my own brain could conceive. Some to be revealed--some to be hidden. And +thus the world will one day receive the story of the Dancer of Peshawar +in her upward lives, that it may know, if it will, that death is +nothing--for Life and Love are all. + + + + +THE INCOMPARABLE LADY + +A STORY OF CHINA WITH A MORAL + +It is recorded that when the Pearl Empress (his mother) asked of the +philosophic Yellow Emperor which he considered the most beautiful of the +Imperial concubines, he replied instantly: “The Lady A-Kuei”: and when +the Royal Parent in profound astonishment demanded bow this could +be, having regard to the exquisite beauties in question, the Emperor +replied; + +“I have never seen her. It was dark when I entered the Dragon Chamber +and dusk of dawn when I rose and left her.” + +Then said the Pearl Princess; + +“Possibly the harmony of her voice solaced the Son of Heaven?” + +But he replied; + +“She spoke not.” + +And the Pearl Empress rejoined: + +“Her limbs then are doubtless softer than the kingfisher’s plumage?” + +But the Yellow Emperor replied; + +“Doubtless. Yet I have not touched them. I was that night immersed in +speculations on the Yin and the Yang. How then should I touch a woman?” + +And the Pearl Empress was silent from very great amazement, not daring +to question further but marveling how the thing might be. And seeing +this, the Yellow Emperor recited a poem to the following effect: + + “It is said that Power rules the world + And who shall gainsay it? + But Loveliness is the head-jewel upon the brow of Power.” + +And when the Empress had listened with reverence to the Imperial Poet, +she quitted the August Presence. + +Immediately, having entered her own palace of the Tranquil Motherly +Virtues, she caused the Lady A-Kuei to be summoned to her presence, who +came, habited in a purple robe and with pins of jade and coral in her +hair. And the Pearl Empress considered her attentively, recalling the +perfect features of the White Jade Concubine, the ambrosial smile of the +Princess of Feminine Propriety, and the willow-leaf eyebrows of the Lady +of Chen, and her astonishment was excessive, because the Lady A-Kuei +could not in beauty approach any one of these ladies. Reflecting further +she then placed her behind the screen, and summoned the court artist, Lo +Cheng, who had been formerly commissioned to paint the heavenly +features of the Emperor’s Ladies, mirrored in still water, though he had +naturally not been permitted to view the beauties themselves. Of him the +Empress demanded: + +“Who is the most beautiful--which the most priceless jewel of the +dwellers in the Dragon Palace?” + +And, with humility, Lo Cheng replied: + +“What mortal man shall decide between the white Crane and the Swan, +or between the paeony flower and the lotus?” And having thus said he +remained silent, and in him was no help. Finally and after exhortation +the Pearl Empress condescended to threaten him with the loss of a head +so useless to himself and to her majesty. Then, in great fear and haste +he replied: + +“Of all the flowers that adorn the garden of the Sun of Heaven, the Lady +A-Kuei is the fittest to be gathered by the Imperial Hand, and this is +my deliberate opinion.” + +Now, hearing this statement, the Pearl Empress was submerged in +bewilderment, knowing that the Lady A-Kuei had modestly retired when the +artist had depicted the reflection of the assembled loveliness of the +Inner Chambers, as not counting herself worthy of portraiture, and her +features were therefore unknown to him. Nor could the Empress further +question the artist, for when she had done so, he replied only: + +“This is the secret of the Son of Heaven,” and, having gained +permission, he swiftly departed. + +Nor could the Lady A-Kuei herself aid her Imperial Majesty, for on being +questioned she was overwhelmed with modesty and confusion, and with +stammering lips could only repeat: + +“This is the secret of his Divine Majesty,” imploring with the utmost +humility, forgiveness from the Imperial Mother. + +The Pearl Empress was unable to eat her supper. In vain were spread +before her the delicacies of the Empire. She could but trifle with a +shark’s fin and a “Silver Ear” fungus and a dish of slugs entrapped upon +roses, with the dew-like pearls upon them. Her burning curiosity had +wholly deprived her of appetite, nor could the amusing exertions of +the Palace mimes, or a lantern fete upon the lake restore her to +any composure. “This circumstance will cause my flight on the Dragon +(death),” she said to herself, “unless I succeed in unveiling the +mystery. What therefore should be my next proceeding?” + +And so, deeply reflecting, she caused the Chief of the Eunuchs to summon +the Princess of Feminine Propriety, the White Jade Concubine and all the +other exalted beauties of the Heavenly Palace. + +In due course of time these ladies arrived, paying suitable respect and +obeisance to the Mother of his Divine Majesty. They were resplendent in +king-fisher ornaments, in jewels of jade, crystal and coral, in robes +of silk and gauze, and still more resplendent in charms that not +the Celestial Empire itself could equal, setting aside entirely all +countries of the foreign barbarians. And in grace and elegance of +manners, in skill in the arts of poetry and the lute, what could surpass +them? + +Like a parterre of flowers they surrounded her Majesty, and awaited her +pleasure with perfect decorum, when, having saluted them with affability +she thus addressed them--“Lovely ones--ladies distinguished by the +particular attention of your sovereign and mine, I have sent for you +to resolve a doubt and a difficulty. On questioning our sovereign as to +whom he regarded as the loveliest of his garden of beauty he benignantly +replied: “The Lady A-Kuei is incomparable,” and though this may well be, +he further graciously added that he had never seen her. Nor, on pursuing +the subject, could I learn the Imperial reason. The artist Lo Cheng +follows in his Master’s footsteps, he also never having seen the favored +lady, and he and she reply to me that this is an Imperial secret. +Declare to me therefore if your perspicacity and the feminine interest +which every lady property takes in the other can unravel this mystery, +for my liver is tormented with anxiety beyond measure.” + +As soon as the Pearl Empress had spoken she realized that she had +committed a great indiscretion. A babel of voices, of cries, questions +and contradictions instantly arose. Decorum was abandoned. The Lady of +Chen swooned, nor could she be revived for an hour, and the Princess of +Feminine Propriety and the White Jade Concubine could be dragged apart +only by the united efforts of six of the Palace matrons, so great was +their fury the one with the other, each accusing each of encouragement +to the Lady A-Kuei’s pretensions. So also with the remaining ladies. +Shrieks resounded through the Hall of Virtuous Tranquillity, and when +the Pearl Empress attempted to pour oil on the troubled waters by +speaking soothing and comfortable words, the august Voice was entirely +inaudible in the tumult. + +All sought at length in united indignation for the Lady A-Kuei, but she +had modestly withdrawn to the Pearl Pavilion in the Imperial Garden and, +foreseeing anxieties, had there secured herself on hearing the opening +of the Royal Speech. + +Finally the ladies were led away by their attendants, weeping, +lamenting, raging, according to their several dispositions, and the +Pearl Empress, left with her own maidens, beheld the floor strewn with +jade pins, kingfisher and coral jewels, and even with fragments of silk +and gauze. Nor was she any nearer the solution of the desired secret. + +That night she tossed upon a bed sleepless though heaped with down, +and her mind raged like a fire up and down all possible answers to the +riddle, but none would serve. Then, at the dawn, raising herself on one +august elbow she called to her venerable nurse and foster mother, the +Lady Ma, wise and resourceful in the affairs and difficulties of women, +and, repeating the circumstances, demanded her counsel. + +The Lady Ma considering the matter long and deeply, slowly replied: + +“This is a great riddle and dangerous, for to intermeddle with the +divine secrets is the high road to the Yellow Springs (death). But the +child of my breasts and my exalted Mistress shall never ask in vain, for +a thwarted curiosity is dangerous as a suppressed fever. I will conceal +myself nightly in the Dragon Bedchamber and this will certainly unveil +the truth. And if I perish I perish.” + +It is impossible to describe how the Empress heaped Lady Ma with costly +jewels and silken brocades and taels of silver beyond measuring--how she +placed on her breast the amulet of jade that had guarded herself from +all evil influences, how she called the ancestral spirits to witness +that she would provide for the Lady Ma’s remotest descendants if she +lost her life in this sublime devotion to duty. + +That night Lady Ma concealed herself behind the Imperial couch in the +Dragon Chamber, to await the coming of the Son of Heaven. Slowly dripped +the water-clock as the minutes fled away; sorely ached the venerable +limbs of the Lady Ma as she crouched in the shadows and saw the rising +moon scattering silver through the elegant traceries of carved ebony and +ivory; wildly beat her heart as delicately tripping footsteps approached +the Dragon Chamber, and the Princess of Feminine Propriety, attended by +her maidens, ascended the Imperial Couch and hastily dismissed them. Yet +no sweet repose awaited this favored lady. The Lady Ma could hear her +smothered sobs, her muttered exclamations--nay could even feel the +couch itself tremble as the Princess uttered the hated name of the Lady +A-Kuei, the poison of jealousy running in every vein. It was impossible +for Lady Ma to decide which was the most virulent, this, or the poison +of curiosity in the heart of the Pearl Empress. Though she loved not the +Princess she was compelled to pity such suffering. But all thought was +banished by the approach of the Yellow Emperor, prepared for repose and +unattended, in simple but divine grandeur. + +It cannot indeed be supposed that a Celestial Emperor is human, yet +there was mortality in the start which his Augustness gave when the +Princess of Feminine Propriety flinging herself from the Dragon couch, +threw herself at his feet and with tears that flowed like that river +known as “The Sorrow of China,” demanded to know what she had done that +another should be preferred before her; reciting in frantic haste such +imperfections of the Lady A-Kuei’s appearance as she could recall (or +invent) in the haste of that agitating moment. + +“That one of her eyes is larger than the other--no human being can +doubt” sobbed the lady--“and surely your Divine Majesty cannot be aware +that her hair reaches but to her waist, and that there is a brown mole +on the nape of her neck? When she sings it resembles the croak of the +crow. It is true that most of the Palace ladies are chosen for anything +but beauty, yet she is the most ill-favored. And is it this--this +bat-faced lady who is preferred to me! Would I had never been born: Yet +even your Majesty’s own lips have told me I am fair!” + +The Yellow Emperor supported the form of the Princess in his arms. +There are moments when even a Son of Heaven is but human. “Fair as the +rainbow,” he murmured, and the Princess faintly smiled; then gathering +the resolution of the Philosopher he added manfully--“But the Lady +A-Kuei is incomparable. And the reason is--” + +The Lady Ma eagerly stretched her head forward with a hand to either +ear. But the Princess of Feminine Propriety with one shriek had swooned +and in the hurry of summoning attendants and causing her to be conveyed +to her own apartments that precious sentence was never completed. + +Still the Lady Ma groveled behind the Dragon Couch as the Son of +Heaven, left alone, approached the veranda and apostrophizing the moon, +murmured-- + +“O loveliest pale watcher of the destinies of men, illuminate the beauty +of the Lady A-Kuei, and grant that I who have never seen that beauty may +never see it, but remain its constant admirer!” So saying, he sought +his solitary couch and slept, while the Lady Ma, in a torment of +bewilderment, glided from the room. + +The matter remained in suspense for several days. The White Jade +Concubine was the next lady commanded to the Dragon Chamber, and again +the Lady Ma was in her post of observation. Much she heard, much she +saw that was not to the point, but the scene ended as before by the +dismissal of the lady in tears, and the departure of the Lady Ma in +ignorance of the secret. + +The Emperor’s peace was ended. + +The singular circumstance was that the Lady A-Kuei was never summoned +by the Yellow Emperor. Eagerly as the Empress watched, no token of +affection for her was ever visible. Nothing could be detected. It was +inexplicable. Finally, devoured by curiosity that gave her no respite, +she resolved on a stratagem that should dispel the mystery, though it +carried with it a risk on which she trembled to reflect. It was the +afternoon of a languid summer day, and the Yellow Emperor, almost +unattended, had come to pay a visit of filial respect to the Pearl +Empress. She received him with the ceremony due to her sovereign in the +porcelain pavilion of the Eastern Gardens, with the lotos fish ponds +before them, and a faint breeze occasionally tinkling the crystal +wind-bells that decorated the shrubs on the cloud and dragon-wrought +slopes of the marble approach. A bird of brilliant plumage uttered a cry +of reverence from its gold cage as the Son of Heaven entered. As was +his occasional custom, and after suitable inquiries as to his parent’s +health, the attendants were all dismissed out of earshot and the Emperor +leaned on his cushions and gazed reflectively into the sunshine +outside. So had the Court Artist represented him as “The Incarnation of +Philosophic Calm.” + +“These gardens are fair,” said the Empress after a respectful silence, +moving her fan illustrated with the emblem of Immortality--the Ho Bird. + +“Fair indeed,” returned the Emperor.--“It might be supposed that all +sorrow and disturbance would be shut without the Forbidden Precincts. +Yet it is not so. And though the figures of my ladies moving among the +flowers appear at this distance instinct with joy, yet--” + +He was silent. + +“They know not,” said the Empress with solemnity “that death entered the +Forbidden Precincts but last night. A disembodied spirit has returned to +its place and doubtless exists in bliss.” “Indeed?” returned the Yellow +Emperor with indifference--“yet if the spirit is absorbed into the +Source whence it came, and the bones have crumbled into nothingness, +where does the Ego exist? The dead are venerable, but no longer of +interest.” + +“Not even when they were loved in life?” said the Empress, caressing the +bird in the cage with one jewelled finger, but attentively observing +her son from the corner of her august eye. “They were; they are not,” he +remarked sententiously and stifling a yawn; it was a drowsy afternoon. +“But who is it that has abandoned us? Surely not the Lady Ma--your +Majesty’s faithful foster-mother?” + +“A younger, a lovelier spirit has sought the Yellow Springs,” replied +the trembling Empress. “I regret to inform your Majesty that a sudden +convulsion last night deprived the Lady A-Kuei of life. I would not +permit the news to reach you lest it should break your august night’s +rest.” + +There was a silence, then the Emperor turned his eyes serenely upon his +Imperial Mother. “That the statement of my august Parent is merely--let +us say--allegoric--does not detract from its interest. But had the Lady +A-Kuei in truth departed to the Yellow Springs I should none the less +have received the news without uneasiness. What though the sun set--is +not the memory of his light all surpassing?” + +No longer could the Pearl Empress endure the excess of her curiosity. +Deeply kowtowing, imploring pardon, with raised hands and tears which no +son dare neglect, she besought the Emperor to enlighten her as to this +mystery, recounting his praises of the lady and his admission that he +had never beheld her, and all the circumstances connected with this +remarkable episode. She omitted only, (from considerations of delicacy +and others,) the vigils of the Lady Ma in the Dragon Chamber. The +Emperor, sighing, looked upon the ground, and for a time was silent. +Then he replied as follows: + +“Willingly would I have kept silence, but what child dare withstand the +plea of a parent? Is it necessary to inform the Heavenly Empress that +beauty seen is beauty made familiar and that familiarity is the foe +of admiration? How is it possible that I should see the Princess of +Feminine Propriety, for instance, by night and day without becoming +aware of her imperfections as well as her graces? How awake in the night +without hearing the snoring of the White Jade Concubine and considering +the mouth from which it issues as the less lovely. How partake of the +society of any woman without finding her chattering as the crane, avid +of admiration, jealous, destructive of philosophy, fatal to composure, +fevered with curiosity; a creature, in short, a little above the gibbon, +but infinitely below the notice of the sage, save as a temporary measure +of amusement in itself unworthy the philosopher. The faces of all my +ladies are known to me. All are fair and all alike. But one night, as I +lay in the Dragon Couch, lost in speculation, absorbed in contemplation +of the Yin and the Yang, the night passed for the solitary dreamer as a +dream. In the darkness of the dawn I rose still dreaming, and departed +to the Pearl Pavilion in the garden, and there remained an hour viewing +the sunrise and experiencing ineffable opinions on the destiny of man. +Returning then to a couch which I believed to have been that of the +solitary philosopher I observed a depression where another form had +lain, and in it a jade hairpin such as is worn by my junior beauties. +Petrified with amazement at the display of such reserve, such +continence, such august self-restraint, I perceived that, lost in +my thoughts, I had had an unimagined companion and that this gentle +reminder was from her gentle hand. But whom? I knew not. I then observed +Lo Cheng the Court Artist in attendance and immediately despatched him +to make secret enquiry and ascertain the name and circumstances of that +beauty who, unknown, had shared my vigil. I learnt on his return that +it was the Lady A-Kuei. I had entered the Dragon Chamber in a low +moonlight, and guessed not her presence. She spoke no word. Finding her +Imperial Master thus absorbed, she invited no attention, nor in any way +obtruded her beauties upon my notice. Scarcely did she draw breath. Yet +reflect upon what she might have done! The night passed and I remained +entirely unconscious of her presence, and out of respect she would not +sleep but remained reverently and modestly awake, assisting, if it may +so be expressed, at a humble distance, in the speculations which held me +prisoner. What a pearl was here! On learning these details by Lo Cheng +from her own roseate lips, and remembering the unexampled temptation +she had resisted (for well she knew that had she touched the Emperor +the Philosopher had vanished) I despatched an august rescript to this +favored Lady, conferring on her the degree of Incomparable Beauty of the +First Rank. On condition of secrecy.” + +The Pearl Empress, still in deepest bewilderment, besought his majesty +to proceed. He did so, with his usual dignity. + +“Though my mind could not wholly restrain its admiration, yet secrecy +was necessary, for had the facts been known, every lady, from the +Princess of Feminine Propriety to the Junior Beauty of the Bed Chamber +would henceforward have observed only silence and a frigid decorum in +the Dragon Bed Chamber. And though the Emperor be a philosopher, yet a +philosopher is still a man, and there are moments when decorum--” + +The Emperor paused discreetly; then resumed. + +“The world should not be composed entirely of A-Kueis, yet in my mind I +behold the Incomparable Lady fair beyond expression. Like the moon she +sails glorious in the heavens to be adored only in vision as the one +woman who could respect the absorption of the Emperor, and of whose +beauty as she lay beside him the philosopher could remain unconscious +and therefore untroubled in body. To see her, to find her earthly, +would be an experience for which the Emperor might have courage, but the +philosopher never. And attached to all this is a moral:” + +The Pearl Empress urgently inquired its nature. + +“Let the wisdom of my august parent discern it,” said the Emperor +sententiously. + +“And the future?” she inquired. + +“The--let us call it parable--” said the Emperor politely--“with which +your Majesty was good enough to entertain me, has suggested a precaution +to my mind. I see now a lovely form moving among the flowers. It is +possible that it may be the Incomparable Lady, or that at any moment I +may come upon her and my ideal be shattered. This must be safeguarded. +I might command her retirement to her native province, but who shall +insure me against the weakness of my own heart demanding her return? +No. Let Your Majesty’s words spoken--well--in parable, be fulfilled in +truth. I shall give orders to the Chief Eunuch that the Incomparable +Lady tonight shall drink the Draught of Crushed Pearls, and be thus +restored to the sphere that alone is worthy of her. Thus are all +anxieties soothed, and the honours offered to her virtuous spirit shall +be a glorious repayment of the ideal that will ever illuminate my soul.” + +The Empress was speechless. She had borne the Emperor in her womb, but +the philosopher outsoared her comprehension. She retired, leaving his +Majesty in a reverie, endeavoring herself to grasp the moral of which +he had spoken, for the guidance of herself and the ladies concerned. But +whether it inculcated reserve or the reverse in the Dragon Chamber, and +what the Imperial ladies should follow as an example she was, to the +end of her life, totally unable to say. Philosophy indeed walks on the +heights. We cannot all expect to follow it. + +That night the Incomparable Lady drank the Draught of Crushed Pearls. + +The Princess of Feminine Propriety and the White Jade Concubine, +learning these circumstances, redoubled their charms, their coquetries +and their efforts to occupy what may be described as the inner sanctuary +of the Emperor’s esteem. Both lived to a green old age, wealthy and +honored, alike firm in the conviction that if the Incomparable Lady had +not shown herself so superior to temptation the Emperor might have been +on the whole better pleased, whatever the sufferings of the philosopher. +Both lived to be the tyrants of many generations of beauties at the +Celestial Court. Both were assiduous in their devotions before the +spirit tablet of the departed lady, and in recommending her example of +reserve and humility to every damsel whom it might concern. + +It will probably occur to the reader of this unique but veracious story +that there is more in it than meets the eye, and more than the one +moral alluded to by the Emperor according to the point of view of the +different actors. + +To the discernment of the reader it must accordingly be left. + + + + +THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN + +A Story of Burma + +Most wonderful is the Irawadi, the mighty river of Burma. In all the +world elsewhere is no such river, bearing the melted snows from its +mysterious sources in the high places of the mountains. The dawn rises +upon its league-wide flood; the moon walks upon it with silver feet. It +is the pulsing heart of the land, living still though so many rules and +rulers have risen and fallen beside it, their pomps and glories drifting +like flotsam dawn the river to the eternal ocean that is the end of +all--and the beginning. Dead civilizations strew its banks, dreaming in +the torrid sunshine of glories that were--of blood-stained gold, jewels +wept from woeful crowns, nightmare dreams of murder and terror; dreaming +also of heavenly beauty, for the Lord Buddha looks down in moonlight +peace upon the land that leaped to kiss His footprints, that has laid +its heart in the hand of the Blessed One, and shares therefore in His +bliss and content. The Land of the Lord Buddha, where the myriad pagodas +lift their golden flames of worship everywhere, and no idlest wind can +pass but it ruffles the bells below the knees until they send forth +their silver ripple of music to swell the hymn of praise! + +There is a little bay on the bank of the flooding river--a silent, +deserted place of sanddunes and small bills. When a ship is in sight, +some poor folk come and spread out the red lacquer that helps their +scanty subsistence, and the people from the passing ship land and barter +and in a few minutes are gone on their busy way and silence settles +down once more. They neither know nor care that, near by, a mighty city +spread its splendour for miles along the river bank, that the king +known as Lord of the Golden Palace, The Golden Foot, Lord of the White +Elephant, held his state there with balls of magnificence, obsequious +women, fawning courtiers and all the riot and colour of an Eastern +tyranny. How should they care? Now there are ruins--ruins, and the +cobras slip in and out through the deserted holy places. They breed +their writhing young in the sleeping-chambers of queens, the tigers mew +in the moonlight, and the giant spider, more terrible than the cobra, +strikes with its black poison-claw and, paralyzing the life of the +victim, sucks its brain with slow, lascivious pleasure. + +Are these foul creatures more dreadful than some of the men, the women, +who dwelt in these palaces--the more evil because of the human brain +that plotted and foresaw? That is known only to the mysterious Law that +in silence watches and decrees. + +But this is a story of the dead days of Pagan, by the Irawadi, and it +will be shown that, as the Lotus of the Lord Buddha grows up a white +splendour from the black mud of the depths, so also may the soul of a +woman. + +In the days of the Lord of the White Elephant, the King Pagan Men, was a +boy named Mindon, son of second Queen and the King. So, at least, it +was said in the Golden Palace, but those who knew the secrets of such +matters whispered that, when the King had taken her by the hand she +came to him no maid, and that the boy was the son of an Indian trader. +Furthermore it was said that she herself was woman of the Rajputs, +knowledgeable in spells, incantations and elemental spirits such as the +Beloos that terribly haunt waste places, and all Powers that move in +the dark, and that thus she had won the King. Certainly she had been +captured by the King’s war-boats off the coast from a trading-ship bound +for Ceylon, and it was her story that, because of her beauty, she was +sent thither to serve as concubine to the King, Tissa of Ceylon. Being +captured, she was brought to the Lord of the Golden Palace. The tongue +she spoke was strange to all the fighting men, but it was wondrous to +see how swiftly she learnt theirs and spoke it with a sweet ripple such +as is in the throat of a bird. + +She was beautiful exceedingly, with a colour of pale gold upon her and +lengths of silk-spun hair, and eyes like those of a jungle-deer, and +water might run beneath the arch of her foot without wetting it, and her +breasts were like the cloudy pillows where the sun couches at setting. +Now, at Pagan, the name they called her was Dwaymenau, but her true +name, known only to herself, was Sundari, and she knew not the Law of +the Blessed Buddha but was a heathen accursed. In the strong hollow of +her hand she held the heart of the King, so that on the birth of her son +she had risen from a mere concubine to be the second Queen and a power +to whom all bowed. The First Queen, Maya, languished in her palace, her +pale beauty wasting daily, deserted and lonely, for she had been the +light of the King’s eyes until the coming of the Indian woman, and she +loved her lord with a great love and was a noble woman brought up in +honour and all things becoming a queen. But sigh as she would, the King +came never. All night he lay in the arms of Dwaymenau, all day he sat +beside her, whether at the great water pageants or at the festival when +the dancing-girls swayed and postured before him in her gilded chambers. +Even when he went forth to hunt the tiger, she went with him as far as +a woman may go, and then stood back only because he would not risk his +jewel, her life. So all that was evil in the man she fostered and all +that was good she cherished not at all, fearing lest he should return +to the Queen. At her will he had consulted the Hiwot Daw, the Council of +the Woon-gyees or Ministers, concerning a divorce of the Queen, but +this they told him could not be since she had kept all the laws of Manu, +being faithful, noble and beautiful and having borne him a son. + +For, before the Indian woman had come to the King, the Queen had borne +a son, Ananda, and he was pale and slender and the King despised him +because of the wiles of Dwaymenau, saying he was fit only to sit among +the women, having the soul of a slave, and he laughed bitterly as the +pale child crouched in the corner to see him pass. If his eyes had been +clear, he would have known that here was no slave, but a heart as much +greater than his own as the spirit is stronger than the body. But this +he did not know and he strode past with Dwaymenau’s boy on his shoulder, +laughing with cruel glee. + +And this boy, Mindon, was beautiful and strong as his mother, pale olive +of face, with the dark and crafty eyes of the cunning Indian traders, +with black hair and a body straight, strong and long in the leg for his +years--apt at the beginnings of bow, sword and spear--full of promise, +if the promise was only words and looks. + +And so matters rested in the palace until Ananda had ten years and +Mindon nine. + +It was the warm and sunny winter and the days were pleasant, and on a +certain day the Queen, Maya, went with her ladies to worship the Blessed +One at the Thapinyu Temple, looking down upon the swiftly flowing river. +The temple was exceedingly rich and magnificent, so gilded with pure +gold-leaf that it appeared of solid gold. And about the upper part were +golden bells beneath the jewelled knee, which wafted very sweetly in +the wind and gave forth a crystal-clear music. The ladies bore in their +hands more gold-leaf, that they might acquire merit by offering this +for the service of the Master of the Law, and indeed this temple was +the offering of the Queen herself, who, because she bore the name of +the Mother of the Lord, excelled in good works and was the Moon of this +lower world in charity and piety. + +Though wan with grief and anxiety, this Queen was beautiful. Her eyes, +like mournful lakes of darkness, were lovely in the pale ivory of +her face. Her lips were nobly cut and calm, and by the favour of the +Guardian Nats, she was shaped with grace and health, a worthy mother of +kings. Also she wore her jewels like a mighty princess, a magnificence +to which all the people shikoed as she passed, folding their hands and +touching the forehead while they bowed down, kneeling. + +Before the colossal image of the Holy One she made her offering and, +attended by her women, she sat in meditation, drawing consolation from +the Tranquillity above her and the silence of the shrine. This ended, +the Queen rose and did obeisance to the Lord and, retiring, paced back +beneath the White Canopy and entered the courtyard where the palace +stood--a palace of noble teakwood, brown and golden and carved like lace +into strange fantasies of spires and pinnacles and branches where Nats +and Tree Spirits and Beloos and swaying river maidens mingled and met +amid fruits and leaves and flowers in a wild and joyous confusion. The +faces, the blowing garments, whirled into points with the swiftness of +the dance, were touched with gold, and so glad was the building that it +seemed as if a very light wind might whirl it to the sky, and even +the sad Queen stopped to rejoice in its beauty as it blossomed in the +sunlight. + +And even as she paused, her little son Ananda rushed to meet her, pale +and panting, and flung himself into her arms with dry sobs like those of +an overrun man. She soothed him until he could speak, and then the grief +made way in a rain of tears. + +“Mindon has killed my deer. He bared his knife, slit his throat and cast +him in the ditch and there he lies.” + +“There will he not lie long!” shouted Mindon, breaking from the palace +to the group where all were silent now. “For the worms will eat him and +the dogs pick clean his bones, and he will show his horns at his lords +no more. If you loved him, White-liver, you should have taught him +better manners to his betters.” + +With a stifled shriek Ananda caught the slender knife from his girdle +and flew at Mindon like a cat of the woods. Such things were done daily +by young and old, and this was a long sorrow come to a head between the +boys. + +Suddenly, lifting the hangings of the palace gateway, before them stood +the mother of Mindon, the Lady Dwaymenau, pale as wool, having heard the +shout of her boy, so that the two Queens faced each other, each holding +the shoulders of her son, and the ladies watched, mute as fishes, for it +was years since these two had met. + +“What have you done to my son?” breathed Maya the Queen, dry in the +throat and all but speechless with passion. For indeed his face, for a +child, was ghastly. + +“Look at his knife! What would he do to my son?” Dwaymenau was stiff +with hate and spoke as to a slave. + +“He has killed my deer and mocks me because I loved him, He is the devil +in this place. Look at the devils in his eyes. Look quick before he +smiles, my mother.” + +And indeed, young as the boy was, an evil thing sat in either eye and +glittered upon them. Dwaymenau passed her hand across his brow, and he +smiled and they were gone. + +“The beast ran at me and would have flung me with his horns,” he said, +looking up brightly at his mother. “He had the madness upon him. I +struck once and he was dead. My father would have done the same. + +“That would he not!” said Queen Maya bitterly. “Your father would have +crept up, fawning on the deer, and offered him the fruits he loved, +stroking him the while. And in trust the beast would have eaten, and the +poison in the fruit would have slain him. For the people of your father +meet neither man nor beast in fair fight. With a kiss they stab!” + +Horror kept the women staring and silent. No one had dreamed that +the scandal had reached the Queen. Never had she spoken or looked her +knowledge but endured all in patience. Now it sprang out like a sword +among them, and they feared for Maya, whom all loved. + +Mindon did not understand. It was beyond him, but he saw he was scorned. +Dwaymenau, her face rigid as a mask, looked pitilessly at the shaking +Queen, and each word dropped from her mouth, hard and cold as the +falling of diamonds. She refused the insult. + +“If it is thus you speak of our lord and my love, what wonder he +forsakes you? Mother of a craven milk runs in your veins and his for +blood. Take your slinking brat away and weep together! My son and I +go forth to meet the King as he comes from hunting, and to welcome him +kingly!” She caught her boy to her with a magnificent gesture; he flung +his little arm about her, and laughing loudly they went off together. + +The tension relaxed a little when they were out of sight. The women knew +that, since Dwaymenau had refused to take the Queen’s meaning, she +would certainly not carry her complaint to the King. They guessed at her +reason for this forbearance, but, be that as it might, it was Certain +that no other person would dare to tell him and risk the fate that waits +the messenger of evil. + +The eldest lady led away the Queen, now almost tottering in the reaction +of fear and pain. Oh, that she had controlled her speech! Not for her +own sake--for she had lost all and the beggar can lose no more--but for +the boy’s sake, the unloved child that stood between the stranger and +her hopes. For him she had made a terrible enemy. Weeping, the boy +followed her. + +“Take comfort, little son,” she said, drawing him to her tenderly. “The +deer can suffer no more. For the tigers, he does not fear them. He runs +in green woods now where there is none to hunt. He is up and away. The +Blessed One was once a deer as gentle as yours.” + +But still the child wept, and the Queen broke down utterly. “Oh, if life +be a dream, let us wake, let us wake!” she sobbed. “For evil things walk +in it that cannot live in the light. Or let us dream deeper and forget. +Go, little son, yet stay--for who can tell what waits us when the King +comes. Let us meet him here.” + +For she believed that Dwaymenau would certainly carry the tale of her +speech to the King, and, if so, what hope but death together? + +That night, after the feasting, when the girls were dancing the dance +of the fairies and spirits, in gold dresses, winged on the legs and +shoulders, and high, gold-spired and pinnacled caps, the King missed the +little Prince, Ananda, and asked why he was absent. + +No one answered, the women looking upon each other, until Dwaymenau, +sitting beside him, glimmering with rough pearls and rubies, spoke +smoothly: “Lord, worshipped and beloved, the two boys quarreled this +day, and Ananda’s deer attacked our Mindon. He had a madness upon him +and thrust with his horns. But, Mindon, your true son, flew in upon him +and in a great fight he slit the beast’s throat with the knife you gave +him. Did he not well?” + +“Well,” said the King briefly. “But is there no hurt? Have searched? For +he is mine.” + +There was arrogance in the last sentence and her proud soul rebelled, +but smoothly as ever she spoke: “I have searched and there is not the +littlest scratch. But Ananda is weeping because the deer is dead, and +his mother is angry. What should I do?” + +“Nothing. Ananda is worthless and worthless let him be! And for that +pale shadow that was once a woman, let her be forgotten. And now, drink, +my Queen!” + +And Dwaymenau drank but the drink was bitter to her, for a ghost had +risen upon her that day. She had never dreamed that such a scandal had +been spoken, and it stunned her very soul with fear, that the Queen +should know her vileness and the cheat she had put upon the King. As +pure maid he had received her, and she knew, none better, what the doom +would be if his trust were broken and he knew the child not his. +She herself had seen this thing done to a concubine who had a little +offended. She was thrust living in a sack and this hung between two +earthen jars pierced with small holes, and thus she was set afloat on +the terrible river. And not till the slow filling and sinking of the +jars was the agony over and the cries for mercy stilled. No, the Queen’s +speech was safe with her, but was it safe with the Queen? For her +silence, Dwaymenau must take measures. + +Then she put it all aside and laughed and jested with the King and did +indeed for a time forget, for she loved him for his black-browed beauty +and his courage and royalty and the childlike trust and the man’s +passion that mingled in him for her. Daily and nightly such prayers as +she made to strange gods were that she might bear a son, true son of +his. + +Next day, in the noonday stillness when all slept, she led her young son +by the hand to her secret chamber, and, holding him upon her knees in +that rich and golden place, she lifted his face to hers and stared into +his eyes. And so unwavering was her gaze, so mighty the hard, unblinking +stare that his own was held against it, and he stared back as the earth +stares breathless at the moon. Gradually the terror faded out of his +eyes; they glazed as if in a trance; his head fell stupidly against her +bosom; his spirit stood on the borderland of being and waited. + +Seeing this, she took his palm and, molding it like wax, into the cup +of it she dropped clear fluid from a small vessel of pottery with the +fylfot upon its side and the disks of the god Shiva. And strange it was +to see that lore of India in the palace where the Blessed Law reigned +in peace. Then, fixing her eyes with power upon Mindon, she bade him, a +pure child, see for her in its clearness. + +“Only virgin-pure can see!” she muttered, staring into his eyes. “See! +See!” + +The eyes of Mindon were closing. He half opened them and looked dully at +his palm. His face was pinched and yellow. + +“A woman--a child, on a long couch. Dead! I see!” + +“See her face. Is her head crowned with the Queen’s jewels? See!” + +“Jewels. I cannot see her face. It is hidden.” + +“Why is it hidden?” + +“A robe across her face. Oh, let me go!” + +“And the child? See!” + +“Let me go. Stop--my head--my head! I cannot see. The child is hidden. +Her arm holds it. A woman stoops above them.” + +“A woman? Who? Is it like me? Speak! See!” + +“A woman. It is like you, mother--it is like you. I fear very greatly. A +knife--a knife! Blood! I cannot see--I cannot speak! I--I sleep.” + +His face was ghastly white now, his body cold and collapsed. Terrified, +she caught him to her breast and relaxed the power of her will upon him. +For that moment, she was only the passionate mother and quaked to think +she might have hurt him. An hour passed and he slept heavily in her +arms, and in agony she watched to see the colour steal back into the +olive cheek and white lips. In the second hour he waked and stretched +himself indolently, yawning like a cat. Her tears dropped like rain upon +him as she clasped him violently to her. + +He writhed himself free, petulant and spoilt. “Let me be. I hate kisses +and women’s tricks. I want to go forth and play. I have had a devil’s +dream. + +“What did you see in your dream, prince of my heart?” She caught +frantically at the last chance. + +“A deer--a tiger. I have forgotten. Let me go.” He ran off and she sat +alone with her doubts and fears. Yet triumph coloured them too. She saw +a dead woman, a dead child, and herself bending above them. She hid the +vessel in her bosom and went out among her women. + +Weeks passed, and never a word that she dreaded from Maya the Queen. The +women of Dwaymenau, questioning the Queen’s women, heard that she seemed +to have heavy sorrow upon her. Her eyes were like dying lamps and she +faded as they. The King never entered her palace. Drowned in Dwaymenau’s +wiles and beauty, her slave, her thrall, he forgot all else but his +fighting, his hunting and his long war-boats, and whether the Queen +lived or died, he cared nothing. Better indeed she should die and +her place be emptied for the beloved, without offence to her powerful +kindred. + +And now he was to sail upon a raid against the Shan Tsaubwa, who had +denied him tribute of gold and jewels and slaves. Glorious were the +boats prepared for war, of brown teak and gilded until they shone like +gold. Seventy men rowed them, sword and lance beside each. Warriors +crowded them, flags and banners fluttered about them; the shining water +reflected the pomp like a mirror and the air rang with song. Dwaymenau +stood beside the water with her women, bidding the King farewell, and so +he saw her, radiant in the dawn, with her boy beside her, and waved his +hand to the last. + +The ships were gone and the days languished a little at Pagan. They +missed the laughter and royalty of the King, and few men, and those old +and weak, were left in the city. The pulse of life beat slower. + +And Dwaymenau took rule in the Golden Palace. Queen Maya sat like one in +a dream and questioned nothing, and Dwaymenau ruled with wisdom but none +loved her. To all she was the interloper, the witch-woman, the out-land +upstart. Only the fear of the King guarded her and her boy, but that +was strong. The boys played together sometimes, Mindon tyrannizing and +cruel, Ananda fearing and complying, broken in spirit. + +Maya the Queen walked daily in the long and empty Golden Hall of +Audience, where none came now that the King was gone, pacing up and +down, gazing wearily at the carved screens and all their woodland beauty +of gods that did not hear, of happy spirits that had no pity. Like +a spirit herself she passed between the red pillars, appearing and +reappearing with steps that made no sound, consumed with hate of the +evil woman that had stolen her joy. Like a slow fire it burned in her +soul, and the face of the Blessed One was hidden from her, and she had +forgotten His peace. In that atmosphere of hate her life dwindled. Her +son’s dwindled also, and there was talk among the women of some potion +that Dwaymenau had been seen to drop into his noontide drink as she went +swiftly by. That might he the gossip of malice, but he pined. His +eyes were large like a young bird’s; his hands like little claws. They +thought the departing year would take him with it. What harm? Very +certainly the King would shed no tear. + +It was a sweet and silent afternoon and she wandered in the great and +lonely hall, sickened with the hate in her soul and her fear for her +boy. Suddenly she heard flying footsteps--a boy’s, running in mad haste +in the outer hall, and, following them, bare feet, soft, thudding. + +She stopped dead and every pulse cried--Danger! No time to think or +breathe when Mindon burst into sight, wild with terror and following +close beside him a man--a madman, a short bright dah in his grasp, his +jaws grinding foam, his wild eyes starting--one passion to murder. So +sometimes from the Nats comes pitiless fury, and men run mad and kill +and none knows why. + +Maya the Queen stiffened to meet the danger. Joy swept through her soul; +her weariness was gone. A fierce smile showed her teeth--a smile +of hate, as she stood there and drew her dagger for defense. For +defense--the man would rend the boy and turn on her and she would not +die. She would live to triumph that the mongrel was dead, and her son, +the Prince again and his father’s joy--for his heart would turn to the +child most surely. Justice was rushing on its victim. She would see it +and live content, the long years of agony wiped out in blood, as was +fitting. She would not flee; she would see it and rejoice. And as +she stood in gladness--these broken thoughts rushing through her like +flashes of lightning--Mindon saw her by the pillar and, screaming in +anguish for the first time, fled to her for refuge. + +She raised her knife to meet the staring eyes, the chalk white face, and +drive him back on the murderer. If the man failed, she would not! And +even as she did this a strange thing befell. Something stronger than +hate swept her away like a leaf on the river; something primeval that +lives in the lonely pangs of childbirth, that hides in the womb and +breasts of the mother. It was stronger than she. It was not the hated +Mindoin--she saw him no more. Suddenly it was the eternal Child, lifting +dying, appealing eyes to the Woman, as he clung to her knees. She did +not think this--she felt it, and it dominated her utterly. The Woman +answered. As if it had been her own flesh and blood, she swept the +panting body behind her and faced the man with uplifted dagger and knew +her victory assured, whether in life or death. On came the horrible +rush, the flaming eyes, and, if it was chance that set the dagger +against his throat, it was cool strength that drove it home and never +wavered until the blood welling from the throat quenched the flame in +the wild eyes, and she stood triumphing like a war-goddess, with the +man at her feet. Then, strong and flushed, Maya the Queen gathered the +half-dead boy in her arms, and, both drenched with blood, they moved +slowly down the hall and outside met the hurrying crowd, with Dwaymenau, +whom the scream had brought to find her son. + +“You have killed him! She has killed him!” Scarcely could the Rajput +woman speak. She was kneeling beside him--he hideous with blood. “She +hated him always. She has murdered him. Seize her!” + +“Woman, what matter your hates and mine?” the Queen said slowly. “The +boy is stark with fear. Carry him in and send for old Meh Shway Gon. +Woman, be silent!” + +When a Queen commands, men and women obey, and a Queen commanded then. +A huddled group lifted the child and carried him away, Dwaymenau with +them, still uttering wild threats, and the Queen was left alone. + +She could not realize what she had done and left undone. She could not +understand it. She had hated, sickened with loathing, as it seemed for +ages, and now, in a moment it had blown away like a whirlwind that is +gone. Hate was washed out of her soul and had left it cool and white as +the Lotus of the Blessed One. What power had Dwaymenau to hurt her when +that other Power walked beside her? She seemed to float above her in +high air and look down upon her with compassion. Strength, virtue flowed +in her veins; weakness, fear were fantasies. She could not understand, +but knew that here was perfect enlightenment. About her echoed the words +of the Blessed One: “Never in this world doth hatred cease by hatred, +but only by love. This is an old rule.” + +“Whereas I was blind, now I see,” said Maya the Queen slowly to her own +heart. She had grasped the hems of the Mighty. + +Words cannot speak the still passion of strength and joy that possessed +her. Her step was light. As she walked, her soul sang within her, for +thus it is with those that have received the Law. About them is the +Peace. + +In the dawn she was told that the Queen, Dwaymenau, would speak with +her, and without a tremor she who had shaken like a leaf at that name +commanded that she should enter. It was Dwaymenau that trembled as she +came into that unknown place. + +With cloudy brows and eyes that would reveal no secret, she stood before +the high seat where the Queen sat pale and majestic. + +“Is it well with the boy?” the Queen asked earnestly. + +“Well,” said Dwaymenau, fingering the silver bosses of her girdle. + +“Then--is there more to say?” The tone was that of the great lady who +courteously ends an audience. “There is more. The men brought in the +body and in its throat your dagger was sticking. And my son has told me +that your body was a shield to him. You offered your life for his. I did +not think to thank you--but I thank you.” She ended abruptly and still +her eyes had never met the Queen’s. + +“I accept your thanks. Yet a mother could do no less.” + +The tone was one of dismissal but still Dwaymenau lingered. + +“The dagger,” she said and drew it from her bosom. On the clear, pointed +blade the blood had curdled and dried. “I never thought to ask a gift of +you, but this dagger is a memorial of my son’s danger. May I keep it?” + +“As you will. Here is the sheath.” From her girdle she drew it--rough +silver, encrusted with rubies from the mountains. + +The hand rejected it. + +“Jewels I cannot take, but bare steel is a fitting gift between us two.” + +“As you will.” + +The Queen spoke compassionately, and Dwaymenau, still with veiled eyes, +was gone without fare well. The empty sheath lay on the seat--a symbol +of the sharp-edged hate that had passed out of her life. She touched the +sheath to her lips and, smiling, laid it away. + +And the days went by and Dwaymenau came no more before her, and her days +were fulfilled with peace. And now again the Queen ruled in the palace +wisely and like a Queen, and this Dwaymenau did not dispute, but what +her thoughts were no man could tell. + +Then came the end. + +One night the city awakened to a wild alarm. A terrible fleet of +war-boats came sweeping along the river thick as locusts--the war fleet +of the Lord of Prome. Battle shouts broke the peace of the night +to horror; axes battered on the outer doors; the roofs of the outer +buildings were all aflame. It was no wonderful incident, but a common +one enough of those turbulent days--reprisal by a powerful ruler with +raids and hates to avenge on the Lord of the Golden Palace. It was +indeed a right to be gainsaid only by the strong arm, and the strong arm +was absent; as for the men of Pagan, if the guard failed and the women’s +courage sank, they would return to blackened walls, empty chambers and +desolation. + +At Pagan the guard was small, indeed, for the King’s greed of plunder +had taken almost every able man with him. Still, those who were left +did what they could, and the women, alert and brave, with but few +exceptions, gathered the children and handed such weapons as they could +muster to the men, and themselves, taking knives and daggers, helped to +defend the inner rooms. + +In the farthest, the Queen, having given her commands and encouraged all +with brave words, like a wise, prudent princess, sat with her son beside +her. Her duty was now to him. Loved or unloved, he was still the heir, +the root of the House tree. If all failed, she must make ransom +and terms for him, and, if they died, it must be together. He, with +sparkling eyes, gay in the danger, stood by her. Thus Dwaymenau found +them. + +She entered quietly and without any display of emotion and stood before +the high seat. + +“Great Queen”--she used that title for the first time--“the leader is +Meng Kyinyo of Prome. There is no mercy. The end is near. Our men fall +fast, the women are fleeing. I have come to say this thing: Save the +Prince.” + +“And how?” asked the Queen, still seated. “I have no power.” + +“I have sent to Maung Tin, abbot of the Golden Monastery, and he has +said this thing. In the Kyoung across the river he can hide one child +among the novices. Cut his hair swiftly and put upon him this yellow +robe. The time is measured in minutes.” + +Then the Queen perceived, standing by the pillar, a monk of a stern, +dark presence, the creature of Dwaymenau. For an instant she pondered. +Was the woman selling the child to death? Dwaymenau spoke no word. +Her face was a mask. A minute that seemed an hour drifted by, and the +yelling and shrieks for mercy drew nearer. + +“There will be pursuit,” said the Queen. “They will slay him on the +river. Better here with me.” + +“There will be no pursuit.” Dwaymenau fixed her strange eyes on the +Queen for the first time. + +What moved in those eyes? The Queen could not tell. But despairing, +she rose and went to the silent monk, leading the Prince by the hand. +Swiftly he stripped the child of the silk pasoh of royalty, swiftly +he cut the long black tresses knotted on the little head, and upon the +slender golden body he set the yellow robe worn by the Lord Himself on +earth, and in the small hand he placed the begging-bowl of the Lord. +And now, remote and holy, in the dress that is of all most sacred, the +Prince, standing by the monk, turned to his mother and looked with grave +eyes upon her, as the child Buddha looked upon his Mother--also a Queen. +But Dwaymenau stood by silent and lent no help as the Queen folded the +Prince in her arms and laid his hand in the hand of the monk and saw +them pass away among the pillars, she standing still and white. + +She turned to her rival. “If you have meant truly, I thank you.” + +“I have meant truly.” + +She turned to go, but the Queen caught her by the hand. + +“Why have you done this?” she asked, looking into the strange eyes of +the strange woman. + +Something like tears gathered in them for a moment, but she brushed them +away as she said hurriedly: + +“I was grateful. You saved my son. Is it not enough?” + +“No, not enough!” cried the Queen. “There is more. Tell me, for death is +upon us.” + +“His footsteps are near,” said the Indian. “I will speak. I love my +lord. In death I will not cheat him. What you have known is true. My +child is no child of his. I will not go down to death with a lie upon my +lips. Come and see.” + +Dwaymenau was no more. Sundari, the Indian woman, awful and calm, led +the Queen down the long ball and into her own chamber, where Mindon, the +child, slept a drugged sleep. The Queen felt that she had never known +her; she herself seemed diminished in stature as she followed the +stately figure, with its still, dark face. Into this room the enemy were +breaking, shouldering their way at the door--a rabble of terrible faces. +Their fury was partly checked when only a sleeping child and two women +confronted them, but their leader, a grim and evil-looking man, strode +from the huddle. + +“Where is the son of the King?” he shouted. “Speak, women! Whose is this +boy?” + +Sundari laid her hand upon her son’s shoulder. Not a muscle of her face +flickered. + +“This is his son.” + +“His true son--the son of Maya the Queen?” + +“His true son, the son of Maya the Queen.” + +“Not the younger--the mongrel?” + +“The younger--the mongrel died last week of a fever.” + +Every moment of delay was precious. Her eyes saw only a monk and a boy +fleeing across the wide river. + +“Which is Maya the Queen?” + +“This,” said Sundari. “She cannot speak. It is her son--the Prince.” + +Maya had veiled her face with her hands. Her brain swam, but she +understood the noble lie. This woman could love. Their lord would not be +left childless. Thought beat like pulses in her--raced along her veins. +She held her breath and was dumb. + +His doubt was assuaged and the lust of vengeance was on him--a madness +seized the man. But even his own wild men shrank back a moment, for to +slay a sleeping child in cold blood is no man’s work. + +“You swear it is the Prince. But why? Why do you not lie to save him if +you are the King’s woman?” + +“Because his mother has trampled me to the earth. I am the Indian +woman--the mother of the younger, who is dead and safe. She jeered at +me--she mocked me. It is time I should see her suffer. Suffer now as I +have suffered, Maya the Queen!” + +This was reasonable--this was like the women he had known. His doubt was +gone--he laughed aloud. + +“Then feed full of vengeance!” he cried, and drove his knife through the +child’s heart. + +For a moment Sundari wavered where she stood, but she held herself and +was rigid as the dead. + +“Tha-du! Well done!” she said with an awful smile. “The tree is broken, +the roots cut. And now for us women--our fate, O master?” + +“Wait here,” he answered. “Let not a hair of their heads be touched. +Both are fair. The two for me. For the rest draw lots when all is done.” + +The uproar surged away. The two stood by the dead boy. So swift had been +his death that he lay as though he still slept--the black lashes pressed +upon his cheek. + +With the heredity of their different races upon them, neither wept. But +silently the Queen opened her arms; wide as a woman that entreats +she opened them to the Indian Queen, and speechlessly the two clung +together. For a while neither spoke. + +“My sister!” said Maya the Queen. And again, “O great of heart!” + +She laid her cheek against Sundari’s, and a wave of solemn joy seemed to +break in her soul and flood it with life and light. + +“Had I known sooner!” she said. “For now the night draws on.” + +“What is time?” answered the Rajput woman. “We stand before the Lords of +Life and Death. The life you gave was yours, and I am unworthy to kiss +the feet of the Queen. Our lord will return and his son is saved. The +House can be rebuilt. My son and I were waifs washed up from the sea. +Another wave washes us back to nothingness. Tell him my story and he +will loathe me.” + +“My lips are shut,” said the Queen. “Should I betray my sister’s honour? +When he speaks of the noble women of old, your name will be among them. +What matters which of us he loves and remembers? Your soul and mine have +seen the same thing, and we are one. But I--what have I to do with life? +The ship and the bed of the conqueror await us. Should we await them, my +sister?” + +The bright tears glittered in the eyes of Sundari at the tender name and +the love in the face of the Queen. At last she accepted it. + +“My sister, no,” she said, and drew from her bosom the dagger of Maya, +with the man’s blood rusted upon it. “Here is the way. I have kept this +dagger in token of my debt. Nightly have I kissed it, swearing that, +when the time came, I would repay my debt to the great Queen. Shall I go +first or follow, my sister?” + +Her voice lingered on the word. It was precious to her. It was like +clear water, laying away the stain of the shameful years. + +“Your arm is strong,” answered the Queen. “I go first. Because the +King’s son is safe, I bless you. For your love of the King, I love you. +And here, standing on the verge of life, I testify that the words of the +Blessed One are truth--that love is All; that hatred is Nothing.” + +She bared the breast that this woman had made desolate--that, with the +love of this woman, was desolate ho longer, and, stooping, laid her hand +on the brow of Mindon. Once more they embraced, and then, strong and +true, and with the Rajput passion behind the blow, the stroke fell and +Sundari had given her sister the crowning mercy of deliverance. She +laid the body beside her own son, composing the stately limbs, the quiet +eyelids, the black lengths of hair into majesty. So, she thought, in the +great temple of the Rajput race, the Mother Goddess shed silence and awe +upon her worshippers. The two lay like mother and son--one slight hand +of the Queen she laid across the little body as if to guard it. + +Her work done, she turned to the entrance and watched the dawn coming +glorious over the river. The men shouted and quarreled in the distance, +but she heeded them no more than the chattering of apes. Her heart was +away over the distance to the King, but with no passion now: so might a +mother have thought of her son. He was sleeping, forgetful of even her +in his dreams. What matter? She was glad at heart. The Queen was dearer +to her than the King--so strange is life; so healing is death. She +remembered without surprise that she had asked no forgiveness of the +Queen for all the cruel wrongs, for the deadly intent--had made no +confession. Again what matter? What is forgiveness when love is all? + +She turned from the dawn-light to the light in the face of the Queen. +It was well. Led by such a hand, she could present herself without fear +before the Lords of Life and Death--she and the child. She smiled. Life +is good, but death, which is more life, is better. The son of the King +was safe, but her own son safer. + +When the conqueror reentered the chamber, he found the dead Queen +guarding the dead child, and across her feet, as not worthy to lie +beside her, was the body of the Indian woman, most beautiful in death. + + + + +FIRE OF BEAUTY + +(Salutation to Ganesa the Lord of Wisdom, and to Saraswate the Lady of +Sweet Speech!) + +This story was composed by the Brahmin Visravas, that dweller on the +banks of holy Kashi; and though the events it records are long past, yet +it is absolutely and immutably true because, by the power of his yoga, +he summoned up every scene before him, and beheld the persons moving +and speaking as in life. Thus he had naught to do but to set down what +befell. + +What follows, that hath he seen. + + +I + +Wide was the plain, the morning sun shining full upon it, drinking up +the dew as the Divine drinks up the spirit of man. Far it stretched, +resembling the ocean, and riding upon it like a stately ship was the +league-long Rock of Chitor. It is certainly by the favour of the Gods +that this great fortress of the Rajput Kings thus rises from the plain, +leagues in length, noble in height; and very strange it is to see the +flat earth fall away from it like waters from the bows of a boat, as it +soars into the sky with its burden of palaces and towers. + +Here dwelt the Queen Padmini and her husband Bhimsi, the Rana of the +Rajputs. + +The sight of the holy ascetic Visravas pierced even the secrets of the +Rani’s bower, where, in the inmost chamber of marble, carved until it +appeared like lace of the foam of the sea, she was seated upon cushions +of blue Bokhariot silk, like the lotus whose name she bore floating upon +the blue depths of the lake. She had just risen from the shallow bath of +marble at her feet. + +Most beautiful was this Queen, a haughty beauty such as should be a +Rajput lady; for the name “Rajput” signifies Son of a King, and this +lady was assuredly the daughter of Kings and of no lesser persons. And +since that beauty is long since ashes (all things being transitory), +it is permitted to describe the mellowed ivory of her body, the smooth +curves of her hips, and the defiance of her glimmering bosom, half +veiled by the long silken tresses of sandal-scented hair which a maiden +on either side, bowing toward her, knotted upon her head. But even +he who with his eyes has seen it can scarce tell the beauty of her +face--the slender arched nose, the great eyes like lakes of darkness +in the reeds of her curled lashes, the mouth of roses, the glance, +deer-like but proud, that courted and repelled admiration. This cannot +be told, nor could the hand of man paint it. Scarcely could that fair +wife of the Pandava Prince, Draupadi the Beautiful (who bore upon her +perfect form every auspicious mark) excel this lady. + +(Ashes--ashes! May Maheshwara have mercy upon her rebirths!) + +Throughout India had run the fame of this beauty. In the bazaar of +Kashmir they told of it. It was recorded in the palaces of Travancore, +and all the lands that lay between; and in an evil hour--may the Gods +curse the mother that bore him!--it reached the ears of Allah-u-Din, the +Moslem dog, a very great fighting man who sat in Middle India, looting +and spoiling. + +(Ahi! for the beauty that is as a burning flame!) + +In the gardens beneath the windows of the Queen, the peacocks, those +maharajas of the birds, were spreading the bronze and emerald of their +tails. The sun shone on them as on heaps of jewels, so that they dazzled +the eyes. They stood about the feet of the ancient Brahmin sage, he +who had tutored the Queen in her childhood and given her wisdom as the +crest-jeweled of her loveliness. He, the Twice-born sat under the shade +of a neem tree, hearing the gurgle of the sacred waters from the Cow’s +Mouth, where the great tank shone under the custard-apple boughs; and, +at peace with all the world, he read in the Scripture which affirms the +transience of all things drifting across the thought of the Supreme like +clouds upon the surface of the Ocean. + +(Ahi! that loveliness is also illusion!) + +Her women placed about the Queen--that Lotus of Women--a robe of silk +of which none could say that it was green or blue, the noble colours so +mingled into each other under the latticed gold work of Kashi. They set +the jewels on her head, and wide thin rings of gold heavy with great +pearls in her ears. Upon the swell of her bosom they clasped the +necklace of table emeralds, large, deep, and full of green lights, which +is the token of the Chitor queens. Upon her slender ankles they placed +the chooris of pure soft gold, set also with grass-green emeralds, and +the delicate souls of her feet they reddened with lac. Nor were her arms +forgotten, but loaded with bangles so free from alloy that they could be +bent between the hands of a child. Then with fine paste they painted the +Symbol between her dark brows, and, rising, she shone divine as a nymph +of heaven who should cause the righteous to stumble in his austerities +and arrest even the glances of Gods. + +(Ahi! that the Transient should be so fair!) + + +II + +Now it was the hour that the Rana should visit her; for since the coming +of the Lotus Lady, he had forgotten his other women, and in her was all +his heart. He came from the Hall of Audience where petitions were heard, +and justice done to rich and poor; and as he came, the Queen, hearing +his step on the stone, dismissed her women, and smiling to know her +loveliness, bowed before him, even as the Goddess Uma bows before Him +who is her other half. + +Now he was a tall man, with the falcon look of the Hill Rajputs, and +moustaches that curled up to his eyes, lion-waisted and lean in the +flanks like Arjoon himself, a very ruler of men; and as he came, his +hand was on the hilt of the sword that showed beneath his gold coat of +khincob. On the high cushions he sat, and the Rani a step beneath him; +and she said, raising her lotus eyes:-- + +“Speak, Aryaputra, (son of a noble father)--what hath befallen?” + +And he, looking upon her beauty with fear, replied,-- + +“It is thy beauty, O wife, that brings disaster.” + +“And how is this?” she asked very earnestly. + +For a moment he paused, regarding her as might a stranger, as one +who considers a beauty in which he hath no part; and, drawn by this +strangeness, she rose and knelt beside him, pillowing her head upon his +heart. + +“Say on,” she said in her voice of music. + +He unfurled a scroll that he had crushed in his strong right hand, and +read aloud:-- + + “‘Thus says Allah-u-Din, Shadow of God, Wonder of the Age, +Viceregent of Kings. We have heard that in the Treasury of Chitor is a +jewel, the like of which is not in the Four Seas--the work of the hand +of the Only God, to whom be praise! This jewel is thy Queen, the Lady +Padmini. Now, since the sons of the Prophet are righteous, I desire but +to look upon this jewel, and ascribing glory to the Creator, to depart +in peace. Granted requests are the bonds of friendship; therefore +lay the head of acquiescence in the dust of opportunity and name an +auspicious day.’” + +He crushed it again and flung it furiously from him on the marble. + +“The insult is deadly. The sorry son of a debased mother! Well he knows +that to the meanest Rajput his women are sacred, and how much more the +daughters and wives of the Kings! The jackals feast on the tongue that +speaks this shame! But it is a threat, Beloved--a threat! Give me thy +counsel that never failed me yet.” + +For the Rajputs take counsel with their women who are wise. + +They were silent, each weighing the force of resistance that could be +made; and this the Rani knew even as he. + +“It cannot be,” she said; “the very ashes of the dead would shudder to +hear. Shall the Queens of India be made the sport of the barbarians?” + +Her husband looked upon her fair face. She could feel his heart labor +beneath her ear. + +“True, wife; but the barbarians are strong. Our men are tigers, each +one, but the red dogs of the Dekkan can pull down the tiger, for they +are many, and he alone.” + +Then that great Lady, accepting his words, and conscious of the danger, +murmured this, clinging to her husband:-- + +“There was a Princess of our line whose beauty made all other women seem +as waning moons in the sun’s splendour. And many great Kings sought her, +and there was contention and war. And, she, fearing that the Rajputs +would be crushed to powder between the warring Kings, sent unto each +this message: ‘Come on such and such a day, and thou shalt see my face +and hear my choice.’ And they, coming, rejoiced exceedingly, thinking +each one that he was the Chosen. So they came into the great Hall, and +there was a table, and somewhat upon it covered with a gold cloth; and +an old veiled woman lifted the gold, and the head of the Princess lay +there with the lashes like night upon her cheek, and between her lips +was a little scroll, saying this: ‘I have chosen my Lover and my Lord, +and he is mightiest, for he is Death.’--So the Kings went silently away. +And there was Peace.” + +The music of her voice ceased, and the Rana clasped her closer. + +“This I cannot do. Better die together. Let us take counsel with the +ancient Brahman, thy guru [teacher], for he is very wise.” + +She clapped her hands, and the maidens returned, and, bowing, brought +the venerable Prabhu Narayan into the Presence, and again those roses +retired. + +Respectful salutation was then offered by the King and the Queen to that +saint, hoary with wisdom--he who had seen her grow into the loveliness +of the sea-born Shri, yet had never seen that loveliness; for he had +never raised his eyes above the chooris about her ankles. To him the +King related his anxieties; and he sat rapt in musing, and the two +waited in dutiful silence until long minutes had fallen away; and at the +last he lifted his head, weighted with wisdom, and spoke. + +“O King, Descendant of Rama! this outrage cannot be. Yet, knowing the +strength and desire of this obscene one and the weakness of our power, +it is plain that only with cunning can cunning be met. Hear, therefore, +the history of the Fox and the Drum. + +“A certain Fox searched for food in the jungle, and so doing beheld +a tree on which hung a drum; and when the boughs knocked upon the +parchment, it sounded aloud. Considering, he believed that so round a +form and so great a voice must portend much good feeding. Neglecting on +this account a fowl that fed near by, he ascended to the drum. The drum +being rent was but air and parchment, and meanwhile the fowl fled away. +And from the eye of folly he shed the tear of disappointment, having +bartered the substance for the shadow. So must we act with this budmash +[scoundrel]. First, receiving his oath that he will depart without +violence, hid him hither to a great feast, and say that he shall behold +the face of the Queen in a mirror. Provide that some fair woman of +the city show her face, and then let him depart in peace, showing him +friendship. He shall not know he hath not seen the beauty he would +befoul.” + +After consultation, no better way could be found; but the heart of the +great Lady was heavy with foreboding. + +(A hi! that Beauty should wander a pilgrim in the ways of sorrow!) + +To Allah-u-Din therefore did the King dispatch this letter by swift +riders on mares of Mewar. + +After salutations--“Now whereas thou hast said thou wouldest look upon +the beauty of the Treasure of Chitor, know it is not the custom of the +Rajputs that any eye should light upon their treasure. Yet assuredly, +when requests arise between friends, there cannot fail to follow +distress of mind and division of soul if these are ungranted. So, under +promises that follow, I bid thee to a feast at my poor house of Chitor, +and thou shalt see that beauty reflected in a mirror, and so seeing, +depart in peace from the house of a friend.” + +This being writ by the Twice-Born, the Brahman, did the Rana sign with +bitter rage in his heart. And the days passed. + + +III + +On a certain day found fortunate by the astrologers--a day of early +winter, when the dawns were pure gold and the nights radiant with a +cool moon--did a mighty troop of Moslems set their camp on the plain of +Chitor. It was as if a city had blossomed in an hour. Those who looked +from the walls muttered prayers to the Lord of the Trident; for these +men seemed like the swarms of the locust--people, warriors all, fierce +fighting-men. And in the ways of Chitor, and up the steep and winding +causeway from the plains, were warriors also, the chosen of the Rajputs, +thick as blades of corn hedging the path. + +(Ahi! that the blossom of beauty should have swords for thorns!) + +Then, leaving his camp, attended by many Chiefs,--may the mothers and +sires that begot them be accursed!--came Allah-u-Din, riding toward the +Lower Gate, and so upward along the causeway, between the two rows of +men who neither looked nor spoke, standing like the carvings of war in +the Caves of Ajunta. And the moon was rising through the sunset as he +came beneath the last and seventh gate. Through the towers and palaces +he rode with his following, but no woman, veiled or unveiled,--no, not +even an outcast of the city,--was there to see him come; only the men, +armed and silent. So he turned to Munim Khan that rode at his bridle, +saying,-- + +“Let not the eye of watchfulness close this night on the pillow of +forgetfulness!” + +And thus he entered the palace. + +Very great was the feast in Chitor, and the wines that those accursed +should not drink (since the Outcast whom they call their Prophet forbade +them) ran like water, and at the right hand of Allah-u-Din was set the +great crystal Cup inlaid with gold by a craft that is now perished; and +he filled and refilled it--may his own Prophet curse the swine! + +But because the sons of Kings eat not with the outcasts, the Rana +entered after, clothed in chain armor of blue steel, and having greeted +him, bid him to the sight of that Treasure. And Allah-u-Din, his eyes +swimming with wine, and yet not drunken, followed, and the two went +alone. + +Purdahs [curtains] of great splendour were hung in the great Hall that +is called the Raja’s Hall, exceeding rich with gold, and in front of the +opening was a kneeling-cushion, and an a gold stool before it a polished +mirror. + +(Ahi! for gold and beauty, the scourges of the world!) + +And the Rana was pale to the lips. + +Now as the Princes stood by the purdah, a veiled woman, shrouded in +white so that no shape could be seen in her, came forth from within, +and kneeling upon the cushion, she unveiled her face bending until +the mirror, like a pool of water, held it, and that only. And the King +motioned his guest to look, and he looked over her veiled shoulder +and saw. Very great was the bowed beauty that the mirror held, but +Allah-u-Din turned to the Rana. + +“By the Bread and the Salt, by the Guest-Right, by the Honour of thy +House, I ask--is this the Treasure of Chitor?” + +And since the Sun-Descended cannot lie, no, not though they perish, the +Rana answered, flushing darkly,--“This is not the Treasure. Wilt thou +spare?” + +But he would not, and the woman slipped like a shadow behind the purdah +and no word said. + +Then was heard the tinkling of chooris, and the little noise fell upon +the silence like a fear, and, parting the curtains, came a woman veiled +like the other. She did not kneel, but took the mirror in her hand, and +Allah-u-Din drew up behind her back. From her face she raised the veil +of gold Dakka webs, and gazed into the mirror, holding it high, and that +Accursed stumbled back, blinded with beauty, saying this only,--“I have +seen the Treasure of Chitor.” + +So the purdah fell about her. + +The next day, after the Imaum of the Accursed had called them to prayer, +they departed, and Allah-u-Din, paying thanks to the Rana for honours +given and taken, and swearing friendship, besought him to ride to his +camp, to see the marvels of gold and steel armor brought down from the +passes, swearing also safe-conduct. And because the Rajputs trust the +word even of a foe, he went. + +(A hi! that honour should strike hands with traitors!) + + +IV + +The hours went by, heavy-footed like mourners. Padmini the Rani knelt by +the window in her tower that overlooks the plains. Motionless she knelt +there, as the Goddess Uma lost in her penances, and she saw her Lord +ride forth, and the sparkle of steel where the sun shone on them, and +the Standard of the Cold Disk on its black ground. So the camp of the +Moslem swallowed them up, and they returned no more. Still she knelt and +none dared speak with her; and as the first shade of evening fell across +the hills of Rajasthan, she saw a horseman spurting over the flat; and +he rode like the wind, and, seeing, she implored the Gods. + +Then entered the Twice-Born, that saint of clear eyes, and he bore a +scroll; and she rose and seated herself, and he stood by her, as her +ladies cowered like frightened doves before the woe in his face as he +read. + +“To the Rose of Beauty, The Pearl among Women, the Chosen of the Palace. +Who, having seen thy loveliness, can look on another? Who, having tasted +the wine of the Houris, but thirsts forever? Behold, I have thy King as +hostage. Come thou and deliver him. I have sworn that he shall return in +thy place.” + +And from a smaller scroll, the Brahman read this:-- + +“I am fallen in the snare. Act thou as becomes a Rajputni.” + +Then that Daughter of the Sun lifted her head, for the thronging of +armed feet was heard in the Council Hall below. From the floor she +caught her veil and veiled herself in haste, and the Brahman with bowed +head followed, while her women mourned aloud. And, descending, between +the folds of the purdah she appeared white and veiled, and the Brahman +beside her, and the eyes of all the Princes were lowered to her shrouded +feet, while the voice they had not heard fell silvery upon the air, and +the echoes of the high roof repeated it. + +“Chief of the Rajputs, what is your counsel?” And he of Marwar stepped +forward, and not raising his eyes above her feet, answered,-- + +“Queen, what is thine?” + +For the Rajputs have ever heard the voice of their women. + +And she said,-- + +“I counsel that I die and my head be sent to him, that my blood may +quench his desire.” + +And each talked eagerly with the other, but amid the tumult the +Twice-Born said,-- + +“This is not good talk. In his rage he will slay the King. By my yoga, I +have seen it. Seek another way.” + +So they sought, but could determine nothing, and they feared to ride +against the dog, for he held the life of the King; and the tumult was +great, but all were for the King’s safety. + +Then once more she spoke. + +“Seeing it is determined that the King’s life is more than my honour, +I go this night. In your hand I leave my little son, the Prince Ajeysi. +Prepare my litters, seven hundred of the best, for all my women go with +me. Depart now, for I have a thought from the Gods.” + +Then, returning to her bower, she spoke this letter to the saint, and he +wrote it, and it was sent to the camp. + +After salutations--“Wisdom and strength have attained their end. Have +ready for release the Rana of Chitor, for this night I come with my +ladies, the prize of the conqueror.” + +When the sun sank, a great procession with torches descended the steep +way of Chitor--seven hundred litters, and in the first was borne the +Queen, and all her women followed. + +All the streets were thronged with women, weeping and beating their +breasts. Very greatly they wept, and no men were seen, for their livers +were black within them for shame as the Treasure of Chitor departed, +nor would they look upon the sight. And across the plains went that +procession; as if the stars had fallen upon the earth, so glittered the +sorrowful lights of the Queen. + +But in the camp was great rejoicing, for the Barbarians knew that many +fair women attended on her. + +Now, before the entrance to the camp they had made a great shamiana +[tent] ready, hung with shawls of Kashmir and the plunder of Delhi; and +there was set a silk divan for the Rani, and beside it stood the Loser +and the Gainer, Allah-u-Din and the King, awaiting the Treasure. + +Veiled she entered, stepping proudly, and taking no heed of the Moslem, +she stood before her husband, and even through the veil he could feel +the eyes he knew. + +And that Accursed spoke, laughing. + +“I have won-I have won, O King! Bid farewell to the Chosen of the +Palace--the Beloved of the Viceregent of Kings!” + +Then she spoke softly, delicately, in her own tongue, that the outcast +should not guess the matter of her speech. + +“Stand by me. Stir not. And when I raise my arm, cry the cry of the +Rajputs. NOW!” + +And she flung her arm above her head, and instantly, like a lion +roaring, he shouted, drawing his sword, and from every litter sprang an +armed man, glittering in steel, and the bearers, humble of mien, were +Rajput knights, every one. + +And Allah-u-Din thrust at the breast of the Queen; but around them +surged the war, and she was hedged with swords like a rose in the +thickets. + +Very full of wine, dull with feasting and lust and surprised, the +Moslems fled across the plains, streaming in a broken rabble, cursing +and shouting like low-caste women; and the Rajputs, wiping their swords, +returned from the pursuit and laughed upon each other. + +But what shall be said of the joy of the King and of her who had +imagined this thing, instructed of the Goddess who is the other half of +her Lord? + +So the procession returned, singing, to Chitor with those Two in the +midst; but among the dogs that fled was Allah-u-Din, his face blackened +with shame and wrath, the curses choking in his foul throat. + +(Aid! that the evil still walk the ways of the world!) + + +V + +So the time went by and the beauty of the Queen grew, and her King could +see none but hers. Like the moon she obscured the stars, and every day +he remembered her wisdom, her valour, and his soul did homage at her +feet, and there was great content in Chitor. + +It chanced one day that the Queen, looking from her high window that +like an eagle’s nest overhung the precipice, saw, on the plain beneath, +a train of men, walking like ants, and each carried a basket on his +back, and behind them was a cloud of dust like a great army. Already the +city was astir because of this thing, and the rumours came thick and the +spies were sent out. + +In the dark they returned, and the Rana entered the bower of Padmini, +his eyes burning like coal with hate and wrath, and he flung his arm +round his wife like a shield. + +“He is returned, and in power. Counsel me again, O wife, for great is +thy wisdom!” + +But she answered only this,-- + +“Fight, for this time it is to the death.” + +Then each day she watched bow the baskets of earth, emptied upon the +plain at first, made nothing, an ant heap whereat fools might laugh. But +each day as the trains of men came, spilling their baskets, the great +earthworks grew and their height mounted. Day after day the Rajputs rode +forth and slew; and as they slew it seemed that all the teeming millions +of the earth came forth to take the places of the slain. And the Rajputs +fell also, and under the pennons the thundering forces returned daily, +thinned of their best. + +(A hi! that Evil rules the world as God!) + +And still the earth grew up to the heights, and the protection of the +hills was slowly withdrawn from Chitor, for on the heights they made +they set their engines of war. + +Then in a red dawn that great saint Narayan came to the Queen, where she +watched by her window, and spoke. + +“O great lady, I have dreamed a fearful dream. Nay, rather have I seen a +vision.” + +With her face set like a sword, the Queen said,-- + +“Say on.” + +“In a light red like blood, I waked, and beside me stood the +Mother,--Durga,--awful to see, with a girdle of heads about her middle; +and the drops fell thick and slow from That which she held in her hand, +and in the other was her sickle of Doom. Nor did she speak, but my soul +heard her words.” + +“Narrate them.” + +“She commanded: ‘Say this to the Rana: “In Chitor is My altar; in Chitor +is thy throne. If thou wouldest save either, send forth twelve crowned +Kings of Chitor to die.’” + +As he said this, the Rana, fore-spent with fighting, entered and heard +the Divine word. + +Now there were twelve princes of the Rajput blood, and the youngest was +the son of Padmini. What choice had these most miserable but to appease +the dreadful anger of the Goddess? So on each fourth day a King of +Chitor was crowned, and for three days sat upon the throne, and on the +fourth day, set in the front, went forth and died fighting. So perished +eleven Kings of Chitor, and now there was left but the little Ajeysi, +the son of the Queen. + +And that day was a great Council called. + +Few were there. On the plains many lay dead; holding the gates many +watched; but the blood was red in their hearts and flowed like Indus in +the melting of the snows. And to them spoke the Rana, his hand clenched +on his sword, and the other laid on the small dark head of the Prince +Ajeysi, who stood between his knees. And as he spoke his voice gathered +strength till it rang through the hall like the voice of Indra when he +thunders in the heavens. + +“Men of the Rajputs, this child shall not die. Are we become jackals +that we fall upon the weak and tear them? When have we put our women +and children in the forefront of the war? I--I only am King of Chitor. +Narayan shall save this child for the time that will surely come. And +for us--what shall we do? I die for Chitor!” + +And like the hollow waves of a great sea they answered him,-- + +“We will die for Chitor.” + +There was silence and Marwar spoke. + +“The women?” + +“Do they not know the duty of a Rajputni?” said the King. “My household +has demanded that the caves be prepared.” + +And the men clashed stew joy with their swords, and the council +dispersed. + +Then that very great saint, the Twice-Born, put off the sacred thread +that is the very soul of the Brahman. In his turban he wound it +secretly, and he stained his noble Aryan body until it resembled the +Pariahs, foul for the pure to see, loathsome for the pure to touch, +and he put on him the rags of the lowest of the earth, and taking the +Prince, he removed from the body of the child every trace of royal and +Rajput birth, and he appeared like a child of the Bhils--the vile forest +wanderers that shame not to defile their lips with carrion. And in this +guise they stood before the Queen; and when she looked on the saint, the +tears fell from her eyes like rain, not for grief for her son, nor for +death, but that for their sake the pure should be made impure and the +glory of the Brahman-hood be defiled. And she fell at the old man’s feet +and laid her head on the ground before him. + +“Rise, daughter!” he said, “and take comfort! Are not the eyes of the +Gods clear that they should distinguish?--and this day we stand before +the God of Gods. Have not the Great Ones said, ‘That which causes life +causes also decay and death’? Therefore we who go and you who stay are +alike a part of the Divine. Embrace now your child and bless him, for we +depart. And it is on account of the sacrifice of the Twelve that he is +saved alive.” + +So, controlling her tears, she rose, and clasping the child to her +bosom, she bade him be of good cheer since he went with the Gods. And +that great saint took his hand from hers, and for the first time in the +life of the Queen he raised his aged eyes to her face, and she gazed at +him; but what she read, even the ascetic Visravas, who saw all by +the power of his yoga, could not tell, for it was beyond speech. Very +certainly the peace thereafter possessed her. + +So those two went out by the secret ways of the rocks, and wandering +far, were saved by the favour of Durga. + + +VI + +And the nights went by and the days, and the time came that no longer +could they hold Chitor, and all hope was dead. + +On a certain day the Rana and the Rani stood for the last time in her +bower, and looked down into the city; and in the streets were gathered +in a very wonderful procession the women of Chitor; and not one was +veiled. Flowers that had bloomed in the inner chambers, great ladies +jewelled for a festival, young brides, aged mothers, and girl children +clinging to the robes of their mothers who held their babes, crowded the +ways. Even the low-caste women walked with measured steps and proudly, +decked in what they had of best, their eyes lengthened with soorma, and +flowers in the darkness of their hair. + +The Queen was clothed in a gold robe of rejoicing, her bodice latticed +with diamonds and great gems, and upon her bosom the necklace of table +emeralds, alight with green fire, which is the jewel of the Queens of +Chitor. So she stood radiant as a vision of Shri, and it appeared that +rays encircled her person. + +And the Rana, unarmed save for his sword, had the saffron dress of a +bridegroom and the jeweled cap of the Rajput Kings, and below in the +hall were the Princes and Chiefs, clad even as he. + +Then, raising her lotus eyes to her lord, the Princess said,-- + +“Beloved, the time is come, and we have chosen rightly, for this is +the way of honour, and it is but another link forged in the chain of +existence; for until existence itself is ended and rebirth destroyed, +still shall we meet in lives to come and still be husband and wife. What +room then for despair?” + +And he answered,-- + +“This is true. Go first, wife, and I follow. Let not the door swing to +behind thee. But oh, to see thy beauty once more that is the very speech +of Gods with men! Wilt thou surely come again to me and again be fair?” + +And for all answer she smiled upon him, and at his feet performed the +obeisance of the Rajput wife when she departs upon a journey; and they +went out together, the Queen unveiled. + +As she passed through the Princes, they lowered their eyes so that none +saw her; but when she stood on the steps of the palace, the women all +turned eagerly toward her like stars about the moon, and lifting their +arms, they began to sing the dirge of the Rajput women. + +So they marched, and in great companies they marched, company behind +company, young and old, past the Queen, saluting her and drawing courage +from the loveliness and kindness of her unveiled face. + +In the rocks beneath the palaces of Chitor are very great caves--league +long and terrible, with ways of darkness no eyes have seen; and it +is believed that in times past spirits have haunted them with strange +wailings. In these was prepared great store of wood and oils and +fragrant matters for burning. So to these caves they marched and, +company by company, disappeared into the darkness; and the voice of +their singing grew faint and hollow, and died away, as the men stood +watching their women go. + +Now, when this was done and the last had gone, the Rani descended the +steps, and the Rana, taking a torch dipped in fragrant oils, followed +her, and the Princes walked after, clad like bridegrooms but with no +faces of bridal joy. At the entrance of the caves, having lit the torch, +he gave it into her hand, and she, receiving it and smiling, turned once +upon the threshold, and for the first time those Princes beheld the face +of the Queen, but they hid their eyes with their hands when they had +seen. So she departed within, and the Rana shut to the door and barred +and bolted it, and the men with him flung down great rocks before it so +that none should know the way, nor indeed is it known to this day; and +with their hands on their swords they waited there, not speaking, until +a great smoke rose between the crevices of the rocks, but no sound at +all. + +(Ashes of roses--ashes of roses!--Ahi! for beauty that is but touched +and remitted!) + +The sun was high when those men with their horses and on foot marched +down the winding causeway beneath the seven gates, and so forth into the +plains, and charging unarmed upon the Moslems, they perished every man. +After, it was asked of one who had seen the great slaughter,-- + +“Say how my King bore himself.” + +And he who had seen told this:-- + +“Reaper of the harvest of battle, on the bed of honour he has spread a +carpet of the slain! He sleeps ringed about by his enemies. How can the +world tell of his deeds? The tongue is silent.” + +When that Accursed, Allah-u-Din, came up the winding height of the +hills, he found only a dead city, and his heart was sick within him. + +Now this is the Sack of Chitor, and by the Oath of the Sack of Chitor do +the Rajputs swear when they bind their honour. + +But it is only the ascetic Visravas who by the power of his yoga has +heard every word, and with his eyes beheld that Flame of Beauty, who, +for a brief space illuminating the world as a Queen, returns to birth in +many a shape of sorrowful loveliness until the Blue-throated God shall +in his favour destroy her rebirths. + +Salutation to Ganesa the Elephant-Headed One, and to Shri the Lady of +Beauty! + + + + +THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL + + In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful--the Smiting! + A day when the soul shall know what it has sent on or kept back. + A day when no soul shall control aught for another. + And the bidding belongs to God. + + +THE KORAN. + +I + +Now the Shah-in-Shah, Shah Jahan, Emperor in India, loved his wife with +a great love. And of all the wives of the Mogul Emperors surely this +Lady Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal---the Chosen of the Palace--was the most +worthy of love. In the tresses of her silk-soft hair his heart was +bound, and for none other had he so much as a passing thought since +his soul had been submerged in her sweetness. Of her he said, using the +words of the poet Faisi,-- + +“How shall I understand the magic of Love the Juggler? For he made thy +beauty enter at that small gate the pupil of my eye, And now--and now my +heart cannot contain it!” + +But who should marvel? For those who have seen this Arjemand crowned +with the crown the Padishah set upon her sweet low brows, with the lamps +of great jewels lighting the dimples of her cheeks as they swung beside +them, have most surely seen perfection. He who sat upon the Peacock +Throne, where the outspread tail of massed gems is centred by that great +ruby, “The Eye of the Peacock, the Tribute of the World,” valued it not +so much as one Jock of the dark and perfumed tresses that rolled to her +feet. Less to him the twelve throne columns set close with pearls than +the little pearls she showed in her sweet laughter. For if this lady was +all beauty, so too she was all goodness; and from the Shah-in-Shah to +the poorest, all hearts of the world knelt in adoration, before the +Chosen of the Palace. She was, indeed, an extraordinary beauty, in that +she had the soul of a child, and she alone remained unconscious of her +power; and so she walked, crowned and clothed with humility. + +Cold, haughty, and silent was the Shah-in-Shah before she blessed his +arms--flattered, envied, but loved by none. But the gift this Lady +brought with her was love; and this, shining like the sun upon ice, +melted his coldness, and he became indeed the kingly centre of a kingly +court May the Peace be upon her! + +Now it was the dawn of a sorrowful day when the pains of the Lady +Arjemand came strong and terrible, and she travailed in agony. The +hakims (physicians) stroked their beards and reasoned one with another; +the wise women surrounded her, and remedies many and great were tried; +and still her anguish grew, and in the hall without sat the Shah-in-Shah +upon his divan, in anguish of spirit yet greater. The sweat ran on his +brows, the knotted veins were thick on his temples, and his eyes, sunk +in their caves, showed as those of a maddened man. He crouched on his +cushions and stared at the purdah that divided him from the Lady; and +all day the people came and went about him, and there was silence from +the voice he longed to hear; for she would not moan, lest the sound +should slay the Emperor. Her women besought her, fearing that her strong +silence would break her heart; but still she lay, her hands clenched in +one another, enduring; and the Emperor endured without. The Day of the +Smiting! + +So, as the time of the evening prayer drew nigh, a child was born, +and the Empress, having done with pain, began to sink slowly into +that profound sleep that is the shadow cast by the Last. May Allah the +Upholder have mercy on our weakness! And the women, white with fear +and watching, looked upon her, and whispered one to another, “It is the +end.” + +And the aged mother of Abdul Mirza, standing at her head, said, “She +heeds not the cry of the child. She cannot stay.” And the newly wed +wife of Saif Khan, standing at her feet, said, “The voice of the beloved +husband is as the Call of the Angel. Let the Padishah be summoned.” + +So, the evening prayer being over (but the Emperor had not prayed), the +wisest of the hakims, Kazim Sharif, went before him and spoke:-- + +“Inhallah! May the will of the Issuer of Decrees in all things be done! +Ascribe unto the Creator glory, bowing before his Throne.” + +And he remained silent; but the Padishah, haggard in his jewels, with +his face hidden, answered thickly, “The truth! For Allah has forgotten +his slave.” + +And Kazim Sharif, bowing at his feet and veiling his face with his +hands, replied: + +“The voice of the child cannot reach her, and the Lady of Delight +departs. He who would speak with her must speak quickly.” + +Then the Emperor rose to his feet unsteadily, like a man drunk with +the forbidden juice; and when Kazim Sharif would have supported him, he +flung aside his hands, and he stumbled, a man wounded to death, as it +were, to the marble chamber where she lay. + +In that white chamber it was dusk, and they had lit the little cressets +so that a very faint light fell upon her face. A slender fountain a +little cooled the hot, still air with its thin music and its sprinkled +diamonds, and outside, the summer lightnings were playing wide and blue +on the river; but so still was it that the dragging footsteps of the +Emperor raised the hair on the flesh of those who heard, So the women +who should, veiled themselves, and the others remained like pillars of +stone. + +Now, when those steps were heard, a faint colour rose in the cheek of +the Lady Arjemand; but she did not raise the heavy lashes, or move her +hand. And he came up beside her, and the Shadow of God, who should kneel +to none, knelt, and his head fell forward upon her breast; and in the +hush the women glided out like ghosts, leaving the husband with the wife +excepting only that her foster-nurse stood far off, with eyes averted. + +So the minutes drifted by, falling audibly one by one into eternity, and +at the long last she slowly opened her eyes and, as from the depths of +a dream, beheld the Emperor; and in a voice faint as the fall of a +rose-leaf she said the one word, “Beloved!” + +And he from between his clenched teeth, answered, “Speak, wife.” + +So she, who in all things had loved and served him,--she, Light of +all hearts, dispeller of all gloom,--gathered her dying breath for +consolation, and raised one hand slowly; and it fell across his, and so +remained. + +Now, her beauty had been broken in the anguish like a rose in storm; but +it returned to her, doubtless that the Padishah might take comfort in +its memory; and she looked like a houri of Paradise who, kneeling beside +the Zemzem Well, beholds the Waters of Peace. Not Fatmeh herself, the +daughter of the Prophet of God, shone more sweetly. She repeated the +word, “Beloved”; and after a pause she whispered on with lips that +scarcely stirred, “King of the Age, this is the end.” + +But still he was like a dead man, nor lifted his face. + +“Surely all things pass. And though I go, in your heart I abide, and +nothing can sever us. Take comfort.” + +But there was no answer. + +“Nothing but Love’s own hand can slay Love. Therefore, remember me, and +I shall live.” + +And he answered from the darkness of her bosom, “The whole world shall +remember. But when shall I be united to thee? O Allah, how long wilt +thou leave me to waste in this separation?” + +And she: “Beloved, what is time? We sleep and the night is gone. Now put +your arms about me, for I sink into rest. What words are needed between +us? Love is enough.” + +So, making not the Profession of Faith,--and what need, since all her +life was worship,--the Lady Arjemand turned into his arms like a child. +And the night deepened. + +Morning, with its arrows of golden light that struck the river to +splendour! Morning, with its pure breath, its sunshine of joy, and the +koels fluting in the Palace gardens! Morning, divine and new from +the hand of the Maker! And in the innermost chamber of marble a white +silence; and the Lady, the Mirror of Goodness, lying in the Compassion +of Allah, and a broken man stretched on the ground beside her. For all +flesh, from the camel-driver to the Shah-in-Shah, is as one in the Day +of the Smiting. + + +II + +For weeks the Emperor lay before the door of death; and had it opened +to him, he had been blessed. So the months went by, and very slowly the +strength returned to him; but his eyes were withered and the bones stood +out in his cheeks. But he resumed his throne, and sat upon it kingly, +black-bearded, eagle-eyed, terribly apart in his grief and his royalty; +and so seated among his Usbegs, he declared his will. + +“For this Lady (upon whom be peace), departed to the mercy of the Giver +and Taker, shall a tomb-palace be made, the Like of which is not found +in the four corners of the world. Send forth therefore for craftsmen +like the builders of the Temple of Solomon the Wise; for I will build.” + +So, taking counsel, they sent in haste into Agra for Ustad Isa, the +Master-Builder, a man of Shiraz; and he, being presented before the +Padishah, received his instructions in these words:-- + +“I will that all the world shall remember the Flower of the World, +that all hearts shall give thanks for her beauty, which was indeed the +perfect Mirror of the Creator. And since it is abhorrent of Islam that +any image be made in the likeness of anything that has life, make for me +a palace-tomb, gracious as she was gracious, lovely as she was lovely. +Not such as the tombs of the Kings and the Conquerors, but of a divine +sweetness. Make me a garden on the banks of Jumna, and build it there, +where, sitting in my Pavilion of Marble, I may see it rise.” + +And Ustad Isa, having heard, said, “Upon my head and eyes!” and went out +from the Presence. + +So, musing upon the words of the Padishah, he went to his house in Agra, +and there pondered the matter long and deeply; and for a whole day and +night he refused all food and secluded himself from the society of all +men; for he said:-- + +“This is a weighty thing, for this Lady (upon whom be peace) must +visibly dwell in her tomb-palace on the shore of the river; and how +shall I, who have never seen her, imagine the grace that was in her, and +restore it to the world? Oh, had I but the memory of her face! Could I +but see it as the Shah-in-Shah sees it, remembering the past! Prophet +of God, intercede for me, that I may look through his eyes, if but for a +moment!” + +That night he slept, wearied and weakened with fasting; and whether it +were that the body guarded no longer the gates of the soul, I cannot +say; for, when the body ails, the soul soars free above its weakness. +But a strange marvel happened. + +For, as it seemed to him, he awoke at the mid-noon of the night, and +he was sitting, not in his own house, but upon the roof of the royal +palace, looking down on the gliding Jumna, where the low moon slept in +silver, and the light was alone upon the water; and there were no boats, +but sleep and dream, hovering hand-in-hand, moved upon the air, and his +heart was dilated in the great silence. + +Yet he knew well that he waked in some supernatural sphere: for his eyes +could see across the river as if the opposite shore lay at his feet; +and he could distinguish every leaf on every tree, and the flowers +moon-blanched and ghost-like. And there, in the blackest shade of the +pippala boughs, he beheld a faint light like a pearl; and looking with +unspeakable anxiety, he saw within the light, slowly growing, the figure +of a lady exceedingly glorious in majesty and crowned with a rayed crown +of mighty jewels of white and golden splendour. Her gold robe fell to +her feet, and--very strange to tell--her feet touched not the ground, +but hung a span’s length above it, so that she floated in the air. + +But the marvel of marvels was her face--not, indeed, for its beauty, +though that transcended all, but for its singular and compassionate +sweetness, wherewith she looked toward the Palace beyond the river as if +it held the heart of her heart, while death and its river lay between. + +And Ustad Isa said:--“O dream, if this sweetness be but a dream, let me +never wake! Let me see forever this exquisite work of Allah the Maker, +before whom all the craftsmen are as children! For my knowledge is as +nothing, and I am ashamed in its presence.” + +And as he spoke, she turned those brimming eyes on him, and he saw her +slowly absorbed into the glory of the moonlight; but as she faded into +dream, he beheld, slowly rising, where her feet had hung in the blessed +air, a palace of whiteness, warm as ivory, cold as chastity, domes and +cupolas, slender minars, arches of marble fretted into sea-foam, screen +within screen of purest marble, to hide the sleeping beauty of a great +Queen--silence in the heart of it, and in every line a harmony beyond +all music. Grace was about it--the grace of a Queen who prays and does +not command; who, seated in her royalty yet inclines all hearts to love. +And he saw that its grace was her grace, and its soul her soul, and +that she gave it for the consolation of the Emperor. + +And he fell on his face and worshipped the Master-Builder of the +Universe, saying,--“Praise cannot express thy Perfection. Thine Essence +confounds thought. Surely I am but the tool in the hand of the Builder.” + +And when he awoke, he was lying in his own secret chamber, but beside +him was a drawing such as the craftsmen make of the work they have +imagined in their hearts. And it was the Palace of the Tomb. + +Henceforward, how should he waver? He was as a slave who obeys his +master, and with haste he summoned to Agra his Army of Beauty. + +Then were assembled all the master craftsmen of India and of the outer +world. From Delhi, from Shiraz, even from Baghdad and Syria, they came. +Muhammad Hanif, the wise mason, came from Kandahar, Muhammad Sayyid from +Mooltan. Amanat Khan, and other great writers of the holy Koran, who +should make the scripts of the Book upon fine marble. Inlayers from +Kanauj, with fingers like those of the Spirits that bowed before Solomon +the King, who should make beautiful the pure stone with inlay of jewels, +as did their forefathers for the Rajah of Mewar; mighty dealers with +agate, cornelian, and lapis lazuli. Came also, from Bokhara, Ata +Muhammad and Shakri Muhammad, that they might carve the lilies of the +field, very glorious, about that Flower of the World. Men of India, men +of Persia, men of the outer lands, they came at the bidding of Ustad +Isa, that the spirit of his vision might be made manifest. + +And a great council was held among these servants of beauty, so they +made a model in little of the glory that was to be, and laid it at the +feet of the Shah-in-Shah; and he allowed it, though not as yet fully +discerning their intent. And when it was approved, Ustad Isa called to +him a man of Kashmir; and the very hand of the Creator was upon this +man, for he could make gardens second only to the Gardens of Paradise, +having been born by that Dal Lake where are those roses of the earth, +the Shalimar and the Nishat Bagh; and to him said Ustad Isa,-- + +“Behold, Rain Lal Kashmiri, consider this design! Thus and thus shall +a white palace, exquisite in perfection, arise on the banks of Jumna. +Here, in little, in this model of sandalwood, see what shall be. +Consider these domes, rounded as the Bosom of Beauty, recalling the +mystic fruit of the lotus flower. Consider these four minars that stand +about them like Spirits about the Throne. And remembering that all this +shall stand upon a great dais of purest marble, and that the river shall +be its mirror, repeating to everlasting its loveliness, make me a garden +that shall be the throne room to this Queen.” + +And Ram Lal Kashmiri salaamed and said, “Obedience!” and went forth and +pondered night and day, journeying even over the snows of the Pir Panjal +to Kashmir, that he might bathe his eyes in beauty where she walks, +naked and divine, upon the earth, and he it was who imagined the black +marble and white that made the way of approach. + +So grew the palace that should murmur, like a seashell, in the ear of +the world the secret of love. + +Veiled had that loveliness been in the shadow of the palace; but now the +sun should rise upon it and turn its ivory to gold, should set upon +it and flush its snow with rose. The moon should lie upon it like the +pearls upon her bosom, the visible grace of her presence breathe about +it, the music of her voice hover in the birds and trees of the garden. +Times there were when Ustad Isa despaired lest even these mighty +servants of beauty should miss perfection. Yet it grew and grew, rising +like the growth of a flower. + +So on a certain day it stood completed, and beneath the small tomb in +the sanctuary, veiled with screens of wrought marble so fine that +they might lift in the breeze,--the veils of a Queen,--slept the Lady +Arjemand; and above her a narrow coffer of white marble, enriched in +a great script with the Ninety-Nine Wondrous Names of God. And the +Shah-in-Shah, now grey and worn, entered and, standing by her, cried in +a loud voice,--“I ascribe to the Unity, the only Creator, the perfection +of his handiwork made visible here by the hand of mortal man. For the +beauty that was secret in my Palace is here revealed; and the Crowned +Lady shall sit forever upon the banks of the Jumna River. It was love +that commanded this Tomb.” + +And the golden echo carried his voice up into the high dome, and it died +away in whispers of music. + +But Ustad Isa standing far off in the throng (for what are craftsmen +in the presence of the mighty?), said softly in his beard, “It was Love +also that built, and therefore it shall endure.” + +Now it is told that, on a certain night in summer, when the moon is +full, a man who lingers by the straight water, where the cypresses stand +over their own image, may see a strange marvel--may see the Palace of +the Taj dissolve like a pearl, and so rise in a mist into the moonlight; +and in its place, on her dais of white marble, he shall see the Lady +Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal, the Chosen of the Palace, stand there in the +white perfection of beauty, smiling as one who hath attained unto the +Peace. For she is its soul. + +And kneeling before the dais, he shall see Ustad Isa, who made this body +of her beauty; and his face is hidden in his hands. + + + + +“HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!” + +A JAPANESE STORY + + +(O Lovely One-O thou Flower! With Thy beautiful face, with Thy beautiful +eyes, pour light upon the world! Adoration to Kwannon.) + +In Japan in the days of the remote Ancestors, near the little village of +Shiobara, the river ran through rocks of a very strange blue colour, and +the bed of the river was also composed of these rocks, so that the clear +water ran blue as turquoise gems to the sea. + +The great forests murmured beside it, and through their swaying boughs +was breathed the song of Eternity. Those who listen may hear if their +ears are open. To others it is but the idle sighing of the wind. + +Now because of all this beauty there stood in these forests a roughly +built palace of unbarked wood, and here the great Emperor would come +from City-Royal to seek rest for his doubtful thoughts and the cares of +state, turning aside often to see the moonlight in Shiobara. He sought +also the free air and the sound of falling water, yet dearer to him than +the plucked strings of sho and biwa. For he said; + +“Where and how shall We find peace even for a moment, and afford Our +heart refreshment even for a single second?” + +And it seemed to him that he found such moments at Shiobara. + +Only one of his great nobles would His Majesty bring with him--the +Dainagon, and him be chose because he was a worthy and honorable person +and very simple of heart. + +There was yet another reason why the Son of Heaven inclined to the +little Shiobara. It had reached the Emperor that a Recluse of the +utmost sanctity dwelt in that forest. His name was Semimaru. He had made +himself a small hut in the deep woods, much as a decrepit silkworm might +spin his last Cocoon and there had the Peace found him. + +It had also reached His Majesty that, although blind, he was exceedingly +skilled in the art of playing the biwa, both in the Flowing Fount manner +and the Woodpecker manner, and that, especially on nights when the moon +was full, this aged man made such music as transported the soul. This +music His Majesty desired very greatly to hear. + +Never had Semimaru left his hut save to gather wood or seek food until +the Divine Emperor commanded his attendance that he might soothe his +august heart with music. + +Now on this night of nights the moon was full and the snow heavy on the +pines, and the earth was white also, and when the moon shone through the +boughs it made a cold light like dawn, and the shadows of the trees were +black upon it. + +The attendants of His Majesty long since slept for sheer weariness, for +the night was far spent, but the Emperor and the Dainagon still sat +with their eyes fixed on the venerable Semimaru. For many hours he had +played, drawing strange music from his biwa. Sometimes it had been like +rain blowing over the plains of Adzuma, sometimes like the winds roaring +down the passes of the Yoshino Mountains, and yet again like the voice +of far cities. For many hours they listened without weariness, and +thought that all the stories of the ancients might flow past them in the +weird music that seemed to have neither beginning nor end. + +“It is as the river that changes and changes not, and is ever and ever +the same,” said the Emperor in his own soul. + +And certainly had a voice announced to His Augustness that centuries +were drifting by as he listened, he could have felt no surprise. + +Before them, as they sat upon the silken floor cushions, was a small +shrine with a Buddha shelf, and a hanging picture of the Amida Buddha +within it--the expression one of rapt peace. Figures of Fugen and +Fudo were placed before the curtain doors of the shrine, looking up in +adoration to the Blessed One. A small and aged pine tree was in a pot of +grey porcelain from Chosen--the only ornament in the chamber. + +Suddenly His Majesty became aware that the Dainagon also had fallen +asleep from weariness, and that the recluse was no longer playing, but +was speaking in a still voice like a deeply flowing stream. The Emperor +had observed no change from music to speech, nor could he recall when +the music had ceased, so that it altogether resembled a dream. + +“When I first came here”--the Venerable one continued--“it was not my +intention to stay long in the forest. As each day dawned, I said; ‘In +seven days I go.’ And again--‘In seven.’ Yet have I not gone. The days +glided by and here have I attained to look on the beginnings of peace. +Then wherefore should I go?--for all life is within the soul. Shall the +fish weary of his pool? And I, who through my blind eyes feel the moon +illuming my forest by night and the sun by day, abide in peace, so that +even the wild beasts press round to hear my music. I have come by a path +overblown by autumn leaves. But I have come.” + +Then said the Divine Emperor as if unconsciously; + +“Would that I also might come! But the august duties cannot easily be +laid aside. And I have no wife--no son.” + +And Semimaru, playing very softly on the strings of his biwa made +no other answer, and His Majesty, collecting his thoughts, which had +become, as it were, frozen with the cold and the quiet and the strange +music, spoke thus, as if in a waking dream; + +“Why have I not wedded? Because I have desired a bride beyond the +women of earth, and of none such as I desire has the rumor reached me. +Consider that Ancestor who wedded Her Shining Majesty! Evil and lovely +was she, and the passions were loud about her. And so it is with women. +Trouble and vexation of spirit, or instead a great weariness. But if the +Blessed One would vouchsafe to my prayers a maiden of blossom and dew, +with a heart calm as moonlight, her would I wed. O, honorable One, whose +wisdom surveys the world, is there in any place near or far--in heaven +or in earth, such a one that I may seek and find?” + +And Semimaru, still making a very low music on his biwa, said this; + +“Supreme Master, where the Shiobara River breaks away through the gorges +to the sea, dwelt a poor couple--the husband a wood-cutter. They had no +children to aid in their toil, and daily the woman addressed her prayers +for a son to the Bodhisattwa Kwannon, the Lady of Pity who looketh down +for ever upon the sound of prayer. Very fervently she prayed, with such +offerings as her poverty allowed, and on a certain night she dreamed +this dream. At the shrine of the Senju Kwannon she knelt as was her +custom, and that Great Lady, sitting enthroned upon the Lotos of Purity, +opened Her eyes slowly from Her divine contemplation and heard the +prayer of the wood-cutter’s wife. Then stooping like a blown willow +branch, she gathered a bud from the golden lotos plant that stood upon +her altar, and breathing upon it it became pure white and living, and it +exhaled a perfume like the flowers of Paradise, This flower the Lady +of Pity flung into the bosom of her petitioner, and closing Her eyes +returned into Her divine dream, whilst the woman awoke, weeping for joy. + +“But when she sought in her bosom for the Lotos it was gone. Of all this +she boasted loudly to her folk and kin, and the more so, when in due +time she perceived herself to be with child, for, from that august +favour she looked for nothing less than a son, radiant with the Five +Ornaments of riches, health, longevity, beauty, and success. Yet, when +her hour was come, a girl was born, and blind.” + +“Was she welcomed?” asked the dreaming voice of the Emperor. + +“Augustness, but as a household drudge. For her food was cruelty and her +drink tears. And the shrine of the Senju Kwannon was neglected by her +parents because of the disappointment and shame of the unwanted gift. +And they believed that, lost in Her divine contemplation, the Great Lady +would not perceive this neglect. The Gods however are known by their +great memories.” + +“Her name?” + +“Majesty, Tsuyu-Morning Dew. And like the morning dew she shines in +stillness. She has repaid good for evil to her evil parents, serving +them with unwearied service.” + +“What distinguishes her from others?” + +“Augustness, a very great peace. Doubtless the shadow of the dream of +the Holy Kwannon. She works, she moves, she smiles as one who has tasted +of content.” + +“Has she beauty?” + +“Supreme Master, am I not blind? But it is said that she has no beauty +that men should desire her. Her face is flat and round, and her eyes +blind.” + +“And yet content?” + +“Philosophers might envy her calm. And her blindness is without doubt +a grace from the excelling Pity, for could she see her own exceeding +ugliness she must weep for shame. But she sees not. Her sight is inward, +and she is well content.” + +“Where does she dwell?” + +“Supreme Majesty, far from here--where in the heart of the woods the +river breaks through the rocks.” + +“Venerable One, why have you told me this? I asked for a royal maiden +wise and beautiful, calm as the dawn, and you have told me of a +wood-cutter’s drudge, blind and ugly.” + +And now Semimaru did not answer, but the tones of the biwa grew louder +and clearer, and they rang like a song of triumph, and the Emperor could +hear these words in the voice of the strings. + +“She is beautiful as the night, crowned with moon and stars for him +who has eyes to see. Princess Splendour was dim beside her; Prince +Fireshine, gloom! Her Shining Majesty was but a darkened glory before +this maid. All beauty shines within her hidden eyes.” + +And having uttered this the music became wordless once more, but it +still flowed on more and more softly like a river that flows into the +far distance. + +The Emperor stared at the mats, musing--the light of the lamp was +burning low. His heart said within him; + +“This maiden, cast like a flower from the hand of Kwannon Sama, will I +see.” + +And as he said this the music had faded away into a thread-like +smallness, and when after long thought he raised his august head, he was +alone save for the Dainagon, sleeping on the mats behind him, and the +chamber was in darkness. Semimaru had departed in silence, and His +Majesty, looking forth into the broad moonlight, could see the track of +his feet upon the shining snow, and the music came back very thinly like +spring rain in the trees. Once more he looked at the whiteness of the +night, and then, stretching his august person on the mats, he slept amid +dreams of sweet sound. + +The next day, forbidding any to follow save the Dainagon, His Majesty +went forth upon the frozen snow where the sun shone in a blinding +whiteness. They followed the track of Semimaru’s feet far under the pine +trees so heavy with their load of snow that they were bowed as if with +fruit. And the track led on and the air was so still that the cracking +of a bough was like the blow of a hammer, and the sliding of a load of +snow from a branch like the fall of an avalanche. Nor did they speak as +they went. They listened, nor could they say for what. + +Then, when they had gone a very great way, the track ceased suddenly, +as if cut off, and at this spot, under the pines furred with snow, His +Majesty became aware of a perfume so sweet that it was as though all the +flowers of the earth haunted the place with their presence, and a music +like the biwa of Semimaru was heard in the tree tops. This sounded far +off like the whispering of rain when it falls in very small leaves, and +presently it died away, and a voice followed after, singing, alone in +the woods, so that the silence appeared to have been created that such a +music might possess the world. So the Emperor stopped instantly, and the +Dainagon behind him and he heard these words. + + “In me the Heavenly Lotos grew, + The fibres ran from head to feet, + And my heart was the august Blossom. + Therefore the sweetness flowed through the veins of my flesh, + And I breathed peace upon all the world, + And about me was my fragrance shed + That the souls of men should desire me.” + +Now, as he listened, there came through the wood a maiden, bare--footed, +save for grass sandals, and clad in coarse clothing, and she came up and +passed them, still singing. + +And when she was past, His Majesty put up his hand to his eyes, like one +dreaming, and said; + +“What have you seen?” + +And the Dainagon answered; + +“Augustness, a country wench, flat--faced, ugly and blind, and with a +voice like a crow. Has not your Majesty seen this?” + +The Emperor, still shading his eyes, replied; + +“I saw a maiden so beautiful that her Shining Majesty would be a black +blot beside her. As she went, the Spring and all its sweetness blew from +her garments. Her robe was green with small gold flowers. Her eyes were +closed, but she resembled a cherry tree, snowy with bloom and dew. Her +voice was like the singing flowers of Paradise.” + +The Dainagon looked at him with fear and compassion; + +“Augustness, how should such a lady carry in her arms a bundle of +firewood?” + +“She bore in her hands three lotos flowers, and where each foot fell I +saw a lotos bloom and vanish.” + +They retraced their steps through the wood; His Majesty radiant as +Prince Fireshine with the joy that filled his soul; the Dainagon +darkened as Prince Firefade with fear, believing that the strange music +of Semimaru had bewitched His Majesty, or that the maiden herself might +possibly have the power of the fox in shape-changing and bewildering the +senses. + +Very sorrowful and careful was his heart for he loved his Master. + +That night His Majesty dreamed that he stood before the kakemono of the +Amida Buddha, and that as he raised his eyes in adoration to the Blessed +Face, he beheld the images of Fugen and Fudo, rise up and bow down +before that One Who Is. Then, gliding in, before these Holinesses stood +a figure, and it was the wood-cutter’s daughter homely and blinded. She +stretched her hands upward as though invoking the supreme Buddha, and +then turning to His Majesty she smiled upon him, her eyes closed as in +bliss unutterable. And he said aloud. + +“Would that I might see her eyes!” and so saying awoke in a great +stillness of snow and moonlight. + +Having waked, he said within himself + +“This marvel will I wed and she shall be my Empress were she lower than +the Eta, and whether her face be lovely or homely. For she is certainly +a flower dropped from the hand of the Divine.” + +So when the sun was high His Majesty, again followed by the Dainagon, +went through the forest swiftly, and like a man that sees his goal, +and when they reached the place where the maiden went by, His Majesty +straitly commanded the Dainagon that he should draw apart, and leave him +to speak with the maiden; yet that he should watch what befell. + +So the Dainagon watched, and again he saw her come, very poorly clad, +and with bare feet that shrank from the snow in her grass sandals, bowed +beneath a heavy load of wood upon her shoulders, and her face flat and +homely like a girl of the people, and her eyes blind and shut. + +And as she came she sang this. + + “The Eternal way lies before him, + The way that is made manifest in the Wise. + The Heart that loves reveals itself to man. + For now he draws nigh to the Source. + The night advances fast, + And lo! the moon shines bright.” + +And to the Dainagon it seemed a harsh crying nor could he distinguish +any words at all. + +But what His Majesty beheld was this. The evening had come on and the +moon was rising. The snow had gone. It was the full glory of spring, and +the flowers sprang thick as stars upon the grass, and among them lotos +flowers, great as the wheel of a chariot, white and shining with +the luminance of the pearl, and upon each one of these was seated an +incarnate Holiness, looking upward with joined hands. In the trees were +the voices of the mystic Birds that are the utterance of the Blessed +One, proclaiming in harmony the Five Virtues, The Five Powers, the Seven +Steps ascending to perfect Illumination, the Noble Eightfold Path, and +all the Law. And, bearing, in the heart of the Son of Heaven awoke the +Three Remembrances--the Remembrance of Him who is Blessed, Remembrance +of the Law, and Remembrance of the Communion of the Assembly. + +So, looking upward to the heavens, he beheld the Infinite Buddha, +high and lifted up in a great raying glory. About Him were the exalted +Bodhisattwas, the mighty Disciples, great Arhats all, and all the +countless Angelhood. And these rose high into the infinite until they +could be seen but as a point of fire against the moon. With this golden +multitude beyond all numbering was He. + +Then, as His Majesty had seen in the dream of the night, the +wood-cutter’s daughter, moving through the flowers like one blind that +gropes his way, advanced before the Blessed Feet, and uplifting her +hands, did adoration, and her face he could not see, but his heart +went with her, adoring also the infinite Buddha seated in the calms of +boundless Light. + +Then enlightenment entered at his eyes, as a man that wakes from sleep, +and suddenly he beheld the Maiden crowned and robed and terrible in +beauty, and her feet were stayed upon an open lotos, and his soul knew +the Senju Kwannon Herself, myriad-armed for the helping of mankind. + +And turning, she smiled as in the vision, but his eyes being now clear +her blinded eyes were opened, and that glory who shall tell as those +living founts of Wisdom rayed upon him their ineffable light? In that +ocean was his being drowned, and so, bowed before the Infinite Buddha, +he received the Greater Illumination. + +How great is the Glory of Kwannon! + +When the radiance and the vision were withdrawn and only the moon looked +over the trees, His Majesty rose upon his feet, and standing on the +snow, surrounded with calm, he called to the Dainagon, and asked this; + +“What have you seen?” + +“Augustness, nothing but the country wench and moon and snow.” + +“And heard?” + +“Augustness, nothing but the harsh voice of the wood-cutter’s daughter.” + +“And felt?” + +“Augustness, nothing but the bone-piercing cold.” So His Majesty adored +that which cannot be uttered, saying; + +“So Wisdom, so Glory encompass us about, and we see them not for we +are blinded with illusion. Yet every stone is a jewel and every clod +is spirit and to the hems of the Infinite Buddha all cling. Through the +compassion of the Supernal Mercy that walks the earth as the Bodhisattwa +Kwannon, am I admitted to wisdom and given sight and hearing. And what +is all the world to that happy one who has beheld Her eyes!” + +And His Majesty returned through the forest. + +When, the next day, he sent for the venerable Semimaru that holy recluse +had departed and none knew where. But still when the moon is full a +strange music moves in the tree tops of Shiobara. + +Then His sacred Majesty returned to City-Royal, having determined +to retire into the quiet life, and there, abandoning the throne to a +kinsman wise in greatness, he became a dweller in the deserted hut of +Semimaru. + +His life, like a descending moon approaching the hill that should hide +it, was passed in meditation on that Incarnate Love and Compassion whose +glory had augustly been made known to him, and having cast aside all +save the image of the Divine from his soul, His Majesty became even as +that man who desired enlightenment of the Blessed One. + +For he, desiring instruction, gathered precious flowers, and journeyed +to present them as an offering to the Guatama Buddha. Standing before +Him, he stretched forth both his hands holding the flowers. + +Then said the Holy One, looking upon his petitioner’s right hand; + +“Loose your hold of these.” + +And the man dropped the flowers from his right hand. And the Holy One +looking upon his left hand, said; + +“Loose your hold of these.” + +And, sorrowing, he dropped the flowers from his left hand. And again the +Master said; + +“Loose your hold of that which is neither in the right nor in the left.” + +And the disciple said very pitifully; + +“Lord, of what should I loose my hold for I have nothing left?” + +And He looked upon him steadfastly. + +Therefore at last understanding he emptied his soul of all desire, and +of fear that is the shadow of desire, and being enlightened relinquished +all burdens. + +So was it also with His Majesty. In peace he dwelt, and becoming a great +Arhat, in peace he departed to that Uttermost Joy where is the Blessed +One made manifest in Pure Light. + +As for the parents of the maiden, they entered after sore troubles into +peace, having been remembered by the Infinite. For it is certain that +the enemies also of the Supreme Buddha go to salvation by thinking on +Him, even though it be against Him. + +And he who tells this truth makes this prayer to the Lady of Pity; + + “Grant me, I pray, + One dewdrop from Thy willow spray, + And in the double Lotos keep + My hidden heart asleep.” + +How great is the Glory of Kwannon! + + + + +THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY + +A STORY OF THE CHINESE COURT + +In the city of Chang-an music filled the palaces, and the festivities of +the Emperor were measured by its beat. Night, and the full moon swimming +like a gold-fish in the garden lakes, gave the signal for the Feather +Jacket and Rainbow Skirt dances. Morning, with the rising sun, summoned +the court again to the feast and wine-cup in the floating gardens. + +The Emperor Chung Tsu favored this city before all others. The Yen Tower +soaring heavenward, the Drum Towers, the Pearl Pagoda, were the only +fit surroundings of his magnificence; and in the Pavilion of Tranquil +Learning were held those discussions which enlightened the world and +spread the fame of the Jade Emperor far and wide. In all respects he +adorned the Dragon Throne--in all but one; for Nature, bestowing so +much, withheld one gift, and the Imperial heart, as precious as jade, +was also as hard, and he eschewed utterly the company of the Hidden +Palace Flowers. + +Yet the Inner Chambers were filled with ladies chosen from all parts of +the Celestial Empire--ladies of the most exquisite and torturing beauty, +moons of loveliness, moving coquettishly on little feet, with all the +grace of willow branches in a light breeze. They were sprinkled with +perfumes, adorned with jewels, robed in silks woven with gold and +embroidered with designs of flowers and birds. Their faces were painted +and their eyebrows formed into slender and perfect arches whence the +soul of man might well slip to perdition, and a breath of sweet odor +followed each wherever she moved. Every one might have been the Empress +of some lesser kingdom; but though rumours reached the Son of Heaven +from time to time of their charms,--especially when some new blossom was +added to the Imperial bouquet,--he had dismissed them from his august +thoughts, and they languished in a neglect so complete that the Great +Cold Palaces of the Moon were not more empty than their hearts. They +remained under the supervision of the Princess of Han, August Aunt +of the Emperor, knowing that their Lord considered the company of +sleeve-dogs and macaws more pleasant than their own. Nor had he as yet +chosen an Empress, and it was evident that without some miracle, such +as the intervention of the Municipal God, no heir to the throne could be +hoped for. + +Yet the Emperor one day remembered his imprisoned beauties, and it +crossed the Imperial thoughts that even these inferior creatures might +afford such interest as may be found in the gambols of trained fleas or +other insects of no natural attainments. + +Accordingly, he commanded that the subject last discussed in his +presence should be transferred to the Inner Chambers, and it was his +Order that the ladies should also discuss it, and their opinions be +engraved on ivory, bound together with red silk and tassels and thus +presented at the Dragon feet. The subject chosen was the following:-- + +Describe the Qualities of the Ideal Man + +Now when this command was laid before the August Aunt, the guardian of +the Inner Chambers, she was much perturbed in mind, for such a thing +was unheard of in all the annals of the Empire. Recovering herself, she +ventured to say that the discussion of such a question might raise +very disquieting thoughts in the minds of the ladies, who could not +be supposed to have any opinions at all on such a subject. Nor was it +desirable that they should have. To every woman her husband and no other +is and must be the Ideal Man. So it was always in the past; so it must +ever be. There are certain things which it is dangerous to question or +discuss, and how can ladies who have never spoken with any other man +than a parent or a brother judge such matters? + +“How, indeed,” asked this lady of exalted merit, “can the bat form +an idea of the sunlight, or the carp of the motion of wings? If his +Celestial Majesty had commanded a discussion on the Superior Woman and +the virtues which should adorn her, some sentiments not wholly unworthy +might have been offered. But this is a calamity. They come unexpectedly, +springing up like mushrooms, and this one is probably due to the lack of +virtue of the inelegant and unintellectual person who is now speaking.” + +This she uttered in the presence of the principal beauties of the +Inner Chambers. They sat or reclined about her in attitudes of perfect +loveliness. Two, embroidering silver pheasants, paused with their +needles suspended above the stretched silk, to hear the August Aunt. +One, threading beads of jewel jade, permitted them to slip from the +string and so distended the rose of her mouth in surprise that the small +pearl-shells were visible within. The Lady Tortoise, caressing a scarlet +and azure macaw, in her agitation so twitched the feathers that the +bird, shrieking, bit her finger. The Lady Golden Bells blushed deeply +at the thought of what was required of them; and the little Lady Summer +Dress, youngest of all the assembled beauties, was so alarmed at the +prospect that she began to sob aloud, until she met the eye of the +August Aunt and abruptly ceased. + +“It is not, however, to be supposed,” said the August Aunt, opening her +snuff-bottle of painted crystal, “that the minds of our deplorable and +unattractive sex are wholly incapable of forming opinions. But speech +is a grave matter for women, naturally slow-witted and feeble-minded as +they are. This unenlightened person recalls the Odes as saying:-- + + ‘A flaw in a piece of white jade + May be ground away, + But when a woman has spoken foolishly + Nothing can be done-’ + +a consideration which should make every lady here and throughout the +world think anxiously before speech.” So anxiously did the assembled +beauties think, that all remained mute as fish in a pool, and the August +Aunt continued:-- + +“Let Tsu-ssu be summoned. It is my intention to suggest to the Dragon +Emperor that the virtues of women be the subject of our discourse, and I +will myself open and conclude the discussion.” + +Tsu-ssu was not long in kotowing before the August Aunt, who despatched +her message with the proper ceremonial due to its Imperial destination; +and meanwhile, in much agitation, the beauties could but twitter and +whisper in each other’s ears, and await the response like condemned +prisoners who yet hope for reprieve. + +Scarce an hour had dripped away on the water-clock when an Imperial +Missive bound with yellow silk arrived, and the August Aunt, rising, +kotowed nine times before she received it in her jewelled hand with its +delicate and lengthy nails ensheathed in pure gold and set with gems +of the first water. She then read it aloud, the ladies prostrating +themselves. + +To the Princess of Han, the August Aunt, the Lady of the Nine Superior +Virtues:-- + +“Having deeply reflected on the wisdom submitted, We thus reply. Women +should not be the judges of their own virtues, since these exist only +in relation to men. Let Our Command therefore be executed, and tablets +presented before us seven days hence, with the name of each lady +appended to her tablet.” + +It was indeed pitiable to see the anxiety of the ladies! A sacrifice to +Kwan-Yin, the Goddess of Mercy, of a jewel from each, with intercession +for aid, was proposed by the Lustrous Lady; but the majority shook their +heads sadly. The August Aunt, tossing her head, declared that, as the +Son of Heaven had made no comment on her proposal of opening and closing +the discussion, she should take no part other than safeguarding the +interests of propriety. This much increased the alarm, and, kneeling at +her feet, the swan-like beauties, Deep-Snow and Winter Moon implored her +aid and compassion. But, rising indignantly, the August Aunt sought her +own apartments, and for the first time the inmates of the Pepper Chamber +saw with regret the golden dragons embroidered on her back. + +It was then that the Round-Faced Beauty ventured a remark. This maiden, +having been born in the far-off province of Suchuan, was considered a +rustic by the distinguished elegance of the Palace and, therefore, had +never spoken unless decorum required. Still, even her detractors were +compelled to admit the charms that had gained her her name. Her face had +the flawless outline of the pearl, and like the blossom of the plum was +the purity of her complexion, upon which the darkness of her eyebrows +resembled two silk-moths alighted to flutter above the brilliance of her +eyes--eyes which even the August Aunt had commended after a banquet of +unsurpassed variety. Her hair had been compared to the crow’s plumage; +her waist was like a roll of silk, and her discretion in habiting +herself was such that even the Lustrous Lady and the Lady Tortoise drew +instruction from the splendours of her robes. It created, however, a +general astonishment when she spoke. + +“Paragons of beauty, what is this dull and opaque-witted person that +she should speak?” + +“What, indeed!” said the Celestial Sister. “This entirely +undistinguished person cannot even imagine.” + +A distressing pause followed, during which many whispered anxiously. The +Lustrous Lady broke it. + +“It is true that the highly ornamental Round-Faced Beauty is but lately +come, yet even the intelligent Ant may assist the Dragon; and in the +presence of alarm, what is decorum? With a tiger behind one, who can +recall the Book of Rites and act with befitting elegance?” + +“The high-born will at all times remember the Rites!” retorted the +Celestial Sister. “Have we not heard the August Aunt observe: ‘Those who +understand do not speak. Those who speak do not understand’?” + +The Round-Faced Beauty collected her courage. + +“Doubtless this is wisdom; yet if the wise do not speak, who should +instruct us? The August Aunt herself would be silent.” + +All were confounded by this dilemma, and the little Lady Summer-Dress, +still weeping, entreated that the Round-Faced Beauty might be heard. +The Heavenly Blossoms then prepared to listen and assumed attitudes of +attention, which so disconcerted the Round-Faced Beauty that she blushed +like a spring tulip in speaking. + +“Beautiful ladies, our Lord, who is unknown to us all, has issued an +august command. It cannot be disputed, for the whisper of disobedience +is heard as thunder in the Imperial Presence. Should we not aid each +other? If any lady has formed a dream in her soul of the Ideal +Man, might not such a picture aid us all? Let us not be +‘say-nothing-do-nothing,’ but act!” + +They hung their heads and smiled, but none would allow that she had +formed such an image. The little Lady Tortoise, laughing behind her +fan of sandalwood, said roguishly: “The Ideal Man should be handsome, +liberal in giving, and assuredly he should appreciate the beauty of his +wives. But this we cannot say to the Divine Emperor.” + +A sigh rustled through the Pepper Chamber. The Celestial Sister looked +angrily at the speaker. + +“This is the talk of children,” she said. “Does no one remember +Kung-fu-tse’s [Confucius] description of the Superior Man?” + +Unfortunately none did--not even the Celestial Sister herself. + +“Is it not probable,” said the Round-Faced Beauty, “that the Divine +Emperor remembers it himself and wishes--” + +But the Celestial Sister, yawning audibly, summoned the attendants to +bring rose-leaves in honey, and would hear no more. + +The Round-Faced Beauty therefore wandered forth among the mossy rocks +and drooping willows of the Imperial Garden, deeply considering the +matter. She ascended the bow-curved bridge of marble which crossed the +Pool of Clear Weather, and from the top idly observed the reflection of +her rose-and-gold coat in the water while, with her taper fingers, she +crumbled cake for the fortunate gold-fish that dwelt in it. And, so +doing, she remarked one fish, four-tailed among the six-tailed, and in +no way distinguished by elegance, which secured by far the largest share +of the crumbs dropped into the pool. Bending lower, she observed this +singular fish and its methods. + +The others crowded about the spot where the crumbs fell, all herded +together. In their eagerness and stupidity they remained like a cloud of +gold in one spot, slowly waving their tails. But this fish, concealing +itself behind a miniature rock, waited, looking upward, until the +crumbs were falling, and then, rushing forth with the speed of an +arrow, scattered the stupid mass of fish, and bore off the crumbs to its +shelter, where it instantly devoured them. + +“This is notable,” said the Round-Faced Beauty. “Observation enlightens +the mind. To be apart--to be distinguished--secures notice!” And she +plunged into thought again, wandering, herself a flower, among the +gorgeous tree peonies. + +On the following day the August Aunt commanded that a writer among the +palace attendants should, with brush and ink, be summoned to transcribe +the wisdom of the ladies. She requested that each would give three +days to thought, relating the following anecdote. “There was a man who, +taking a piece of ivory, carved it into a mulberry leaf, spending three +years on the task. When finished it could not be told from the original, +and was a gift suitable for the Brother of the Sun and Moon. Do +likewise!” + +“But yet, O Augustness!” said the Celestial Sister, “if the Lord of +Heaven took as long with each leaf, there would be few leaves on the +trees, and if-” + +The August Aunt immediately commanded silence and retired. On the third +day she seated herself in her chair of carved ebony, while the attendant +placed himself by her feet and prepared to record her words. + +“This insignificant person has decided,” began her Augustness, looking +round and unscrewing the amber top of her snuff-bottle, “to take an +unintelligent part in these proceedings. An example should be set. +Attendant, write!” + +She then dictated as follows: “The Ideal Man is he who now decorates +the Imperial Throne, or he who in all humility ventures to resemble the +incomparable Emperor. Though he may not hope to attain, his endeavor is +his merit. No further description it needed.” + +With complacence she inhaled the perfumed snuff, as the writer appended +the elegant characters of her Imperial name. + +If it is permissible to say that the faces of the beauties lengthened +visibly, it should now be said. For it had been the intention of every +lady to make an illusion to the Celestial Emperor and depict him as the +Ideal Man. Nor had they expected that the August Aunt would take any +part in the matter. + +“Oh, but it was the intention of this commonplace and undignified person +to say this very thing!” cried the Lustrous Lady, with tears in the +jewels of her eyes. “I thought no other high-minded and distinguished +lady would for a moment think of it.” + +“And it was my intention also!” fluttered the little Lady Tortoise, +wringing her hands! “What now shall this most unlucky and unendurable +person do? For three nights has sleep forsaken my unattractive eyelids, +and, tossing and turning on a couch deprived of all comfort, I could +only repeat, ‘The Ideal Man is the Divine Dragon Emperor!’” + +“May one of entirely contemptible attainments make a suggestion in this +assemblage of scintillating wit and beauty?” inquired the Celestial +Sister. “My superficial opinion is that it would be well to prepare a +single paper to which all names should be appended, stating that His +Majesty in his Dragon Divinity comprises all ideals in his sacred +Person.” + +“Let those words be recorded,” said the August Aunt. “What else should +any lady of discretion and propriety say? In this Palace of Virtuous +Peace, where all is consecrated to the Son of Heaven, though he deigns +not to enter it, what other thought dare be breathed? Has any lady +ventured to step outside such a limit? If so, let her declare herself!” + +All shook their heads, and the August Aunt proceeded: “Let the writer +record this as the opinion of every lady of the Imperial Household, and +let each name be separately appended.” + +Had any desired to object, none dared to confront the August Aunt; +but apparently no beauty so desired, for after three nights’ sleepless +meditation, no other thought than this had occurred to any. + +Accordingly, the writer moved from lady to lady and, under the +supervision of the August Aunt, transcribed the following: “The Ideal +Man is the earthly likeness of the Divine Emperor. How should it be +otherwise?” And under this sentence wrote the name of each lovely one +in succession. The papers were then placed in the hanging sleeves of the +August Aunt for safety. + +By the decree of Fate, the father of the Round-Faced Beauty had, before +he became an ancestral spirit, been a scholar of distinction, having +graduated at the age of seventy-two with a composition commended by the +Grand Examiner. Having no gold and silver to give his daughter, he +had formed her mind, and had presented her with the sole jewel of his +family-a pearl as large as a bean. Such was her sole dower, but the +accomplished Aunt may excel the indolent Prince. + +Yet, before the thought in her mind, she hesitated and trembled, +recalling the lesson of the gold-fish; and it was with anxiety that +paled her roseate lips that, on a certain day, she had sought the Willow +Bridge Pavilion. There had awaited her a palace attendant skilled with +the brush, and there in secrecy and dire affright, hearing the footsteps +of the August Aunt in every rustle of leafage, and her voice in the +call of every crow, did the Round-Faced Beauty dictate the following +composition:-- + +“Though the sky rain pearls, it cannot equal the beneficence of the Son +of Heaven. Though the sky rain jade it cannot equal his magnificence. He +has commanded his slave to describe the qualities of the Ideal Man. +How should I, a mere woman, do this? I, who have not seen the Divine +Emperor, how should I know what is virtue? I, who have not seen the +glory of his countenance, how should I know what is beauty? Report +speaks of his excellencies, but I who live in the dark know not. But to +the Ideal Woman, the very vices of her husband are virtues. Should he +exalt another, this is a mark of his superior taste. Should he dismiss +his slave, this is justice. To the Ideal Woman there is but one Ideal +Man--and that is her lord. From the day she crosses his threshold, to +the day when they clothe her in the garments of Immortality, this is her +sole opinion. Yet would that she might receive instruction of what only +are beauty and virtue in his adorable presence.” + +This being written, she presented her one pearl to the attendant and +fled, not looking behind her, as quickly as her delicate feet would +permit. + +On the seventh day the compositions, engraved on ivory and bound with +red silk and tassels, were presented to the Emperor, and for seven +days more he forgot their existence. On the eighth the High Chamberlain +ventured to recall them to the Imperial memory, and the Emperor glancing +slightly at one after another, threw them aside, yawning as he did so. +Finally, one arrested his eyes, and reading it more than once he laid it +before him and meditated. An hour passed in this way while the forgotten +Lord Chamberlain continued to kneel. The Son of Heaven, then raising his +head, pronounced these words: “In the society of the Ideal Woman, she to +whom jealousy is unknown, tranquillity might possibly be obtained. Let +prayer be made before the Ancestors with the customary offerings, for +this is a matter deserving attention.” + +A few days passed, and an Imperial attendant, escorted by two mandarins +of the peacock-feather and crystal-button rank, desired an audience of +the August Aunt, and, speaking before the curtain, informed her that his +Imperial Majesty would pay a visit that evening to the Hall of Tranquil +Longevity. Such was her agitation at this honour that she immediately +swooned; but, reviving, summoned all the attendants and gave orders for +a banquet and musicians. + +Lanterns painted with pheasants and exquisite landscapes were hung on +all the pavilions. Tapestries of rose, decorated with the Five-Clawed +Dragons, adorned the chambers; and upon the High Seat was placed a robe +of yellow satin embroidered with pearls. All was hurry and excitement. +The Blossoms of the Palace were so exquisitely decked that one grain +more of powder would have made them too lily-like, and one touch more of +rouge, too rosecheeked. It was indeed perfection, and, like lotuses upon +a lake, or Asian birds, gorgeous of plumage, they stood ranged in the +outer chamber while the Celestial Emperor took his seat. + +The Round-Faced Beauty wore no jewels, having bartered her pearl for her +opportunity; but her long coat of jade-green, embroidered with golden +willows, and her trousers of palest rose left nothing to be desired. In +her hair two golden peonies were fastened with pins of kingfisher work. +The Son of Heaven was seated upon the throne as the ladies approached, +marshaled by the August Aunt. He was attired in the Yellow Robe with the +Flying Dragons, and upon the Imperial Head was the Cap, ornamented +with one hundred and forty-four priceless gems. From it hung the twelve +pendants of strings of pearls, partly concealing the august eyes of the +Jade Emperor. No greater splendour can strike awe into the soul of man. + +At his command the August Aunt took her seat upon a lesser chair at the +Celestial Feet. Her mien was majestic, and struck awe into the assembled +beauties, whose names she spoke aloud as each approached and prostrated +herself. She then pronounced these words: + +“Beautiful ones, the Emperor, having considered the opinions submitted +by you on the subject of the Superior Man, is pleased to express his +august commendation. Dismiss, therefore, anxiety from your minds, and +prepare to assist at the humble concert of music we have prepared for +his Divine pleasure.” + +Slightly raising himself in his chair, the Son of Heaven looked down +upon that Garden of Beauty, holding in his hand an ivory tablet bound +with red silk. + +“Lovely ladies,” he began, in a voice that assuaged fear, “who among you +was it that laid before our feet a composition beginning thus--‘Though +the sky rain pearls’?” + +The August Aunt immediately rose. + +“Imperial Majesty, none! These eyes supervised every composition. No +impropriety was permitted.” + +The Son of Heaven resumed: “Let that lady stand forth.” + +The words were few, but sufficient. Trembling in every limb, the +Round-Faced Beauty separated herself from her companions and prostrated +herself, amid the breathless amazement of the Blossoms of the Palace. He +looked down upon her as she knelt, pale as a lady carved in ivory, but +lovely as the lotus of Chang-Su. He turned to the August Aunt. “Princess +of Han, my Imperial Aunt, I would speak with this lady alone.” + +Decorum itself and the custom of Palaces could not conceal the +indignation of the August Aunt as she rose and retired, driving the +ladies before her as a shepherd drives his sheep. + +The Hall of Tranquil Longevity being now empty, the Jade Emperor +extended his hand and beckoned the Round-Faced Beauty to approach. This +she did, hanging her head like a flower surcharged with dew and swaying +gracefully as a wind-bell, and knelt on the lowest step of the Seat of +State. + +“Loveliest One,” said the Emperor, “I have read your composition. +I would know the truth. Did any aid you as you spoke it? Was it the +thought of your own heart?” + +“None aided, Divine,” said she, almost fainting with fear. “It +was indeed the thought of this illiterate slave, consumed with an +unwarranted but uncontrollable passion.” + +“And have you in truth desired to see your Lord?” + +“As a prisoner in a dungeon desires the light, so was it with this low +person.” + +“And having seen?” + +“Augustness, the dull eyes of this slave are blinded with beauty.” + +She laid her head before his feet. + +“Yet you have depicted, not the Ideal Man, but the Ideal Woman. This was +not the Celestial command. How was this?” + +“Because, O versatile and auspicious Emperor, the blind cannot behold +the sunlight, and it is only the Ideal Woman who is worthy to comprehend +and worship the Ideal Man. For this alone is she created.” + +A smile began to illuminate the Imperial Countenance. “And how, O +Round-Faced Beauty, did you evade the vigilance of the August Aunt?” + +She hung her head lower, speaking almost in a whisper. “With her one +pearl did this person buy the secrecy of the writer; and when the August +Aunt slept, did I conceal the paper in her sleeve with the rest, and her +own Imperial hand gave it to the engraver of ivory.” + +She veiled her face with two jade-white hands that trembled excessively. +On hearing this statement the Celestial Emperor broke at once into a +very great laughter, and he laughed loud and long as a tiller of wheat. +The Round-Faced Beauty heard it demurely until, catching the Imperial +eye, decorum was forgotten and she too laughed uncontrollably. So they +continued, and finally the Emperor leaned back, drying the tears in his +eyes with his august sleeve, and the lady, resuming her gravity, hid her +face in her hands, yet regarded him through her fingers. + +When the August Aunt returned at the end of an hour with the ladies, +surrounded by the attendants with their instruments of music, the +Round-Faced Beauty was seated in the chair that she herself had +occupied, and on the whiteness of her brow was hung the chain of pearls, +which had formed the frontal of the Cap of the Emperor. + +It is recorded that, advancing from honour to honour, the Round-Faced +Beauty was eventually chosen Empress and became the mother of the +Imperial Prince. The celestial purity of her mind and the absence of all +flaws of jealousy and anger warranted this distinction. But it is also +recorded that, after her elevation, no other lady was ever exalted in +the Imperial favour or received the slightest notice from the Emperor. +For the Empress, now well acquainted with the Ideal Man, judged it +better that his experiences of the Ideal Woman should be drawn from +herself alone. And as she decreed, so it was done. Doubtless Her Majesty +did well. + +It is known that the Emperor departed to the Ancestral Spirits at an +early age, seeking, as the August Aunt observed, that repose which on +earth could never more be his. But no one has asserted that this lady’s +disposition was free from the ordinary blemishes of humanity. + +As for the Celestial Empress (who survives in history as one of the most +astute rulers who ever adorned the Dragon Throne), she continued to rule +her son and the Empire, surrounded by the respectful admiration of all. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Ninth Vibration And Other Stories, by +L. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/1853-0.zip b/1853-0.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4e14173 --- /dev/null +++ b/1853-0.zip diff --git a/1853-h.zip b/1853-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..33b473c --- /dev/null +++ b/1853-h.zip diff --git a/1853-h/1853-h.htm b/1853-h/1853-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e994de5 --- /dev/null +++ b/1853-h/1853-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,9124 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + The Ninth Vibration and Other Stories, by L. Adams Beck + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + +Project Gutenberg's The Ninth Vibration And Other Stories, by L. Adams Beck + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Ninth Vibration And Other Stories + +Author: L. Adams Beck + +Release Date: November 18, 2009 [EBook #1853] +Last Updated: October 31, 2016 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NINTH VIBRATION *** + + + + +Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer, and David Widger + + + + + + +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h1> + THE NINTH VIBRATION <br /><br />AND OTHER STORIES + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By L. Adams Beck + </h2> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + Contents + </h2> + <table summary="" style="margin-right: auto; margin-left: auto"> + <tr> + <td> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> THE NINTH VIBRATION </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> THE INTERPRETER A ROMANCE OF THE EAST </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> THE INCOMPARABLE LADY </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> FIRE OF BEAUTY </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> “HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!” </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY </a> + </p> + </td> + </tr> + </table> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <h2> + THE NINTH VIBRATION + </h2> + <p> + There is a place uplifted nine thousand feet in purest air where one of + the most ancient tracks in the world runs from India into Tibet. It leaves + Simla of the Imperial councils by a stately road; it passes beyond, but + now narrowing, climbing higher beside the khuds or steep drops to the + precipitous valleys beneath, and the rumor of Simla grows distant and the + way is quiet, for, owing to the danger of driving horses above the khuds, + such baggage as you own must be carried by coolies, and you yourself must + either ride on horseback or in the little horseless carriage of the + Orient, here drawn and pushed by four men. And presently the deodars + darken the way with a solemn presence, for— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “These are the Friars of the wood, + The Brethren of the Solitude + Hooded and grave—” + </pre> + <p> + their breath most austerely pure in the gradually chilling air. Their + companies increase and now the way is through a great wood where it has + become a trail and no more, and still it climbs for many miles and finally + a rambling bungalow, small and low, is sighted in the deeps of the trees, + a mountain stream from unknown heights falling beside it. And this is + known as the House in the Woods. Very few people are permitted to go + there, for the owner has no care for money and makes no provision for + guests. You must take your own servant and the khansamah will cook you + such simple food as men expect in the wilds, and that is all. You stay as + long as you please and when you leave not even a gift to the khansamah is + permitted. + </p> + <p> + I had been staying in Ranipur of the plains while I considered the + question of getting to Upper Kashmir by the route from Simla along the old + way to Chinese Tibet where I would touch Shipki in the Dalai Lama’s + territory and then pass on to Zanskar and so down to Kashmir—a + tremendous route through the Himalaya and a crowning experience of the + mightiest mountain scenery in the world. I was at Ranipur for the purpose + of consulting my old friend Olesen, now an irrigation official in the + Rampur district—a man who had made this journey and nearly lost his + life in doing it. It is not now perhaps so dangerous as it was, and my + life was of no particular value to any one but myself, and the plan + interested me. + </p> + <p> + I pass over the long discussions of ways and means in the blinding heat of + Ranipur. Olesen put all his knowledge at my service and never uttered a + word of the envy that must have filled him as he looked at the distant + snows cool and luminous in blue air, and, shrugging good-natured + shoulders, spoke of the work that lay before him on the burning plains + until the terrible summer should drag itself to a close. We had vanquished + the details and were smoking in comparative silence one night on the + veranda, when he said in his slow reflective way; + </p> + <p> + “You don’t like the average hotel, Ormond, and you’ll like it still less + up Simla way with all the Simla crowd of grass-widows and fellows out for + as good a time as they can cram into the hot weather. I wonder if I could + get you a permit for The House in the Woods while you re waiting to fix up + your men and route for Shipki.” + </p> + <p> + He explained and of course I jumped at the chance. It belonged, he said, + to a man named Rup Singh, a pandit, or learned man of Ranipur. He had + always spent the summer there, but age and failing health made this + impossible now, and under certain conditions he would occasionally allow + people known to friends of his own to put up there. + </p> + <p> + “And Rup Singh and I are very good friends,” Olesen said; “I won his heart + by discovering the lost Sukh Mandir, or Hall of Pleasure, built many + centuries ago by a Maharao of Ranipur for a summer retreat in the great + woods far beyond Simla. There are lots of legends about it here in + Ranipur. They call it The House of Beauty. Rup Singh’s ancestor had been a + close friend of the Maharao and was with him to the end, and that’s why he + himself sets such store on the place. You have a good chance if I ask for + a permit. + </p> + <p> + “He told me the story and since it is the heart of my own I give it + briefly. Many centuries ago the Ranipur Kingdom was ruled by the Maharao + Rai Singh a prince of the great lunar house of the Rajputs. Expecting a + bride from some far away kingdom (the name of this is unrecorded) he built + the Hall of Pleasure as a summer palace, a house of rare and costly + beauty. A certain great chamber he lined with carved figures of the Gods + and their stories, almost unsurpassed for truth and life. So, with the + pine trees whispering about it the secret they sigh to tell, he hoped to + create an earthly Paradise with this Queen in whom all loveliness was + perfected. And then some mysterious tragedy ended all his hopes. It was + rumoured that when the Princess came to his court, she was, by some + terrible mistake, received with insult and offered the position only of + one of his women. After that nothing was known. Certain only is it that he + fled to the hills, to the home of his broken hope, and there ended his + days in solitude, save for the attendance of two faithful friends who + would not abandon him even in the ghostly quiet of the winter when the + pine boughs were heavy with snow and a spectral moon stared at the + panthers shuffling through the white wastes beneath. Of these two Rup + Singh’s ancestor was one. And in his thirty fifth year the Maharao died + and his beauty and strength passed into legend and his kingdom was taken + by another and the jungle crept silently over his Hall of Pleasure and the + story ended. + </p> + <p> + “There was not a memory of the place up there,” Olesen went on. “Certainly + I never heard anything of it when I went up to the Shipki in 1904. But I + had been able to be useful to Rup Singh and he gave me a permit for The + House in the Woods, and I stopped there for a few days’ shooting. I + remember that day so well. I was wandering in the dense woods while my men + got their midday grub, and I missed the trail somehow and found myself in + a part where the trees were dark and thick and the silence heavy as lead. + It was as if the trees were on guard—they stood shoulder to shoulder + and stopped the way. Well, I halted, and had a notion there was something + beyond that made me doubt whether to go on. I must have stood there five + minutes hesitating. Then I pushed on, bruising the thick ferns under my + shooting boots and stooping under the knotted boughs. Suddenly I tramped + out of the jungle into a clearing, and lo and behold a ruined House, with + blocks of marble lying all about it, and carved pillars and a great roof + all being slowly smothered by the jungle. The weirdest thing you ever saw. + I climbed some fallen columns to get a better look, and as I did I saw a + face flash by at the arch of a broken window. I sang out in Hindustani, + but no answer: only the echo from the woods. Somehow that dampened my + ardour, and I didn’t go in to what seemed like a great ruined hall for the + place was so eerie and lonely, and looked mighty snaky into the bargain. + So I came ingloriously away and told Rup Singh. And his whole face + changed. ‘That is The House of Beauty,’ he said. ‘All my life have I + sought it and in vain. For, friend of my soul, a man must lose himself + that he may find himself and what lies beyond, and the trodden path has + ever been my doom. And you who have not sought have seen. Most strange are + the way of the Gods’. Later on I knew this was why he had always gone up + yearly, thinking and dreaming God knows what. He and I tried for the place + together, but in vain and the whole thing is like a dream. Twice he has + let friends of mine stay at The House in the Woods, and I think he won’t + refuse now.” + </p> + <p> + “Did he ever tell you the story?” + </p> + <p> + “Never. I only know what I’ve picked up here. Some horrible mistake about + the Rani that drove the man almost mad with remorse. I’ve heard bits here + and there. There’s nothing so vital as tradition in India.” + </p> + <p> + “I wonder’. what really happened.” + </p> + <p> + “That we shall never know. I got a little old picture of the Maharao—said + to be painted by a Pahari artist. It’s not likely to be authentic, but you + never can tell. A Brahman sold it to me that he might complete his + daughter’s dowry, and hated doing it.” + </p> + <p> + “May I see it?” + </p> + <p> + “Why certainly. Not a very good light, but—can do,” as the Chinks + say. + </p> + <p> + He brought it out rolled in silk stuff and I carried it under the hanging + lamp. A beautiful young man indeed, with the air of race these people have + beyond all others;—a cold haughty face, immovably dignified. He sat + with his hands resting lightly on the arms of his chair of State. A + crescent of rubies clasped the folds of the turban and from this sprang an + aigrette scattering splendours. The magnificent hilt of a sword was ready + beside him. The face was not only beautiful but arresting. + </p> + <p> + “A strange picture,” I said. “The artist has captured the man himself. I + can see him trampling on any one who opposed him, and suffering in the + same cold secret way. It ought to be authentic if it isn’t. Don’t you know + any more?” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing. Well—to bed, and tomorrow I’ll see Rup Singh.” + </p> + <p> + I was glad when he returned with the permission. I was to be very careful, + he said, to make no allusion to the lost palace, for two women were + staying at the House in the Woods—a mother and daughter to whom Rup + Singh had granted hospitality because of an obligation he must honor. But + with true Oriental distrust of women he had thought fit to make no + confidence to them. I promised and asked Olesen if he knew them. + </p> + <p> + “Slightly. Canadians of Danish blood like my own. Their name is Ingmar. + Some people think the daughter good-looking. The mother is supposed to be + clever; keen on occult subjects which she came back to India to study. The + husband was a great naturalist and the kindest of men. He almost lived in + the jungle and the natives had all sorts of rumours about his powers. You + know what they are. They said the birds and beasts followed him about. Any + old thing starts a legend.” + </p> + <p> + “What was the connection with Rup Singh?” + </p> + <p> + “He was in difficulties and undeservedly, and Ingmar generously lent him + money at a critical time, trusting to his honour for repayment. Like most + Orientals he never forgets a good turn and would do anything for any of + the family—except trust the women with any secret he valued. The + father is long dead. By the way Rup Singh gave me a queer message for you. + He said; ‘Tell the Sahib these words—“Let him who finds water in the + desert share his cup with him who dies of thirst.” He is certainly getting + very old. I don’t suppose he knew himself what he meant.” + </p> + <p> + I certainly did not. However my way was thus smoothed for me and I took + the upward road, leaving Olesen to the long ungrateful toil of the man who + devotes his life to India without sufficient time or knowledge to make his + way to the inner chambers of her beauty. There is no harder mistress + unless you hold the pass-key to her mysteries, there is none of whom so + little can be told in words but who kindles so deep a passion. Necessity + sometimes takes me from that enchanted land, but when the latest dawns are + shining in my skies I shall make my feeble way back to her and die at her + worshipped feet. So I went up from Kalka. + </p> + <p> + I have never liked Simla. It is beautiful enough—eight thousand feet + up in the grip of the great hills looking toward the snows, the famous + summer home of the Indian Government. Much diplomacy is whispered on + Observatory Hill and many are the lighter diversions of which Mr. Kipling + and lesser men have written. But Simla is also a gateway to many things—to + the mighty deodar forests that clothe the foot-hills of the mountains, to + Kulu, to the eternal snows, to the old, old bridle way that leads up to + the Shipki Pass and the mysteries of Tibet—and to the strange things + told in this story. So I passed through with scarcely a glance at the busy + gayety of the little streets and the tiny shops where the pretty ladies + buy their rouge and powder. I was attended by my servant Ali Khan, a + Mohammedan from Nagpur, sent up with me by Olesen with strong + recommendation. He was a stout walker, so too am I, and an inveterate + dislike to the man-drawn carriage whenever my own legs would serve me + decided me to walk the sixteen miles to the House in the Woods, sending on + the baggage. Ali Khan despatched it and prepared to follow me, the fine + cool air of the hills giving us a zest. + </p> + <p> + “Subhan Alla! (Praise be to God!) the air is sweet!” he said, stepping out + behind me. “What time does the Sahib look to reach the House?” + </p> + <p> + “About five or six. Now, Ali Khan, strike out of the road. You know the + way.” + </p> + <p> + So we struck up into the glorious pine woods, mountains all about us. Here + and there as we climbed higher was a little bank of forgotten snow, but + spring had triumphed and everywhere was the waving grace of maiden-hair + ferns, banks of violets and strangely beautiful little wild flowers. These + woods are full of panthers, but in day time the only precaution necessary + is to take no dog,—a dainty they cannot resist. The air was + exquisite with the sun-warm scent of pines, and here and there the trees + broke away disclosing mighty ranges of hills covered with rich blue + shadows like the bloom on a plum,—the clouds chasing the sunshine + over the mountain sides and the dark green velvet of the robe of pines. I + looked across ravines that did not seem gigantic and yet the villages on + the other side were like a handful of peas, so tremendous was the scale. I + stood now and then to see the rhododendrons, forest trees here with great + trunks and massive boughs glowing with blood-red blossom, and time went by + and I took no count of it, so glorious was the climb. + </p> + <p> + It must have been hours later when it struck me that the sun was getting + low and that by now we should be nearing The House in the Woods. I said as + much to Ali Khan. He looked perplexed and agreed. We had reached a + comparatively level place, the trail faint but apparent, and it surprised + me that we heard no sound of life from the dense wood where our goal must + be. + </p> + <p> + “I know not, Presence,” he said. “May his face be blackened that directed + me. I thought surely I could not miss the way, and yet-” + </p> + <p> + We cast back and could see no trail forking from the one we were on. There + was nothing for it but to trust to luck and push on. But I began to be + uneasy and so was the man. I had stupidly forgotten to unpack my revolver, + and worse, we had no food, and the mountain air is an appetiser, and at + night the woods have their dangers, apart from being absolutely trackless. + We had not met a living being since we left the road and there seemed no + likelihood of asking for directions. I stopped no longer for views but + went steadily on, Ali Khan keeping up a running fire of low-voiced + invocations and lamentations. And now it was dusk and the position + decidedly unpleasant. + </p> + <p> + It was at that moment I saw a woman before us walking lightly and steadily + under the pines. She must have struck into the trail from the side for she + never could have kept before us all the way. A native woman, but wearing + the all-concealing boorka, more like a town dweller than a woman of the + hills. I put on speed and Ali Khan, now very tired, toiled on behind me as + I came up with her and courteously asked the way. Her face was entirely + hidden, but the answering voice was clear and sweet. I made up my mind she + was young, for it had the bird-like thrill of youth. + </p> + <p> + “If the Presence continues to follow this path he will arrive. It is not + far. They wait for him.” + </p> + <p> + That was all. It left me with a desire to see the veiled face. We passed + on and Ali Khan looked fearfully back. + </p> + <p> + “Ajaib! (Wonderful!) A strange place to meet one of the purdah-nashin + (veiled women)” he muttered. “What would she be doing up here in the + heights? She walked like a Khanam (khan’s wife) and I saw the gleam of + gold under the boorka.” + </p> + <p> + I turned with some curiosity as he spoke, and lo! there was no human being + in sight. She had disappeared from the track behind us and it was + impossible to say where. The darkening trees were beginning to hold the + dusk and it seemed unimaginable that a woman should leave the way and take + to the dangers of the woods. + </p> + <p> + “Puna-i-Khoda—God protect us!” said Ali Khan in a shuddering + whisper. “She was a devil of the wilds. Press on, Sahib. We should not be + here in the dark.” + </p> + <p> + There was nothing else to do. We made the best speed we could, and the + trees grew more dense and the trail fainter between the close trunks, and + so the night came bewildering with the expectation that we must pass the + night unfed and unarmed in the cold of the heights. They might send out a + search party from The House in the Woods—that was still a hope, if + there were no other. And then, very gradually and wonderfully the moon + dawned over the tree tops and flooded the wood with mysterious silver + lights and about her rolled the majesty of the stars. We pressed on into + the heart of the night. From the dense black depths we emerged at last. An + open glade lay before us—the trees falling back to right and left to + disclose—what? + </p> + <p> + A long low house of marble, unlit, silent, bathed in pale splendour and + shadow. About it stood great deodars, clothed in clouds of the white + blossoming clematis, ghostly and still. Acacias hung motionless trails of + heavily scented bloom as if carved in ivory. It was all silent as death. A + flight of nobly sculptured steps led up to a broad veranda and a wide open + door with darkness behind it. Nothing more. + </p> + <p> + I forced myself to shout in Hindustani—the cry seeming a brutal + outrage upon the night, and an echo came back numbed in the black woods. I + tried once more and in vain. We stood absorbed also into the silence. + </p> + <p> + “Ya Alla! it is a house of the dead!” whispered Ali Khan, shuddering at my + shoulder,—and even as the words left his lips I understood where we + were. “It is the Sukh Mandir.” I said. “It is the House of the Maharao of + Ranipur.” + </p> + <p> + It was impossible to be in Ranipur and hear nothing of the dead house of + the forest and Ali Khan had heard—God only knows what tales. In his + terror all discipline, all the inborn respect of the native forsook him, + and without word or sign he turned and fled along the track, crashing + through the forest blind and mad with fear. It would have been insanity to + follow him, and in India the first rule of life is that the Sahib shows no + fear, so I left him to his fate whatever it might be, believing at the + same time that a little reflection and dread of the lonely forest would + bring him to heel quickly. + </p> + <p> + I stood there and the stillness flowed like water about me. It was as + though I floated upon it—bathed in quiet. My thoughts adjusted + themselves. Possibly it was not the Sukh Mandir. Olesen had spoken of + ruin. I could see none. At least it was shelter from the chill which is + always present at these heights when the sun sets,—and it was + beautiful as a house not made with hands. There was a sense of awe but no + fear as I went slowly up the great steps and into the gloom beyond and so + gained the hall. + </p> + <p> + The moon went with me and from a carven arch filled with marble tracery + rained radiance that revealed and hid. Pillars stood about me, wonderful + with horses ramping forward as in the Siva Temple at Vellore. They + appeared to spring from the pillars into the gloom urged by invisible + riders, the effect barbarously rich and strange—motion arrested, + struck dumb in a violent gesture, and behind them impenetrable darkness. I + could not see the end of this hall—for the moon did not reach it, + but looking up I beheld the walls fretted in great panels into the utmost + splendour of sculpture, encircling the stories of the Gods amid a twining + and under-weaving of leaves and flowers. It was more like a temple than a + dwelling. Siva, as Nataraja the Cosmic Dancer, the Rhythm of the Universe, + danced before me, flinging out his arms in the passion of creation. Kama, + the Indian Eros, bore his bow strung with honey-sweet black bees that + typify the heart’s desire. Krishna the Beloved smiled above the + herd-maidens adoring at his feet. Ganesha the Elephant-Headed, sat in + massive calm, wreathing his wise trunk about him. And many more. But all + these so far as I could see tended to one centre panel larger than any, + representing two life-size figures of a dim beauty. At first I could + scarcely distinguish one from the other in the upward-reflected light, and + then, even as I stood, the moving moon revealed the two as if floating in + vapor. At once I recognized the subject—I had seen it already in the + ruined temple of Ranipur, though the details differed. Parvati, the Divine + Daughter of the Himalaya, the Emanation of the mighty mountains, seated + upon a throne, listening to a girl who played on a Pan pipe before her. + The goddess sat, her chin leaned upon her hand, her shoulders slightly + inclined in a pose of gentle sweetness, looking down upon the girl at her + feet, absorbed in the music of the hills and lonely places. A band of + jewels, richly wrought, clasped the veil on her brows, and below the bare + bosom a glorious girdle clothed her with loops and strings and tassels of + jewels that fell to her knees—her only garment. + </p> + <p> + The girl was a lovely image of young womanhood, the proud swell of the + breast tapering to the slim waist and long limbs easily folded as she half + reclined at the divine feet, her lips pressed to the pipe. Its silent + music mysteriously banished fear. The sleep must be sweet indeed that + would come under the guardianship of these two fair creatures—their + gracious influence was dewy in the air. I resolved that I would spend the + night beside them. Now with the march of the moon dim vistas of the walls + beyond sprang into being. Strange mythologies—the incarnations of + Vishnu the Preserver, the Pastoral of Krishna the Beautiful. I promised + myself that next day I would sketch some of the loveliness about me. But + the moon was passing on her way—I folded the coat I carried into a + pillow and lay down at the feet of the goddess and her nymph. Then a + moonlit quiet I slept in a dream of peace. + </p> + <p> + Sleep annihilates time. Was it long or short when I woke like a man + floating up to the surface from tranquil deeps? That I cannot tell, but + once more I possessed myself and every sense was on guard. + </p> + <p> + My hearing first. Bare feet were coming, falling softly as leaves, but + unmistakable. There was a dim whispering but I could hear no word. I rose + on my elbow and looked down the long hall. Nothing. The moonlight lay in + pools of light and seas of shadow on the floor, and the feet drew nearer. + Was I afraid? I cannot tell, but a deep expectation possessed me as the + sound grew like the rustle of grasses parted in a fluttering breeze, and + now a girl came swiftly up the steps, irradiate in the moonlight, and + passing up the hall stood beside me. I could see her robe, her feet bare + from the jungle, but her face wavered and changed and re-united like the + face of a dream woman. I could not fix it for one moment, yet knew this + was the messenger for whom I had waited all my life—for whom one + strange experience, not to be told at present, had prepared me in early + manhood. Words came, and I said: + </p> + <p> + “Is this a dream?” + </p> + <p> + “No. We meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is true.” + </p> + <p> + “Is a dream never true?” + </p> + <p> + “Sometimes it is the echo of the Ninth Vibration and therefore a harmonic + of truth. You are awake now. It is the day-time that is the sleep of the + soul. You are in the Lower Perception, wherein the truth behind the veil + of what men call Reality is perceived.” + </p> + <p> + “Can I ascend?” + </p> + <p> + “I cannot tell. That is for you, not me. + </p> + <p> + “What do I perceive tonight?” + </p> + <p> + “The Present as it is in the Eternal. Say no more. Come with me.” + </p> + <p> + She stretched her hand and took mine with the assurance of a goddess, and + we went up the hall where the night had been deepest between the great + pillars. + </p> + <p> + Now it is very clear to me that in every land men, when the doors of + perception are opened, will see what we call the Supernatural clothed in + the image in which that country has accepted it. Blake, the mighty mystic, + will see the Angels of the Revelation, driving their terrible way above + Lambeth—it is not common nor unclean. The fisherman, plying his + coracle on the Thames will behold the consecration of the great new Abbey + of Westminster celebrated with mass and chant and awful lights in the dead + mid-noon of night by that Apostle who is the Rock of the Church. Before + him who wanders in Thessaly Pan will brush the dewy lawns and slim-girt + Artemis pursue the flying hart. In the pale gold of Egyptian sands the + heavy brows of Osiris crowned with the pshent will brood above the seer + and the veil of Isis tremble to the lifting. For all this is the rhythm to + which the souls of men are attuned and in that vibration they will see, + and no other, since in this the very mountains and trees of the land are + rooted. So here, where our remote ancestors worshipped the Gods of Nature, + we must needs stand before the Mystic Mother of India, the divine daughter + of the Himalaya. + </p> + <p> + How shall I describe the world we entered? The carvings upon the walls had + taken life—they had descended. It was a gathering of the dreams men + have dreamed here of the Gods, yet most real and actual. They watched in a + serenity that set them apart in an atmosphere of their own—forms of + indistinct majesty and august beauty, absolute, simple, and everlasting. I + saw them as one sees reflections in rippled water—no more. But all + faces turned to the place where now a green and flowering leafage + enshrined and partly hid the living Nature Goddess, as she listened to a + voice that was not dumb to me. I saw her face only in glimpses of an + indescribable sweetness, but an influence came from her presence like the + scent of rainy pine forests, the coolness that breathes from great rivers, + the passion of Spring when she breaks on the world with a wave of flowers. + Healing and life flowed from it. Understanding also. It seemed I could + interpret the very silence of the trees outside into the expression of + their inner life, the running of the green life-blood in their veins, the + delicate trembling of their finger-tips. + </p> + <p> + My companion and I were not heeded. We stood hand in hand like children + who have innocently strayed into a palace, gazing in wonderment. The + august life went its way upon its own occasions, and, if we would, we + might watch. Then the voice, clear and cold, proceeding, as it were, with + some story begun before we had strayed into the Presence, the whole + assembly listening in silence. + </p> + <p> + “—and as it has been so it will be, for the Law will have the blind + soul carried into a body which is a record of the sins it has committed, + and will not suffer that soul to escape from rebirth into bodies until it + has seen the truth—” + </p> + <p> + And even as this was said and I listened, knowing myself on the verge of + some great knowledge, I felt sleep beginning to weigh upon my eyelids. The + sound blurred, flowed unsyllabled as a stream, the girl’s hand grew light + in mine; she was fading, becoming unreal; I saw her eyes like faint stars + in a mist. They were gone. Arms seemed to receive me—to lay me to + sleep and I sank below consciousness, and the night took me. + </p> + <p> + When I awoke the radiant arrows of the morning were shooting into the long + hall where I lay, but as I rose and looked about me, strange—most + strange, ruin encircled me everywhere. The blue sky was the roof. What I + had thought a palace lost in the jungle, fit to receive its King should he + enter, was now a broken hall of State; the shattered pillars were + festooned with waving weeds, the many coloured lantana grew between the + fallen blocks of marble. Even the sculptures on the walls were difficult + to decipher. Faintly I could trace a hand, a foot, the orb of a woman’s + bosom, the gracious outline of some young God, standing above a crouching + worshipper. No more. Yes, and now I saw above me as the dawn touched it + the form of the Dweller in the Windhya Hills, Parvati the Beautiful, + leaning softly over something breathing music at her feet. Yet I knew I + could trace the almost obliterated sculpture only because I had already + seen it defined in perfect beauty. A deep crack ran across the marble; it + was weathered and stained by many rains, and little ferns grew in the + crevices, but I could reconstruct every line from my own knowledge. And + how? The Parvati of Ranipur differed in many important details. She stood, + bending forward, wheras this sweet Lady sat. Her attendants were small + satyr-like spirits of the wilds, piping and fluting, in place of the + reclining maiden. The sweeping scrolls of a great halo encircled her whole + person. Then how could I tell what this nearly obliterated carving had + been? I groped for the answer and could not find it. I doubted— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Were such things here as we do speak about? + Or have we eaten of the insane root + That takes the reason captive?” + </pre> + <p> + Memory rushed over me like the sea over dry sands. A girl—there had + been a girl—we had stood with clasped hands to hear a strange music, + but in spite of the spiritual intimacy of those moments I could not recall + her face. I saw it cloudy against a background of night and dream, the + eyes remote as stars, and so it eluded me. Only her presence and her words + survived; “We meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is true.” But the + Ninth Vibration itself was dream-land. I had never heard the phrase—I + could not tell what was meant, nor whether my apprehension was true or + false. I knew only that the night had taken her and the dawn denied her, + and that, dream or no dream, I stood there with a pang of loss that even + now leaves me wordless. + </p> + <p> + A bird sang outside in the acacias, clear and shrill for day, and this + awakened my senses and lowered me to the plane where I became aware of + cold and hunger, and was chilled with dew. I passed down the tumbled steps + that had been a stately ascent the night before and made my way into the + jungle by the trail, small and lost in fern, by which we had come. Again I + wandered, and it was high noon before I heard mule bells at a distance, + and, thus guided, struck down through the green tangle to find myself, + wearied but safe, upon the bridle way that leads to Fagu and the far + Shipki. Two coolies then directed me to The House in the Woods. + </p> + <p> + All was anxiety there. Ali Khan had arrived in the night, having found his + way under the guidance of blind flight and fear. He had brought the news + that I was lost in the jungle and amid the dwellings of demons. It was, of + course, hopeless to search in the dark, though the khansamah and his man + had gone as far as they dared with lanterns and shouting, and with the + daylight they tried again and were even now away. It was useless to + reproach the man even if I had cared to do so. His ready plea was that as + far as men were concerned he was as brave as any (which was true enough as + I had reason to know later) but that when it came to devilry the Twelve + Imaums themselves would think twice before facing it. + </p> + <p> + “Inshalla ta-Alla! (If the sublime God wills!) this unworthy one will one + day show the Protector of the poor, that he is a respectable person and no + coward, but it is only the Sahibs who laugh in the face of devils.” + </p> + <p> + He went off to prepare me some food, consumed with curiosity as to my + adventures, and when I had eaten I found my tiny whitewashed cell, for the + room was little more, and slept for hours. + </p> + <p> + Late in the afternoon I waked and looked out. A low but glowing sunlight + suffused the wild garden reclaimed from the strangle-hold of the jungle + and hemmed in with rocks and forest. A few simple flowers had been planted + here and there, but its chief beauty was a mountain stream, brown and + clear as the eyes of a dog, that fell from a crag above into a rocky + basin, maidenhair ferns growing in such masses about it that it was + henceforward scarcely more than a woodland voice. Beside it two great + deodars spread their canopies, and there a woman sat in a low chair, a + girl beside her reading aloud. She had thrown her hat off and the sunshine + turned her massed dark hair to bronze. That was all I could see. I went + out and joined them, taking the note of introduction which Olesen had + given me. + </p> + <p> + I pass over the unessentials of my story; their friendly greetings and + sympathy for my adventure. It set us at ease at once and I knew my stay + would be the happier for their presence though it is not every woman one + would choose as a companion in the great mountain country. But what is + germane to my purpose must be told, and of this a part is the personality + of Brynhild Ingmar. That she was beautiful I never doubted, though I have + heard it disputed and smiled inwardly as the disputants urged lip and + cheek and shades of rose and lily, weighing and appraising. Let me + describe her as I saw her or, rather, as I can, adding that even without + all this she must still have been beautiful because of the deep + significance to those who had eyes to see or feel some mysterious element + which mingled itself with her presence comparable only to the delight + which the power and spiritual essence of Nature inspires in all but the + dullest minds. I know I cannot hope to convey this in words. It means + little if I say I thought of all quiet lovely solitary things when I + looked into her calm eyes,—that when she moved it was like clear + springs renewed by flowing, that she seemed the perfect flowering of a day + in June, for these are phrases. Does Nature know her wonders when she + shines in her strength? Does a woman know the infinite meanings her beauty + may have for the beholder? I cannot tell. Nor can I tell if I saw this + girl as she may have seemed to those who read only the letter of the book + and are blind to its spirit, or in the deepest sense as she really was in + the sight of That which created her and of which she was a part. Surely it + is a proof of the divinity of love that in and for a moment it lifts the + veil of so-called reality and shows each to the other mysteriously perfect + and inspiring as the world will never see them, but as they exist in the + Eternal, and in the sight of those who have learnt that the material is + but the dream, and the vision of love the truth. + </p> + <p> + I will say then, for the alphabet of what I knew but cannot tell, that she + had the low broad brows of a Greek Nature Goddess, the hair swept back + wing-like from the temples and massed with a noble luxuriance. It lay like + rippled bronze, suggesting something strong and serene in its essence. Her + eyes were clear and gray as water, the mouth sweetly curved above a + resolute chin. It was a face which recalled a modelling in marble rather + than the charming pastel and aquarelle of a young woman’s colouring, and + somehow I thought of it less as the beauty of a woman than as some sexless + emanation of natural things, and this impression was strengthened by her + height and the long limbs, slender and strong as those of some youth + trained in the pentathlon, subject to the severest discipline until all + that was superfluous was fined away and the perfect form expressing the + true being emerged. The body was thus more beautiful than the face, and I + may note in passing that this is often the case, because the face is more + directly the index of the restless and unhappy soul within and can attain + true beauty only when the soul is in harmony with its source. + </p> + <p> + She was a little like her pale and wearied mother. She might resemble her + still more when the sorrow of this world that worketh death should have + had its will of her. I had yet to learn that this would never be—that + she had found the open door of escape. + </p> + <p> + We three spent much time together in the days that followed. I never tired + of their company and I think they did not tire of mine, for my wanderings + through the world and my studies in the ancient Indian literatures and + faiths with the Pandit Devaswami were of interest to them both though in + entirely different ways. Mrs. Ingmar was a woman who centred all her + interests in books and chiefly in the scientific forms of occult research. + She was no believer in anything outside the range of what she called human + experience. The evidences had convinced her of nothing but a force as yet + unclassified in the scientific categories and all her interest lay in the + undeveloped powers of brain which might be discovered in the course of + ignorant and credulous experiment. We met therefore on the common ground + of rejection of the so-called occultism of the day, though I knew even + then, and how infinitely better now, that her constructions were wholly + misleading. + </p> + <p> + Nearly all day she would lie in her chair under the deodars by the + delicate splash and ripple of the stream. Living imprisoned in the crystal + sphere of the intellect she saw the world outside, painted in few but + distinct colours, small, comprehensible, moving on a logical orbit. I + never knew her posed for an explanation. She had the contented atheism of + a certain type of French mind and found as much ease in it as another kind + of sweet woman does in her rosary and confessional. + </p> + <p> + “I cannot interest Brynhild,” she said, when I knew her better. “She has + no affinity with science. She is simply a nature worshipper, and in such + places as this she seems to draw life from the inanimate life about her. I + have sometimes wondered whether she might not be developed into a kind of + bridge between the articulate and the inarticulate, so well does she + understand trees and flowers. Her father was like that—he had all + sorts of strange power with animals and plants, and thought he had more + than he had. He could never realize that the energy of nature is merely + mechanical.” + </p> + <p> + “You think all energy is mechanical?” + </p> + <p> + “Certainly. We shall lay our finger on the mainspring one day and the + mystery will disappear. But as for Brynhild—I gave her the best + education possible and yet she has never understood the conception of a + universe moving on mathematical laws to which we must submit in body and + mind. She has the oddest ideas. I would not willingly say of a child of + mine that she is a mystic, and yet—” + </p> + <p> + She shook her head compassionately. But I scarcely heard. My eyes were + fixed on Brynhild, who stood apart, looking steadily out over the snows. + It was a glorious sunset, the west vibrating with gorgeous colour spilt + over in torrents that flooded the sky, Terrible splendours—hues for + which we have no thought—no name. I had not thought of it as music + until I saw her face but she listened as well as saw, and her expression + changed as it changes when the pomp of a great orchestra breaks upon the + silence. It flashed to the chords of blood-red and gold that was burning + fire. It softened through the fugue of woven crimson gold and flame, to + the melancholy minor of ashes-of-roses and paling green, and so through + all the dying glories that faded slowly to a tranquil grey and left the + world to the silver melody of one sole star that dawned above the + ineffable heights of the snows. Then she listened as a child does to a + bird, entranced, with a smile like a butterfly on her parted lips. I never + saw such a power of quiet. + </p> + <p> + She and I were walking next day among the forest ways, the pine-scented + sunshine dappling the dropped frondage. We had been speaking of her + mother. “It is such a misfortune for her,” she said thoughtfully, “that I + am not clever. She should have had a daughter who could have shared her + thoughts. She analyses everything, reasons about everything, and that is + quite out of my reach.” + </p> + <p> + She moved beside me with her wonderful light step—the poise and + balance of a nymph in the Parthenon frieze. + </p> + <p> + “How do you see things?” + </p> + <p> + “See? That is the right word. I see things—I never reason about + them. They are. For her they move like figures in a sum. For me every one + of them is a window through which one may look to what is beyond.” + </p> + <p> + “To where?” + </p> + <p> + “To what they really are—not what they seem.” + </p> + <p> + I looked at her with interest. + </p> + <p> + “Did you ever hear of the double vision?” + </p> + <p> + For this is a subject on which the spiritually learned men of India, like + the great mystics of all the faiths, have much to say. I had listened with + bewilderment and doubt to the expositions of my Pandit on this very head. + Her simple words seemed for a moment the echo of his deep and searching + thought. Yet it surely could not be. Impossible. + </p> + <p> + “Never. What does it mean?” She raised clear unveiled eyes. “You must + forgive me for being so stupid, but it is my mother who is at home with + all these scientific phrases. I know none of them.” + </p> + <p> + “It means that for some people the material universe—the things we + see with our eyes—is only a mirage, or say, a symbol, which either + hides or shadows forth the eternal truth. And in that sense they see + things as they really are, not as they seem to the rest of us. And whether + this is the statement of a truth or the wildest of dreams, I cannot tell.” + </p> + <p> + She did not answer for a moment; then said; + </p> + <p> + “Are there people who believe this—know it?” + </p> + <p> + “Certainly. There are people who believe that thought is the only real + thing—that the whole universe is thought made visible. That we + create with our thoughts the very body by which we shall re-act on the + universe in lives to be. + </p> + <p> + “Do you believe it?” + </p> + <p> + “I don’t know. Do you?” + </p> + <p> + She paused; looked at me, and then went on: + </p> + <p> + “You see, I don’t think things out. I only feel. But this cannot interest + you.” + </p> + <p> + I felt she was eluding the question. She began to interest me more than + any one I had ever known. She had extraordinary power of a sort. Once, in + the woods, where I was reading in so deep a shade that she never saw me, I + had an amazing vision of her. She stood in a glade with the sunlight and + shade about her; she had no hat and a sunbeam turned her hair to pale + bronze. A small bright April shower was falling through the sun, and she + stood in pure light that reflected itself in every leaf and grass-blade. + But it was nothing of all this that arrested me, beautiful as it was. She + stood as though life were for the moment suspended;—then, very + softly, she made a low musical sound, infinitely wooing, from scarcely + parted lips, and instantly I saw a bird of azure plumage flutter down and + settle on her shoulder, pluming himself there in happy security. Again she + called softly and another followed the first. Two flew to her feet, two + more to her breast and hand. They caressed her, clung to her, drew some + joyous influence from her presence. She stood in the glittering rain like + Spring with her birds about her—a wonderful sight. Then, raising one + hand gently with the fingers thrown back she uttered a different note, + perfectly sweet and intimate, and the branches parted and a young deer + with full bright eyes fixed on her advanced and pushed a soft muzzle into + her hand. + </p> + <p> + In my astonishment I moved, however slightly, and the picture broke up. + The deer sprang back into the trees, the birds fluttered up in a hurry of + feathers, and she turned calm eyes upon me, as unstartled as if she had + known all the time that I was there. + </p> + <p> + “You should not have breathed,” she said smiling. “They must have utter + quiet.” + </p> + <p> + I rose up and joined her. + </p> + <p> + “It is a marvel. I can scarcely believe my eyes. How do you do it?” + </p> + <p> + “My father taught me. They come. How can I tell?” + </p> + <p> + She turned away and left me. I thought long over this episode. I recalled + words heard in the place of my studies—words I had dismissed without + any care at the moment. “To those who see, nothing is alien. They move in + the same vibration with all that has life, be it in bird or flower. And in + the Uttermost also, for all things are One. For such there is no death.” + </p> + <p> + That was beyond me still, but I watched her with profound interest. She + recalled also words I had half forgotten— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “There was nought above me and nought below, + My childhood had not learnt to know; + For what are the voices of birds, + Aye, and of beasts, but words, our words,— + Only so much more sweet.” + </pre> + <p> + That might have been written of her. And more. + </p> + <p> + She had found one day in the woods a flower of a sort I had once seen in + the warm damp forests below Darjiling—ivory white and shaped like a + dove in flight. She wore it that evening on her bosom. A week later she + wore what I took to be another. + </p> + <p> + “You have had luck,” I said; “I never heard of such a thing being seen so + high up, and you have found it twice.” + </p> + <p> + “No, it is the same.” + </p> + <p> + “The same? Impossible. You found it more than a week ago.” “I know. It is + ten days. Flowers don’t die when one understands them—not as most + people think.” + </p> + <p> + Her mother looked up and said fretfully: + </p> + <p> + “Since she was a child Brynhild has had that odd idea. That flower is dead + and withered. Throw it away, child. It looks hideous.” + </p> + <p> + Was it glamour? What was it? I saw the flower dewy fresh in her bosom She + smiled and turned away. + </p> + <p> + It was that very evening she left the veranda where we were sitting in the + subdued light of a little lamp and passed beyond where the ray cut the + darkness. She went down the perspective of trees to the edge of he + clearing and I rose to follow for it seemed absolutely unsafe that she + should be on the verge of the panther-haunted woods alone. Mrs. Ingmar + turned a page of her book serenely; + </p> + <p> + “She will not like it if you go. I cannot imagine that she should come to + harm. She always goes her own way—light or dark.” + </p> + <p> + I returned to my seat and watched steadfastly. At first I could see + nothing but as my sight adjusted itself I saw her a long way down the + clearing that opened the snows, and quite certainly also I saw something + like a huge dog detach itself from the woods and bound to her feet. It + mingled with her dark dress and I lost it. Mrs. Ingmar said, seeing my + anxiety but nothing else; “Her father was just the same;—he had no + fear of anything that lives. No doubt some people have that power. I have + never seen her attract birds and beasts as he certainly did, but she is + quite as fond of them.” + </p> + <p> + I could not understand her blindness—what I myself had seen raised + questions I found unanswerable, and her mother saw nothing! Which of us + was right? presently she came back slowly and I ventured no word. + </p> + <p> + A woodland sorcery, innocent as the dawn, hovered about her. What was it? + Did the mere love of these creatures make a bond between her soul and + theirs, or was the ancient dream true and could she at times move in the + same vibration? I thought of her as a wood-spirit sometimes, an expression + herself of some passion of beauty in Nature, a thought of snows and starry + nights and flowing rivers made visible in flesh. It is surely when seized + with the urge of some primeval yearning which in man is merely sexual that + Nature conceives her fair forms and manifests them, for there is a + correspondence that runs through all creation. + </p> + <p> + Here I ask myself—Did I love her? In a sense, yes, deeply, but not + in the common reading of the phrase. I have trembled with delight before + the wild and terrible splendour of the Himalayan heights-; low golden + moons have steeped my soul longing, but I did not think of these things as + mine in any narrow sense, nor so desire them. They were Angels of the + Evangel of beauty. So too was she. She had none of the “silken nets and + traps of adamant,” she was no sister of the “girls of mild silver or of + furious gold;”—but fair, strong, and her own, a dweller in the House + of Quiet. I did not covet her. I loved her. + </p> + <p> + Days passed. There came a night when the winds were loosed—no moon, + the stars flickering like blown tapers through driven clouds, the trees + swaying and lamenting. + </p> + <p> + “There will be rain tomorrow.” Mrs. Ingmar said, as we parted for the + night. I closed my door. Some great cat of the woods was crying harshly + outside my window, the sound receding towards the bridle way. I slept in a + dream of tossing seas and ships labouring among them. + </p> + <p> + With the sense of a summons I waked—I cannot tell when. + Unmistakable, as if I were called by name. I rose and dressed, and heard + distinctly bare feet passing my door. I opened it noiselessly and looked + out into the little passage way that made for the entry, and saw nothing + but pools of darkness and a dim light from the square of the window at the + end. But the wind had swept the sky clear with its flying bosom and was + sleeping now in its high places and the air was filled with a mild moony + radiance and a great stillness. + </p> + <p> + Now let me speak with restraint and exactness. I was not afraid but felt + as I imagine a dog feels in the presence of his master, conscious of a + purpose, a will entirely above his own and incomprehensible, yet to be + obeyed without question. I followed my reading of the command, bewildered + but docile, and understanding nothing but that I was called. + </p> + <p> + The lights were out. The house dead silent; the familiar veranda ghostly + in the night. And now I saw a white figure at the head of the steps—Brynhild. + She turned and looked over her shoulder, her face pale in the moon, and + made the same gesture with which she summoned her birds. I knew her + meaning, for now we were moving in the same rhythm, and followed as she + took the lead. How shall I describe that strange night in the jungle. + There were fire-flies or dancing points of light that recalled them. + Perhaps she was only thinking them—only thinking the moon and the + quiet, for we were in the world where thought is the one reality. But they + went with us in a cloud and faintly lighted our way. There were exquisite + wafts of perfume from hidden flowers breathing their dreams to the night. + Here and there a drowsy bird stirred and chirped from the roof of + darkness, a low note of content that greeted her passing. It was a path + intricate and winding and how long we went, and where, I cannot tell. But + at last she stooped and parting the boughs before her we stepped into an + open space, and before us—I knew it—I knew it!—The House + of Beauty. + </p> + <p> + She paused at the foot of the great marble steps and looked at me. + </p> + <p> + “We have met here already.” + </p> + <p> + I did not wonder—I could not. In the Ninth vibration surprise had + ceased to be. Why had I not recognized her before—O dull of heart! + That was my only thought. We walk blindfold through the profound darkness + of material nature, the blinder because we believe we see it. It is only + when the doors of the material are closed that the world appears to man as + it exists in the eternal truth. + </p> + <p> + “Did you know this?” I asked, trembling before mystery. + </p> + <p> + “I knew it, because I am awake. You forgot it in the dull sleep which we + call daily life. But we were here and THEY began the story of the King who + made this house. Tonight we shall hear it. It he story of Beauty wandering + through the world and the world received her not. We hear it in this place + because here he agonized for what he knew too late.” + </p> + <p> + “Was that our only meeting?” + </p> + <p> + “We meet every night, but you forget when the day brings the sleep of the + soul.—You do not sink deep enough into rest to remember. You float + on the surface where the little bubbles of foolish dream are about you and + I cannot reach you then.” + </p> + <p> + “How can I compel myself to the deeps?” + </p> + <p> + “You cannot. It will come. But when you have passed up the bridle way and + beyond the Shipki, stop at Gyumur. There is the Monastery of Tashigong, + and there one will meet you— + </p> + <p> + “His name?” + </p> + <p> + “Stephen Clifden. He will tell you what you desire to know. Continue on + then with him to Yarkhand. There in the Ninth Vibration we shall meet + again. It is a long journey but you will be content.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you certainly know that we shall meet again?” + </p> + <p> + “When you have learnt, we can meet when we will. He will teach you the + Laya Yoga. You should not linger here in the woods any longer. You should + go on. In three days it will be possible.” + </p> + <p> + “But how have you learnt—a girl and young?” + </p> + <p> + “Through a close union with Nature—that is one of the three roads. + But I know little as yet. Now take my hand and come. + </p> + <p> + “One last question. Is this house ruined and abject as I have seen it in + the daylight, or royal and the house of Gods as we see it now? Which is + truth?” + </p> + <p> + “In the day you saw it in the empty illusion of blind thought. Tonight, + eternally lovely as in the thought of the man who made it. Nothing that is + beautiful is lost, though in the sight of the unwise it seems to die. + Death is in the eyes we look through—when they are cleansed we see + Life only. Now take my hand and come. Delay no more.” + </p> + <p> + She caught my hand and we entered the dim magnificence of the great hall. + The moon entered with us. + </p> + <p> + Instantly I had the feeling of supernatural presence. Yet I only write + this in deference to common use, for it was absolutely natural—more + so than any I have met in the state called daily life. It was a thing in + which I had a part, and if this was supernatural so also was I. + </p> + <p> + Again I saw the Dark One, the Beloved, the young Krishna, above the women + who loved him. He motioned with his hand as we passed, as though he waved + us smiling on our way. Again the dancers moved in a rhythmic tread to the + feet of the mountain Goddess—again we followed to where she bent to + hear. But now, solemn listening faces crowded in the shadows about her, + grave eyes fixed immovably upon what lay at her feet—a man, + submerged in the pure light that fell from her presence, his dark face + stark and fine, lips locked, eyes shut, arms flung out cross-wise in utter + abandonment, like a figure of grief invisibly crucified upon his shame. I + stopped a few feet from him, arrested by a barrier I could not pass. Was + it sleep or death or some mysterious state that partook of both? Not + sleep, for there was no flutter of breath. Not death—no rigid + immobility struck chill into the air. It was the state of subjection where + the spirit set free lies tranced in the mighty influences which surround + us invisibly until we have entered, though but for a moment, the Ninth + Vibration. + </p> + <p> + And now, with these Listeners about us, a clear voice began and stirred + the air with music. I have since been asked in what tongue it spoke and + could only answer that it reached my ears in the words of my childhood, + and that I know whatever that language had been it would so have reached + me. + </p> + <p> + “Great Lady, hear the story of this man’s fall, for it is the story of + man. Be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them light.” + </p> + <p> + There was long since in Ranipur a mighty King and at his birth the wise + men declared that unless he cast aside all passions that debase the soul, + relinquishing the lower desires for the higher until a Princess laden with + great gifts should come to be his bride, he would experience great and + terrible misfortunes. And his royal parents did what they could to possess + him with this belief, but they died before he reached manhood. Behold him + then, a young King in his palace, surrounded with splendour. How should he + withstand the passionate crying of the flesh or believe that through + pleasure comes satiety and the loss of that in the spirit whereby alone + pleasure can be enjoyed? For his gift was that he could win all hearts. + They swarmed round him like hiving bees and hovered about him like + butterflies. Sometimes he brushed them off. Often he caressed them, and + when this happened, each thought proudly “I am the Royal Favourite. There + is none other than me.” + </p> + <p> + Also the Princess delayed who would be the crest-jewel of the crown, + bringing with her all good and the blessing of the High Gods, and in + consequence of all these things the King took such pleasures as he could, + and they were many, not knowing they darken the inner eye whereby what is + royal is known through disguises. + </p> + <p> + (Most pitiful to see, beneath the close-shut lids of the man at the feet + of the Dweller in the Heights, tears forced themselves, as though a corpse + dead to all else lived only to anguish. They flowed like blood-drops upon + his face as he lay enduring, and the voice proceeded.) What was the charm + of the King? Was it his stately height and strength? Or his faithless + gayety? Or his voice, deep and soft as the sitar when it sings of love? + His women said—some one thing, some another, but none of these + ladies were of royal blood, and therefore they knew not. + </p> + <p> + Now one day, the all-privileged jester of the King, said, laughing + harshly: + </p> + <p> + “Maharaj, you divert yourself. But how if, while we feast and play, the + Far Away Princess glided past and was gone, unknown and unwelcomed?” + </p> + <p> + And the King replied: + </p> + <p> + “Fool, content yourself. I shall know my Princess, but she delays so long + that I weary.” + </p> + <p> + Now in a far away country was a Princess, daughter of the Greatest, and + her Father hesitated to give her in marriage to such a King for all + reported that he was faithless of heart, but having seen his portrait she + loved him and fled in disguise from the palaces of her Father, and being + captured she was brought before the King in Ranipur. + </p> + <p> + He sat upon a cloth of gold and about him was the game he had killed in + hunting, in great masses of ruffled fur and plumage, and he turned the + beauty of his face carelessly upon her, and as the Princess looked upon + him, her heart yearned to him, and he said in his voice that was like the + male string of the sitar: + </p> + <p> + “Little slave, what is your desire?” + </p> + <p> + Then she saw that the long journey had scarred her feet and dimmed her + hair with dust, and that the King’s eyes, worn with days and nights of + pleasure did not pierce her disguise. Now in her land it is a custom that + the blood royal must not proclaim itself, so she folded her hands and said + gently: + </p> + <p> + “A place in the household of the King.” And he, hearing that the Waiting + slave of his chief favorite Jayashri was dead, gave her that place. So the + Princess attended on those ladies, courteous and obedient to all authority + as beseemed her royalty, and she braided her bright hair so that it hid + the little crowns which the Princesses of her House must wear always in + token of their rank, and every day her patience strengthened. + </p> + <p> + Sometimes the King, carelessly desiring her laughing face and sad eyes, + would send for her to wile away an hour, and he would say; “Dance, little + slave, and tell me stories of the far countries. You quite unlike my + Women, doubtless because you are a slave.” + </p> + <p> + And she thought—“No, but because I am a Princess,”—but this + she did not say. She laughed and told him the most marvellous stories in + the world until he laid his head upon her warm bosom, dreaming awake. + </p> + <p> + There were stories of the great Himalayan solitudes where in the winter + nights the white tiger stares at the witches’ dance of the Northern Lights + dazzled by the hurtling of their myriad spears. And she told how the + King-eagle, hanging motionless over the peaks of Gaurisankar, watches with + golden eyes for his prey, and falling like a plummet strikes its life out + with his clawed heel and, screaming with triumph, bears it to his fierce + mate in her cranny of the rocks. + </p> + <p> + “A gallant story!” the King would say. “More!” Then she told of the + tropical heats and the stealthy deadly creatures of forest and jungle, and + the blue lotus of Buddha swaying on the still lagoon,—And she spoke + of loves of men and women, their passion and pain and joy. And when she + told of their fidelity and valour and honour that death cannot quench, her + voice was like the song of a minstrel, for she had read all the stories of + the ages and the heart of a Princess told her the rest. And the King + listened unwearying though he believed this was but a slave. + </p> + <p> + (The face of the man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights twitched in + a white agony. Pearls of sweat were distilled upon his brows, but he moved + neither hand nor foot, enduring as in a flame of fire. And the voice + continued.) + </p> + <p> + So one day, in the misty green of the Spring, while she rested at his feet + in the garden Pavilion, he said to her: + </p> + <p> + “Little slave, why do you love me?” + </p> + <p> + And she answered proudly: + </p> + <p> + “Because you have the heart of a King.” + </p> + <p> + He replied slowly; + </p> + <p> + “Of the women who have loved me none gave this reason, though they gave + many.” + </p> + <p> + She laid her cheek on his hand. + </p> + <p> + “That is the true reason.” + </p> + <p> + But he drew it away and was vaguely troubled, for her words, he knew not + why, reminded him of the Far Away Princess and of things he had long + forgotten, and he said; “What does a slave know of the hearts of Kings?” + And that night he slept or waked alone. + </p> + <p> + Winter was at hand with its blue and cloudless days, and she was commanded + to meet the King where the lake lay still and shining like an ecstasy of + bliss, and she waited with her chin dropped into the cup of her hands, + looking over the water with eyes that did not see, for her whole soul + said; “How long O my Sovereign Lord, how long before you know the truth + and we enter together into our Kingdom?” + </p> + <p> + As she sat she heard the King’s step, and the colour stole up into her + face in a flush like the earliest sunrise. “He is coming,” she said; and + again; “He loves me.” + </p> + <p> + So he came beside the water, walking slowly. But the King was not alone. + His arm embraced the latest-come beauty from Samarkhand, and, with his + head bent, he whispered in her willing ear. + </p> + <p> + Then clasping her hands, the Princess drew a long sobbing breath, and he + turned and his eyes grew hard as blue steel. + </p> + <p> + “Go, slave,” he cried. “What place have you in Kings’ gardens? Go. Let me + see you no more.” + </p> + <p> + (The man lying at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights, raised a heavy + arm and flung it above his head, despairing, and it fell again on the + cross of his torment. And the voice went on.) + </p> + <p> + And as he said this, her heart broke; and she went and her feet were + weary. So she took the wise book she loved and unrolled it until she came + to a certain passage, and this she read twice; “If the heart of a slave be + broken it may be mended with jewels and soft words, but the heart of a + Princess can be healed only by the King who broke it, or in Yamapura, the + City under the Sunset where they make all things new. Now, Yama, the Lord + of this City, is the Lord of Death.” And having thus read the Princess + rolled the book and put it from her. + </p> + <p> + And next day, the King said to his women; “Send for her,” for his heart + smote him and he desired to atone royally for the shame of his speech. And + they sought and came back saying; + </p> + <p> + “Maharaj, she is gone. We cannot find her.” + </p> + <p> + Fear grew in the heart of the King—a nameless dread, and he said, + “Search.” And again they sought and returned and the King was striding up + and down the great hall and none dared cross his path. But, trembling, + they told him, and he replied; “Search again. I will not lose her, and, + slave though be, she shall be my Queen.” + </p> + <p> + So they ran, dispersing to the Four Quarters, and King strode up and down + the hall, and Loneliness kept step with him and clasped his hand and + looked his eyes. + </p> + <p> + Then the youngest of the women entered with a tale to tell. “Majesty, we + have found her. She lies beside the lake. When the birds fled this morning + she fled with them, but upon a longer journey. Even to Yamapura, the City + under the Sunset.” + </p> + <p> + And the King said; “Let none follow.” And he strode forth swiftly, white + with thoughts he dared not think. + </p> + <p> + The Princess lay among the gold of the fallen leaves. All was gold, for + her bright hair was out-spread in shining waves and in it shone the glory + of the hidden crown. On her face was no smile—only at last was + revealed the patience she had covered with laughter so long that even the + voice of the King could not now break it into joy. The hands that had + clung, the swift feet that had run beside his, the tender body, mighty to + serve and to love, lay within touch but farther away than the uttermost + star was the Far Away Princess, known and loved too late. + </p> + <p> + And he said; “My Princess—O my Princess!” and laid his head on her + cold bosom. + </p> + <p> + “Too late!” a harsh Voice croaked beside him, and it was the voice of the + Jester who mocks at all things. “Too late! O madness, to despise the blood + royal because it humbled itself to service and so was doubly royal. The + Far Away Princess came laden with great gifts, and to her the King’s gift + was the wage of a slave and a broken heart. Cast your crown and sceptre in + the dust, O King—O King of Fools.” + </p> + <p> + (The man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights moved. Some dim word + shaped upon his locked lips. She listened in a divine calm. It seemed that + the very Gods drew nearer. Again the man essayed speech, the body dead, + life only in the words that none could hear. The voice went on.) + </p> + <p> + But the Princess flying wearily because of the sore wound in her heart, + came at last to the City under the Sunset, where the Lord of Death rules + in the House of Quiet, and was there received with royal honours for in + that land are no disguises. And she knelt before the Secret One and in a + voice broken with agony entreated him to heal her. And with veiled and + pitying eyes he looked upon her, for many and grievous as are the wounds + he has healed this was more grievous still. And he said; + </p> + <p> + “Princess, I cannot, But this I can do—I can give a new heart in a + new birth—happy and careless as the heart of a child. Take this + escape from the anguish you endure and be at peace.” + </p> + <p> + But the Princess, white with pain, asked only; + </p> + <p> + “In this new heart and birth, is there room for the King?” + </p> + <p> + And the Lord of Peace replied; + </p> + <p> + “None. He too will be forgotten.” + </p> + <p> + Then she rose to her feet. + </p> + <p> + “I will endure and when he comes I will serve him once more. If he will he + shall heal me, and if not I will endure for ever.” + </p> + <p> + And He who is veiled replied; + </p> + <p> + “In this sacred City no pain may disturb the air, therefore you must wait + outside in the chill and the dark. Think better, Princess! Also, he must + pass through many rebirths, because he beheld the face of Beauty unveiled + and knew her not. And when he comes he will be weary and weak as a + new-born child, and no more a great King.” And the Princess smiled; + </p> + <p> + “Then he will need me the more,” she said; “I will wait and kiss the feet + of my King.” + </p> + <p> + “And the Lord of Death was silent. So she went outside into the darkness + of the spaces, and the souls free passed her like homing doves, and she + sat with her hands clasped over the sore wound in her heart, watching the + earthward way. And the Princess is keeping still the day of her long + patience.” + </p> + <p> + The voice ceased. And there was a great silence, and the listening faces + drew nearer. + </p> + <p> + Then the Dweller in the Heights spoke in a voice soft as the falling of + snow in the quiet of frost and moon. I could have wept myself blind with + joy to hear that music. More I dare not say. + </p> + <p> + “He is in the Lower State of Perception. He sorrows for his loss. Let him + have one instant’s light that still he may hope.” + </p> + <p> + She bowed above the man, gazing upon him as a mother might upon her + sleeping child. The dead eyelids stirred, lifted, a faint gleam showed + beneath them, an unspeakable weariness. I thought they would fall + unsatisfied. Suddenly he saw What looked upon him, and a terror of joy no + tongue can tell flashed over the dark mirror of his face. He stretched a + faint hand to touch her feet, a sobbing sigh died upon his lips, and once + more the swooning sleep took him. He lay as a dead man before the + Assembly. + </p> + <p> + “The night is far spent,” a voice said, from I know not where. And I knew + it was said not only for the sleeper but for all, for though the flying + feet of Beauty seem for a moment to outspeed us she will one day wait our + coming and gather us to her bosom. + </p> + <p> + As before, the vision spread outward like rings in a broken reflection in + water. I saw the girl beside me, but her hand grew light in mine. I felt + it no longer. I heard the roaring wind in the trees, or was it a great + voice thundering in my ears? Sleep took me. I waked in my little room. + </p> + <p> + Strange and sad—I saw her next day and did not remember her whom of + all things I desired to know. I remembered the vision and knew that + whether in dream or waking I had heard an eternal truth. I longed with a + great longing to meet my beautiful companion, and she stood at my side and + I was blind. + </p> + <p> + Now that I have climbed a little higher on the Mount of Vision it seems + even to myself that this could not be. Yet it was, and it is true of not + this only but of how much else! + </p> + <p> + She knew me. I learnt that later, but she made no sign. Her simplicities + had carried her far beyond and above me, to places where only the winged + things attain—“as a bird among the bird-droves of God.” + </p> + <p> + I have since known that this power of direct simplicity in her was why + among the great mountains we beheld the Divine as the emanation of the + terrible beauty about us. We cannot see it as it is—only in some + shadowing forth, gathering sufficient strength for manifestation from the + spiritual atoms that haunt the region where that form has been for ages + the accepted vehicle of adoration. But I was now to set forth to find + another knowledge—to seek the Beauty that blinds us to all other. + Next day the man who was directing my preparations for travel sent me word + from Simla that all was ready and I could start two days later. I told my + friends the time of parting was near. + </p> + <p> + “But it was no surprise to me,” I added, “for I had heard already that in + a very few days I should be on my way.” + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Ingmar was more than kind. She laid a frail hand on mine. + </p> + <p> + “We shall miss you indeed. If it is possible to send us word of your + adventures in those wild solitudes I hope you will do it. Of course + aviation will soon lay bare their secrets and leave them no mysteries, so + you don’t go too soon. One may worship science and yet feel it injures the + beauty of the world. But what is beauty compared with knowledge?” + </p> + <p> + “Do you never regret it?” I asked. + </p> + <p> + “Never, dear Mr. Ormond. I am a worshipper of hard facts and however + hideous they may be I prefer them to the prismatic colours of romance.” + </p> + <p> + Brynhild, smiling, quoted; + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Their science roamed from star to star + And than itself found nothing greater. + What wonder? In a Leyden jar + They bottled the Creator?” + </pre> + <p> + “There is nothing greater than science,” said Mrs. Ingmar with soft + reverence. “The mind of man is the foot-rule of the universe.” + </p> + <p> + She meditated for a moment and then added that my kind interests in their + plans decided her to tell me that she would be returning to Europe and + then to Canada in a few months with a favourite niece as her companion + while Brynhild would remain in India with friends in Mooltan for a time. I + looked eagerly at her but she was lost in her own thoughts and it was + evidently not the time to say more. + </p> + <p> + If I had hoped for a vision before I left the neighbourhood of that + strange House of Beauty where a spirit imprisoned appeared to await the + day of enlightenment I was disappointed. These things do not happen as one + expects or would choose. The wind bloweth where it listeth until the laws + which govern the inner life are understood, and then we would not choose + if we could for we know that all is better than well. In this world, + either in the blinded sight of daily life or in the clarity of the true + sight I have not since seen it, but that has mattered little, for having + heard an authentic word within its walls I have passed on my way + elsewhere. + </p> + <p> + Next day a letter from Olesen reached me. + </p> + <p> + “Dear Ormond, I hope you have had a good time at the House in the Woods. I + saw Rup Singh a few days ago and he wrote the odd message I enclose. You + know what these natives are, even the most sensible of them, and you will + humour the old fellow for he ages very fast and I think is breaking up. + But this was not what I wanted to say. I had a letter from a man I had not + seen for years—a fellow called Stephen Clifden, who lives in + Kashmir. As a matter of fact I had forgotten his existence but evidently + he has not repaid the compliment for he writes as follows—No, I had + better send you the note and you can do as you please. I am rushed off my + legs with work and the heat is hell with the lid off. And-” + </p> + <p> + But the rest was of no interest except to a friend of years’ standing. I + read Rup Singh’s message first. It was written in his own tongue. + </p> + <p> + “To the Honoured One who has attained to the favour of the Favourable. + </p> + <p> + “You have with open eyes seen what this humble one has dreamed but has not + known. If the thing be possible, write me this word that I may depart in + peace. ‘With that one who in a former birth you loved all is well. Fear + nothing for him. The way is long but at the end the lamps of love are lit + and the Unstruck music is sounded. He lies at the feet of Mercy and there + awaits his hour.’ And if it be not possible to write these words, write + nothing, O Honoured, for though it be in the hells my soul shall find my + King, and again I shall serve him as once I served.” + </p> + <p> + I understood, and wrote those words as he had written them. Strange + mystery of life—that I who had not known should see, and that this + man whose fidelity had not deserted his broken King in his utter downfall + should have sought with passion for one sight of the beloved face across + the waters of death and sought in vain. I thought of those Buddhist words + of Seneca—“The soul may be and is in the mass of men drugged and + silenced by the seductions of sense and the deceptions of the world. But + if, in some moment of detachment and elation, when its captors and jailors + relax their guard, it can escape their clutches, it will seek at once the + region of its birth and its true home.” + </p> + <p> + Well—the shell must break before the bird can fly, and the time drew + near for the faithful servant to seek his lord. My message reached him in + time and gladdened him. + </p> + <p> + I turned then to Clifden’s letter. + </p> + <p> + “Dear Olesen, you will have forgotten me, and feeling sure of this I + should scarcely have intruded a letter into your busy life were it not + that I remember your good-nature as a thing unforgettable though so many + years have gone by. I hear of you sometimes when Sleigh comes up the Sind + valley, for I often camp at Sonamarg and above the Zoji La and farther. I + want you to give a message to a man you know who should be expecting to + hear from me. Tell him I shall be at the Tashigong Monastery when he + reaches Gyumur beyond the Shipki. Tell him I have the information he wants + and I will willingly go on with him to Yarkhand and his destination. He + need not arrange for men beyond Gyumur. All is fixed. So sorry to bother + you, old man, but I don’t know Ormond’s address, except that he was with + you and has gone up Simla way. And of course he will be keen to hear the + thing is settled.” + </p> + <p> + Amazing. I remembered the message I had heard and this man’s words rang + true and kindly, but what could it mean? I really did not question farther + than this for now I could not doubt that I was guided. Stronger hands than + mine had me in charge, and it only remained for me to set forth in + confidence and joy to an end that as yet I could not discern. I turned my + face gladly to the wonder of the mountains. + </p> + <p> + Gladly—but with a reservation. I was leaving a friend and one whom I + dimly felt might one day be more than a friend—Brynhild Ingmar. That + problem must be met before I could take my way. I thought much of what + might be said at parting. True, she had the deepest attraction for me, but + true also that I now beheld a quest stretching out into the unknown which + I must accept in the spirit of the knight errant. Dare I then bind my + heart to any allegiance which would pledge me to a future inconsistent + with what lay before me? How could I tell what she might think of the + things which to me were now real and external—the revelation of the + only reality that underlies all the seeming. Life can never be the same + for the man who has penetrated to this, and though it may seem a hard + saying there can be but a maimed understanding between him and those who + still walk amid the phantoms of death and decay. + </p> + <p> + Her sympathy with nature was deep and wonderful but might it not be that + though the earth was eloquent to her the skies were silent? I was but a + beginner myself—I knew little indeed. Dare I risk that little in a + sweet companionship which would sink me into the contentment of the life + lived by the happily deluded between the cradle and the grave and perhaps + close to me for ever that still sphere where my highest hope abides? I had + much to ponder, for how could I lose her out of my life—though I + knew not at all whether she who had so much to make her happiness would + give me a single thought when I was gone. + </p> + <p> + If all this seem the very uttermost of selfish vanity, forgive a man who + grasped in his hand a treasure so new, so wonderful that he walked in fear + and doubt lest it should slip away and leave him in a world darkened for + ever by the torment of the knowledge that it might have been his and he + had bartered it for the mess of pottage that has bought so many + birthrights since Jacob bargained with his weary brother in the tents of + Lahai-roi. I thought I would come back later with my prize gained and + throwing it at her feet ask her wisdom in return, for whatever I might not + know I knew well she was wiser than I except in that one shining of the + light from Eleusis. I walked alone in the woods thinking of these things + and no answer satisfied me. + </p> + <p> + I did not see her alone until the day I left, for I was compelled by the + arrangements I was making to go down to Simla for a night. And now the + last morning had come with golden sun—shot mists rolling upward to + disclose the far white billows of the sea of eternity, the mountains + awaking to their enormous joys. The trees were dripping glory to the + steaming earth; it flowed like rivers into their most secret recesses, + moss and flower, fern and leaf floated upon the waves of light revealing + their inmost soul in triumphant gladness. Far off across the valleys a + cuckoo was calling—the very voice of spring, and in the green world + above my head a bird sang, a feathered joy, so clear, so passionate that I + thought the great summer morning listened in silence to his rapture + ringing through the woods. I waited until the Jubilate was ended and then + went in to bid good-bye to my friends. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Ingmar bid me the kindest farewell and I left her serene in the + negation of all beauty, all hope save that of a world run on the lines of + a model municipality, disease a memory, sewerage, light and air systems + perfected, the charted brain sending its costless messages to the outer + parts of the habitable globe, and at least a hundred years of life with a + decent cremation at the end of it assured to every eugenically born + citizen. No more. But I have long ceased to regret that others use their + own eyes whether clear or dim. Better the merest glimmer of light + perceived thus than the hearsay of the revelations of others. And by the + broken fragments of a bewildered hope a man shall eventually reach the + goal and rejoice in that dawn where the morning stars sing together and + the sons of God shout for joy. It must come, for it is already here. + </p> + <p> + Brynhild walked with me through the long glades in the fresh thin air to + the bridle road where my men and ponies waited, eager to be off. We stood + at last in the fringe of trees on a small height which commanded the way;—a + high uplifted path cut along the shoulders of the hills and on the left + the sheer drop of the valleys. Perhaps seven or eight feet in width and + dignified by the name of the Great Hindustan and Tibet Road it ran winding + far away into Wonderland. Looking down into the valleys, so far beneath + that the solitudes seem to wall them in I thought of all the strange + caravans which have taken this way with tinkle of bells and laughter now + so long silenced, and as I looked I saw a lost little monastery in a giant + crevice, solitary as a planet on the outermost ring of the system, and + remembrance flashed into my mind and I said; + </p> + <p> + “I have marching orders that have countermanded my own plans. I am to + journey to the Buddhist Monastery of Tashigong, and there meet a friend + who will tell me what is necessary that I may travel to Yarkhand and + beyond. It will be long before I see Kashmir.” + </p> + <p> + In those crystal clear eyes I saw a something new to me—a faint + smile, half pitying, half sad; + </p> + <p> + “Who told you, and where?” + </p> + <p> + “A girl in a strange place. A woman who has twice guided me—” + </p> + <p> + I broke off. Her smile perplexed me. I could not tell what to say. She + repeated in a soft undertone; + </p> + <p> + “Great Lady, be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them light.” + </p> + <p> + And instantly I knew. O blind—blind! Was the unhappy King of the + story duller of heart than I? And shame possessed me. Here was the + chrysoberyl that all day hides its secret in deeps of lucid green but when + the night comes flames with its fiery ecstasy of crimson to the moon, and + I—I had been complacently considering whether I might not blunt my + own spiritual instinct by companionship with her, while she had been my + guide, as infinitely beyond me in insight as she was in all things + beautiful. I could have kissed her feet in my deep repentance. True it is + that the gateway of the high places is reverence and he who cannot bow his + head shall receive no crown. I saw that my long travel in search of + knowledge would have been utterly vain if I had not learnt that lesson + there and then. In those moments of silence I learnt it once and for ever. + </p> + <p> + She stood by me breathing the liquid morning air, her face turned upon the + eternal snows. I caught her hand in a recognition that might have ended + years of parting, and its warm youth vibrated in mine, the foretaste of + all understanding, all unions, of love that asks nothing, that fears + nothing, that has no petition to make. She raised her eyes to mine and her + tears were a rainbow of hope. So we stood in silence that was more than + any words, and the golden moments went by. I knew her now for what she + was, one of whom it might have been written; + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “I come from where night falls clearer + Than your morning sun can rise; + From an earth that to heaven draws nearer + Than your visions of Paradise,— + For the dreams that your dreamers dream + We behold them with open eyes.” + </pre> + <p> + With open eyes! Later I asked the nature of the strange bond that had + called her to my side. + </p> + <p> + “I do not understand that fully myself,” she said—“That is part of + the knowledge we must wait for. But you have the eyes that see, and that + is a tie nothing can break. I had waited long in the House of Beauty for + you. I guided you there. But between you and me there is also love.” + </p> + <p> + I stretched an eager hand but she repelled it gently, drawing back a + little. “Not love of each other though we are friends and in the future + may be infinitely more. But—have you ever seen a drawing of Blake’s—a + young man stretching his arms to a white swan which flies from him on + wings he cannot stay? That is the story of both our lives. We long to be + joined in this life, here and now, to an unspeakable beauty and power + whose true believers we are because we have seen and known. There is no + love so binding as the same purpose. Perhaps that is the only true love. + And so we shall never be apart though we may never in this world be + together again in what is called companionship.” + </p> + <p> + “We shall meet,” I said confidently. She smiled and was silent. + </p> + <p> + “Do we follow a will-o’-the wisp in parting? Do we give up the substance + for the shadow? Shall I stay?” + </p> + <p> + She laughed joyously; + </p> + <p> + “We give a single rose for a rose-tree that bears seven times seven. Daily + I see more, and you are going where you will be instructed. As you know my + mother prefers for a time to have my cousin with her to help her with the + book she means to write. So I shall have time to myself. What do you think + I shall do?” + </p> + <p> + “Blow away on a great wind. Ride on the crests of tossing waves. Catch a + star to light the fireflies!” + </p> + <p> + She laughed like a bird’s song. + </p> + <p> + “Wrong—wrong! I shall be a student. All I know as yet has come to me + by intuition, but there is Law as well as Love and I will learn. I have + drifted like a happy cloud before the wind. Now I will learn to be the + wind that blows the clouds.” + </p> + <p> + I looked at her in astonishment. If a flower had desired the same thing it + could scarcely have seemed more incredible, for I had thought her whole + life and nature instinctive not intellective. She smiled as one who has a + beloved secret to keep. + </p> + <p> + “When you have gained what in this country they call The Knowledge of + Regeneration, come back and ask me what I have learnt.” + </p> + <p> + She would say no more of that and turned to another matter, speaking with + earnestness; + </p> + <p> + “Before you came here I had a message for you, and Stephen Clifden will + tell you the same thing when you meet. Believe it for it is true. Remember + always that the psychical is not the mystical and that what we seek is not + marvel but vision. These two things are very far apart, so let the first + with all its dangers pass you by, for our way lies to the heights, and for + us there is only one danger—that of turning back and losing what the + whole world cannot give in exchange. I have never seen Stephen Clifden but + I know much of him. He is a safe guide—a man who has had much and + strange sorrow which has brought him joy that cannot be told. He will take + you to those who know the things that you desire. I wish I might have gone + too.” + </p> + <p> + Something in the sweetness of her voice, its high passion, the strong + beauty of her presence woke a poignant longing in my heart. I said; + </p> + <p> + “I cannot leave you. You are the only guide I can follow. Let us search + together—you always on before.” + </p> + <p> + “Your way lies there,” she pointed to the high mountains. “And mine to the + plains, and if we chose our own we should wander. But we shall meet again + in the way and time that will be best and with knowledge so enlarged that + what we have seen already will be like an empty dream compared to daylight + truth. If you knew what waits for you you would not delay one moment.” + </p> + <p> + She stood radiant beneath the deodars, a figure of Hope, pointing steadily + to the heights. I knew her words were true though as yet I could not tell + how. I knew that whereas we had seen the Wonderful in beautiful though + local forms there is a plane where the Formless may be apprehended in + clear dream and solemn vision-the meeting of spirit with Spirit. What that + revelation would mean I could not guess—how should I?—but I + knew the illusion we call death and decay would wither before it. There is + a music above and beyond the Ninth Vibration though I must love those + words for ever for what their hidden meaning gave me. + </p> + <p> + I took her hand and held it. Strange—beyond all strangeness that + that story of an ancient sorrow should have made us what we were to each + other—should have opened to me the gates of that Country where she + wandered content. For the first time I had realized in its fulness the + loveliness of this crystal nature, clear as flowing water to receive and + transmit the light—itself a prophecy and fulfilment of some higher + race which will one day inhabit our world when it has learnt the true + values. She drew a flower from her breast and gave it to me. It lies + before me white and living as I write these words. + </p> + <p> + I sprang down the road and mounted, giving the word to march. The men + shouted and strode on—our faces to the Shipki Pass and what lay + beyond. + </p> + <p> + We had parted. + </p> + <p> + Once, twice, I looked back, and standing in full sunlight, she waved her + hand. + </p> + <p> + We turned the angle of the rocks. + </p> + <p> + What I found—what she found is a story strange and beautiful which I + may tell one day to those who care to hear. That for me there were pauses, + hesitancies, dreads, on the way I am not concerned to deny, for so it must + always be with the roots of the old beliefs of fear and ignorance buried + in the soil of our hearts and ready to throw out their poisonous fibres. + But there was never doubt. For myself I have long forgotten the meaning of + that word in anything that is of real value. + </p> + <p> + Do not let it be thought that the treasure is reserved for the few or + those of special gifts. And it is as free to the West as to the East + though I own it lies nearer to the surface in the Orient where the + spiritual genius of the people makes it possible and the greater and more + faithful teachers are found. It is not without meaning that all the faiths + of the world have dawned in those sunrise skies. Yet it is within reach of + all and asks only recognition, for the universe has been the mine of its + jewels— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Median gold it holds, and silver from Atropatene, Ruby and + emerald from Hindustan, and Bactrian agate, Bright with beryl + and pearl, sardonyx and sapphire.”— + and more that cannot be uttered— + the Lights and Perfections. +</pre> + <p> + So for all seekers I pray this prayer—beautiful in its sonorous + Latin, but noble in all the tongues; + </p> + <p> + “Supplico tibi, Pater et Dux—I pray Thee, Guide of our vision, that + we may remember the nobleness with which Thou hast endowed us, and that + Thou wouldest be always on our right and on our left in the motion of our + wills, that we may be purged from the contagion of the body and the + affections of the brute and overcome and rule them. And I pray also that + Thou wouldest drive away the blinding darkness from the eyes of our souls + that we may know well what is to be held for divine and what for mortal.” + </p> + <p> + “The nobleness with which Thou hast endowed us-” this, and not the cry of + the miserable sinner whose very repentance is no virtue but the + consequence of failure and weakness is the strong music to which we must + march. + </p> + <p> + And the way is open to the mountains. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE INTERPRETER A ROMANCE OF THE EAST + </h2> + <p> + I + </p> + <p> + There are strange things in this story, but, so far as I understand them, + I tell the truth. If you measure the East with a Western foot-rule you + will say, “Impossible.” I should have said it myself. + </p> + <p> + Of myself I will say as little as I can, for this story is of Vanna + Loring. I am an incident only, though I did not know that at first. + </p> + <p> + My name is Stephen Clifden, and I was eight-and-thirty; plenty of money, + sound in wind and limb. I had been by way of being a writer before the + war, the hobby of a rich man; but if I picked up anything in the welter in + France, it was that real work is the only salvation this mad world has to + offer; so I meant to begin at the beginning, and learn my trade like a + journeyman labourer. I had come to the right place. A very wonderful city + is Peshawar—rather let us say, two cities—the compounds, the + fortifications where Europeans dwell in such peace as their strong right + arms can secure them; and the native city and bazaar humming and buzzing + like a hive of angry bees with the rumours that come up from Lower India + or down the Khyber Pass with the camel caravans loaded with merchandise + from Afghanistan, Bokhara, and farther. And it is because of this that + Peshawar is the Key of India, and a city of Romance that stands at every + corner, and cries aloud in the market—place. For at Peshawar every + able-bodied man sleeps with his revolver under his pillow, and the old + Fort is always ready in case it should be necessary at brief and sharp + notice to hurry the women and children into it, and possibly, to die in + their defense. So enlivening is the neighbourhood of the frontier tribes + that haunt the famous Khyber Pass and the menacing hills where danger is + always lurking. + </p> + <p> + But there was society here, and I was swept into it—there was + chatter, and it galled me. + </p> + <p> + I was beginning to feel that I had missed my mark, and must go farther + afield, perhaps up into Central Asia, when I met Vanna Loring. If I say + that her hair was soft and dark; that she had the deepest hazel eyes I + have ever seen, and a sensitive, tender mouth; that she moved with a + flowing grace like “a wave of the sea”—it sounds like the portrait + of a beauty, and she was never that. Also, incidentally, it gives none of + her charm. I never heard any one get any further than that she was “oddly + attractive”—let us leave it at that. She was certainly attractive to + me. + </p> + <p> + She was the governess of little Winifred Meryon, whose father held the + august position of General Commanding the Frontier Forces, and her mother + the more commanding position of the reigning beauty of Northern India, + generally speaking. No one disputed that. She was as pretty as a picture, + and her charming photograph had graced as many illustrated papers as there + were illustrated papers to grace. + </p> + <p> + But Vanna—I gleaned her story by bits when I came across her with + the child in the gardens. I was beginning to piece it together now. + </p> + <p> + Her love of the strange and beautiful she had inherited from a young + Italian mother, daughter of a political refugee; her childhood had been + spent in a remote little village in the West of England; half reluctantly + she told me how she had brought herself up after her mother’s death and + her father’s second marriage. Little was said of that, but I gathered that + it had been a grief to her, a factor in her flight to the East. + </p> + <p> + We were walking in the Circular Road then with Winifred in front leading + her Pekingese by its blue ribbon, and we had it almost to ourselves except + for a few natives passing slow and dignified on their own occasions, for + fashionable Peshawar was finishing its last rubber of bridge, before + separating to dress for dinner, and had no time to spare for trivialities + and sunsets. + </p> + <p> + “So when I came to three-and-twenty,” she said slowly, “I felt I must + break away from our narrow life. I had a call to India stronger than + anything on earth. You would not understand but that was so, and I had + spent every spare moment in teaching myself India—its history, + legends, religions, everything! And I was not wanted at home, and I had + grown afraid.” + </p> + <p> + I could divine years of patience and repression under this plain tale, but + also a power that would be dynamic when the authentic voice called. That + was her charm—gentleness in strength—a sweet serenity. + </p> + <p> + “What were you afraid of?” + </p> + <p> + “Of growing old and missing what was waiting for me out here. But I could + not get away like other people. No money, you see. So I thought I would + come out here and teach. Dare I? Would they let me? I knew I was fighting + life and chances and risks if I did it; but it was death if I stayed + there. And then—Do you really care to hear?” + </p> + <p> + “Of course. Tell me how you broke your chain.” + </p> + <p> + “I spare you the family quarrels. I can never go back. But I was spurred—spurred + to take some wild leap; and I took it. Six years ago I came out. First I + went to a doctor and his wife at Cawnpore. They had a wonderful knowledge + of the Indian peoples, and there I learned Hindustani and much else. Then + he died. But an aunt had left me two hundred pounds, and I could wait a + little and choose; and so I came here.” + </p> + <p> + It interested me. The courage that pale elastic type of woman has! + </p> + <p> + “Have you ever regretted it? Would they take you back if you failed?” + </p> + <p> + “Never, to both questions,” she said, smiling. “Life is glorious. I’ve + drunk of a cup I never thought to taste; and if I died tomorrow I should + know I had done right. I rejoice in every moment I live—even when + Winifred and I are wrestling with arithmetic.” + </p> + <p> + “I shouldn’t have thought life was very easy with Lady Meryon.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, she is kind enough in an indifferent sort of way. I am not the + persecuted Jane Eyre sort of governess at all. But that is all on the + surface and does not matter. It is India I care for-the people, the sun, + the infinite beauty. It was coming home. You would laugh if I told you I + knew Peshawar long before I came here. Knew it—walked here, lived. + Before there were English in India at all.” She broke off. “You won’t + understand.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I have had that feeling, too,” I said patronizingly. “If one has read + very much about a place-” + </p> + <p> + “That was not quite what I meant. Never mind. The people, the place—that + is the real thing to me. All this is the dream.” The sweep of her hand + took in not only Winifred and myself, but the general’s stately residence, + which to blaspheme in Peshawar is rank infidelity. + </p> + <p> + “By George, I would give thousands to feel that! I can’t get out of Europe + here. I want to write, Miss Loring,” I found myself saying. “I’d done a + bit, and then the war came and blew my life to pieces. Now I want to get + inside the skin of the East, and I can’t do it. I see it from outside, + with a pane of glass between. No life in it. If you feel as you say, for + God’s sake be my interpreter!” + </p> + <p> + I really meant what I said. I knew she was a harp that any breeze would + sweep into music. I divined that temperament in her and proposed to use it + for my own ends. She had and I had not, the power to be a part of all she + saw, to feel kindred blood running in her own veins. To the average + European the native life of India is scarcely interesting, so far is it + removed from all comprehension. To me it was interesting, but I could not + tell why. I stood outside and had not the fairy gold to pay for my + entrance. Here at all events she could buy her way where I could not. + Without cruelty, which honestly was not my besetting sin—especially + where women were concerned, the egoist in me felt I would use her, would + extract the last drop of the enchantment of her knowledge before I went on + my way. What more natural than that Vanna or any other woman should + minister to my thirst for information? Men are like that. I pretend to be + no better than the rest. She pleased my fastidiousness—that + fastidiousness which is the only austerity in men not otherwise austere. + </p> + <p> + “Interpret?” she said, looking at me with clear hazel eyes; “how could I? + You were in the native city yesterday. What did you miss?” + </p> + <p> + “Everything! I saw masses of colour, light, movement. Brilliantly + picturesque people. Children like Asiatic angels. Magnificently scowling + ruffians in sheepskin coats. In fact, a movie staged for my benefit. I was + afraid they would ring down the curtain before I had had enough. It had no + meaning. When I got back to my diggings I tried to put down what I had + just seen, and I swear there’s more inspiration in the guide-book.” + </p> + <p> + “Did you go alone?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I certainly would not go sight-seeing with the Meryon crowd. Tell me + what you felt when you saw it first.” + </p> + <p> + “I went with Sir John’s uncle. He was a great traveler. The colour struck + me dumb. It flames—it sings. Think of the grey pinched life in the + West! I saw a grave dark potter turning his wheel, while his little girl + stood by, glad at our pleasure, her head veiled like a miniature woman, + tiny baggy trousers, and a silver nose-stud, like a star, in one delicate + nostril. In her thin arms she held a heavy baby in a gilt cap, like a + monkey. And the wheel turned and whirled until it seemed to be spinning + dreams, thick as motes in the sun. The clay rose in smooth spirals under + his hand, and the wheel sang, ‘Shall the vessel reprove him who made one + to honour and one to dishonour?’ And I saw the potter thumping his wet + clay, and the clay, plastic as dream-stuff, shaped swift as light, and the + three Fates stood at his shoulder. Dreams, dreams, and all in the spinning + of the wheel, and the rich shadows of the old broken courtyard where he + sat. And the wheel stopped and the thread broke, and the little new shapes + he had made stood all about him, and he was only a potter in Peshawar.” + </p> + <p> + Her voice was like a song. She had utterly forgotten my existence. I did + not dislike it at the moment, for I wanted to hear more, and the + impersonal is the rarest gift a woman can give a man. + </p> + <p> + “Did you buy anything?” + </p> + <p> + “He gave me a gift—a flawed jar of turquoise blue, faint turquoise + green round the lip. He saw I understood. And then I bought a little gold + cap and a wooden box of jade-green Kabul grapes. About a rupee, all told. + But it was Eastern merchandise, and I was trading from Balsora and + Baghdad, and Eleazar’s camels were swaying down from Damascus along the + Khyber Pass, and coming in at the great Darwazah, and friends’ eyes met me + everywhere. I am profoundly happy here.” + </p> + <p> + The sinking sun lit an almost ecstatic face. + </p> + <p> + I envied her more deeply than I had ever envied any one. She had the + secret of immortal youth, and I felt old as I looked at her. One might be + eighty and share that passionate impersonal joy. Age could not wither nor + custom stale the infinite variety of her world’s joys. She had a child’s + dewy youth in her eyes. + </p> + <p> + There are great sunsets at Peshawar, flaming over the plain, dying in + melancholy splendour over the dangerous hills. They too were hers, in a + sense in which they could never be mine. But what a companion! To my + astonishment a wild thought of marriage flashed across me, to be instantly + rebuffed with a shrug. Marriage—that one’s wife might talk poetry to + one about the East! Absurd! But what was it these people felt and I could + not feel? Almost, shut up in the prison of self, I knew what Vanna had + felt in her village—a maddening desire to escape, to be a part of + the loveliness that lay beyond me. So might a man love a king’s daughter + in her hopeless heights. + </p> + <p> + “It may be very beautiful on the surface,” I said morosely; “but there’s a + lot of misery below—hateful, they tell me.” + </p> + <p> + “Of course. We shall get to work one day. But look at the sunset. It opens + like a mysterious flower. I must take Winifred home now.” + </p> + <p> + “One moment,” I pleaded; “I can only see it through your eyes. I feel it + while you speak, and then the good minute goes.” + </p> + <p> + She laughed. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> +“And so must I. Come, Winifred. Look, there’s an owl; not like the owls +in the summer dark in England— + + “Lovely are the curves of the white owl sweeping, Wavy in the +dark, lit by one low star.” + </pre> + <p> + Suddenly she turned again and looked at me half wistfully. + </p> + <p> + “It is good to talk to you. You want to know. You are so near it all. I + wish I could help you; I am so exquisitely happy myself.” + </p> + <p> + My writing was at a standstill. It seemed the groping of a blind man in a + radiant world. Once perhaps I had felt that life was good in itself—when + the guns came thundering toward the Vimy Ridge in a mad gallop of horses, + and men shouting and swearing and frantically urging them on. Then, riding + for more than life, I had tasted life for an instant. Not before or since. + But this woman had the secret. + </p> + <p> + Lady Meryon, with her escort of girls and subalterns, came daintily past + the hotel compound, and startled me from my brooding with her pretty + silvery voice. + </p> + <p> + “Dreaming, Mr. Clifden? It isn’t at all wholesome to dream in the East. + Come and dine with us tomorrow. A tiny dance afterwards, you know; or + bridge for those who like it.” + </p> + <p> + I had not the faintest notion whether governesses dined with the family or + came in afterward with the coffee; but it was a sporting chance, and I + took it. + </p> + <p> + Then Sir John came up and joined us. + </p> + <p> + “You can’t well dance tomorrow, Kitty,” he said to his wife. “There’s been + an outpost affair in the Swat Hills, and young Fitzgerald has been shot. + Come to dinner of course, Clifden. Glad to see you. But no dancing, I + think.” + </p> + <p> + Kitty Meryon’s mouth drooped like a pouting child’s. Was it for the lost + dance, or the lost soldier lying out on the hills in the dying sunset. Who + could tell? In either case it was pretty enough for the illustrated + papers. + </p> + <p> + “How sad! Such a dear boy. We shall miss him at tennis.” Then brightly; + “Well, we’ll have to put the dance off for a week, but come tomorrow + anyhow.” + </p> + <p> + II + </p> + <p> + Next evening I went into Lady Meryon’s flower-scented drawing-room. The + electric fans were fluttering and the evening air was cool. Five or six + pretty girls and as many men made up the party—Kitty Meryon the + prettiest of them all, fashionably undressed in faint pink and crystal, + with a charming smile in readiness, all her gay little flags flying in the + rich man’s honour. I am no vainer than other men, but I saw that. Whatever + her charm might be it was none for me. What could I say to interest her + who lived in her foolish little world as one shut in a bright bubble? And + she had said the wrong word about young Fitzgerald—I wanted Vanna, + with her deep seeing eyes, to say the right one and adjust those cruel + values. + </p> + <p> + Governesses dine, it appeared, only to fill an unexpected place, or make a + decorous entry afterward, to play accompaniments. Fortunately Kitty Meryon + sang, in a pinched little soprano, not nearly so pretty as her silver + ripple of talk. + </p> + <p> + It was when the party had settled down to bridge and I was standing out, + that I ventured to go up to her as she sat knitting by a window—not + unwatched by the quick flash of Lady Meryon’s eyes as I did it. + </p> + <p> + “I think you hypnotize me, Miss Loring. When I hear anything I straightway + want to know what you will say. Have you heard of Fitzgerald’s death?” + </p> + <p> + “That is why we are not dancing tonight. Tomorrow the cable will reach his + home in England. He was an only child, and they are the great people of + the village where we are the little people. I knew his mother as one knows + a great lady who is kind to all the village folk. It may kill her. It is + travelling tonight like a bullet to her heart, and she does not know.” + </p> + <p> + “His father?” + </p> + <p> + “A brave man—a soldier himself. He will know it was a good death and + that Harry would not fail. He did not at Ypres. He would not here. But all + joy and hope will be dead in that house tomorrow.” + </p> + <p> + “And what do you think?” + </p> + <p> + “I am not sorry for Harry, if you mean that. He knew—we all know—that + he was on guard here holding the outposts against blood and treachery and + terrible things—playing the Great Game. One never loses at that game + if one plays it straight, and I am sure that at the last it was joy he + felt and not fear. He has not lost. Did you notice in the church a niche + before every soldier’s seat to hold his loaded gun? And the tablets on the + walls; “Killed at Kabul River, aged 22.”—“Killed on outpost duty.”—“Murdered + by an Afghan fanatic.” This will be one memory more. Why be sorry.” + </p> + <p> + Presently:— + </p> + <p> + “I am going up to the hills tomorrow, to the Malakhand Fort, with Mrs. + Delany, Lady Meryon’s aunt, and we shall see the wonderful Tahkt-i-Bahi + Monastery on the way. You should do that run before you go. The fort is + the last but one on the way to Chitral, and beyond that the road is so + beset that only soldiers may go farther, and indeed the regiments escort + each other up and down. But it is an early start, for we must be back in + Peshawar at six for fear of raiding natives.” + </p> + <p> + “I know; they hauled me up in the dusk the other day, and told me I should + be swept off to the hills if I fooled about after dusk. But I say—is + it safe for you to go? You ought to have a man. Could I go too?” + </p> + <p> + I thought she did not look enthusiastic at the proposal. + </p> + <p> + “Ask. You know I settle nothing. I go where I am sent.” She said it with + the happiest smile. I knew they could send her nowhere that she would not + find joy. I thought her mere presence must send the vibrations of + happiness through the household. Yet again—why? For where there is + no receiver the current speaks in vain; and for an instant I seemed to see + the air full of messages—of speech striving to utter its passionate + truths to deaf ears stopped for ever against the breaking waves of sound. + But Vanna heard. + </p> + <p> + She left the room; and when the bridge was over, I made my request. Lady + Meryon shrugged her shoulders and declared it would be a terribly dull run—the + scenery nothing, “and only” (she whispered) “Aunt Selina and poor Miss + Loring?” + </p> + <p> + Of course I saw at once that she did not like it; but Sir John was all for + my going, and that saved the situation. + </p> + <p> + I certainly could have dispensed with Aunt Selina when the automobile drew + up in the golden river of the sunrise at the hotel. There were only the + driver, a personal servant, and the two ladies; Mrs. Delany, comely, + pleasant, talkative, and Vanna— + </p> + <p> + Her face in its dark motoring veil, fine and delicate as a young moon in a + cloud drift—the sensitive sweet mouth that had quivered a little + when she spoke of Fitzgerald—the pure glance that radiated such + kindness to all the world. She sat there with the Key of Dreams pressed + against her slight bosom—her eyes dreaming above it. Already the + strange airs of her unknown world were breathing about me, and as yet I + knew not the things that belonged unto my peace. + </p> + <p> + We glided along the straight military road from Peshawar to Nowshera, the + gold-bright sun dazzling in its whiteness—a strange drive through + the flat, burned country, with the ominous Kabul River flowing through it. + Military preparations everywhere, and the hills looking watchfully down—alive, + as it were, with keen, hostile eyes. War was at present about us as behind + the lines in France; and when we crossed the Kabul River on a bridge of + boats, and I saw its haunted waters, I began to feel the atmosphere of the + place closing down upon me. It had a sinister beauty; it breathed + suspense; and I wished, as I was sure Vanna did, for silence that was not + at our command. + </p> + <p> + For Mrs. Delany felt nothing of it. A bright shallow ripple of talk was + her contribution to the joys of the day; though it was, fortunately, + enough for her happiness if we listened and agreed. I knew Vanna listened + only in show. Her intent eyes were fixed on the Tahkt-i-Bahi hills after + we had swept out of Nowshera; and when the car drew up at the rough track, + she had a strange look of suspense and pallor. I remember I wondered at + the time if she were nervous in the wild open country. + </p> + <p> + “Now pray don’t be shocked,” said Mrs. Delany comfortably; “but you two + young people may go up to the monastery, and I shall stay here. I am + dreadfully ashamed of myself, but the sight of that hill is enough for me. + Don’t hurry. I may have a little doze, and be all the better company when + you get back. No, don’t try to persuade me, Mr. Clifden. It isn’t the part + of a friend.” + </p> + <p> + I cannot say I was sorry, though I had a moment of panic when Vanna + offered to stay with her—very much, too, as if she really meant it. + So we set out perforce, Vanna leading steadily, as if she knew the way. + She never looked up, and her wish for silence was so evident, that I + followed, lending my hand mutely when the difficulties obliged it, she + accepting absently, and as if her thoughts were far away. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly she quickened her pace. We had climbed about nine hundred feet, + and now the narrow track twisted through the rocks—a track that + looked as age-worn as no doubt it was. We threaded it, and struggled over + the ridge, and looked down victorious on the other side. + </p> + <p> + There she stopped. A very wonderful sight, of which I had never seen the + like, lay below us. Rock and waste and towering crags, and the mighty ruin + of the monastery set in the fangs of the mountain like a robber baron’s + castle, looking far away to the blue mountains of the Debatable Land—the + land of mystery and danger. It stood there—the great ruin of a vast + habitation of men. Building after building, mysterious and broken, + corridors, halls, refectories, cells; the dwelling of a faith so alien + that I could not reconstruct the life that gave it being. And all sinking + gently into ruin that in a century more would confound it with the roots + of the mountains. + </p> + <p> + Grey and wonderful, it clung to the heights and looked with eyeless + windows at the past. Somehow I found it infinitely pathetic; the very + faith it expressed is dead in India, and none left so poor to do it + reverence. + </p> + <p> + But Vanna knew her way. Unerringly she led me from point to point, and she + was visibly at home in the intricacies. Such knowledge in a young woman + bewildered me. Could she have studied the plans in the Museum? How else + should she know where the abbot lived, or where the refractory brothers + were punished? + </p> + <p> + Once I missed her, while I stooped to examine some scroll-work, and + following, found her before one of the few images of the Buddha that the + rapacious Museum had spared—a singularly beautiful bas-relief, the + hand raised to enforce the truth the calm lips were speaking, the drapery + falling in stately folds to the bare feet. As I came up, she had an air as + if she had just ceased from movement, and I had a distinct feeling that + she had knelt before it—I saw the look of worship! The thing + troubled me like a dream, haunting, impossible, but real. + </p> + <p> + “How beautiful!” I said in spite of myself, as she pointed to the image. + “In this utter solitude it seems the very spirit of the place.” + </p> + <p> + “He was. He is,” said Vanna. + </p> + <p> + “Explain to me. I don’t understand. I know so little of him. What is the + subject?” + </p> + <p> + She hesitated; then chose her words as if for a beginner;—“It is the + Blessed One preaching to the Tree-Spirits. See how eagerly they lean from + the boughs to listen. This other relief represents him in the state of + mystic vision. Here he is drowned in peace. See how it overflows from the + closed eyes; the closed lips. The air is filled with his quiet.” + </p> + <p> + “What is he dreaming?” + </p> + <p> + “Not dreaming—seeing. Peace. He sits at the point where time and + infinity meet. To attain that vision was the aim of the monks who lived + here.” + </p> + <p> + “Did they attain?” I found myself speaking as if she could certainly + answer. + </p> + <p> + “A few. There was one, Vasettha, the Brahman, a young man who had + renounced all his possessions and riches, and seated here before this + image of the Blessed One, he fell often into the mystic state. He had a + strange vision at one time of the future of India, which will surely be + fulfilled. He did not forget it in his rebirths. He remembers-” + </p> + <p> + She broke off suddenly and said with forced indifference,—“He would + sit here often looking out over the mountains; the monks sat at his feet + to hear. He became abbot while still young. But his story is a sad one.” + </p> + <p> + “I entreat you to tell me.” + </p> + <p> + She looked away over the mountains. “While he was abbot here,—still + a young man,—a famous Chinese Pilgrim came down through Kashmir to + visit the Holy Places in India. The abbot went forward with him to + Peshawar, that he might make him welcome. And there came a dancer to + Peshawar, named Lilavanti, most beautiful! I dare not tell you her beauty. + I tremble now to think-” + </p> + <p> + Again she paused, and again the faint creeping sense of mystery invaded + me. + </p> + <p> + She resumed;— + </p> + <p> + “The abbot saw her and he loved her. He was young still, you remember. She + was a woman of the Hindu faith and hated Buddhism. It swept him down into + the lower worlds of storm and desire. He fled with Lilavanti and never + returned here. So in his rebirth he fell-” + </p> + <p> + She stopped dead; her face pale as death. + </p> + <p> + “How do you know? Where have you read it? If I could only find what you + find and know what you know! The East is like an open book to you. Tell me + the rest.” + </p> + <p> + “How should I know any more?” she said hurriedly. “We must be going back. + You should study the plans of this place at Peshawar. They were very + learned monks who lived here. It is famous for learning.” + </p> + <p> + The life had gone out of her words-out of the ruins. There was no more to + be said. + </p> + <p> + We clambered down the hill in the hot sunshine, speaking only of the view, + the strange shrubs and flowers, and, once, the swift gliding of a snake, + and found Mrs. Delany blissfully asleep in the most padded corner of the + car. The spirit of the East vanished in her comfortable presence, and + luncheon seemed the only matter of moment. + </p> + <p> + “I wonder, my dears,” she said, “if you would be very disappointed and + think me very dense if I proposed our giving up the Malakhand Fort? The + driver has been giving me in very poor English such an account of the + dangers of that awful road up the hill that I feel no Fort would repay me + for its terrors. Do say what you feel, Miss Loring. Mr. Clifden can lunch + with the officers at Nowshera and come any time. I know I am an atrocity.” + </p> + <p> + There could be only one answer, though Vanna and I knew perfectly well the + crafty design of the driver to spare himself work. Mrs. Delany remained + brightly awake for the run home, and favored us with many remarkable views + on India and its shortcomings, Vanna, who had a sincere liking for her, + laughing with delight at her description of a visit of condolence with + Lady Meryon to the five widows of one of the hill Rajas. + </p> + <p> + But I own I was pre-occupied. I knew those moments at the monastery had + given me a glimpse into the wonderland of her soul that made me long for + more. It was rapidly becoming clear to me that unless my intentions + developed on very different lines I must flee Peshawar. For love is born + of sympathy, and sympathy was strengthening daily, but for love I had no + courage yet. + </p> + <p> + I feared it as men fear the unknown. I despised myself—but I feared. + I will confess my egregious folly and vanity—I had no doubt as to + her reception of my offer if I should make it, but possessed by a colossal + selfishness, I thought only of myself, and from that point of view could + not decide how I stood to lose or gain. In my wildest accesses of vanity I + did not suppose Vanna loved me, but I felt she liked me, and I believe the + advantages I had to offer would be overwhelming to a woman in her + position. So, tossed on the waves of indecision, I inclined to flight. + </p> + <p> + That night I resolutely began my packing, and wrote a note of farewell to + Lady Meryon. The next morning I furiously undid it, and destroyed the + note. And that afternoon I took the shortest way to the sun-set road to + lounge about and wait for Vanna and Winifred. She never came, and I was as + unreasonably angry as if I had deserved the blessing of her presence. + </p> + <p> + Next day I could see that she tried gently hut clearly to discourage our + meeting and for three days I never saw her at all. Yet I knew that in her + solitary life our talks counted for a pleasure, and when we met again I + thought I saw a new softness in the lovely hazel deeps of her eyes. + </p> + <p> + III + </p> + <p> + On the day when things became clear to me, I was walking towards the + Meryons’ gates when I met her coming alone along the sunset road, in the + late gold of the afternoon. She looked pale and a little wearied, and I + remembered I wished I did not know every change of her face as I did. It + was a symptom that alarmed my selfishness—it galled me with the + sense that I was no longer my own despot. + </p> + <p> + “So you have been up the Khyber Pass,” she said as I fell into step at her + side. “Tell me—was it as wonderful as you expected?” + </p> + <p> + “No, no,—you tell me! It will give me what I missed. Begin at the + beginning. Tell me what I saw.” + </p> + <p> + I could not miss the delight of her words, and she laughed, knowing my + whim. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, that Pass!—the wonder of those old roads that have borne the + traffic and romance of the world for ages. Do you think there is anything + in the world so fascinating as they are? But did you go on Tuesday or + Friday?” + </p> + <p> + For these are the only days in the week when the Khyber can be safely + entered. The British then turn out the Khyber Rifles and man every crag, + and the loaded caravans move like a tide, and go up and down the narrow + road on their occasions. + </p> + <p> + Naturally mere sightseers are not welcomed, for much business must be got + through in that urgent forty eight hours in which life is not risked in + entering. + </p> + <p> + “Tuesday. But make a picture for me.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, you gave your word not to photograph or sketch—as if one + wanted to when every bit of it is stamped on one’s brain! And you went up + to Jumrood Fort at the entrance. Did they tell you it is an old Sikh Fort + and has been on duty in that turbulent place for five hundred years And + did you see the machine guns in the court? And every one armed—even + the boys with belts of cartridges? Then you went up the narrow winding + track between the mountains, and you said to yourself, ‘This is the road + of pure romance. It goes up to silken Samarkhand, and I can ride to + Bokhara of the beautiful women and to all the dreams. Am I alive and is it + real?’ You felt that?” + </p> + <p> + “All. Every bit. Go on!” + </p> + <p> + She smiled with pleasure. + </p> + <p> + “And you saw the little forts on the crags and the men on guard all along + the bills, rifles ready! You could hear the guns rattle as they saluted. + Do you know that up there men plough with rifles loaded beside them? They + have to be men indeed.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you mean to imply that we are not men?” + </p> + <p> + “Different men at least. This is life in a Border ballad. Such a life as + you knew in France but beautiful in a wild—hawk sort of way. Don’t + the Khyber Rifles bewilder you? They are drawn from these very Hill + tribes, and will shoot their own fathers and brothers in the way of duty + as comfortably as if they were jackals. Once there was a scrap here and + one of the tribesmen sniped our men unbearably. What do you suppose + happened? A Khyber Rifle came to the Colonel and said, ‘Let me put an end + to him, Colonel Sahib. I know exactly where he sits. He is my + grandfather.’ And he did it!” + </p> + <p> + “The bond of bread and salt?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, and discipline. I’m sometimes half frightened of discipline. It + moulds a man like wax. Even God doesn’t do that. Well—then you had + the traders—wild shaggy men in sheepskin and women in massive + jewelry of silver and turquoise,-great earrings, heavy bracelets loading + their arms, wild, fierce, handsome. And the camels—thousands of + them, some going up, some coming down, a mass of human and animal life. + Above you, moving figures against the keen blue sky, or deep below you in + the ravines. + </p> + <p> + “The camels were swaying along with huge bales of goods, and dark + beautiful women in wicker cages perched on them. Silks and carpets from + Bokhara, and blue—eyed Persian cats, and bluer Persian turquoises. + Wonderful! And the dust, gilded by the sunshine, makes a vaporous golden + atmosphere for it all.” + </p> + <p> + “What was the most wonderful thing you saw there?” + </p> + <p> + “The most beautiful, I think, was a man—a splendid dark ruffian + lounging along. He wanted to show off, and his swagger was perfect. Long + black onyx eyes and a tumble of black curls, and teeth like almonds. But + what do you think he carried on his wrist—a hawk with fierce yellow + eyes, ringed and chained. Hawking is a favourite sport in the hills. Oh, + why doesn’t some great painter come and paint it all before they take to + trains and cars? I long to see it all again, but I never shall.” + </p> + <p> + “Why not,” said I. “Surely Sir John can get you up there any day?” + </p> + <p> + “Not now. The fighting makes it difficult. But it isn’t that. I am + leaving.” + </p> + <p> + “Leaving?” My heart gave a leap. “Why? Where?” + </p> + <p> + “Leaving Lady Meryon.” + </p> + <p> + “Why—for Heaven’s sake?” + </p> + <p> + “I had rather not tell you.” + </p> + <p> + “But I must know.” + </p> + <p> + “You cannot.” + </p> + <p> + “I shall ask Lady Meryon.” + </p> + <p> + “I forbid you.” + </p> + <p> + And then the unexpected happened, and an unbearable impulse swept me into + folly—or was it wisdom? + </p> + <p> + “Listen to me. I would not have said it yet, but this settles it. I want + you to marry me. I want it atrociously!” + </p> + <p> + It was a strange word. What I felt for her at that moment was difficult to + describe. I endured it like a pain that could only be assuaged by her + presence, but I endured it angrily. We were walking on the sunset road—very + deserted and quiet at the time. The place was propitious if nothing else + was. + </p> + <p> + She looked at me in transparent astonishment; + </p> + <p> + “Mr. Clifden, are you dreaming? You can’t mean what you say.” + </p> + <p> + “Why can’t I? I do. I want you. You have the key of all I care for. I + think of the world without you and find it tasteless.” + </p> + <p> + “Surely you have all the world can give? What do you want more?” + </p> + <p> + “The power to enjoy it—to understand it. You have got that—I + haven’t. I want you always with me to interpret, like a guide to a blind + fellow. I am no better.” + </p> + <p> + “Say like a dog, at once!” she interrupted. “At least you are frank enough + to put it on that ground. You have not said you love me. You could not say + it.” + </p> + <p> + “I don’t know whether I do or not. I know nothing about love. I want you. + Indescribably. Perhaps that is love—is it? I never wanted any one + before. I have tried to get away and I can’t.” + </p> + <p> + I was brutally frank, you see. She compelled my very thoughts. + </p> + <p> + “Why have you tried?” + </p> + <p> + “Because every man likes freedom. But I like you better.” “I can tell you + the reason,” she said in her gentle unwavering voice. “I am Lady Meryon’s + governess, and an undesirable. You have felt that?” + </p> + <p> + “Don’t make me out such a snob. No—yes. You force me into honesty. I + did feel it at first like the miserable fool I am, but I could kick myself + when I think of that now. It is utterly forgotten. Take me and make me + what you will, and forgive me. Only tell me your secret of joy. How is it + you understand everything alive or dead? I want to live—to see, to + know.” + </p> + <p> + It was a rhapsody like a boy’s. Yet at the moment I was not even ashamed + of it, so sharp was my need. + </p> + <p> + “I think,” she said, slowly, looking straight before her, “that I had + better be quite frank. I don’t love you. I don’t know what love means in + the Western sense. It has a very different meaning for me. Your voice + comes to me from an immense distance when you speak in that way. You want + me—but never with a thought of what I might want. Is that love? I + like you very deeply as a friend, but we are of different races. There is + a gulf.” + </p> + <p> + “A gulf? You are English.” + </p> + <p> + “By birth, yes. In mind, no. And there are things that go deeper, that you + could not understand. So I refuse quite definitely, and our ways part + here, for in a few days I go. I shall not see you again, but I wish to say + good-bye.” + </p> + <p> + The bitterest chagrin was working in my soul. I felt as if all were + deserting me-a sickening feeling of loneliness. I did not know the man who + was in me, and was a stranger to myself. + </p> + <p> + “I entreat you to tell me why, and where.” + </p> + <p> + “Since you have made me this offer, I will tell you why. Lady Meryon + objected to my friendship with you, and objected in a way which-” + </p> + <p> + She stopped, flushing palely. I caught her hand. + </p> + <p> + “That settles it!-that she should have dared! I’ll go up this minute and + tell her we are engaged. Vanna-Vanna!” + </p> + <p> + For she disengaged her hand, quietly but firmly. + </p> + <p> + “On no account. How can I make it more plain to you? I should have gone + soon in any case. My place is in the native city—that is the life I + want. I have work there, I knew it before I came out. My sympathies are + all with them. They know what life is—why even the beggars, poorer + than poor, are perfectly happy, basking in the great generous sun. Oh, the + splendour and riot of life and colour! That’s my life—I sicken of + this.” + </p> + <p> + “But I’ll give it to you. Marry me, and we will travel till you’re tired + of it.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, and look on as at a play—sitting in the stalls, and applauding + when we are pleased. No, I’m going to work there.” “For God’s sake, how? + Let me come too.” + </p> + <p> + “You can’t. You’re not in it. I am going to attach myself to the medical + mission at Lahore and learn nursing, and then I shall go to my own + people.” + </p> + <p> + “Missionaries? You’ve nothing in common with them?” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing. But they teach what I want. Mr. Clifden, I shall not come this + way again. If I remember—I’ll write to you, and tell you what the + real world is like.” + </p> + <p> + She smiled, the absorbed little smile I knew and feared. I saw pleading + was useless then. I would wait, and never lose sight of her and of hope. + </p> + <p> + “Vanna, before you go, give me your gift of sight. Interpret for me. Stay + with me a little and make me see.” + </p> + <p> + “What do you mean exactly?” she asked in her gentlest voice, half turning + to me. + </p> + <p> + “Make one journey with me, as my sister, if you will do no more. Though I + warn you that all the time I shall be trying to win my wife. But come with + me once, and after that—if you will go, you must. Say yes.” + </p> + <p> + Madness! But she hesitated—a hesitation full of hope, and looked at + me with intent eyes. + </p> + <p> + “I will tell you frankly,” she said at last, “that I know my knowledge of + the East and kinship with it goes far beyond mere words. In my case the + doors were not shut. I believe—I know that long ago this was my + life. If I spoke for ever I could not make you understand how much I know + and why. So I shall quite certainly go back to it. Nothing—you least + of all, can hold me. But you are my friend—that is a true bond. And + if you would wish me to give you two months before I go, I might do that + if it would in any way help you. As your friend only—you clearly + understand. You would not reproach me afterwards when I left you, as I + should most certainly do?” + </p> + <p> + “I swear I would not. I swear I would protect you even from myself. I want + you for ever, but if you will only give me two months—come! But have + you thought that people will talk. It may injure you. I’m not worth that, + God knows. And you will take nothing I could give you in return.” + </p> + <p> + She spoke very quietly. + </p> + <p> + “That does not trouble me.—It would only trouble me if you asked + what I have not to give. For two months I would travel with you as a + friend, if, like a friend, I paid my own expenses-” + </p> + <p> + I would have interrupted, but she brushed that firmly aside. “No, I must + do as I say, and I am quite able to or I should not suggest it. I would go + on no other terms. It would be hard if because we are man and woman I + might not do one act of friendship for you before we part. For though I + refuse your offer utterly, I appreciate it, and I would make what little + return I can. It would be a sharp pain to me to distress you.” + </p> + <p> + Her gentleness and calm, the magnitude of the offer she was making stunned + me so that I could scarcely speak. There was such an extraordinary + simplicity and generosity in her manner that it appeared to me more + enthralling and bewildering than the most finished coquetry I had ever + known. She gave me opportunities that the most ardent lover could in his + wildest dream desire, and with the remoteness in her eyes and her still + voice she deprived them of all hope. It kindled in me a flame that made my + throat dry when I tried to speak. + </p> + <p> + “Vanna, is it a promise? You mean it?” + </p> + <p> + “If you wish it, yes. But I warn you I think it will not make it easier + for you when the time is over. + </p> + <p> + “Why two months?” + </p> + <p> + “Partly because I can afford no more. No! I know what you would say. + Partly because I can spare no more time. But I will give you that, if you + wish, though, honestly, I had very much rather not. I think it unwise for + you. I would protect you if I could—indeed I would!” + </p> + <p> + It was my turn to hesitate now. Every moment revealed to me some new + sweetness, some charm that I saw would weave itself into the very fibre of + my I had been! Was I not now a fool? Would it not being if the opportunity + were given. Oh, fool that be better to let her go before she had become a + part of my daily experience? I began to fear I was courting my own + shipwreck. She read my thoughts clearly. + </p> + <p> + “Indeed you would be wise to decide against it. Release me from my + promise. It was a mad scheme.” + </p> + <p> + The superiority—or so I felt it—of her gentleness maddened me. + It might have been I who needed protection, who was running the risk of + misjudgment—not she, a lonely woman. She looked at me, waiting—trying + to be wise for me, never for one instant thinking of herself. I felt + utterly exiled from the real purpose of her life. + </p> + <p> + “I will never release you. I claim your promise. I hold to it.” + </p> + <p> + “Very well then—I will write, and tell you where I shall be. + Good-bye, and if you change your mind, as I hope you will, tell me.” + </p> + <p> + She extended her hand cool as a snowflake, and was gone, walking swiftly + up the road. Ah, let a man beware when his wishes fulfilled, rain down + upon him! + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> +To what had I committed myself? She knew her strength and had no fears. +I could scarcely realize that she had liking enough for me to make the +offer. That it meant no shade more than she had said I knew well. She +was safe, but what was to be the result for me? I knew nothing—she was +a beloved mystery. + + “Strange she is and secret, Strange her eyes; her cheeks are +cold as cold sea-shells.” + </pre> + <p> + Yet I would risk it, for I knew there was no hope if I let her go now, and + if I saw her again, some glimmer might fall upon my dark. + </p> + <p> + Next day this reached me:—Dear Mr. Clifden,— + </p> + <p> + I am going to some Indian friends for a time. On the 15th of June I shall + be at Srinagar in Kashmir. A friend has allowed me to take her little + houseboat, the “Kedarnath.” If you like this plan we will share the cost + for two months. I warn you it is not luxurious, but I think you will like + it. I shall do this whether you come or no, for I want a quiet time before + I take up my nursing in Lahore. In thinking of all this will you remember + that I am not a girl but a woman. I shall be twenty-nine my next birthday. + Sincerely yours, VANNA LORING. + </p> + <p> + P.S. But I still think you would be wiser not to come. I hope to hear you + will not. + </p> + <p> + I replied only this:—Dear Miss Loring,—I think I understand + the position fully. I will be there. I thank you with all my heart. + Gratefully yours, STEPHEN CLIFDEN. + </p> + <p> + IV + </p> + <p> + Three days later I met Lady Meryon, and was swept in to tea. Her manner + was distinctly more cordial as she mentioned casually that Vanna had left—she + understood to take up missionary work—“which is odd,” she added with + a woman’s acrimony, “for she had no more in common with missionaries than + I have, and that is saying a good deal. Of course she speaks Hindustani + perfectly, and could be useful, but I haven’t grasped the point of it + yet.” I saw she counted on my knowing nothing of the real reason of + Vanna’s going and left it, of course, at that. The talk drifted away under + my guidance. Vanna evidently puzzled her. She half feared, and wholly + misunderstood her. + </p> + <p> + No message came to me, as time went by, and for the time she had vanished + completely, but I held fast to her promise and lived on that only. + </p> + <p> + I take up my life where it ceased to be a mere suspense and became life + once more. + </p> + <p> + On the 15th of June, I found myself riding into Srinagar in Kashmir, + through the pure tremulous green of the mighty poplars that hedge the road + into the city. The beauty of the country had half stunned me when I + entered the mountain barrier of Baramula and saw the snowy peaks that + guard the Happy Valley, with the Jhelum flowing through its tranquil + loveliness. The flush of the almond blossom was over, but the iris, like a + blue sea of peace had overflowed the world—the azure meadows smiled + back at the radiant sky. Such blossom! the blue shading into clear violet, + like a shoaling sea. The earth, like a cup held in the hand of a god, + brimmed with the draught of youth and summer and—love? But no, for + me the very word was sinister. Vanna’s face, immutably calm, confronted + it. + </p> + <p> + That night I slept in a boat at Sopor, and I remember that, waking at + midnight, I looked out and saw a mountain with a gloriole of hazy silver + about it, misty and faint as a cobweb threaded with dew. The river, there + spreading into a lake, was dark under it, flowing in a deep smooth + blackness of shadow, and everything awaited—what? And even while I + looked, the moon floated serenely above the peak, and all was bathed in + pure light, the water rippling and shining in broken silver and pearl. So + had Vanna floated into my sky, luminous, sweet, remote. I did not question + my heart any more. I knew I loved her. + </p> + <p> + Two days later I rode into Srinagar, and could scarcely see the wild + beauty of that strange Venice of the East, my heart was so beating in my + eyes. I rode past the lovely wooden bridges where the balconied houses + totter to each other across the canals in dim splendour of carving and + age; where the many-coloured native life crowds down to the river steps + and cleanses its flower-bright robes, its gold-bright brass vessels in the + shining stream, and my heart said only—Vanna, Vanna! + </p> + <p> + One day, one thought, of her absence had taught me what she was to me, and + if humility and patient endeavor could raise me to her feet, I was + resolved that I would spend my life in labor and think it well spent. + </p> + <p> + My servant dismounted and led his horse, asking from every one where the + “Kedarnath” could be found, and eager black eyes sparkled and two little + bronze images detached themselves from the crowd of boys, and ran, fleet + as fauns, before us. + </p> + <p> + Above the last bridge the Jhelum broadens out into a stately river, + controlled at one side by the banked walk known as the Bund, with the Club + House upon it and the line of houseboats beneath. Here the visitors + flutter up and down and exchange the gossip, the bridge appointments, the + little dinners that sit so incongruously on the pure Orient that is + Kashmir. + </p> + <p> + She would not be here. My heart told me that, and sure enough the boys + were leading across the bridge and by a quiet shady way to one of the many + backwaters that the great river makes in the enchanting city. There is one + waterway stretching on afar to the Dal Lake. It looks like a river—it + is the very haunt of peace. Under those mighty chenar, or plane trees, + that are the glory of Kashmir, clouding the water with deep green shadows, + the sun can scarcely pierce, save in a dipping sparkle here and there to + intensify the green gloom. The murmur of the city, the chatter of the + club, are hundreds of miles away. We rode downward under the towering + trees, and dismounting, saw a little houseboat tethered to the bank. It + was not of the richer sort that haunts the Bund, where the native servants + follow in a separate boat, and even the electric light is turned on as + part of the luxury. This was a long low craft, very broad, thatched like a + country cottage afloat. In the forepart lived the native owner, and his + family, their crew, our cooks and servants; for they played many parts in + our service. And in the afterpart, room for a life, a dream, the joy or + curse & many days to be. + </p> + <p> + But then, I saw only one thing—Vanna sat under the trees, reading, + or looking at the cool dim watery vista, with a single boat, loaded to the + river’s edge with melons and scarlet tomatoes, punting lazily down to + Srinagar in the sleepy afternoon. + </p> + <p> + She was dressed in white with a shady hat, and her delicate dark face + seemed to glow in the shadow like the heart of a pale rose. For the first + time I knew she was beautiful. Beauty shone in her like the flame in an + alabaster lamp, serene, diffused in the very air about her, so that to me + she moved in a mild radiance. She rose to meet me with both hands + outstretched—the kindest, most cordial welcome. Not an eyelash + flickered, not a trace of self-consciousness. If I could have seen her + flush or tremble—but no—her eyes were clear and calm as a + forest pool. So I remembered her. So I saw her once more. + </p> + <p> + I tried, with a hopeless pretence, to follow her example and hide what I + felt, where she had nothing to hide. + </p> + <p> + “What a place you have found. Why, it’s like the deep heart of a wood!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I saw it once when I was here with the Meryons. But we lay at the + Bund then—just under the Club. This is better. Did you like the ride + up?” + </p> + <p> + I threw myself on the grass beside her with a feeling of perfect rest. + </p> + <p> + “It was like a new heaven and a new earth. What a country!” + </p> + <p> + The very spirit of Quiet seemed to be drowsing in those branches towering + up into the blue, dipping their green fingers into the crystal of the + water. What a heaven! + </p> + <p> + “Now you shall have your tea and then I will show you your rooms,” she + said, smiling at my delight. “We shall stay here a few days more that you + may see Srinagar, and then they tow us up into the Dal Lake opposite the + Gardens of the Mogul Emperors. And if you think this beautiful what will + you say then?” + </p> + <p> + I shut my eyes and see still that first meal of my new life. The little + table that Pir Baksh, breathing full East in his jade-green turban, set + before her, with its cloth worked in a pattern of the chenar leaves that + are the symbol of Kashmir; the brown cakes made by Ahmad Khan in a + miraculous kitchen of his own invention—a few holes burrowed in the + river bank, a smoldering fire beneath them, and a width of canvas for a + roof. But it served, and no more need be asked of luxury. And Vanna, + making it mysteriously the first home I ever had known, the central joy of + it all. Oh, wonderful days of life that breathe the spirit of immortality + and pass so quickly—surely they must be treasured somewhere in + Eternity that we may look upon their beloved light once more. + </p> + <p> + “Now you must see the boat. The Kedarnath is not a Dreadnought, but she is + broad and very comfortable. And we have many chaperons. They all live in + the bows, and exist simply to protect the Sahiblog from all discomfort, + and very well they do it. That is Ahmad Khan by the kitchen. He cooks for + us. Salama owns the boat, and steers her and engages the men to tow us + when we move. And when I arrived he aired a little English and said + piously; The Lord help me to give you no trouble, and the Lord help you! + That is his wife sitting on the bank. She speaks little but Kashmiri, but + I know a little of that. Look at the hundred rat-tail plaits of her hair, + lengthened with wool, and see her silver and turquoise jewelry. She wears + much of the family fortune and is quite a walking bank. Salama, Ahmad Khan + and I talk by the hour. Ahmad comes from Fyzabad. Look at Salama’s boy—I + call him the Orange Imp. Did you ever see anything so beautiful?” + </p> + <p> + I looked in sheer delight, and grasped my camera. Sitting near us was a + lovely little Kashmiri boy of about eight, in a faded orange coat, and a + turban exactly like his father’s. His curled black eyelashes were so long + that they made a soft gloom over the upper part of the little golden face. + The perfect bow of the scarlet lips, the long eyes, the shy smile, + suggested an Indian Eros. He sat dipping his feet in the water with little + pigeon-like cries of content. + </p> + <p> + “He paddles at the bow of our little shikara boat with a paddle exactly + like a water-lily leaf. Do you like our friends? I love them already, and + know all their affairs. And now for the boat.” + </p> + <p> + “One moment—If we are friends on a great adventure, I must call you + Vanna, and you me Stephen.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I suppose that is part of it,” she said, smiling. “Come, Stephen.” + </p> + <p> + It was like music, but a cold music that chilled me. She should have + hesitated, should have flushed—it was I who trembled. So I followed + her across the broad plank into our new home. + </p> + <p> + “This is our sitting-room. Look, how charming!” + </p> + <p> + It was better than charming; it was home indeed. Windows at each side + opening down almost to the water, a little table for meals that lived + mostly on the bank, with a grey pot of iris in the middle. Another table + for writing, photography, and all the little pursuits of travel. A + bookshelf with some well—worn friends. Two long cushioned chairs. + Two for meals, and a Bokhara rug, soft and pleasant for the feet. The + interior was plain unpainted wood, but set so that the grain showed like + satin in the rippling lights from the water. + </p> + <p> + That is the inventory of the place I have loved best in the world, but + what eloquence can describe what it gave me, what its memory gives me to + this day? And I have no eloquence—what I felt leaves me dumb. + </p> + <p> + “It is perfect,” was all I said as she waved her hand proudly. “It is + home.” + </p> + <p> + “And if you had come alone to Kashmir you would have had a great rich boat + with electric light and a butler. You would never have seen the people + except at meal—times. I think you will like this better. Well, this + is your tiny bedroom, and your bathroom, and beyond the sitting—room + are mine. Do you like it all?” + </p> + <p> + But I could say no more. The charm of her own personality had touched + everything and left its fragrance like a flower—breath in the air. I + was beggared of thanks, but my whole soul was gratitude. We dined on the + bank that evening, the lamp burning steadily in the still air and throwing + broken reflections in the water, while the moon looked in upon them + through the leaves. I felt extraordinarily young and happy. + </p> + <p> + The quiet of her voice was soft as the little lap of water against the + bows of the boat, and Kahdra, the Orange Imp, was singing a little + wordless song to himself as he washed the plates beside us. It was a + simple meal, and Vanna, abstemious as a hermit never ate anything but rice + and fruit, but I could remember no meal in all my days of luxury where I + had eaten with such zest. + </p> + <p> + “It looks very grand to have so many to wait upon us, doesn’t it? But this + is one of the cheapest countries in the world though the old timers mourn + over present expenses. You will laugh when I show you your share of the + cost.” + </p> + <p> + “The wealth of the world could not buy this,” I said, and was silent. + </p> + <p> + “But you must listen to my plans. We must do a little camping the last + three weeks before we part. Up in the mountains. Are they not marvellous? + They stand like a rampart round us, but not cold and terrible, but “Like + as the hills stand round about Jerusalem”—they are guardian + presences. And running up into them, high-very high, are the valleys and + hills where we shall camp. Tomorrow we shall row through Srinagar, by the + old Maharaja’s palace.” + </p> + <p> + V + </p> + <p> + And so began a life of sheer enchantment. We knew no one. The visitors in + Kashmir change nearly every season, and no one cared-no one asked anything + of us, and as for our shipmates, a willing affectionate service was their + gift, and no more. Looking back, I know in what a wonder-world I was + privileged to live. Vanna could talk with them all. She did not move + apart, a condescending or indifferent foreigner. Kahdra would come to her + knee and prattle to her of the great snake that lived up on Mahadeo to + devour erring boys who omitted their prayers at proper Moslem intervals. + She would sit with the baby in her lap while the mother busied herself in + the sunny bows with the mysterious dishes that smelt so savory to a hungry + man. The cuts, the bruises of the neighbourhood all came to Vanna for + treatment. + </p> + <p> + “I am graduating as a nurse,” she would say laughing as she bent over the + lean arm of some weirdly wrinkled old lady, bandaging and soothing at the + same moment. Her reward would be some bit of folk-lore, some quaintness of + gratitude that I noted down in the little book I kept for remembrance—that + I do not need, for every word is in my heart. + </p> + <p> + We rowed down through the city next day—Salama rowing, and little + Kahdra lazily paddling at the bow—a wonderful city, with its narrow + ways begrimed with the dirt of ages, and its balconied houses looking as + if disease and sin had soaked into them and given them a vicious tottering + beauty, horrible and yet lovely too. We saw the swarming life of the + bazaar, the white turbans coming and going, diversified by the rose and + yellow Hindu turbans, and the caste-marks, orange and red, on the dark + brows. + </p> + <p> + I saw two women—girls—painted and tired like Jezebel, looking + out of one window carved and old, and the grey burnished doves flying + about it. They leaned indolently, like all the old, old wickedness of the + East that yet is ever young—“Flowers of Delight,” with smooth black + hair braided with gold and blossoms, and covered with pale rose veils, and + gold embossed disks swinging like lamps beside the olive cheeks, the great + eyes artificially lengthened and darkened with soorma, and the curves of + the full lips emphasized with vermilion. They looked down on us with + apathy, a dull weariness that held all the old evil of the wicked humming + city. + </p> + <p> + It had taken shape in those indolent bodies and heavy eyes that could + flash into life as a snake wakes into fierce darting energy when the time + comes to spring—direct inheritrixes from Lilith, in the fittest + setting in the world—the almost exhausted vice of an Oriental city + as old as time. + </p> + <p> + “And look-below here,” said Vanna, pointing to one of the ghauts—long + rugged steps running down to the river. + </p> + <p> + “When I came yesterday, a great broken crowd was collected here, almost + shouldering each other into the water where a boat lay rocking. In it lay + the body of a man brutally murdered for the sake of a few rupees and flung + into the river. I could see the poor brown body stark in the boat with a + friend weeping beside it. On the lovely deodar bridge people leaned over, + watching with a grim open-mouthed curiosity, and business went on gaily + where the jewelers make the silver bangles for slender wrists, and the + rows of silver chains that make the necks like ‘the Tower of Damascus + builded for an armory.’ It was all very wild and cruel. I went down to + them-” + </p> + <p> + “Vanna—you went down? Horrible!” + </p> + <p> + “No, you see I heard them say the wife was almost a child and needs help. + So I went. Once long ago at Peshawar I saw the same thing happen, and they + came and took the child for the service of the gods, for she was most + lovely, and she clung to the feet of a man in terror, and the priest + stabbed her to the heart. She died in my arms. + </p> + <p> + “Good God!” I said, shuddering; “what a sight for you! Did they never hang + him?” + </p> + <p> + “He was not punished. I told you it was a very long time ago. Her + expression had a brooding quiet as she looked down into the running river, + almost it might be as if she saw the picture of that past misery in the + deep water. She said no more. But in her words and the terrible crowding + of its life, Srinagar seemed to me more of a nightmare than anything I had + seen, excepting only Benares; for the holy Benares is a memory of horror, + with a sense of blood hidden under its frantic crazy devotion, and not far + hidden either. + </p> + <p> + “Our own green shade, when we pulled back to it in the evening cool, was a + refuge of unspeakable quiet. She read aloud to me that evening by the + small light of our lamp beneath the trees, and, singularly, she read of + joy. + </p> + <p> + “I have drunk of the Cup of the Ineffable, I have found the key of the + Mystery, Travelling by no track I have come to the Sorrowless Land; very + easily has the mercy of the great Lord come upon me. Wonderful is that + Land of rest to which no merit can win. There have I seen joy filled to + the brim, perfection of joy. He dances in rapture and waves of form arise + from His dance. He holds all within his bliss.” + </p> + <p> + “What is that?” + </p> + <p> + “It is from the songs of the great Indian mystic—Kabir. Let me read + you more. It is like the singing of a lark, lost in the infinite of light + and heaven.” + </p> + <p> + So in the soft darkness I heard for the first time those immortal words; + and hearing, a faint glimmer of understanding broke upon me as to the + source of the peace that surrounded her. I had accepted it as an emanation + of her own heart when it was the pulsing of the tide of the Divine. She + read, choosing a verse here and there, and I listened with absorption. + </p> + <p> + Suppose I had been wrong in believing that sorrow is the keynote of life; + that pain is the road of ascent, if road there be; that an implacable + Nature and that only, presides over all our pitiful struggles and seekings + and writes a black “Finis” to the holograph of our existence? + </p> + <p> + What then? What was she teaching me? Was she the Interpreter of a Beauty + eternal in the heavens, and reflected like a broken prism in the beauty + that walked visible beside me? So I listened like a child to an unknown + language, yet ventured my protest. + </p> + <p> + “In India, in this wonderful country where men have time and will for + speculation such thoughts may be natural. Can they be found in the West?” + </p> + <p> + “This is from the West—might not Kabir himself have said it? + Certainly he would have felt it. ‘Happy is he who seeks not to understand + the Mystery of God, but who, merging his spirit into Thine, sings to Thy + face, O Lord, like a harp, understanding how difficult it is to know—how + easy to love Thee.’ We debate and argue and the Vision passes us by. We + try to prove it, and kill it in the laboratory of our minds, when on the + altar of our souls it will dwell for ever.” + </p> + <p> + Silence—and I pondered. Finally she laid the book aside, and + repeated from memory and in a tone of perfect music; “Kabir says, ‘I shall + go to the House of my Lord with my Love at my side; then shall I sound the + trumpet of triumph.’” + </p> + <p> + And when she left me alone in the moonlight silence the old doubts came + back to me—the fear that I saw only through her eyes, and began to + believe in joy only because I loved her. I remember I wrote in the little + book I kept for my stray thoughts, these words which are not mine but + reflect my thought of her; “Thine is the skill of the Fairy Woman, and the + virtue of St. Bride, and the faith of Mary the Mild, and the gracious way + of the Greek woman, and the beauty of lovely Emer, and the tenderness of + heart-sweet Deirdre, and the courage of Maev the great Queen, and the + charm of Mouth-of-Music.” + </p> + <p> + Yes, all that and more, but I feared lest I should see the heaven of joy + through her eyes only and find it mirage as I had found so much else. + </p> + <p> + SECOND PART Early in the pure dawn the men came and our boat was towed up + into the Dal Lake through crystal waterways and flowery banks, the men on + the path keeping step and straining at the rope until the bronze muscles + stood out on their legs and backs, shouting strong rhythmic phrases to + mark the pull. + </p> + <p> + “They shout the Wondrous Names of God—as they are called,” said + Vanna when I asked. “They always do that for a timid effort. Bad shah! The + Lord, the Compassionate, and so on. I don’t think there is any religion + about it but it is as natural to them as One, Two, Three, to us. It gives + a tremendous lift. Watch and see.” + </p> + <p> + It was part of the delightful strangeness that we should move to that + strong music. We sat on the upper deck and watched the dream—like + beauty drift slowly by until we emerged beneath a little bridge into the + fairy land of the lake which the Mogul Emperors loved so well that they + made their noble pleasance gardens on the banks, and thought it little to + travel up yearly from far—off Delhi over the snowy Pir Panjal with + their Queens and courts for the perfect summer of Kashmir. + </p> + <p> + We moored by a low bank under a great wood of chenar trees, and saw the + little table in the wilderness set in the greenest shade with our chairs + beside it, and my pipe laid reverently upon it by Kahdra. + </p> + <p> + Across the glittering water lay on one side the Shalimar Garden known to + all readers of “Lalla Ruhk”—a paradise of roses; and beyond it again + the lovelier gardens of Nour-Mahal, the Light of the Palace, that imperial + woman who ruled India under the weak Emperor’s name—she whose name + he set thus upon his coins: + </p> + <p> + “By order of King Jehangir. Gold has a hundred splendours added to it by + receiving the name of Nour-Jahan the Queen.” + </p> + <p> + Has any woman ever had a more royal homage than this most royal lady—known + first as Mihr-u-nissa—Sun of Women, and later, Nour-Mahal, Light of + the Palace, and latest, Nour-Jahan-Begam, Queen, Light of the World? + </p> + <p> + Here in these gardens she had lived—had seen the snow mountains + change from the silver of dawn to the illimitable rose of sunset. The + life, the colour beat insistently upon my brain. They built a world of + magic where every moment was pure gold. Surely—surely to Vanna it + must be the same. I believed in my very soul that she who gave and shared + such joy could not be utterly apart from me? Could I then feel certain + that I had gained any ground in these days we had been together? Could she + still define the cruel limits she had laid down, or were her eyes kinder, + her tones a more broken music? I did not know. Whenever I could hazard a + guess the next minute baffled me. + </p> + <p> + Just then, in the sunset, she was sitting on deck, singing under her + breath and looking absently away to the Gardens across the Lake. I could + catch the words here and there, and knew them. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Pale hands I loved beside the Shalimar, + Where are you now—who lies beneath your spell? + Whom do you lead on Rapture’s roadway far, + Before you agonize them in farewell?” + </pre> + <p> + “Don’t!” I said abruptly. It stung me. + </p> + <p> + “What?” she asked in surprise. “That is the song every one remembers here. + Poor Laurence Hope! How she knew and loved this India! What are you + grumbling at?” + </p> + <p> + Her smile stung me. + </p> + <p> + “Never mind,” I said morosely. “You don’t understand. You never will.” + </p> + <p> + And yet I believed sometimes that she would—that time was on my + side. + </p> + <p> + When Kahdra and I pulled her across to Nour-Mahal’s garden next day, how + could I not believe it—her face was so full of joy as she looked at + me for sympathy? + </p> + <p> + “I don’t think so much beauty is crowded into any other few miles in the + world—beauty of association, history, nature, everything!” she said + with shining eyes. “The lotus flowers are not out yet but when they come + that is the last touch of perfection. Do you remember Homer—‘But + whoso ate of the honey-sweet fruit of the lotus, was neither willing to + bring me word again, nor to depart. Nay, their desire was to remain there + for ever, feeding on the lotus with the Lotus Eaters, forgetful of all + return.’ You know the people here eat the roots and seeds? I ate them last + year and perhaps that is why I cannot stay away. But look at Nour-Mahal’s + garden!” + </p> + <p> + We were pulling in among the reeds and the huge carven leaves of the water + plants, and the snake-headed buds lolling upon them with the slippery + half-sinister look that water-flowers have, as though their cold secret + life belonged to the hidden water world and not to ours. But now the boat + was touching the little wooden steps. + </p> + <p> + O beautiful—most beautiful the green lawns, shaded with huge + pyramids of the chenar trees, the terraced gardens where the marble steps + climbed from one to the other, and the mountain streams flashed singing + and shining down the carved marble slopes that cunning hands had made to + delight the Empress of Beauty, between the wildernesses of roses. Her + pavilion stands still among the flowers, and the waters ripple through it + to join the lake—and she is—where? Even in the glory of + sunshine the passing of all fair things was present with me as I saw the + empty shell that had held the Pearl of Empire, and her roses that still + bloom, her waters that still sing for others. + </p> + <p> + The spray of a hundred fountains was misty diamond dust in the warm air + laden with the scent of myriad flowers. Kahdra followed us everywhere, + singing his little tuneless happy song. The world brimmed with beauty and + joy. And we were together. Words broke from me. + </p> + <p> + “Vanna, let it be for ever! Let us live here. I’ll give up all the world + for this and you.” + </p> + <p> + “But you see,” she said delicately, “it would be ‘giving up.’ You use the + right word. It is not your life. It is a lovely holiday, no more. You + would weary of it. You would want the city life and your own kind.” + </p> + <p> + I protested with all my soul. + </p> + <p> + “No. Indeed I will say frankly that it would be lowering yourself to live + a lotus-eating life among my people. It is a life with which you have no + tie. A Westerner who lives like that steps down; he loses his birthright + just as an Oriental does who Europeanizes himself. He cannot live your + life nor you his. If you had work here it would be different. No—six + or eight weeks more; then go away and forget it.” + </p> + <p> + I turned from her. The serpent was in Paradise. When is he absent? + </p> + <p> + On one of the terraces a man was beating a tom-tom, and veiled women + listened, grouped about him in brilliant colours. + </p> + <p> + “Isn’t that all India?” she said; “that dull reiterated sound? It half + stupefies, half maddens. Once at Darjiling I saw the Lamas’ Devil Dance—the + soul, a white-faced child with eyes unnaturally enlarged, fleeing among a + rabble of devils—the evil passions. It fled wildly here and there + and every way was blocked. The child fell on its knees, screaming dumbly—you + could see the despair in the staring eyes, but all was drowned in the + thunder of Tibetan drums. No mercy—no escape. Horrible!” + </p> + <p> + “Even in Europe the drum is awful,” I said. “Do you remember in the French + Revolution how they Drowned the victims’ voices in a thunder roll of + drums?” + </p> + <p> + “I shall always see the face of the child, hunted down to hell, falling on + its knees, and screaming without a sound, when I hear the drum. But listen—a + flute! Now if that were the Flute of Krishna you would have to follow. Let + us come!” + </p> + <p> + I could hear nothing of it, but she insisted and we followed the music, + inaudible to me, up the slopes of the garden that is the foot-hill of the + mighty mountain of Mahadeo, and still I could hear nothing. And Vanna told + me strange stories of the Apollo of India whom all hearts must adore, even + as the herd-girls adored him in his golden youth by Jumna river and in the + pastures of Brindaban. + </p> + <p> + Next day we were climbing the hill to the ruins where the evil magician + brought the King’s daughter nightly to his will, flying low under a golden + moon. Vanna took my arm and I pulled her laughing up the steepest flowery + slopes until we reached the height, and lo! the arched windows were + eyeless and a lonely breeze blowing through the cloisters, and the + beautiful yellowish stone arches supported nothing and were but frames for + the blue of far lake and mountain and the divine sky. We climbed the + broken stairs where the lizards went by like flashes, and had I the tongue + of men and angels I could not tell the wonder that lay before us,—the + whole wide valley of Kashmir in summer glory, with its scented breeze + singing, singing above it. + </p> + <p> + We sat on the crushed aromatic herbs and among the wild roses and looked + down. + </p> + <p> + “To think,” she said, “that we might have died and never seen it!” + </p> + <p> + There followed a long silence. I thought she was tired, and would not + break it. Suddenly she spoke in a strange voice, low and toneless; + </p> + <p> + “The story of this place. She was the Princess Padmavati, and her home was + in Ayodhya. When she woke and found herself here by the lake she was so + terrified that she flung herself in and was drowned. They held her back, + but she died.” + </p> + <p> + “How do you know?” + </p> + <p> + “Because a wandering monk came to the abbey of Tahkt-i-Bahi near Peshawar + and told Vasettha the Abbot.” + </p> + <p> + I had nearly spoilt all by an exclamation, but I held myself back. I saw + she was dreaming awake and was unconscious of what she said. + </p> + <p> + “The Abbot said, ‘Do not describe her. What talk is this for holy men? The + young monks must not hear. Some of them have never seen a woman. Should a + monk speak of such toys?’ But the wanderer disobeyed and spoke, and there + was a great tumult, and the monks threw him out at the command of the + young Abbot, and he wandered down to Peshawar, and it was he later—the + evil one!—that brought his sister, Lilavanti the Dancer, to + Peshawar, and the Abbot fell into her snare. That was his revenge!” + </p> + <p> + Her face was fixed and strange, for a moment her cheek looked hollow, her + eyes dim and grief-worn. What was she seeing?—what remembering? Was + it a story—a memory? What was it? + </p> + <p> + “She was beautiful?” I prompted. + </p> + <p> + “Men have said so, but for it he surrendered the Peace. Do not speak of + her accursed beauty.” + </p> + <p> + Her voice died away to a drowsy murmur; her head dropped on my shoulder + and for the mere delight of contact I sat still and scarcely breathed, + praying that she might speak again, but the good minute was gone. She drew + one or two deep breaths, and sat up with a bewildered look that quickly + passed. + </p> + <p> + “I was quite sleepy for a minute. The climb was so strenuous. Hark—I + hear the Flute of Krishna again.” + </p> + <p> + And again I could hear nothing, but she said it was sounding from the + trees at the base of the hill. Later when we climbed down I found she was + right—that a peasant lad, dark and amazingly beautiful as these + Kashmiris often are, was playing on the flute to a girl at his feet—looking + up at him with rapt eyes. He flung Vanna a flower as we passed. She caught + it and put it in her bosom. A singular blossom, three petals of purest + white, set against three leaves of purest green, and lower down the stem + the three green leaves were repeated. It was still in her bosom after + dinner, and I looked at it more closely. + </p> + <p> + “That is a curious flower,” I said. “Three and three and three. Nine. That + makes the mystic number. I never saw a purer white. What is it?” + </p> + <p> + “Of course it is mystic,” she said seriously. “It is the Ninefold Flower. + You saw who gave it?” + </p> + <p> + “That peasant lad.” + </p> + <p> + She smiled. + </p> + <p> + “You will see more some day. Some might not even have seen that.” + </p> + <p> + “Does it grow here?” + </p> + <p> + “This is the first I have seen. It is said to grow only where the gods + walk. Do you know that throughout all India Kashmir is said to be holy + ground? It was called long ago the land of the gods, and of strange, but + not evil, sorceries. Great marvels were seen here.” + </p> + <p> + I felt the labyrinthine enchantments of that enchanted land were closing + about me—a slender web, grey, almost impalpable, finer than fairy + silk, was winding itself about my feet. My eyes were opening to things I + had not dreamed. She saw my thought. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, you could not have seen even that much of him in Peshawar. You did + not know then.” + </p> + <p> + “He was not there,” I answered, falling half unconsciously into her tone. + </p> + <p> + “He is always there—everywhere, and when he plays, all who hear must + follow. He was the Pied Piper in Hamelin, he was Pan in Hellas. You will + hear his wild fluting in many strange places when you know how to listen. + When one has seen him the rest comes soon. And then you will follow.” + </p> + <p> + “Not away from you, Vanna.” + </p> + <p> + “From the marriage feast, from the Table of the Lord,” she said, smiling + strangely. “The man who wrote that spoke of another call, but it is the + same—Krishna or Christ. When we hear the music we follow. And we may + lose or gain heaven.” + </p> + <p> + It might have been her compelling personality—it might have been the + marvels of beauty about me, but I knew well I had entered at some mystic + gate. A pass word had been spoken for me—I was vouched for and might + go in. Only a little way as yet. Enchanted forests lay beyond, and + perilous seas, but there were hints, breaths like the wafting of the + garments of unspeakable Presences. My talk with Vanna grew less personal, + and more introspective. I felt the touch of her finger-tips leading me + along the ways of Quiet—my feet brushed a shining dew. Once, in the + twilight under the chenar trees, I saw a white gleaming and thought it a + swiftly passing Being, but when in haste I gained the tree I found there + only a Ninefold flower, white as a spirit in the evening calm. I would not + gather it but told Vanna what I had seen. + </p> + <p> + “You nearly saw;” she said. “She passed so quickly. It was the Snowy One, + Uma, Parvati, the Daughter of the Himalaya. That mountain is the mountain + of her lord—Shiva. It is natural she should be here. I saw her last + night lean over the height—her face pillowed on her folded arms, + with a low star in the mists of her hair. Her eyes were like lakes of blue + darkness. Vast and wonderful. She is the Mystic Mother of India. You will + see soon. You could not have seen the flower until now.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you know,” she added, “that in the mountains there are poppies of + clear blue—blue as turquoise. We will go up into the heights and + find them.” + </p> + <p> + And next moment she was planning the camping details, the men, the ponies, + with a practical zest that seemed to relegate the occult to the absurd. + Yet the very next day came a wonderful moment. + </p> + <p> + The sun was just setting and, as it were, suddenly the purple glooms + banked up heavy with thunder. The sky was black with fury, the earth + passive with dread. I never saw such lightning—it was continuous and + tore in zigzag flashes down the mountains like rents in the substance of + the world’s fabric. And the thunder roared up in the mountain gorges with + shattering echoes. Then fell the rain, and the whole lake seemed to rise + to meet it, and the noise was like the rattle of musketry. We were + standing by the cabin window and she suddenly caught my hand, and I saw in + a light of their own two dancing figures on the tormented water before us. + Wild in the tumult, embodied delight, with arms tossed violently above + their heads, and feet flung up behind them, skimming the waves like + seagulls, they passed. Their sex I could not tell—I think they had + none, but were bubble emanations of the rejoicing rush of the rain and the + wild retreating laughter of the thunder. I saw the fierce aerial faces and + their inhuman glee as they fled by, and she dropped my hand and they were + gone. Slowly the storm lessened, and in the west the clouds tore raggedly + asunder and a flood of livid yellow light poured down upon the lake—an + awful light that struck it into an abyss of fire. Then, as if at a word of + command, two glorious rainbows sprang across the water with the mountains + for their piers, each with its proper colours chorded. They made a Bridge + of Dread that stood out radiant against the background of storm—the + Twilight of the Gods, and the doomed gods marching forth to the last + fight. And the thunder growled sullenly away into the recesses of the hill + and the terrible rainbows faded until the stars came quietly out and it + was a still night. + </p> + <p> + But I had seen that what is our dread is the joy of the spirits of the + Mighty Mother, and though the vision faded and I doubted what I had seen, + it prepared the way for what I was yet to see. A few days later we started + on what was to be the most exquisite memory of my life. A train of ponies + carried our tents and camping necessaries and there was a pony for each of + us. And so, in the cool grey of a divine morning, with little rosy clouds + flecking the eastern sky, we set out from Islamabad for Vernag. And this + was the order of our going. She and I led the way, attended by a sais + (groom) and a coolie carrying the luncheon basket. Half way we would stop + in some green dell, or by some rushing stream, and there rest and eat our + little meal while the rest of the cavalcade passed on to the appointed + camping place, and in the late afternoon we would follow, riding slowly, + and find the tents pitched and the kitchen department in full swing. If + the place pleased us we lingered for some days;—if not, the camp was + struck next morning, and again we wandered in search of beauty. + </p> + <p> + The people were no inconsiderable part of my joy. I cannot see what they + have to gain from such civilization as ours—a kindly people and + happy. Courtesy and friendliness met us everywhere, and if their labor was + hard, their harvest of beauty and laughter seemed to be its reward. The + little villages with their groves of walnut and fruit trees spoke of no + unfulfilled want, the mulberries which fatten the sleek bears in their + season fattened the children too. I compared their lot with that of the + toilers in our cities and knew which I would choose. We rode by shimmering + fields of barley, with red poppies floating in the clear transparent green + as in deep sea water, through fields of millet like the sky fallen on the + earth, so innocently blue were its blossoms, and the trees above us were + trellised with the wild roses, golden and crimson, and the ways tapestried + with the scented stars of the large white jasmine. + </p> + <p> + It was strange that later much of what she said, escaped me. Some I noted + down at the time, but there were hints, shadows of lovelier things beyond + that eluded all but the fringes of memory when I tried to piece them + together and make a coherence of a living wonder. For that reason, the + best things cannot be told in this history. It is only the cruder, grosser + matters that words will hold. The half-touchings—vanishing looks, + breaths—O God, I know them, but cannot tell. + </p> + <p> + In the smaller villages, the head man came often to greet us and make us + welcome, bearing on a flat dish a little offering of cakes and fruit, the + produce of the place. One evening a man so approached, stately in white + robes and turban, attended by a little lad who carried the patriarchal + gift beside him. Our tents were pitched under a glorious walnut tree with + a running stream at our feet. + </p> + <p> + Vanna of course, was the interpreter, and I called her from her tent as + the man stood salaaming before me. It was strange that when she came, + dressed in white, he stopped in his salutation, and gazed at her in what, + I thought, was silent wonder. + </p> + <p> + She spoke earnestly to him, standing before him with clasped hands, + almost, I could think, in the attitude of a suppliant. The man listened + gravely, with only an interjection, now and again, and once he turned and + looked curiously at me. Then he spoke, evidently making some announcement + which she received with bowed head—and when he turned to go with a + grave salute, she performed a very singular ceremony, moving slowly round + him three times with clasped hands; keeping him always on the right. He + repaid it with the usual salaam and greeting of peace, which he bestowed + also on me, and then departed in deep meditation, his eyes fixed on the + ground. I ventured to ask what it all meant, and she looked thoughtfully + at me before replying. + </p> + <p> + “It was a strange thing. I fear you will not altogether understand, but I + will tell you what I can. That man though living here among Mahomedans, is + a Brahman from Benares, and, what is very rare in India, a Buddhist. And + when he saw me he believed he remembered me in a former birth. The + ceremony you saw me perform is one of honour in India. It was his due.” + </p> + <p> + “Did you remember him?” I knew my voice was incredulous. + </p> + <p> + “Very well. He has changed little but is further on the upward path. I saw + him with dread for he holds the memory of a great wrong I did. Yet he told + me a thing that has filled my heart with joy.” + </p> + <p> + “Vanna-what is it?” + </p> + <p> + She had a clear uplifted look which startled me. There was suddenly a + chill air blowing between us. + </p> + <p> + “I must not tell you yet but you will know soon. He was a good man. I am + glad we have met.” + </p> + <p> + She buried herself in writing in a small book I had noticed and longed to + look into, and no more was said. + </p> + <p> + We struck camp next day and trekked on towards Vernag—a rough march, + but one of great beauty, beneath the shade of forest trees, garlanded with + pale roses that climbed from bough to bough and tossed triumphant wreaths + into the uppermost blue. + </p> + <p> + In the afternoon thunder was flapping its wings far off in the mountains + and a little rain fell while we were lunching under a big tree. I was + considering anxiously how to shelter Vanna, when a farmer invited us to + his house—a scene of Biblical hospitality that delighted us both. He + led us up some break-neck little stairs to a large bare room, open to the + clean air all round the roof, and with a kind of rough enclosure on the + wooden floor where the family slept at night. There he opened our basket, + and then, with anxious care, hung clothes and rough draperies about us + that our meal might be unwatched by one or two friends who had followed us + in with breathless interest. Still further to entertain us a great rarity + was brought out and laid at Vanna’s feet as something we might like to + watch—a curious bird in a cage, with brightly barred wings and a + singular cry. She fed it with fruit, and it fluttered to her hand. Just so + Abraham might have welcomed his guests, and when we left with words of + deepest gratitude, our host made the beautiful obeisance of touching his + forehead with joined hands as he bowed. To me the whole incident had an + extraordinary grace, and ennobled both host and guest. But we met an + ascending scale of loveliness so varied in its aspects that I passed from + one emotion to another and knew no sameness. + </p> + <p> + That afternoon the camp was pitched at the foot of a mighty hill, under + the waving pyramids of the chenars, sweeping their green like the robes of + a goddess. Near by was a half circle of low arches falling into ruin, and + as we went in among them I beheld a wondrous sight—the huge + octagonal tank or basin made by the Mogul Emperor Jehangir to receive the + waters of a mighty Spring which wells from the hill and has been held + sacred by Hindu and Moslem. And if loveliness can sanctify surely it is + sacred indeed. + </p> + <p> + The tank was more than a hundred feet in diameter and circled by a roughly + paved pathway where the little arched cells open that the devotees may sit + and contemplate the lustral waters. There on a black stone, is sculptured + the Imperial inscription comparing this spring to the holier wells of + Paradise, and I thought no less of it, for it rushes straight from the + rock with no aiding stream, and its waters are fifty feet deep, and sweep + away from this great basin through beautiful low arches in a wild foaming + river—the crystal life-blood of the mountains for ever welling away. + The colour and perfect purity of this living jewel were most marvellous—clear + blue-green like a chalcedony, but changing as the lights in an opal—a + wonderful quivering brilliance, flickering with the silver of shoals of + sacred fish. + </p> + <p> + But the Mogul Empire is with the snows of yesteryear and the wonder has + passed from the Moslems into the keeping of the Hindus once more, and the + Lingam of Shiva, crowned with flowers, is the symbol in the little shrine + by the entrance. Surely in India, the gods are one and have no jealousies + among them—so swiftly do their glories merge the one into the other. + </p> + <p> + “How all the Mogul Emperors loved running water,” said Vanna. “I can see + them leaning over it in their carved pavilions with delicate dark faces + and pensive eyes beneath their turbans, lost in the endless reverie of the + East while liquid melody passes into their dream. It was the music they + best loved.” + </p> + <p> + She was leading me into the royal garden below, where the young river + flows beneath the pavilion set above and across the rush of the water. + </p> + <p> + “I remember before I came to India,” she went on, “there were certain + words and phrases that meant the whole East to me. It was an enchantment. + The first flash picture I had was Milton’s— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ‘Dark faces with white silken turbans wreathed.’ +</pre> + <p> + and it still is. I have thought ever since that every man should wear a + turban. It dignifies the un-comeliest and it is quite curious to see how + many inches a man descends in the scale of beauty the moment he takes it + off and you see only the skull-cap about which they wind it. They wind it + with wonderful skill too. I have seen a man take eighteen yards of muslin + and throw it round his head with a few turns, and in five or six minutes + the beautiful folds were all in order and he looked like a king. Some of + the Gujars here wear black ones and they are very effective and worth + painting—the black folds and the sullen tempestuous black brows + underneath.” + </p> + <p> + We sat in the pavilion for awhile looking down on the rushing water, and + she spoke of Akbar, the greatest of the Moguls, and spoke with a curious + personal touch, as I thought. + </p> + <p> + “I wish you would try to write a story of him—one on more human + lines than has been done yet. No one has accounted for the passionate + quest of truth that was the real secret of his life. Strange in an + Oriental despot if you think of it! It really can only be understood from + the Buddhist belief, which curiously seems to have been the only one he + neglected, that a mysterious Karma influenced all his thoughts. If I tell + you as a key-note for your story, that in a past life he had been a + Buddhist priest—one who had fallen away, would that in any way + account to you for attempts to recover the lost way? Try to think that + out, and to write the story, not as a Western mind sees it, but pure + East.” + </p> + <p> + “That would be a great book to write if one could catch the voices of the + past. But how to do it?” + </p> + <p> + “I will give you one day a little book that may help you. The other story + I wish you would write is the story of a Dancer of Peshawar. There is a + connection between the two—a story of ruin and repentance.” + </p> + <p> + “Will you tell it to me?” + </p> + <p> + “A part. In this same book you will find much more, but not all. All + cannot be told. You must imagine much. But I think your imagination will + be true.” + </p> + <p> + “Why do you think so?” + </p> + <p> + “Because in these few days you have learnt so much. You have seen the + Ninefold Flower, and the rain spirits. You will soon hear the Flute of + Krishna which none can hear who cannot dream true.” + </p> + <p> + That night I heard it. I waked, suddenly, to music, and standing in the + door of my tent, in the dead silence of the night, lit only by a few low + stars, I heard the poignant notes of a flute. If it had called my name it + could not have summoned me more clearly, and I followed without a thought + of delay, forgetting even Vanna in the strange urgency that filled me. The + music was elusive, seeming to come first from one side, then from the + other, but finally I tracked it as a bee does a flower by the scent, to + the gate of the royal garden—the pleasure place of the dead + Emperors. + </p> + <p> + The gate stood ajar—strange! for I had seen the custodian close it + that evening. Now it stood wide and I went in, walking noiselessly over + the dewy grass. I knew and could not tell how, that I must be noiseless. + Passing as if I were guided, down the course of the strong young river, I + came to the pavilion that spanned it—the place where we had stood + that afternoon—and there to my profound amazement, I saw Vanna, + leaning against a slight wooden pillar. As if she had expected me, she + laid one finger on her lip, and stretching out her hand, took mine and + drew me beside her as a mother might a child. And instantly I saw! + </p> + <p> + On the further bank a young man in a strange diadem or miter of jewels, + bare-breasted and beautiful, stood among the flowering oleanders, one foot + lightly crossed over the other as he stood. He was like an image of pale + radiant gold, and I could have sworn that the light came from within + rather than fell upon him, for the night was very dark. He held the flute + to his lips, and as I looked, I became aware that the noise of the rushing + water was tapering off into a murmur scarcely louder than that of a summer + bee in the heart of a rose. Therefore the music rose like a fountain of + crystal drops, cold, clear, and of an entrancing sweetness, and the face + above it was such that I had no power to turn my eyes away. How shall I + say what it was? All I had ever desired, dreamed, hoped, prayed, looked at + me from the remote beauty of the eyes and with the most persuasive + gentleness entreated me, rather than commanded to follow fearlessly and + win. But these are words, and words shaped in the rough mould of thought + cannot convey the deep desire that would have hurled me to his feet if + Vanna had not held me with a firm restraining hand. Looking up in adoring + love to the dark face was a ring of woodland creatures. I thought I could + distinguish the white clouded robe of a snow-leopard, the soft clumsiness + of a young bear, and many more, but these shifted and blurred like dream + creatures—I could not be sure of them nor define their numbers. The + eyes of the Player looked down upon their passionate delight with careless + kindness. + </p> + <p> + Dim images passed through my mind. Orpheus—No, this was no Greek. + Pan-yet again, No. Where were the pipes, the goat hoofs? The young + Dionysos—No, there were strange jewels instead of his vines. And + then Vanna’s voice said as if from a great distance; + </p> + <p> + “Krishna—the Beloved.” And I said aloud, “I see!” And even as I said + it the whole picture blurred together like a dream, and I was alone in the + pavilion and the water was foaming past me. Had I walked in my sleep, I + thought, as I made my way hack? As I gained the garden gate, before me, + like a snowflake, I saw the Ninefold Flower. + </p> + <p> + When I told her next day, speaking of it as a dream, she said simply; + “They have opened the door to you. You will not need me soon. + </p> + <p> + “I shall always need you. You have taught me everything. I could see + nothing last night until you took my hand.” + </p> + <p> + “I was not there,” she said smiling. “It was only the thought of me, and + you can have that when I am very far away. I was sleeping in my tent. What + you called in me then you can always call, even if I am—dead.” + </p> + <p> + “That is a word which is beginning to have no meaning for me. You have + said things to me—no, thought them, that have made me doubt if there + is room in the universe for the thing we have called death.” + </p> + <p> + She smiled her sweet wise smile. + </p> + <p> + “Where we are death is not. Where death is we are not. But you will + understand better soon.” + </p> + <p> + Our march curving took us by the Mogul gardens of Achibal, and the + glorious ruins of the great Temple at Martund, and so down to Bawan with + its crystal waters and that loveliest camping ground beside them. A mighty + grove of chenar trees, so huge that I felt as if we were in a great sea + cave where the air is dyed with the deep shadowy green of the inmost + ocean, and the murmuring of the myriad leaves was like a sea at rest. I + looked up into the noble height and my memory of Westminster dwindled, for + this led on and up to the infinite blue, and at night the stars hung like + fruit upon the branches. The water ran with a great joyous rush of release + from the mountain behind, but was first received in a broad basin full of + sacred fish and reflecting a little temple of Maheshwara and one of Surya + the Sun. Here in this basin the water lay pure and still as an ecstasy, + and beside it was musing the young Brahman priest who served the temple. + Since I had joined Vanna I had begun with her help to study a little + Hindustani, and with an aptitude for language could understand here and + there. I caught a word or two as she spoke with him that startled me, when + the high-bred ascetic face turned serenely upon her, and he addressed her + as “My sister,” adding a sentence beyond my learning, but which she + willingly translated later.—“May He who sits above the Mysteries, + have mercy upon thy rebirth.” + </p> + <p> + She said afterwards; + </p> + <p> + “How beautiful some of these men are. It seems a different type of beauty + from ours, nearer to nature and the old gods. Look at that priest—the + tall figure, the clear olive skin, the dark level brows, the long lashes + that make a soft gloom about the eyes—eyes that have the fathomless + depth of a deer’s, the proud arch of the lip. I think there is no country + where aristocracy is more clearly marked than in India. The Brahmans are + aristocrats of the world. You see it is a religious aristocracy as well. + It has everything that can foster pride and exclusiveness. They spring + from the Mouth of Deity. They are His word incarnate. Not many kings are + of the Brahman caste, and the Brahmans look down upon them from Sovereign + heights. I have known men who would not eat with their own rulers who + would have drunk the water that washed the Brahmans’ feet.” + </p> + <p> + She took me that day, the Brahman with us, to see a cave in the mountain. + We climbed up the face of the cliff to where a little tree grew on a + ledge, and the black mouth yawned. We went in and often it was so low we + had to stoop, leaving the sunlight behind until it was like a dim eye + glimmering in the velvet blackness. The air was dank and cold and + presently obscene with the smell of bats, and alive with their wings, as + they came sweeping about us, gibbering and squeaking. I thought of the + rush of the ghosts, blown like dead leaves in the Odyssey. And then a + small rock chamber branched off, and in this, lit by a bit of burning + wood, we saw the bones of a holy man who lived and died there four hundred + years ago. Think of it! He lived there always, with the slow dropping of + water from the dead weight of the mountain above his head, drop by drop + tolling the minutes away: the little groping feet through the cave that + would bring him food and drink, hurrying into the warmth and sunlight + again, and his only companion the sacred Lingam which means the Creative + Energy that sets the worlds dancing for joy round the sun—that, and + the black solitude to sit down beside him. Surely his bones can hardly be + dryer and colder now than they were then! There must be strange ecstasies + in such a life—wild visions in the dark, or it could never be + endured. + </p> + <p> + And so, in marches of about ten miles a day, we came to Pahlgam on the + banks of the dancing Lidar. There was now only three weeks left of the + time she had promised. After a few days at Pahlgam the march would turn + and bend its way back to Srinagar, and to—what? I could not believe + it was to separation—in her lovely kindness she had grown so close + to me that, even for the sake of friendship, I believed our paths must run + together to the end, and there were moments when I could still half + convince myself that I had grown as necessary to her as she was to me. No—not + as necessary, for she was life and soul to me, but a part of her daily + experience that she valued and would not easily part with. That evening we + were sitting outside the tents, near the camp fire, of pine logs and + cones, the leaping flames making the night beautiful with gold and leaping + sparks, in an attempt to reach the mellow splendours of the moon. The men, + in various attitudes of rest, were lying about, and one had been telling a + story which had just ended in excitement and loud applause. + </p> + <p> + “These are Mahomedans,” said Vanna, “and it is only a story of love and + fighting like the Arabian Nights. If they had been Hindus, it might well + have been of Krishna or of Rama and Sita. Their faith comes from an + earlier time and they still see visions. The Moslem is a hard practical + faith for men—men of the world too. It is not visionary now, though + it once had its great mysteries.” + </p> + <p> + “I wish you would tell me what you think of the visions or apparitions of + the gods that are seen here. Is it all illusion? Tell me your thought.” + </p> + <p> + “How difficult that is to answer. I suppose if love and faith are strong + enough they will always create the vibrations to which the greater + vibrations respond, and so make God in their own image at any time or + place. But that they call up what is the truest reality I have never + doubted. There is no shadow without a substance. The substance is beyond + us but under certain conditions the shadow is projected and we see it. + </p> + <p> + “Have I seen or has it been dream?” + </p> + <p> + “I cannot tell. It may have been the impress of my mind on yours, for I + see such things always. You say I took your hand?” + </p> + <p> + “Take it now.” + </p> + <p> + She obeyed, and instantly, as I felt the firm cool clasp, I heard the rain + of music through the pines—the Flute Player was passing. She dropped + it smiling and the sweet sound ceased. + </p> + <p> + “You see! How can I tell what you have seen? You will know better when I + am gone. You will stand alone then.” + </p> + <p> + “You will not go—you cannot. I have seen how you have loved all this + wonderful time. I believe it has been as dear to you as to me. And every + day I have loved you more. I depend upon you for everything that makes + life worth living. You could not—you who are so gentle—you + could not commit the senseless cruelty of leaving me when you have taught + me to love you with every beat of my heart. I have been patient—I + have held myself in, but I must speak now. Marry me, and teach me. I know + nothing. You know all I need to know. For pity’s sake be my wife.” + </p> + <p> + I had not meant to say it; it broke from me in the firelight moonlight + with a power that I could not stay. She looked at me with a disarming + gentleness. + </p> + <p> + “Is this fair? Do you remember how at Peshawar I told you I thought it was + a dangerous experiment, and that it would make things harder for you. But + you took the risk like a brave man because you felt there were things to + be gained—knowledge, insight, beauty. Have you not gained them?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Absolutely.” + </p> + <p> + “Then, is it all loss if I go?” + </p> + <p> + “Not all. But loss I dare not face.” + </p> + <p> + “I will tell you this. I could not stay if I would. Do you remember the + old man on the way to Vernag? He told me that I must very soon take up an + entirely new life. I have no choice, though if I had I would still do it.” + </p> + <p> + There was silence and down a long arcade, without any touch of her hand I + heard the music, receding with exquisite modulations to a very great + distance, and between the pillared stems, I saw a faint light. + </p> + <p> + “Do you wish to go?” + </p> + <p> + “Entirely. But I shall not forget you, Stephen. I will tell you something. + For me, since I came to India, the gate that shuts us out at birth has + opened. How shall I explain? Do you remember Kipling’s ‘Finest Story in + the World’?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Fiction!” + </p> + <p> + “Not fiction—true, whether he knew it or no. But for me the door has + opened wide. First, I remembered piecemeal, with wide gaps, then more + connectedly. Then, at the end of the first year, I met one day at + Cawnpore, an ascetic, an old man of great beauty and wisdom, and he was + able by his own knowledge to enlighten mine. Not wholly—much has + come since then. Has come, some of it in ways you could not understand + now, but much by direct sight and hearing. Long, long ago I lived in + Peshawar, and my story was a sorrowful one. I will tell you a little + before I go.” + </p> + <p> + “I hold you to your promise. What is there I cannot believe when you tell + me? But does that life put you altogether away from me? Was there no place + for me in any of your memories that has drawn us together now? Give me a + little hope that in the eternal pilgrimage there is some bond between us + and some rebirth where we may met again.” + </p> + <p> + “I will tell you that also before we part. I have grown to believe that + you do love me—and therefore love something which is infinitely + above me.” + </p> + <p> + “And do you love me at all? Am I nothing, Vanna—Vanna?” + </p> + <p> + “My friend,” she said, and laid her hand on mine. + </p> + <p> + A silence, and then she spoke, very low. + </p> + <p> + “You must be prepared for very great change, Stephen, and yet believe that + it does not really change things at all. See how even the gods pass and do + not change! The early gods of India are gone and Shiva, Vishnu, Krishna + have taken their places and are one and the same. The old Buddhist stories + say that in heaven “The flowers of the garland the God wore are withered, + his robes of majesty are waxed old and faded; he falls from his high + estate, and is re-born into a new life.” But he lives still in the young + God who is born among men. The gods cannot die, nor can we nor anything + that has life. Now I must go in.” + </p> + <p> + I sat long in the moonlight thinking. The whole camp was sunk in sleep and + the young dawn was waking upon the peaks when I turned in. + </p> + <p> + The days that were left we spent in wandering up the Lidar River to the + hills that are the first ramp of the ascent to the great heights. We found + the damp corners where the mushrooms grow like pearls—the mushrooms + of which she said—“To me they have always been fairy things. To see + them in the silver-grey dew of the early mornings—mysteriously there + like the manna in the desert—they are elfin plunder, and as a child + I was half afraid of them. No wonder they are the darlings of folklore, + especially in Celtic countries where the Little People move in the + starlight. Strange to think they are here too among strange gods!” + </p> + <p> + We climbed to where the wild peonies bloom in glory that few eyes see, and + the rosy beds of wild sweet strawberries ripen. Every hour brought with it + some new delight, some exquisiteness of sight or of words that I shall remember + for ever. She sat one day on a rock, holding the sculptured leaves and + massive seed-vessels of some glorious plant that the Kashmiris believe has + magic virtues hidden in the seeds of pure rose embedded in the white down. + </p> + <p> + “If you fast for three days and eat nine of these in the Night of No Moon, + you can rise on the air light as thistledown and stand on the peak of + Haramoukh. And on Haramoukh, as you know it is believed, the gods dwell. + There was a man here who tried this enchantment. He was a changed man for + ever after, wandering and muttering to himself and avoiding all human + intercourse as far as he could. He was no Kashmiri—A Jat from the + Punjab, and they showed him to me when I was here with the Meryons, and + told me he would speak to none. But I knew he would speak to me, and he + did.” + </p> + <p> + “Did he tell you anything of what he had seen in the high world up + yonder?” + </p> + <p> + “He said he had seen the Dream of the God. I could not get more than that. + But there are many people here who believe that the Universe as we know it + is but an image in the dream of Ishvara, the Universal Spirit—in + whom are all the gods—and that when He ceases to dream we pass again + into the Night of Brahm, and all is darkness until the Spirit of God moves + again on the face of the waters. There are few temples to Brahm. He is + above and beyond all direct worship.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you think he had seen anything?” + </p> + <p> + “What do I know? Will you eat the seeds? The Night of No Moon will soon be + here.” + </p> + <p> + She held out the seed-vessels, laughing. I write that down but how record + the lovely light of kindliness in her eyes—the almost submissive + gentleness that yet was a defense stronger than steel. I never knew—how + should I?—whether she was sitting by my side or heavens away from me + in her own strange world. But always she was a sweetness that I could not + reach, a cup of nectar that I might not drink, unalterably her own and + never mine, and yet—my friend. + </p> + <p> + She showed me the wild track up into the mountains where the Pilgrims go + to pay their devotions at the Great God’s shrine in the awful heights, + regretting that we were too early for that most wonderful sight. Above + where we were sitting the river fell in a tormented white cascade, + crashing and feathering into spray-dust of diamonds. An eagle was flying + above it with a mighty spread of wings that seemed almost double-jointed + in the middle—they curved and flapped so wide and free. The fierce + head was outstretched with the rake of a plundering galley as he swept + down the wind, seeking his meat from God, and passed majestic from our + sight. The valley beneath us was littered with enormous boulders spilt + from the ancient hollows of the hills. It must have been a great sight + when the giants set them trundling down in work or play!—I said this + to Vanna, who was looking down upon it with meditative eyes. She roused + herself. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, this really is Giant-Land up here—everything is so huge. And + when they quarrel up in the heights—in Jotunheim—and the black + storms come down the valleys it is like colossal laughter or clumsy + boisterous anger. And the Frost giants are still at work up there with + their great axes of frost and rain. They fling down the side of a mountain + or make fresh ways for the rivers. About sixty years ago—far above + here—they tore down a mountain side and damned up the mighty Indus, + so that for months he was a lake, shut back in the hills. But the river + giants are no less strong up here in the heights of the world, and lie lay + brooding and hiding his time. And then one awful day he tore the barrier + down and roared down the valley carrying death and ruin with him, and + swept away a whole Sikh army among other unconsidered trifles. That must + have been a soul-shaking sight.” + </p> + <p> + She spoke on, and as she spoke I saw. What are her words as I record them? + Stray dead leaves pressed in a book—the life and grace dead. Yet I + record, for she taught me what I believe the world should learn, that the + Buddhist philosophers are right when they teach that all forms of what we + call matter are really but aggregates of spiritual units, and that life + itself is a curtain hiding reality as the vast veil of day conceals from + our sight the countless orbs of space. So that the purified mind even + while prisoned in the body, may enter into union with the Real and, + according to attainment, see it as it is. + </p> + <p> + She was an interpreter because she believed this truth profoundly. She saw + the spiritual essence beneath the lovely illusion of matter, and the air + about her was radiant with the motion of strange forces for which the dull + world has many names aiming indeed at the truth, but falling—O how + far short of her calm perception! She was indeed of a Household higher + than the Household of Faith. She had received enlightenment. She beheld + with open eyes. + </p> + <p> + Next day our camp was struck and we turned our faces again to Srinagar and + to the day of parting. I set down but one strange incident of our journey, + of which I did not speak even to her. + </p> + <p> + We were camping at Bijbehara, awaiting our house boat, and the site was by + the Maharaja’s lodge above the little town. It was midnight and I was + sleepless—the shadow of the near future was upon me. I wandered down + to the lovely old wooded bridge across the Jhelum, where the strong young + trees grow up from the piles. Beyond it the moon was shining on the + ancient Hindu remains close to the new temple, and as I stood on the + bridge I could see the figure of a man in deepest meditation by the ruins. + He was no European. I saw the straight dignified folds of the robes. But + it was not surprising he should be there and I should have thought no more + of it, had I not heard at that instant from the further side of the river + the music of the Flute. I cannot hope to describe that music to any who + have not heard it. Suffice it to say that where it calls he who hears must + follow whether in the body or the spirit. Nor can I now tell in which I + followed. One day it will call me across the River of Death, and I shall + ford it or sink in the immeasurable depths and either will be well. + </p> + <p> + But immediately I was at the other side of the river, standing by the + stone Bull of Shiva where he kneels before the Symbol, and looking + steadfastly upon me a few paces away was a man in the dress of a Buddhist + monk. He wore the yellow robe that leaves one shoulder bare; his head was + bare also and he held in one hand a small bowl like a stemless chalice. I + knew I was seeing a very strange inexplicable sight—one that in + Kashmir should be incredible, but I put wonder aside for I knew now that I + was moving in the sphere where the incredible may well be the actual. His + expression was of the most unbroken calm. If I compare it to the + passionless gaze of the Sphinx I misrepresent, for the Riddle of the + Sphinx still awaits solution, but in this face was a noble acquiescence + and a content that had it vibrated must have passed into joy. + </p> + <p> + Words or their equivalent passed between us. I felt his voice. + </p> + <p> + “You have heard the music of the Flute?” + </p> + <p> + “I have heard.” + </p> + <p> + “What has it given?” + </p> + <p> + “A consuming longing.” + </p> + <p> + “It is the music of the Eternal. The creeds and the faiths are the words + that men have set to that melody. Listening, it will lead you to Wisdom. + Day by day you will interpret more surely.” + </p> + <p> + “I cannot stand alone.” + </p> + <p> + “You will not need. What has led you will lead you still. Through many + births it has led you. How should it fail?” + </p> + <p> + “What should I do?” + </p> + <p> + “Go forward.” + </p> + <p> + “What should I shun?” + </p> + <p> + “Sorrow and fear.” + </p> + <p> + “What should I seek?” + </p> + <p> + “Joy.” + </p> + <p> + “And the end?” + </p> + <p> + “Joy. Wisdom. They are the Light and Dark of the Divine.” A cold breeze + passed and touched my forehead. I was still standing in the middle of the + bridge above the water gliding to the Ocean, and there was no figure by + the Bull of Shiva. I was alone. I passed back to the tents with the + shudder that is not fear but akin to death upon me. I knew I had been + profoundly withdrawn from what we call actual life, and the return is + dread. + </p> + <p> + The days passed as we floated down the river to Srinagar. On board the + Kedarnath, now lying in our first berth beneath the chenars near and yet + far from the city, the last night had come. Next morning I should begin + the long ride to Baramula and beyond that barrier of the Happy Valley down + to Murree and the Punjab. Where afterwards? I neither knew nor cared. My + lesson was before me to be learned. I must try to detach myself from all I + had prized—to say to my heart it was but a loan and no gift, and to + cling only to the imperishable. And did I as yet certainly know more than + the A B C of the hard doctrine by which I must live? “Que vivre est + difficile, O mon cocur fatigue!”—an immense weariness possessed me—a + passive grief. + </p> + <p> + Vanna would follow later with the wife of an Indian doctor. I believed she + was bound for Lahore but on that point she had not spoken certainly and I + felt we should not meet again. + </p> + <p> + And now my packing was finished, and, as far as my possessions went, the + little cabin had the soulless emptiness that comes with departure. I was + enduring as best I could. If she had held loyally to her pact, could I do + less. Was she to blame for my wild hope that in the end she would relent + and step down to the household levels of love? + </p> + <p> + She sat by the window—the last time I should see the moonlit banks + and her clear face against them. I made and won my fight for the courage + of words. + </p> + <p> + “And now I’ve finished everything—thank goodness! and we can talk. + Vanna—you will write to me?” + </p> + <p> + “Once. I promise that.” + </p> + <p> + “Only once? Why? I counted on your words.” + </p> + <p> + “I want to speak to you of something else now. I want to tell you a + memory. But look first at the pale light behind the Takht-i-Suliman.” + </p> + <p> + So I had seen it with her. So I should not see it again. We watched until + a line of silver sparkled on the black water, and then she spoke again. + </p> + <p> + “Stephen, do you remember in the ruined monastery near Peshawar, how I + told you of the young Abbot, who came down to Peshawar with a Chinese + pilgrim? And he never returned.” + </p> + <p> + “I remember. There was a Dancer.” + </p> + <p> + “There was a Dancer. She was Lilavanti, and she was brought there to trap + him but when she saw him she loved him, and that was his ruin and hers. + Trickery he would have known and escaped. Love caught him in an + unbreakable net, and they fled down the Punjab and no one knew any more. + But I know. For two years they lived together and she saw the agony in his + heart—the anguish of his broken vows, the face of the Blessed One + receding into an infinite distance. She knew that every day added a link + to the heavy Karma that was bound about the feet she loved, and her soul + said “Set him free,” and her heart refused the torture. But her soul was + the stronger. She set him free.” + </p> + <p> + “How?” + </p> + <p> + “She took poison. He became an ascetic in the hills and died in peace but + with a long expiation upon him.” + </p> + <p> + “And she?” + </p> + <p> + “I am she.” + </p> + <p> + “You!” I heard my voice as if it were another man’s. Was it possible that + I—a man of the twentieth century, believed this impossible thing? + Impossible, and yet—what had I learnt if not the unity of Time, the + illusion of matter? What is the twentieth century, what the first? Do they + not lie before the Supreme as one, and clean from our petty divisions? And + I myself had seen what, if I could trust it, asserted the marvels that are + no marvels to those who know. + </p> + <p> + “You loved him?” + </p> + <p> + “I love him.” + </p> + <p> + “Then there is nothing at all for me.” + </p> + <p> + She resumed as if she had heard nothing. + </p> + <p> + “I have lost him for many lives. He stepped above me at once, for he was + clean gold though he fell, and though I have followed I have not found. + But that Buddhist beyond Islamabad—you shall hear now what he said. + It was this. ‘The shut door opens, and this time he awaits.’ I cannot yet + say all it means, but there is no Lahore for me. I shall meet him soon.” + </p> + <p> + “Vanna, you would not harm yourself again?” + </p> + <p> + “Never. I should not meet him. But you will see. Now I can talk no more. I + will be there tomorrow when you go, and I will ride with you to the poplar + road.” + </p> + <p> + She passed like a shadow into her little dark cabin, and I was left alone. + I will not dwell on that black loneliness of the spirit, for it has passed—it + was the darkness of hell, a madness of jealousy, and could have no + enduring life in any heart that had known her. But it was death while it + lasted. I had moments of horrible belief, of horrible disbelief, but + however it might be I knew that she was out of reach for ever. Near me—yes! + but only as the silver image of the moon floated in the water by the boat, + with the moon herself cold myriads of miles away. I will say no more of + that last eclipse of what she had wrought in me. + </p> + <p> + The bright morning came, sunny as if my joys were beginning instead of + ending. Vanna mounted her horse and led the way from the boat. I cast one + long look at the little Kedarnath, the home of those perfect weeks, of + such joy and sorrow as would have seemed impossible to me in the chrysalis + of my former existence. Little Kahdra stood crying bitterly on the bank—the + kindly folk who had served us were gathered saddened and quiet. I set my + teeth and followed her. + </p> + <p> + How dear she looked, how kind, how gentle her appealing eyes, as I drew up + beside her. She knew what I felt. She knew that the sight of little Kahdra + crying as he said good—bye was the last pull at my sore heart. Still + she rode steadily on, and still I followed. Once she spoke. + </p> + <p> + “Stephen, there was a man in Peshawar, kind and true, who loved that + Lilavanti who had no heart for him. And when she died, it was in his arms, + as a sister might cling to a brother, for the man she loved had left her. + It seems that will not be in this life, but do not think I have been so + blind that I did not know my friend.” + </p> + <p> + I could not answer—it was the realization of the utmost I could hope + and it came like healing to my spirit. Better that bond between us, slight + as most men might think it, than the dearest and closest with a woman not + Vanna. It was the first thrill of a new joy in my heart—the first, I + thank the Infinite, of many and steadily growing joys and hopes that + cannot be uttered here. + </p> + <p> + I bent to take the hand she stretched to me, but even as they touched, I + saw, passing behind the trees by the road, the young man I had seen in the + garden at Vernag—most beautiful, in the strange miter of his + jewelled diadem. His flute was at his lips and the music rang out sudden + and crystal clear as though a woodland god were passing to awaken all the + joys of the dawn. + </p> + <p> + The horses heard too. In an instant hers had swerved wildly, and she lay + on the ground at my feet. The music had ceased. + </p> + <p> + Days had gone before I could recall what had happened then. I lifted her + in my arms and carried her into the rest-house near at hand, and the + doctor came and looked grave, and a nurse was sent from the Mission + Hospital. No doubt all was done that was possible, but I knew from the + first what it meant and how it would be. She lay in a white stillness, and + the room was quiet as death. I remembered with unspeakable gratitude later + that the nurse had been merciful and had not sent me away. + </p> + <p> + So Vanna lay all day and through the night, and when the dawn came again + she stirred and motioned with her hand, although her eyes were closed. I + understood, and kneeling, I put my hand under her head, and rested it + against my shoulder. Her faint voice murmured at my ear. + </p> + <p> + “I dreamed—I was in the pine wood at Pahlgam and it was the Night of + No Moon, and I was afraid for it was dark, but suddenly all the trees were + covered with little lights like stars, and the greater light was beyond. + Nothing to be afraid of.” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing, Beloved.” + </p> + <p> + “And I looked beyond Peshawar, further than eyes could see, and in the + ruins of the monastery where we stood, you and I—I saw him, and he + lay with his head at the feet of the Blessed One. That is well, is it + not?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, Beloved.” + </p> + <p> + “And it is well I go? Is it not?” + </p> + <p> + “It is well.” + </p> + <p> + A long silence. The first sun ray touched the floor. Again the whisper. + </p> + <p> + “Believe what I have told you. For we shall meet again.” I repeated— + </p> + <p> + “We shall meet again.” + </p> + <p> + In my arms she died. + </p> + <p> + Later, when all was over I asked myself if I believed this and answered + with full assurance—Yes. + </p> + <p> + If the story thus told sounds incredible it was not incredible to me. I + had had a profound experience. What is a miracle? It is simply the vision + of the Divine behind nature. It will come in different forms according to + the eyes that see, but the soul will know that its perception is + authentic. + </p> + <p> + I could not leave Kashmir, nor was there any need. On the contrary I saw + that there was work for me here among the people she had loved, and my + first aim was to fit myself for that and for the writing I now felt was to + be my career in life. After much thought I bought the little Kedarnath and + made it my home, very greatly to the satisfaction of little Kahdra and all + the friendly people to whom I owed so much. + </p> + <p> + Vanna’s cabin I made my sleeping room, and it is the simple truth that the + first night I slept in the place that was a Temple of Peace in my + thoughts, I had a dream of wordless bliss, and starting awake for sheer + joy I saw her face in the night, human and dear, looking down upon me with + that poignant sweetness which would seem to be the utmost revelation of + love and pity. And as I stretched my hands, another face dawned solemnly + from the shadow beside her with grave brows bent on mine—one I had + known and seen in the ruins at Bijbehara. Outside and very near I could + hear the silver weaving of the Flute that in India is the symbol of the + call of the Divine. A dream—yes, but it taught me to live. At first, + in my days of grief and loss, I did but dream—the days were hard to + endure. I will not dwell on that illusion of sorrow, now long dead. I + lived only for the night. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “When sleep comes to close each difficult day, + When night gives pause to the long watch I keep, + And all my bonds I needs must loose apart, + Must doff my will as raiment laid away— + With the first dream that comes with the first sleep, + I run—I run! I am gathered to thy heart!” + </pre> + <p> + To the heart of her pity. Thus for awhile I lived. Slowly I became + conscious of her abiding presence about me, day or night It grew clearer, + closer. + </p> + <p> + Like the austere Hippolytus to his unseen Goddess, I could say; + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Who am more to thee than other mortals are, + Whose is the holy lot, + As friend with friend to walk and talk with thee, + Hearing thy sweet mouth’s music in mine ear, + But thee beholding not.” + </pre> + <p> + That was much, but later, the sunshine was no bar, the bond strengthened + and there have been days in the heights of the hills, in the depths of the + woods, when I saw her as in life, passing at a distance, but real and + lovely. Life? She had never lived as she did now—a spirit, freed and + rejoicing. For me the door she had opened would never shut. The Presences + were about me, and I entered upon my heritage of joy, knowing that in + Kashmir, the holy land of Beauty, they walk very near, and lift up the + folds of the Dark that the initiate may see the light behind. + </p> + <p> + So I began my solitary life of gladness. I wrote, aided by the little book + she had left me, full of strangest stories, stranger by far than my own + brain could conceive. Some to be revealed—some to be hidden. And + thus the world will one day receive the story of the Dancer of Peshawar in + her upward lives, that it may know, if it will, that death is nothing—for + Life and Love are all. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE INCOMPARABLE LADY + </h2> + <h3> + A STORY OF CHINA WITH A MORAL + </h3> + <p> + It is recorded that when the Pearl Empress (his mother) asked of the + philosophic Yellow Emperor which he considered the most beautiful of the + Imperial concubines, he replied instantly: “The Lady A-Kuei”: and when the + Royal Parent in profound astonishment demanded bow this could be, having + regard to the exquisite beauties in question, the Emperor replied; + </p> + <p> + “I have never seen her. It was dark when I entered the Dragon Chamber and + dusk of dawn when I rose and left her.” + </p> + <p> + Then said the Pearl Princess; + </p> + <p> + “Possibly the harmony of her voice solaced the Son of Heaven?” + </p> + <p> + But he replied; + </p> + <p> + “She spoke not.” + </p> + <p> + And the Pearl Empress rejoined: + </p> + <p> + “Her limbs then are doubtless softer than the kingfisher’s plumage?” + </p> + <p> + But the Yellow Emperor replied; + </p> + <p> + “Doubtless. Yet I have not touched them. I was that night immersed in + speculations on the Yin and the Yang. How then should I touch a woman?” + </p> + <p> + And the Pearl Empress was silent from very great amazement, not daring to + question further but marveling how the thing might be. And seeing this, + the Yellow Emperor recited a poem to the following effect: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “It is said that Power rules the world + And who shall gainsay it? + But Loveliness is the head-jewel upon the brow of Power.” + </pre> + <p> + And when the Empress had listened with reverence to the Imperial Poet, she + quitted the August Presence. + </p> + <p> + Immediately, having entered her own palace of the Tranquil Motherly + Virtues, she caused the Lady A-Kuei to be summoned to her presence, who + came, habited in a purple robe and with pins of jade and coral in her + hair. And the Pearl Empress considered her attentively, recalling the + perfect features of the White Jade Concubine, the ambrosial smile of the + Princess of Feminine Propriety, and the willow-leaf eyebrows of the Lady + of Chen, and her astonishment was excessive, because the Lady A-Kuei could + not in beauty approach any one of these ladies. Reflecting further she + then placed her behind the screen, and summoned the court artist, Lo + Cheng, who had been formerly commissioned to paint the heavenly features + of the Emperor’s Ladies, mirrored in still water, though he had naturally + not been permitted to view the beauties themselves. Of him the Empress + demanded: + </p> + <p> + “Who is the most beautiful—which the most priceless jewel of the + dwellers in the Dragon Palace?” + </p> + <p> + And, with humility, Lo Cheng replied: + </p> + <p> + “What mortal man shall decide between the white Crane and the Swan, or + between the paeony flower and the lotus?” And having thus said he remained + silent, and in him was no help. Finally and after exhortation the Pearl + Empress condescended to threaten him with the loss of a head so useless to + himself and to her majesty. Then, in great fear and haste he replied: + </p> + <p> + “Of all the flowers that adorn the garden of the Sun of Heaven, the Lady + A-Kuei is the fittest to be gathered by the Imperial Hand, and this is my + deliberate opinion.” + </p> + <p> + Now, hearing this statement, the Pearl Empress was submerged in + bewilderment, knowing that the Lady A-Kuei had modestly retired when the + artist had depicted the reflection of the assembled loveliness of the + Inner Chambers, as not counting herself worthy of portraiture, and her + features were therefore unknown to him. Nor could the Empress further + question the artist, for when she had done so, he replied only: + </p> + <p> + “This is the secret of the Son of Heaven,” and, having gained permission, + he swiftly departed. + </p> + <p> + Nor could the Lady A-Kuei herself aid her Imperial Majesty, for on being + questioned she was overwhelmed with modesty and confusion, and with + stammering lips could only repeat: + </p> + <p> + “This is the secret of his Divine Majesty,” imploring with the utmost + humility, forgiveness from the Imperial Mother. + </p> + <p> + The Pearl Empress was unable to eat her supper. In vain were spread before + her the delicacies of the Empire. She could but trifle with a shark’s fin + and a “Silver Ear” fungus and a dish of slugs entrapped upon roses, with + the dew-like pearls upon them. Her burning curiosity had wholly deprived + her of appetite, nor could the amusing exertions of the Palace mimes, or a + lantern fete upon the lake restore her to any composure. “This + circumstance will cause my flight on the Dragon (death),” she said to + herself, “unless I succeed in unveiling the mystery. What therefore should + be my next proceeding?” + </p> + <p> + And so, deeply reflecting, she caused the Chief of the Eunuchs to summon + the Princess of Feminine Propriety, the White Jade Concubine and all the + other exalted beauties of the Heavenly Palace. + </p> + <p> + In due course of time these ladies arrived, paying suitable respect and + obeisance to the Mother of his Divine Majesty. They were resplendent in + king-fisher ornaments, in jewels of jade, crystal and coral, in robes of + silk and gauze, and still more resplendent in charms that not the + Celestial Empire itself could equal, setting aside entirely all countries + of the foreign barbarians. And in grace and elegance of manners, in skill + in the arts of poetry and the lute, what could surpass them? + </p> + <p> + Like a parterre of flowers they surrounded her Majesty, and awaited her + pleasure with perfect decorum, when, having saluted them with affability + she thus addressed them—“Lovely ones—ladies distinguished by + the particular attention of your sovereign and mine, I have sent for you + to resolve a doubt and a difficulty. On questioning our sovereign as to + whom he regarded as the loveliest of his garden of beauty he benignantly + replied: “The Lady A-Kuei is incomparable,” and though this may well be, + he further graciously added that he had never seen her. Nor, on pursuing + the subject, could I learn the Imperial reason. The artist Lo Cheng + follows in his Master’s footsteps, he also never having seen the favored + lady, and he and she reply to me that this is an Imperial secret. Declare + to me therefore if your perspicacity and the feminine interest which every + lady property takes in the other can unravel this mystery, for my liver is + tormented with anxiety beyond measure.” + </p> + <p> + As soon as the Pearl Empress had spoken she realized that she had + committed a great indiscretion. A babel of voices, of cries, questions and + contradictions instantly arose. Decorum was abandoned. The Lady of Chen + swooned, nor could she be revived for an hour, and the Princess of + Feminine Propriety and the White Jade Concubine could be dragged apart + only by the united efforts of six of the Palace matrons, so great was + their fury the one with the other, each accusing each of encouragement to + the Lady A-Kuei’s pretensions. So also with the remaining ladies. Shrieks + resounded through the Hall of Virtuous Tranquillity, and when the Pearl + Empress attempted to pour oil on the troubled waters by speaking soothing + and comfortable words, the august Voice was entirely inaudible in the + tumult. + </p> + <p> + All sought at length in united indignation for the Lady A-Kuei, but she + had modestly withdrawn to the Pearl Pavilion in the Imperial Garden and, + foreseeing anxieties, had there secured herself on hearing the opening of + the Royal Speech. + </p> + <p> + Finally the ladies were led away by their attendants, weeping, lamenting, + raging, according to their several dispositions, and the Pearl Empress, + left with her own maidens, beheld the floor strewn with jade pins, + kingfisher and coral jewels, and even with fragments of silk and gauze. + Nor was she any nearer the solution of the desired secret. + </p> + <p> + That night she tossed upon a bed sleepless though heaped with down, and + her mind raged like a fire up and down all possible answers to the riddle, + but none would serve. Then, at the dawn, raising herself on one august + elbow she called to her venerable nurse and foster mother, the Lady Ma, + wise and resourceful in the affairs and difficulties of women, and, + repeating the circumstances, demanded her counsel. + </p> + <p> + The Lady Ma considering the matter long and deeply, slowly replied: + </p> + <p> + “This is a great riddle and dangerous, for to intermeddle with the divine + secrets is the high road to the Yellow Springs (death). But the child of + my breasts and my exalted Mistress shall never ask in vain, for a thwarted + curiosity is dangerous as a suppressed fever. I will conceal myself + nightly in the Dragon Bedchamber and this will certainly unveil the truth. + And if I perish I perish.” + </p> + <p> + It is impossible to describe how the Empress heaped Lady Ma with costly + jewels and silken brocades and taels of silver beyond measuring—how + she placed on her breast the amulet of jade that had guarded herself from + all evil influences, how she called the ancestral spirits to witness that + she would provide for the Lady Ma’s remotest descendants if she lost her + life in this sublime devotion to duty. + </p> + <p> + That night Lady Ma concealed herself behind the Imperial couch in the + Dragon Chamber, to await the coming of the Son of Heaven. Slowly dripped + the water-clock as the minutes fled away; sorely ached the venerable limbs + of the Lady Ma as she crouched in the shadows and saw the rising moon + scattering silver through the elegant traceries of carved ebony and ivory; + wildly beat her heart as delicately tripping footsteps approached the + Dragon Chamber, and the Princess of Feminine Propriety, attended by her + maidens, ascended the Imperial Couch and hastily dismissed them. Yet no + sweet repose awaited this favored lady. The Lady Ma could hear her + smothered sobs, her muttered exclamations—nay could even feel the + couch itself tremble as the Princess uttered the hated name of the Lady + A-Kuei, the poison of jealousy running in every vein. It was impossible + for Lady Ma to decide which was the most virulent, this, or the poison of + curiosity in the heart of the Pearl Empress. Though she loved not the + Princess she was compelled to pity such suffering. But all thought was + banished by the approach of the Yellow Emperor, prepared for repose and + unattended, in simple but divine grandeur. + </p> + <p> + It cannot indeed be supposed that a Celestial Emperor is human, yet there + was mortality in the start which his Augustness gave when the Princess of + Feminine Propriety flinging herself from the Dragon couch, threw herself + at his feet and with tears that flowed like that river known as “The + Sorrow of China,” demanded to know what she had done that another should + be preferred before her; reciting in frantic haste such imperfections of + the Lady A-Kuei’s appearance as she could recall (or invent) in the haste + of that agitating moment. + </p> + <p> + “That one of her eyes is larger than the other—no human being can + doubt” sobbed the lady—“and surely your Divine Majesty cannot be + aware that her hair reaches but to her waist, and that there is a brown + mole on the nape of her neck? When she sings it resembles the croak of the + crow. It is true that most of the Palace ladies are chosen for anything + but beauty, yet she is the most ill-favored. And is it this—this + bat-faced lady who is preferred to me! Would I had never been born: Yet + even your Majesty’s own lips have told me I am fair!” + </p> + <p> + The Yellow Emperor supported the form of the Princess in his arms. There + are moments when even a Son of Heaven is but human. “Fair as the rainbow,” + he murmured, and the Princess faintly smiled; then gathering the + resolution of the Philosopher he added manfully—“But the Lady A-Kuei + is incomparable. And the reason is—” + </p> + <p> + The Lady Ma eagerly stretched her head forward with a hand to either ear. + But the Princess of Feminine Propriety with one shriek had swooned and in + the hurry of summoning attendants and causing her to be conveyed to her + own apartments that precious sentence was never completed. + </p> + <p> + Still the Lady Ma groveled behind the Dragon Couch as the Son of Heaven, + left alone, approached the veranda and apostrophizing the moon, murmured— + </p> + <p> + “O loveliest pale watcher of the destinies of men, illuminate the beauty + of the Lady A-Kuei, and grant that I who have never seen that beauty may + never see it, but remain its constant admirer!” So saying, he sought his + solitary couch and slept, while the Lady Ma, in a torment of bewilderment, + glided from the room. + </p> + <p> + The matter remained in suspense for several days. The White Jade Concubine + was the next lady commanded to the Dragon Chamber, and again the Lady Ma + was in her post of observation. Much she heard, much she saw that was not + to the point, but the scene ended as before by the dismissal of the lady + in tears, and the departure of the Lady Ma in ignorance of the secret. + </p> + <p> + The Emperor’s peace was ended. + </p> + <p> + The singular circumstance was that the Lady A-Kuei was never summoned by + the Yellow Emperor. Eagerly as the Empress watched, no token of affection + for her was ever visible. Nothing could be detected. It was inexplicable. + Finally, devoured by curiosity that gave her no respite, she resolved on a + stratagem that should dispel the mystery, though it carried with it a risk + on which she trembled to reflect. It was the afternoon of a languid summer + day, and the Yellow Emperor, almost unattended, had come to pay a visit of + filial respect to the Pearl Empress. She received him with the ceremony + due to her sovereign in the porcelain pavilion of the Eastern Gardens, + with the lotos fish ponds before them, and a faint breeze occasionally + tinkling the crystal wind-bells that decorated the shrubs on the cloud and + dragon-wrought slopes of the marble approach. A bird of brilliant plumage + uttered a cry of reverence from its gold cage as the Son of Heaven + entered. As was his occasional custom, and after suitable inquiries as to + his parent’s health, the attendants were all dismissed out of earshot and + the Emperor leaned on his cushions and gazed reflectively into the + sunshine outside. So had the Court Artist represented him as “The + Incarnation of Philosophic Calm.” + </p> + <p> + “These gardens are fair,” said the Empress after a respectful silence, + moving her fan illustrated with the emblem of Immortality—the Ho + Bird. + </p> + <p> + “Fair indeed,” returned the Emperor.—“It might be supposed that all + sorrow and disturbance would be shut without the Forbidden Precincts. Yet + it is not so. And though the figures of my ladies moving among the flowers + appear at this distance instinct with joy, yet—” + </p> + <p> + He was silent. + </p> + <p> + “They know not,” said the Empress with solemnity “that death entered the + Forbidden Precincts but last night. A disembodied spirit has returned to + its place and doubtless exists in bliss.” “Indeed?” returned the Yellow + Emperor with indifference—“yet if the spirit is absorbed into the + Source whence it came, and the bones have crumbled into nothingness, where + does the Ego exist? The dead are venerable, but no longer of interest.” + </p> + <p> + “Not even when they were loved in life?” said the Empress, caressing the + bird in the cage with one jewelled finger, but attentively observing her + son from the corner of her august eye. “They were; they are not,” he + remarked sententiously and stifling a yawn; it was a drowsy afternoon. + “But who is it that has abandoned us? Surely not the Lady Ma—your + Majesty’s faithful foster-mother?” + </p> + <p> + “A younger, a lovelier spirit has sought the Yellow Springs,” replied the + trembling Empress. “I regret to inform your Majesty that a sudden + convulsion last night deprived the Lady A-Kuei of life. I would not permit + the news to reach you lest it should break your august night’s rest.” + </p> + <p> + There was a silence, then the Emperor turned his eyes serenely upon his + Imperial Mother. “That the statement of my august Parent is merely—let + us say—allegoric—does not detract from its interest. But had + the Lady A-Kuei in truth departed to the Yellow Springs I should none the + less have received the news without uneasiness. What though the sun set—is + not the memory of his light all surpassing?” + </p> + <p> + No longer could the Pearl Empress endure the excess of her curiosity. + Deeply kowtowing, imploring pardon, with raised hands and tears which no + son dare neglect, she besought the Emperor to enlighten her as to this + mystery, recounting his praises of the lady and his admission that he had + never beheld her, and all the circumstances connected with this remarkable + episode. She omitted only, (from considerations of delicacy and others,) + the vigils of the Lady Ma in the Dragon Chamber. The Emperor, sighing, + looked upon the ground, and for a time was silent. Then he replied as + follows: + </p> + <p> + “Willingly would I have kept silence, but what child dare withstand the + plea of a parent? Is it necessary to inform the Heavenly Empress that + beauty seen is beauty made familiar and that familiarity is the foe of + admiration? How is it possible that I should see the Princess of Feminine + Propriety, for instance, by night and day without becoming aware of her + imperfections as well as her graces? How awake in the night without + hearing the snoring of the White Jade Concubine and considering the mouth + from which it issues as the less lovely. How partake of the society of any + woman without finding her chattering as the crane, avid of admiration, + jealous, destructive of philosophy, fatal to composure, fevered with + curiosity; a creature, in short, a little above the gibbon, but infinitely + below the notice of the sage, save as a temporary measure of amusement in + itself unworthy the philosopher. The faces of all my ladies are known to + me. All are fair and all alike. But one night, as I lay in the Dragon + Couch, lost in speculation, absorbed in contemplation of the Yin and the + Yang, the night passed for the solitary dreamer as a dream. In the + darkness of the dawn I rose still dreaming, and departed to the Pearl + Pavilion in the garden, and there remained an hour viewing the sunrise and + experiencing ineffable opinions on the destiny of man. Returning then to a + couch which I believed to have been that of the solitary philosopher I + observed a depression where another form had lain, and in it a jade + hairpin such as is worn by my junior beauties. Petrified with amazement at + the display of such reserve, such continence, such august self-restraint, + I perceived that, lost in my thoughts, I had had an unimagined companion + and that this gentle reminder was from her gentle hand. But whom? I knew + not. I then observed Lo Cheng the Court Artist in attendance and + immediately despatched him to make secret enquiry and ascertain the name + and circumstances of that beauty who, unknown, had shared my vigil. I + learnt on his return that it was the Lady A-Kuei. I had entered the Dragon + Chamber in a low moonlight, and guessed not her presence. She spoke no + word. Finding her Imperial Master thus absorbed, she invited no attention, + nor in any way obtruded her beauties upon my notice. Scarcely did she draw + breath. Yet reflect upon what she might have done! The night passed and I + remained entirely unconscious of her presence, and out of respect she + would not sleep but remained reverently and modestly awake, assisting, if + it may so be expressed, at a humble distance, in the speculations which + held me prisoner. What a pearl was here! On learning these details by Lo + Cheng from her own roseate lips, and remembering the unexampled temptation + she had resisted (for well she knew that had she touched the Emperor the + Philosopher had vanished) I despatched an august rescript to this favored + Lady, conferring on her the degree of Incomparable Beauty of the First + Rank. On condition of secrecy.” + </p> + <p> + The Pearl Empress, still in deepest bewilderment, besought his majesty to + proceed. He did so, with his usual dignity. + </p> + <p> + “Though my mind could not wholly restrain its admiration, yet secrecy was + necessary, for had the facts been known, every lady, from the Princess of + Feminine Propriety to the Junior Beauty of the Bed Chamber would + henceforward have observed only silence and a frigid decorum in the Dragon + Bed Chamber. And though the Emperor be a philosopher, yet a philosopher is + still a man, and there are moments when decorum—” + </p> + <p> + The Emperor paused discreetly; then resumed. + </p> + <p> + “The world should not be composed entirely of A-Kueis, yet in my mind I + behold the Incomparable Lady fair beyond expression. Like the moon she + sails glorious in the heavens to be adored only in vision as the one woman + who could respect the absorption of the Emperor, and of whose beauty as + she lay beside him the philosopher could remain unconscious and therefore + untroubled in body. To see her, to find her earthly, would be an + experience for which the Emperor might have courage, but the philosopher + never. And attached to all this is a moral:” + </p> + <p> + The Pearl Empress urgently inquired its nature. + </p> + <p> + “Let the wisdom of my august parent discern it,” said the Emperor + sententiously. + </p> + <p> + “And the future?” she inquired. + </p> + <p> + “The—let us call it parable—” said the Emperor politely—“with + which your Majesty was good enough to entertain me, has suggested a + precaution to my mind. I see now a lovely form moving among the flowers. + It is possible that it may be the Incomparable Lady, or that at any moment + I may come upon her and my ideal be shattered. This must be safeguarded. I + might command her retirement to her native province, but who shall insure + me against the weakness of my own heart demanding her return? No. Let Your + Majesty’s words spoken—well—in parable, be fulfilled in truth. + I shall give orders to the Chief Eunuch that the Incomparable Lady tonight + shall drink the Draught of Crushed Pearls, and be thus restored to the + sphere that alone is worthy of her. Thus are all anxieties soothed, and + the honours offered to her virtuous spirit shall be a glorious repayment + of the ideal that will ever illuminate my soul.” + </p> + <p> + The Empress was speechless. She had borne the Emperor in her womb, but the + philosopher outsoared her comprehension. She retired, leaving his Majesty + in a reverie, endeavoring herself to grasp the moral of which he had + spoken, for the guidance of herself and the ladies concerned. But whether + it inculcated reserve or the reverse in the Dragon Chamber, and what the + Imperial ladies should follow as an example she was, to the end of her + life, totally unable to say. Philosophy indeed walks on the heights. We + cannot all expect to follow it. + </p> + <p> + That night the Incomparable Lady drank the Draught of Crushed Pearls. + </p> + <p> + The Princess of Feminine Propriety and the White Jade Concubine, learning + these circumstances, redoubled their charms, their coquetries and their + efforts to occupy what may be described as the inner sanctuary of the + Emperor’s esteem. Both lived to a green old age, wealthy and honored, + alike firm in the conviction that if the Incomparable Lady had not shown + herself so superior to temptation the Emperor might have been on the whole + better pleased, whatever the sufferings of the philosopher. Both lived to + be the tyrants of many generations of beauties at the Celestial Court. + Both were assiduous in their devotions before the spirit tablet of the + departed lady, and in recommending her example of reserve and humility to + every damsel whom it might concern. + </p> + <p> + It will probably occur to the reader of this unique but veracious story + that there is more in it than meets the eye, and more than the one moral + alluded to by the Emperor according to the point of view of the different + actors. + </p> + <p> + To the discernment of the reader it must accordingly be left. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN + </h2> + <h3> + A Story of Burma + </h3> + <p> + Most wonderful is the Irawadi, the mighty river of Burma. In all the world + elsewhere is no such river, bearing the melted snows from its mysterious + sources in the high places of the mountains. The dawn rises upon its + league-wide flood; the moon walks upon it with silver feet. It is the + pulsing heart of the land, living still though so many rules and rulers + have risen and fallen beside it, their pomps and glories drifting like + flotsam dawn the river to the eternal ocean that is the end of all—and + the beginning. Dead civilizations strew its banks, dreaming in the torrid + sunshine of glories that were—of blood-stained gold, jewels wept + from woeful crowns, nightmare dreams of murder and terror; dreaming also + of heavenly beauty, for the Lord Buddha looks down in moonlight peace upon + the land that leaped to kiss His footprints, that has laid its heart in + the hand of the Blessed One, and shares therefore in His bliss and + content. The Land of the Lord Buddha, where the myriad pagodas lift their + golden flames of worship everywhere, and no idlest wind can pass but it + ruffles the bells below the knees until they send forth their silver + ripple of music to swell the hymn of praise! + </p> + <p> + There is a little bay on the bank of the flooding river—a silent, + deserted place of sanddunes and small bills. When a ship is in sight, some + poor folk come and spread out the red lacquer that helps their scanty + subsistence, and the people from the passing ship land and barter and in a + few minutes are gone on their busy way and silence settles down once more. + They neither know nor care that, near by, a mighty city spread its + splendour for miles along the river bank, that the king known as Lord of + the Golden Palace, The Golden Foot, Lord of the White Elephant, held his + state there with balls of magnificence, obsequious women, fawning + courtiers and all the riot and colour of an Eastern tyranny. How should + they care? Now there are ruins—ruins, and the cobras slip in and out + through the deserted holy places. They breed their writhing young in the + sleeping-chambers of queens, the tigers mew in the moonlight, and the + giant spider, more terrible than the cobra, strikes with its black + poison-claw and, paralyzing the life of the victim, sucks its brain with + slow, lascivious pleasure. + </p> + <p> + Are these foul creatures more dreadful than some of the men, the women, + who dwelt in these palaces—the more evil because of the human brain + that plotted and foresaw? That is known only to the mysterious Law that in + silence watches and decrees. + </p> + <p> + But this is a story of the dead days of Pagan, by the Irawadi, and it will + be shown that, as the Lotus of the Lord Buddha grows up a white splendour + from the black mud of the depths, so also may the soul of a woman. + </p> + <p> + In the days of the Lord of the White Elephant, the King Pagan Men, was a + boy named Mindon, son of second Queen and the King. So, at least, it was + said in the Golden Palace, but those who knew the secrets of such matters + whispered that, when the King had taken her by the hand she came to him no + maid, and that the boy was the son of an Indian trader. Furthermore it was + said that she herself was woman of the Rajputs, knowledgeable in spells, + incantations and elemental spirits such as the Beloos that terribly haunt + waste places, and all Powers that move in the dark, and that thus she had + won the King. Certainly she had been captured by the King’s war-boats off + the coast from a trading-ship bound for Ceylon, and it was her story that, + because of her beauty, she was sent thither to serve as concubine to the + King, Tissa of Ceylon. Being captured, she was brought to the Lord of the + Golden Palace. The tongue she spoke was strange to all the fighting men, + but it was wondrous to see how swiftly she learnt theirs and spoke it with + a sweet ripple such as is in the throat of a bird. + </p> + <p> + She was beautiful exceedingly, with a colour of pale gold upon her and + lengths of silk-spun hair, and eyes like those of a jungle-deer, and water + might run beneath the arch of her foot without wetting it, and her breasts + were like the cloudy pillows where the sun couches at setting. Now, at + Pagan, the name they called her was Dwaymenau, but her true name, known + only to herself, was Sundari, and she knew not the Law of the Blessed + Buddha but was a heathen accursed. In the strong hollow of her hand she + held the heart of the King, so that on the birth of her son she had risen + from a mere concubine to be the second Queen and a power to whom all + bowed. The First Queen, Maya, languished in her palace, her pale beauty + wasting daily, deserted and lonely, for she had been the light of the + King’s eyes until the coming of the Indian woman, and she loved her lord + with a great love and was a noble woman brought up in honour and all + things becoming a queen. But sigh as she would, the King came never. All + night he lay in the arms of Dwaymenau, all day he sat beside her, whether + at the great water pageants or at the festival when the dancing-girls + swayed and postured before him in her gilded chambers. Even when he went + forth to hunt the tiger, she went with him as far as a woman may go, and + then stood back only because he would not risk his jewel, her life. So all + that was evil in the man she fostered and all that was good she cherished + not at all, fearing lest he should return to the Queen. At her will he had + consulted the Hiwot Daw, the Council of the Woon-gyees or Ministers, + concerning a divorce of the Queen, but this they told him could not be + since she had kept all the laws of Manu, being faithful, noble and + beautiful and having borne him a son. + </p> + <p> + For, before the Indian woman had come to the King, the Queen had borne a + son, Ananda, and he was pale and slender and the King despised him because + of the wiles of Dwaymenau, saying he was fit only to sit among the women, + having the soul of a slave, and he laughed bitterly as the pale child + crouched in the corner to see him pass. If his eyes had been clear, he + would have known that here was no slave, but a heart as much greater than + his own as the spirit is stronger than the body. But this he did not know + and he strode past with Dwaymenau’s boy on his shoulder, laughing with + cruel glee. + </p> + <p> + And this boy, Mindon, was beautiful and strong as his mother, pale olive + of face, with the dark and crafty eyes of the cunning Indian traders, with + black hair and a body straight, strong and long in the leg for his years—apt + at the beginnings of bow, sword and spear—full of promise, if the + promise was only words and looks. + </p> + <p> + And so matters rested in the palace until Ananda had ten years and Mindon + nine. + </p> + <p> + It was the warm and sunny winter and the days were pleasant, and on a + certain day the Queen, Maya, went with her ladies to worship the Blessed + One at the Thapinyu Temple, looking down upon the swiftly flowing river. + The temple was exceedingly rich and magnificent, so gilded with pure + gold-leaf that it appeared of solid gold. And about the upper part were + golden bells beneath the jewelled knee, which wafted very sweetly in the + wind and gave forth a crystal-clear music. The ladies bore in their hands + more gold-leaf, that they might acquire merit by offering this for the + service of the Master of the Law, and indeed this temple was the offering + of the Queen herself, who, because she bore the name of the Mother of the + Lord, excelled in good works and was the Moon of this lower world in + charity and piety. + </p> + <p> + Though wan with grief and anxiety, this Queen was beautiful. Her eyes, + like mournful lakes of darkness, were lovely in the pale ivory of her + face. Her lips were nobly cut and calm, and by the favour of the Guardian + Nats, she was shaped with grace and health, a worthy mother of kings. Also + she wore her jewels like a mighty princess, a magnificence to which all + the people shikoed as she passed, folding their hands and touching the + forehead while they bowed down, kneeling. + </p> + <p> + Before the colossal image of the Holy One she made her offering and, + attended by her women, she sat in meditation, drawing consolation from the + Tranquillity above her and the silence of the shrine. This ended, the + Queen rose and did obeisance to the Lord and, retiring, paced back beneath + the White Canopy and entered the courtyard where the palace stood—a + palace of noble teakwood, brown and golden and carved like lace into + strange fantasies of spires and pinnacles and branches where Nats and Tree + Spirits and Beloos and swaying river maidens mingled and met amid fruits + and leaves and flowers in a wild and joyous confusion. The faces, the + blowing garments, whirled into points with the swiftness of the dance, + were touched with gold, and so glad was the building that it seemed as if + a very light wind might whirl it to the sky, and even the sad Queen + stopped to rejoice in its beauty as it blossomed in the sunlight. + </p> + <p> + And even as she paused, her little son Ananda rushed to meet her, pale and + panting, and flung himself into her arms with dry sobs like those of an + overrun man. She soothed him until he could speak, and then the grief made + way in a rain of tears. + </p> + <p> + “Mindon has killed my deer. He bared his knife, slit his throat and cast + him in the ditch and there he lies.” + </p> + <p> + “There will he not lie long!” shouted Mindon, breaking from the palace to + the group where all were silent now. “For the worms will eat him and the + dogs pick clean his bones, and he will show his horns at his lords no + more. If you loved him, White-liver, you should have taught him better + manners to his betters.” + </p> + <p> + With a stifled shriek Ananda caught the slender knife from his girdle and + flew at Mindon like a cat of the woods. Such things were done daily by + young and old, and this was a long sorrow come to a head between the boys. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly, lifting the hangings of the palace gateway, before them stood + the mother of Mindon, the Lady Dwaymenau, pale as wool, having heard the + shout of her boy, so that the two Queens faced each other, each holding + the shoulders of her son, and the ladies watched, mute as fishes, for it + was years since these two had met. + </p> + <p> + “What have you done to my son?” breathed Maya the Queen, dry in the throat + and all but speechless with passion. For indeed his face, for a child, was + ghastly. + </p> + <p> + “Look at his knife! What would he do to my son?” Dwaymenau was stiff with + hate and spoke as to a slave. + </p> + <p> + “He has killed my deer and mocks me because I loved him, He is the devil + in this place. Look at the devils in his eyes. Look quick before he + smiles, my mother.” + </p> + <p> + And indeed, young as the boy was, an evil thing sat in either eye and + glittered upon them. Dwaymenau passed her hand across his brow, and he + smiled and they were gone. + </p> + <p> + “The beast ran at me and would have flung me with his horns,” he said, + looking up brightly at his mother. “He had the madness upon him. I struck + once and he was dead. My father would have done the same. + </p> + <p> + “That would he not!” said Queen Maya bitterly. “Your father would have + crept up, fawning on the deer, and offered him the fruits he loved, + stroking him the while. And in trust the beast would have eaten, and the + poison in the fruit would have slain him. For the people of your father + meet neither man nor beast in fair fight. With a kiss they stab!” + </p> + <p> + Horror kept the women staring and silent. No one had dreamed that the + scandal had reached the Queen. Never had she spoken or looked her + knowledge but endured all in patience. Now it sprang out like a sword + among them, and they feared for Maya, whom all loved. + </p> + <p> + Mindon did not understand. It was beyond him, but he saw he was scorned. + Dwaymenau, her face rigid as a mask, looked pitilessly at the shaking + Queen, and each word dropped from her mouth, hard and cold as the falling + of diamonds. She refused the insult. + </p> + <p> + “If it is thus you speak of our lord and my love, what wonder he forsakes + you? Mother of a craven milk runs in your veins and his for blood. Take + your slinking brat away and weep together! My son and I go forth to meet + the King as he comes from hunting, and to welcome him kingly!” She caught + her boy to her with a magnificent gesture; he flung his little arm about + her, and laughing loudly they went off together. + </p> + <p> + The tension relaxed a little when they were out of sight. The women knew + that, since Dwaymenau had refused to take the Queen’s meaning, she would + certainly not carry her complaint to the King. They guessed at her reason + for this forbearance, but, be that as it might, it was Certain that no + other person would dare to tell him and risk the fate that waits the + messenger of evil. + </p> + <p> + The eldest lady led away the Queen, now almost tottering in the reaction + of fear and pain. Oh, that she had controlled her speech! Not for her own + sake—for she had lost all and the beggar can lose no more—but + for the boy’s sake, the unloved child that stood between the stranger and + her hopes. For him she had made a terrible enemy. Weeping, the boy + followed her. + </p> + <p> + “Take comfort, little son,” she said, drawing him to her tenderly. “The + deer can suffer no more. For the tigers, he does not fear them. He runs in + green woods now where there is none to hunt. He is up and away. The + Blessed One was once a deer as gentle as yours.” + </p> + <p> + But still the child wept, and the Queen broke down utterly. “Oh, if life + be a dream, let us wake, let us wake!” she sobbed. “For evil things walk + in it that cannot live in the light. Or let us dream deeper and forget. + Go, little son, yet stay—for who can tell what waits us when the + King comes. Let us meet him here.” + </p> + <p> + For she believed that Dwaymenau would certainly carry the tale of her + speech to the King, and, if so, what hope but death together? + </p> + <p> + That night, after the feasting, when the girls were dancing the dance of + the fairies and spirits, in gold dresses, winged on the legs and + shoulders, and high, gold-spired and pinnacled caps, the King missed the + little Prince, Ananda, and asked why he was absent. + </p> + <p> + No one answered, the women looking upon each other, until Dwaymenau, + sitting beside him, glimmering with rough pearls and rubies, spoke + smoothly: “Lord, worshipped and beloved, the two boys quarreled this day, + and Ananda’s deer attacked our Mindon. He had a madness upon him and + thrust with his horns. But, Mindon, your true son, flew in upon him and in + a great fight he slit the beast’s throat with the knife you gave him. Did + he not well?” + </p> + <p> + “Well,” said the King briefly. “But is there no hurt? Have searched? For + he is mine.” + </p> + <p> + There was arrogance in the last sentence and her proud soul rebelled, but + smoothly as ever she spoke: “I have searched and there is not the littlest + scratch. But Ananda is weeping because the deer is dead, and his mother is + angry. What should I do?” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing. Ananda is worthless and worthless let him be! And for that pale + shadow that was once a woman, let her be forgotten. And now, drink, my + Queen!” + </p> + <p> + And Dwaymenau drank but the drink was bitter to her, for a ghost had risen + upon her that day. She had never dreamed that such a scandal had been + spoken, and it stunned her very soul with fear, that the Queen should know + her vileness and the cheat she had put upon the King. As pure maid he had + received her, and she knew, none better, what the doom would be if his + trust were broken and he knew the child not his. She herself had seen this + thing done to a concubine who had a little offended. She was thrust living + in a sack and this hung between two earthen jars pierced with small holes, + and thus she was set afloat on the terrible river. And not till the slow + filling and sinking of the jars was the agony over and the cries for mercy + stilled. No, the Queen’s speech was safe with her, but was it safe with + the Queen? For her silence, Dwaymenau must take measures. + </p> + <p> + Then she put it all aside and laughed and jested with the King and did + indeed for a time forget, for she loved him for his black-browed beauty + and his courage and royalty and the childlike trust and the man’s passion + that mingled in him for her. Daily and nightly such prayers as she made to + strange gods were that she might bear a son, true son of his. + </p> + <p> + Next day, in the noonday stillness when all slept, she led her young son + by the hand to her secret chamber, and, holding him upon her knees in that + rich and golden place, she lifted his face to hers and stared into his + eyes. And so unwavering was her gaze, so mighty the hard, unblinking stare + that his own was held against it, and he stared back as the earth stares + breathless at the moon. Gradually the terror faded out of his eyes; they + glazed as if in a trance; his head fell stupidly against her bosom; his + spirit stood on the borderland of being and waited. + </p> + <p> + Seeing this, she took his palm and, molding it like wax, into the cup of + it she dropped clear fluid from a small vessel of pottery with the fylfot + upon its side and the disks of the god Shiva. And strange it was to see + that lore of India in the palace where the Blessed Law reigned in peace. + Then, fixing her eyes with power upon Mindon, she bade him, a pure child, + see for her in its clearness. + </p> + <p> + “Only virgin-pure can see!” she muttered, staring into his eyes. “See! + See!” + </p> + <p> + The eyes of Mindon were closing. He half opened them and looked dully at + his palm. His face was pinched and yellow. + </p> + <p> + “A woman—a child, on a long couch. Dead! I see!” + </p> + <p> + “See her face. Is her head crowned with the Queen’s jewels? See!” + </p> + <p> + “Jewels. I cannot see her face. It is hidden.” + </p> + <p> + “Why is it hidden?” + </p> + <p> + “A robe across her face. Oh, let me go!” + </p> + <p> + “And the child? See!” + </p> + <p> + “Let me go. Stop—my head—my head! I cannot see. The child is + hidden. Her arm holds it. A woman stoops above them.” + </p> + <p> + “A woman? Who? Is it like me? Speak! See!” + </p> + <p> + “A woman. It is like you, mother—it is like you. I fear very + greatly. A knife—a knife! Blood! I cannot see—I cannot speak! + I—I sleep.” + </p> + <p> + His face was ghastly white now, his body cold and collapsed. Terrified, + she caught him to her breast and relaxed the power of her will upon him. + For that moment, she was only the passionate mother and quaked to think + she might have hurt him. An hour passed and he slept heavily in her arms, + and in agony she watched to see the colour steal back into the olive cheek + and white lips. In the second hour he waked and stretched himself + indolently, yawning like a cat. Her tears dropped like rain upon him as + she clasped him violently to her. + </p> + <p> + He writhed himself free, petulant and spoilt. “Let me be. I hate kisses + and women’s tricks. I want to go forth and play. I have had a devil’s + dream. + </p> + <p> + “What did you see in your dream, prince of my heart?” She caught + frantically at the last chance. + </p> + <p> + “A deer—a tiger. I have forgotten. Let me go.” He ran off and she + sat alone with her doubts and fears. Yet triumph coloured them too. She + saw a dead woman, a dead child, and herself bending above them. She hid + the vessel in her bosom and went out among her women. + </p> + <p> + Weeks passed, and never a word that she dreaded from Maya the Queen. The + women of Dwaymenau, questioning the Queen’s women, heard that she seemed + to have heavy sorrow upon her. Her eyes were like dying lamps and she + faded as they. The King never entered her palace. Drowned in Dwaymenau’s + wiles and beauty, her slave, her thrall, he forgot all else but his + fighting, his hunting and his long war-boats, and whether the Queen lived + or died, he cared nothing. Better indeed she should die and her place be + emptied for the beloved, without offence to her powerful kindred. + </p> + <p> + And now he was to sail upon a raid against the Shan Tsaubwa, who had + denied him tribute of gold and jewels and slaves. Glorious were the boats + prepared for war, of brown teak and gilded until they shone like gold. + Seventy men rowed them, sword and lance beside each. Warriors crowded + them, flags and banners fluttered about them; the shining water reflected + the pomp like a mirror and the air rang with song. Dwaymenau stood beside + the water with her women, bidding the King farewell, and so he saw her, + radiant in the dawn, with her boy beside her, and waved his hand to the + last. + </p> + <p> + The ships were gone and the days languished a little at Pagan. They missed + the laughter and royalty of the King, and few men, and those old and weak, + were left in the city. The pulse of life beat slower. + </p> + <p> + And Dwaymenau took rule in the Golden Palace. Queen Maya sat like one in a + dream and questioned nothing, and Dwaymenau ruled with wisdom but none + loved her. To all she was the interloper, the witch-woman, the out-land + upstart. Only the fear of the King guarded her and her boy, but that was + strong. The boys played together sometimes, Mindon tyrannizing and cruel, + Ananda fearing and complying, broken in spirit. + </p> + <p> + Maya the Queen walked daily in the long and empty Golden Hall of Audience, + where none came now that the King was gone, pacing up and down, gazing + wearily at the carved screens and all their woodland beauty of gods that + did not hear, of happy spirits that had no pity. Like a spirit herself she + passed between the red pillars, appearing and reappearing with steps that + made no sound, consumed with hate of the evil woman that had stolen her + joy. Like a slow fire it burned in her soul, and the face of the Blessed + One was hidden from her, and she had forgotten His peace. In that + atmosphere of hate her life dwindled. Her son’s dwindled also, and there + was talk among the women of some potion that Dwaymenau had been seen to + drop into his noontide drink as she went swiftly by. That might he the + gossip of malice, but he pined. His eyes were large like a young bird’s; + his hands like little claws. They thought the departing year would take + him with it. What harm? Very certainly the King would shed no tear. + </p> + <p> + It was a sweet and silent afternoon and she wandered in the great and + lonely hall, sickened with the hate in her soul and her fear for her boy. + Suddenly she heard flying footsteps—a boy’s, running in mad haste in + the outer hall, and, following them, bare feet, soft, thudding. + </p> + <p> + She stopped dead and every pulse cried—Danger! No time to think or + breathe when Mindon burst into sight, wild with terror and following close + beside him a man—a madman, a short bright dah in his grasp, his jaws + grinding foam, his wild eyes starting—one passion to murder. So + sometimes from the Nats comes pitiless fury, and men run mad and kill and + none knows why. + </p> + <p> + Maya the Queen stiffened to meet the danger. Joy swept through her soul; + her weariness was gone. A fierce smile showed her teeth—a smile of + hate, as she stood there and drew her dagger for defense. For defense—the + man would rend the boy and turn on her and she would not die. She would + live to triumph that the mongrel was dead, and her son, the Prince again + and his father’s joy—for his heart would turn to the child most + surely. Justice was rushing on its victim. She would see it and live + content, the long years of agony wiped out in blood, as was fitting. She + would not flee; she would see it and rejoice. And as she stood in gladness—these + broken thoughts rushing through her like flashes of lightning—Mindon + saw her by the pillar and, screaming in anguish for the first time, fled + to her for refuge. + </p> + <p> + She raised her knife to meet the staring eyes, the chalk white face, and + drive him back on the murderer. If the man failed, she would not! And even + as she did this a strange thing befell. Something stronger than hate swept + her away like a leaf on the river; something primeval that lives in the + lonely pangs of childbirth, that hides in the womb and breasts of the + mother. It was stronger than she. It was not the hated Mindoin—she + saw him no more. Suddenly it was the eternal Child, lifting dying, + appealing eyes to the Woman, as he clung to her knees. She did not think + this—she felt it, and it dominated her utterly. The Woman answered. + As if it had been her own flesh and blood, she swept the panting body + behind her and faced the man with uplifted dagger and knew her victory + assured, whether in life or death. On came the horrible rush, the flaming + eyes, and, if it was chance that set the dagger against his throat, it was + cool strength that drove it home and never wavered until the blood welling + from the throat quenched the flame in the wild eyes, and she stood + triumphing like a war-goddess, with the man at her feet. Then, strong and + flushed, Maya the Queen gathered the half-dead boy in her arms, and, both + drenched with blood, they moved slowly down the hall and outside met the + hurrying crowd, with Dwaymenau, whom the scream had brought to find her + son. + </p> + <p> + “You have killed him! She has killed him!” Scarcely could the Rajput woman + speak. She was kneeling beside him—he hideous with blood. “She hated + him always. She has murdered him. Seize her!” + </p> + <p> + “Woman, what matter your hates and mine?” the Queen said slowly. “The boy + is stark with fear. Carry him in and send for old Meh Shway Gon. Woman, be + silent!” + </p> + <p> + When a Queen commands, men and women obey, and a Queen commanded then. A + huddled group lifted the child and carried him away, Dwaymenau with them, + still uttering wild threats, and the Queen was left alone. + </p> + <p> + She could not realize what she had done and left undone. She could not + understand it. She had hated, sickened with loathing, as it seemed for + ages, and now, in a moment it had blown away like a whirlwind that is + gone. Hate was washed out of her soul and had left it cool and white as + the Lotus of the Blessed One. What power had Dwaymenau to hurt her when + that other Power walked beside her? She seemed to float above her in high + air and look down upon her with compassion. Strength, virtue flowed in her + veins; weakness, fear were fantasies. She could not understand, but knew + that here was perfect enlightenment. About her echoed the words of the + Blessed One: “Never in this world doth hatred cease by hatred, but only by + love. This is an old rule.” + </p> + <p> + “Whereas I was blind, now I see,” said Maya the Queen slowly to her own + heart. She had grasped the hems of the Mighty. + </p> + <p> + Words cannot speak the still passion of strength and joy that possessed + her. Her step was light. As she walked, her soul sang within her, for thus + it is with those that have received the Law. About them is the Peace. + </p> + <p> + In the dawn she was told that the Queen, Dwaymenau, would speak with her, + and without a tremor she who had shaken like a leaf at that name commanded + that she should enter. It was Dwaymenau that trembled as she came into + that unknown place. + </p> + <p> + With cloudy brows and eyes that would reveal no secret, she stood before + the high seat where the Queen sat pale and majestic. + </p> + <p> + “Is it well with the boy?” the Queen asked earnestly. + </p> + <p> + “Well,” said Dwaymenau, fingering the silver bosses of her girdle. + </p> + <p> + “Then—is there more to say?” The tone was that of the great lady who + courteously ends an audience. “There is more. The men brought in the body + and in its throat your dagger was sticking. And my son has told me that + your body was a shield to him. You offered your life for his. I did not + think to thank you—but I thank you.” She ended abruptly and still + her eyes had never met the Queen’s. + </p> + <p> + “I accept your thanks. Yet a mother could do no less.” + </p> + <p> + The tone was one of dismissal but still Dwaymenau lingered. + </p> + <p> + “The dagger,” she said and drew it from her bosom. On the clear, pointed + blade the blood had curdled and dried. “I never thought to ask a gift of + you, but this dagger is a memorial of my son’s danger. May I keep it?” + </p> + <p> + “As you will. Here is the sheath.” From her girdle she drew it—rough + silver, encrusted with rubies from the mountains. + </p> + <p> + The hand rejected it. + </p> + <p> + “Jewels I cannot take, but bare steel is a fitting gift between us two.” + </p> + <p> + “As you will.” + </p> + <p> + The Queen spoke compassionately, and Dwaymenau, still with veiled eyes, + was gone without fare well. The empty sheath lay on the seat—a + symbol of the sharp-edged hate that had passed out of her life. She + touched the sheath to her lips and, smiling, laid it away. + </p> + <p> + And the days went by and Dwaymenau came no more before her, and her days + were fulfilled with peace. And now again the Queen ruled in the palace + wisely and like a Queen, and this Dwaymenau did not dispute, but what her + thoughts were no man could tell. + </p> + <p> + Then came the end. + </p> + <p> + One night the city awakened to a wild alarm. A terrible fleet of war-boats + came sweeping along the river thick as locusts—the war fleet of the + Lord of Prome. Battle shouts broke the peace of the night to horror; axes + battered on the outer doors; the roofs of the outer buildings were all + aflame. It was no wonderful incident, but a common one enough of those + turbulent days—reprisal by a powerful ruler with raids and hates to + avenge on the Lord of the Golden Palace. It was indeed a right to be + gainsaid only by the strong arm, and the strong arm was absent; as for the + men of Pagan, if the guard failed and the women’s courage sank, they would + return to blackened walls, empty chambers and desolation. + </p> + <p> + At Pagan the guard was small, indeed, for the King’s greed of plunder had + taken almost every able man with him. Still, those who were left did what + they could, and the women, alert and brave, with but few exceptions, + gathered the children and handed such weapons as they could muster to the + men, and themselves, taking knives and daggers, helped to defend the inner + rooms. + </p> + <p> + In the farthest, the Queen, having given her commands and encouraged all + with brave words, like a wise, prudent princess, sat with her son beside + her. Her duty was now to him. Loved or unloved, he was still the heir, the + root of the House tree. If all failed, she must make ransom and terms for + him, and, if they died, it must be together. He, with sparkling eyes, gay + in the danger, stood by her. Thus Dwaymenau found them. + </p> + <p> + She entered quietly and without any display of emotion and stood before + the high seat. + </p> + <p> + “Great Queen”—she used that title for the first time—“the + leader is Meng Kyinyo of Prome. There is no mercy. The end is near. Our + men fall fast, the women are fleeing. I have come to say this thing: Save + the Prince.” + </p> + <p> + “And how?” asked the Queen, still seated. “I have no power.” + </p> + <p> + “I have sent to Maung Tin, abbot of the Golden Monastery, and he has said + this thing. In the Kyoung across the river he can hide one child among the + novices. Cut his hair swiftly and put upon him this yellow robe. The time + is measured in minutes.” + </p> + <p> + Then the Queen perceived, standing by the pillar, a monk of a stern, dark + presence, the creature of Dwaymenau. For an instant she pondered. Was the + woman selling the child to death? Dwaymenau spoke no word. Her face was a + mask. A minute that seemed an hour drifted by, and the yelling and shrieks + for mercy drew nearer. + </p> + <p> + “There will be pursuit,” said the Queen. “They will slay him on the river. + Better here with me.” + </p> + <p> + “There will be no pursuit.” Dwaymenau fixed her strange eyes on the Queen + for the first time. + </p> + <p> + What moved in those eyes? The Queen could not tell. But despairing, she + rose and went to the silent monk, leading the Prince by the hand. Swiftly + he stripped the child of the silk pasoh of royalty, swiftly he cut the + long black tresses knotted on the little head, and upon the slender golden + body he set the yellow robe worn by the Lord Himself on earth, and in the + small hand he placed the begging-bowl of the Lord. And now, remote and + holy, in the dress that is of all most sacred, the Prince, standing by the + monk, turned to his mother and looked with grave eyes upon her, as the + child Buddha looked upon his Mother—also a Queen. But Dwaymenau + stood by silent and lent no help as the Queen folded the Prince in her + arms and laid his hand in the hand of the monk and saw them pass away + among the pillars, she standing still and white. + </p> + <p> + She turned to her rival. “If you have meant truly, I thank you.” + </p> + <p> + “I have meant truly.” + </p> + <p> + She turned to go, but the Queen caught her by the hand. + </p> + <p> + “Why have you done this?” she asked, looking into the strange eyes of the + strange woman. + </p> + <p> + Something like tears gathered in them for a moment, but she brushed them + away as she said hurriedly: + </p> + <p> + “I was grateful. You saved my son. Is it not enough?” + </p> + <p> + “No, not enough!” cried the Queen. “There is more. Tell me, for death is + upon us.” + </p> + <p> + “His footsteps are near,” said the Indian. “I will speak. I love my lord. + In death I will not cheat him. What you have known is true. My child is no + child of his. I will not go down to death with a lie upon my lips. Come + and see.” + </p> + <p> + Dwaymenau was no more. Sundari, the Indian woman, awful and calm, led the + Queen down the long ball and into her own chamber, where Mindon, the + child, slept a drugged sleep. The Queen felt that she had never known her; + she herself seemed diminished in stature as she followed the stately + figure, with its still, dark face. Into this room the enemy were breaking, + shouldering their way at the door—a rabble of terrible faces. Their + fury was partly checked when only a sleeping child and two women + confronted them, but their leader, a grim and evil-looking man, strode + from the huddle. + </p> + <p> + “Where is the son of the King?” he shouted. “Speak, women! Whose is this + boy?” + </p> + <p> + Sundari laid her hand upon her son’s shoulder. Not a muscle of her face + flickered. + </p> + <p> + “This is his son.” + </p> + <p> + “His true son—the son of Maya the Queen?” + </p> + <p> + “His true son, the son of Maya the Queen.” + </p> + <p> + “Not the younger—the mongrel?” + </p> + <p> + “The younger—the mongrel died last week of a fever.” + </p> + <p> + Every moment of delay was precious. Her eyes saw only a monk and a boy + fleeing across the wide river. + </p> + <p> + “Which is Maya the Queen?” + </p> + <p> + “This,” said Sundari. “She cannot speak. It is her son—the Prince.” + </p> + <p> + Maya had veiled her face with her hands. Her brain swam, but she + understood the noble lie. This woman could love. Their lord would not be + left childless. Thought beat like pulses in her—raced along her + veins. She held her breath and was dumb. + </p> + <p> + His doubt was assuaged and the lust of vengeance was on him—a + madness seized the man. But even his own wild men shrank back a moment, + for to slay a sleeping child in cold blood is no man’s work. + </p> + <p> + “You swear it is the Prince. But why? Why do you not lie to save him if + you are the King’s woman?” + </p> + <p> + “Because his mother has trampled me to the earth. I am the Indian woman—the + mother of the younger, who is dead and safe. She jeered at me—she + mocked me. It is time I should see her suffer. Suffer now as I have + suffered, Maya the Queen!” + </p> + <p> + This was reasonable—this was like the women he had known. His doubt + was gone—he laughed aloud. + </p> + <p> + “Then feed full of vengeance!” he cried, and drove his knife through the + child’s heart. + </p> + <p> + For a moment Sundari wavered where she stood, but she held herself and was + rigid as the dead. + </p> + <p> + “Tha-du! Well done!” she said with an awful smile. “The tree is broken, + the roots cut. And now for us women—our fate, O master?” + </p> + <p> + “Wait here,” he answered. “Let not a hair of their heads be touched. Both + are fair. The two for me. For the rest draw lots when all is done.” + </p> + <p> + The uproar surged away. The two stood by the dead boy. So swift had been + his death that he lay as though he still slept—the black lashes + pressed upon his cheek. + </p> + <p> + With the heredity of their different races upon them, neither wept. But + silently the Queen opened her arms; wide as a woman that entreats she + opened them to the Indian Queen, and speechlessly the two clung together. + For a while neither spoke. + </p> + <p> + “My sister!” said Maya the Queen. And again, “O great of heart!” + </p> + <p> + She laid her cheek against Sundari’s, and a wave of solemn joy seemed to + break in her soul and flood it with life and light. + </p> + <p> + “Had I known sooner!” she said. “For now the night draws on.” + </p> + <p> + “What is time?” answered the Rajput woman. “We stand before the Lords of + Life and Death. The life you gave was yours, and I am unworthy to kiss the + feet of the Queen. Our lord will return and his son is saved. The House + can be rebuilt. My son and I were waifs washed up from the sea. Another + wave washes us back to nothingness. Tell him my story and he will loathe + me.” + </p> + <p> + “My lips are shut,” said the Queen. “Should I betray my sister’s honour? + When he speaks of the noble women of old, your name will be among them. + What matters which of us he loves and remembers? Your soul and mine have + seen the same thing, and we are one. But I—what have I to do with + life? The ship and the bed of the conqueror await us. Should we await + them, my sister?” + </p> + <p> + The bright tears glittered in the eyes of Sundari at the tender name and + the love in the face of the Queen. At last she accepted it. + </p> + <p> + “My sister, no,” she said, and drew from her bosom the dagger of Maya, + with the man’s blood rusted upon it. “Here is the way. I have kept this + dagger in token of my debt. Nightly have I kissed it, swearing that, when + the time came, I would repay my debt to the great Queen. Shall I go first + or follow, my sister?” + </p> + <p> + Her voice lingered on the word. It was precious to her. It was like clear + water, laying away the stain of the shameful years. + </p> + <p> + “Your arm is strong,” answered the Queen. “I go first. Because the King’s + son is safe, I bless you. For your love of the King, I love you. And here, + standing on the verge of life, I testify that the words of the Blessed One + are truth—that love is All; that hatred is Nothing.” + </p> + <p> + She bared the breast that this woman had made desolate—that, with + the love of this woman, was desolate ho longer, and, stooping, laid her + hand on the brow of Mindon. Once more they embraced, and then, strong and + true, and with the Rajput passion behind the blow, the stroke fell and + Sundari had given her sister the crowning mercy of deliverance. She laid + the body beside her own son, composing the stately limbs, the quiet + eyelids, the black lengths of hair into majesty. So, she thought, in the + great temple of the Rajput race, the Mother Goddess shed silence and awe + upon her worshippers. The two lay like mother and son—one slight + hand of the Queen she laid across the little body as if to guard it. + </p> + <p> + Her work done, she turned to the entrance and watched the dawn coming + glorious over the river. The men shouted and quarreled in the distance, + but she heeded them no more than the chattering of apes. Her heart was + away over the distance to the King, but with no passion now: so might a + mother have thought of her son. He was sleeping, forgetful of even her in + his dreams. What matter? She was glad at heart. The Queen was dearer to + her than the King—so strange is life; so healing is death. She + remembered without surprise that she had asked no forgiveness of the Queen + for all the cruel wrongs, for the deadly intent—had made no + confession. Again what matter? What is forgiveness when love is all? + </p> + <p> + She turned from the dawn-light to the light in the face of the Queen. It + was well. Led by such a hand, she could present herself without fear + before the Lords of Life and Death—she and the child. She smiled. + Life is good, but death, which is more life, is better. The son of the + King was safe, but her own son safer. + </p> + <p> + When the conqueror reentered the chamber, he found the dead Queen guarding + the dead child, and across her feet, as not worthy to lie beside her, was + the body of the Indian woman, most beautiful in death. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + FIRE OF BEAUTY + </h2> + <p> + (Salutation to Ganesa the Lord of Wisdom, and to Saraswate the Lady of + Sweet Speech!) + </p> + <p> + This story was composed by the Brahmin Visravas, that dweller on the banks + of holy Kashi; and though the events it records are long past, yet it is + absolutely and immutably true because, by the power of his yoga, he + summoned up every scene before him, and beheld the persons moving and + speaking as in life. Thus he had naught to do but to set down what befell. + </p> + <p> + What follows, that hath he seen. + </p> + <p> + I + </p> + <p> + Wide was the plain, the morning sun shining full upon it, drinking up the + dew as the Divine drinks up the spirit of man. Far it stretched, + resembling the ocean, and riding upon it like a stately ship was the + league-long Rock of Chitor. It is certainly by the favour of the Gods that + this great fortress of the Rajput Kings thus rises from the plain, leagues + in length, noble in height; and very strange it is to see the flat earth + fall away from it like waters from the bows of a boat, as it soars into + the sky with its burden of palaces and towers. + </p> + <p> + Here dwelt the Queen Padmini and her husband Bhimsi, the Rana of the + Rajputs. + </p> + <p> + The sight of the holy ascetic Visravas pierced even the secrets of the + Rani’s bower, where, in the inmost chamber of marble, carved until it + appeared like lace of the foam of the sea, she was seated upon cushions of + blue Bokhariot silk, like the lotus whose name she bore floating upon the + blue depths of the lake. She had just risen from the shallow bath of + marble at her feet. + </p> + <p> + Most beautiful was this Queen, a haughty beauty such as should be a Rajput + lady; for the name “Rajput” signifies Son of a King, and this lady was + assuredly the daughter of Kings and of no lesser persons. And since that + beauty is long since ashes (all things being transitory), it is permitted + to describe the mellowed ivory of her body, the smooth curves of her hips, + and the defiance of her glimmering bosom, half veiled by the long silken + tresses of sandal-scented hair which a maiden on either side, bowing + toward her, knotted upon her head. But even he who with his eyes has seen + it can scarce tell the beauty of her face—the slender arched nose, + the great eyes like lakes of darkness in the reeds of her curled lashes, + the mouth of roses, the glance, deer-like but proud, that courted and + repelled admiration. This cannot be told, nor could the hand of man paint + it. Scarcely could that fair wife of the Pandava Prince, Draupadi the + Beautiful (who bore upon her perfect form every auspicious mark) excel + this lady. + </p> + <p> + (Ashes—ashes! May Maheshwara have mercy upon her rebirths!) + </p> + <p> + Throughout India had run the fame of this beauty. In the bazaar of Kashmir + they told of it. It was recorded in the palaces of Travancore, and all the + lands that lay between; and in an evil hour—may the Gods curse the + mother that bore him!—it reached the ears of Allah-u-Din, the Moslem + dog, a very great fighting man who sat in Middle India, looting and + spoiling. + </p> + <p> + (Ahi! for the beauty that is as a burning flame!) + </p> + <p> + In the gardens beneath the windows of the Queen, the peacocks, those + maharajas of the birds, were spreading the bronze and emerald of their + tails. The sun shone on them as on heaps of jewels, so that they dazzled + the eyes. They stood about the feet of the ancient Brahmin sage, he who + had tutored the Queen in her childhood and given her wisdom as the + crest-jeweled of her loveliness. He, the Twice-born sat under the shade of + a neem tree, hearing the gurgle of the sacred waters from the Cow’s Mouth, + where the great tank shone under the custard-apple boughs; and, at peace + with all the world, he read in the Scripture which affirms the transience + of all things drifting across the thought of the Supreme like clouds upon + the surface of the Ocean. + </p> + <p> + (Ahi! that loveliness is also illusion!) + </p> + <p> + Her women placed about the Queen—that Lotus of Women—a robe of + silk of which none could say that it was green or blue, the noble colours + so mingled into each other under the latticed gold work of Kashi. They set + the jewels on her head, and wide thin rings of gold heavy with great + pearls in her ears. Upon the swell of her bosom they clasped the necklace + of table emeralds, large, deep, and full of green lights, which is the + token of the Chitor queens. Upon her slender ankles they placed the + chooris of pure soft gold, set also with grass-green emeralds, and the + delicate souls of her feet they reddened with lac. Nor were her arms + forgotten, but loaded with bangles so free from alloy that they could be + bent between the hands of a child. Then with fine paste they painted the + Symbol between her dark brows, and, rising, she shone divine as a nymph of + heaven who should cause the righteous to stumble in his austerities and + arrest even the glances of Gods. + </p> + <p> + (Ahi! that the Transient should be so fair!) + </p> + <p> + II + </p> + <p> + Now it was the hour that the Rana should visit her; for since the coming + of the Lotus Lady, he had forgotten his other women, and in her was all + his heart. He came from the Hall of Audience where petitions were heard, + and justice done to rich and poor; and as he came, the Queen, hearing his + step on the stone, dismissed her women, and smiling to know her + loveliness, bowed before him, even as the Goddess Uma bows before Him who + is her other half. + </p> + <p> + Now he was a tall man, with the falcon look of the Hill Rajputs, and + moustaches that curled up to his eyes, lion-waisted and lean in the flanks + like Arjoon himself, a very ruler of men; and as he came, his hand was on + the hilt of the sword that showed beneath his gold coat of khincob. On the + high cushions he sat, and the Rani a step beneath him; and she said, + raising her lotus eyes:— + </p> + <p> + “Speak, Aryaputra, (son of a noble father)—what hath befallen?” + </p> + <p> + And he, looking upon her beauty with fear, replied,— + </p> + <p> + “It is thy beauty, O wife, that brings disaster.” + </p> + <p> + “And how is this?” she asked very earnestly. + </p> + <p> + For a moment he paused, regarding her as might a stranger, as one who + considers a beauty in which he hath no part; and, drawn by this + strangeness, she rose and knelt beside him, pillowing her head upon his + heart. + </p> + <p> + “Say on,” she said in her voice of music. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> +He unfurled a scroll that he had crushed in his strong right hand, and +read aloud:— + + “‘Thus says Allah-u-Din, Shadow of God, Wonder of the Age, +Viceregent of Kings. We have heard that in the Treasury of Chitor is a +jewel, the like of which is not in the Four Seas—the work of the hand +of the Only God, to whom be praise! This jewel is thy Queen, the Lady +Padmini. Now, since the sons of the Prophet are righteous, I desire but +to look upon this jewel, and ascribing glory to the Creator, to depart +in peace. Granted requests are the bonds of friendship; therefore +lay the head of acquiescence in the dust of opportunity and name an +auspicious day.’” + </pre> + <p> + He crushed it again and flung it furiously from him on the marble. + </p> + <p> + “The insult is deadly. The sorry son of a debased mother! Well he knows + that to the meanest Rajput his women are sacred, and how much more the + daughters and wives of the Kings! The jackals feast on the tongue that + speaks this shame! But it is a threat, Beloved—a threat! Give me thy + counsel that never failed me yet.” + </p> + <p> + For the Rajputs take counsel with their women who are wise. + </p> + <p> + They were silent, each weighing the force of resistance that could be + made; and this the Rani knew even as he. + </p> + <p> + “It cannot be,” she said; “the very ashes of the dead would shudder to + hear. Shall the Queens of India be made the sport of the barbarians?” + </p> + <p> + Her husband looked upon her fair face. She could feel his heart labor + beneath her ear. + </p> + <p> + “True, wife; but the barbarians are strong. Our men are tigers, each one, + but the red dogs of the Dekkan can pull down the tiger, for they are many, + and he alone.” + </p> + <p> + Then that great Lady, accepting his words, and conscious of the danger, + murmured this, clinging to her husband:— + </p> + <p> + “There was a Princess of our line whose beauty made all other women seem + as waning moons in the sun’s splendour. And many great Kings sought her, + and there was contention and war. And, she, fearing that the Rajputs would + be crushed to powder between the warring Kings, sent unto each this + message: ‘Come on such and such a day, and thou shalt see my face and hear + my choice.’ And they, coming, rejoiced exceedingly, thinking each one that + he was the Chosen. So they came into the great Hall, and there was a + table, and somewhat upon it covered with a gold cloth; and an old veiled + woman lifted the gold, and the head of the Princess lay there with the + lashes like night upon her cheek, and between her lips was a little + scroll, saying this: ‘I have chosen my Lover and my Lord, and he is + mightiest, for he is Death.’—So the Kings went silently away. And + there was Peace.” + </p> + <p> + The music of her voice ceased, and the Rana clasped her closer. + </p> + <p> + “This I cannot do. Better die together. Let us take counsel with the + ancient Brahman, thy guru [teacher], for he is very wise.” + </p> + <p> + She clapped her hands, and the maidens returned, and, bowing, brought the + venerable Prabhu Narayan into the Presence, and again those roses retired. + </p> + <p> + Respectful salutation was then offered by the King and the Queen to that + saint, hoary with wisdom—he who had seen her grow into the + loveliness of the sea-born Shri, yet had never seen that loveliness; for + he had never raised his eyes above the chooris about her ankles. To him + the King related his anxieties; and he sat rapt in musing, and the two + waited in dutiful silence until long minutes had fallen away; and at the + last he lifted his head, weighted with wisdom, and spoke. + </p> + <p> + “O King, Descendant of Rama! this outrage cannot be. Yet, knowing the + strength and desire of this obscene one and the weakness of our power, it + is plain that only with cunning can cunning be met. Hear, therefore, the + history of the Fox and the Drum. + </p> + <p> + “A certain Fox searched for food in the jungle, and so doing beheld a tree + on which hung a drum; and when the boughs knocked upon the parchment, it + sounded aloud. Considering, he believed that so round a form and so great + a voice must portend much good feeding. Neglecting on this account a fowl + that fed near by, he ascended to the drum. The drum being rent was but air + and parchment, and meanwhile the fowl fled away. And from the eye of folly + he shed the tear of disappointment, having bartered the substance for the + shadow. So must we act with this budmash [scoundrel]. First, receiving his + oath that he will depart without violence, hid him hither to a great + feast, and say that he shall behold the face of the Queen in a mirror. + Provide that some fair woman of the city show her face, and then let him + depart in peace, showing him friendship. He shall not know he hath not + seen the beauty he would befoul.” + </p> + <p> + After consultation, no better way could be found; but the heart of the + great Lady was heavy with foreboding. + </p> + <p> + (A hi! that Beauty should wander a pilgrim in the ways of sorrow!) + </p> + <p> + To Allah-u-Din therefore did the King dispatch this letter by swift riders + on mares of Mewar. + </p> + <p> + After salutations—“Now whereas thou hast said thou wouldest look + upon the beauty of the Treasure of Chitor, know it is not the custom of + the Rajputs that any eye should light upon their treasure. Yet assuredly, + when requests arise between friends, there cannot fail to follow distress + of mind and division of soul if these are ungranted. So, under promises + that follow, I bid thee to a feast at my poor house of Chitor, and thou + shalt see that beauty reflected in a mirror, and so seeing, depart in + peace from the house of a friend.” + </p> + <p> + This being writ by the Twice-Born, the Brahman, did the Rana sign with + bitter rage in his heart. And the days passed. + </p> + <p> + III + </p> + <p> + On a certain day found fortunate by the astrologers—a day of early + winter, when the dawns were pure gold and the nights radiant with a cool + moon—did a mighty troop of Moslems set their camp on the plain of + Chitor. It was as if a city had blossomed in an hour. Those who looked + from the walls muttered prayers to the Lord of the Trident; for these men + seemed like the swarms of the locust—people, warriors all, fierce + fighting-men. And in the ways of Chitor, and up the steep and winding + causeway from the plains, were warriors also, the chosen of the Rajputs, + thick as blades of corn hedging the path. + </p> + <p> + (Ahi! that the blossom of beauty should have swords for thorns!) + </p> + <p> + Then, leaving his camp, attended by many Chiefs,—may the mothers and + sires that begot them be accursed!—came Allah-u-Din, riding toward + the Lower Gate, and so upward along the causeway, between the two rows of + men who neither looked nor spoke, standing like the carvings of war in the + Caves of Ajunta. And the moon was rising through the sunset as he came + beneath the last and seventh gate. Through the towers and palaces he rode + with his following, but no woman, veiled or unveiled,—no, not even + an outcast of the city,—was there to see him come; only the men, + armed and silent. So he turned to Munim Khan that rode at his bridle, + saying,— + </p> + <p> + “Let not the eye of watchfulness close this night on the pillow of + forgetfulness!” + </p> + <p> + And thus he entered the palace. + </p> + <p> + Very great was the feast in Chitor, and the wines that those accursed + should not drink (since the Outcast whom they call their Prophet forbade + them) ran like water, and at the right hand of Allah-u-Din was set the + great crystal Cup inlaid with gold by a craft that is now perished; and he + filled and refilled it—may his own Prophet curse the swine! + </p> + <p> + But because the sons of Kings eat not with the outcasts, the Rana entered + after, clothed in chain armor of blue steel, and having greeted him, bid + him to the sight of that Treasure. And Allah-u-Din, his eyes swimming with + wine, and yet not drunken, followed, and the two went alone. + </p> + <p> + Purdahs [curtains] of great splendour were hung in the great Hall that is + called the Raja’s Hall, exceeding rich with gold, and in front of the + opening was a kneeling-cushion, and an a gold stool before it a polished + mirror. + </p> + <p> + (Ahi! for gold and beauty, the scourges of the world!) + </p> + <p> + And the Rana was pale to the lips. + </p> + <p> + Now as the Princes stood by the purdah, a veiled woman, shrouded in white + so that no shape could be seen in her, came forth from within, and + kneeling upon the cushion, she unveiled her face bending until the mirror, + like a pool of water, held it, and that only. And the King motioned his + guest to look, and he looked over her veiled shoulder and saw. Very great + was the bowed beauty that the mirror held, but Allah-u-Din turned to the + Rana. + </p> + <p> + “By the Bread and the Salt, by the Guest-Right, by the Honour of thy + House, I ask—is this the Treasure of Chitor?” + </p> + <p> + And since the Sun-Descended cannot lie, no, not though they perish, the + Rana answered, flushing darkly,—“This is not the Treasure. Wilt thou + spare?” + </p> + <p> + But he would not, and the woman slipped like a shadow behind the purdah + and no word said. + </p> + <p> + Then was heard the tinkling of chooris, and the little noise fell upon the + silence like a fear, and, parting the curtains, came a woman veiled like + the other. She did not kneel, but took the mirror in her hand, and + Allah-u-Din drew up behind her back. From her face she raised the veil of + gold Dakka webs, and gazed into the mirror, holding it high, and that + Accursed stumbled back, blinded with beauty, saying this only,—“I + have seen the Treasure of Chitor.” + </p> + <p> + So the purdah fell about her. + </p> + <p> + The next day, after the Imaum of the Accursed had called them to prayer, + they departed, and Allah-u-Din, paying thanks to the Rana for honours + given and taken, and swearing friendship, besought him to ride to his + camp, to see the marvels of gold and steel armor brought down from the + passes, swearing also safe-conduct. And because the Rajputs trust the word + even of a foe, he went. + </p> + <p> + (A hi! that honour should strike hands with traitors!) + </p> + <p> + IV + </p> + <p> + The hours went by, heavy-footed like mourners. Padmini the Rani knelt by + the window in her tower that overlooks the plains. Motionless she knelt + there, as the Goddess Uma lost in her penances, and she saw her Lord ride + forth, and the sparkle of steel where the sun shone on them, and the + Standard of the Cold Disk on its black ground. So the camp of the Moslem + swallowed them up, and they returned no more. Still she knelt and none + dared speak with her; and as the first shade of evening fell across the + hills of Rajasthan, she saw a horseman spurting over the flat; and he rode + like the wind, and, seeing, she implored the Gods. + </p> + <p> + Then entered the Twice-Born, that saint of clear eyes, and he bore a + scroll; and she rose and seated herself, and he stood by her, as her + ladies cowered like frightened doves before the woe in his face as he + read. + </p> + <p> + “To the Rose of Beauty, The Pearl among Women, the Chosen of the Palace. + Who, having seen thy loveliness, can look on another? Who, having tasted + the wine of the Houris, but thirsts forever? Behold, I have thy King as + hostage. Come thou and deliver him. I have sworn that he shall return in + thy place.” + </p> + <p> + And from a smaller scroll, the Brahman read this:— + </p> + <p> + “I am fallen in the snare. Act thou as becomes a Rajputni.” + </p> + <p> + Then that Daughter of the Sun lifted her head, for the thronging of armed + feet was heard in the Council Hall below. From the floor she caught her + veil and veiled herself in haste, and the Brahman with bowed head + followed, while her women mourned aloud. And, descending, between the + folds of the purdah she appeared white and veiled, and the Brahman beside + her, and the eyes of all the Princes were lowered to her shrouded feet, + while the voice they had not heard fell silvery upon the air, and the + echoes of the high roof repeated it. + </p> + <p> + “Chief of the Rajputs, what is your counsel?” And he of Marwar stepped + forward, and not raising his eyes above her feet, answered,— + </p> + <p> + “Queen, what is thine?” + </p> + <p> + For the Rajputs have ever heard the voice of their women. + </p> + <p> + And she said,— + </p> + <p> + “I counsel that I die and my head be sent to him, that my blood may quench + his desire.” + </p> + <p> + And each talked eagerly with the other, but amid the tumult the Twice-Born + said,— + </p> + <p> + “This is not good talk. In his rage he will slay the King. By my yoga, I + have seen it. Seek another way.” + </p> + <p> + So they sought, but could determine nothing, and they feared to ride + against the dog, for he held the life of the King; and the tumult was + great, but all were for the King’s safety. + </p> + <p> + Then once more she spoke. + </p> + <p> + “Seeing it is determined that the King’s life is more than my honour, I go + this night. In your hand I leave my little son, the Prince Ajeysi. Prepare + my litters, seven hundred of the best, for all my women go with me. Depart + now, for I have a thought from the Gods.” + </p> + <p> + Then, returning to her bower, she spoke this letter to the saint, and he + wrote it, and it was sent to the camp. + </p> + <p> + After salutations—“Wisdom and strength have attained their end. Have + ready for release the Rana of Chitor, for this night I come with my + ladies, the prize of the conqueror.” + </p> + <p> + When the sun sank, a great procession with torches descended the steep way + of Chitor—seven hundred litters, and in the first was borne the + Queen, and all her women followed. + </p> + <p> + All the streets were thronged with women, weeping and beating their + breasts. Very greatly they wept, and no men were seen, for their livers + were black within them for shame as the Treasure of Chitor departed, nor + would they look upon the sight. And across the plains went that + procession; as if the stars had fallen upon the earth, so glittered the + sorrowful lights of the Queen. + </p> + <p> + But in the camp was great rejoicing, for the Barbarians knew that many + fair women attended on her. + </p> + <p> + Now, before the entrance to the camp they had made a great shamiana [tent] + ready, hung with shawls of Kashmir and the plunder of Delhi; and there was + set a silk divan for the Rani, and beside it stood the Loser and the + Gainer, Allah-u-Din and the King, awaiting the Treasure. + </p> + <p> + Veiled she entered, stepping proudly, and taking no heed of the Moslem, + she stood before her husband, and even through the veil he could feel the + eyes he knew. + </p> + <p> + And that Accursed spoke, laughing. + </p> + <p> + “I have won-I have won, O King! Bid farewell to the Chosen of the Palace—the + Beloved of the Viceregent of Kings!” + </p> + <p> + Then she spoke softly, delicately, in her own tongue, that the outcast + should not guess the matter of her speech. + </p> + <p> + “Stand by me. Stir not. And when I raise my arm, cry the cry of the + Rajputs. NOW!” + </p> + <p> + And she flung her arm above her head, and instantly, like a lion roaring, + he shouted, drawing his sword, and from every litter sprang an armed man, + glittering in steel, and the bearers, humble of mien, were Rajput knights, + every one. + </p> + <p> + And Allah-u-Din thrust at the breast of the Queen; but around them surged + the war, and she was hedged with swords like a rose in the thickets. + </p> + <p> + Very full of wine, dull with feasting and lust and surprised, the Moslems + fled across the plains, streaming in a broken rabble, cursing and shouting + like low-caste women; and the Rajputs, wiping their swords, returned from + the pursuit and laughed upon each other. + </p> + <p> + But what shall be said of the joy of the King and of her who had imagined + this thing, instructed of the Goddess who is the other half of her Lord? + </p> + <p> + So the procession returned, singing, to Chitor with those Two in the + midst; but among the dogs that fled was Allah-u-Din, his face blackened + with shame and wrath, the curses choking in his foul throat. + </p> + <p> + (Aid! that the evil still walk the ways of the world!) + </p> + <p> + V + </p> + <p> + So the time went by and the beauty of the Queen grew, and her King could + see none but hers. Like the moon she obscured the stars, and every day he + remembered her wisdom, her valour, and his soul did homage at her feet, + and there was great content in Chitor. + </p> + <p> + It chanced one day that the Queen, looking from her high window that like + an eagle’s nest overhung the precipice, saw, on the plain beneath, a train + of men, walking like ants, and each carried a basket on his back, and + behind them was a cloud of dust like a great army. Already the city was + astir because of this thing, and the rumours came thick and the spies were + sent out. + </p> + <p> + In the dark they returned, and the Rana entered the bower of Padmini, his + eyes burning like coal with hate and wrath, and he flung his arm round his + wife like a shield. + </p> + <p> + “He is returned, and in power. Counsel me again, O wife, for great is thy + wisdom!” + </p> + <p> + But she answered only this,— + </p> + <p> + “Fight, for this time it is to the death.” + </p> + <p> + Then each day she watched bow the baskets of earth, emptied upon the plain + at first, made nothing, an ant heap whereat fools might laugh. But each + day as the trains of men came, spilling their baskets, the great + earthworks grew and their height mounted. Day after day the Rajputs rode + forth and slew; and as they slew it seemed that all the teeming millions + of the earth came forth to take the places of the slain. And the Rajputs + fell also, and under the pennons the thundering forces returned daily, + thinned of their best. + </p> + <p> + (A hi! that Evil rules the world as God!) + </p> + <p> + And still the earth grew up to the heights, and the protection of the + hills was slowly withdrawn from Chitor, for on the heights they made they + set their engines of war. + </p> + <p> + Then in a red dawn that great saint Narayan came to the Queen, where she + watched by her window, and spoke. + </p> + <p> + “O great lady, I have dreamed a fearful dream. Nay, rather have I seen a + vision.” + </p> + <p> + With her face set like a sword, the Queen said,— + </p> + <p> + “Say on.” + </p> + <p> + “In a light red like blood, I waked, and beside me stood the Mother,—Durga,—awful + to see, with a girdle of heads about her middle; and the drops fell thick + and slow from That which she held in her hand, and in the other was her + sickle of Doom. Nor did she speak, but my soul heard her words.” + </p> + <p> + “Narrate them.” + </p> + <p> + “She commanded: ‘Say this to the Rana: “In Chitor is My altar; in Chitor + is thy throne. If thou wouldest save either, send forth twelve crowned + Kings of Chitor to die.’” + </p> + <p> + As he said this, the Rana, fore-spent with fighting, entered and heard the + Divine word. + </p> + <p> + Now there were twelve princes of the Rajput blood, and the youngest was + the son of Padmini. What choice had these most miserable but to appease + the dreadful anger of the Goddess? So on each fourth day a King of Chitor + was crowned, and for three days sat upon the throne, and on the fourth + day, set in the front, went forth and died fighting. So perished eleven + Kings of Chitor, and now there was left but the little Ajeysi, the son of + the Queen. + </p> + <p> + And that day was a great Council called. + </p> + <p> + Few were there. On the plains many lay dead; holding the gates many + watched; but the blood was red in their hearts and flowed like Indus in + the melting of the snows. And to them spoke the Rana, his hand clenched on + his sword, and the other laid on the small dark head of the Prince Ajeysi, + who stood between his knees. And as he spoke his voice gathered strength + till it rang through the hall like the voice of Indra when he thunders in + the heavens. + </p> + <p> + “Men of the Rajputs, this child shall not die. Are we become jackals that + we fall upon the weak and tear them? When have we put our women and + children in the forefront of the war? I—I only am King of Chitor. + Narayan shall save this child for the time that will surely come. And for + us—what shall we do? I die for Chitor!” + </p> + <p> + And like the hollow waves of a great sea they answered him,— + </p> + <p> + “We will die for Chitor.” + </p> + <p> + There was silence and Marwar spoke. + </p> + <p> + “The women?” + </p> + <p> + “Do they not know the duty of a Rajputni?” said the King. “My household + has demanded that the caves be prepared.” + </p> + <p> + And the men clashed stew joy with their swords, and the council dispersed. + </p> + <p> + Then that very great saint, the Twice-Born, put off the sacred thread that + is the very soul of the Brahman. In his turban he wound it secretly, and + he stained his noble Aryan body until it resembled the Pariahs, foul for + the pure to see, loathsome for the pure to touch, and he put on him the + rags of the lowest of the earth, and taking the Prince, he removed from + the body of the child every trace of royal and Rajput birth, and he + appeared like a child of the Bhils—the vile forest wanderers that + shame not to defile their lips with carrion. And in this guise they stood + before the Queen; and when she looked on the saint, the tears fell from + her eyes like rain, not for grief for her son, nor for death, but that for + their sake the pure should be made impure and the glory of the + Brahman-hood be defiled. And she fell at the old man’s feet and laid her + head on the ground before him. + </p> + <p> + “Rise, daughter!” he said, “and take comfort! Are not the eyes of the Gods + clear that they should distinguish?—and this day we stand before the + God of Gods. Have not the Great Ones said, ‘That which causes life causes + also decay and death’? Therefore we who go and you who stay are alike a + part of the Divine. Embrace now your child and bless him, for we depart. + And it is on account of the sacrifice of the Twelve that he is saved + alive.” + </p> + <p> + So, controlling her tears, she rose, and clasping the child to her bosom, + she bade him be of good cheer since he went with the Gods. And that great + saint took his hand from hers, and for the first time in the life of the + Queen he raised his aged eyes to her face, and she gazed at him; but what + she read, even the ascetic Visravas, who saw all by the power of his yoga, + could not tell, for it was beyond speech. Very certainly the peace + thereafter possessed her. + </p> + <p> + So those two went out by the secret ways of the rocks, and wandering far, + were saved by the favour of Durga. + </p> + <p> + VI + </p> + <p> + And the nights went by and the days, and the time came that no longer + could they hold Chitor, and all hope was dead. + </p> + <p> + On a certain day the Rana and the Rani stood for the last time in her + bower, and looked down into the city; and in the streets were gathered in + a very wonderful procession the women of Chitor; and not one was veiled. + Flowers that had bloomed in the inner chambers, great ladies jewelled for + a festival, young brides, aged mothers, and girl children clinging to the + robes of their mothers who held their babes, crowded the ways. Even the + low-caste women walked with measured steps and proudly, decked in what + they had of best, their eyes lengthened with soorma, and flowers in the + darkness of their hair. + </p> + <p> + The Queen was clothed in a gold robe of rejoicing, her bodice latticed + with diamonds and great gems, and upon her bosom the necklace of table + emeralds, alight with green fire, which is the jewel of the Queens of + Chitor. So she stood radiant as a vision of Shri, and it appeared that + rays encircled her person. + </p> + <p> + And the Rana, unarmed save for his sword, had the saffron dress of a + bridegroom and the jeweled cap of the Rajput Kings, and below in the hall + were the Princes and Chiefs, clad even as he. + </p> + <p> + Then, raising her lotus eyes to her lord, the Princess said,— + </p> + <p> + “Beloved, the time is come, and we have chosen rightly, for this is the + way of honour, and it is but another link forged in the chain of + existence; for until existence itself is ended and rebirth destroyed, + still shall we meet in lives to come and still be husband and wife. What + room then for despair?” + </p> + <p> + And he answered,— + </p> + <p> + “This is true. Go first, wife, and I follow. Let not the door swing to + behind thee. But oh, to see thy beauty once more that is the very speech + of Gods with men! Wilt thou surely come again to me and again be fair?” + </p> + <p> + And for all answer she smiled upon him, and at his feet performed the + obeisance of the Rajput wife when she departs upon a journey; and they + went out together, the Queen unveiled. + </p> + <p> + As she passed through the Princes, they lowered their eyes so that none + saw her; but when she stood on the steps of the palace, the women all + turned eagerly toward her like stars about the moon, and lifting their + arms, they began to sing the dirge of the Rajput women. + </p> + <p> + So they marched, and in great companies they marched, company behind + company, young and old, past the Queen, saluting her and drawing courage + from the loveliness and kindness of her unveiled face. + </p> + <p> + In the rocks beneath the palaces of Chitor are very great caves—league + long and terrible, with ways of darkness no eyes have seen; and it is + believed that in times past spirits have haunted them with strange + wailings. In these was prepared great store of wood and oils and fragrant + matters for burning. So to these caves they marched and, company by + company, disappeared into the darkness; and the voice of their singing + grew faint and hollow, and died away, as the men stood watching their + women go. + </p> + <p> + Now, when this was done and the last had gone, the Rani descended the + steps, and the Rana, taking a torch dipped in fragrant oils, followed her, + and the Princes walked after, clad like bridegrooms but with no faces of + bridal joy. At the entrance of the caves, having lit the torch, he gave it + into her hand, and she, receiving it and smiling, turned once upon the + threshold, and for the first time those Princes beheld the face of the + Queen, but they hid their eyes with their hands when they had seen. So she + departed within, and the Rana shut to the door and barred and bolted it, + and the men with him flung down great rocks before it so that none should + know the way, nor indeed is it known to this day; and with their hands on + their swords they waited there, not speaking, until a great smoke rose + between the crevices of the rocks, but no sound at all. + </p> + <p> + (Ashes of roses—ashes of roses!—Ahi! for beauty that is but + touched and remitted!) + </p> + <p> + The sun was high when those men with their horses and on foot marched down + the winding causeway beneath the seven gates, and so forth into the + plains, and charging unarmed upon the Moslems, they perished every man. + After, it was asked of one who had seen the great slaughter,— + </p> + <p> + “Say how my King bore himself.” + </p> + <p> + And he who had seen told this:— + </p> + <p> + “Reaper of the harvest of battle, on the bed of honour he has spread a + carpet of the slain! He sleeps ringed about by his enemies. How can the + world tell of his deeds? The tongue is silent.” + </p> + <p> + When that Accursed, Allah-u-Din, came up the winding height of the hills, + he found only a dead city, and his heart was sick within him. + </p> + <p> + Now this is the Sack of Chitor, and by the Oath of the Sack of Chitor do + the Rajputs swear when they bind their honour. + </p> + <p> + But it is only the ascetic Visravas who by the power of his yoga has heard + every word, and with his eyes beheld that Flame of Beauty, who, for a + brief space illuminating the world as a Queen, returns to birth in many a + shape of sorrowful loveliness until the Blue-throated God shall in his + favour destroy her rebirths. + </p> + <p> + Salutation to Ganesa the Elephant-Headed One, and to Shri the Lady of + Beauty! + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful—the Smiting! + A day when the soul shall know what it has sent on or kept back. + A day when no soul shall control aught for another. + And the bidding belongs to God. +</pre> + <p> + THE KORAN. I + </p> + <p> + Now the Shah-in-Shah, Shah Jahan, Emperor in India, loved his wife with a + great love. And of all the wives of the Mogul Emperors surely this Lady + Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal—-the Chosen of the Palace—was the + most worthy of love. In the tresses of her silk-soft hair his heart was + bound, and for none other had he so much as a passing thought since his + soul had been submerged in her sweetness. Of her he said, using the words + of the poet Faisi,— + </p> + <p> + “How shall I understand the magic of Love the Juggler? For he made thy + beauty enter at that small gate the pupil of my eye, And now—and now + my heart cannot contain it!” + </p> + <p> + But who should marvel? For those who have seen this Arjemand crowned with + the crown the Padishah set upon her sweet low brows, with the lamps of + great jewels lighting the dimples of her cheeks as they swung beside them, + have most surely seen perfection. He who sat upon the Peacock Throne, + where the outspread tail of massed gems is centred by that great ruby, + “The Eye of the Peacock, the Tribute of the World,” valued it not so much + as one Jock of the dark and perfumed tresses that rolled to her feet. Less + to him the twelve throne columns set close with pearls than the little + pearls she showed in her sweet laughter. For if this lady was all beauty, + so too she was all goodness; and from the Shah-in-Shah to the poorest, all + hearts of the world knelt in adoration, before the Chosen of the Palace. + She was, indeed, an extraordinary beauty, in that she had the soul of a + child, and she alone remained unconscious of her power; and so she walked, + crowned and clothed with humility. + </p> + <p> + Cold, haughty, and silent was the Shah-in-Shah before she blessed his arms—flattered, + envied, but loved by none. But the gift this Lady brought with her was + love; and this, shining like the sun upon ice, melted his coldness, and he + became indeed the kingly centre of a kingly court May the Peace be upon + her! + </p> + <p> + Now it was the dawn of a sorrowful day when the pains of the Lady Arjemand + came strong and terrible, and she travailed in agony. The hakims + (physicians) stroked their beards and reasoned one with another; the wise + women surrounded her, and remedies many and great were tried; and still + her anguish grew, and in the hall without sat the Shah-in-Shah upon his + divan, in anguish of spirit yet greater. The sweat ran on his brows, the + knotted veins were thick on his temples, and his eyes, sunk in their + caves, showed as those of a maddened man. He crouched on his cushions and + stared at the purdah that divided him from the Lady; and all day the + people came and went about him, and there was silence from the voice he + longed to hear; for she would not moan, lest the sound should slay the + Emperor. Her women besought her, fearing that her strong silence would + break her heart; but still she lay, her hands clenched in one another, + enduring; and the Emperor endured without. The Day of the Smiting! + </p> + <p> + So, as the time of the evening prayer drew nigh, a child was born, and the + Empress, having done with pain, began to sink slowly into that profound + sleep that is the shadow cast by the Last. May Allah the Upholder have + mercy on our weakness! And the women, white with fear and watching, looked + upon her, and whispered one to another, “It is the end.” + </p> + <p> + And the aged mother of Abdul Mirza, standing at her head, said, “She heeds + not the cry of the child. She cannot stay.” And the newly wed wife of Saif + Khan, standing at her feet, said, “The voice of the beloved husband is as + the Call of the Angel. Let the Padishah be summoned.” + </p> + <p> + So, the evening prayer being over (but the Emperor had not prayed), the + wisest of the hakims, Kazim Sharif, went before him and spoke:— + </p> + <p> + “Inhallah! May the will of the Issuer of Decrees in all things be done! + Ascribe unto the Creator glory, bowing before his Throne.” + </p> + <p> + And he remained silent; but the Padishah, haggard in his jewels, with his + face hidden, answered thickly, “The truth! For Allah has forgotten his + slave.” + </p> + <p> + And Kazim Sharif, bowing at his feet and veiling his face with his hands, + replied: + </p> + <p> + “The voice of the child cannot reach her, and the Lady of Delight departs. + He who would speak with her must speak quickly.” + </p> + <p> + Then the Emperor rose to his feet unsteadily, like a man drunk with the + forbidden juice; and when Kazim Sharif would have supported him, he flung + aside his hands, and he stumbled, a man wounded to death, as it were, to + the marble chamber where she lay. + </p> + <p> + In that white chamber it was dusk, and they had lit the little cressets so + that a very faint light fell upon her face. A slender fountain a little + cooled the hot, still air with its thin music and its sprinkled diamonds, + and outside, the summer lightnings were playing wide and blue on the + river; but so still was it that the dragging footsteps of the Emperor + raised the hair on the flesh of those who heard, So the women who should, + veiled themselves, and the others remained like pillars of stone. + </p> + <p> + Now, when those steps were heard, a faint colour rose in the cheek of the + Lady Arjemand; but she did not raise the heavy lashes, or move her hand. + And he came up beside her, and the Shadow of God, who should kneel to + none, knelt, and his head fell forward upon her breast; and in the hush + the women glided out like ghosts, leaving the husband with the wife + excepting only that her foster-nurse stood far off, with eyes averted. + </p> + <p> + So the minutes drifted by, falling audibly one by one into eternity, and + at the long last she slowly opened her eyes and, as from the depths of a + dream, beheld the Emperor; and in a voice faint as the fall of a rose-leaf + she said the one word, “Beloved!” + </p> + <p> + And he from between his clenched teeth, answered, “Speak, wife.” + </p> + <p> + So she, who in all things had loved and served him,—she, Light of + all hearts, dispeller of all gloom,—gathered her dying breath for + consolation, and raised one hand slowly; and it fell across his, and so + remained. + </p> + <p> + Now, her beauty had been broken in the anguish like a rose in storm; but + it returned to her, doubtless that the Padishah might take comfort in its + memory; and she looked like a houri of Paradise who, kneeling beside the + Zemzem Well, beholds the Waters of Peace. Not Fatmeh herself, the daughter + of the Prophet of God, shone more sweetly. She repeated the word, + “Beloved”; and after a pause she whispered on with lips that scarcely + stirred, “King of the Age, this is the end.” + </p> + <p> + But still he was like a dead man, nor lifted his face. + </p> + <p> + “Surely all things pass. And though I go, in your heart I abide, and + nothing can sever us. Take comfort.” + </p> + <p> + But there was no answer. + </p> + <p> + “Nothing but Love’s own hand can slay Love. Therefore, remember me, and I + shall live.” + </p> + <p> + And he answered from the darkness of her bosom, “The whole world shall + remember. But when shall I be united to thee? O Allah, how long wilt thou + leave me to waste in this separation?” + </p> + <p> + And she: “Beloved, what is time? We sleep and the night is gone. Now put + your arms about me, for I sink into rest. What words are needed between + us? Love is enough.” + </p> + <p> + So, making not the Profession of Faith,—and what need, since all her + life was worship,—the Lady Arjemand turned into his arms like a + child. And the night deepened. + </p> + <p> + Morning, with its arrows of golden light that struck the river to + splendour! Morning, with its pure breath, its sunshine of joy, and the + koels fluting in the Palace gardens! Morning, divine and new from the hand + of the Maker! And in the innermost chamber of marble a white silence; and + the Lady, the Mirror of Goodness, lying in the Compassion of Allah, and a + broken man stretched on the ground beside her. For all flesh, from the + camel-driver to the Shah-in-Shah, is as one in the Day of the Smiting. + </p> + <p> + II + </p> + <p> + For weeks the Emperor lay before the door of death; and had it opened to + him, he had been blessed. So the months went by, and very slowly the + strength returned to him; but his eyes were withered and the bones stood + out in his cheeks. But he resumed his throne, and sat upon it kingly, + black-bearded, eagle-eyed, terribly apart in his grief and his royalty; + and so seated among his Usbegs, he declared his will. + </p> + <p> + “For this Lady (upon whom be peace), departed to the mercy of the Giver + and Taker, shall a tomb-palace be made, the Like of which is not found in + the four corners of the world. Send forth therefore for craftsmen like the + builders of the Temple of Solomon the Wise; for I will build.” + </p> + <p> + So, taking counsel, they sent in haste into Agra for Ustad Isa, the + Master-Builder, a man of Shiraz; and he, being presented before the + Padishah, received his instructions in these words:— + </p> + <p> + “I will that all the world shall remember the Flower of the World, that + all hearts shall give thanks for her beauty, which was indeed the perfect + Mirror of the Creator. And since it is abhorrent of Islam that any image + be made in the likeness of anything that has life, make for me a + palace-tomb, gracious as she was gracious, lovely as she was lovely. Not + such as the tombs of the Kings and the Conquerors, but of a divine + sweetness. Make me a garden on the banks of Jumna, and build it there, + where, sitting in my Pavilion of Marble, I may see it rise.” + </p> + <p> + And Ustad Isa, having heard, said, “Upon my head and eyes!” and went out + from the Presence. + </p> + <p> + So, musing upon the words of the Padishah, he went to his house in Agra, + and there pondered the matter long and deeply; and for a whole day and + night he refused all food and secluded himself from the society of all + men; for he said:— + </p> + <p> + “This is a weighty thing, for this Lady (upon whom be peace) must visibly + dwell in her tomb-palace on the shore of the river; and how shall I, who + have never seen her, imagine the grace that was in her, and restore it to + the world? Oh, had I but the memory of her face! Could I but see it as the + Shah-in-Shah sees it, remembering the past! Prophet of God, intercede for + me, that I may look through his eyes, if but for a moment!” + </p> + <p> + That night he slept, wearied and weakened with fasting; and whether it + were that the body guarded no longer the gates of the soul, I cannot say; + for, when the body ails, the soul soars free above its weakness. But a + strange marvel happened. + </p> + <p> + For, as it seemed to him, he awoke at the mid-noon of the night, and he + was sitting, not in his own house, but upon the roof of the royal palace, + looking down on the gliding Jumna, where the low moon slept in silver, and + the light was alone upon the water; and there were no boats, but sleep and + dream, hovering hand-in-hand, moved upon the air, and his heart was + dilated in the great silence. + </p> + <p> + Yet he knew well that he waked in some supernatural sphere: for his eyes + could see across the river as if the opposite shore lay at his feet; and + he could distinguish every leaf on every tree, and the flowers + moon-blanched and ghost-like. And there, in the blackest shade of the + pippala boughs, he beheld a faint light like a pearl; and looking with + unspeakable anxiety, he saw within the light, slowly growing, the figure + of a lady exceedingly glorious in majesty and crowned with a rayed crown + of mighty jewels of white and golden splendour. Her gold robe fell to her + feet, and—very strange to tell—her feet touched not the + ground, but hung a span’s length above it, so that she floated in the air. + </p> + <p> + But the marvel of marvels was her face—not, indeed, for its beauty, + though that transcended all, but for its singular and compassionate + sweetness, wherewith she looked toward the Palace beyond the river as if + it held the heart of her heart, while death and its river lay between. + </p> + <p> + And Ustad Isa said:—“O dream, if this sweetness be but a dream, let + me never wake! Let me see forever this exquisite work of Allah the Maker, + before whom all the craftsmen are as children! For my knowledge is as + nothing, and I am ashamed in its presence.” + </p> + <p> + And as he spoke, she turned those brimming eyes on him, and he saw her + slowly absorbed into the glory of the moonlight; but as she faded into + dream, he beheld, slowly rising, where her feet had hung in the blessed + air, a palace of whiteness, warm as ivory, cold as chastity, domes and + cupolas, slender minars, arches of marble fretted into sea-foam, screen + within screen of purest marble, to hide the sleeping beauty of a great + Queen—silence in the heart of it, and in every line a harmony beyond + all music. Grace was about it—the grace of a Queen who prays and + does not command; who, seated in her royalty yet inclines all hearts to + love. And he saw that its grace was her grace, and its soul her soul, and + that she gave it for the consolation of the Emperor. + </p> + <p> + And he fell on his face and worshipped the Master-Builder of the Universe, + saying,—“Praise cannot express thy Perfection. Thine Essence + confounds thought. Surely I am but the tool in the hand of the Builder.” + </p> + <p> + And when he awoke, he was lying in his own secret chamber, but beside him + was a drawing such as the craftsmen make of the work they have imagined in + their hearts. And it was the Palace of the Tomb. + </p> + <p> + Henceforward, how should he waver? He was as a slave who obeys his master, + and with haste he summoned to Agra his Army of Beauty. + </p> + <p> + Then were assembled all the master craftsmen of India and of the outer + world. From Delhi, from Shiraz, even from Baghdad and Syria, they came. + Muhammad Hanif, the wise mason, came from Kandahar, Muhammad Sayyid from + Mooltan. Amanat Khan, and other great writers of the holy Koran, who + should make the scripts of the Book upon fine marble. Inlayers from + Kanauj, with fingers like those of the Spirits that bowed before Solomon + the King, who should make beautiful the pure stone with inlay of jewels, + as did their forefathers for the Rajah of Mewar; mighty dealers with + agate, cornelian, and lapis lazuli. Came also, from Bokhara, Ata Muhammad + and Shakri Muhammad, that they might carve the lilies of the field, very + glorious, about that Flower of the World. Men of India, men of Persia, men + of the outer lands, they came at the bidding of Ustad Isa, that the spirit + of his vision might be made manifest. + </p> + <p> + And a great council was held among these servants of beauty, so they made + a model in little of the glory that was to be, and laid it at the feet of + the Shah-in-Shah; and he allowed it, though not as yet fully discerning + their intent. And when it was approved, Ustad Isa called to him a man of + Kashmir; and the very hand of the Creator was upon this man, for he could + make gardens second only to the Gardens of Paradise, having been born by + that Dal Lake where are those roses of the earth, the Shalimar and the + Nishat Bagh; and to him said Ustad Isa,— + </p> + <p> + “Behold, Rain Lal Kashmiri, consider this design! Thus and thus shall a + white palace, exquisite in perfection, arise on the banks of Jumna. Here, + in little, in this model of sandalwood, see what shall be. Consider these + domes, rounded as the Bosom of Beauty, recalling the mystic fruit of the + lotus flower. Consider these four minars that stand about them like + Spirits about the Throne. And remembering that all this shall stand upon a + great dais of purest marble, and that the river shall be its mirror, + repeating to everlasting its loveliness, make me a garden that shall be + the throne room to this Queen.” + </p> + <p> + And Ram Lal Kashmiri salaamed and said, “Obedience!” and went forth and + pondered night and day, journeying even over the snows of the Pir Panjal + to Kashmir, that he might bathe his eyes in beauty where she walks, naked + and divine, upon the earth, and he it was who imagined the black marble + and white that made the way of approach. + </p> + <p> + So grew the palace that should murmur, like a seashell, in the ear of the + world the secret of love. + </p> + <p> + Veiled had that loveliness been in the shadow of the palace; but now the + sun should rise upon it and turn its ivory to gold, should set upon it and + flush its snow with rose. The moon should lie upon it like the pearls upon + her bosom, the visible grace of her presence breathe about it, the music + of her voice hover in the birds and trees of the garden. Times there were + when Ustad Isa despaired lest even these mighty servants of beauty should + miss perfection. Yet it grew and grew, rising like the growth of a flower. + </p> + <p> + So on a certain day it stood completed, and beneath the small tomb in the + sanctuary, veiled with screens of wrought marble so fine that they might + lift in the breeze,—the veils of a Queen,—slept the Lady + Arjemand; and above her a narrow coffer of white marble, enriched in a + great script with the Ninety-Nine Wondrous Names of God. And the + Shah-in-Shah, now grey and worn, entered and, standing by her, cried in a + loud voice,—“I ascribe to the Unity, the only Creator, the + perfection of his handiwork made visible here by the hand of mortal man. + For the beauty that was secret in my Palace is here revealed; and the + Crowned Lady shall sit forever upon the banks of the Jumna River. It was + love that commanded this Tomb.” + </p> + <p> + And the golden echo carried his voice up into the high dome, and it died + away in whispers of music. + </p> + <p> + But Ustad Isa standing far off in the throng (for what are craftsmen in + the presence of the mighty?), said softly in his beard, “It was Love also + that built, and therefore it shall endure.” + </p> + <p> + Now it is told that, on a certain night in summer, when the moon is full, + a man who lingers by the straight water, where the cypresses stand over + their own image, may see a strange marvel—may see the Palace of the + Taj dissolve like a pearl, and so rise in a mist into the moonlight; and + in its place, on her dais of white marble, he shall see the Lady Arjemand, + Mumtaz-i-Mahal, the Chosen of the Palace, stand there in the white + perfection of beauty, smiling as one who hath attained unto the Peace. For + she is its soul. + </p> + <p> + And kneeling before the dais, he shall see Ustad Isa, who made this body + of her beauty; and his face is hidden in his hands. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + “HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!” + </h2> + <h3> + A JAPANESE STORY + </h3> + <p> + (O Lovely One-O thou Flower! With Thy beautiful face, with Thy beautiful + eyes, pour light upon the world! Adoration to Kwannon.) + </p> + <p> + In Japan in the days of the remote Ancestors, near the little village of + Shiobara, the river ran through rocks of a very strange blue colour, and + the bed of the river was also composed of these rocks, so that the clear + water ran blue as turquoise gems to the sea. + </p> + <p> + The great forests murmured beside it, and through their swaying boughs was + breathed the song of Eternity. Those who listen may hear if their ears are + open. To others it is but the idle sighing of the wind. + </p> + <p> + Now because of all this beauty there stood in these forests a roughly + built palace of unbarked wood, and here the great Emperor would come from + City-Royal to seek rest for his doubtful thoughts and the cares of state, + turning aside often to see the moonlight in Shiobara. He sought also the + free air and the sound of falling water, yet dearer to him than the + plucked strings of sho and biwa. For he said; + </p> + <p> + “Where and how shall We find peace even for a moment, and afford Our heart + refreshment even for a single second?” + </p> + <p> + And it seemed to him that he found such moments at Shiobara. + </p> + <p> + Only one of his great nobles would His Majesty bring with him—the + Dainagon, and him be chose because he was a worthy and honorable person + and very simple of heart. + </p> + <p> + There was yet another reason why the Son of Heaven inclined to the little + Shiobara. It had reached the Emperor that a Recluse of the utmost sanctity + dwelt in that forest. His name was Semimaru. He had made himself a small + hut in the deep woods, much as a decrepit silkworm might spin his last + Cocoon and there had the Peace found him. + </p> + <p> + It had also reached His Majesty that, although blind, he was exceedingly + skilled in the art of playing the biwa, both in the Flowing Fount manner + and the Woodpecker manner, and that, especially on nights when the moon + was full, this aged man made such music as transported the soul. This + music His Majesty desired very greatly to hear. + </p> + <p> + Never had Semimaru left his hut save to gather wood or seek food until the + Divine Emperor commanded his attendance that he might soothe his august + heart with music. + </p> + <p> + Now on this night of nights the moon was full and the snow heavy on the + pines, and the earth was white also, and when the moon shone through the + boughs it made a cold light like dawn, and the shadows of the trees were + black upon it. + </p> + <p> + The attendants of His Majesty long since slept for sheer weariness, for + the night was far spent, but the Emperor and the Dainagon still sat with + their eyes fixed on the venerable Semimaru. For many hours he had played, + drawing strange music from his biwa. Sometimes it had been like rain + blowing over the plains of Adzuma, sometimes like the winds roaring down + the passes of the Yoshino Mountains, and yet again like the voice of far + cities. For many hours they listened without weariness, and thought that + all the stories of the ancients might flow past them in the weird music + that seemed to have neither beginning nor end. + </p> + <p> + “It is as the river that changes and changes not, and is ever and ever the + same,” said the Emperor in his own soul. + </p> + <p> + And certainly had a voice announced to His Augustness that centuries were + drifting by as he listened, he could have felt no surprise. + </p> + <p> + Before them, as they sat upon the silken floor cushions, was a small + shrine with a Buddha shelf, and a hanging picture of the Amida Buddha + within it—the expression one of rapt peace. Figures of Fugen and + Fudo were placed before the curtain doors of the shrine, looking up in + adoration to the Blessed One. A small and aged pine tree was in a pot of + grey porcelain from Chosen—the only ornament in the chamber. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly His Majesty became aware that the Dainagon also had fallen asleep + from weariness, and that the recluse was no longer playing, but was + speaking in a still voice like a deeply flowing stream. The Emperor had + observed no change from music to speech, nor could he recall when the + music had ceased, so that it altogether resembled a dream. + </p> + <p> + “When I first came here”—the Venerable one continued—“it was + not my intention to stay long in the forest. As each day dawned, I said; + ‘In seven days I go.’ And again—‘In seven.’ Yet have I not gone. The + days glided by and here have I attained to look on the beginnings of + peace. Then wherefore should I go?—for all life is within the soul. + Shall the fish weary of his pool? And I, who through my blind eyes feel + the moon illuming my forest by night and the sun by day, abide in peace, + so that even the wild beasts press round to hear my music. I have come by + a path overblown by autumn leaves. But I have come.” + </p> + <p> + Then said the Divine Emperor as if unconsciously; + </p> + <p> + “Would that I also might come! But the august duties cannot easily be laid + aside. And I have no wife—no son.” + </p> + <p> + And Semimaru, playing very softly on the strings of his biwa made no other + answer, and His Majesty, collecting his thoughts, which had become, as it + were, frozen with the cold and the quiet and the strange music, spoke + thus, as if in a waking dream; + </p> + <p> + “Why have I not wedded? Because I have desired a bride beyond the women of + earth, and of none such as I desire has the rumor reached me. Consider + that Ancestor who wedded Her Shining Majesty! Evil and lovely was she, and + the passions were loud about her. And so it is with women. Trouble and + vexation of spirit, or instead a great weariness. But if the Blessed One + would vouchsafe to my prayers a maiden of blossom and dew, with a heart + calm as moonlight, her would I wed. O, honorable One, whose wisdom surveys + the world, is there in any place near or far—in heaven or in earth, + such a one that I may seek and find?” + </p> + <p> + And Semimaru, still making a very low music on his biwa, said this; + </p> + <p> + “Supreme Master, where the Shiobara River breaks away through the gorges + to the sea, dwelt a poor couple—the husband a wood-cutter. They had + no children to aid in their toil, and daily the woman addressed her + prayers for a son to the Bodhisattwa Kwannon, the Lady of Pity who looketh + down for ever upon the sound of prayer. Very fervently she prayed, with + such offerings as her poverty allowed, and on a certain night she dreamed + this dream. At the shrine of the Senju Kwannon she knelt as was her + custom, and that Great Lady, sitting enthroned upon the Lotos of Purity, + opened Her eyes slowly from Her divine contemplation and heard the prayer + of the wood-cutter’s wife. Then stooping like a blown willow branch, she + gathered a bud from the golden lotos plant that stood upon her altar, and + breathing upon it it became pure white and living, and it exhaled a + perfume like the flowers of Paradise, This flower the Lady of Pity flung + into the bosom of her petitioner, and closing Her eyes returned into Her + divine dream, whilst the woman awoke, weeping for joy. + </p> + <p> + “But when she sought in her bosom for the Lotos it was gone. Of all this + she boasted loudly to her folk and kin, and the more so, when in due time + she perceived herself to be with child, for, from that august favour she + looked for nothing less than a son, radiant with the Five Ornaments of + riches, health, longevity, beauty, and success. Yet, when her hour was + come, a girl was born, and blind.” + </p> + <p> + “Was she welcomed?” asked the dreaming voice of the Emperor. + </p> + <p> + “Augustness, but as a household drudge. For her food was cruelty and her + drink tears. And the shrine of the Senju Kwannon was neglected by her + parents because of the disappointment and shame of the unwanted gift. And + they believed that, lost in Her divine contemplation, the Great Lady would + not perceive this neglect. The Gods however are known by their great + memories.” + </p> + <p> + “Her name?” + </p> + <p> + “Majesty, Tsuyu-Morning Dew. And like the morning dew she shines in + stillness. She has repaid good for evil to her evil parents, serving them + with unwearied service.” + </p> + <p> + “What distinguishes her from others?” + </p> + <p> + “Augustness, a very great peace. Doubtless the shadow of the dream of the + Holy Kwannon. She works, she moves, she smiles as one who has tasted of + content.” + </p> + <p> + “Has she beauty?” + </p> + <p> + “Supreme Master, am I not blind? But it is said that she has no beauty + that men should desire her. Her face is flat and round, and her eyes + blind.” + </p> + <p> + “And yet content?” + </p> + <p> + “Philosophers might envy her calm. And her blindness is without doubt a + grace from the excelling Pity, for could she see her own exceeding + ugliness she must weep for shame. But she sees not. Her sight is inward, + and she is well content.” + </p> + <p> + “Where does she dwell?” + </p> + <p> + “Supreme Majesty, far from here—where in the heart of the woods the + river breaks through the rocks.” + </p> + <p> + “Venerable One, why have you told me this? I asked for a royal maiden wise + and beautiful, calm as the dawn, and you have told me of a wood-cutter’s + drudge, blind and ugly.” + </p> + <p> + And now Semimaru did not answer, but the tones of the biwa grew louder and + clearer, and they rang like a song of triumph, and the Emperor could hear + these words in the voice of the strings. + </p> + <p> + “She is beautiful as the night, crowned with moon and stars for him who + has eyes to see. Princess Splendour was dim beside her; Prince Fireshine, + gloom! Her Shining Majesty was but a darkened glory before this maid. All + beauty shines within her hidden eyes.” + </p> + <p> + And having uttered this the music became wordless once more, but it still + flowed on more and more softly like a river that flows into the far + distance. + </p> + <p> + The Emperor stared at the mats, musing—the light of the lamp was + burning low. His heart said within him; + </p> + <p> + “This maiden, cast like a flower from the hand of Kwannon Sama, will I + see.” + </p> + <p> + And as he said this the music had faded away into a thread-like smallness, + and when after long thought he raised his august head, he was alone save + for the Dainagon, sleeping on the mats behind him, and the chamber was in + darkness. Semimaru had departed in silence, and His Majesty, looking forth + into the broad moonlight, could see the track of his feet upon the shining + snow, and the music came back very thinly like spring rain in the trees. + Once more he looked at the whiteness of the night, and then, stretching + his august person on the mats, he slept amid dreams of sweet sound. + </p> + <p> + The next day, forbidding any to follow save the Dainagon, His Majesty went + forth upon the frozen snow where the sun shone in a blinding whiteness. + They followed the track of Semimaru’s feet far under the pine trees so + heavy with their load of snow that they were bowed as if with fruit. And + the track led on and the air was so still that the cracking of a bough was + like the blow of a hammer, and the sliding of a load of snow from a branch + like the fall of an avalanche. Nor did they speak as they went. They + listened, nor could they say for what. + </p> + <p> + Then, when they had gone a very great way, the track ceased suddenly, as + if cut off, and at this spot, under the pines furred with snow, His + Majesty became aware of a perfume so sweet that it was as though all the + flowers of the earth haunted the place with their presence, and a music + like the biwa of Semimaru was heard in the tree tops. This sounded far off + like the whispering of rain when it falls in very small leaves, and + presently it died away, and a voice followed after, singing, alone in the + woods, so that the silence appeared to have been created that such a music + might possess the world. So the Emperor stopped instantly, and the + Dainagon behind him and he heard these words. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “In me the Heavenly Lotos grew, + The fibres ran from head to feet, + And my heart was the august Blossom. + Therefore the sweetness flowed through the veins of my flesh, + And I breathed peace upon all the world, + And about me was my fragrance shed + That the souls of men should desire me.” + </pre> + <p> + Now, as he listened, there came through the wood a maiden, bare—footed, + save for grass sandals, and clad in coarse clothing, and she came up and + passed them, still singing. + </p> + <p> + And when she was past, His Majesty put up his hand to his eyes, like one + dreaming, and said; + </p> + <p> + “What have you seen?” + </p> + <p> + And the Dainagon answered; + </p> + <p> + “Augustness, a country wench, flat—faced, ugly and blind, and with a + voice like a crow. Has not your Majesty seen this?” + </p> + <p> + The Emperor, still shading his eyes, replied; + </p> + <p> + “I saw a maiden so beautiful that her Shining Majesty would be a black + blot beside her. As she went, the Spring and all its sweetness blew from + her garments. Her robe was green with small gold flowers. Her eyes were + closed, but she resembled a cherry tree, snowy with bloom and dew. Her + voice was like the singing flowers of Paradise.” + </p> + <p> + The Dainagon looked at him with fear and compassion; + </p> + <p> + “Augustness, how should such a lady carry in her arms a bundle of + firewood?” + </p> + <p> + “She bore in her hands three lotos flowers, and where each foot fell I saw + a lotos bloom and vanish.” + </p> + <p> + They retraced their steps through the wood; His Majesty radiant as Prince + Fireshine with the joy that filled his soul; the Dainagon darkened as + Prince Firefade with fear, believing that the strange music of Semimaru + had bewitched His Majesty, or that the maiden herself might possibly have + the power of the fox in shape-changing and bewildering the senses. + </p> + <p> + Very sorrowful and careful was his heart for he loved his Master. + </p> + <p> + That night His Majesty dreamed that he stood before the kakemono of the + Amida Buddha, and that as he raised his eyes in adoration to the Blessed + Face, he beheld the images of Fugen and Fudo, rise up and bow down before + that One Who Is. Then, gliding in, before these Holinesses stood a figure, + and it was the wood-cutter’s daughter homely and blinded. She stretched + her hands upward as though invoking the supreme Buddha, and then turning + to His Majesty she smiled upon him, her eyes closed as in bliss + unutterable. And he said aloud. + </p> + <p> + “Would that I might see her eyes!” and so saying awoke in a great + stillness of snow and moonlight. + </p> + <p> + Having waked, he said within himself + </p> + <p> + “This marvel will I wed and she shall be my Empress were she lower than + the Eta, and whether her face be lovely or homely. For she is certainly a + flower dropped from the hand of the Divine.” + </p> + <p> + So when the sun was high His Majesty, again followed by the Dainagon, went + through the forest swiftly, and like a man that sees his goal, and when + they reached the place where the maiden went by, His Majesty straitly + commanded the Dainagon that he should draw apart, and leave him to speak + with the maiden; yet that he should watch what befell. + </p> + <p> + So the Dainagon watched, and again he saw her come, very poorly clad, and + with bare feet that shrank from the snow in her grass sandals, bowed + beneath a heavy load of wood upon her shoulders, and her face flat and + homely like a girl of the people, and her eyes blind and shut. + </p> + <p> + And as she came she sang this. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “The Eternal way lies before him, + The way that is made manifest in the Wise. + The Heart that loves reveals itself to man. + For now he draws nigh to the Source. + The night advances fast, + And lo! the moon shines bright.” + </pre> + <p> + And to the Dainagon it seemed a harsh crying nor could he distinguish any + words at all. + </p> + <p> + But what His Majesty beheld was this. The evening had come on and the moon + was rising. The snow had gone. It was the full glory of spring, and the + flowers sprang thick as stars upon the grass, and among them lotos + flowers, great as the wheel of a chariot, white and shining with the + luminance of the pearl, and upon each one of these was seated an incarnate + Holiness, looking upward with joined hands. In the trees were the voices + of the mystic Birds that are the utterance of the Blessed One, proclaiming + in harmony the Five Virtues, The Five Powers, the Seven Steps ascending to + perfect Illumination, the Noble Eightfold Path, and all the Law. And, + bearing, in the heart of the Son of Heaven awoke the Three Remembrances—the + Remembrance of Him who is Blessed, Remembrance of the Law, and Remembrance + of the Communion of the Assembly. + </p> + <p> + So, looking upward to the heavens, he beheld the Infinite Buddha, high and + lifted up in a great raying glory. About Him were the exalted + Bodhisattwas, the mighty Disciples, great Arhats all, and all the + countless Angelhood. And these rose high into the infinite until they + could be seen but as a point of fire against the moon. With this golden + multitude beyond all numbering was He. + </p> + <p> + Then, as His Majesty had seen in the dream of the night, the wood-cutter’s + daughter, moving through the flowers like one blind that gropes his way, + advanced before the Blessed Feet, and uplifting her hands, did adoration, + and her face he could not see, but his heart went with her, adoring also + the infinite Buddha seated in the calms of boundless Light. + </p> + <p> + Then enlightenment entered at his eyes, as a man that wakes from sleep, + and suddenly he beheld the Maiden crowned and robed and terrible in + beauty, and her feet were stayed upon an open lotos, and his soul knew the + Senju Kwannon Herself, myriad-armed for the helping of mankind. + </p> + <p> + And turning, she smiled as in the vision, but his eyes being now clear her + blinded eyes were opened, and that glory who shall tell as those living + founts of Wisdom rayed upon him their ineffable light? In that ocean was + his being drowned, and so, bowed before the Infinite Buddha, he received + the Greater Illumination. + </p> + <p> + How great is the Glory of Kwannon! + </p> + <p> + When the radiance and the vision were withdrawn and only the moon looked + over the trees, His Majesty rose upon his feet, and standing on the snow, + surrounded with calm, he called to the Dainagon, and asked this; + </p> + <p> + “What have you seen?” + </p> + <p> + “Augustness, nothing but the country wench and moon and snow.” + </p> + <p> + “And heard?” + </p> + <p> + “Augustness, nothing but the harsh voice of the wood-cutter’s daughter.” + </p> + <p> + “And felt?” + </p> + <p> + “Augustness, nothing but the bone-piercing cold.” So His Majesty adored + that which cannot be uttered, saying; + </p> + <p> + “So Wisdom, so Glory encompass us about, and we see them not for we are + blinded with illusion. Yet every stone is a jewel and every clod is spirit + and to the hems of the Infinite Buddha all cling. Through the compassion + of the Supernal Mercy that walks the earth as the Bodhisattwa Kwannon, am + I admitted to wisdom and given sight and hearing. And what is all the + world to that happy one who has beheld Her eyes!” + </p> + <p> + And His Majesty returned through the forest. + </p> + <p> + When, the next day, he sent for the venerable Semimaru that holy recluse + had departed and none knew where. But still when the moon is full a + strange music moves in the tree tops of Shiobara. + </p> + <p> + Then His sacred Majesty returned to City-Royal, having determined to + retire into the quiet life, and there, abandoning the throne to a kinsman + wise in greatness, he became a dweller in the deserted hut of Semimaru. + </p> + <p> + His life, like a descending moon approaching the hill that should hide it, + was passed in meditation on that Incarnate Love and Compassion whose glory + had augustly been made known to him, and having cast aside all save the + image of the Divine from his soul, His Majesty became even as that man who + desired enlightenment of the Blessed One. + </p> + <p> + For he, desiring instruction, gathered precious flowers, and journeyed to + present them as an offering to the Guatama Buddha. Standing before Him, he + stretched forth both his hands holding the flowers. + </p> + <p> + Then said the Holy One, looking upon his petitioner’s right hand; + </p> + <p> + “Loose your hold of these.” + </p> + <p> + And the man dropped the flowers from his right hand. And the Holy One + looking upon his left hand, said; + </p> + <p> + “Loose your hold of these.” + </p> + <p> + And, sorrowing, he dropped the flowers from his left hand. And again the + Master said; + </p> + <p> + “Loose your hold of that which is neither in the right nor in the left.” + </p> + <p> + And the disciple said very pitifully; + </p> + <p> + “Lord, of what should I loose my hold for I have nothing left?” + </p> + <p> + And He looked upon him steadfastly. + </p> + <p> + Therefore at last understanding he emptied his soul of all desire, and of + fear that is the shadow of desire, and being enlightened relinquished all + burdens. + </p> + <p> + So was it also with His Majesty. In peace he dwelt, and becoming a great + Arhat, in peace he departed to that Uttermost Joy where is the Blessed One + made manifest in Pure Light. + </p> + <p> + As for the parents of the maiden, they entered after sore troubles into + peace, having been remembered by the Infinite. For it is certain that the + enemies also of the Supreme Buddha go to salvation by thinking on Him, + even though it be against Him. + </p> + <p> + And he who tells this truth makes this prayer to the Lady of Pity; + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Grant me, I pray, + One dewdrop from Thy willow spray, + And in the double Lotos keep + My hidden heart asleep.” + </pre> + <p> + How great is the Glory of Kwannon! + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY + </h2> + <h3> + A STORY OF THE CHINESE COURT + </h3> + <p> + In the city of Chang-an music filled the palaces, and the festivities of + the Emperor were measured by its beat. Night, and the full moon swimming + like a gold-fish in the garden lakes, gave the signal for the Feather + Jacket and Rainbow Skirt dances. Morning, with the rising sun, summoned + the court again to the feast and wine-cup in the floating gardens. + </p> + <p> + The Emperor Chung Tsu favored this city before all others. The Yen Tower + soaring heavenward, the Drum Towers, the Pearl Pagoda, were the only fit + surroundings of his magnificence; and in the Pavilion of Tranquil Learning + were held those discussions which enlightened the world and spread the + fame of the Jade Emperor far and wide. In all respects he adorned the + Dragon Throne—in all but one; for Nature, bestowing so much, + withheld one gift, and the Imperial heart, as precious as jade, was also + as hard, and he eschewed utterly the company of the Hidden Palace Flowers. + </p> + <p> + Yet the Inner Chambers were filled with ladies chosen from all parts of + the Celestial Empire—ladies of the most exquisite and torturing + beauty, moons of loveliness, moving coquettishly on little feet, with all + the grace of willow branches in a light breeze. They were sprinkled with + perfumes, adorned with jewels, robed in silks woven with gold and + embroidered with designs of flowers and birds. Their faces were painted + and their eyebrows formed into slender and perfect arches whence the soul + of man might well slip to perdition, and a breath of sweet odor followed + each wherever she moved. Every one might have been the Empress of some + lesser kingdom; but though rumours reached the Son of Heaven from time to + time of their charms,—especially when some new blossom was added to + the Imperial bouquet,—he had dismissed them from his august + thoughts, and they languished in a neglect so complete that the Great Cold + Palaces of the Moon were not more empty than their hearts. They remained + under the supervision of the Princess of Han, August Aunt of the Emperor, + knowing that their Lord considered the company of sleeve-dogs and macaws + more pleasant than their own. Nor had he as yet chosen an Empress, and it + was evident that without some miracle, such as the intervention of the + Municipal God, no heir to the throne could be hoped for. + </p> + <p> + Yet the Emperor one day remembered his imprisoned beauties, and it crossed + the Imperial thoughts that even these inferior creatures might afford such + interest as may be found in the gambols of trained fleas or other insects + of no natural attainments. + </p> + <p> + Accordingly, he commanded that the subject last discussed in his presence + should be transferred to the Inner Chambers, and it was his Order that the + ladies should also discuss it, and their opinions be engraved on ivory, + bound together with red silk and tassels and thus presented at the Dragon + feet. The subject chosen was the following:— + </p> + <p> + Describe the Qualities of the Ideal Man + </p> + <p> + Now when this command was laid before the August Aunt, the guardian of the + Inner Chambers, she was much perturbed in mind, for such a thing was + unheard of in all the annals of the Empire. Recovering herself, she + ventured to say that the discussion of such a question might raise very + disquieting thoughts in the minds of the ladies, who could not be supposed + to have any opinions at all on such a subject. Nor was it desirable that + they should have. To every woman her husband and no other is and must be + the Ideal Man. So it was always in the past; so it must ever be. There are + certain things which it is dangerous to question or discuss, and how can + ladies who have never spoken with any other man than a parent or a brother + judge such matters? + </p> + <p> + “How, indeed,” asked this lady of exalted merit, “can the bat form an idea + of the sunlight, or the carp of the motion of wings? If his Celestial + Majesty had commanded a discussion on the Superior Woman and the virtues + which should adorn her, some sentiments not wholly unworthy might have + been offered. But this is a calamity. They come unexpectedly, springing up + like mushrooms, and this one is probably due to the lack of virtue of the + inelegant and unintellectual person who is now speaking.” + </p> + <p> + This she uttered in the presence of the principal beauties of the Inner + Chambers. They sat or reclined about her in attitudes of perfect + loveliness. Two, embroidering silver pheasants, paused with their needles + suspended above the stretched silk, to hear the August Aunt. One, + threading beads of jewel jade, permitted them to slip from the string and + so distended the rose of her mouth in surprise that the small pearl-shells + were visible within. The Lady Tortoise, caressing a scarlet and azure + macaw, in her agitation so twitched the feathers that the bird, shrieking, + bit her finger. The Lady Golden Bells blushed deeply at the thought of + what was required of them; and the little Lady Summer Dress, youngest of + all the assembled beauties, was so alarmed at the prospect that she began + to sob aloud, until she met the eye of the August Aunt and abruptly + ceased. + </p> + <p> + “It is not, however, to be supposed,” said the August Aunt, opening her + snuff-bottle of painted crystal, “that the minds of our deplorable and + unattractive sex are wholly incapable of forming opinions. But speech is a + grave matter for women, naturally slow-witted and feeble-minded as they + are. This unenlightened person recalls the Odes as saying:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ‘A flaw in a piece of white jade + May be ground away, + But when a woman has spoken foolishly + Nothing can be done-’ +</pre> + <p> + a consideration which should make every lady here and throughout the world + think anxiously before speech.” So anxiously did the assembled beauties + think, that all remained mute as fish in a pool, and the August Aunt + continued:— + </p> + <p> + “Let Tsu-ssu be summoned. It is my intention to suggest to the Dragon + Emperor that the virtues of women be the subject of our discourse, and I + will myself open and conclude the discussion.” + </p> + <p> + Tsu-ssu was not long in kotowing before the August Aunt, who despatched + her message with the proper ceremonial due to its Imperial destination; + and meanwhile, in much agitation, the beauties could but twitter and + whisper in each other’s ears, and await the response like condemned + prisoners who yet hope for reprieve. + </p> + <p> + Scarce an hour had dripped away on the water-clock when an Imperial + Missive bound with yellow silk arrived, and the August Aunt, rising, + kotowed nine times before she received it in her jewelled hand with its + delicate and lengthy nails ensheathed in pure gold and set with gems of + the first water. She then read it aloud, the ladies prostrating + themselves. + </p> + <p> + To the Princess of Han, the August Aunt, the Lady of the Nine Superior + Virtues:— + </p> + <p> + “Having deeply reflected on the wisdom submitted, We thus reply. Women + should not be the judges of their own virtues, since these exist only in + relation to men. Let Our Command therefore be executed, and tablets + presented before us seven days hence, with the name of each lady appended + to her tablet.” + </p> + <p> + It was indeed pitiable to see the anxiety of the ladies! A sacrifice to + Kwan-Yin, the Goddess of Mercy, of a jewel from each, with intercession + for aid, was proposed by the Lustrous Lady; but the majority shook their + heads sadly. The August Aunt, tossing her head, declared that, as the Son + of Heaven had made no comment on her proposal of opening and closing the + discussion, she should take no part other than safeguarding the interests + of propriety. This much increased the alarm, and, kneeling at her feet, + the swan-like beauties, Deep-Snow and Winter Moon implored her aid and + compassion. But, rising indignantly, the August Aunt sought her own + apartments, and for the first time the inmates of the Pepper Chamber saw + with regret the golden dragons embroidered on her back. + </p> + <p> + It was then that the Round-Faced Beauty ventured a remark. This maiden, + having been born in the far-off province of Suchuan, was considered a + rustic by the distinguished elegance of the Palace and, therefore, had + never spoken unless decorum required. Still, even her detractors were + compelled to admit the charms that had gained her her name. Her face had + the flawless outline of the pearl, and like the blossom of the plum was + the purity of her complexion, upon which the darkness of her eyebrows + resembled two silk-moths alighted to flutter above the brilliance of her + eyes—eyes which even the August Aunt had commended after a banquet + of unsurpassed variety. Her hair had been compared to the crow’s plumage; + her waist was like a roll of silk, and her discretion in habiting herself + was such that even the Lustrous Lady and the Lady Tortoise drew + instruction from the splendours of her robes. It created, however, a + general astonishment when she spoke. + </p> + <p> + “Paragons of beauty, what is this dull and opaque-witted person that she + should speak?” + </p> + <p> + “What, indeed!” said the Celestial Sister. “This entirely undistinguished + person cannot even imagine.” + </p> + <p> + A distressing pause followed, during which many whispered anxiously. The + Lustrous Lady broke it. + </p> + <p> + “It is true that the highly ornamental Round-Faced Beauty is but lately + come, yet even the intelligent Ant may assist the Dragon; and in the + presence of alarm, what is decorum? With a tiger behind one, who can + recall the Book of Rites and act with befitting elegance?” + </p> + <p> + “The high-born will at all times remember the Rites!” retorted the + Celestial Sister. “Have we not heard the August Aunt observe: ‘Those who + understand do not speak. Those who speak do not understand’?” + </p> + <p> + The Round-Faced Beauty collected her courage. + </p> + <p> + “Doubtless this is wisdom; yet if the wise do not speak, who should + instruct us? The August Aunt herself would be silent.” + </p> + <p> + All were confounded by this dilemma, and the little Lady Summer-Dress, + still weeping, entreated that the Round-Faced Beauty might be heard. The + Heavenly Blossoms then prepared to listen and assumed attitudes of + attention, which so disconcerted the Round-Faced Beauty that she blushed + like a spring tulip in speaking. + </p> + <p> + “Beautiful ladies, our Lord, who is unknown to us all, has issued an + august command. It cannot be disputed, for the whisper of disobedience is + heard as thunder in the Imperial Presence. Should we not aid each other? + If any lady has formed a dream in her soul of the Ideal Man, might not + such a picture aid us all? Let us not be ‘say-nothing-do-nothing,’ but + act!” + </p> + <p> + They hung their heads and smiled, but none would allow that she had formed + such an image. The little Lady Tortoise, laughing behind her fan of + sandalwood, said roguishly: “The Ideal Man should be handsome, liberal in + giving, and assuredly he should appreciate the beauty of his wives. But + this we cannot say to the Divine Emperor.” + </p> + <p> + A sigh rustled through the Pepper Chamber. The Celestial Sister looked + angrily at the speaker. + </p> + <p> + “This is the talk of children,” she said. “Does no one remember + Kung-fu-tse’s [Confucius] description of the Superior Man?” + </p> + <p> + Unfortunately none did—not even the Celestial Sister herself. + </p> + <p> + “Is it not probable,” said the Round-Faced Beauty, “that the Divine + Emperor remembers it himself and wishes—” + </p> + <p> + But the Celestial Sister, yawning audibly, summoned the attendants to + bring rose-leaves in honey, and would hear no more. + </p> + <p> + The Round-Faced Beauty therefore wandered forth among the mossy rocks and + drooping willows of the Imperial Garden, deeply considering the matter. + She ascended the bow-curved bridge of marble which crossed the Pool of + Clear Weather, and from the top idly observed the reflection of her + rose-and-gold coat in the water while, with her taper fingers, she + crumbled cake for the fortunate gold-fish that dwelt in it. And, so doing, + she remarked one fish, four-tailed among the six-tailed, and in no way + distinguished by elegance, which secured by far the largest share of the + crumbs dropped into the pool. Bending lower, she observed this singular + fish and its methods. + </p> + <p> + The others crowded about the spot where the crumbs fell, all herded + together. In their eagerness and stupidity they remained like a cloud of + gold in one spot, slowly waving their tails. But this fish, concealing + itself behind a miniature rock, waited, looking upward, until the crumbs + were falling, and then, rushing forth with the speed of an arrow, + scattered the stupid mass of fish, and bore off the crumbs to its shelter, + where it instantly devoured them. + </p> + <p> + “This is notable,” said the Round-Faced Beauty. “Observation enlightens + the mind. To be apart—to be distinguished—secures notice!” And + she plunged into thought again, wandering, herself a flower, among the + gorgeous tree peonies. + </p> + <p> + On the following day the August Aunt commanded that a writer among the + palace attendants should, with brush and ink, be summoned to transcribe + the wisdom of the ladies. She requested that each would give three days to + thought, relating the following anecdote. “There was a man who, taking a + piece of ivory, carved it into a mulberry leaf, spending three years on + the task. When finished it could not be told from the original, and was a + gift suitable for the Brother of the Sun and Moon. Do likewise!” + </p> + <p> + “But yet, O Augustness!” said the Celestial Sister, “if the Lord of Heaven + took as long with each leaf, there would be few leaves on the trees, and + if-” + </p> + <p> + The August Aunt immediately commanded silence and retired. On the third + day she seated herself in her chair of carved ebony, while the attendant + placed himself by her feet and prepared to record her words. + </p> + <p> + “This insignificant person has decided,” began her Augustness, looking + round and unscrewing the amber top of her snuff-bottle, “to take an + unintelligent part in these proceedings. An example should be set. + Attendant, write!” + </p> + <p> + She then dictated as follows: “The Ideal Man is he who now decorates the + Imperial Throne, or he who in all humility ventures to resemble the + incomparable Emperor. Though he may not hope to attain, his endeavor is + his merit. No further description it needed.” + </p> + <p> + With complacence she inhaled the perfumed snuff, as the writer appended + the elegant characters of her Imperial name. + </p> + <p> + If it is permissible to say that the faces of the beauties lengthened + visibly, it should now be said. For it had been the intention of every + lady to make an illusion to the Celestial Emperor and depict him as the + Ideal Man. Nor had they expected that the August Aunt would take any part + in the matter. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, but it was the intention of this commonplace and undignified person + to say this very thing!” cried the Lustrous Lady, with tears in the jewels + of her eyes. “I thought no other high-minded and distinguished lady would + for a moment think of it.” + </p> + <p> + “And it was my intention also!” fluttered the little Lady Tortoise, + wringing her hands! “What now shall this most unlucky and unendurable + person do? For three nights has sleep forsaken my unattractive eyelids, + and, tossing and turning on a couch deprived of all comfort, I could only + repeat, ‘The Ideal Man is the Divine Dragon Emperor!’” + </p> + <p> + “May one of entirely contemptible attainments make a suggestion in this + assemblage of scintillating wit and beauty?” inquired the Celestial + Sister. “My superficial opinion is that it would be well to prepare a + single paper to which all names should be appended, stating that His + Majesty in his Dragon Divinity comprises all ideals in his sacred Person.” + </p> + <p> + “Let those words be recorded,” said the August Aunt. “What else should any + lady of discretion and propriety say? In this Palace of Virtuous Peace, + where all is consecrated to the Son of Heaven, though he deigns not to + enter it, what other thought dare be breathed? Has any lady ventured to + step outside such a limit? If so, let her declare herself!” + </p> + <p> + All shook their heads, and the August Aunt proceeded: “Let the writer + record this as the opinion of every lady of the Imperial Household, and + let each name be separately appended.” + </p> + <p> + Had any desired to object, none dared to confront the August Aunt; but + apparently no beauty so desired, for after three nights’ sleepless + meditation, no other thought than this had occurred to any. + </p> + <p> + Accordingly, the writer moved from lady to lady and, under the supervision + of the August Aunt, transcribed the following: “The Ideal Man is the + earthly likeness of the Divine Emperor. How should it be otherwise?” And + under this sentence wrote the name of each lovely one in succession. The + papers were then placed in the hanging sleeves of the August Aunt for + safety. + </p> + <p> + By the decree of Fate, the father of the Round-Faced Beauty had, before he + became an ancestral spirit, been a scholar of distinction, having + graduated at the age of seventy-two with a composition commended by the + Grand Examiner. Having no gold and silver to give his daughter, he had + formed her mind, and had presented her with the sole jewel of his family-a + pearl as large as a bean. Such was her sole dower, but the accomplished + Aunt may excel the indolent Prince. + </p> + <p> + Yet, before the thought in her mind, she hesitated and trembled, recalling + the lesson of the gold-fish; and it was with anxiety that paled her + roseate lips that, on a certain day, she had sought the Willow Bridge + Pavilion. There had awaited her a palace attendant skilled with the brush, + and there in secrecy and dire affright, hearing the footsteps of the + August Aunt in every rustle of leafage, and her voice in the call of every + crow, did the Round-Faced Beauty dictate the following composition:— + </p> + <p> + “Though the sky rain pearls, it cannot equal the beneficence of the Son of + Heaven. Though the sky rain jade it cannot equal his magnificence. He has + commanded his slave to describe the qualities of the Ideal Man. How should + I, a mere woman, do this? I, who have not seen the Divine Emperor, how + should I know what is virtue? I, who have not seen the glory of his + countenance, how should I know what is beauty? Report speaks of his + excellencies, but I who live in the dark know not. But to the Ideal Woman, + the very vices of her husband are virtues. Should he exalt another, this + is a mark of his superior taste. Should he dismiss his slave, this is + justice. To the Ideal Woman there is but one Ideal Man—and that is + her lord. From the day she crosses his threshold, to the day when they + clothe her in the garments of Immortality, this is her sole opinion. Yet + would that she might receive instruction of what only are beauty and + virtue in his adorable presence.” + </p> + <p> + This being written, she presented her one pearl to the attendant and fled, + not looking behind her, as quickly as her delicate feet would permit. + </p> + <p> + On the seventh day the compositions, engraved on ivory and bound with red + silk and tassels, were presented to the Emperor, and for seven days more + he forgot their existence. On the eighth the High Chamberlain ventured to + recall them to the Imperial memory, and the Emperor glancing slightly at + one after another, threw them aside, yawning as he did so. Finally, one + arrested his eyes, and reading it more than once he laid it before him and + meditated. An hour passed in this way while the forgotten Lord Chamberlain + continued to kneel. The Son of Heaven, then raising his head, pronounced + these words: “In the society of the Ideal Woman, she to whom jealousy is + unknown, tranquillity might possibly be obtained. Let prayer be made + before the Ancestors with the customary offerings, for this is a matter + deserving attention.” + </p> + <p> + A few days passed, and an Imperial attendant, escorted by two mandarins of + the peacock-feather and crystal-button rank, desired an audience of the + August Aunt, and, speaking before the curtain, informed her that his + Imperial Majesty would pay a visit that evening to the Hall of Tranquil + Longevity. Such was her agitation at this honour that she immediately + swooned; but, reviving, summoned all the attendants and gave orders for a + banquet and musicians. + </p> + <p> + Lanterns painted with pheasants and exquisite landscapes were hung on all + the pavilions. Tapestries of rose, decorated with the Five-Clawed Dragons, + adorned the chambers; and upon the High Seat was placed a robe of yellow + satin embroidered with pearls. All was hurry and excitement. The Blossoms + of the Palace were so exquisitely decked that one grain more of powder + would have made them too lily-like, and one touch more of rouge, too + rosecheeked. It was indeed perfection, and, like lotuses upon a lake, or + Asian birds, gorgeous of plumage, they stood ranged in the outer chamber + while the Celestial Emperor took his seat. + </p> + <p> + The Round-Faced Beauty wore no jewels, having bartered her pearl for her + opportunity; but her long coat of jade-green, embroidered with golden + willows, and her trousers of palest rose left nothing to be desired. In + her hair two golden peonies were fastened with pins of kingfisher work. + The Son of Heaven was seated upon the throne as the ladies approached, + marshaled by the August Aunt. He was attired in the Yellow Robe with the + Flying Dragons, and upon the Imperial Head was the Cap, ornamented with + one hundred and forty-four priceless gems. From it hung the twelve + pendants of strings of pearls, partly concealing the august eyes of the + Jade Emperor. No greater splendour can strike awe into the soul of man. + </p> + <p> + At his command the August Aunt took her seat upon a lesser chair at the + Celestial Feet. Her mien was majestic, and struck awe into the assembled + beauties, whose names she spoke aloud as each approached and prostrated + herself. She then pronounced these words: + </p> + <p> + “Beautiful ones, the Emperor, having considered the opinions submitted by + you on the subject of the Superior Man, is pleased to express his august + commendation. Dismiss, therefore, anxiety from your minds, and prepare to + assist at the humble concert of music we have prepared for his Divine + pleasure.” + </p> + <p> + Slightly raising himself in his chair, the Son of Heaven looked down upon + that Garden of Beauty, holding in his hand an ivory tablet bound with red + silk. + </p> + <p> + “Lovely ladies,” he began, in a voice that assuaged fear, “who among you + was it that laid before our feet a composition beginning thus—‘Though + the sky rain pearls’?” + </p> + <p> + The August Aunt immediately rose. + </p> + <p> + “Imperial Majesty, none! These eyes supervised every composition. No + impropriety was permitted.” + </p> + <p> + The Son of Heaven resumed: “Let that lady stand forth.” + </p> + <p> + The words were few, but sufficient. Trembling in every limb, the + Round-Faced Beauty separated herself from her companions and prostrated + herself, amid the breathless amazement of the Blossoms of the Palace. He + looked down upon her as she knelt, pale as a lady carved in ivory, but + lovely as the lotus of Chang-Su. He turned to the August Aunt. “Princess + of Han, my Imperial Aunt, I would speak with this lady alone.” + </p> + <p> + Decorum itself and the custom of Palaces could not conceal the indignation + of the August Aunt as she rose and retired, driving the ladies before her + as a shepherd drives his sheep. + </p> + <p> + The Hall of Tranquil Longevity being now empty, the Jade Emperor extended + his hand and beckoned the Round-Faced Beauty to approach. This she did, + hanging her head like a flower surcharged with dew and swaying gracefully + as a wind-bell, and knelt on the lowest step of the Seat of State. + </p> + <p> + “Loveliest One,” said the Emperor, “I have read your composition. I would + know the truth. Did any aid you as you spoke it? Was it the thought of + your own heart?” + </p> + <p> + “None aided, Divine,” said she, almost fainting with fear. “It was indeed + the thought of this illiterate slave, consumed with an unwarranted but + uncontrollable passion.” + </p> + <p> + “And have you in truth desired to see your Lord?” + </p> + <p> + “As a prisoner in a dungeon desires the light, so was it with this low + person.” + </p> + <p> + “And having seen?” + </p> + <p> + “Augustness, the dull eyes of this slave are blinded with beauty.” + </p> + <p> + She laid her head before his feet. + </p> + <p> + “Yet you have depicted, not the Ideal Man, but the Ideal Woman. This was + not the Celestial command. How was this?” + </p> + <p> + “Because, O versatile and auspicious Emperor, the blind cannot behold the + sunlight, and it is only the Ideal Woman who is worthy to comprehend and + worship the Ideal Man. For this alone is she created.” + </p> + <p> + A smile began to illuminate the Imperial Countenance. “And how, O + Round-Faced Beauty, did you evade the vigilance of the August Aunt?” + </p> + <p> + She hung her head lower, speaking almost in a whisper. “With her one pearl + did this person buy the secrecy of the writer; and when the August Aunt + slept, did I conceal the paper in her sleeve with the rest, and her own + Imperial hand gave it to the engraver of ivory.” + </p> + <p> + She veiled her face with two jade-white hands that trembled excessively. + On hearing this statement the Celestial Emperor broke at once into a very + great laughter, and he laughed loud and long as a tiller of wheat. The + Round-Faced Beauty heard it demurely until, catching the Imperial eye, + decorum was forgotten and she too laughed uncontrollably. So they + continued, and finally the Emperor leaned back, drying the tears in his + eyes with his august sleeve, and the lady, resuming her gravity, hid her + face in her hands, yet regarded him through her fingers. + </p> + <p> + When the August Aunt returned at the end of an hour with the ladies, + surrounded by the attendants with their instruments of music, the + Round-Faced Beauty was seated in the chair that she herself had occupied, + and on the whiteness of her brow was hung the chain of pearls, which had + formed the frontal of the Cap of the Emperor. + </p> + <p> + It is recorded that, advancing from honour to honour, the Round-Faced + Beauty was eventually chosen Empress and became the mother of the Imperial + Prince. The celestial purity of her mind and the absence of all flaws of + jealousy and anger warranted this distinction. But it is also recorded + that, after her elevation, no other lady was ever exalted in the Imperial + favour or received the slightest notice from the Emperor. For the Empress, + now well acquainted with the Ideal Man, judged it better that his + experiences of the Ideal Woman should be drawn from herself alone. And as + she decreed, so it was done. Doubtless Her Majesty did well. + </p> + <p> + It is known that the Emperor departed to the Ancestral Spirits at an early + age, seeking, as the August Aunt observed, that repose which on earth + could never more be his. But no one has asserted that this lady’s + disposition was free from the ordinary blemishes of humanity. + </p> + <p> + As for the Celestial Empress (who survives in history as one of the most + astute rulers who ever adorned the Dragon Throne), she continued to rule + her son and the Empire, surrounded by the respectful admiration of all. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Ninth Vibration And Other Stories, by +L. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Ninth Vibration And Other Stories + +Author: L. Adams Beck + +Release Date: August, 1999 [Etext #1853] +Posting Date: November 18, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NINTH VIBRATION *** + + + + +Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer + + + + + +THE NINTH VIBRATION AND OTHER STORIES + +By L. Adams Beck + + + + +CONTENTS: + + THE NINTH VIBRATION + + THE INTERPRETER A ROMANCE OF THE EAST + + THE INCOMPARABLE LADY A STORY OF CHINA WITH A MORAL + + THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN A STORY OF BURMA + + FIRE OF BEAUTY + + THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL + + "HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!" + + "THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY" + + + + +THE NINTH VIBRATION + +There is a place uplifted nine thousand feet in purest air where one +of the most ancient tracks in the world runs from India into Tibet. +It leaves Simla of the Imperial councils by a stately road; it passes +beyond, but now narrowing, climbing higher beside the khuds or steep +drops to the precipitous valleys beneath, and the rumor of Simla grows +distant and the way is quiet, for, owing to the danger of driving horses +above the khuds, such baggage as you own must be carried by coolies, and +you yourself must either ride on horseback or in the little horseless +carriage of the Orient, here drawn and pushed by four men. And presently +the deodars darken the way with a solemn presence, for-- + + "These are the Friars of the wood, + The Brethren of the Solitude + Hooded and grave--" + +their breath most austerely pure in the gradually chilling air. Their +companies increase and now the way is through a great wood where it +has become a trail and no more, and still it climbs for many miles and +finally a rambling bungalow, small and low, is sighted in the deeps of +the trees, a mountain stream from unknown heights falling beside it. And +this is known as the House in the Woods. Very few people are permitted +to go there, for the owner has no care for money and makes no provision +for guests. You must take your own servant and the khansamah will cook +you such simple food as men expect in the wilds, and that is all. You +stay as long as you please and when you leave not even a gift to the +khansamah is permitted. + +I had been staying in Ranipur of the plains while I considered the +question of getting to Upper Kashmir by the route from Simla along the +old way to Chinese Tibet where I would touch Shipki in the Dalai +Lama's territory and then pass on to Zanskar and so down to Kashmir--a +tremendous route through the Himalaya and a crowning experience of +the mightiest mountain scenery in the world. I was at Ranipur for the +purpose of consulting my old friend Olesen, now an irrigation official +in the Rampur district--a man who had made this journey and nearly lost +his life in doing it. It is not now perhaps so dangerous as it was, and +my life was of no particular value to any one but myself, and the plan +interested me. + +I pass over the long discussions of ways and means in the blinding heat +of Ranipur. Olesen put all his knowledge at my service and never uttered +a word of the envy that must have filled him as he looked at the +distant snows cool and luminous in blue air, and, shrugging good-natured +shoulders, spoke of the work that lay before him on the burning +plains until the terrible summer should drag itself to a close. We had +vanquished the details and were smoking in comparative silence one night +on the veranda, when he said in his slow reflective way; + +"You don't like the average hotel, Ormond, and you'll like it still less +up Simla way with all the Simla crowd of grass-widows and fellows out +for as good a time as they can cram into the hot weather. I wonder if I +could get you a permit for The House in the Woods while you re waiting +to fix up your men and route for Shipki." + +He explained and of course I jumped at the chance. It belonged, he said, +to a man named Rup Singh, a pandit, or learned man of Ranipur. He had +always spent the summer there, but age and failing health made this +impossible now, and under certain conditions he would occasionally allow +people known to friends of his own to put up there. + +"And Rup Singh and I are very good friends," Olesen said; "I won his +heart by discovering the lost Sukh Mandir, or Hall of Pleasure, built +many centuries ago by a Maharao of Ranipur for a summer retreat in the +great woods far beyond Simla. There are lots of legends about it here in +Ranipur. They call it The House of Beauty. Rup Singh's ancestor had been +a close friend of the Maharao and was with him to the end, and that's +why he himself sets such store on the place. You have a good chance if I +ask for a permit. + +"He told me the story and since it is the heart of my own I give it +briefly. Many centuries ago the Ranipur Kingdom was ruled by the Maharao +Rai Singh a prince of the great lunar house of the Rajputs. Expecting +a bride from some far away kingdom (the name of this is unrecorded) +he built the Hall of Pleasure as a summer palace, a house of rare and +costly beauty. A certain great chamber he lined with carved figures of +the Gods and their stories, almost unsurpassed for truth and life. So, +with the pine trees whispering about it the secret they sigh to tell, +he hoped to create an earthly Paradise with this Queen in whom all +loveliness was perfected. And then some mysterious tragedy ended all +his hopes. It was rumoured that when the Princess came to his court, +she was, by some terrible mistake, received with insult and offered the +position only of one of his women. After that nothing was known. Certain +only is it that he fled to the hills, to the home of his broken hope, +and there ended his days in solitude, save for the attendance of two +faithful friends who would not abandon him even in the ghostly quiet of +the winter when the pine boughs were heavy with snow and a spectral moon +stared at the panthers shuffling through the white wastes beneath. Of +these two Rup Singh's ancestor was one. And in his thirty fifth year +the Maharao died and his beauty and strength passed into legend and his +kingdom was taken by another and the jungle crept silently over his Hall +of Pleasure and the story ended. + +"There was not a memory of the place up there," Olesen went on. +"Certainly I never heard anything of it when I went up to the Shipki +in 1904. But I had been able to be useful to Rup Singh and he gave me a +permit for The House in the Woods, and I stopped there for a few days' +shooting. I remember that day so well. I was wandering in the dense +woods while my men got their midday grub, and I missed the trail somehow +and found myself in a part where the trees were dark and thick and the +silence heavy as lead. It was as if the trees were on guard--they stood +shoulder to shoulder and stopped the way. Well, I halted, and had a +notion there was something beyond that made me doubt whether to go on. +I must have stood there five minutes hesitating. Then I pushed on, +bruising the thick ferns under my shooting boots and stooping under the +knotted boughs. Suddenly I tramped out of the jungle into a clearing, +and lo and behold a ruined House, with blocks of marble lying all about +it, and carved pillars and a great roof all being slowly smothered +by the jungle. The weirdest thing you ever saw. I climbed some fallen +columns to get a better look, and as I did I saw a face flash by at the +arch of a broken window. I sang out in Hindustani, but no answer: only +the echo from the woods. Somehow that dampened my ardour, and I didn't +go in to what seemed like a great ruined hall for the place was so +eerie and lonely, and looked mighty snaky into the bargain. So I came +ingloriously away and told Rup Singh. And his whole face changed. 'That +is The House of Beauty,' he said. 'All my life have I sought it and in +vain. For, friend of my soul, a man must lose himself that he may find +himself and what lies beyond, and the trodden path has ever been my +doom. And you who have not sought have seen. Most strange are the way +of the Gods'. Later on I knew this was why he had always gone up yearly, +thinking and dreaming God knows what. He and I tried for the place +together, but in vain and the whole thing is like a dream. Twice he has +let friends of mine stay at The House in the Woods, and I think he won't +refuse now." + +"Did he ever tell you the story?" + +"Never. I only know what I've picked up here. Some horrible mistake +about the Rani that drove the man almost mad with remorse. I've heard +bits here and there. There's nothing so vital as tradition in India." + +"I wonder'. what really happened." + +"That we shall never know. I got a little old picture of the +Maharao--said to be painted by a Pahari artist. It's not likely to be +authentic, but you never can tell. A Brahman sold it to me that he might +complete his daughter's dowry, and hated doing it." + +"May I see it?" + +"Why certainly. Not a very good light, but--can do," as the Chinks say. + +He brought it out rolled in silk stuff and I carried it under the +hanging lamp. A beautiful young man indeed, with the air of race +these people have beyond all others;--a cold haughty face, immovably +dignified. He sat with his hands resting lightly on the arms of his +chair of State. A crescent of rubies clasped the folds of the turban and +from this sprang an aigrette scattering splendours. The magnificent hilt +of a sword was ready beside him. The face was not only beautiful but +arresting. + +"A strange picture," I said. "The artist has captured the man himself. +I can see him trampling on any one who opposed him, and suffering in the +same cold secret way. It ought to be authentic if it isn't. Don't you +know any more?" + +"Nothing. Well--to bed, and tomorrow I'll see Rup Singh." + +I was glad when he returned with the permission. I was to be very +careful, he said, to make no allusion to the lost palace, for two women +were staying at the House in the Woods--a mother and daughter to whom +Rup Singh had granted hospitality because of an obligation he must +honor. But with true Oriental distrust of women he had thought fit to +make no confidence to them. I promised and asked Olesen if he knew them. + +"Slightly. Canadians of Danish blood like my own. Their name is Ingmar. +Some people think the daughter good-looking. The mother is supposed +to be clever; keen on occult subjects which she came back to India to +study. The husband was a great naturalist and the kindest of men. He +almost lived in the jungle and the natives had all sorts of rumours +about his powers. You know what they are. They said the birds and beasts +followed him about. Any old thing starts a legend." + +"What was the connection with Rup Singh?" + +"He was in difficulties and undeservedly, and Ingmar generously lent +him money at a critical time, trusting to his honour for repayment. Like +most Orientals he never forgets a good turn and would do anything for +any of the family--except trust the women with any secret he valued. The +father is long dead. By the way Rup Singh gave me a queer message for +you. He said; 'Tell the Sahib these words--"Let him who finds water in +the desert share his cup with him who dies of thirst." He is certainly +getting very old. I don't suppose he knew himself what he meant." + +I certainly did not. However my way was thus smoothed for me and I took +the upward road, leaving Olesen to the long ungrateful toil of the man +who devotes his life to India without sufficient time or knowledge to +make his way to the inner chambers of her beauty. There is no harder +mistress unless you hold the pass-key to her mysteries, there is none of +whom so little can be told in words but who kindles so deep a passion. +Necessity sometimes takes me from that enchanted land, but when the +latest dawns are shining in my skies I shall make my feeble way back to +her and die at her worshipped feet. So I went up from Kalka. + +I have never liked Simla. It is beautiful enough--eight thousand feet +up in the grip of the great hills looking toward the snows, the famous +summer home of the Indian Government. Much diplomacy is whispered +on Observatory Hill and many are the lighter diversions of which Mr. +Kipling and lesser men have written. But Simla is also a gateway to many +things--to the mighty deodar forests that clothe the foot-hills of the +mountains, to Kulu, to the eternal snows, to the old, old bridle way +that leads up to the Shipki Pass and the mysteries of Tibet--and to the +strange things told in this story. So I passed through with scarcely a +glance at the busy gayety of the little streets and the tiny shops +where the pretty ladies buy their rouge and powder. I was attended by +my servant Ali Khan, a Mohammedan from Nagpur, sent up with me by Olesen +with strong recommendation. He was a stout walker, so too am I, and an +inveterate dislike to the man-drawn carriage whenever my own legs would +serve me decided me to walk the sixteen miles to the House in the Woods, +sending on the baggage. Ali Khan despatched it and prepared to follow +me, the fine cool air of the hills giving us a zest. + +"Subhan Alla! (Praise be to God!) the air is sweet!" he said, stepping +out behind me. "What time does the Sahib look to reach the House?" + +"About five or six. Now, Ali Khan, strike out of the road. You know the +way." + +So we struck up into the glorious pine woods, mountains all about us. +Here and there as we climbed higher was a little bank of forgotten +snow, but spring had triumphed and everywhere was the waving grace of +maiden-hair ferns, banks of violets and strangely beautiful little wild +flowers. These woods are full of panthers, but in day time the only +precaution necessary is to take no dog,--a dainty they cannot resist. +The air was exquisite with the sun-warm scent of pines, and here and +there the trees broke away disclosing mighty ranges of hills covered +with rich blue shadows like the bloom on a plum,--the clouds chasing the +sunshine over the mountain sides and the dark green velvet of the robe +of pines. I looked across ravines that did not seem gigantic and yet the +villages on the other side were like a handful of peas, so tremendous +was the scale. I stood now and then to see the rhododendrons, forest +trees here with great trunks and massive boughs glowing with blood-red +blossom, and time went by and I took no count of it, so glorious was the +climb. + +It must have been hours later when it struck me that the sun was getting +low and that by now we should be nearing The House in the Woods. I said +as much to Ali Khan. He looked perplexed and agreed. We had reached +a comparatively level place, the trail faint but apparent, and it +surprised me that we heard no sound of life from the dense wood where +our goal must be. + +"I know not, Presence," he said. "May his face be blackened that +directed me. I thought surely I could not miss the way, and yet-" + +We cast back and could see no trail forking from the one we were on. +There was nothing for it but to trust to luck and push on. But I began +to be uneasy and so was the man. I had stupidly forgotten to unpack +my revolver, and worse, we had no food, and the mountain air is an +appetiser, and at night the woods have their dangers, apart from being +absolutely trackless. We had not met a living being since we left the +road and there seemed no likelihood of asking for directions. I stopped +no longer for views but went steadily on, Ali Khan keeping up a running +fire of low-voiced invocations and lamentations. And now it was dusk and +the position decidedly unpleasant. + +It was at that moment I saw a woman before us walking lightly and +steadily under the pines. She must have struck into the trail from +the side for she never could have kept before us all the way. A native +woman, but wearing the all-concealing boorka, more like a town dweller +than a woman of the hills. I put on speed and Ali Khan, now very tired, +toiled on behind me as I came up with her and courteously asked the +way. Her face was entirely hidden, but the answering voice was clear and +sweet. I made up my mind she was young, for it had the bird-like thrill +of youth. + +"If the Presence continues to follow this path he will arrive. It is not +far. They wait for him." + +That was all. It left me with a desire to see the veiled face. We passed +on and Ali Khan looked fearfully back. + +"Ajaib! (Wonderful!) A strange place to meet one of the purdah-nashin +(veiled women)" he muttered. "What would she be doing up here in the +heights? She walked like a Khanam (khan's wife) and I saw the gleam of +gold under the boorka." + +I turned with some curiosity as he spoke, and lo! there was no human +being in sight. She had disappeared from the track behind us and it was +impossible to say where. The darkening trees were beginning to hold the +dusk and it seemed unimaginable that a woman should leave the way and +take to the dangers of the woods. + +"Puna-i-Khoda--God protect us!" said Ali Khan in a shuddering whisper. +"She was a devil of the wilds. Press on, Sahib. We should not be here in +the dark." + +There was nothing else to do. We made the best speed we could, and the +trees grew more dense and the trail fainter between the close trunks, +and so the night came bewildering with the expectation that we must pass +the night unfed and unarmed in the cold of the heights. They might send +out a search party from The House in the Woods--that was still a hope, +if there were no other. And then, very gradually and wonderfully the +moon dawned over the tree tops and flooded the wood with mysterious +silver lights and about her rolled the majesty of the stars. We pressed +on into the heart of the night. From the dense black depths we emerged +at last. An open glade lay before us--the trees falling back to right +and left to disclose--what? + +A long low house of marble, unlit, silent, bathed in pale splendour and +shadow. About it stood great deodars, clothed in clouds of the white +blossoming clematis, ghostly and still. Acacias hung motionless trails +of heavily scented bloom as if carved in ivory. It was all silent as +death. A flight of nobly sculptured steps led up to a broad veranda and +a wide open door with darkness behind it. Nothing more. + +I forced myself to shout in Hindustani--the cry seeming a brutal outrage +upon the night, and an echo came back numbed in the black woods. I tried +once more and in vain. We stood absorbed also into the silence. + +"Ya Alla! it is a house of the dead!" whispered Ali Khan, shuddering at +my shoulder,--and even as the words left his lips I understood where we +were. "It is the Sukh Mandir." I said. "It is the House of the Maharao +of Ranipur." + +It was impossible to be in Ranipur and hear nothing of the dead house +of the forest and Ali Khan had heard--God only knows what tales. In his +terror all discipline, all the inborn respect of the native forsook him, +and without word or sign he turned and fled along the track, crashing +through the forest blind and mad with fear. It would have been insanity +to follow him, and in India the first rule of life is that the Sahib +shows no fear, so I left him to his fate whatever it might be, believing +at the same time that a little reflection and dread of the lonely forest +would bring him to heel quickly. + +I stood there and the stillness flowed like water about me. It was +as though I floated upon it--bathed in quiet. My thoughts adjusted +themselves. Possibly it was not the Sukh Mandir. Olesen had spoken of +ruin. I could see none. At least it was shelter from the chill which is +always present at these heights when the sun sets,--and it was beautiful +as a house not made with hands. There was a sense of awe but no fear as +I went slowly up the great steps and into the gloom beyond and so gained +the hall. + +The moon went with me and from a carven arch filled with marble tracery +rained radiance that revealed and hid. Pillars stood about me, wonderful +with horses ramping forward as in the Siva Temple at Vellore. They +appeared to spring from the pillars into the gloom urged by invisible +riders, the effect barbarously rich and strange--motion arrested, struck +dumb in a violent gesture, and behind them impenetrable darkness. I +could not see the end of this hall--for the moon did not reach it, but +looking up I beheld the walls fretted in great panels into the utmost +splendour of sculpture, encircling the stories of the Gods amid a +twining and under-weaving of leaves and flowers. It was more like a +temple than a dwelling. Siva, as Nataraja the Cosmic Dancer, the Rhythm +of the Universe, danced before me, flinging out his arms in the passion +of creation. Kama, the Indian Eros, bore his bow strung with honey-sweet +black bees that typify the heart's desire. Krishna the Beloved smiled +above the herd-maidens adoring at his feet. Ganesha the Elephant-Headed, +sat in massive calm, wreathing his wise trunk about him. And many more. +But all these so far as I could see tended to one centre panel larger +than any, representing two life-size figures of a dim beauty. At first +I could scarcely distinguish one from the other in the upward-reflected +light, and then, even as I stood, the moving moon revealed the two as +if floating in vapor. At once I recognized the subject--I had seen it +already in the ruined temple of Ranipur, though the details differed. +Parvati, the Divine Daughter of the Himalaya, the Emanation of the +mighty mountains, seated upon a throne, listening to a girl who played +on a Pan pipe before her. The goddess sat, her chin leaned upon her +hand, her shoulders slightly inclined in a pose of gentle sweetness, +looking down upon the girl at her feet, absorbed in the music of the +hills and lonely places. A band of jewels, richly wrought, clasped the +veil on her brows, and below the bare bosom a glorious girdle clothed +her with loops and strings and tassels of jewels that fell to her +knees--her only garment. + +The girl was a lovely image of young womanhood, the proud swell of the +breast tapering to the slim waist and long limbs easily folded as she +half reclined at the divine feet, her lips pressed to the pipe. Its +silent music mysteriously banished fear. The sleep must be sweet +indeed that would come under the guardianship of these two fair +creatures--their gracious influence was dewy in the air. I resolved that +I would spend the night beside them. Now with the march of the moon dim +vistas of the walls beyond sprang into being. Strange mythologies--the +incarnations of Vishnu the Preserver, the Pastoral of Krishna the +Beautiful. I promised myself that next day I would sketch some of the +loveliness about me. But the moon was passing on her way--I folded the +coat I carried into a pillow and lay down at the feet of the goddess and +her nymph. Then a moonlit quiet I slept in a dream of peace. + +Sleep annihilates time. Was it long or short when I woke like a man +floating up to the surface from tranquil deeps? That I cannot tell, but +once more I possessed myself and every sense was on guard. + +My hearing first. Bare feet were coming, falling softly as leaves, but +unmistakable. There was a dim whispering but I could hear no word. I +rose on my elbow and looked down the long hall. Nothing. The moonlight +lay in pools of light and seas of shadow on the floor, and the feet drew +nearer. Was I afraid? I cannot tell, but a deep expectation possessed +me as the sound grew like the rustle of grasses parted in a fluttering +breeze, and now a girl came swiftly up the steps, irradiate in the +moonlight, and passing up the hall stood beside me. I could see her +robe, her feet bare from the jungle, but her face wavered and changed +and re-united like the face of a dream woman. I could not fix it for +one moment, yet knew this was the messenger for whom I had waited all +my life--for whom one strange experience, not to be told at present, had +prepared me in early manhood. Words came, and I said: + +"Is this a dream?" + +"No. We meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is true." + +"Is a dream never true?" + +"Sometimes it is the echo of the Ninth Vibration and therefore a +harmonic of truth. You are awake now. It is the day-time that is the +sleep of the soul. You are in the Lower Perception, wherein the truth +behind the veil of what men call Reality is perceived." + +"Can I ascend?" + +"I cannot tell. That is for you, not me. + +"What do I perceive tonight?" + +"The Present as it is in the Eternal. Say no more. Come with me." + +She stretched her hand and took mine with the assurance of a goddess, +and we went up the hall where the night had been deepest between the +great pillars. + +Now it is very clear to me that in every land men, when the doors of +perception are opened, will see what we call the Supernatural clothed +in the image in which that country has accepted it. Blake, the mighty +mystic, will see the Angels of the Revelation, driving their terrible +way above Lambeth--it is not common nor unclean. The fisherman, plying +his coracle on the Thames will behold the consecration of the great new +Abbey of Westminster celebrated with mass and chant and awful lights +in the dead mid-noon of night by that Apostle who is the Rock of the +Church. Before him who wanders in Thessaly Pan will brush the dewy +lawns and slim-girt Artemis pursue the flying hart. In the pale gold of +Egyptian sands the heavy brows of Osiris crowned with the pshent will +brood above the seer and the veil of Isis tremble to the lifting. For +all this is the rhythm to which the souls of men are attuned and in that +vibration they will see, and no other, since in this the very mountains +and trees of the land are rooted. So here, where our remote ancestors +worshipped the Gods of Nature, we must needs stand before the Mystic +Mother of India, the divine daughter of the Himalaya. + +How shall I describe the world we entered? The carvings upon the walls +had taken life--they had descended. It was a gathering of the dreams men +have dreamed here of the Gods, yet most real and actual. They watched in +a serenity that set them apart in an atmosphere of their own--forms of +indistinct majesty and august beauty, absolute, simple, and everlasting. +I saw them as one sees reflections in rippled water--no more. But +all faces turned to the place where now a green and flowering leafage +enshrined and partly hid the living Nature Goddess, as she listened to +a voice that was not dumb to me. I saw her face only in glimpses of an +indescribable sweetness, but an influence came from her presence like +the scent of rainy pine forests, the coolness that breathes from great +rivers, the passion of Spring when she breaks on the world with a wave +of flowers. Healing and life flowed from it. Understanding also. It +seemed I could interpret the very silence of the trees outside into the +expression of their inner life, the running of the green life-blood in +their veins, the delicate trembling of their finger-tips. + +My companion and I were not heeded. We stood hand in hand like children +who have innocently strayed into a palace, gazing in wonderment. The +august life went its way upon its own occasions, and, if we would, we +might watch. Then the voice, clear and cold, proceeding, as it were, +with some story begun before we had strayed into the Presence, the whole +assembly listening in silence. + +"--and as it has been so it will be, for the Law will have the blind +soul carried into a body which is a record of the sins it has committed, +and will not suffer that soul to escape from rebirth into bodies until +it has seen the truth--" + +And even as this was said and I listened, knowing myself on the verge of +some great knowledge, I felt sleep beginning to weigh upon my eyelids. +The sound blurred, flowed unsyllabled as a stream, the girl's hand grew +light in mine; she was fading, becoming unreal; I saw her eyes like +faint stars in a mist. They were gone. Arms seemed to receive me--to lay +me to sleep and I sank below consciousness, and the night took me. + +When I awoke the radiant arrows of the morning were shooting into the +long hall where I lay, but as I rose and looked about me, strange--most +strange, ruin encircled me everywhere. The blue sky was the roof. What I +had thought a palace lost in the jungle, fit to receive its King should +he enter, was now a broken hall of State; the shattered pillars were +festooned with waving weeds, the many coloured lantana grew between the +fallen blocks of marble. Even the sculptures on the walls were difficult +to decipher. Faintly I could trace a hand, a foot, the orb of a +woman's bosom, the gracious outline of some young God, standing above a +crouching worshipper. No more. Yes, and now I saw above me as the dawn +touched it the form of the Dweller in the Windhya Hills, Parvati the +Beautiful, leaning softly over something breathing music at her feet. +Yet I knew I could trace the almost obliterated sculpture only because +I had already seen it defined in perfect beauty. A deep crack ran across +the marble; it was weathered and stained by many rains, and little ferns +grew in the crevices, but I could reconstruct every line from my own +knowledge. And how? The Parvati of Ranipur differed in many important +details. She stood, bending forward, wheras this sweet Lady sat. Her +attendants were small satyr-like spirits of the wilds, piping and +fluting, in place of the reclining maiden. The sweeping scrolls of a +great halo encircled her whole person. Then how could I tell what this +nearly obliterated carving had been? I groped for the answer and could +not find it. I doubted-- + + "Were such things here as we do speak about? + Or have we eaten of the insane root + That takes the reason captive?" + +Memory rushed over me like the sea over dry sands. A girl--there had +been a girl--we had stood with clasped hands to hear a strange music, +but in spite of the spiritual intimacy of those moments I could not +recall her face. I saw it cloudy against a background of night and +dream, the eyes remote as stars, and so it eluded me. Only her presence +and her words survived; "We meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is +true." But the Ninth Vibration itself was dream-land. I had never heard +the phrase--I could not tell what was meant, nor whether my apprehension +was true or false. I knew only that the night had taken her and the dawn +denied her, and that, dream or no dream, I stood there with a pang of +loss that even now leaves me wordless. + +A bird sang outside in the acacias, clear and shrill for day, and this +awakened my senses and lowered me to the plane where I became aware of +cold and hunger, and was chilled with dew. I passed down the tumbled +steps that had been a stately ascent the night before and made my way +into the jungle by the trail, small and lost in fern, by which we had +come. Again I wandered, and it was high noon before I heard mule bells +at a distance, and, thus guided, struck down through the green tangle +to find myself, wearied but safe, upon the bridle way that leads to Fagu +and the far Shipki. Two coolies then directed me to The House in the +Woods. + +All was anxiety there. Ali Khan had arrived in the night, having found +his way under the guidance of blind flight and fear. He had brought the +news that I was lost in the jungle and amid the dwellings of demons. It +was, of course, hopeless to search in the dark, though the khansamah and +his man had gone as far as they dared with lanterns and shouting, +and with the daylight they tried again and were even now away. It was +useless to reproach the man even if I had cared to do so. His ready plea +was that as far as men were concerned he was as brave as any (which +was true enough as I had reason to know later) but that when it came to +devilry the Twelve Imaums themselves would think twice before facing it. + +"Inshalla ta-Alla! (If the sublime God wills!) this unworthy one will +one day show the Protector of the poor, that he is a respectable person +and no coward, but it is only the Sahibs who laugh in the face of +devils." + +He went off to prepare me some food, consumed with curiosity as to my +adventures, and when I had eaten I found my tiny whitewashed cell, for +the room was little more, and slept for hours. + +Late in the afternoon I waked and looked out. A low but glowing +sunlight suffused the wild garden reclaimed from the strangle-hold of +the jungle and hemmed in with rocks and forest. A few simple flowers had +been planted here and there, but its chief beauty was a mountain stream, +brown and clear as the eyes of a dog, that fell from a crag above into +a rocky basin, maidenhair ferns growing in such masses about it that +it was henceforward scarcely more than a woodland voice. Beside it two +great deodars spread their canopies, and there a woman sat in a low +chair, a girl beside her reading aloud. She had thrown her hat off and +the sunshine turned her massed dark hair to bronze. That was all I could +see. I went out and joined them, taking the note of introduction which +Olesen had given me. + +I pass over the unessentials of my story; their friendly greetings and +sympathy for my adventure. It set us at ease at once and I knew my stay +would be the happier for their presence though it is not every woman one +would choose as a companion in the great mountain country. But what +is germane to my purpose must be told, and of this a part is the +personality of Brynhild Ingmar. That she was beautiful I never doubted, +though I have heard it disputed and smiled inwardly as the disputants +urged lip and cheek and shades of rose and lily, weighing and +appraising. Let me describe her as I saw her or, rather, as I can, +adding that even without all this she must still have been beautiful +because of the deep significance to those who had eyes to see or +feel some mysterious element which mingled itself with her presence +comparable only to the delight which the power and spiritual essence of +Nature inspires in all but the dullest minds. I know I cannot hope to +convey this in words. It means little if I say I thought of all quiet +lovely solitary things when I looked into her calm eyes,--that when she +moved it was like clear springs renewed by flowing, that she seemed the +perfect flowering of a day in June, for these are phrases. Does Nature +know her wonders when she shines in her strength? Does a woman know the +infinite meanings her beauty may have for the beholder? I cannot tell. +Nor can I tell if I saw this girl as she may have seemed to those who +read only the letter of the book and are blind to its spirit, or in the +deepest sense as she really was in the sight of That which created her +and of which she was a part. Surely it is a proof of the divinity of +love that in and for a moment it lifts the veil of so-called reality and +shows each to the other mysteriously perfect and inspiring as the world +will never see them, but as they exist in the Eternal, and in the sight +of those who have learnt that the material is but the dream, and the +vision of love the truth. + +I will say then, for the alphabet of what I knew but cannot tell, that +she had the low broad brows of a Greek Nature Goddess, the hair swept +back wing-like from the temples and massed with a noble luxuriance. It +lay like rippled bronze, suggesting something strong and serene in its +essence. Her eyes were clear and gray as water, the mouth sweetly curved +above a resolute chin. It was a face which recalled a modelling in +marble rather than the charming pastel and aquarelle of a young woman's +colouring, and somehow I thought of it less as the beauty of a woman +than as some sexless emanation of natural things, and this impression +was strengthened by her height and the long limbs, slender and strong as +those of some youth trained in the pentathlon, subject to the severest +discipline until all that was superfluous was fined away and the perfect +form expressing the true being emerged. The body was thus more beautiful +than the face, and I may note in passing that this is often the case, +because the face is more directly the index of the restless and unhappy +soul within and can attain true beauty only when the soul is in harmony +with its source. + +She was a little like her pale and wearied mother. She might resemble +her still more when the sorrow of this world that worketh death should +have had its will of her. I had yet to learn that this would never +be--that she had found the open door of escape. + +We three spent much time together in the days that followed. I never +tired of their company and I think they did not tire of mine, for +my wanderings through the world and my studies in the ancient Indian +literatures and faiths with the Pandit Devaswami were of interest to +them both though in entirely different ways. Mrs. Ingmar was a woman who +centred all her interests in books and chiefly in the scientific forms +of occult research. She was no believer in anything outside the range +of what she called human experience. The evidences had convinced her of +nothing but a force as yet unclassified in the scientific categories and +all her interest lay in the undeveloped powers of brain which might be +discovered in the course of ignorant and credulous experiment. We met +therefore on the common ground of rejection of the so-called occultism +of the day, though I knew even then, and how infinitely better now, that +her constructions were wholly misleading. + +Nearly all day she would lie in her chair under the deodars by the +delicate splash and ripple of the stream. Living imprisoned in the +crystal sphere of the intellect she saw the world outside, painted in +few but distinct colours, small, comprehensible, moving on a logical +orbit. I never knew her posed for an explanation. She had the contented +atheism of a certain type of French mind and found as much ease in it as +another kind of sweet woman does in her rosary and confessional. + +"I cannot interest Brynhild," she said, when I knew her better. "She has +no affinity with science. She is simply a nature worshipper, and in such +places as this she seems to draw life from the inanimate life about her. +I have sometimes wondered whether she might not be developed into a kind +of bridge between the articulate and the inarticulate, so well does she +understand trees and flowers. Her father was like that--he had all sorts +of strange power with animals and plants, and thought he had more than +he had. He could never realize that the energy of nature is merely +mechanical." + +"You think all energy is mechanical?" + +"Certainly. We shall lay our finger on the mainspring one day and +the mystery will disappear. But as for Brynhild--I gave her the best +education possible and yet she has never understood the conception of a +universe moving on mathematical laws to which we must submit in body and +mind. She has the oddest ideas. I would not willingly say of a child of +mine that she is a mystic, and yet--" + +She shook her head compassionately. But I scarcely heard. My eyes were +fixed on Brynhild, who stood apart, looking steadily out over the snows. +It was a glorious sunset, the west vibrating with gorgeous colour spilt +over in torrents that flooded the sky, Terrible splendours--hues for +which we have no thought--no name. I had not thought of it as music +until I saw her face but she listened as well as saw, and her expression +changed as it changes when the pomp of a great orchestra breaks upon the +silence. It flashed to the chords of blood-red and gold that was burning +fire. It softened through the fugue of woven crimson gold and flame, to +the melancholy minor of ashes-of-roses and paling green, and so through +all the dying glories that faded slowly to a tranquil grey and left +the world to the silver melody of one sole star that dawned above the +ineffable heights of the snows. Then she listened as a child does to +a bird, entranced, with a smile like a butterfly on her parted lips. I +never saw such a power of quiet. + +She and I were walking next day among the forest ways, the pine-scented +sunshine dappling the dropped frondage. We had been speaking of her +mother. "It is such a misfortune for her," she said thoughtfully, "that +I am not clever. She should have had a daughter who could have shared +her thoughts. She analyses everything, reasons about everything, and +that is quite out of my reach." + +She moved beside me with her wonderful light step--the poise and balance +of a nymph in the Parthenon frieze. + +"How do you see things?" + +"See? That is the right word. I see things--I never reason about them. +They are. For her they move like figures in a sum. For me every one of +them is a window through which one may look to what is beyond." + +"To where?" + +"To what they really are--not what they seem." + +I looked at her with interest. + +"Did you ever hear of the double vision?" + +For this is a subject on which the spiritually learned men of India, +like the great mystics of all the faiths, have much to say. I had +listened with bewilderment and doubt to the expositions of my Pandit +on this very head. Her simple words seemed for a moment the echo of his +deep and searching thought. Yet it surely could not be. Impossible. + +"Never. What does it mean?" She raised clear unveiled eyes. "You must +forgive me for being so stupid, but it is my mother who is at home with +all these scientific phrases. I know none of them." + +"It means that for some people the material universe--the things we see +with our eyes--is only a mirage, or say, a symbol, which either hides +or shadows forth the eternal truth. And in that sense they see things as +they really are, not as they seem to the rest of us. And whether this is +the statement of a truth or the wildest of dreams, I cannot tell." + +She did not answer for a moment; then said; + +"Are there people who believe this--know it?" + +"Certainly. There are people who believe that thought is the only real +thing--that the whole universe is thought made visible. That we create +with our thoughts the very body by which we shall re-act on the universe +in lives to be. + +"Do you believe it?" + +"I don't know. Do you?" + +She paused; looked at me, and then went on: + +"You see, I don't think things out. I only feel. But this cannot +interest you." + +I felt she was eluding the question. She began to interest me more than +any one I had ever known. She had extraordinary power of a sort. Once, +in the woods, where I was reading in so deep a shade that she never +saw me, I had an amazing vision of her. She stood in a glade with the +sunlight and shade about her; she had no hat and a sunbeam turned her +hair to pale bronze. A small bright April shower was falling through the +sun, and she stood in pure light that reflected itself in every leaf and +grass-blade. But it was nothing of all this that arrested me, +beautiful as it was. She stood as though life were for the moment +suspended;--then, very softly, she made a low musical sound, infinitely +wooing, from scarcely parted lips, and instantly I saw a bird of azure +plumage flutter down and settle on her shoulder, pluming himself there +in happy security. Again she called softly and another followed the +first. Two flew to her feet, two more to her breast and hand. They +caressed her, clung to her, drew some joyous influence from her +presence. She stood in the glittering rain like Spring with her birds +about her--a wonderful sight. Then, raising one hand gently with the +fingers thrown back she uttered a different note, perfectly sweet and +intimate, and the branches parted and a young deer with full bright eyes +fixed on her advanced and pushed a soft muzzle into her hand. + +In my astonishment I moved, however slightly, and the picture broke up. +The deer sprang back into the trees, the birds fluttered up in a hurry +of feathers, and she turned calm eyes upon me, as unstartled as if she +had known all the time that I was there. + +"You should not have breathed," she said smiling. "They must have utter +quiet." + +I rose up and joined her. + +"It is a marvel. I can scarcely believe my eyes. How do you do it?" + +"My father taught me. They come. How can I tell?" + +She turned away and left me. I thought long over this episode. I +recalled words heard in the place of my studies--words I had dismissed +without any care at the moment. "To those who see, nothing is alien. +They move in the same vibration with all that has life, be it in bird +or flower. And in the Uttermost also, for all things are One. For such +there is no death." + +That was beyond me still, but I watched her with profound interest. She +recalled also words I had half forgotten-- + + "There was nought above me and nought below, + My childhood had not learnt to know; + For what are the voices of birds, + Aye, and of beasts, but words, our words,-- + Only so much more sweet." + +That might have been written of her. And more. + +She had found one day in the woods a flower of a sort I had once seen +in the warm damp forests below Darjiling--ivory white and shaped like a +dove in flight. She wore it that evening on her bosom. A week later she +wore what I took to be another. + +"You have had luck," I said; "I never heard of such a thing being seen +so high up, and you have found it twice." + +"No, it is the same." + +"The same? Impossible. You found it more than a week ago." "I know. It +is ten days. Flowers don't die when one understands them--not as most +people think." + +Her mother looked up and said fretfully: + +"Since she was a child Brynhild has had that odd idea. That flower is +dead and withered. Throw it away, child. It looks hideous." + +Was it glamour? What was it? I saw the flower dewy fresh in her bosom +She smiled and turned away. + +It was that very evening she left the veranda where we were sitting in +the subdued light of a little lamp and passed beyond where the ray cut +the darkness. She went down the perspective of trees to the edge of he +clearing and I rose to follow for it seemed absolutely unsafe that she +should be on the verge of the panther-haunted woods alone. Mrs. Ingmar +turned a page of her book serenely; + +"She will not like it if you go. I cannot imagine that she should come +to harm. She always goes her own way--light or dark." + +I returned to my seat and watched steadfastly. At first I could see +nothing but as my sight adjusted itself I saw her a long way down the +clearing that opened the snows, and quite certainly also I saw something +like a huge dog detach itself from the woods and bound to her feet. It +mingled with her dark dress and I lost it. Mrs. Ingmar said, seeing my +anxiety but nothing else; "Her father was just the same;--he had no fear +of anything that lives. No doubt some people have that power. I have +never seen her attract birds and beasts as he certainly did, but she is +quite as fond of them." + +I could not understand her blindness--what I myself had seen raised +questions I found unanswerable, and her mother saw nothing! Which of us +was right? presently she came back slowly and I ventured no word. + +A woodland sorcery, innocent as the dawn, hovered about her. What was +it? Did the mere love of these creatures make a bond between her soul +and theirs, or was the ancient dream true and could she at times move +in the same vibration? I thought of her as a wood-spirit sometimes, an +expression herself of some passion of beauty in Nature, a thought of +snows and starry nights and flowing rivers made visible in flesh. It is +surely when seized with the urge of some primeval yearning which in +man is merely sexual that Nature conceives her fair forms and manifests +them, for there is a correspondence that runs through all creation. + +Here I ask myself--Did I love her? In a sense, yes, deeply, but not in +the common reading of the phrase. I have trembled with delight before +the wild and terrible splendour of the Himalayan heights-; low golden +moons have steeped my soul longing, but I did not think of these things +as mine in any narrow sense, nor so desire them. They were Angels of the +Evangel of beauty. So too was she. She had none of the "silken nets and +traps of adamant," she was no sister of the "girls of mild silver or of +furious gold;"--but fair, strong, and her own, a dweller in the House of +Quiet. I did not covet her. I loved her. + +Days passed. There came a night when the winds were loosed--no moon, +the stars flickering like blown tapers through driven clouds, the trees +swaying and lamenting. + +"There will be rain tomorrow." Mrs. Ingmar said, as we parted for the +night. I closed my door. Some great cat of the woods was crying harshly +outside my window, the sound receding towards the bridle way. I slept in +a dream of tossing seas and ships labouring among them. + +With the sense of a summons I waked--I cannot tell when. Unmistakable, +as if I were called by name. I rose and dressed, and heard distinctly +bare feet passing my door. I opened it noiselessly and looked out into +the little passage way that made for the entry, and saw nothing but +pools of darkness and a dim light from the square of the window at the +end. But the wind had swept the sky clear with its flying bosom and was +sleeping now in its high places and the air was filled with a mild moony +radiance and a great stillness. + +Now let me speak with restraint and exactness. I was not afraid but felt +as I imagine a dog feels in the presence of his master, conscious of a +purpose, a will entirely above his own and incomprehensible, yet to +be obeyed without question. I followed my reading of the command, +bewildered but docile, and understanding nothing but that I was called. + +The lights were out. The house dead silent; the familiar veranda +ghostly in the night. And now I saw a white figure at the head of the +steps--Brynhild. She turned and looked over her shoulder, her face +pale in the moon, and made the same gesture with which she summoned her +birds. I knew her meaning, for now we were moving in the same rhythm, +and followed as she took the lead. How shall I describe that strange +night in the jungle. There were fire-flies or dancing points of light +that recalled them. Perhaps she was only thinking them--only thinking +the moon and the quiet, for we were in the world where thought is the +one reality. But they went with us in a cloud and faintly lighted our +way. There were exquisite wafts of perfume from hidden flowers breathing +their dreams to the night. Here and there a drowsy bird stirred and +chirped from the roof of darkness, a low note of content that greeted +her passing. It was a path intricate and winding and how long we went, +and where, I cannot tell. But at last she stooped and parting the boughs +before her we stepped into an open space, and before us--I knew it--I +knew it!--The House of Beauty. + +She paused at the foot of the great marble steps and looked at me. + +"We have met here already." + +I did not wonder--I could not. In the Ninth vibration surprise had +ceased to be. Why had I not recognized her before--O dull of heart! That +was my only thought. We walk blindfold through the profound darkness of +material nature, the blinder because we believe we see it. It is only +when the doors of the material are closed that the world appears to man +as it exists in the eternal truth. + +"Did you know this?" I asked, trembling before mystery. + +"I knew it, because I am awake. You forgot it in the dull sleep which we +call daily life. But we were here and THEY began the story of the King +who made this house. Tonight we shall hear it. It he story of Beauty +wandering through the world and the world received her not. We hear it +in this place because here he agonized for what he knew too late." + +"Was that our only meeting?" + +"We meet every night, but you forget when the day brings the sleep of +the soul.--You do not sink deep enough into rest to remember. You float +on the surface where the little bubbles of foolish dream are about you +and I cannot reach you then." + +"How can I compel myself to the deeps?" + +"You cannot. It will come. But when you have passed up the bridle +way and beyond the Shipki, stop at Gyumur. There is the Monastery of +Tashigong, and there one will meet you-- + +"His name?" + +"Stephen Clifden. He will tell you what you desire to know. Continue on +then with him to Yarkhand. There in the Ninth Vibration we shall meet +again. It is a long journey but you will be content." + +"Do you certainly know that we shall meet again?" + +"When you have learnt, we can meet when we will. He will teach you +the Laya Yoga. You should not linger here in the woods any longer. You +should go on. In three days it will be possible." + +"But how have you learnt--a girl and young?" + +"Through a close union with Nature--that is one of the three roads. But +I know little as yet. Now take my hand and come. + +"One last question. Is this house ruined and abject as I have seen it in +the daylight, or royal and the house of Gods as we see it now? Which is +truth?" + +"In the day you saw it in the empty illusion of blind thought. Tonight, +eternally lovely as in the thought of the man who made it. Nothing that +is beautiful is lost, though in the sight of the unwise it seems to die. +Death is in the eyes we look through--when they are cleansed we see Life +only. Now take my hand and come. Delay no more." + +She caught my hand and we entered the dim magnificence of the great +hall. The moon entered with us. + +Instantly I had the feeling of supernatural presence. Yet I only write +this in deference to common use, for it was absolutely natural--more so +than any I have met in the state called daily life. It was a thing in +which I had a part, and if this was supernatural so also was I. + +Again I saw the Dark One, the Beloved, the young Krishna, above the +women who loved him. He motioned with his hand as we passed, as though +he waved us smiling on our way. Again the dancers moved in a rhythmic +tread to the feet of the mountain Goddess--again we followed to where +she bent to hear. But now, solemn listening faces crowded in the shadows +about her, grave eyes fixed immovably upon what lay at her feet--a man, +submerged in the pure light that fell from her presence, his dark face +stark and fine, lips locked, eyes shut, arms flung out cross-wise in +utter abandonment, like a figure of grief invisibly crucified upon his +shame. I stopped a few feet from him, arrested by a barrier I could not +pass. Was it sleep or death or some mysterious state that partook of +both? Not sleep, for there was no flutter of breath. Not death--no rigid +immobility struck chill into the air. It was the state of subjection +where the spirit set free lies tranced in the mighty influences which +surround us invisibly until we have entered, though but for a moment, +the Ninth Vibration. + +And now, with these Listeners about us, a clear voice began and stirred +the air with music. I have since been asked in what tongue it spoke and +could only answer that it reached my ears in the words of my childhood, +and that I know whatever that language had been it would so have reached +me. + +"Great Lady, hear the story of this man's fall, for it is the story of +man. Be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them light." + +There was long since in Ranipur a mighty King and at his birth the wise +men declared that unless he cast aside all passions that debase the +soul, relinquishing the lower desires for the higher until a Princess +laden with great gifts should come to be his bride, he would experience +great and terrible misfortunes. And his royal parents did what they +could to possess him with this belief, but they died before he reached +manhood. Behold him then, a young King in his palace, surrounded with +splendour. How should he withstand the passionate crying of the flesh or +believe that through pleasure comes satiety and the loss of that in the +spirit whereby alone pleasure can be enjoyed? For his gift was that +he could win all hearts. They swarmed round him like hiving bees and +hovered about him like butterflies. Sometimes he brushed them off. Often +he caressed them, and when this happened, each thought proudly "I am the +Royal Favourite. There is none other than me." + +Also the Princess delayed who would be the crest-jewel of the crown, +bringing with her all good and the blessing of the High Gods, and in +consequence of all these things the King took such pleasures as he +could, and they were many, not knowing they darken the inner eye whereby +what is royal is known through disguises. + +(Most pitiful to see, beneath the close-shut lids of the man at the +feet of the Dweller in the Heights, tears forced themselves, as though +a corpse dead to all else lived only to anguish. They flowed like +blood-drops upon his face as he lay enduring, and the voice proceeded.) +What was the charm of the King? Was it his stately height and strength? +Or his faithless gayety? Or his voice, deep and soft as the sitar when +it sings of love? His women said--some one thing, some another, but none +of these ladies were of royal blood, and therefore they knew not. + +Now one day, the all-privileged jester of the King, said, laughing +harshly: + +"Maharaj, you divert yourself. But how if, while we feast and play, the +Far Away Princess glided past and was gone, unknown and unwelcomed?" + +And the King replied: + +"Fool, content yourself. I shall know my Princess, but she delays so +long that I weary." + +Now in a far away country was a Princess, daughter of the Greatest, +and her Father hesitated to give her in marriage to such a King for all +reported that he was faithless of heart, but having seen his portrait +she loved him and fled in disguise from the palaces of her Father, and +being captured she was brought before the King in Ranipur. + +He sat upon a cloth of gold and about him was the game he had killed in +hunting, in great masses of ruffled fur and plumage, and he turned the +beauty of his face carelessly upon her, and as the Princess looked upon +him, her heart yearned to him, and he said in his voice that was like +the male string of the sitar: + +"Little slave, what is your desire?" + +Then she saw that the long journey had scarred her feet and dimmed her +hair with dust, and that the King's eyes, worn with days and nights of +pleasure did not pierce her disguise. Now in her land it is a custom +that the blood royal must not proclaim itself, so she folded her hands +and said gently: + +"A place in the household of the King." And he, hearing that the Waiting +slave of his chief favorite Jayashri was dead, gave her that place. So +the Princess attended on those ladies, courteous and obedient to all +authority as beseemed her royalty, and she braided her bright hair so +that it hid the little crowns which the Princesses of her House +must wear always in token of their rank, and every day her patience +strengthened. + +Sometimes the King, carelessly desiring her laughing face and sad eyes, +would send for her to wile away an hour, and he would say; "Dance, +little slave, and tell me stories of the far countries. You quite unlike +my Women, doubtless because you are a slave." + +And she thought--"No, but because I am a Princess,"--but this she did +not say. She laughed and told him the most marvellous stories in the +world until he laid his head upon her warm bosom, dreaming awake. + +There were stories of the great Himalayan solitudes where in the winter +nights the white tiger stares at the witches' dance of the Northern +Lights dazzled by the hurtling of their myriad spears. And she told +how the King-eagle, hanging motionless over the peaks of Gaurisankar, +watches with golden eyes for his prey, and falling like a plummet +strikes its life out with his clawed heel and, screaming with triumph, +bears it to his fierce mate in her cranny of the rocks. + +"A gallant story!" the King would say. "More!" Then she told of the +tropical heats and the stealthy deadly creatures of forest and jungle, +and the blue lotus of Buddha swaying on the still lagoon,--And she spoke +of loves of men and women, their passion and pain and joy. And when she +told of their fidelity and valour and honour that death cannot quench, +her voice was like the song of a minstrel, for she had read all the +stories of the ages and the heart of a Princess told her the rest. And +the King listened unwearying though he believed this was but a slave. + +(The face of the man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights twitched +in a white agony. Pearls of sweat were distilled upon his brows, but +he moved neither hand nor foot, enduring as in a flame of fire. And the +voice continued.) + +So one day, in the misty green of the Spring, while she rested at his +feet in the garden Pavilion, he said to her: + +"Little slave, why do you love me?" + +And she answered proudly: + +"Because you have the heart of a King." + +He replied slowly; + +"Of the women who have loved me none gave this reason, though they gave +many." + +She laid her cheek on his hand. + +"That is the true reason." + +But he drew it away and was vaguely troubled, for her words, he knew +not why, reminded him of the Far Away Princess and of things he had long +forgotten, and he said; "What does a slave know of the hearts of Kings?" +And that night he slept or waked alone. + +Winter was at hand with its blue and cloudless days, and she was +commanded to meet the King where the lake lay still and shining like an +ecstasy of bliss, and she waited with her chin dropped into the cup of +her hands, looking over the water with eyes that did not see, for her +whole soul said; "How long O my Sovereign Lord, how long before you know +the truth and we enter together into our Kingdom?" + +As she sat she heard the King's step, and the colour stole up into her +face in a flush like the earliest sunrise. "He is coming," she said; and +again; "He loves me." + +So he came beside the water, walking slowly. But the King was not alone. +His arm embraced the latest-come beauty from Samarkhand, and, with his +head bent, he whispered in her willing ear. + +Then clasping her hands, the Princess drew a long sobbing breath, and he +turned and his eyes grew hard as blue steel. + +"Go, slave," he cried. "What place have you in Kings' gardens? Go. Let +me see you no more." + +(The man lying at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights, raised a heavy +arm and flung it above his head, despairing, and it fell again on the +cross of his torment. And the voice went on.) + +And as he said this, her heart broke; and she went and her feet were +weary. So she took the wise book she loved and unrolled it until she +came to a certain passage, and this she read twice; "If the heart of +a slave be broken it may be mended with jewels and soft words, but the +heart of a Princess can be healed only by the King who broke it, or in +Yamapura, the City under the Sunset where they make all things new. Now, +Yama, the Lord of this City, is the Lord of Death." And having thus read +the Princess rolled the book and put it from her. + +And next day, the King said to his women; "Send for her," for his heart +smote him and he desired to atone royally for the shame of his speech. +And they sought and came back saying; + +"Maharaj, she is gone. We cannot find her." + +Fear grew in the heart of the King--a nameless dread, and he said, +"Search." And again they sought and returned and the King was striding +up and down the great hall and none dared cross his path. But, +trembling, they told him, and he replied; "Search again. I will not lose +her, and, slave though be, she shall be my Queen." + +So they ran, dispersing to the Four Quarters, and King strode up and +down the hall, and Loneliness kept step with him and clasped his hand +and looked his eyes. + +Then the youngest of the women entered with a tale to tell. "Majesty, +we have found her. She lies beside the lake. When the birds fled this +morning she fled with them, but upon a longer journey. Even to Yamapura, +the City under the Sunset." + +And the King said; "Let none follow." And he strode forth swiftly, white +with thoughts he dared not think. + +The Princess lay among the gold of the fallen leaves. All was gold, +for her bright hair was out-spread in shining waves and in it shone the +glory of the hidden crown. On her face was no smile--only at last was +revealed the patience she had covered with laughter so long that even +the voice of the King could not now break it into joy. The hands that +had clung, the swift feet that had run beside his, the tender body, +mighty to serve and to love, lay within touch but farther away than the +uttermost star was the Far Away Princess, known and loved too late. + +And he said; "My Princess--O my Princess!" and laid his head on her cold +bosom. + +"Too late!" a harsh Voice croaked beside him, and it was the voice of +the Jester who mocks at all things. "Too late! O madness, to despise +the blood royal because it humbled itself to service and so was doubly +royal. The Far Away Princess came laden with great gifts, and to her the +King's gift was the wage of a slave and a broken heart. Cast your crown +and sceptre in the dust, O King--O King of Fools." + +(The man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights moved. Some dim word +shaped upon his locked lips. She listened in a divine calm. It seemed +that the very Gods drew nearer. Again the man essayed speech, the body +dead, life only in the words that none could hear. The voice went on.) + +But the Princess flying wearily because of the sore wound in her heart, +came at last to the City under the Sunset, where the Lord of Death rules +in the House of Quiet, and was there received with royal honours for in +that land are no disguises. And she knelt before the Secret One and in +a voice broken with agony entreated him to heal her. And with veiled and +pitying eyes he looked upon her, for many and grievous as are the wounds +he has healed this was more grievous still. And he said; + +"Princess, I cannot, But this I can do--I can give a new heart in a new +birth--happy and careless as the heart of a child. Take this escape from +the anguish you endure and be at peace." + +But the Princess, white with pain, asked only; + +"In this new heart and birth, is there room for the King?" + +And the Lord of Peace replied; + +"None. He too will be forgotten." + +Then she rose to her feet. + +"I will endure and when he comes I will serve him once more. If he will +he shall heal me, and if not I will endure for ever." + +And He who is veiled replied; + +"In this sacred City no pain may disturb the air, therefore you must +wait outside in the chill and the dark. Think better, Princess! Also, +he must pass through many rebirths, because he beheld the face of Beauty +unveiled and knew her not. And when he comes he will be weary and weak +as a new-born child, and no more a great King." And the Princess smiled; + +"Then he will need me the more," she said; "I will wait and kiss the +feet of my King." + +"And the Lord of Death was silent. So she went outside into the darkness +of the spaces, and the souls free passed her like homing doves, and she +sat with her hands clasped over the sore wound in her heart, watching +the earthward way. And the Princess is keeping still the day of her long +patience." + +The voice ceased. And there was a great silence, and the listening faces +drew nearer. + +Then the Dweller in the Heights spoke in a voice soft as the falling of +snow in the quiet of frost and moon. I could have wept myself blind with +joy to hear that music. More I dare not say. + +"He is in the Lower State of Perception. He sorrows for his loss. Let +him have one instant's light that still he may hope." + +She bowed above the man, gazing upon him as a mother might upon her +sleeping child. The dead eyelids stirred, lifted, a faint gleam showed +beneath them, an unspeakable weariness. I thought they would fall +unsatisfied. Suddenly he saw What looked upon him, and a terror of +joy no tongue can tell flashed over the dark mirror of his face. He +stretched a faint hand to touch her feet, a sobbing sigh died upon his +lips, and once more the swooning sleep took him. He lay as a dead man +before the Assembly. + +"The night is far spent," a voice said, from I know not where. And I +knew it was said not only for the sleeper but for all, for though the +flying feet of Beauty seem for a moment to outspeed us she will one day +wait our coming and gather us to her bosom. + +As before, the vision spread outward like rings in a broken reflection +in water. I saw the girl beside me, but her hand grew light in mine. I +felt it no longer. I heard the roaring wind in the trees, or was it a +great voice thundering in my ears? Sleep took me. I waked in my little +room. + +Strange and sad--I saw her next day and did not remember her whom of all +things I desired to know. I remembered the vision and knew that whether +in dream or waking I had heard an eternal truth. I longed with a great +longing to meet my beautiful companion, and she stood at my side and I +was blind. + +Now that I have climbed a little higher on the Mount of Vision it seems +even to myself that this could not be. Yet it was, and it is true of not +this only but of how much else! + +She knew me. I learnt that later, but she made no sign. Her simplicities +had carried her far beyond and above me, to places where only the winged +things attain--"as a bird among the bird-droves of God." + +I have since known that this power of direct simplicity in her was why +among the great mountains we beheld the Divine as the emanation of +the terrible beauty about us. We cannot see it as it is--only in some +shadowing forth, gathering sufficient strength for manifestation from +the spiritual atoms that haunt the region where that form has been for +ages the accepted vehicle of adoration. But I was now to set forth to +find another knowledge--to seek the Beauty that blinds us to all other. +Next day the man who was directing my preparations for travel sent me +word from Simla that all was ready and I could start two days later. I +told my friends the time of parting was near. + +"But it was no surprise to me," I added, "for I had heard already that +in a very few days I should be on my way." + +Mrs. Ingmar was more than kind. She laid a frail hand on mine. + +"We shall miss you indeed. If it is possible to send us word of your +adventures in those wild solitudes I hope you will do it. Of course +aviation will soon lay bare their secrets and leave them no mysteries, +so you don't go too soon. One may worship science and yet feel it +injures the beauty of the world. But what is beauty compared with +knowledge?" + +"Do you never regret it?" I asked. + +"Never, dear Mr. Ormond. I am a worshipper of hard facts and however +hideous they may be I prefer them to the prismatic colours of romance." + +Brynhild, smiling, quoted; + + "Their science roamed from star to star + And than itself found nothing greater. + What wonder? In a Leyden jar + They bottled the Creator?" + +"There is nothing greater than science," said Mrs. Ingmar with soft +reverence. "The mind of man is the foot-rule of the universe." + +She meditated for a moment and then added that my kind interests in +their plans decided her to tell me that she would be returning to +Europe and then to Canada in a few months with a favourite niece as her +companion while Brynhild would remain in India with friends in Mooltan +for a time. I looked eagerly at her but she was lost in her own thoughts +and it was evidently not the time to say more. + +If I had hoped for a vision before I left the neighbourhood of that +strange House of Beauty where a spirit imprisoned appeared to await the +day of enlightenment I was disappointed. These things do not happen as +one expects or would choose. The wind bloweth where it listeth until the +laws which govern the inner life are understood, and then we would not +choose if we could for we know that all is better than well. In this +world, either in the blinded sight of daily life or in the clarity of +the true sight I have not since seen it, but that has mattered little, +for having heard an authentic word within its walls I have passed on my +way elsewhere. + +Next day a letter from Olesen reached me. + +"Dear Ormond, I hope you have had a good time at the House in the Woods. +I saw Rup Singh a few days ago and he wrote the odd message I enclose. +You know what these natives are, even the most sensible of them, and you +will humour the old fellow for he ages very fast and I think is breaking +up. But this was not what I wanted to say. I had a letter from a man I +had not seen for years--a fellow called Stephen Clifden, who lives in +Kashmir. As a matter of fact I had forgotten his existence but evidently +he has not repaid the compliment for he writes as follows--No, I had +better send you the note and you can do as you please. I am rushed off +my legs with work and the heat is hell with the lid off. And-" + +But the rest was of no interest except to a friend of years' standing. I +read Rup Singh's message first. It was written in his own tongue. + +"To the Honoured One who has attained to the favour of the Favourable. + +"You have with open eyes seen what this humble one has dreamed but +has not known. If the thing be possible, write me this word that I may +depart in peace. 'With that one who in a former birth you loved all is +well. Fear nothing for him. The way is long but at the end the lamps of +love are lit and the Unstruck music is sounded. He lies at the feet of +Mercy and there awaits his hour.' And if it be not possible to write +these words, write nothing, O Honoured, for though it be in the hells my +soul shall find my King, and again I shall serve him as once I served." + +I understood, and wrote those words as he had written them. Strange +mystery of life--that I who had not known should see, and that this man +whose fidelity had not deserted his broken King in his utter downfall +should have sought with passion for one sight of the beloved face across +the waters of death and sought in vain. I thought of those Buddhist +words of Seneca--"The soul may be and is in the mass of men drugged and +silenced by the seductions of sense and the deceptions of the world. +But if, in some moment of detachment and elation, when its captors and +jailors relax their guard, it can escape their clutches, it will seek at +once the region of its birth and its true home." + +Well--the shell must break before the bird can fly, and the time drew +near for the faithful servant to seek his lord. My message reached him +in time and gladdened him. + +I turned then to Clifden's letter. + +"Dear Olesen, you will have forgotten me, and feeling sure of this I +should scarcely have intruded a letter into your busy life were it not +that I remember your good-nature as a thing unforgettable though so many +years have gone by. I hear of you sometimes when Sleigh comes up the +Sind valley, for I often camp at Sonamarg and above the Zoji La and +farther. I want you to give a message to a man you know who should +be expecting to hear from me. Tell him I shall be at the Tashigong +Monastery when he reaches Gyumur beyond the Shipki. Tell him I have the +information he wants and I will willingly go on with him to Yarkhand +and his destination. He need not arrange for men beyond Gyumur. All +is fixed. So sorry to bother you, old man, but I don't know Ormond's +address, except that he was with you and has gone up Simla way. And of +course he will be keen to hear the thing is settled." + +Amazing. I remembered the message I had heard and this man's words +rang true and kindly, but what could it mean? I really did not question +farther than this for now I could not doubt that I was guided. Stronger +hands than mine had me in charge, and it only remained for me to set +forth in confidence and joy to an end that as yet I could not discern. I +turned my face gladly to the wonder of the mountains. + +Gladly--but with a reservation. I was leaving a friend and one whom I +dimly felt might one day be more than a friend--Brynhild Ingmar. That +problem must be met before I could take my way. I thought much of what +might be said at parting. True, she had the deepest attraction for me, +but true also that I now beheld a quest stretching out into the unknown +which I must accept in the spirit of the knight errant. Dare I then +bind my heart to any allegiance which would pledge me to a future +inconsistent with what lay before me? How could I tell what she +might think of the things which to me were now real and external--the +revelation of the only reality that underlies all the seeming. Life can +never be the same for the man who has penetrated to this, and though it +may seem a hard saying there can be but a maimed understanding between +him and those who still walk amid the phantoms of death and decay. + +Her sympathy with nature was deep and wonderful but might it not be that +though the earth was eloquent to her the skies were silent? I was but +a beginner myself--I knew little indeed. Dare I risk that little in a +sweet companionship which would sink me into the contentment of the +life lived by the happily deluded between the cradle and the grave and +perhaps close to me for ever that still sphere where my highest hope +abides? I had much to ponder, for how could I lose her out of my +life--though I knew not at all whether she who had so much to make her +happiness would give me a single thought when I was gone. + +If all this seem the very uttermost of selfish vanity, forgive a man who +grasped in his hand a treasure so new, so wonderful that he walked +in fear and doubt lest it should slip away and leave him in a world +darkened for ever by the torment of the knowledge that it might have +been his and he had bartered it for the mess of pottage that has bought +so many birthrights since Jacob bargained with his weary brother in +the tents of Lahai-roi. I thought I would come back later with my +prize gained and throwing it at her feet ask her wisdom in return, for +whatever I might not know I knew well she was wiser than I except in +that one shining of the light from Eleusis. I walked alone in the woods +thinking of these things and no answer satisfied me. + +I did not see her alone until the day I left, for I was compelled by the +arrangements I was making to go down to Simla for a night. And now the +last morning had come with golden sun--shot mists rolling upward to +disclose the far white billows of the sea of eternity, the mountains +awaking to their enormous joys. The trees were dripping glory to the +steaming earth; it flowed like rivers into their most secret recesses, +moss and flower, fern and leaf floated upon the waves of light revealing +their inmost soul in triumphant gladness. Far off across the valleys +a cuckoo was calling--the very voice of spring, and in the green world +above my head a bird sang, a feathered joy, so clear, so passionate that +I thought the great summer morning listened in silence to his rapture +ringing through the woods. I waited until the Jubilate was ended and +then went in to bid good-bye to my friends. + +Mrs. Ingmar bid me the kindest farewell and I left her serene in the +negation of all beauty, all hope save that of a world run on the lines +of a model municipality, disease a memory, sewerage, light and air +systems perfected, the charted brain sending its costless messages to +the outer parts of the habitable globe, and at least a hundred years +of life with a decent cremation at the end of it assured to every +eugenically born citizen. No more. But I have long ceased to regret +that others use their own eyes whether clear or dim. Better the merest +glimmer of light perceived thus than the hearsay of the revelations of +others. And by the broken fragments of a bewildered hope a man shall +eventually reach the goal and rejoice in that dawn where the morning +stars sing together and the sons of God shout for joy. It must come, for +it is already here. + +Brynhild walked with me through the long glades in the fresh thin air +to the bridle road where my men and ponies waited, eager to be off. We +stood at last in the fringe of trees on a small height which commanded +the way;--a high uplifted path cut along the shoulders of the hills and +on the left the sheer drop of the valleys. Perhaps seven or eight feet +in width and dignified by the name of the Great Hindustan and Tibet Road +it ran winding far away into Wonderland. Looking down into the valleys, +so far beneath that the solitudes seem to wall them in I thought of all +the strange caravans which have taken this way with tinkle of bells +and laughter now so long silenced, and as I looked I saw a lost little +monastery in a giant crevice, solitary as a planet on the outermost ring +of the system, and remembrance flashed into my mind and I said; + +"I have marching orders that have countermanded my own plans. I am to +journey to the Buddhist Monastery of Tashigong, and there meet a friend +who will tell me what is necessary that I may travel to Yarkhand and +beyond. It will be long before I see Kashmir." + +In those crystal clear eyes I saw a something new to me--a faint smile, +half pitying, half sad; + +"Who told you, and where?" + +"A girl in a strange place. A woman who has twice guided me--" + +I broke off. Her smile perplexed me. I could not tell what to say. She +repeated in a soft undertone; + +"Great Lady, be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them light." + +And instantly I knew. O blind--blind! Was the unhappy King of the story +duller of heart than I? And shame possessed me. Here was the chrysoberyl +that all day hides its secret in deeps of lucid green but when the night +comes flames with its fiery ecstasy of crimson to the moon, and I--I had +been complacently considering whether I might not blunt my own spiritual +instinct by companionship with her, while she had been my guide, as +infinitely beyond me in insight as she was in all things beautiful. I +could have kissed her feet in my deep repentance. True it is that the +gateway of the high places is reverence and he who cannot bow his head +shall receive no crown. I saw that my long travel in search of knowledge +would have been utterly vain if I had not learnt that lesson there and +then. In those moments of silence I learnt it once and for ever. + +She stood by me breathing the liquid morning air, her face turned upon +the eternal snows. I caught her hand in a recognition that might +have ended years of parting, and its warm youth vibrated in mine, the +foretaste of all understanding, all unions, of love that asks nothing, +that fears nothing, that has no petition to make. She raised her eyes to +mine and her tears were a rainbow of hope. So we stood in silence that +was more than any words, and the golden moments went by. I knew her now +for what she was, one of whom it might have been written; + + "I come from where night falls clearer + Than your morning sun can rise; + From an earth that to heaven draws nearer + Than your visions of Paradise,-- + For the dreams that your dreamers dream + We behold them with open eyes." + +With open eyes! Later I asked the nature of the strange bond that had +called her to my side. + +"I do not understand that fully myself," she said--"That is part of the +knowledge we must wait for. But you have the eyes that see, and that is +a tie nothing can break. I had waited long in the House of Beauty for +you. I guided you there. But between you and me there is also love." + +I stretched an eager hand but she repelled it gently, drawing back a +little. "Not love of each other though we are friends and in the future +may be infinitely more. But--have you ever seen a drawing of Blake's--a +young man stretching his arms to a white swan which flies from him on +wings he cannot stay? That is the story of both our lives. We long to +be joined in this life, here and now, to an unspeakable beauty and power +whose true believers we are because we have seen and known. There is no +love so binding as the same purpose. Perhaps that is the only true love. +And so we shall never be apart though we may never in this world be +together again in what is called companionship." + +"We shall meet," I said confidently. She smiled and was silent. + +"Do we follow a will-o'-the wisp in parting? Do we give up the substance +for the shadow? Shall I stay?" + +She laughed joyously; + +"We give a single rose for a rose-tree that bears seven times seven. +Daily I see more, and you are going where you will be instructed. As you +know my mother prefers for a time to have my cousin with her to help her +with the book she means to write. So I shall have time to myself. What +do you think I shall do?" + +"Blow away on a great wind. Ride on the crests of tossing waves. Catch a +star to light the fireflies!" + +She laughed like a bird's song. + +"Wrong--wrong! I shall be a student. All I know as yet has come to me +by intuition, but there is Law as well as Love and I will learn. I have +drifted like a happy cloud before the wind. Now I will learn to be the +wind that blows the clouds." + +I looked at her in astonishment. If a flower had desired the same thing +it could scarcely have seemed more incredible, for I had thought her +whole life and nature instinctive not intellective. She smiled as one +who has a beloved secret to keep. + +"When you have gained what in this country they call The Knowledge of +Regeneration, come back and ask me what I have learnt." + +She would say no more of that and turned to another matter, speaking +with earnestness; + +"Before you came here I had a message for you, and Stephen Clifden +will tell you the same thing when you meet. Believe it for it is true. +Remember always that the psychical is not the mystical and that what we +seek is not marvel but vision. These two things are very far apart, so +let the first with all its dangers pass you by, for our way lies to the +heights, and for us there is only one danger--that of turning back and +losing what the whole world cannot give in exchange. I have never seen +Stephen Clifden but I know much of him. He is a safe guide--a man who +has had much and strange sorrow which has brought him joy that cannot be +told. He will take you to those who know the things that you desire. I +wish I might have gone too." + +Something in the sweetness of her voice, its high passion, the strong +beauty of her presence woke a poignant longing in my heart. I said; + +"I cannot leave you. You are the only guide I can follow. Let us search +together--you always on before." + +"Your way lies there," she pointed to the high mountains. "And mine to +the plains, and if we chose our own we should wander. But we shall +meet again in the way and time that will be best and with knowledge +so enlarged that what we have seen already will be like an empty dream +compared to daylight truth. If you knew what waits for you you would not +delay one moment." + +She stood radiant beneath the deodars, a figure of Hope, pointing +steadily to the heights. I knew her words were true though as yet I +could not tell how. I knew that whereas we had seen the Wonderful in +beautiful though local forms there is a plane where the Formless may be +apprehended in clear dream and solemn vision-the meeting of spirit with +Spirit. What that revelation would mean I could not guess--how should +I?--but I knew the illusion we call death and decay would wither before +it. There is a music above and beyond the Ninth Vibration though I must +love those words for ever for what their hidden meaning gave me. + +I took her hand and held it. Strange--beyond all strangeness that that +story of an ancient sorrow should have made us what we were to each +other--should have opened to me the gates of that Country where she +wandered content. For the first time I had realized in its fulness the +loveliness of this crystal nature, clear as flowing water to receive and +transmit the light--itself a prophecy and fulfilment of some higher race +which will one day inhabit our world when it has learnt the true values. +She drew a flower from her breast and gave it to me. It lies before me +white and living as I write these words. + +I sprang down the road and mounted, giving the word to march. The men +shouted and strode on--our faces to the Shipki Pass and what lay beyond. + +We had parted. + +Once, twice, I looked back, and standing in full sunlight, she waved her +hand. + +We turned the angle of the rocks. + +What I found--what she found is a story strange and beautiful which +I may tell one day to those who care to hear. That for me there were +pauses, hesitancies, dreads, on the way I am not concerned to deny, +for so it must always be with the roots of the old beliefs of fear and +ignorance buried in the soil of our hearts and ready to throw out their +poisonous fibres. But there was never doubt. For myself I have long +forgotten the meaning of that word in anything that is of real value. + +Do not let it be thought that the treasure is reserved for the few or +those of special gifts. And it is as free to the West as to the East +though I own it lies nearer to the surface in the Orient where the +spiritual genius of the people makes it possible and the greater and +more faithful teachers are found. It is not without meaning that all the +faiths of the world have dawned in those sunrise skies. Yet it is within +reach of all and asks only recognition, for the universe has been the +mine of its jewels-- + + "Median gold it holds, and silver from Atropatene, Ruby and + emerald from Hindustan, and Bactrian agate, Bright with beryl + and pearl, sardonyx and sapphire."-- + and more that cannot be uttered-- + the Lights and Perfections. + +So for all seekers I pray this prayer--beautiful in its sonorous Latin, +but noble in all the tongues; + +"Supplico tibi, Pater et Dux--I pray Thee, Guide of our vision, that +we may remember the nobleness with which Thou hast endowed us, and that +Thou wouldest be always on our right and on our left in the motion of +our wills, that we may be purged from the contagion of the body and the +affections of the brute and overcome and rule them. And I pray also +that Thou wouldest drive away the blinding darkness from the eyes of our +souls that we may know well what is to be held for divine and what for +mortal." + +"The nobleness with which Thou hast endowed us-" this, and not the +cry of the miserable sinner whose very repentance is no virtue but the +consequence of failure and weakness is the strong music to which we must +march. + +And the way is open to the mountains. + + + + +THE INTERPRETER A ROMANCE OF THE EAST + + +I + +There are strange things in this story, but, so far as I understand +them, I tell the truth. If you measure the East with a Western foot-rule +you will say, "Impossible." I should have said it myself. + +Of myself I will say as little as I can, for this story is of Vanna +Loring. I am an incident only, though I did not know that at first. + +My name is Stephen Clifden, and I was eight-and-thirty; plenty of money, +sound in wind and limb. I had been by way of being a writer before the +war, the hobby of a rich man; but if I picked up anything in the welter +in France, it was that real work is the only salvation this mad world +has to offer; so I meant to begin at the beginning, and learn my trade +like a journeyman labourer. I had come to the right place. A very +wonderful city is Peshawar--rather let us say, two cities--the +compounds, the fortifications where Europeans dwell in such peace as +their strong right arms can secure them; and the native city and bazaar +humming and buzzing like a hive of angry bees with the rumours that +come up from Lower India or down the Khyber Pass with the camel caravans +loaded with merchandise from Afghanistan, Bokhara, and farther. And +it is because of this that Peshawar is the Key of India, and a city +of Romance that stands at every corner, and cries aloud in the +market--place. For at Peshawar every able-bodied man sleeps with his +revolver under his pillow, and the old Fort is always ready in case it +should be necessary at brief and sharp notice to hurry the women and +children into it, and possibly, to die in their defense. So enlivening +is the neighbourhood of the frontier tribes that haunt the famous Khyber +Pass and the menacing hills where danger is always lurking. + +But there was society here, and I was swept into it--there was chatter, +and it galled me. + +I was beginning to feel that I had missed my mark, and must go farther +afield, perhaps up into Central Asia, when I met Vanna Loring. If I say +that her hair was soft and dark; that she had the deepest hazel eyes +I have ever seen, and a sensitive, tender mouth; that she moved with a +flowing grace like "a wave of the sea"--it sounds like the portrait of a +beauty, and she was never that. Also, incidentally, it gives none of her +charm. I never heard any one get any further than that she was "oddly +attractive"--let us leave it at that. She was certainly attractive to +me. + +She was the governess of little Winifred Meryon, whose father held +the august position of General Commanding the Frontier Forces, and her +mother the more commanding position of the reigning beauty of Northern +India, generally speaking. No one disputed that. She was as pretty as +a picture, and her charming photograph had graced as many illustrated +papers as there were illustrated papers to grace. + +But Vanna--I gleaned her story by bits when I came across her with the +child in the gardens. I was beginning to piece it together now. + +Her love of the strange and beautiful she had inherited from a young +Italian mother, daughter of a political refugee; her childhood had +been spent in a remote little village in the West of England; half +reluctantly she told me how she had brought herself up after her +mother's death and her father's second marriage. Little was said of +that, but I gathered that it had been a grief to her, a factor in her +flight to the East. + +We were walking in the Circular Road then with Winifred in front leading +her Pekingese by its blue ribbon, and we had it almost to ourselves +except for a few natives passing slow and dignified on their own +occasions, for fashionable Peshawar was finishing its last rubber of +bridge, before separating to dress for dinner, and had no time to spare +for trivialities and sunsets. + +"So when I came to three-and-twenty," she said slowly, "I felt I must +break away from our narrow life. I had a call to India stronger than +anything on earth. You would not understand but that was so, and I had +spent every spare moment in teaching myself India--its history, legends, +religions, everything! And I was not wanted at home, and I had grown +afraid." + +I could divine years of patience and repression under this plain tale, +but also a power that would be dynamic when the authentic voice called. +That was her charm--gentleness in strength--a sweet serenity. + +"What were you afraid of?" + +"Of growing old and missing what was waiting for me out here. But I +could not get away like other people. No money, you see. So I thought I +would come out here and teach. Dare I? Would they let me? I knew I was +fighting life and chances and risks if I did it; but it was death if I +stayed there. And then--Do you really care to hear?" + +"Of course. Tell me how you broke your chain." + +"I spare you the family quarrels. I can never go back. But I was +spurred--spurred to take some wild leap; and I took it. Six years ago I +came out. First I went to a doctor and his wife at Cawnpore. They had +a wonderful knowledge of the Indian peoples, and there I learned +Hindustani and much else. Then he died. But an aunt had left me two +hundred pounds, and I could wait a little and choose; and so I came +here." + +It interested me. The courage that pale elastic type of woman has! + +"Have you ever regretted it? Would they take you back if you failed?" + +"Never, to both questions," she said, smiling. "Life is glorious. I've +drunk of a cup I never thought to taste; and if I died tomorrow I should +know I had done right. I rejoice in every moment I live--even when +Winifred and I are wrestling with arithmetic." + +"I shouldn't have thought life was very easy with Lady Meryon." + +"Oh, she is kind enough in an indifferent sort of way. I am not the +persecuted Jane Eyre sort of governess at all. But that is all on the +surface and does not matter. It is India I care for-the people, the sun, +the infinite beauty. It was coming home. You would laugh if I told you +I knew Peshawar long before I came here. Knew it--walked here, lived. +Before there were English in India at all." She broke off. "You won't +understand." + +"Oh, I have had that feeling, too," I said patronizingly. "If one has +read very much about a place-" + +"That was not quite what I meant. Never mind. The people, the +place--that is the real thing to me. All this is the dream." The sweep +of her hand took in not only Winifred and myself, but the general's +stately residence, which to blaspheme in Peshawar is rank infidelity. + +"By George, I would give thousands to feel that! I can't get out of +Europe here. I want to write, Miss Loring," I found myself saying. "I'd +done a bit, and then the war came and blew my life to pieces. Now I want +to get inside the skin of the East, and I can't do it. I see it from +outside, with a pane of glass between. No life in it. If you feel as you +say, for God's sake be my interpreter!" + +I really meant what I said. I knew she was a harp that any breeze would +sweep into music. I divined that temperament in her and proposed to use +it for my own ends. She had and I had not, the power to be a part of all +she saw, to feel kindred blood running in her own veins. To the average +European the native life of India is scarcely interesting, so far is it +removed from all comprehension. To me it was interesting, but I could +not tell why. I stood outside and had not the fairy gold to pay for my +entrance. Here at all events she could buy her way where I could not. +Without cruelty, which honestly was not my besetting sin--especially +where women were concerned, the egoist in me felt I would use her, would +extract the last drop of the enchantment of her knowledge before I went +on my way. What more natural than that Vanna or any other woman should +minister to my thirst for information? Men are like that. I pretend +to be no better than the rest. She pleased my fastidiousness--that +fastidiousness which is the only austerity in men not otherwise austere. + +"Interpret?" she said, looking at me with clear hazel eyes; "how could +I? You were in the native city yesterday. What did you miss?" + +"Everything! I saw masses of colour, light, movement. Brilliantly +picturesque people. Children like Asiatic angels. Magnificently scowling +ruffians in sheepskin coats. In fact, a movie staged for my benefit. I +was afraid they would ring down the curtain before I had had enough. It +had no meaning. When I got back to my diggings I tried to put down +what I had just seen, and I swear there's more inspiration in the +guide-book." + +"Did you go alone?" + +"Yes, I certainly would not go sight-seeing with the Meryon crowd. Tell +me what you felt when you saw it first." + +"I went with Sir John's uncle. He was a great traveler. The colour +struck me dumb. It flames--it sings. Think of the grey pinched life in +the West! I saw a grave dark potter turning his wheel, while his little +girl stood by, glad at our pleasure, her head veiled like a miniature +woman, tiny baggy trousers, and a silver nose-stud, like a star, in one +delicate nostril. In her thin arms she held a heavy baby in a gilt cap, +like a monkey. And the wheel turned and whirled until it seemed to be +spinning dreams, thick as motes in the sun. The clay rose in smooth +spirals under his hand, and the wheel sang, 'Shall the vessel reprove +him who made one to honour and one to dishonour?' And I saw the potter +thumping his wet clay, and the clay, plastic as dream-stuff, shaped +swift as light, and the three Fates stood at his shoulder. Dreams, +dreams, and all in the spinning of the wheel, and the rich shadows of +the old broken courtyard where he sat. And the wheel stopped and the +thread broke, and the little new shapes he had made stood all about him, +and he was only a potter in Peshawar." + +Her voice was like a song. She had utterly forgotten my existence. I +did not dislike it at the moment, for I wanted to hear more, and the +impersonal is the rarest gift a woman can give a man. + +"Did you buy anything?" + +"He gave me a gift--a flawed jar of turquoise blue, faint turquoise +green round the lip. He saw I understood. And then I bought a little +gold cap and a wooden box of jade-green Kabul grapes. About a rupee, all +told. But it was Eastern merchandise, and I was trading from Balsora and +Baghdad, and Eleazar's camels were swaying down from Damascus along the +Khyber Pass, and coming in at the great Darwazah, and friends' eyes met +me everywhere. I am profoundly happy here." + +The sinking sun lit an almost ecstatic face. + +I envied her more deeply than I had ever envied any one. She had the +secret of immortal youth, and I felt old as I looked at her. One might +be eighty and share that passionate impersonal joy. Age could not wither +nor custom stale the infinite variety of her world's joys. She had a +child's dewy youth in her eyes. + +There are great sunsets at Peshawar, flaming over the plain, dying in +melancholy splendour over the dangerous hills. They too were hers, in +a sense in which they could never be mine. But what a companion! To +my astonishment a wild thought of marriage flashed across me, to be +instantly rebuffed with a shrug. Marriage--that one's wife might talk +poetry to one about the East! Absurd! But what was it these people felt +and I could not feel? Almost, shut up in the prison of self, I knew what +Vanna had felt in her village--a maddening desire to escape, to be a +part of the loveliness that lay beyond me. So might a man love a king's +daughter in her hopeless heights. + +"It may be very beautiful on the surface," I said morosely; "but there's +a lot of misery below--hateful, they tell me." + +"Of course. We shall get to work one day. But look at the sunset. It +opens like a mysterious flower. I must take Winifred home now." + +"One moment," I pleaded; "I can only see it through your eyes. I feel it +while you speak, and then the good minute goes." + +She laughed. + +"And so must I. Come, Winifred. Look, there's an owl; not like the owls +in the summer dark in England-- + + "Lovely are the curves of the white owl sweeping, Wavy in the +dark, lit by one low star." + +Suddenly she turned again and looked at me half wistfully. + +"It is good to talk to you. You want to know. You are so near it all. I +wish I could help you; I am so exquisitely happy myself." + +My writing was at a standstill. It seemed the groping of a blind man +in a radiant world. Once perhaps I had felt that life was good in +itself--when the guns came thundering toward the Vimy Ridge in a mad +gallop of horses, and men shouting and swearing and frantically urging +them on. Then, riding for more than life, I had tasted life for an +instant. Not before or since. But this woman had the secret. + +Lady Meryon, with her escort of girls and subalterns, came daintily past +the hotel compound, and startled me from my brooding with her pretty +silvery voice. + +"Dreaming, Mr. Clifden? It isn't at all wholesome to dream in the East. +Come and dine with us tomorrow. A tiny dance afterwards, you know; or +bridge for those who like it." + +I had not the faintest notion whether governesses dined with the family +or came in afterward with the coffee; but it was a sporting chance, and +I took it. + +Then Sir John came up and joined us. + +"You can't well dance tomorrow, Kitty," he said to his wife. "There's +been an outpost affair in the Swat Hills, and young Fitzgerald has +been shot. Come to dinner of course, Clifden. Glad to see you. But no +dancing, I think." + +Kitty Meryon's mouth drooped like a pouting child's. Was it for the lost +dance, or the lost soldier lying out on the hills in the dying sunset. +Who could tell? In either case it was pretty enough for the illustrated +papers. + +"How sad! Such a dear boy. We shall miss him at tennis." Then brightly; +"Well, we'll have to put the dance off for a week, but come tomorrow +anyhow." + + +II + + +Next evening I went into Lady Meryon's flower-scented drawing-room. The +electric fans were fluttering and the evening air was cool. Five or +six pretty girls and as many men made up the party--Kitty Meryon the +prettiest of them all, fashionably undressed in faint pink and crystal, +with a charming smile in readiness, all her gay little flags flying in +the rich man's honour. I am no vainer than other men, but I saw that. +Whatever her charm might be it was none for me. What could I say to +interest her who lived in her foolish little world as one shut in a +bright bubble? And she had said the wrong word about young Fitzgerald--I +wanted Vanna, with her deep seeing eyes, to say the right one and adjust +those cruel values. + +Governesses dine, it appeared, only to fill an unexpected place, or make +a decorous entry afterward, to play accompaniments. Fortunately Kitty +Meryon sang, in a pinched little soprano, not nearly so pretty as her +silver ripple of talk. + +It was when the party had settled down to bridge and I was standing out, +that I ventured to go up to her as she sat knitting by a window--not +unwatched by the quick flash of Lady Meryon's eyes as I did it. + +"I think you hypnotize me, Miss Loring. When I hear anything I +straightway want to know what you will say. Have you heard of +Fitzgerald's death?" + +"That is why we are not dancing tonight. Tomorrow the cable will reach +his home in England. He was an only child, and they are the great people +of the village where we are the little people. I knew his mother as one +knows a great lady who is kind to all the village folk. It may kill her. +It is travelling tonight like a bullet to her heart, and she does not +know." + +"His father?" + +"A brave man--a soldier himself. He will know it was a good death and +that Harry would not fail. He did not at Ypres. He would not here. But +all joy and hope will be dead in that house tomorrow." + +"And what do you think?" + +"I am not sorry for Harry, if you mean that. He knew--we all know--that +he was on guard here holding the outposts against blood and treachery +and terrible things--playing the Great Game. One never loses at that +game if one plays it straight, and I am sure that at the last it was joy +he felt and not fear. He has not lost. Did you notice in the church +a niche before every soldier's seat to hold his loaded gun? And the +tablets on the walls; "Killed at Kabul River, aged 22."--"Killed on +outpost duty."--"Murdered by an Afghan fanatic." This will be one memory +more. Why be sorry." + +Presently:-- + +"I am going up to the hills tomorrow, to the Malakhand Fort, with Mrs. +Delany, Lady Meryon's aunt, and we shall see the wonderful Tahkt-i-Bahi +Monastery on the way. You should do that run before you go. The fort is +the last but one on the way to Chitral, and beyond that the road is so +beset that only soldiers may go farther, and indeed the regiments escort +each other up and down. But it is an early start, for we must be back in +Peshawar at six for fear of raiding natives." + +"I know; they hauled me up in the dusk the other day, and told me I +should be swept off to the hills if I fooled about after dusk. But I +say--is it safe for you to go? You ought to have a man. Could I go too?" + +I thought she did not look enthusiastic at the proposal. + +"Ask. You know I settle nothing. I go where I am sent." She said it with +the happiest smile. I knew they could send her nowhere that she would +not find joy. I thought her mere presence must send the vibrations of +happiness through the household. Yet again--why? For where there is no +receiver the current speaks in vain; and for an instant I seemed to see +the air full of messages--of speech striving to utter its passionate +truths to deaf ears stopped for ever against the breaking waves of +sound. But Vanna heard. + +She left the room; and when the bridge was over, I made my request. Lady +Meryon shrugged her shoulders and declared it would be a terribly dull +run--the scenery nothing, "and only" (she whispered) "Aunt Selina and +poor Miss Loring?" + +Of course I saw at once that she did not like it; but Sir John was all +for my going, and that saved the situation. + +I certainly could have dispensed with Aunt Selina when the automobile +drew up in the golden river of the sunrise at the hotel. There were only +the driver, a personal servant, and the two ladies; Mrs. Delany, comely, +pleasant, talkative, and Vanna-- + +Her face in its dark motoring veil, fine and delicate as a young moon in +a cloud drift--the sensitive sweet mouth that had quivered a little when +she spoke of Fitzgerald--the pure glance that radiated such kindness to +all the world. She sat there with the Key of Dreams pressed against her +slight bosom--her eyes dreaming above it. Already the strange airs of +her unknown world were breathing about me, and as yet I knew not the +things that belonged unto my peace. + +We glided along the straight military road from Peshawar to Nowshera, +the gold-bright sun dazzling in its whiteness--a strange drive through +the flat, burned country, with the ominous Kabul River flowing through +it. Military preparations everywhere, and the hills looking watchfully +down--alive, as it were, with keen, hostile eyes. War was at present +about us as behind the lines in France; and when we crossed the Kabul +River on a bridge of boats, and I saw its haunted waters, I began to +feel the atmosphere of the place closing down upon me. It had a sinister +beauty; it breathed suspense; and I wished, as I was sure Vanna did, for +silence that was not at our command. + +For Mrs. Delany felt nothing of it. A bright shallow ripple of talk was +her contribution to the joys of the day; though it was, fortunately, +enough for her happiness if we listened and agreed. I knew Vanna +listened only in show. Her intent eyes were fixed on the Tahkt-i-Bahi +hills after we had swept out of Nowshera; and when the car drew up +at the rough track, she had a strange look of suspense and pallor. I +remember I wondered at the time if she were nervous in the wild open +country. + +"Now pray don't be shocked," said Mrs. Delany comfortably; "but you two +young people may go up to the monastery, and I shall stay here. I am +dreadfully ashamed of myself, but the sight of that hill is enough for +me. Don't hurry. I may have a little doze, and be all the better company +when you get back. No, don't try to persuade me, Mr. Clifden. It isn't +the part of a friend." + +I cannot say I was sorry, though I had a moment of panic when Vanna +offered to stay with her--very much, too, as if she really meant it. So +we set out perforce, Vanna leading steadily, as if she knew the way. +She never looked up, and her wish for silence was so evident, that I +followed, lending my hand mutely when the difficulties obliged it, she +accepting absently, and as if her thoughts were far away. + +Suddenly she quickened her pace. We had climbed about nine hundred feet, +and now the narrow track twisted through the rocks--a track that looked +as age-worn as no doubt it was. We threaded it, and struggled over the +ridge, and looked down victorious on the other side. + +There she stopped. A very wonderful sight, of which I had never seen the +like, lay below us. Rock and waste and towering crags, and the mighty +ruin of the monastery set in the fangs of the mountain like a robber +baron's castle, looking far away to the blue mountains of the Debatable +Land--the land of mystery and danger. It stood there--the great ruin +of a vast habitation of men. Building after building, mysterious and +broken, corridors, halls, refectories, cells; the dwelling of a faith so +alien that I could not reconstruct the life that gave it being. And all +sinking gently into ruin that in a century more would confound it with +the roots of the mountains. + +Grey and wonderful, it clung to the heights and looked with eyeless +windows at the past. Somehow I found it infinitely pathetic; the very +faith it expressed is dead in India, and none left so poor to do it +reverence. + +But Vanna knew her way. Unerringly she led me from point to point, and +she was visibly at home in the intricacies. Such knowledge in a young +woman bewildered me. Could she have studied the plans in the Museum? +How else should she know where the abbot lived, or where the refractory +brothers were punished? + +Once I missed her, while I stooped to examine some scroll-work, and +following, found her before one of the few images of the Buddha that the +rapacious Museum had spared--a singularly beautiful bas-relief, the hand +raised to enforce the truth the calm lips were speaking, the drapery +falling in stately folds to the bare feet. As I came up, she had an air +as if she had just ceased from movement, and I had a distinct feeling +that she had knelt before it--I saw the look of worship! The thing +troubled me like a dream, haunting, impossible, but real. + +"How beautiful!" I said in spite of myself, as she pointed to the image. +"In this utter solitude it seems the very spirit of the place." + +"He was. He is," said Vanna. + +"Explain to me. I don't understand. I know so little of him. What is the +subject?" + +She hesitated; then chose her words as if for a beginner;--"It is the +Blessed One preaching to the Tree-Spirits. See how eagerly they lean +from the boughs to listen. This other relief represents him in the state +of mystic vision. Here he is drowned in peace. See how it overflows from +the closed eyes; the closed lips. The air is filled with his quiet." + +"What is he dreaming?" + +"Not dreaming--seeing. Peace. He sits at the point where time and +infinity meet. To attain that vision was the aim of the monks who lived +here." + +"Did they attain?" I found myself speaking as if she could certainly +answer. + +"A few. There was one, Vasettha, the Brahman, a young man who had +renounced all his possessions and riches, and seated here before this +image of the Blessed One, he fell often into the mystic state. He had a +strange vision at one time of the future of India, which will surely be +fulfilled. He did not forget it in his rebirths. He remembers-" + +She broke off suddenly and said with forced indifference,--"He would sit +here often looking out over the mountains; the monks sat at his feet to +hear. He became abbot while still young. But his story is a sad one." + +"I entreat you to tell me." + +She looked away over the mountains. "While he was abbot here,--still a +young man,--a famous Chinese Pilgrim came down through Kashmir to visit +the Holy Places in India. The abbot went forward with him to Peshawar, +that he might make him welcome. And there came a dancer to Peshawar, +named Lilavanti, most beautiful! I dare not tell you her beauty. I +tremble now to think-" + +Again she paused, and again the faint creeping sense of mystery invaded +me. + +She resumed;-- + +"The abbot saw her and he loved her. He was young still, you remember. +She was a woman of the Hindu faith and hated Buddhism. It swept him down +into the lower worlds of storm and desire. He fled with Lilavanti and +never returned here. So in his rebirth he fell-" + +She stopped dead; her face pale as death. + +"How do you know? Where have you read it? If I could only find what you +find and know what you know! The East is like an open book to you. Tell +me the rest." + +"How should I know any more?" she said hurriedly. "We must be going +back. You should study the plans of this place at Peshawar. They were +very learned monks who lived here. It is famous for learning." + +The life had gone out of her words-out of the ruins. There was no more +to be said. + +We clambered down the hill in the hot sunshine, speaking only of the +view, the strange shrubs and flowers, and, once, the swift gliding of a +snake, and found Mrs. Delany blissfully asleep in the most padded corner +of the car. The spirit of the East vanished in her comfortable presence, +and luncheon seemed the only matter of moment. + +"I wonder, my dears," she said, "if you would be very disappointed and +think me very dense if I proposed our giving up the Malakhand Fort? The +driver has been giving me in very poor English such an account of the +dangers of that awful road up the hill that I feel no Fort would repay +me for its terrors. Do say what you feel, Miss Loring. Mr. Clifden can +lunch with the officers at Nowshera and come any time. I know I am an +atrocity." + +There could be only one answer, though Vanna and I knew perfectly well +the crafty design of the driver to spare himself work. Mrs. Delany +remained brightly awake for the run home, and favored us with many +remarkable views on India and its shortcomings, Vanna, who had a sincere +liking for her, laughing with delight at her description of a visit of +condolence with Lady Meryon to the five widows of one of the hill Rajas. + +But I own I was pre-occupied. I knew those moments at the monastery had +given me a glimpse into the wonderland of her soul that made me long +for more. It was rapidly becoming clear to me that unless my intentions +developed on very different lines I must flee Peshawar. For love is born +of sympathy, and sympathy was strengthening daily, but for love I had no +courage yet. + +I feared it as men fear the unknown. I despised myself--but I feared. +I will confess my egregious folly and vanity--I had no doubt as to her +reception of my offer if I should make it, but possessed by a colossal +selfishness, I thought only of myself, and from that point of view could +not decide how I stood to lose or gain. In my wildest accesses of vanity +I did not suppose Vanna loved me, but I felt she liked me, and I believe +the advantages I had to offer would be overwhelming to a woman in her +position. So, tossed on the waves of indecision, I inclined to flight. + +That night I resolutely began my packing, and wrote a note of farewell +to Lady Meryon. The next morning I furiously undid it, and destroyed the +note. And that afternoon I took the shortest way to the sun-set road to +lounge about and wait for Vanna and Winifred. She never came, and I was +as unreasonably angry as if I had deserved the blessing of her presence. + +Next day I could see that she tried gently hut clearly to discourage our +meeting and for three days I never saw her at all. Yet I knew that in +her solitary life our talks counted for a pleasure, and when we met +again I thought I saw a new softness in the lovely hazel deeps of her +eyes. + + +III + + +On the day when things became clear to me, I was walking towards the +Meryons' gates when I met her coming alone along the sunset road, in the +late gold of the afternoon. She looked pale and a little wearied, and I +remembered I wished I did not know every change of her face as I did. It +was a symptom that alarmed my selfishness--it galled me with the sense +that I was no longer my own despot. + +"So you have been up the Khyber Pass," she said as I fell into step at +her side. "Tell me--was it as wonderful as you expected?" + +"No, no,--you tell me! It will give me what I missed. Begin at the +beginning. Tell me what I saw." + +I could not miss the delight of her words, and she laughed, knowing my +whim. + +"Oh, that Pass!--the wonder of those old roads that have borne the +traffic and romance of the world for ages. Do you think there is +anything in the world so fascinating as they are? But did you go on +Tuesday or Friday?" + +For these are the only days in the week when the Khyber can be safely +entered. The British then turn out the Khyber Rifles and man every crag, +and the loaded caravans move like a tide, and go up and down the narrow +road on their occasions. + +Naturally mere sightseers are not welcomed, for much business must be +got through in that urgent forty eight hours in which life is not risked +in entering. + +"Tuesday. But make a picture for me." + +"Well, you gave your word not to photograph or sketch--as if one wanted +to when every bit of it is stamped on one's brain! And you went up to +Jumrood Fort at the entrance. Did they tell you it is an old Sikh Fort +and has been on duty in that turbulent place for five hundred years And +did you see the machine guns in the court? And every one armed--even the +boys with belts of cartridges? Then you went up the narrow winding track +between the mountains, and you said to yourself, 'This is the road of +pure romance. It goes up to silken Samarkhand, and I can ride to Bokhara +of the beautiful women and to all the dreams. Am I alive and is it +real?' You felt that?" + +"All. Every bit. Go on!" + +She smiled with pleasure. + +"And you saw the little forts on the crags and the men on guard all +along the bills, rifles ready! You could hear the guns rattle as they +saluted. Do you know that up there men plough with rifles loaded beside +them? They have to be men indeed." + +"Do you mean to imply that we are not men?" + +"Different men at least. This is life in a Border ballad. Such a life as +you knew in France but beautiful in a wild--hawk sort of way. Don't the +Khyber Rifles bewilder you? They are drawn from these very Hill tribes, +and will shoot their own fathers and brothers in the way of duty as +comfortably as if they were jackals. Once there was a scrap here and +one of the tribesmen sniped our men unbearably. What do you suppose +happened? A Khyber Rifle came to the Colonel and said, 'Let me put +an end to him, Colonel Sahib. I know exactly where he sits. He is my +grandfather.' And he did it!" + +"The bond of bread and salt?" + +"Yes, and discipline. I'm sometimes half frightened of discipline. It +moulds a man like wax. Even God doesn't do that. Well--then you had the +traders--wild shaggy men in sheepskin and women in massive jewelry of +silver and turquoise,-great earrings, heavy bracelets loading their +arms, wild, fierce, handsome. And the camels--thousands of them, some +going up, some coming down, a mass of human and animal life. Above +you, moving figures against the keen blue sky, or deep below you in the +ravines. + +"The camels were swaying along with huge bales of goods, and dark +beautiful women in wicker cages perched on them. Silks and carpets from +Bokhara, and blue--eyed Persian cats, and bluer Persian turquoises. +Wonderful! And the dust, gilded by the sunshine, makes a vaporous golden +atmosphere for it all." + +"What was the most wonderful thing you saw there?" + +"The most beautiful, I think, was a man--a splendid dark ruffian +lounging along. He wanted to show off, and his swagger was perfect. Long +black onyx eyes and a tumble of black curls, and teeth like almonds. +But what do you think he carried on his wrist--a hawk with fierce yellow +eyes, ringed and chained. Hawking is a favourite sport in the hills. Oh, +why doesn't some great painter come and paint it all before they take to +trains and cars? I long to see it all again, but I never shall." + +"Why not," said I. "Surely Sir John can get you up there any day?" + +"Not now. The fighting makes it difficult. But it isn't that. I am +leaving." + +"Leaving?" My heart gave a leap. "Why? Where?" + +"Leaving Lady Meryon." + +"Why--for Heaven's sake?" + +"I had rather not tell you." + +"But I must know." + +"You cannot." + +"I shall ask Lady Meryon." + +"I forbid you." + +And then the unexpected happened, and an unbearable impulse swept me +into folly--or was it wisdom? + +"Listen to me. I would not have said it yet, but this settles it. I want +you to marry me. I want it atrociously!" + +It was a strange word. What I felt for her at that moment was difficult +to describe. I endured it like a pain that could only be assuaged by +her presence, but I endured it angrily. We were walking on the sunset +road--very deserted and quiet at the time. The place was propitious if +nothing else was. + +She looked at me in transparent astonishment; + +"Mr. Clifden, are you dreaming? You can't mean what you say." + +"Why can't I? I do. I want you. You have the key of all I care for. I +think of the world without you and find it tasteless." + +"Surely you have all the world can give? What do you want more?" + +"The power to enjoy it--to understand it. You have got that--I haven't. +I want you always with me to interpret, like a guide to a blind fellow. +I am no better." + +"Say like a dog, at once!" she interrupted. "At least you are frank +enough to put it on that ground. You have not said you love me. You +could not say it." + +"I don't know whether I do or not. I know nothing about love. I want +you. Indescribably. Perhaps that is love--is it? I never wanted any one +before. I have tried to get away and I can't." + +I was brutally frank, you see. She compelled my very thoughts. + +"Why have you tried?" + +"Because every man likes freedom. But I like you better." "I can tell +you the reason," she said in her gentle unwavering voice. "I am Lady +Meryon's governess, and an undesirable. You have felt that?" + +"Don't make me out such a snob. No--yes. You force me into honesty. +I did feel it at first like the miserable fool I am, but I could kick +myself when I think of that now. It is utterly forgotten. Take me and +make me what you will, and forgive me. Only tell me your secret of joy. +How is it you understand everything alive or dead? I want to live--to +see, to know." + +It was a rhapsody like a boy's. Yet at the moment I was not even ashamed +of it, so sharp was my need. + +"I think," she said, slowly, looking straight before her, "that I had +better be quite frank. I don't love you. I don't know what love means +in the Western sense. It has a very different meaning for me. Your voice +comes to me from an immense distance when you speak in that way. You +want me--but never with a thought of what I might want. Is that love? I +like you very deeply as a friend, but we are of different races. There +is a gulf." + +"A gulf? You are English." + +"By birth, yes. In mind, no. And there are things that go deeper, that +you could not understand. So I refuse quite definitely, and our ways +part here, for in a few days I go. I shall not see you again, but I wish +to say good-bye." + +The bitterest chagrin was working in my soul. I felt as if all were +deserting me-a sickening feeling of loneliness. I did not know the man +who was in me, and was a stranger to myself. + +"I entreat you to tell me why, and where." + +"Since you have made me this offer, I will tell you why. Lady Meryon +objected to my friendship with you, and objected in a way which-" + +She stopped, flushing palely. I caught her hand. + +"That settles it!-that she should have dared! I'll go up this minute and +tell her we are engaged. Vanna-Vanna!" + +For she disengaged her hand, quietly but firmly. + +"On no account. How can I make it more plain to you? I should have gone +soon in any case. My place is in the native city--that is the life I +want. I have work there, I knew it before I came out. My sympathies are +all with them. They know what life is--why even the beggars, poorer than +poor, are perfectly happy, basking in the great generous sun. Oh, the +splendour and riot of life and colour! That's my life--I sicken of +this." + +"But I'll give it to you. Marry me, and we will travel till you're tired +of it." + +"Yes, and look on as at a play--sitting in the stalls, and applauding +when we are pleased. No, I'm going to work there." "For God's sake, how? +Let me come too." + +"You can't. You're not in it. I am going to attach myself to the medical +mission at Lahore and learn nursing, and then I shall go to my own +people." + +"Missionaries? You've nothing in common with them?" + +"Nothing. But they teach what I want. Mr. Clifden, I shall not come this +way again. If I remember--I'll write to you, and tell you what the real +world is like." + +She smiled, the absorbed little smile I knew and feared. I saw pleading +was useless then. I would wait, and never lose sight of her and of hope. + +"Vanna, before you go, give me your gift of sight. Interpret for me. +Stay with me a little and make me see." + +"What do you mean exactly?" she asked in her gentlest voice, half +turning to me. + +"Make one journey with me, as my sister, if you will do no more. Though +I warn you that all the time I shall be trying to win my wife. But come +with me once, and after that--if you will go, you must. Say yes." + +Madness! But she hesitated--a hesitation full of hope, and looked at me +with intent eyes. + +"I will tell you frankly," she said at last, "that I know my knowledge +of the East and kinship with it goes far beyond mere words. In my case +the doors were not shut. I believe--I know that long ago this was my +life. If I spoke for ever I could not make you understand how much I +know and why. So I shall quite certainly go back to it. Nothing--you +least of all, can hold me. But you are my friend--that is a true bond. +And if you would wish me to give you two months before I go, I might do +that if it would in any way help you. As your friend only--you clearly +understand. You would not reproach me afterwards when I left you, as I +should most certainly do?" + +"I swear I would not. I swear I would protect you even from myself. I +want you for ever, but if you will only give me two months--come! But +have you thought that people will talk. It may injure you. I'm not worth +that, God knows. And you will take nothing I could give you in return." + +She spoke very quietly. + +"That does not trouble me.--It would only trouble me if you asked what +I have not to give. For two months I would travel with you as a friend, +if, like a friend, I paid my own expenses-" + +I would have interrupted, but she brushed that firmly aside. "No, I must +do as I say, and I am quite able to or I should not suggest it. I would +go on no other terms. It would be hard if because we are man and woman I +might not do one act of friendship for you before we part. For though I +refuse your offer utterly, I appreciate it, and I would make what little +return I can. It would be a sharp pain to me to distress you." + +Her gentleness and calm, the magnitude of the offer she was making +stunned me so that I could scarcely speak. There was such an +extraordinary simplicity and generosity in her manner that it appeared +to me more enthralling and bewildering than the most finished coquetry +I had ever known. She gave me opportunities that the most ardent lover +could in his wildest dream desire, and with the remoteness in her eyes +and her still voice she deprived them of all hope. It kindled in me a +flame that made my throat dry when I tried to speak. + +"Vanna, is it a promise? You mean it?" + +"If you wish it, yes. But I warn you I think it will not make it easier +for you when the time is over. + +"Why two months?" + +"Partly because I can afford no more. No! I know what you would say. +Partly because I can spare no more time. But I will give you that, +if you wish, though, honestly, I had very much rather not. I think it +unwise for you. I would protect you if I could--indeed I would!" + +It was my turn to hesitate now. Every moment revealed to me some new +sweetness, some charm that I saw would weave itself into the very +fibre of my I had been! Was I not now a fool? Would it not being if the +opportunity were given. Oh, fool that be better to let her go before she +had become a part of my daily experience? I began to fear I was courting +my own shipwreck. She read my thoughts clearly. + +"Indeed you would be wise to decide against it. Release me from my +promise. It was a mad scheme." + +The superiority--or so I felt it--of her gentleness maddened me. It +might have been I who needed protection, who was running the risk of +misjudgment--not she, a lonely woman. She looked at me, waiting--trying +to be wise for me, never for one instant thinking of herself. I felt +utterly exiled from the real purpose of her life. + +"I will never release you. I claim your promise. I hold to it." + +"Very well then--I will write, and tell you where I shall be. Good-bye, +and if you change your mind, as I hope you will, tell me." + +She extended her hand cool as a snowflake, and was gone, walking swiftly +up the road. Ah, let a man beware when his wishes fulfilled, rain down +upon him! + +To what had I committed myself? She knew her strength and had no fears. +I could scarcely realize that she had liking enough for me to make the +offer. That it meant no shade more than she had said I knew well. She +was safe, but what was to be the result for me? I knew nothing--she was +a beloved mystery. + + "Strange she is and secret, Strange her eyes; her cheeks are +cold as cold sea-shells." + +Yet I would risk it, for I knew there was no hope if I let her go now, +and if I saw her again, some glimmer might fall upon my dark. + +Next day this reached me:--Dear Mr. Clifden,-- + +I am going to some Indian friends for a time. On the 15th of June I +shall be at Srinagar in Kashmir. A friend has allowed me to take her +little houseboat, the "Kedarnath." If you like this plan we will share +the cost for two months. I warn you it is not luxurious, but I think you +will like it. I shall do this whether you come or no, for I want a quiet +time before I take up my nursing in Lahore. In thinking of all this will +you remember that I am not a girl but a woman. I shall be twenty-nine my +next birthday. Sincerely yours, VANNA LORING. + +P.S. But I still think you would be wiser not to come. I hope to hear +you will not. + +I replied only this:--Dear Miss Loring,--I think I understand the +position fully. I will be there. I thank you with all my heart. +Gratefully yours, STEPHEN CLIFDEN. + + +IV + + +Three days later I met Lady Meryon, and was swept in to tea. Her manner +was distinctly more cordial as she mentioned casually that Vanna had +left--she understood to take up missionary work--"which is odd," she +added with a woman's acrimony, "for she had no more in common with +missionaries than I have, and that is saying a good deal. Of course she +speaks Hindustani perfectly, and could be useful, but I haven't grasped +the point of it yet." I saw she counted on my knowing nothing of the +real reason of Vanna's going and left it, of course, at that. The talk +drifted away under my guidance. Vanna evidently puzzled her. She half +feared, and wholly misunderstood her. + +No message came to me, as time went by, and for the time she had +vanished completely, but I held fast to her promise and lived on that +only. + +I take up my life where it ceased to be a mere suspense and became life +once more. + +On the 15th of June, I found myself riding into Srinagar in Kashmir, +through the pure tremulous green of the mighty poplars that hedge the +road into the city. The beauty of the country had half stunned me when +I entered the mountain barrier of Baramula and saw the snowy peaks that +guard the Happy Valley, with the Jhelum flowing through its tranquil +loveliness. The flush of the almond blossom was over, but the iris, like +a blue sea of peace had overflowed the world--the azure meadows smiled +back at the radiant sky. Such blossom! the blue shading into clear +violet, like a shoaling sea. The earth, like a cup held in the hand of a +god, brimmed with the draught of youth and summer and--love? But no, for +me the very word was sinister. Vanna's face, immutably calm, confronted +it. + +That night I slept in a boat at Sopor, and I remember that, waking at +midnight, I looked out and saw a mountain with a gloriole of hazy silver +about it, misty and faint as a cobweb threaded with dew. The river, +there spreading into a lake, was dark under it, flowing in a deep smooth +blackness of shadow, and everything awaited--what? And even while I +looked, the moon floated serenely above the peak, and all was bathed in +pure light, the water rippling and shining in broken silver and pearl. +So had Vanna floated into my sky, luminous, sweet, remote. I did not +question my heart any more. I knew I loved her. + +Two days later I rode into Srinagar, and could scarcely see the wild +beauty of that strange Venice of the East, my heart was so beating +in my eyes. I rode past the lovely wooden bridges where the balconied +houses totter to each other across the canals in dim splendour of +carving and age; where the many-coloured native life crowds down to the +river steps and cleanses its flower-bright robes, its gold-bright brass +vessels in the shining stream, and my heart said only--Vanna, Vanna! + +One day, one thought, of her absence had taught me what she was to me, +and if humility and patient endeavor could raise me to her feet, I was +resolved that I would spend my life in labor and think it well spent. + +My servant dismounted and led his horse, asking from every one where the +"Kedarnath" could be found, and eager black eyes sparkled and two little +bronze images detached themselves from the crowd of boys, and ran, fleet +as fauns, before us. + +Above the last bridge the Jhelum broadens out into a stately river, +controlled at one side by the banked walk known as the Bund, with the +Club House upon it and the line of houseboats beneath. Here the visitors +flutter up and down and exchange the gossip, the bridge appointments, +the little dinners that sit so incongruously on the pure Orient that is +Kashmir. + +She would not be here. My heart told me that, and sure enough the boys +were leading across the bridge and by a quiet shady way to one of the +many backwaters that the great river makes in the enchanting city. There +is one waterway stretching on afar to the Dal Lake. It looks like a +river--it is the very haunt of peace. Under those mighty chenar, or +plane trees, that are the glory of Kashmir, clouding the water with deep +green shadows, the sun can scarcely pierce, save in a dipping sparkle +here and there to intensify the green gloom. The murmur of the city, the +chatter of the club, are hundreds of miles away. We rode downward under +the towering trees, and dismounting, saw a little houseboat tethered to +the bank. It was not of the richer sort that haunts the Bund, where the +native servants follow in a separate boat, and even the electric light +is turned on as part of the luxury. This was a long low craft, very +broad, thatched like a country cottage afloat. In the forepart lived the +native owner, and his family, their crew, our cooks and servants; for +they played many parts in our service. And in the afterpart, room for a +life, a dream, the joy or curse & many days to be. + +But then, I saw only one thing--Vanna sat under the trees, reading, or +looking at the cool dim watery vista, with a single boat, loaded to the +river's edge with melons and scarlet tomatoes, punting lazily down to +Srinagar in the sleepy afternoon. + +She was dressed in white with a shady hat, and her delicate dark face +seemed to glow in the shadow like the heart of a pale rose. For the +first time I knew she was beautiful. Beauty shone in her like the flame +in an alabaster lamp, serene, diffused in the very air about her, so +that to me she moved in a mild radiance. She rose to meet me with both +hands outstretched--the kindest, most cordial welcome. Not an eyelash +flickered, not a trace of self-consciousness. If I could have seen her +flush or tremble--but no--her eyes were clear and calm as a forest pool. +So I remembered her. So I saw her once more. + +I tried, with a hopeless pretence, to follow her example and hide what I +felt, where she had nothing to hide. + +"What a place you have found. Why, it's like the deep heart of a wood!" + +"Yes, I saw it once when I was here with the Meryons. But we lay at the +Bund then--just under the Club. This is better. Did you like the ride +up?" + +I threw myself on the grass beside her with a feeling of perfect rest. + +"It was like a new heaven and a new earth. What a country!" + +The very spirit of Quiet seemed to be drowsing in those branches +towering up into the blue, dipping their green fingers into the crystal +of the water. What a heaven! + +"Now you shall have your tea and then I will show you your rooms," she +said, smiling at my delight. "We shall stay here a few days more that +you may see Srinagar, and then they tow us up into the Dal Lake opposite +the Gardens of the Mogul Emperors. And if you think this beautiful what +will you say then?" + +I shut my eyes and see still that first meal of my new life. The little +table that Pir Baksh, breathing full East in his jade-green turban, set +before her, with its cloth worked in a pattern of the chenar leaves +that are the symbol of Kashmir; the brown cakes made by Ahmad Khan in +a miraculous kitchen of his own invention--a few holes burrowed in the +river bank, a smoldering fire beneath them, and a width of canvas for +a roof. But it served, and no more need be asked of luxury. And Vanna, +making it mysteriously the first home I ever had known, the central +joy of it all. Oh, wonderful days of life that breathe the spirit of +immortality and pass so quickly--surely they must be treasured somewhere +in Eternity that we may look upon their beloved light once more. + +"Now you must see the boat. The Kedarnath is not a Dreadnought, but she +is broad and very comfortable. And we have many chaperons. They all +live in the bows, and exist simply to protect the Sahiblog from all +discomfort, and very well they do it. That is Ahmad Khan by the kitchen. +He cooks for us. Salama owns the boat, and steers her and engages the +men to tow us when we move. And when I arrived he aired a little English +and said piously; The Lord help me to give you no trouble, and the Lord +help you! That is his wife sitting on the bank. She speaks little but +Kashmiri, but I know a little of that. Look at the hundred rat-tail +plaits of her hair, lengthened with wool, and see her silver and +turquoise jewelry. She wears much of the family fortune and is quite +a walking bank. Salama, Ahmad Khan and I talk by the hour. Ahmad comes +from Fyzabad. Look at Salama's boy--I call him the Orange Imp. Did you +ever see anything so beautiful?" + +I looked in sheer delight, and grasped my camera. Sitting near us was a +lovely little Kashmiri boy of about eight, in a faded orange coat, and +a turban exactly like his father's. His curled black eyelashes were +so long that they made a soft gloom over the upper part of the little +golden face. The perfect bow of the scarlet lips, the long eyes, the shy +smile, suggested an Indian Eros. He sat dipping his feet in the water +with little pigeon-like cries of content. + +"He paddles at the bow of our little shikara boat with a paddle exactly +like a water-lily leaf. Do you like our friends? I love them already, +and know all their affairs. And now for the boat." + +"One moment--If we are friends on a great adventure, I must call you +Vanna, and you me Stephen." + +"Yes, I suppose that is part of it," she said, smiling. "Come, Stephen." + +It was like music, but a cold music that chilled me. She should have +hesitated, should have flushed--it was I who trembled. So I followed her +across the broad plank into our new home. + +"This is our sitting-room. Look, how charming!" + +It was better than charming; it was home indeed. Windows at each side +opening down almost to the water, a little table for meals that lived +mostly on the bank, with a grey pot of iris in the middle. Another +table for writing, photography, and all the little pursuits of travel. +A bookshelf with some well--worn friends. Two long cushioned chairs. +Two for meals, and a Bokhara rug, soft and pleasant for the feet. The +interior was plain unpainted wood, but set so that the grain showed like +satin in the rippling lights from the water. + +That is the inventory of the place I have loved best in the world, but +what eloquence can describe what it gave me, what its memory gives me to +this day? And I have no eloquence--what I felt leaves me dumb. + +"It is perfect," was all I said as she waved her hand proudly. "It is +home." + +"And if you had come alone to Kashmir you would have had a great rich +boat with electric light and a butler. You would never have seen the +people except at meal--times. I think you will like this better. +Well, this is your tiny bedroom, and your bathroom, and beyond the +sitting--room are mine. Do you like it all?" + +But I could say no more. The charm of her own personality had touched +everything and left its fragrance like a flower--breath in the air. I +was beggared of thanks, but my whole soul was gratitude. We dined on +the bank that evening, the lamp burning steadily in the still air and +throwing broken reflections in the water, while the moon looked in upon +them through the leaves. I felt extraordinarily young and happy. + +The quiet of her voice was soft as the little lap of water against +the bows of the boat, and Kahdra, the Orange Imp, was singing a little +wordless song to himself as he washed the plates beside us. It was a +simple meal, and Vanna, abstemious as a hermit never ate anything but +rice and fruit, but I could remember no meal in all my days of luxury +where I had eaten with such zest. + +"It looks very grand to have so many to wait upon us, doesn't it? But +this is one of the cheapest countries in the world though the old timers +mourn over present expenses. You will laugh when I show you your share +of the cost." + +"The wealth of the world could not buy this," I said, and was silent. + +"But you must listen to my plans. We must do a little camping the +last three weeks before we part. Up in the mountains. Are they not +marvellous? They stand like a rampart round us, but not cold and +terrible, but "Like as the hills stand round about Jerusalem"--they are +guardian presences. And running up into them, high-very high, are the +valleys and hills where we shall camp. Tomorrow we shall row through +Srinagar, by the old Maharaja's palace." + + +V + +And so began a life of sheer enchantment. We knew no one. The visitors +in Kashmir change nearly every season, and no one cared-no one asked +anything of us, and as for our shipmates, a willing affectionate service +was their gift, and no more. Looking back, I know in what a wonder-world +I was privileged to live. Vanna could talk with them all. She did not +move apart, a condescending or indifferent foreigner. Kahdra would +come to her knee and prattle to her of the great snake that lived up on +Mahadeo to devour erring boys who omitted their prayers at proper Moslem +intervals. She would sit with the baby in her lap while the mother +busied herself in the sunny bows with the mysterious dishes that smelt +so savory to a hungry man. The cuts, the bruises of the neighbourhood +all came to Vanna for treatment. + +"I am graduating as a nurse," she would say laughing as she bent over +the lean arm of some weirdly wrinkled old lady, bandaging and soothing +at the same moment. Her reward would be some bit of folk-lore, some +quaintness of gratitude that I noted down in the little book I kept for +remembrance--that I do not need, for every word is in my heart. + +We rowed down through the city next day--Salama rowing, and little +Kahdra lazily paddling at the bow--a wonderful city, with its narrow +ways begrimed with the dirt of ages, and its balconied houses looking +as if disease and sin had soaked into them and given them a vicious +tottering beauty, horrible and yet lovely too. We saw the swarming life +of the bazaar, the white turbans coming and going, diversified by the +rose and yellow Hindu turbans, and the caste-marks, orange and red, on +the dark brows. + +I saw two women--girls--painted and tired like Jezebel, looking out of +one window carved and old, and the grey burnished doves flying about +it. They leaned indolently, like all the old, old wickedness of the East +that yet is ever young--"Flowers of Delight," with smooth black hair +braided with gold and blossoms, and covered with pale rose veils, and +gold embossed disks swinging like lamps beside the olive cheeks, the +great eyes artificially lengthened and darkened with soorma, and the +curves of the full lips emphasized with vermilion. They looked down +on us with apathy, a dull weariness that held all the old evil of the +wicked humming city. + +It had taken shape in those indolent bodies and heavy eyes that could +flash into life as a snake wakes into fierce darting energy when the +time comes to spring--direct inheritrixes from Lilith, in the fittest +setting in the world--the almost exhausted vice of an Oriental city as +old as time. + +"And look-below here," said Vanna, pointing to one of the ghauts--long +rugged steps running down to the river. + +"When I came yesterday, a great broken crowd was collected here, almost +shouldering each other into the water where a boat lay rocking. In it +lay the body of a man brutally murdered for the sake of a few rupees and +flung into the river. I could see the poor brown body stark in the boat +with a friend weeping beside it. On the lovely deodar bridge people +leaned over, watching with a grim open-mouthed curiosity, and business +went on gaily where the jewelers make the silver bangles for slender +wrists, and the rows of silver chains that make the necks like 'the +Tower of Damascus builded for an armory.' It was all very wild and +cruel. I went down to them-" + +"Vanna--you went down? Horrible!" + +"No, you see I heard them say the wife was almost a child and needs +help. So I went. Once long ago at Peshawar I saw the same thing happen, +and they came and took the child for the service of the gods, for she +was most lovely, and she clung to the feet of a man in terror, and the +priest stabbed her to the heart. She died in my arms. + +"Good God!" I said, shuddering; "what a sight for you! Did they never +hang him?" + +"He was not punished. I told you it was a very long time ago. Her +expression had a brooding quiet as she looked down into the running +river, almost it might be as if she saw the picture of that past misery +in the deep water. She said no more. But in her words and the terrible +crowding of its life, Srinagar seemed to me more of a nightmare than +anything I had seen, excepting only Benares; for the holy Benares is a +memory of horror, with a sense of blood hidden under its frantic crazy +devotion, and not far hidden either. + +"Our own green shade, when we pulled back to it in the evening cool, was +a refuge of unspeakable quiet. She read aloud to me that evening by the +small light of our lamp beneath the trees, and, singularly, she read of +joy. + +"I have drunk of the Cup of the Ineffable, I have found the key of the +Mystery, Travelling by no track I have come to the Sorrowless Land; very +easily has the mercy of the great Lord come upon me. Wonderful is that +Land of rest to which no merit can win. There have I seen joy filled +to the brim, perfection of joy. He dances in rapture and waves of form +arise from His dance. He holds all within his bliss." + +"What is that?" + +"It is from the songs of the great Indian mystic--Kabir. Let me read you +more. It is like the singing of a lark, lost in the infinite of light +and heaven." + +So in the soft darkness I heard for the first time those immortal words; +and hearing, a faint glimmer of understanding broke upon me as to +the source of the peace that surrounded her. I had accepted it as an +emanation of her own heart when it was the pulsing of the tide of the +Divine. She read, choosing a verse here and there, and I listened with +absorption. + +Suppose I had been wrong in believing that sorrow is the keynote +of life; that pain is the road of ascent, if road there be; that an +implacable Nature and that only, presides over all our pitiful struggles +and seekings and writes a black "Finis" to the holograph of our +existence? + +What then? What was she teaching me? Was she the Interpreter of a Beauty +eternal in the heavens, and reflected like a broken prism in the beauty +that walked visible beside me? So I listened like a child to an unknown +language, yet ventured my protest. + +"In India, in this wonderful country where men have time and will for +speculation such thoughts may be natural. Can they be found in the +West?" + +"This is from the West--might not Kabir himself have said it? Certainly +he would have felt it. 'Happy is he who seeks not to understand the +Mystery of God, but who, merging his spirit into Thine, sings to +Thy face, O Lord, like a harp, understanding how difficult it is to +know--how easy to love Thee.' We debate and argue and the Vision passes +us by. We try to prove it, and kill it in the laboratory of our minds, +when on the altar of our souls it will dwell for ever." + +Silence--and I pondered. Finally she laid the book aside, and repeated +from memory and in a tone of perfect music; "Kabir says, 'I shall go +to the House of my Lord with my Love at my side; then shall I sound the +trumpet of triumph.'" + +And when she left me alone in the moonlight silence the old doubts came +back to me--the fear that I saw only through her eyes, and began to +believe in joy only because I loved her. I remember I wrote in the +little book I kept for my stray thoughts, these words which are not mine +but reflect my thought of her; "Thine is the skill of the Fairy Woman, +and the virtue of St. Bride, and the faith of Mary the Mild, and the +gracious way of the Greek woman, and the beauty of lovely Emer, and the +tenderness of heart-sweet Deirdre, and the courage of Maev the great +Queen, and the charm of Mouth-of-Music." + +Yes, all that and more, but I feared lest I should see the heaven of joy +through her eyes only and find it mirage as I had found so much else. + +SECOND PART Early in the pure dawn the men came and our boat was towed +up into the Dal Lake through crystal waterways and flowery banks, the +men on the path keeping step and straining at the rope until the bronze +muscles stood out on their legs and backs, shouting strong rhythmic +phrases to mark the pull. + +"They shout the Wondrous Names of God--as they are called," said Vanna +when I asked. "They always do that for a timid effort. Bad shah! The +Lord, the Compassionate, and so on. I don't think there is any religion +about it but it is as natural to them as One, Two, Three, to us. It +gives a tremendous lift. Watch and see." + +It was part of the delightful strangeness that we should move to that +strong music. We sat on the upper deck and watched the dream--like +beauty drift slowly by until we emerged beneath a little bridge into the +fairy land of the lake which the Mogul Emperors loved so well that they +made their noble pleasance gardens on the banks, and thought it little +to travel up yearly from far--off Delhi over the snowy Pir Panjal with +their Queens and courts for the perfect summer of Kashmir. + +We moored by a low bank under a great wood of chenar trees, and saw the +little table in the wilderness set in the greenest shade with our chairs +beside it, and my pipe laid reverently upon it by Kahdra. + +Across the glittering water lay on one side the Shalimar Garden known +to all readers of "Lalla Ruhk"--a paradise of roses; and beyond it +again the lovelier gardens of Nour-Mahal, the Light of the Palace, that +imperial woman who ruled India under the weak Emperor's name--she whose +name he set thus upon his coins: + +"By order of King Jehangir. Gold has a hundred splendours added to it by +receiving the name of Nour-Jahan the Queen." + +Has any woman ever had a more royal homage than this most royal +lady--known first as Mihr-u-nissa--Sun of Women, and later, Nour-Mahal, +Light of the Palace, and latest, Nour-Jahan-Begam, Queen, Light of the +World? + +Here in these gardens she had lived--had seen the snow mountains change +from the silver of dawn to the illimitable rose of sunset. The life, the +colour beat insistently upon my brain. They built a world of magic where +every moment was pure gold. Surely--surely to Vanna it must be the same. +I believed in my very soul that she who gave and shared such joy could +not be utterly apart from me? Could I then feel certain that I had +gained any ground in these days we had been together? Could she still +define the cruel limits she had laid down, or were her eyes kinder, her +tones a more broken music? I did not know. Whenever I could hazard a +guess the next minute baffled me. + +Just then, in the sunset, she was sitting on deck, singing under her +breath and looking absently away to the Gardens across the Lake. I could +catch the words here and there, and knew them. + + "Pale hands I loved beside the Shalimar, + Where are you now--who lies beneath your spell? + Whom do you lead on Rapture's roadway far, + Before you agonize them in farewell?" + +"Don't!" I said abruptly. It stung me. + +"What?" she asked in surprise. "That is the song every one remembers +here. Poor Laurence Hope! How she knew and loved this India! What are +you grumbling at?" + +Her smile stung me. + +"Never mind," I said morosely. "You don't understand. You never will." + +And yet I believed sometimes that she would--that time was on my side. + +When Kahdra and I pulled her across to Nour-Mahal's garden next day, how +could I not believe it--her face was so full of joy as she looked at me +for sympathy? + +"I don't think so much beauty is crowded into any other few miles in +the world--beauty of association, history, nature, everything!" she said +with shining eyes. "The lotus flowers are not out yet but when they come +that is the last touch of perfection. Do you remember Homer--'But whoso +ate of the honey-sweet fruit of the lotus, was neither willing to bring +me word again, nor to depart. Nay, their desire was to remain there +for ever, feeding on the lotus with the Lotus Eaters, forgetful of all +return.' You know the people here eat the roots and seeds? I ate them +last year and perhaps that is why I cannot stay away. But look at +Nour-Mahal's garden!" + +We were pulling in among the reeds and the huge carven leaves of the +water plants, and the snake-headed buds lolling upon them with the +slippery half-sinister look that water-flowers have, as though their +cold secret life belonged to the hidden water world and not to ours. But +now the boat was touching the little wooden steps. + +O beautiful--most beautiful the green lawns, shaded with huge pyramids +of the chenar trees, the terraced gardens where the marble steps climbed +from one to the other, and the mountain streams flashed singing and +shining down the carved marble slopes that cunning hands had made to +delight the Empress of Beauty, between the wildernesses of roses. Her +pavilion stands still among the flowers, and the waters ripple through +it to join the lake--and she is--where? Even in the glory of sunshine +the passing of all fair things was present with me as I saw the empty +shell that had held the Pearl of Empire, and her roses that still bloom, +her waters that still sing for others. + +The spray of a hundred fountains was misty diamond dust in the warm air +laden with the scent of myriad flowers. Kahdra followed us everywhere, +singing his little tuneless happy song. The world brimmed with beauty +and joy. And we were together. Words broke from me. + +"Vanna, let it be for ever! Let us live here. I'll give up all the world +for this and you." + +"But you see," she said delicately, "it would be 'giving up.' You use +the right word. It is not your life. It is a lovely holiday, no more. +You would weary of it. You would want the city life and your own kind." + +I protested with all my soul. + +"No. Indeed I will say frankly that it would be lowering yourself to +live a lotus-eating life among my people. It is a life with which you +have no tie. A Westerner who lives like that steps down; he loses his +birthright just as an Oriental does who Europeanizes himself. He cannot +live your life nor you his. If you had work here it would be different. +No--six or eight weeks more; then go away and forget it." + +I turned from her. The serpent was in Paradise. When is he absent? + +On one of the terraces a man was beating a tom-tom, and veiled women +listened, grouped about him in brilliant colours. + +"Isn't that all India?" she said; "that dull reiterated sound? It +half stupefies, half maddens. Once at Darjiling I saw the Lamas' Devil +Dance--the soul, a white-faced child with eyes unnaturally enlarged, +fleeing among a rabble of devils--the evil passions. It fled wildly +here and there and every way was blocked. The child fell on its knees, +screaming dumbly--you could see the despair in the staring eyes, but +all was drowned in the thunder of Tibetan drums. No mercy--no escape. +Horrible!" + +"Even in Europe the drum is awful," I said. "Do you remember in the +French Revolution how they Drowned the victims' voices in a thunder roll +of drums?" + +"I shall always see the face of the child, hunted down to hell, falling +on its knees, and screaming without a sound, when I hear the drum. But +listen--a flute! Now if that were the Flute of Krishna you would have to +follow. Let us come!" + +I could hear nothing of it, but she insisted and we followed the music, +inaudible to me, up the slopes of the garden that is the foot-hill of +the mighty mountain of Mahadeo, and still I could hear nothing. And +Vanna told me strange stories of the Apollo of India whom all hearts +must adore, even as the herd-girls adored him in his golden youth by +Jumna river and in the pastures of Brindaban. + +Next day we were climbing the hill to the ruins where the evil magician +brought the King's daughter nightly to his will, flying low under a +golden moon. Vanna took my arm and I pulled her laughing up the steepest +flowery slopes until we reached the height, and lo! the arched windows +were eyeless and a lonely breeze blowing through the cloisters, and the +beautiful yellowish stone arches supported nothing and were but frames +for the blue of far lake and mountain and the divine sky. We climbed +the broken stairs where the lizards went by like flashes, and had I the +tongue of men and angels I could not tell the wonder that lay before +us,--the whole wide valley of Kashmir in summer glory, with its scented +breeze singing, singing above it. + +We sat on the crushed aromatic herbs and among the wild roses and looked +down. + +"To think," she said, "that we might have died and never seen it!" + +There followed a long silence. I thought she was tired, and would not +break it. Suddenly she spoke in a strange voice, low and toneless; + +"The story of this place. She was the Princess Padmavati, and her home +was in Ayodhya. When she woke and found herself here by the lake she was +so terrified that she flung herself in and was drowned. They held her +back, but she died." + +"How do you know?" + +"Because a wandering monk came to the abbey of Tahkt-i-Bahi near +Peshawar and told Vasettha the Abbot." + +I had nearly spoilt all by an exclamation, but I held myself back. I saw +she was dreaming awake and was unconscious of what she said. + +"The Abbot said, 'Do not describe her. What talk is this for holy men? +The young monks must not hear. Some of them have never seen a woman. +Should a monk speak of such toys?' But the wanderer disobeyed and spoke, +and there was a great tumult, and the monks threw him out at the command +of the young Abbot, and he wandered down to Peshawar, and it was he +later--the evil one!--that brought his sister, Lilavanti the Dancer, to +Peshawar, and the Abbot fell into her snare. That was his revenge!" + +Her face was fixed and strange, for a moment her cheek looked hollow, +her eyes dim and grief-worn. What was she seeing?--what remembering? Was +it a story--a memory? What was it? + +"She was beautiful?" I prompted. + +"Men have said so, but for it he surrendered the Peace. Do not speak of +her accursed beauty." + +Her voice died away to a drowsy murmur; her head dropped on my shoulder +and for the mere delight of contact I sat still and scarcely breathed, +praying that she might speak again, but the good minute was gone. She +drew one or two deep breaths, and sat up with a bewildered look that +quickly passed. + +"I was quite sleepy for a minute. The climb was so strenuous. Hark--I +hear the Flute of Krishna again." + +And again I could hear nothing, but she said it was sounding from the +trees at the base of the hill. Later when we climbed down I found she +was right--that a peasant lad, dark and amazingly beautiful as +these Kashmiris often are, was playing on the flute to a girl at his +feet--looking up at him with rapt eyes. He flung Vanna a flower as we +passed. She caught it and put it in her bosom. A singular blossom, three +petals of purest white, set against three leaves of purest green, and +lower down the stem the three green leaves were repeated. It was still +in her bosom after dinner, and I looked at it more closely. + +"That is a curious flower," I said. "Three and three and three. Nine. +That makes the mystic number. I never saw a purer white. What is it?" + +"Of course it is mystic," she said seriously. "It is the Ninefold +Flower. You saw who gave it?" + +"That peasant lad." + +She smiled. + +"You will see more some day. Some might not even have seen that." + +"Does it grow here?" + +"This is the first I have seen. It is said to grow only where the gods +walk. Do you know that throughout all India Kashmir is said to be holy +ground? It was called long ago the land of the gods, and of strange, but +not evil, sorceries. Great marvels were seen here." + +I felt the labyrinthine enchantments of that enchanted land were closing +about me--a slender web, grey, almost impalpable, finer than fairy silk, +was winding itself about my feet. My eyes were opening to things I had +not dreamed. She saw my thought. + +"Yes, you could not have seen even that much of him in Peshawar. You did +not know then." + +"He was not there," I answered, falling half unconsciously into her +tone. + +"He is always there--everywhere, and when he plays, all who hear must +follow. He was the Pied Piper in Hamelin, he was Pan in Hellas. You +will hear his wild fluting in many strange places when you know how to +listen. When one has seen him the rest comes soon. And then you will +follow." + +"Not away from you, Vanna." + +"From the marriage feast, from the Table of the Lord," she said, smiling +strangely. "The man who wrote that spoke of another call, but it is the +same--Krishna or Christ. When we hear the music we follow. And we may +lose or gain heaven." + +It might have been her compelling personality--it might have been the +marvels of beauty about me, but I knew well I had entered at some mystic +gate. A pass word had been spoken for me--I was vouched for and might go +in. Only a little way as yet. Enchanted forests lay beyond, and perilous +seas, but there were hints, breaths like the wafting of the garments of +unspeakable Presences. My talk with Vanna grew less personal, and more +introspective. I felt the touch of her finger-tips leading me along +the ways of Quiet--my feet brushed a shining dew. Once, in the twilight +under the chenar trees, I saw a white gleaming and thought it a swiftly +passing Being, but when in haste I gained the tree I found there only +a Ninefold flower, white as a spirit in the evening calm. I would not +gather it but told Vanna what I had seen. + +"You nearly saw;" she said. "She passed so quickly. It was the Snowy +One, Uma, Parvati, the Daughter of the Himalaya. That mountain is the +mountain of her lord--Shiva. It is natural she should be here. I saw her +last night lean over the height--her face pillowed on her folded arms, +with a low star in the mists of her hair. Her eyes were like lakes of +blue darkness. Vast and wonderful. She is the Mystic Mother of India. +You will see soon. You could not have seen the flower until now." + +"Do you know," she added, "that in the mountains there are poppies of +clear blue--blue as turquoise. We will go up into the heights and find +them." + +And next moment she was planning the camping details, the men, the +ponies, with a practical zest that seemed to relegate the occult to the +absurd. Yet the very next day came a wonderful moment. + +The sun was just setting and, as it were, suddenly the purple glooms +banked up heavy with thunder. The sky was black with fury, the earth +passive with dread. I never saw such lightning--it was continuous and +tore in zigzag flashes down the mountains like rents in the substance +of the world's fabric. And the thunder roared up in the mountain gorges +with shattering echoes. Then fell the rain, and the whole lake seemed to +rise to meet it, and the noise was like the rattle of musketry. We were +standing by the cabin window and she suddenly caught my hand, and I +saw in a light of their own two dancing figures on the tormented water +before us. Wild in the tumult, embodied delight, with arms tossed +violently above their heads, and feet flung up behind them, skimming the +waves like seagulls, they passed. Their sex I could not tell--I think +they had none, but were bubble emanations of the rejoicing rush of the +rain and the wild retreating laughter of the thunder. I saw the fierce +aerial faces and their inhuman glee as they fled by, and she dropped my +hand and they were gone. Slowly the storm lessened, and in the west the +clouds tore raggedly asunder and a flood of livid yellow light poured +down upon the lake--an awful light that struck it into an abyss of fire. +Then, as if at a word of command, two glorious rainbows sprang across +the water with the mountains for their piers, each with its proper +colours chorded. They made a Bridge of Dread that stood out radiant +against the background of storm--the Twilight of the Gods, and the +doomed gods marching forth to the last fight. And the thunder growled +sullenly away into the recesses of the hill and the terrible rainbows +faded until the stars came quietly out and it was a still night. + +But I had seen that what is our dread is the joy of the spirits of the +Mighty Mother, and though the vision faded and I doubted what I had +seen, it prepared the way for what I was yet to see. A few days later we +started on what was to be the most exquisite memory of my life. A train +of ponies carried our tents and camping necessaries and there was a +pony for each of us. And so, in the cool grey of a divine morning, with +little rosy clouds flecking the eastern sky, we set out from Islamabad +for Vernag. And this was the order of our going. She and I led the way, +attended by a sais (groom) and a coolie carrying the luncheon basket. +Half way we would stop in some green dell, or by some rushing stream, +and there rest and eat our little meal while the rest of the cavalcade +passed on to the appointed camping place, and in the late afternoon we +would follow, riding slowly, and find the tents pitched and the kitchen +department in full swing. If the place pleased us we lingered for some +days;--if not, the camp was struck next morning, and again we wandered +in search of beauty. + +The people were no inconsiderable part of my joy. I cannot see what they +have to gain from such civilization as ours--a kindly people and happy. +Courtesy and friendliness met us everywhere, and if their labor was +hard, their harvest of beauty and laughter seemed to be its reward. The +little villages with their groves of walnut and fruit trees spoke of no +unfulfilled want, the mulberries which fatten the sleek bears in their +season fattened the children too. I compared their lot with that of +the toilers in our cities and knew which I would choose. We rode by +shimmering fields of barley, with red poppies floating in the clear +transparent green as in deep sea water, through fields of millet like +the sky fallen on the earth, so innocently blue were its blossoms, +and the trees above us were trellised with the wild roses, golden and +crimson, and the ways tapestried with the scented stars of the large +white jasmine. + +It was strange that later much of what she said, escaped me. Some I +noted down at the time, but there were hints, shadows of lovelier things +beyond that eluded all but the fringes of memory when I tried to piece +them together and make a coherence of a living wonder. For that reason, +the best things cannot be told in this history. It is only the cruder, +grosser matters that words will hold. The half-touchings--vanishing +looks, breaths--O God, I know them, but cannot tell. + +In the smaller villages, the head man came often to greet us and make +us welcome, bearing on a flat dish a little offering of cakes and fruit, +the produce of the place. One evening a man so approached, stately +in white robes and turban, attended by a little lad who carried the +patriarchal gift beside him. Our tents were pitched under a glorious +walnut tree with a running stream at our feet. + +Vanna of course, was the interpreter, and I called her from her tent as +the man stood salaaming before me. It was strange that when she came, +dressed in white, he stopped in his salutation, and gazed at her in +what, I thought, was silent wonder. + +She spoke earnestly to him, standing before him with clasped hands, +almost, I could think, in the attitude of a suppliant. The man listened +gravely, with only an interjection, now and again, and once he turned +and looked curiously at me. Then he spoke, evidently making some +announcement which she received with bowed head--and when he turned to +go with a grave salute, she performed a very singular ceremony, moving +slowly round him three times with clasped hands; keeping him always on +the right. He repaid it with the usual salaam and greeting of peace, +which he bestowed also on me, and then departed in deep meditation, his +eyes fixed on the ground. I ventured to ask what it all meant, and she +looked thoughtfully at me before replying. + +"It was a strange thing. I fear you will not altogether understand, +but I will tell you what I can. That man though living here among +Mahomedans, is a Brahman from Benares, and, what is very rare in India, +a Buddhist. And when he saw me he believed he remembered me in a former +birth. The ceremony you saw me perform is one of honour in India. It was +his due." + +"Did you remember him?" I knew my voice was incredulous. + +"Very well. He has changed little but is further on the upward path. I +saw him with dread for he holds the memory of a great wrong I did. Yet +he told me a thing that has filled my heart with joy." + +"Vanna-what is it?" + +She had a clear uplifted look which startled me. There was suddenly a +chill air blowing between us. + +"I must not tell you yet but you will know soon. He was a good man. I am +glad we have met." + +She buried herself in writing in a small book I had noticed and longed +to look into, and no more was said. + +We struck camp next day and trekked on towards Vernag--a rough march, +but one of great beauty, beneath the shade of forest trees, garlanded +with pale roses that climbed from bough to bough and tossed triumphant +wreaths into the uppermost blue. + +In the afternoon thunder was flapping its wings far off in the mountains +and a little rain fell while we were lunching under a big tree. I was +considering anxiously how to shelter Vanna, when a farmer invited us to +his house--a scene of Biblical hospitality that delighted us both. He +led us up some break-neck little stairs to a large bare room, open to +the clean air all round the roof, and with a kind of rough enclosure on +the wooden floor where the family slept at night. There he opened our +basket, and then, with anxious care, hung clothes and rough draperies +about us that our meal might be unwatched by one or two friends who had +followed us in with breathless interest. Still further to entertain us +a great rarity was brought out and laid at Vanna's feet as something +we might like to watch--a curious bird in a cage, with brightly barred +wings and a singular cry. She fed it with fruit, and it fluttered to her +hand. Just so Abraham might have welcomed his guests, and when we left +with words of deepest gratitude, our host made the beautiful obeisance +of touching his forehead with joined hands as he bowed. To me the whole +incident had an extraordinary grace, and ennobled both host and guest. +But we met an ascending scale of loveliness so varied in its aspects +that I passed from one emotion to another and knew no sameness. + +That afternoon the camp was pitched at the foot of a mighty hill, under +the waving pyramids of the chenars, sweeping their green like the robes +of a goddess. Near by was a half circle of low arches falling into +ruin, and as we went in among them I beheld a wondrous sight--the huge +octagonal tank or basin made by the Mogul Emperor Jehangir to receive +the waters of a mighty Spring which wells from the hill and has been +held sacred by Hindu and Moslem. And if loveliness can sanctify surely +it is sacred indeed. + +The tank was more than a hundred feet in diameter and circled by a +roughly paved pathway where the little arched cells open that the +devotees may sit and contemplate the lustral waters. There on a black +stone, is sculptured the Imperial inscription comparing this spring to +the holier wells of Paradise, and I thought no less of it, for it rushes +straight from the rock with no aiding stream, and its waters are fifty +feet deep, and sweep away from this great basin through beautiful low +arches in a wild foaming river--the crystal life-blood of the mountains +for ever welling away. The colour and perfect purity of this living +jewel were most marvellous--clear blue-green like a chalcedony, but +changing as the lights in an opal--a wonderful quivering brilliance, +flickering with the silver of shoals of sacred fish. + +But the Mogul Empire is with the snows of yesteryear and the wonder has +passed from the Moslems into the keeping of the Hindus once more, and +the Lingam of Shiva, crowned with flowers, is the symbol in the little +shrine by the entrance. Surely in India, the gods are one and have no +jealousies among them--so swiftly do their glories merge the one into +the other. + +"How all the Mogul Emperors loved running water," said Vanna. "I can see +them leaning over it in their carved pavilions with delicate dark faces +and pensive eyes beneath their turbans, lost in the endless reverie of +the East while liquid melody passes into their dream. It was the music +they best loved." + +She was leading me into the royal garden below, where the young river +flows beneath the pavilion set above and across the rush of the water. + +"I remember before I came to India," she went on, "there were +certain words and phrases that meant the whole East to me. It was an +enchantment. The first flash picture I had was Milton's-- + + 'Dark faces with white silken turbans wreathed.' + +and it still is. I have thought ever since that every man should wear a +turban. It dignifies the un-comeliest and it is quite curious to see how +many inches a man descends in the scale of beauty the moment he takes it +off and you see only the skull-cap about which they wind it. They wind +it with wonderful skill too. I have seen a man take eighteen yards of +muslin and throw it round his head with a few turns, and in five or six +minutes the beautiful folds were all in order and he looked like a king. +Some of the Gujars here wear black ones and they are very effective and +worth painting--the black folds and the sullen tempestuous black brows +underneath." + +We sat in the pavilion for awhile looking down on the rushing water, and +she spoke of Akbar, the greatest of the Moguls, and spoke with a curious +personal touch, as I thought. + +"I wish you would try to write a story of him--one on more human lines +than has been done yet. No one has accounted for the passionate quest +of truth that was the real secret of his life. Strange in an Oriental +despot if you think of it! It really can only be understood from the +Buddhist belief, which curiously seems to have been the only one he +neglected, that a mysterious Karma influenced all his thoughts. If I +tell you as a key-note for your story, that in a past life he had been a +Buddhist priest--one who had fallen away, would that in any way account +to you for attempts to recover the lost way? Try to think that out, and +to write the story, not as a Western mind sees it, but pure East." + +"That would be a great book to write if one could catch the voices of +the past. But how to do it?" + +"I will give you one day a little book that may help you. The other +story I wish you would write is the story of a Dancer of Peshawar. There +is a connection between the two--a story of ruin and repentance." + +"Will you tell it to me?" + +"A part. In this same book you will find much more, but not all. All +cannot be told. You must imagine much. But I think your imagination will +be true." + +"Why do you think so?" + +"Because in these few days you have learnt so much. You have seen the +Ninefold Flower, and the rain spirits. You will soon hear the Flute of +Krishna which none can hear who cannot dream true." + +That night I heard it. I waked, suddenly, to music, and standing in the +door of my tent, in the dead silence of the night, lit only by a few low +stars, I heard the poignant notes of a flute. If it had called my name +it could not have summoned me more clearly, and I followed without a +thought of delay, forgetting even Vanna in the strange urgency that +filled me. The music was elusive, seeming to come first from one side, +then from the other, but finally I tracked it as a bee does a flower by +the scent, to the gate of the royal garden--the pleasure place of the +dead Emperors. + +The gate stood ajar--strange! for I had seen the custodian close it that +evening. Now it stood wide and I went in, walking noiselessly over the +dewy grass. I knew and could not tell how, that I must be noiseless. +Passing as if I were guided, down the course of the strong young river, +I came to the pavilion that spanned it--the place where we had stood +that afternoon--and there to my profound amazement, I saw Vanna, leaning +against a slight wooden pillar. As if she had expected me, she laid one +finger on her lip, and stretching out her hand, took mine and drew me +beside her as a mother might a child. And instantly I saw! + +On the further bank a young man in a strange diadem or miter of jewels, +bare-breasted and beautiful, stood among the flowering oleanders, one +foot lightly crossed over the other as he stood. He was like an image +of pale radiant gold, and I could have sworn that the light came from +within rather than fell upon him, for the night was very dark. He held +the flute to his lips, and as I looked, I became aware that the noise +of the rushing water was tapering off into a murmur scarcely louder than +that of a summer bee in the heart of a rose. Therefore the music rose +like a fountain of crystal drops, cold, clear, and of an entrancing +sweetness, and the face above it was such that I had no power to turn my +eyes away. How shall I say what it was? All I had ever desired, dreamed, +hoped, prayed, looked at me from the remote beauty of the eyes and with +the most persuasive gentleness entreated me, rather than commanded to +follow fearlessly and win. But these are words, and words shaped in the +rough mould of thought cannot convey the deep desire that would have +hurled me to his feet if Vanna had not held me with a firm restraining +hand. Looking up in adoring love to the dark face was a ring of woodland +creatures. I thought I could distinguish the white clouded robe of a +snow-leopard, the soft clumsiness of a young bear, and many more, but +these shifted and blurred like dream creatures--I could not be sure of +them nor define their numbers. The eyes of the Player looked down upon +their passionate delight with careless kindness. + +Dim images passed through my mind. Orpheus--No, this was no Greek. +Pan-yet again, No. Where were the pipes, the goat hoofs? The young +Dionysos--No, there were strange jewels instead of his vines. And then +Vanna's voice said as if from a great distance; + +"Krishna--the Beloved." And I said aloud, "I see!" And even as I said it +the whole picture blurred together like a dream, and I was alone in the +pavilion and the water was foaming past me. Had I walked in my sleep, I +thought, as I made my way hack? As I gained the garden gate, before me, +like a snowflake, I saw the Ninefold Flower. + +When I told her next day, speaking of it as a dream, she said simply; +"They have opened the door to you. You will not need me soon. + +"I shall always need you. You have taught me everything. I could see +nothing last night until you took my hand." + +"I was not there," she said smiling. "It was only the thought of me, and +you can have that when I am very far away. I was sleeping in my tent. +What you called in me then you can always call, even if I am--dead." + +"That is a word which is beginning to have no meaning for me. You have +said things to me--no, thought them, that have made me doubt if there is +room in the universe for the thing we have called death." + +She smiled her sweet wise smile. + +"Where we are death is not. Where death is we are not. But you will +understand better soon." + +Our march curving took us by the Mogul gardens of Achibal, and the +glorious ruins of the great Temple at Martund, and so down to Bawan +with its crystal waters and that loveliest camping ground beside them. +A mighty grove of chenar trees, so huge that I felt as if we were in a +great sea cave where the air is dyed with the deep shadowy green of the +inmost ocean, and the murmuring of the myriad leaves was like a sea at +rest. I looked up into the noble height and my memory of Westminster +dwindled, for this led on and up to the infinite blue, and at night +the stars hung like fruit upon the branches. The water ran with a great +joyous rush of release from the mountain behind, but was first received +in a broad basin full of sacred fish and reflecting a little temple of +Maheshwara and one of Surya the Sun. Here in this basin the water lay +pure and still as an ecstasy, and beside it was musing the young Brahman +priest who served the temple. Since I had joined Vanna I had begun with +her help to study a little Hindustani, and with an aptitude for language +could understand here and there. I caught a word or two as she spoke +with him that startled me, when the high-bred ascetic face turned +serenely upon her, and he addressed her as "My sister," adding a +sentence beyond my learning, but which she willingly translated +later.--"May He who sits above the Mysteries, have mercy upon thy +rebirth." + +She said afterwards; + +"How beautiful some of these men are. It seems a different type of +beauty from ours, nearer to nature and the old gods. Look at that +priest--the tall figure, the clear olive skin, the dark level brows, the +long lashes that make a soft gloom about the eyes--eyes that have the +fathomless depth of a deer's, the proud arch of the lip. I think there +is no country where aristocracy is more clearly marked than in India. +The Brahmans are aristocrats of the world. You see it is a religious +aristocracy as well. It has everything that can foster pride and +exclusiveness. They spring from the Mouth of Deity. They are His word +incarnate. Not many kings are of the Brahman caste, and the Brahmans +look down upon them from Sovereign heights. I have known men who would +not eat with their own rulers who would have drunk the water that washed +the Brahmans' feet." + +She took me that day, the Brahman with us, to see a cave in the +mountain. We climbed up the face of the cliff to where a little tree +grew on a ledge, and the black mouth yawned. We went in and often it was +so low we had to stoop, leaving the sunlight behind until it was like +a dim eye glimmering in the velvet blackness. The air was dank and +cold and presently obscene with the smell of bats, and alive with +their wings, as they came sweeping about us, gibbering and squeaking. +I thought of the rush of the ghosts, blown like dead leaves in the +Odyssey. And then a small rock chamber branched off, and in this, lit by +a bit of burning wood, we saw the bones of a holy man who lived and died +there four hundred years ago. Think of it! He lived there always, with +the slow dropping of water from the dead weight of the mountain above +his head, drop by drop tolling the minutes away: the little groping feet +through the cave that would bring him food and drink, hurrying into +the warmth and sunlight again, and his only companion the sacred Lingam +which means the Creative Energy that sets the worlds dancing for joy +round the sun--that, and the black solitude to sit down beside him. +Surely his bones can hardly be dryer and colder now than they were then! +There must be strange ecstasies in such a life--wild visions in the +dark, or it could never be endured. + +And so, in marches of about ten miles a day, we came to Pahlgam on the +banks of the dancing Lidar. There was now only three weeks left of the +time she had promised. After a few days at Pahlgam the march would turn +and bend its way back to Srinagar, and to--what? I could not believe it +was to separation--in her lovely kindness she had grown so close to me +that, even for the sake of friendship, I believed our paths must run +together to the end, and there were moments when I could still half +convince myself that I had grown as necessary to her as she was to me. +No--not as necessary, for she was life and soul to me, but a part of her +daily experience that she valued and would not easily part with. That +evening we were sitting outside the tents, near the camp fire, of pine +logs and cones, the leaping flames making the night beautiful with gold +and leaping sparks, in an attempt to reach the mellow splendours of the +moon. The men, in various attitudes of rest, were lying about, and one +had been telling a story which had just ended in excitement and loud +applause. + +"These are Mahomedans," said Vanna, "and it is only a story of love and +fighting like the Arabian Nights. If they had been Hindus, it might +well have been of Krishna or of Rama and Sita. Their faith comes from an +earlier time and they still see visions. The Moslem is a hard practical +faith for men--men of the world too. It is not visionary now, though it +once had its great mysteries." + +"I wish you would tell me what you think of the visions or apparitions +of the gods that are seen here. Is it all illusion? Tell me your +thought." + +"How difficult that is to answer. I suppose if love and faith are strong +enough they will always create the vibrations to which the greater +vibrations respond, and so make God in their own image at any time or +place. But that they call up what is the truest reality I have never +doubted. There is no shadow without a substance. The substance is beyond +us but under certain conditions the shadow is projected and we see it. + +"Have I seen or has it been dream?" + +"I cannot tell. It may have been the impress of my mind on yours, for I +see such things always. You say I took your hand?" + +"Take it now." + +She obeyed, and instantly, as I felt the firm cool clasp, I heard the +rain of music through the pines--the Flute Player was passing. She +dropped it smiling and the sweet sound ceased. + +"You see! How can I tell what you have seen? You will know better when I +am gone. You will stand alone then." + +"You will not go--you cannot. I have seen how you have loved all this +wonderful time. I believe it has been as dear to you as to me. And every +day I have loved you more. I depend upon you for everything that makes +life worth living. You could not--you who are so gentle--you could not +commit the senseless cruelty of leaving me when you have taught me to +love you with every beat of my heart. I have been patient--I have held +myself in, but I must speak now. Marry me, and teach me. I know nothing. +You know all I need to know. For pity's sake be my wife." + +I had not meant to say it; it broke from me in the firelight moonlight +with a power that I could not stay. She looked at me with a disarming +gentleness. + +"Is this fair? Do you remember how at Peshawar I told you I thought it +was a dangerous experiment, and that it would make things harder for +you. But you took the risk like a brave man because you felt there were +things to be gained--knowledge, insight, beauty. Have you not gained +them?" + +"Yes. Absolutely." + +"Then, is it all loss if I go?" + +"Not all. But loss I dare not face." + +"I will tell you this. I could not stay if I would. Do you remember the +old man on the way to Vernag? He told me that I must very soon take up +an entirely new life. I have no choice, though if I had I would still do +it." + +There was silence and down a long arcade, without any touch of her hand +I heard the music, receding with exquisite modulations to a very great +distance, and between the pillared stems, I saw a faint light. + +"Do you wish to go?" + +"Entirely. But I shall not forget you, Stephen. I will tell you +something. For me, since I came to India, the gate that shuts us out at +birth has opened. How shall I explain? Do you remember Kipling's 'Finest +Story in the World'?" + +"Yes. Fiction!" + +"Not fiction--true, whether he knew it or no. But for me the door has +opened wide. First, I remembered piecemeal, with wide gaps, then more +connectedly. Then, at the end of the first year, I met one day at +Cawnpore, an ascetic, an old man of great beauty and wisdom, and he was +able by his own knowledge to enlighten mine. Not wholly--much has come +since then. Has come, some of it in ways you could not understand +now, but much by direct sight and hearing. Long, long ago I lived in +Peshawar, and my story was a sorrowful one. I will tell you a little +before I go." + +"I hold you to your promise. What is there I cannot believe when you +tell me? But does that life put you altogether away from me? Was there +no place for me in any of your memories that has drawn us together now? +Give me a little hope that in the eternal pilgrimage there is some bond +between us and some rebirth where we may met again." + +"I will tell you that also before we part. I have grown to believe that +you do love me--and therefore love something which is infinitely above +me." + +"And do you love me at all? Am I nothing, Vanna--Vanna?" + +"My friend," she said, and laid her hand on mine. + +A silence, and then she spoke, very low. + +"You must be prepared for very great change, Stephen, and yet believe +that it does not really change things at all. See how even the gods pass +and do not change! The early gods of India are gone and Shiva, Vishnu, +Krishna have taken their places and are one and the same. The old +Buddhist stories say that in heaven "The flowers of the garland the +God wore are withered, his robes of majesty are waxed old and faded; +he falls from his high estate, and is re-born into a new life." But he +lives still in the young God who is born among men. The gods cannot die, +nor can we nor anything that has life. Now I must go in." + +I sat long in the moonlight thinking. The whole camp was sunk in sleep +and the young dawn was waking upon the peaks when I turned in. + +The days that were left we spent in wandering up the Lidar River to the +hills that are the first ramp of the ascent to the great heights. +We found the damp corners where the mushrooms grow like pearls--the +mushrooms of which she said--"To me they have always been fairy things. +To see them in the silver-grey dew of the early mornings--mysteriously +there like the manna in the desert--they are elfin plunder, and as a +child I was half afraid of them. No wonder they are the darlings of +folklore, especially in Celtic countries where the Little People move in +the starlight. Strange to think they are here too among strange gods!" + +We climbed to where the wild peonies bloom in glory that few eyes see, +and the rosy beds of wild sweet strawberries ripen. Every hour brought +with it some new delight, some exquisiteness of sight or of words that +I shall remember for ever. She sat one day on a rock, holding the +sculptured leaves and massive seed-vessels of some glorious plant that +the Kashmiris believe has magic virtues hidden in the seeds of pure rose +embedded in the white down. + +"If you fast for three days and eat nine of these in the Night of No +Moon, you can rise on the air light as thistledown and stand on the peak +of Haramoukh. And on Haramoukh, as you know it is believed, the gods +dwell. There was a man here who tried this enchantment. He was a changed +man for ever after, wandering and muttering to himself and avoiding all +human intercourse as far as he could. He was no Kashmiri--A Jat from the +Punjab, and they showed him to me when I was here with the Meryons, and +told me he would speak to none. But I knew he would speak to me, and he +did." + +"Did he tell you anything of what he had seen in the high world up +yonder?" + +"He said he had seen the Dream of the God. I could not get more than +that. But there are many people here who believe that the Universe as +we know it is but an image in the dream of Ishvara, the Universal +Spirit--in whom are all the gods--and that when He ceases to dream we +pass again into the Night of Brahm, and all is darkness until the Spirit +of God moves again on the face of the waters. There are few temples to +Brahm. He is above and beyond all direct worship." + +"Do you think he had seen anything?" + +"What do I know? Will you eat the seeds? The Night of No Moon will soon +be here." + +She held out the seed-vessels, laughing. I write that down but how +record the lovely light of kindliness in her eyes--the almost submissive +gentleness that yet was a defense stronger than steel. I never knew--how +should I?--whether she was sitting by my side or heavens away from me in +her own strange world. But always she was a sweetness that I could not +reach, a cup of nectar that I might not drink, unalterably her own and +never mine, and yet--my friend. + +She showed me the wild track up into the mountains where the Pilgrims go +to pay their devotions at the Great God's shrine in the awful heights, +regretting that we were too early for that most wonderful sight. Above +where we were sitting the river fell in a tormented white cascade, +crashing and feathering into spray-dust of diamonds. An eagle was +flying above it with a mighty spread of wings that seemed almost +double-jointed in the middle--they curved and flapped so wide and free. +The fierce head was outstretched with the rake of a plundering galley as +he swept down the wind, seeking his meat from God, and passed majestic +from our sight. The valley beneath us was littered with enormous +boulders spilt from the ancient hollows of the hills. It must have +been a great sight when the giants set them trundling down in work +or play!--I said this to Vanna, who was looking down upon it with +meditative eyes. She roused herself. + +"Yes, this really is Giant-Land up here--everything is so huge. And when +they quarrel up in the heights--in Jotunheim--and the black storms +come down the valleys it is like colossal laughter or clumsy boisterous +anger. And the Frost giants are still at work up there with their great +axes of frost and rain. They fling down the side of a mountain or make +fresh ways for the rivers. About sixty years ago--far above here--they +tore down a mountain side and damned up the mighty Indus, so that for +months he was a lake, shut back in the hills. But the river giants are +no less strong up here in the heights of the world, and lie lay brooding +and hiding his time. And then one awful day he tore the barrier down and +roared down the valley carrying death and ruin with him, and swept away +a whole Sikh army among other unconsidered trifles. That must have been +a soul-shaking sight." + +She spoke on, and as she spoke I saw. What are her words as I record +them? Stray dead leaves pressed in a book--the life and grace dead. Yet +I record, for she taught me what I believe the world should learn, that +the Buddhist philosophers are right when they teach that all forms of +what we call matter are really but aggregates of spiritual units, and +that life itself is a curtain hiding reality as the vast veil of +day conceals from our sight the countless orbs of space. So that the +purified mind even while prisoned in the body, may enter into union with +the Real and, according to attainment, see it as it is. + +She was an interpreter because she believed this truth profoundly. She +saw the spiritual essence beneath the lovely illusion of matter, and the +air about her was radiant with the motion of strange forces for which +the dull world has many names aiming indeed at the truth, but falling--O +how far short of her calm perception! She was indeed of a Household +higher than the Household of Faith. She had received enlightenment. She +beheld with open eyes. + +Next day our camp was struck and we turned our faces again to Srinagar +and to the day of parting. I set down but one strange incident of our +journey, of which I did not speak even to her. + +We were camping at Bijbehara, awaiting our house boat, and the site was +by the Maharaja's lodge above the little town. It was midnight and I was +sleepless--the shadow of the near future was upon me. I wandered down to +the lovely old wooded bridge across the Jhelum, where the strong young +trees grow up from the piles. Beyond it the moon was shining on the +ancient Hindu remains close to the new temple, and as I stood on the +bridge I could see the figure of a man in deepest meditation by the +ruins. He was no European. I saw the straight dignified folds of the +robes. But it was not surprising he should be there and I should have +thought no more of it, had I not heard at that instant from the further +side of the river the music of the Flute. I cannot hope to describe +that music to any who have not heard it. Suffice it to say that where +it calls he who hears must follow whether in the body or the spirit. Nor +can I now tell in which I followed. One day it will call me across the +River of Death, and I shall ford it or sink in the immeasurable depths +and either will be well. + +But immediately I was at the other side of the river, standing by the +stone Bull of Shiva where he kneels before the Symbol, and looking +steadfastly upon me a few paces away was a man in the dress of a +Buddhist monk. He wore the yellow robe that leaves one shoulder bare; +his head was bare also and he held in one hand a small bowl like a +stemless chalice. I knew I was seeing a very strange inexplicable +sight--one that in Kashmir should be incredible, but I put wonder aside +for I knew now that I was moving in the sphere where the incredible may +well be the actual. His expression was of the most unbroken calm. If I +compare it to the passionless gaze of the Sphinx I misrepresent, for the +Riddle of the Sphinx still awaits solution, but in this face was a noble +acquiescence and a content that had it vibrated must have passed into +joy. + +Words or their equivalent passed between us. I felt his voice. + +"You have heard the music of the Flute?" + +"I have heard." + +"What has it given?" + +"A consuming longing." + +"It is the music of the Eternal. The creeds and the faiths are the words +that men have set to that melody. Listening, it will lead you to Wisdom. +Day by day you will interpret more surely." + +"I cannot stand alone." + +"You will not need. What has led you will lead you still. Through many +births it has led you. How should it fail?" + +"What should I do?" + +"Go forward." + +"What should I shun?" + +"Sorrow and fear." + +"What should I seek?" + +"Joy." + +"And the end?" + +"Joy. Wisdom. They are the Light and Dark of the Divine." A cold breeze +passed and touched my forehead. I was still standing in the middle of +the bridge above the water gliding to the Ocean, and there was no figure +by the Bull of Shiva. I was alone. I passed back to the tents with the +shudder that is not fear but akin to death upon me. I knew I had been +profoundly withdrawn from what we call actual life, and the return is +dread. + +The days passed as we floated down the river to Srinagar. On board the +Kedarnath, now lying in our first berth beneath the chenars near and yet +far from the city, the last night had come. Next morning I should begin +the long ride to Baramula and beyond that barrier of the Happy Valley +down to Murree and the Punjab. Where afterwards? I neither knew nor +cared. My lesson was before me to be learned. I must try to detach +myself from all I had prized--to say to my heart it was but a loan +and no gift, and to cling only to the imperishable. And did I as yet +certainly know more than the A B C of the hard doctrine by which I +must live? "Que vivre est difficile, O mon cocur fatigue!"--an immense +weariness possessed me--a passive grief. + +Vanna would follow later with the wife of an Indian doctor. I believed +she was bound for Lahore but on that point she had not spoken certainly +and I felt we should not meet again. + +And now my packing was finished, and, as far as my possessions went, the +little cabin had the soulless emptiness that comes with departure. I was +enduring as best I could. If she had held loyally to her pact, could +I do less. Was she to blame for my wild hope that in the end she would +relent and step down to the household levels of love? + +She sat by the window--the last time I should see the moonlit banks and +her clear face against them. I made and won my fight for the courage of +words. + +"And now I've finished everything--thank goodness! and we can talk. +Vanna--you will write to me?" + +"Once. I promise that." + +"Only once? Why? I counted on your words." + +"I want to speak to you of something else now. I want to tell you a +memory. But look first at the pale light behind the Takht-i-Suliman." + +So I had seen it with her. So I should not see it again. We watched +until a line of silver sparkled on the black water, and then she spoke +again. + +"Stephen, do you remember in the ruined monastery near Peshawar, how I +told you of the young Abbot, who came down to Peshawar with a Chinese +pilgrim? And he never returned." + +"I remember. There was a Dancer." + +"There was a Dancer. She was Lilavanti, and she was brought there to +trap him but when she saw him she loved him, and that was his ruin and +hers. Trickery he would have known and escaped. Love caught him in an +unbreakable net, and they fled down the Punjab and no one knew any more. +But I know. For two years they lived together and she saw the agony in +his heart--the anguish of his broken vows, the face of the Blessed One +receding into an infinite distance. She knew that every day added a link +to the heavy Karma that was bound about the feet she loved, and her soul +said "Set him free," and her heart refused the torture. But her soul was +the stronger. She set him free." + +"How?" + +"She took poison. He became an ascetic in the hills and died in peace +but with a long expiation upon him." + +"And she?" + +"I am she." + +"You!" I heard my voice as if it were another man's. Was it possible +that I--a man of the twentieth century, believed this impossible thing? +Impossible, and yet--what had I learnt if not the unity of Time, the +illusion of matter? What is the twentieth century, what the first? +Do they not lie before the Supreme as one, and clean from our petty +divisions? And I myself had seen what, if I could trust it, asserted the +marvels that are no marvels to those who know. + +"You loved him?" + +"I love him." + +"Then there is nothing at all for me." + +She resumed as if she had heard nothing. + +"I have lost him for many lives. He stepped above me at once, for he was +clean gold though he fell, and though I have followed I have not found. +But that Buddhist beyond Islamabad--you shall hear now what he said. It +was this. 'The shut door opens, and this time he awaits.' I cannot yet +say all it means, but there is no Lahore for me. I shall meet him soon." + +"Vanna, you would not harm yourself again?" + +"Never. I should not meet him. But you will see. Now I can talk no more. +I will be there tomorrow when you go, and I will ride with you to the +poplar road." + +She passed like a shadow into her little dark cabin, and I was left +alone. I will not dwell on that black loneliness of the spirit, for +it has passed--it was the darkness of hell, a madness of jealousy, and +could have no enduring life in any heart that had known her. But it was +death while it lasted. I had moments of horrible belief, of horrible +disbelief, but however it might be I knew that she was out of reach for +ever. Near me--yes! but only as the silver image of the moon floated in +the water by the boat, with the moon herself cold myriads of miles away. +I will say no more of that last eclipse of what she had wrought in me. + +The bright morning came, sunny as if my joys were beginning instead of +ending. Vanna mounted her horse and led the way from the boat. I cast +one long look at the little Kedarnath, the home of those perfect weeks, +of such joy and sorrow as would have seemed impossible to me in the +chrysalis of my former existence. Little Kahdra stood crying bitterly on +the bank--the kindly folk who had served us were gathered saddened and +quiet. I set my teeth and followed her. + +How dear she looked, how kind, how gentle her appealing eyes, as I drew +up beside her. She knew what I felt. She knew that the sight of little +Kahdra crying as he said good--bye was the last pull at my sore heart. +Still she rode steadily on, and still I followed. Once she spoke. + +"Stephen, there was a man in Peshawar, kind and true, who loved that +Lilavanti who had no heart for him. And when she died, it was in his +arms, as a sister might cling to a brother, for the man she loved had +left her. It seems that will not be in this life, but do not think I +have been so blind that I did not know my friend." + +I could not answer--it was the realization of the utmost I could hope +and it came like healing to my spirit. Better that bond between us, +slight as most men might think it, than the dearest and closest with a +woman not Vanna. It was the first thrill of a new joy in my heart--the +first, I thank the Infinite, of many and steadily growing joys and hopes +that cannot be uttered here. + +I bent to take the hand she stretched to me, but even as they touched, +I saw, passing behind the trees by the road, the young man I had seen +in the garden at Vernag--most beautiful, in the strange miter of his +jewelled diadem. His flute was at his lips and the music rang out sudden +and crystal clear as though a woodland god were passing to awaken all +the joys of the dawn. + +The horses heard too. In an instant hers had swerved wildly, and she lay +on the ground at my feet. The music had ceased. + +Days had gone before I could recall what had happened then. I lifted +her in my arms and carried her into the rest-house near at hand, and +the doctor came and looked grave, and a nurse was sent from the Mission +Hospital. No doubt all was done that was possible, but I knew from the +first what it meant and how it would be. She lay in a white stillness, +and the room was quiet as death. I remembered with unspeakable gratitude +later that the nurse had been merciful and had not sent me away. + +So Vanna lay all day and through the night, and when the dawn came again +she stirred and motioned with her hand, although her eyes were closed. +I understood, and kneeling, I put my hand under her head, and rested it +against my shoulder. Her faint voice murmured at my ear. + +"I dreamed--I was in the pine wood at Pahlgam and it was the Night of No +Moon, and I was afraid for it was dark, but suddenly all the trees were +covered with little lights like stars, and the greater light was beyond. +Nothing to be afraid of." + +"Nothing, Beloved." + +"And I looked beyond Peshawar, further than eyes could see, and in the +ruins of the monastery where we stood, you and I--I saw him, and he lay +with his head at the feet of the Blessed One. That is well, is it not?" + +"Well, Beloved." + +"And it is well I go? Is it not?" + +"It is well." + +A long silence. The first sun ray touched the floor. Again the whisper. + +"Believe what I have told you. For we shall meet again." I repeated-- + +"We shall meet again." + +In my arms she died. + +Later, when all was over I asked myself if I believed this and answered +with full assurance--Yes. + +If the story thus told sounds incredible it was not incredible to me. +I had had a profound experience. What is a miracle? It is simply the +vision of the Divine behind nature. It will come in different forms +according to the eyes that see, but the soul will know that its +perception is authentic. + +I could not leave Kashmir, nor was there any need. On the contrary I saw +that there was work for me here among the people she had loved, and my +first aim was to fit myself for that and for the writing I now felt +was to be my career in life. After much thought I bought the little +Kedarnath and made it my home, very greatly to the satisfaction of +little Kahdra and all the friendly people to whom I owed so much. + +Vanna's cabin I made my sleeping room, and it is the simple truth that +the first night I slept in the place that was a Temple of Peace in my +thoughts, I had a dream of wordless bliss, and starting awake for sheer +joy I saw her face in the night, human and dear, looking down upon +me with that poignant sweetness which would seem to be the utmost +revelation of love and pity. And as I stretched my hands, another face +dawned solemnly from the shadow beside her with grave brows bent on +mine--one I had known and seen in the ruins at Bijbehara. Outside and +very near I could hear the silver weaving of the Flute that in India is +the symbol of the call of the Divine. A dream--yes, but it taught me to +live. At first, in my days of grief and loss, I did but dream--the days +were hard to endure. I will not dwell on that illusion of sorrow, now +long dead. I lived only for the night. + + "When sleep comes to close each difficult day, + When night gives pause to the long watch I keep, + And all my bonds I needs must loose apart, + Must doff my will as raiment laid away-- + With the first dream that comes with the first sleep, + I run--I run! I am gathered to thy heart!" + +To the heart of her pity. Thus for awhile I lived. Slowly I became +conscious of her abiding presence about me, day or night It grew +clearer, closer. + +Like the austere Hippolytus to his unseen Goddess, I could say; + + "Who am more to thee than other mortals are, + Whose is the holy lot, + As friend with friend to walk and talk with thee, + Hearing thy sweet mouth's music in mine ear, + But thee beholding not." + +That was much, but later, the sunshine was no bar, the bond strengthened +and there have been days in the heights of the hills, in the depths of +the woods, when I saw her as in life, passing at a distance, but real +and lovely. Life? She had never lived as she did now--a spirit, freed +and rejoicing. For me the door she had opened would never shut. The +Presences were about me, and I entered upon my heritage of joy, knowing +that in Kashmir, the holy land of Beauty, they walk very near, and lift +up the folds of the Dark that the initiate may see the light behind. + +So I began my solitary life of gladness. I wrote, aided by the little +book she had left me, full of strangest stories, stranger by far than +my own brain could conceive. Some to be revealed--some to be hidden. And +thus the world will one day receive the story of the Dancer of Peshawar +in her upward lives, that it may know, if it will, that death is +nothing--for Life and Love are all. + + + + +THE INCOMPARABLE LADY + +A STORY OF CHINA WITH A MORAL + +It is recorded that when the Pearl Empress (his mother) asked of the +philosophic Yellow Emperor which he considered the most beautiful of the +Imperial concubines, he replied instantly: "The Lady A-Kuei": and when +the Royal Parent in profound astonishment demanded bow this could +be, having regard to the exquisite beauties in question, the Emperor +replied; + +"I have never seen her. It was dark when I entered the Dragon Chamber +and dusk of dawn when I rose and left her." + +Then said the Pearl Princess; + +"Possibly the harmony of her voice solaced the Son of Heaven?" + +But he replied; + +"She spoke not." + +And the Pearl Empress rejoined: + +"Her limbs then are doubtless softer than the kingfisher's plumage?" + +But the Yellow Emperor replied; + +"Doubtless. Yet I have not touched them. I was that night immersed in +speculations on the Yin and the Yang. How then should I touch a woman?" + +And the Pearl Empress was silent from very great amazement, not daring +to question further but marveling how the thing might be. And seeing +this, the Yellow Emperor recited a poem to the following effect: + + "It is said that Power rules the world + And who shall gainsay it? + But Loveliness is the head-jewel upon the brow of Power." + +And when the Empress had listened with reverence to the Imperial Poet, +she quitted the August Presence. + +Immediately, having entered her own palace of the Tranquil Motherly +Virtues, she caused the Lady A-Kuei to be summoned to her presence, who +came, habited in a purple robe and with pins of jade and coral in her +hair. And the Pearl Empress considered her attentively, recalling the +perfect features of the White Jade Concubine, the ambrosial smile of the +Princess of Feminine Propriety, and the willow-leaf eyebrows of the Lady +of Chen, and her astonishment was excessive, because the Lady A-Kuei +could not in beauty approach any one of these ladies. Reflecting further +she then placed her behind the screen, and summoned the court artist, Lo +Cheng, who had been formerly commissioned to paint the heavenly +features of the Emperor's Ladies, mirrored in still water, though he had +naturally not been permitted to view the beauties themselves. Of him the +Empress demanded: + +"Who is the most beautiful--which the most priceless jewel of the +dwellers in the Dragon Palace?" + +And, with humility, Lo Cheng replied: + +"What mortal man shall decide between the white Crane and the Swan, +or between the paeony flower and the lotus?" And having thus said he +remained silent, and in him was no help. Finally and after exhortation +the Pearl Empress condescended to threaten him with the loss of a head +so useless to himself and to her majesty. Then, in great fear and haste +he replied: + +"Of all the flowers that adorn the garden of the Sun of Heaven, the Lady +A-Kuei is the fittest to be gathered by the Imperial Hand, and this is +my deliberate opinion." + +Now, hearing this statement, the Pearl Empress was submerged in +bewilderment, knowing that the Lady A-Kuei had modestly retired when the +artist had depicted the reflection of the assembled loveliness of the +Inner Chambers, as not counting herself worthy of portraiture, and her +features were therefore unknown to him. Nor could the Empress further +question the artist, for when she had done so, he replied only: + +"This is the secret of the Son of Heaven," and, having gained +permission, he swiftly departed. + +Nor could the Lady A-Kuei herself aid her Imperial Majesty, for on being +questioned she was overwhelmed with modesty and confusion, and with +stammering lips could only repeat: + +"This is the secret of his Divine Majesty," imploring with the utmost +humility, forgiveness from the Imperial Mother. + +The Pearl Empress was unable to eat her supper. In vain were spread +before her the delicacies of the Empire. She could but trifle with a +shark's fin and a "Silver Ear" fungus and a dish of slugs entrapped upon +roses, with the dew-like pearls upon them. Her burning curiosity had +wholly deprived her of appetite, nor could the amusing exertions of +the Palace mimes, or a lantern fete upon the lake restore her to +any composure. "This circumstance will cause my flight on the Dragon +(death)," she said to herself, "unless I succeed in unveiling the +mystery. What therefore should be my next proceeding?" + +And so, deeply reflecting, she caused the Chief of the Eunuchs to summon +the Princess of Feminine Propriety, the White Jade Concubine and all the +other exalted beauties of the Heavenly Palace. + +In due course of time these ladies arrived, paying suitable respect and +obeisance to the Mother of his Divine Majesty. They were resplendent in +king-fisher ornaments, in jewels of jade, crystal and coral, in robes +of silk and gauze, and still more resplendent in charms that not +the Celestial Empire itself could equal, setting aside entirely all +countries of the foreign barbarians. And in grace and elegance of +manners, in skill in the arts of poetry and the lute, what could surpass +them? + +Like a parterre of flowers they surrounded her Majesty, and awaited her +pleasure with perfect decorum, when, having saluted them with affability +she thus addressed them--"Lovely ones--ladies distinguished by the +particular attention of your sovereign and mine, I have sent for you +to resolve a doubt and a difficulty. On questioning our sovereign as to +whom he regarded as the loveliest of his garden of beauty he benignantly +replied: "The Lady A-Kuei is incomparable," and though this may well be, +he further graciously added that he had never seen her. Nor, on pursuing +the subject, could I learn the Imperial reason. The artist Lo Cheng +follows in his Master's footsteps, he also never having seen the favored +lady, and he and she reply to me that this is an Imperial secret. +Declare to me therefore if your perspicacity and the feminine interest +which every lady property takes in the other can unravel this mystery, +for my liver is tormented with anxiety beyond measure." + +As soon as the Pearl Empress had spoken she realized that she had +committed a great indiscretion. A babel of voices, of cries, questions +and contradictions instantly arose. Decorum was abandoned. The Lady of +Chen swooned, nor could she be revived for an hour, and the Princess of +Feminine Propriety and the White Jade Concubine could be dragged apart +only by the united efforts of six of the Palace matrons, so great was +their fury the one with the other, each accusing each of encouragement +to the Lady A-Kuei's pretensions. So also with the remaining ladies. +Shrieks resounded through the Hall of Virtuous Tranquillity, and when +the Pearl Empress attempted to pour oil on the troubled waters by +speaking soothing and comfortable words, the august Voice was entirely +inaudible in the tumult. + +All sought at length in united indignation for the Lady A-Kuei, but she +had modestly withdrawn to the Pearl Pavilion in the Imperial Garden and, +foreseeing anxieties, had there secured herself on hearing the opening +of the Royal Speech. + +Finally the ladies were led away by their attendants, weeping, +lamenting, raging, according to their several dispositions, and the +Pearl Empress, left with her own maidens, beheld the floor strewn with +jade pins, kingfisher and coral jewels, and even with fragments of silk +and gauze. Nor was she any nearer the solution of the desired secret. + +That night she tossed upon a bed sleepless though heaped with down, +and her mind raged like a fire up and down all possible answers to the +riddle, but none would serve. Then, at the dawn, raising herself on one +august elbow she called to her venerable nurse and foster mother, the +Lady Ma, wise and resourceful in the affairs and difficulties of women, +and, repeating the circumstances, demanded her counsel. + +The Lady Ma considering the matter long and deeply, slowly replied: + +"This is a great riddle and dangerous, for to intermeddle with the +divine secrets is the high road to the Yellow Springs (death). But the +child of my breasts and my exalted Mistress shall never ask in vain, for +a thwarted curiosity is dangerous as a suppressed fever. I will conceal +myself nightly in the Dragon Bedchamber and this will certainly unveil +the truth. And if I perish I perish." + +It is impossible to describe how the Empress heaped Lady Ma with costly +jewels and silken brocades and taels of silver beyond measuring--how she +placed on her breast the amulet of jade that had guarded herself from +all evil influences, how she called the ancestral spirits to witness +that she would provide for the Lady Ma's remotest descendants if she +lost her life in this sublime devotion to duty. + +That night Lady Ma concealed herself behind the Imperial couch in the +Dragon Chamber, to await the coming of the Son of Heaven. Slowly dripped +the water-clock as the minutes fled away; sorely ached the venerable +limbs of the Lady Ma as she crouched in the shadows and saw the rising +moon scattering silver through the elegant traceries of carved ebony and +ivory; wildly beat her heart as delicately tripping footsteps approached +the Dragon Chamber, and the Princess of Feminine Propriety, attended by +her maidens, ascended the Imperial Couch and hastily dismissed them. Yet +no sweet repose awaited this favored lady. The Lady Ma could hear her +smothered sobs, her muttered exclamations--nay could even feel the +couch itself tremble as the Princess uttered the hated name of the Lady +A-Kuei, the poison of jealousy running in every vein. It was impossible +for Lady Ma to decide which was the most virulent, this, or the poison +of curiosity in the heart of the Pearl Empress. Though she loved not the +Princess she was compelled to pity such suffering. But all thought was +banished by the approach of the Yellow Emperor, prepared for repose and +unattended, in simple but divine grandeur. + +It cannot indeed be supposed that a Celestial Emperor is human, yet +there was mortality in the start which his Augustness gave when the +Princess of Feminine Propriety flinging herself from the Dragon couch, +threw herself at his feet and with tears that flowed like that river +known as "The Sorrow of China," demanded to know what she had done that +another should be preferred before her; reciting in frantic haste such +imperfections of the Lady A-Kuei's appearance as she could recall (or +invent) in the haste of that agitating moment. + +"That one of her eyes is larger than the other--no human being can +doubt" sobbed the lady--"and surely your Divine Majesty cannot be aware +that her hair reaches but to her waist, and that there is a brown mole +on the nape of her neck? When she sings it resembles the croak of the +crow. It is true that most of the Palace ladies are chosen for anything +but beauty, yet she is the most ill-favored. And is it this--this +bat-faced lady who is preferred to me! Would I had never been born: Yet +even your Majesty's own lips have told me I am fair!" + +The Yellow Emperor supported the form of the Princess in his arms. +There are moments when even a Son of Heaven is but human. "Fair as the +rainbow," he murmured, and the Princess faintly smiled; then gathering +the resolution of the Philosopher he added manfully--"But the Lady +A-Kuei is incomparable. And the reason is--" + +The Lady Ma eagerly stretched her head forward with a hand to either +ear. But the Princess of Feminine Propriety with one shriek had swooned +and in the hurry of summoning attendants and causing her to be conveyed +to her own apartments that precious sentence was never completed. + +Still the Lady Ma groveled behind the Dragon Couch as the Son of +Heaven, left alone, approached the veranda and apostrophizing the moon, +murmured-- + +"O loveliest pale watcher of the destinies of men, illuminate the beauty +of the Lady A-Kuei, and grant that I who have never seen that beauty may +never see it, but remain its constant admirer!" So saying, he sought +his solitary couch and slept, while the Lady Ma, in a torment of +bewilderment, glided from the room. + +The matter remained in suspense for several days. The White Jade +Concubine was the next lady commanded to the Dragon Chamber, and again +the Lady Ma was in her post of observation. Much she heard, much she +saw that was not to the point, but the scene ended as before by the +dismissal of the lady in tears, and the departure of the Lady Ma in +ignorance of the secret. + +The Emperor's peace was ended. + +The singular circumstance was that the Lady A-Kuei was never summoned +by the Yellow Emperor. Eagerly as the Empress watched, no token of +affection for her was ever visible. Nothing could be detected. It was +inexplicable. Finally, devoured by curiosity that gave her no respite, +she resolved on a stratagem that should dispel the mystery, though it +carried with it a risk on which she trembled to reflect. It was the +afternoon of a languid summer day, and the Yellow Emperor, almost +unattended, had come to pay a visit of filial respect to the Pearl +Empress. She received him with the ceremony due to her sovereign in the +porcelain pavilion of the Eastern Gardens, with the lotos fish ponds +before them, and a faint breeze occasionally tinkling the crystal +wind-bells that decorated the shrubs on the cloud and dragon-wrought +slopes of the marble approach. A bird of brilliant plumage uttered a cry +of reverence from its gold cage as the Son of Heaven entered. As was +his occasional custom, and after suitable inquiries as to his parent's +health, the attendants were all dismissed out of earshot and the Emperor +leaned on his cushions and gazed reflectively into the sunshine +outside. So had the Court Artist represented him as "The Incarnation of +Philosophic Calm." + +"These gardens are fair," said the Empress after a respectful silence, +moving her fan illustrated with the emblem of Immortality--the Ho Bird. + +"Fair indeed," returned the Emperor.--"It might be supposed that all +sorrow and disturbance would be shut without the Forbidden Precincts. +Yet it is not so. And though the figures of my ladies moving among the +flowers appear at this distance instinct with joy, yet--" + +He was silent. + +"They know not," said the Empress with solemnity "that death entered the +Forbidden Precincts but last night. A disembodied spirit has returned to +its place and doubtless exists in bliss." "Indeed?" returned the Yellow +Emperor with indifference--"yet if the spirit is absorbed into the +Source whence it came, and the bones have crumbled into nothingness, +where does the Ego exist? The dead are venerable, but no longer of +interest." + +"Not even when they were loved in life?" said the Empress, caressing the +bird in the cage with one jewelled finger, but attentively observing +her son from the corner of her august eye. "They were; they are not," he +remarked sententiously and stifling a yawn; it was a drowsy afternoon. +"But who is it that has abandoned us? Surely not the Lady Ma--your +Majesty's faithful foster-mother?" + +"A younger, a lovelier spirit has sought the Yellow Springs," replied +the trembling Empress. "I regret to inform your Majesty that a sudden +convulsion last night deprived the Lady A-Kuei of life. I would not +permit the news to reach you lest it should break your august night's +rest." + +There was a silence, then the Emperor turned his eyes serenely upon his +Imperial Mother. "That the statement of my august Parent is merely--let +us say--allegoric--does not detract from its interest. But had the Lady +A-Kuei in truth departed to the Yellow Springs I should none the less +have received the news without uneasiness. What though the sun set--is +not the memory of his light all surpassing?" + +No longer could the Pearl Empress endure the excess of her curiosity. +Deeply kowtowing, imploring pardon, with raised hands and tears which no +son dare neglect, she besought the Emperor to enlighten her as to this +mystery, recounting his praises of the lady and his admission that he +had never beheld her, and all the circumstances connected with this +remarkable episode. She omitted only, (from considerations of delicacy +and others,) the vigils of the Lady Ma in the Dragon Chamber. The +Emperor, sighing, looked upon the ground, and for a time was silent. +Then he replied as follows: + +"Willingly would I have kept silence, but what child dare withstand the +plea of a parent? Is it necessary to inform the Heavenly Empress that +beauty seen is beauty made familiar and that familiarity is the foe +of admiration? How is it possible that I should see the Princess of +Feminine Propriety, for instance, by night and day without becoming +aware of her imperfections as well as her graces? How awake in the night +without hearing the snoring of the White Jade Concubine and considering +the mouth from which it issues as the less lovely. How partake of the +society of any woman without finding her chattering as the crane, avid +of admiration, jealous, destructive of philosophy, fatal to composure, +fevered with curiosity; a creature, in short, a little above the gibbon, +but infinitely below the notice of the sage, save as a temporary measure +of amusement in itself unworthy the philosopher. The faces of all my +ladies are known to me. All are fair and all alike. But one night, as I +lay in the Dragon Couch, lost in speculation, absorbed in contemplation +of the Yin and the Yang, the night passed for the solitary dreamer as a +dream. In the darkness of the dawn I rose still dreaming, and departed +to the Pearl Pavilion in the garden, and there remained an hour viewing +the sunrise and experiencing ineffable opinions on the destiny of man. +Returning then to a couch which I believed to have been that of the +solitary philosopher I observed a depression where another form had +lain, and in it a jade hairpin such as is worn by my junior beauties. +Petrified with amazement at the display of such reserve, such +continence, such august self-restraint, I perceived that, lost in +my thoughts, I had had an unimagined companion and that this gentle +reminder was from her gentle hand. But whom? I knew not. I then observed +Lo Cheng the Court Artist in attendance and immediately despatched him +to make secret enquiry and ascertain the name and circumstances of that +beauty who, unknown, had shared my vigil. I learnt on his return that +it was the Lady A-Kuei. I had entered the Dragon Chamber in a low +moonlight, and guessed not her presence. She spoke no word. Finding her +Imperial Master thus absorbed, she invited no attention, nor in any way +obtruded her beauties upon my notice. Scarcely did she draw breath. Yet +reflect upon what she might have done! The night passed and I remained +entirely unconscious of her presence, and out of respect she would not +sleep but remained reverently and modestly awake, assisting, if it may +so be expressed, at a humble distance, in the speculations which held me +prisoner. What a pearl was here! On learning these details by Lo Cheng +from her own roseate lips, and remembering the unexampled temptation +she had resisted (for well she knew that had she touched the Emperor +the Philosopher had vanished) I despatched an august rescript to this +favored Lady, conferring on her the degree of Incomparable Beauty of the +First Rank. On condition of secrecy." + +The Pearl Empress, still in deepest bewilderment, besought his majesty +to proceed. He did so, with his usual dignity. + +"Though my mind could not wholly restrain its admiration, yet secrecy +was necessary, for had the facts been known, every lady, from the +Princess of Feminine Propriety to the Junior Beauty of the Bed Chamber +would henceforward have observed only silence and a frigid decorum in +the Dragon Bed Chamber. And though the Emperor be a philosopher, yet a +philosopher is still a man, and there are moments when decorum--" + +The Emperor paused discreetly; then resumed. + +"The world should not be composed entirely of A-Kueis, yet in my mind I +behold the Incomparable Lady fair beyond expression. Like the moon she +sails glorious in the heavens to be adored only in vision as the one +woman who could respect the absorption of the Emperor, and of whose +beauty as she lay beside him the philosopher could remain unconscious +and therefore untroubled in body. To see her, to find her earthly, +would be an experience for which the Emperor might have courage, but the +philosopher never. And attached to all this is a moral:" + +The Pearl Empress urgently inquired its nature. + +"Let the wisdom of my august parent discern it," said the Emperor +sententiously. + +"And the future?" she inquired. + +"The--let us call it parable--" said the Emperor politely--"with which +your Majesty was good enough to entertain me, has suggested a precaution +to my mind. I see now a lovely form moving among the flowers. It is +possible that it may be the Incomparable Lady, or that at any moment I +may come upon her and my ideal be shattered. This must be safeguarded. +I might command her retirement to her native province, but who shall +insure me against the weakness of my own heart demanding her return? +No. Let Your Majesty's words spoken--well--in parable, be fulfilled in +truth. I shall give orders to the Chief Eunuch that the Incomparable +Lady tonight shall drink the Draught of Crushed Pearls, and be thus +restored to the sphere that alone is worthy of her. Thus are all +anxieties soothed, and the honours offered to her virtuous spirit shall +be a glorious repayment of the ideal that will ever illuminate my soul." + +The Empress was speechless. She had borne the Emperor in her womb, but +the philosopher outsoared her comprehension. She retired, leaving his +Majesty in a reverie, endeavoring herself to grasp the moral of which +he had spoken, for the guidance of herself and the ladies concerned. But +whether it inculcated reserve or the reverse in the Dragon Chamber, and +what the Imperial ladies should follow as an example she was, to the +end of her life, totally unable to say. Philosophy indeed walks on the +heights. We cannot all expect to follow it. + +That night the Incomparable Lady drank the Draught of Crushed Pearls. + +The Princess of Feminine Propriety and the White Jade Concubine, +learning these circumstances, redoubled their charms, their coquetries +and their efforts to occupy what may be described as the inner sanctuary +of the Emperor's esteem. Both lived to a green old age, wealthy and +honored, alike firm in the conviction that if the Incomparable Lady had +not shown herself so superior to temptation the Emperor might have been +on the whole better pleased, whatever the sufferings of the philosopher. +Both lived to be the tyrants of many generations of beauties at the +Celestial Court. Both were assiduous in their devotions before the +spirit tablet of the departed lady, and in recommending her example of +reserve and humility to every damsel whom it might concern. + +It will probably occur to the reader of this unique but veracious story +that there is more in it than meets the eye, and more than the one +moral alluded to by the Emperor according to the point of view of the +different actors. + +To the discernment of the reader it must accordingly be left. + + + + +THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN + +A Story of Burma + +Most wonderful is the Irawadi, the mighty river of Burma. In all the +world elsewhere is no such river, bearing the melted snows from its +mysterious sources in the high places of the mountains. The dawn rises +upon its league-wide flood; the moon walks upon it with silver feet. It +is the pulsing heart of the land, living still though so many rules and +rulers have risen and fallen beside it, their pomps and glories drifting +like flotsam dawn the river to the eternal ocean that is the end of +all--and the beginning. Dead civilizations strew its banks, dreaming in +the torrid sunshine of glories that were--of blood-stained gold, jewels +wept from woeful crowns, nightmare dreams of murder and terror; dreaming +also of heavenly beauty, for the Lord Buddha looks down in moonlight +peace upon the land that leaped to kiss His footprints, that has laid +its heart in the hand of the Blessed One, and shares therefore in His +bliss and content. The Land of the Lord Buddha, where the myriad pagodas +lift their golden flames of worship everywhere, and no idlest wind can +pass but it ruffles the bells below the knees until they send forth +their silver ripple of music to swell the hymn of praise! + +There is a little bay on the bank of the flooding river--a silent, +deserted place of sanddunes and small bills. When a ship is in sight, +some poor folk come and spread out the red lacquer that helps their +scanty subsistence, and the people from the passing ship land and barter +and in a few minutes are gone on their busy way and silence settles +down once more. They neither know nor care that, near by, a mighty city +spread its splendour for miles along the river bank, that the king +known as Lord of the Golden Palace, The Golden Foot, Lord of the White +Elephant, held his state there with balls of magnificence, obsequious +women, fawning courtiers and all the riot and colour of an Eastern +tyranny. How should they care? Now there are ruins--ruins, and the +cobras slip in and out through the deserted holy places. They breed +their writhing young in the sleeping-chambers of queens, the tigers mew +in the moonlight, and the giant spider, more terrible than the cobra, +strikes with its black poison-claw and, paralyzing the life of the +victim, sucks its brain with slow, lascivious pleasure. + +Are these foul creatures more dreadful than some of the men, the women, +who dwelt in these palaces--the more evil because of the human brain +that plotted and foresaw? That is known only to the mysterious Law that +in silence watches and decrees. + +But this is a story of the dead days of Pagan, by the Irawadi, and it +will be shown that, as the Lotus of the Lord Buddha grows up a white +splendour from the black mud of the depths, so also may the soul of a +woman. + +In the days of the Lord of the White Elephant, the King Pagan Men, was a +boy named Mindon, son of second Queen and the King. So, at least, it +was said in the Golden Palace, but those who knew the secrets of such +matters whispered that, when the King had taken her by the hand she +came to him no maid, and that the boy was the son of an Indian trader. +Furthermore it was said that she herself was woman of the Rajputs, +knowledgeable in spells, incantations and elemental spirits such as the +Beloos that terribly haunt waste places, and all Powers that move in +the dark, and that thus she had won the King. Certainly she had been +captured by the King's war-boats off the coast from a trading-ship bound +for Ceylon, and it was her story that, because of her beauty, she was +sent thither to serve as concubine to the King, Tissa of Ceylon. Being +captured, she was brought to the Lord of the Golden Palace. The tongue +she spoke was strange to all the fighting men, but it was wondrous to +see how swiftly she learnt theirs and spoke it with a sweet ripple such +as is in the throat of a bird. + +She was beautiful exceedingly, with a colour of pale gold upon her and +lengths of silk-spun hair, and eyes like those of a jungle-deer, and +water might run beneath the arch of her foot without wetting it, and her +breasts were like the cloudy pillows where the sun couches at setting. +Now, at Pagan, the name they called her was Dwaymenau, but her true +name, known only to herself, was Sundari, and she knew not the Law of +the Blessed Buddha but was a heathen accursed. In the strong hollow of +her hand she held the heart of the King, so that on the birth of her son +she had risen from a mere concubine to be the second Queen and a power +to whom all bowed. The First Queen, Maya, languished in her palace, her +pale beauty wasting daily, deserted and lonely, for she had been the +light of the King's eyes until the coming of the Indian woman, and she +loved her lord with a great love and was a noble woman brought up in +honour and all things becoming a queen. But sigh as she would, the King +came never. All night he lay in the arms of Dwaymenau, all day he sat +beside her, whether at the great water pageants or at the festival when +the dancing-girls swayed and postured before him in her gilded chambers. +Even when he went forth to hunt the tiger, she went with him as far as +a woman may go, and then stood back only because he would not risk his +jewel, her life. So all that was evil in the man she fostered and all +that was good she cherished not at all, fearing lest he should return +to the Queen. At her will he had consulted the Hiwot Daw, the Council of +the Woon-gyees or Ministers, concerning a divorce of the Queen, but +this they told him could not be since she had kept all the laws of Manu, +being faithful, noble and beautiful and having borne him a son. + +For, before the Indian woman had come to the King, the Queen had borne +a son, Ananda, and he was pale and slender and the King despised him +because of the wiles of Dwaymenau, saying he was fit only to sit among +the women, having the soul of a slave, and he laughed bitterly as the +pale child crouched in the corner to see him pass. If his eyes had been +clear, he would have known that here was no slave, but a heart as much +greater than his own as the spirit is stronger than the body. But this +he did not know and he strode past with Dwaymenau's boy on his shoulder, +laughing with cruel glee. + +And this boy, Mindon, was beautiful and strong as his mother, pale olive +of face, with the dark and crafty eyes of the cunning Indian traders, +with black hair and a body straight, strong and long in the leg for his +years--apt at the beginnings of bow, sword and spear--full of promise, +if the promise was only words and looks. + +And so matters rested in the palace until Ananda had ten years and +Mindon nine. + +It was the warm and sunny winter and the days were pleasant, and on a +certain day the Queen, Maya, went with her ladies to worship the Blessed +One at the Thapinyu Temple, looking down upon the swiftly flowing river. +The temple was exceedingly rich and magnificent, so gilded with pure +gold-leaf that it appeared of solid gold. And about the upper part were +golden bells beneath the jewelled knee, which wafted very sweetly in +the wind and gave forth a crystal-clear music. The ladies bore in their +hands more gold-leaf, that they might acquire merit by offering this +for the service of the Master of the Law, and indeed this temple was +the offering of the Queen herself, who, because she bore the name of +the Mother of the Lord, excelled in good works and was the Moon of this +lower world in charity and piety. + +Though wan with grief and anxiety, this Queen was beautiful. Her eyes, +like mournful lakes of darkness, were lovely in the pale ivory of +her face. Her lips were nobly cut and calm, and by the favour of the +Guardian Nats, she was shaped with grace and health, a worthy mother of +kings. Also she wore her jewels like a mighty princess, a magnificence +to which all the people shikoed as she passed, folding their hands and +touching the forehead while they bowed down, kneeling. + +Before the colossal image of the Holy One she made her offering and, +attended by her women, she sat in meditation, drawing consolation from +the Tranquillity above her and the silence of the shrine. This ended, +the Queen rose and did obeisance to the Lord and, retiring, paced back +beneath the White Canopy and entered the courtyard where the palace +stood--a palace of noble teakwood, brown and golden and carved like lace +into strange fantasies of spires and pinnacles and branches where Nats +and Tree Spirits and Beloos and swaying river maidens mingled and met +amid fruits and leaves and flowers in a wild and joyous confusion. The +faces, the blowing garments, whirled into points with the swiftness of +the dance, were touched with gold, and so glad was the building that it +seemed as if a very light wind might whirl it to the sky, and even +the sad Queen stopped to rejoice in its beauty as it blossomed in the +sunlight. + +And even as she paused, her little son Ananda rushed to meet her, pale +and panting, and flung himself into her arms with dry sobs like those of +an overrun man. She soothed him until he could speak, and then the grief +made way in a rain of tears. + +"Mindon has killed my deer. He bared his knife, slit his throat and cast +him in the ditch and there he lies." + +"There will he not lie long!" shouted Mindon, breaking from the palace +to the group where all were silent now. "For the worms will eat him and +the dogs pick clean his bones, and he will show his horns at his lords +no more. If you loved him, White-liver, you should have taught him +better manners to his betters." + +With a stifled shriek Ananda caught the slender knife from his girdle +and flew at Mindon like a cat of the woods. Such things were done daily +by young and old, and this was a long sorrow come to a head between the +boys. + +Suddenly, lifting the hangings of the palace gateway, before them stood +the mother of Mindon, the Lady Dwaymenau, pale as wool, having heard the +shout of her boy, so that the two Queens faced each other, each holding +the shoulders of her son, and the ladies watched, mute as fishes, for it +was years since these two had met. + +"What have you done to my son?" breathed Maya the Queen, dry in the +throat and all but speechless with passion. For indeed his face, for a +child, was ghastly. + +"Look at his knife! What would he do to my son?" Dwaymenau was stiff +with hate and spoke as to a slave. + +"He has killed my deer and mocks me because I loved him, He is the devil +in this place. Look at the devils in his eyes. Look quick before he +smiles, my mother." + +And indeed, young as the boy was, an evil thing sat in either eye and +glittered upon them. Dwaymenau passed her hand across his brow, and he +smiled and they were gone. + +"The beast ran at me and would have flung me with his horns," he said, +looking up brightly at his mother. "He had the madness upon him. I +struck once and he was dead. My father would have done the same. + +"That would he not!" said Queen Maya bitterly. "Your father would have +crept up, fawning on the deer, and offered him the fruits he loved, +stroking him the while. And in trust the beast would have eaten, and the +poison in the fruit would have slain him. For the people of your father +meet neither man nor beast in fair fight. With a kiss they stab!" + +Horror kept the women staring and silent. No one had dreamed that +the scandal had reached the Queen. Never had she spoken or looked her +knowledge but endured all in patience. Now it sprang out like a sword +among them, and they feared for Maya, whom all loved. + +Mindon did not understand. It was beyond him, but he saw he was scorned. +Dwaymenau, her face rigid as a mask, looked pitilessly at the shaking +Queen, and each word dropped from her mouth, hard and cold as the +falling of diamonds. She refused the insult. + +"If it is thus you speak of our lord and my love, what wonder he +forsakes you? Mother of a craven milk runs in your veins and his for +blood. Take your slinking brat away and weep together! My son and I +go forth to meet the King as he comes from hunting, and to welcome him +kingly!" She caught her boy to her with a magnificent gesture; he flung +his little arm about her, and laughing loudly they went off together. + +The tension relaxed a little when they were out of sight. The women knew +that, since Dwaymenau had refused to take the Queen's meaning, she +would certainly not carry her complaint to the King. They guessed at her +reason for this forbearance, but, be that as it might, it was Certain +that no other person would dare to tell him and risk the fate that waits +the messenger of evil. + +The eldest lady led away the Queen, now almost tottering in the reaction +of fear and pain. Oh, that she had controlled her speech! Not for her +own sake--for she had lost all and the beggar can lose no more--but for +the boy's sake, the unloved child that stood between the stranger and +her hopes. For him she had made a terrible enemy. Weeping, the boy +followed her. + +"Take comfort, little son," she said, drawing him to her tenderly. "The +deer can suffer no more. For the tigers, he does not fear them. He runs +in green woods now where there is none to hunt. He is up and away. The +Blessed One was once a deer as gentle as yours." + +But still the child wept, and the Queen broke down utterly. "Oh, if life +be a dream, let us wake, let us wake!" she sobbed. "For evil things walk +in it that cannot live in the light. Or let us dream deeper and forget. +Go, little son, yet stay--for who can tell what waits us when the King +comes. Let us meet him here." + +For she believed that Dwaymenau would certainly carry the tale of her +speech to the King, and, if so, what hope but death together? + +That night, after the feasting, when the girls were dancing the dance +of the fairies and spirits, in gold dresses, winged on the legs and +shoulders, and high, gold-spired and pinnacled caps, the King missed the +little Prince, Ananda, and asked why he was absent. + +No one answered, the women looking upon each other, until Dwaymenau, +sitting beside him, glimmering with rough pearls and rubies, spoke +smoothly: "Lord, worshipped and beloved, the two boys quarreled this +day, and Ananda's deer attacked our Mindon. He had a madness upon him +and thrust with his horns. But, Mindon, your true son, flew in upon him +and in a great fight he slit the beast's throat with the knife you gave +him. Did he not well?" + +"Well," said the King briefly. "But is there no hurt? Have searched? For +he is mine." + +There was arrogance in the last sentence and her proud soul rebelled, +but smoothly as ever she spoke: "I have searched and there is not the +littlest scratch. But Ananda is weeping because the deer is dead, and +his mother is angry. What should I do?" + +"Nothing. Ananda is worthless and worthless let him be! And for that +pale shadow that was once a woman, let her be forgotten. And now, drink, +my Queen!" + +And Dwaymenau drank but the drink was bitter to her, for a ghost had +risen upon her that day. She had never dreamed that such a scandal had +been spoken, and it stunned her very soul with fear, that the Queen +should know her vileness and the cheat she had put upon the King. As +pure maid he had received her, and she knew, none better, what the doom +would be if his trust were broken and he knew the child not his. +She herself had seen this thing done to a concubine who had a little +offended. She was thrust living in a sack and this hung between two +earthen jars pierced with small holes, and thus she was set afloat on +the terrible river. And not till the slow filling and sinking of the +jars was the agony over and the cries for mercy stilled. No, the Queen's +speech was safe with her, but was it safe with the Queen? For her +silence, Dwaymenau must take measures. + +Then she put it all aside and laughed and jested with the King and did +indeed for a time forget, for she loved him for his black-browed beauty +and his courage and royalty and the childlike trust and the man's +passion that mingled in him for her. Daily and nightly such prayers as +she made to strange gods were that she might bear a son, true son of +his. + +Next day, in the noonday stillness when all slept, she led her young son +by the hand to her secret chamber, and, holding him upon her knees in +that rich and golden place, she lifted his face to hers and stared into +his eyes. And so unwavering was her gaze, so mighty the hard, unblinking +stare that his own was held against it, and he stared back as the earth +stares breathless at the moon. Gradually the terror faded out of his +eyes; they glazed as if in a trance; his head fell stupidly against her +bosom; his spirit stood on the borderland of being and waited. + +Seeing this, she took his palm and, molding it like wax, into the cup +of it she dropped clear fluid from a small vessel of pottery with the +fylfot upon its side and the disks of the god Shiva. And strange it was +to see that lore of India in the palace where the Blessed Law reigned +in peace. Then, fixing her eyes with power upon Mindon, she bade him, a +pure child, see for her in its clearness. + +"Only virgin-pure can see!" she muttered, staring into his eyes. "See! +See!" + +The eyes of Mindon were closing. He half opened them and looked dully at +his palm. His face was pinched and yellow. + +"A woman--a child, on a long couch. Dead! I see!" + +"See her face. Is her head crowned with the Queen's jewels? See!" + +"Jewels. I cannot see her face. It is hidden." + +"Why is it hidden?" + +"A robe across her face. Oh, let me go!" + +"And the child? See!" + +"Let me go. Stop--my head--my head! I cannot see. The child is hidden. +Her arm holds it. A woman stoops above them." + +"A woman? Who? Is it like me? Speak! See!" + +"A woman. It is like you, mother--it is like you. I fear very greatly. A +knife--a knife! Blood! I cannot see--I cannot speak! I--I sleep." + +His face was ghastly white now, his body cold and collapsed. Terrified, +she caught him to her breast and relaxed the power of her will upon him. +For that moment, she was only the passionate mother and quaked to think +she might have hurt him. An hour passed and he slept heavily in her +arms, and in agony she watched to see the colour steal back into the +olive cheek and white lips. In the second hour he waked and stretched +himself indolently, yawning like a cat. Her tears dropped like rain upon +him as she clasped him violently to her. + +He writhed himself free, petulant and spoilt. "Let me be. I hate kisses +and women's tricks. I want to go forth and play. I have had a devil's +dream. + +"What did you see in your dream, prince of my heart?" She caught +frantically at the last chance. + +"A deer--a tiger. I have forgotten. Let me go." He ran off and she sat +alone with her doubts and fears. Yet triumph coloured them too. She saw +a dead woman, a dead child, and herself bending above them. She hid the +vessel in her bosom and went out among her women. + +Weeks passed, and never a word that she dreaded from Maya the Queen. The +women of Dwaymenau, questioning the Queen's women, heard that she seemed +to have heavy sorrow upon her. Her eyes were like dying lamps and she +faded as they. The King never entered her palace. Drowned in Dwaymenau's +wiles and beauty, her slave, her thrall, he forgot all else but his +fighting, his hunting and his long war-boats, and whether the Queen +lived or died, he cared nothing. Better indeed she should die and +her place be emptied for the beloved, without offence to her powerful +kindred. + +And now he was to sail upon a raid against the Shan Tsaubwa, who had +denied him tribute of gold and jewels and slaves. Glorious were the +boats prepared for war, of brown teak and gilded until they shone like +gold. Seventy men rowed them, sword and lance beside each. Warriors +crowded them, flags and banners fluttered about them; the shining water +reflected the pomp like a mirror and the air rang with song. Dwaymenau +stood beside the water with her women, bidding the King farewell, and so +he saw her, radiant in the dawn, with her boy beside her, and waved his +hand to the last. + +The ships were gone and the days languished a little at Pagan. They +missed the laughter and royalty of the King, and few men, and those old +and weak, were left in the city. The pulse of life beat slower. + +And Dwaymenau took rule in the Golden Palace. Queen Maya sat like one in +a dream and questioned nothing, and Dwaymenau ruled with wisdom but none +loved her. To all she was the interloper, the witch-woman, the out-land +upstart. Only the fear of the King guarded her and her boy, but that +was strong. The boys played together sometimes, Mindon tyrannizing and +cruel, Ananda fearing and complying, broken in spirit. + +Maya the Queen walked daily in the long and empty Golden Hall of +Audience, where none came now that the King was gone, pacing up and +down, gazing wearily at the carved screens and all their woodland beauty +of gods that did not hear, of happy spirits that had no pity. Like +a spirit herself she passed between the red pillars, appearing and +reappearing with steps that made no sound, consumed with hate of the +evil woman that had stolen her joy. Like a slow fire it burned in her +soul, and the face of the Blessed One was hidden from her, and she had +forgotten His peace. In that atmosphere of hate her life dwindled. Her +son's dwindled also, and there was talk among the women of some potion +that Dwaymenau had been seen to drop into his noontide drink as she went +swiftly by. That might he the gossip of malice, but he pined. His +eyes were large like a young bird's; his hands like little claws. They +thought the departing year would take him with it. What harm? Very +certainly the King would shed no tear. + +It was a sweet and silent afternoon and she wandered in the great and +lonely hall, sickened with the hate in her soul and her fear for her +boy. Suddenly she heard flying footsteps--a boy's, running in mad haste +in the outer hall, and, following them, bare feet, soft, thudding. + +She stopped dead and every pulse cried--Danger! No time to think or +breathe when Mindon burst into sight, wild with terror and following +close beside him a man--a madman, a short bright dah in his grasp, his +jaws grinding foam, his wild eyes starting--one passion to murder. So +sometimes from the Nats comes pitiless fury, and men run mad and kill +and none knows why. + +Maya the Queen stiffened to meet the danger. Joy swept through her soul; +her weariness was gone. A fierce smile showed her teeth--a smile +of hate, as she stood there and drew her dagger for defense. For +defense--the man would rend the boy and turn on her and she would not +die. She would live to triumph that the mongrel was dead, and her son, +the Prince again and his father's joy--for his heart would turn to the +child most surely. Justice was rushing on its victim. She would see it +and live content, the long years of agony wiped out in blood, as was +fitting. She would not flee; she would see it and rejoice. And as +she stood in gladness--these broken thoughts rushing through her like +flashes of lightning--Mindon saw her by the pillar and, screaming in +anguish for the first time, fled to her for refuge. + +She raised her knife to meet the staring eyes, the chalk white face, and +drive him back on the murderer. If the man failed, she would not! And +even as she did this a strange thing befell. Something stronger than +hate swept her away like a leaf on the river; something primeval that +lives in the lonely pangs of childbirth, that hides in the womb and +breasts of the mother. It was stronger than she. It was not the hated +Mindoin--she saw him no more. Suddenly it was the eternal Child, lifting +dying, appealing eyes to the Woman, as he clung to her knees. She did +not think this--she felt it, and it dominated her utterly. The Woman +answered. As if it had been her own flesh and blood, she swept the +panting body behind her and faced the man with uplifted dagger and knew +her victory assured, whether in life or death. On came the horrible +rush, the flaming eyes, and, if it was chance that set the dagger +against his throat, it was cool strength that drove it home and never +wavered until the blood welling from the throat quenched the flame in +the wild eyes, and she stood triumphing like a war-goddess, with the +man at her feet. Then, strong and flushed, Maya the Queen gathered the +half-dead boy in her arms, and, both drenched with blood, they moved +slowly down the hall and outside met the hurrying crowd, with Dwaymenau, +whom the scream had brought to find her son. + +"You have killed him! She has killed him!" Scarcely could the Rajput +woman speak. She was kneeling beside him--he hideous with blood. "She +hated him always. She has murdered him. Seize her!" + +"Woman, what matter your hates and mine?" the Queen said slowly. "The +boy is stark with fear. Carry him in and send for old Meh Shway Gon. +Woman, be silent!" + +When a Queen commands, men and women obey, and a Queen commanded then. +A huddled group lifted the child and carried him away, Dwaymenau with +them, still uttering wild threats, and the Queen was left alone. + +She could not realize what she had done and left undone. She could not +understand it. She had hated, sickened with loathing, as it seemed for +ages, and now, in a moment it had blown away like a whirlwind that is +gone. Hate was washed out of her soul and had left it cool and white as +the Lotus of the Blessed One. What power had Dwaymenau to hurt her when +that other Power walked beside her? She seemed to float above her in +high air and look down upon her with compassion. Strength, virtue flowed +in her veins; weakness, fear were fantasies. She could not understand, +but knew that here was perfect enlightenment. About her echoed the words +of the Blessed One: "Never in this world doth hatred cease by hatred, +but only by love. This is an old rule." + +"Whereas I was blind, now I see," said Maya the Queen slowly to her own +heart. She had grasped the hems of the Mighty. + +Words cannot speak the still passion of strength and joy that possessed +her. Her step was light. As she walked, her soul sang within her, for +thus it is with those that have received the Law. About them is the +Peace. + +In the dawn she was told that the Queen, Dwaymenau, would speak with +her, and without a tremor she who had shaken like a leaf at that name +commanded that she should enter. It was Dwaymenau that trembled as she +came into that unknown place. + +With cloudy brows and eyes that would reveal no secret, she stood before +the high seat where the Queen sat pale and majestic. + +"Is it well with the boy?" the Queen asked earnestly. + +"Well," said Dwaymenau, fingering the silver bosses of her girdle. + +"Then--is there more to say?" The tone was that of the great lady who +courteously ends an audience. "There is more. The men brought in the +body and in its throat your dagger was sticking. And my son has told me +that your body was a shield to him. You offered your life for his. I did +not think to thank you--but I thank you." She ended abruptly and still +her eyes had never met the Queen's. + +"I accept your thanks. Yet a mother could do no less." + +The tone was one of dismissal but still Dwaymenau lingered. + +"The dagger," she said and drew it from her bosom. On the clear, pointed +blade the blood had curdled and dried. "I never thought to ask a gift of +you, but this dagger is a memorial of my son's danger. May I keep it?" + +"As you will. Here is the sheath." From her girdle she drew it--rough +silver, encrusted with rubies from the mountains. + +The hand rejected it. + +"Jewels I cannot take, but bare steel is a fitting gift between us two." + +"As you will." + +The Queen spoke compassionately, and Dwaymenau, still with veiled eyes, +was gone without fare well. The empty sheath lay on the seat--a symbol +of the sharp-edged hate that had passed out of her life. She touched the +sheath to her lips and, smiling, laid it away. + +And the days went by and Dwaymenau came no more before her, and her days +were fulfilled with peace. And now again the Queen ruled in the palace +wisely and like a Queen, and this Dwaymenau did not dispute, but what +her thoughts were no man could tell. + +Then came the end. + +One night the city awakened to a wild alarm. A terrible fleet of +war-boats came sweeping along the river thick as locusts--the war fleet +of the Lord of Prome. Battle shouts broke the peace of the night +to horror; axes battered on the outer doors; the roofs of the outer +buildings were all aflame. It was no wonderful incident, but a common +one enough of those turbulent days--reprisal by a powerful ruler with +raids and hates to avenge on the Lord of the Golden Palace. It was +indeed a right to be gainsaid only by the strong arm, and the strong arm +was absent; as for the men of Pagan, if the guard failed and the women's +courage sank, they would return to blackened walls, empty chambers and +desolation. + +At Pagan the guard was small, indeed, for the King's greed of plunder +had taken almost every able man with him. Still, those who were left +did what they could, and the women, alert and brave, with but few +exceptions, gathered the children and handed such weapons as they could +muster to the men, and themselves, taking knives and daggers, helped to +defend the inner rooms. + +In the farthest, the Queen, having given her commands and encouraged all +with brave words, like a wise, prudent princess, sat with her son beside +her. Her duty was now to him. Loved or unloved, he was still the heir, +the root of the House tree. If all failed, she must make ransom +and terms for him, and, if they died, it must be together. He, with +sparkling eyes, gay in the danger, stood by her. Thus Dwaymenau found +them. + +She entered quietly and without any display of emotion and stood before +the high seat. + +"Great Queen"--she used that title for the first time--"the leader is +Meng Kyinyo of Prome. There is no mercy. The end is near. Our men fall +fast, the women are fleeing. I have come to say this thing: Save the +Prince." + +"And how?" asked the Queen, still seated. "I have no power." + +"I have sent to Maung Tin, abbot of the Golden Monastery, and he has +said this thing. In the Kyoung across the river he can hide one child +among the novices. Cut his hair swiftly and put upon him this yellow +robe. The time is measured in minutes." + +Then the Queen perceived, standing by the pillar, a monk of a stern, +dark presence, the creature of Dwaymenau. For an instant she pondered. +Was the woman selling the child to death? Dwaymenau spoke no word. +Her face was a mask. A minute that seemed an hour drifted by, and the +yelling and shrieks for mercy drew nearer. + +"There will be pursuit," said the Queen. "They will slay him on the +river. Better here with me." + +"There will be no pursuit." Dwaymenau fixed her strange eyes on the +Queen for the first time. + +What moved in those eyes? The Queen could not tell. But despairing, +she rose and went to the silent monk, leading the Prince by the hand. +Swiftly he stripped the child of the silk pasoh of royalty, swiftly +he cut the long black tresses knotted on the little head, and upon the +slender golden body he set the yellow robe worn by the Lord Himself on +earth, and in the small hand he placed the begging-bowl of the Lord. +And now, remote and holy, in the dress that is of all most sacred, the +Prince, standing by the monk, turned to his mother and looked with grave +eyes upon her, as the child Buddha looked upon his Mother--also a Queen. +But Dwaymenau stood by silent and lent no help as the Queen folded the +Prince in her arms and laid his hand in the hand of the monk and saw +them pass away among the pillars, she standing still and white. + +She turned to her rival. "If you have meant truly, I thank you." + +"I have meant truly." + +She turned to go, but the Queen caught her by the hand. + +"Why have you done this?" she asked, looking into the strange eyes of +the strange woman. + +Something like tears gathered in them for a moment, but she brushed them +away as she said hurriedly: + +"I was grateful. You saved my son. Is it not enough?" + +"No, not enough!" cried the Queen. "There is more. Tell me, for death is +upon us." + +"His footsteps are near," said the Indian. "I will speak. I love my +lord. In death I will not cheat him. What you have known is true. My +child is no child of his. I will not go down to death with a lie upon my +lips. Come and see." + +Dwaymenau was no more. Sundari, the Indian woman, awful and calm, led +the Queen down the long ball and into her own chamber, where Mindon, the +child, slept a drugged sleep. The Queen felt that she had never known +her; she herself seemed diminished in stature as she followed the +stately figure, with its still, dark face. Into this room the enemy were +breaking, shouldering their way at the door--a rabble of terrible faces. +Their fury was partly checked when only a sleeping child and two women +confronted them, but their leader, a grim and evil-looking man, strode +from the huddle. + +"Where is the son of the King?" he shouted. "Speak, women! Whose is this +boy?" + +Sundari laid her hand upon her son's shoulder. Not a muscle of her face +flickered. + +"This is his son." + +"His true son--the son of Maya the Queen?" + +"His true son, the son of Maya the Queen." + +"Not the younger--the mongrel?" + +"The younger--the mongrel died last week of a fever." + +Every moment of delay was precious. Her eyes saw only a monk and a boy +fleeing across the wide river. + +"Which is Maya the Queen?" + +"This," said Sundari. "She cannot speak. It is her son--the Prince." + +Maya had veiled her face with her hands. Her brain swam, but she +understood the noble lie. This woman could love. Their lord would not be +left childless. Thought beat like pulses in her--raced along her veins. +She held her breath and was dumb. + +His doubt was assuaged and the lust of vengeance was on him--a madness +seized the man. But even his own wild men shrank back a moment, for to +slay a sleeping child in cold blood is no man's work. + +"You swear it is the Prince. But why? Why do you not lie to save him if +you are the King's woman?" + +"Because his mother has trampled me to the earth. I am the Indian +woman--the mother of the younger, who is dead and safe. She jeered at +me--she mocked me. It is time I should see her suffer. Suffer now as I +have suffered, Maya the Queen!" + +This was reasonable--this was like the women he had known. His doubt was +gone--he laughed aloud. + +"Then feed full of vengeance!" he cried, and drove his knife through the +child's heart. + +For a moment Sundari wavered where she stood, but she held herself and +was rigid as the dead. + +"Tha-du! Well done!" she said with an awful smile. "The tree is broken, +the roots cut. And now for us women--our fate, O master?" + +"Wait here," he answered. "Let not a hair of their heads be touched. +Both are fair. The two for me. For the rest draw lots when all is done." + +The uproar surged away. The two stood by the dead boy. So swift had been +his death that he lay as though he still slept--the black lashes pressed +upon his cheek. + +With the heredity of their different races upon them, neither wept. But +silently the Queen opened her arms; wide as a woman that entreats +she opened them to the Indian Queen, and speechlessly the two clung +together. For a while neither spoke. + +"My sister!" said Maya the Queen. And again, "O great of heart!" + +She laid her cheek against Sundari's, and a wave of solemn joy seemed to +break in her soul and flood it with life and light. + +"Had I known sooner!" she said. "For now the night draws on." + +"What is time?" answered the Rajput woman. "We stand before the Lords of +Life and Death. The life you gave was yours, and I am unworthy to kiss +the feet of the Queen. Our lord will return and his son is saved. The +House can be rebuilt. My son and I were waifs washed up from the sea. +Another wave washes us back to nothingness. Tell him my story and he +will loathe me." + +"My lips are shut," said the Queen. "Should I betray my sister's honour? +When he speaks of the noble women of old, your name will be among them. +What matters which of us he loves and remembers? Your soul and mine have +seen the same thing, and we are one. But I--what have I to do with life? +The ship and the bed of the conqueror await us. Should we await them, my +sister?" + +The bright tears glittered in the eyes of Sundari at the tender name and +the love in the face of the Queen. At last she accepted it. + +"My sister, no," she said, and drew from her bosom the dagger of Maya, +with the man's blood rusted upon it. "Here is the way. I have kept this +dagger in token of my debt. Nightly have I kissed it, swearing that, +when the time came, I would repay my debt to the great Queen. Shall I go +first or follow, my sister?" + +Her voice lingered on the word. It was precious to her. It was like +clear water, laying away the stain of the shameful years. + +"Your arm is strong," answered the Queen. "I go first. Because the +King's son is safe, I bless you. For your love of the King, I love you. +And here, standing on the verge of life, I testify that the words of the +Blessed One are truth--that love is All; that hatred is Nothing." + +She bared the breast that this woman had made desolate--that, with the +love of this woman, was desolate ho longer, and, stooping, laid her hand +on the brow of Mindon. Once more they embraced, and then, strong and +true, and with the Rajput passion behind the blow, the stroke fell and +Sundari had given her sister the crowning mercy of deliverance. She +laid the body beside her own son, composing the stately limbs, the quiet +eyelids, the black lengths of hair into majesty. So, she thought, in the +great temple of the Rajput race, the Mother Goddess shed silence and awe +upon her worshippers. The two lay like mother and son--one slight hand +of the Queen she laid across the little body as if to guard it. + +Her work done, she turned to the entrance and watched the dawn coming +glorious over the river. The men shouted and quarreled in the distance, +but she heeded them no more than the chattering of apes. Her heart was +away over the distance to the King, but with no passion now: so might a +mother have thought of her son. He was sleeping, forgetful of even her +in his dreams. What matter? She was glad at heart. The Queen was dearer +to her than the King--so strange is life; so healing is death. She +remembered without surprise that she had asked no forgiveness of the +Queen for all the cruel wrongs, for the deadly intent--had made no +confession. Again what matter? What is forgiveness when love is all? + +She turned from the dawn-light to the light in the face of the Queen. +It was well. Led by such a hand, she could present herself without fear +before the Lords of Life and Death--she and the child. She smiled. Life +is good, but death, which is more life, is better. The son of the King +was safe, but her own son safer. + +When the conqueror reentered the chamber, he found the dead Queen +guarding the dead child, and across her feet, as not worthy to lie +beside her, was the body of the Indian woman, most beautiful in death. + + + + +FIRE OF BEAUTY + +(Salutation to Ganesa the Lord of Wisdom, and to Saraswate the Lady of +Sweet Speech!) + +This story was composed by the Brahmin Visravas, that dweller on the +banks of holy Kashi; and though the events it records are long past, yet +it is absolutely and immutably true because, by the power of his yoga, +he summoned up every scene before him, and beheld the persons moving +and speaking as in life. Thus he had naught to do but to set down what +befell. + +What follows, that hath he seen. + + +I + +Wide was the plain, the morning sun shining full upon it, drinking up +the dew as the Divine drinks up the spirit of man. Far it stretched, +resembling the ocean, and riding upon it like a stately ship was the +league-long Rock of Chitor. It is certainly by the favour of the Gods +that this great fortress of the Rajput Kings thus rises from the plain, +leagues in length, noble in height; and very strange it is to see the +flat earth fall away from it like waters from the bows of a boat, as it +soars into the sky with its burden of palaces and towers. + +Here dwelt the Queen Padmini and her husband Bhimsi, the Rana of the +Rajputs. + +The sight of the holy ascetic Visravas pierced even the secrets of the +Rani's bower, where, in the inmost chamber of marble, carved until it +appeared like lace of the foam of the sea, she was seated upon cushions +of blue Bokhariot silk, like the lotus whose name she bore floating upon +the blue depths of the lake. She had just risen from the shallow bath of +marble at her feet. + +Most beautiful was this Queen, a haughty beauty such as should be a +Rajput lady; for the name "Rajput" signifies Son of a King, and this +lady was assuredly the daughter of Kings and of no lesser persons. And +since that beauty is long since ashes (all things being transitory), +it is permitted to describe the mellowed ivory of her body, the smooth +curves of her hips, and the defiance of her glimmering bosom, half +veiled by the long silken tresses of sandal-scented hair which a maiden +on either side, bowing toward her, knotted upon her head. But even +he who with his eyes has seen it can scarce tell the beauty of her +face--the slender arched nose, the great eyes like lakes of darkness +in the reeds of her curled lashes, the mouth of roses, the glance, +deer-like but proud, that courted and repelled admiration. This cannot +be told, nor could the hand of man paint it. Scarcely could that fair +wife of the Pandava Prince, Draupadi the Beautiful (who bore upon her +perfect form every auspicious mark) excel this lady. + +(Ashes--ashes! May Maheshwara have mercy upon her rebirths!) + +Throughout India had run the fame of this beauty. In the bazaar of +Kashmir they told of it. It was recorded in the palaces of Travancore, +and all the lands that lay between; and in an evil hour--may the Gods +curse the mother that bore him!--it reached the ears of Allah-u-Din, the +Moslem dog, a very great fighting man who sat in Middle India, looting +and spoiling. + +(Ahi! for the beauty that is as a burning flame!) + +In the gardens beneath the windows of the Queen, the peacocks, those +maharajas of the birds, were spreading the bronze and emerald of their +tails. The sun shone on them as on heaps of jewels, so that they dazzled +the eyes. They stood about the feet of the ancient Brahmin sage, he +who had tutored the Queen in her childhood and given her wisdom as the +crest-jeweled of her loveliness. He, the Twice-born sat under the shade +of a neem tree, hearing the gurgle of the sacred waters from the Cow's +Mouth, where the great tank shone under the custard-apple boughs; and, +at peace with all the world, he read in the Scripture which affirms the +transience of all things drifting across the thought of the Supreme like +clouds upon the surface of the Ocean. + +(Ahi! that loveliness is also illusion!) + +Her women placed about the Queen--that Lotus of Women--a robe of silk +of which none could say that it was green or blue, the noble colours so +mingled into each other under the latticed gold work of Kashi. They set +the jewels on her head, and wide thin rings of gold heavy with great +pearls in her ears. Upon the swell of her bosom they clasped the +necklace of table emeralds, large, deep, and full of green lights, which +is the token of the Chitor queens. Upon her slender ankles they placed +the chooris of pure soft gold, set also with grass-green emeralds, and +the delicate souls of her feet they reddened with lac. Nor were her arms +forgotten, but loaded with bangles so free from alloy that they could be +bent between the hands of a child. Then with fine paste they painted the +Symbol between her dark brows, and, rising, she shone divine as a nymph +of heaven who should cause the righteous to stumble in his austerities +and arrest even the glances of Gods. + +(Ahi! that the Transient should be so fair!) + + +II + +Now it was the hour that the Rana should visit her; for since the coming +of the Lotus Lady, he had forgotten his other women, and in her was all +his heart. He came from the Hall of Audience where petitions were heard, +and justice done to rich and poor; and as he came, the Queen, hearing +his step on the stone, dismissed her women, and smiling to know her +loveliness, bowed before him, even as the Goddess Uma bows before Him +who is her other half. + +Now he was a tall man, with the falcon look of the Hill Rajputs, and +moustaches that curled up to his eyes, lion-waisted and lean in the +flanks like Arjoon himself, a very ruler of men; and as he came, his +hand was on the hilt of the sword that showed beneath his gold coat of +khincob. On the high cushions he sat, and the Rani a step beneath him; +and she said, raising her lotus eyes:-- + +"Speak, Aryaputra, (son of a noble father)--what hath befallen?" + +And he, looking upon her beauty with fear, replied,-- + +"It is thy beauty, O wife, that brings disaster." + +"And how is this?" she asked very earnestly. + +For a moment he paused, regarding her as might a stranger, as one +who considers a beauty in which he hath no part; and, drawn by this +strangeness, she rose and knelt beside him, pillowing her head upon his +heart. + +"Say on," she said in her voice of music. + +He unfurled a scroll that he had crushed in his strong right hand, and +read aloud:-- + + "'Thus says Allah-u-Din, Shadow of God, Wonder of the Age, +Viceregent of Kings. We have heard that in the Treasury of Chitor is a +jewel, the like of which is not in the Four Seas--the work of the hand +of the Only God, to whom be praise! This jewel is thy Queen, the Lady +Padmini. Now, since the sons of the Prophet are righteous, I desire but +to look upon this jewel, and ascribing glory to the Creator, to depart +in peace. Granted requests are the bonds of friendship; therefore +lay the head of acquiescence in the dust of opportunity and name an +auspicious day.'" + +He crushed it again and flung it furiously from him on the marble. + +"The insult is deadly. The sorry son of a debased mother! Well he knows +that to the meanest Rajput his women are sacred, and how much more the +daughters and wives of the Kings! The jackals feast on the tongue that +speaks this shame! But it is a threat, Beloved--a threat! Give me thy +counsel that never failed me yet." + +For the Rajputs take counsel with their women who are wise. + +They were silent, each weighing the force of resistance that could be +made; and this the Rani knew even as he. + +"It cannot be," she said; "the very ashes of the dead would shudder to +hear. Shall the Queens of India be made the sport of the barbarians?" + +Her husband looked upon her fair face. She could feel his heart labor +beneath her ear. + +"True, wife; but the barbarians are strong. Our men are tigers, each +one, but the red dogs of the Dekkan can pull down the tiger, for they +are many, and he alone." + +Then that great Lady, accepting his words, and conscious of the danger, +murmured this, clinging to her husband:-- + +"There was a Princess of our line whose beauty made all other women seem +as waning moons in the sun's splendour. And many great Kings sought her, +and there was contention and war. And, she, fearing that the Rajputs +would be crushed to powder between the warring Kings, sent unto each +this message: 'Come on such and such a day, and thou shalt see my face +and hear my choice.' And they, coming, rejoiced exceedingly, thinking +each one that he was the Chosen. So they came into the great Hall, and +there was a table, and somewhat upon it covered with a gold cloth; and +an old veiled woman lifted the gold, and the head of the Princess lay +there with the lashes like night upon her cheek, and between her lips +was a little scroll, saying this: 'I have chosen my Lover and my Lord, +and he is mightiest, for he is Death.'--So the Kings went silently away. +And there was Peace." + +The music of her voice ceased, and the Rana clasped her closer. + +"This I cannot do. Better die together. Let us take counsel with the +ancient Brahman, thy guru [teacher], for he is very wise." + +She clapped her hands, and the maidens returned, and, bowing, brought +the venerable Prabhu Narayan into the Presence, and again those roses +retired. + +Respectful salutation was then offered by the King and the Queen to that +saint, hoary with wisdom--he who had seen her grow into the loveliness +of the sea-born Shri, yet had never seen that loveliness; for he had +never raised his eyes above the chooris about her ankles. To him the +King related his anxieties; and he sat rapt in musing, and the two +waited in dutiful silence until long minutes had fallen away; and at the +last he lifted his head, weighted with wisdom, and spoke. + +"O King, Descendant of Rama! this outrage cannot be. Yet, knowing the +strength and desire of this obscene one and the weakness of our power, +it is plain that only with cunning can cunning be met. Hear, therefore, +the history of the Fox and the Drum. + +"A certain Fox searched for food in the jungle, and so doing beheld +a tree on which hung a drum; and when the boughs knocked upon the +parchment, it sounded aloud. Considering, he believed that so round a +form and so great a voice must portend much good feeding. Neglecting on +this account a fowl that fed near by, he ascended to the drum. The drum +being rent was but air and parchment, and meanwhile the fowl fled away. +And from the eye of folly he shed the tear of disappointment, having +bartered the substance for the shadow. So must we act with this budmash +[scoundrel]. First, receiving his oath that he will depart without +violence, hid him hither to a great feast, and say that he shall behold +the face of the Queen in a mirror. Provide that some fair woman of +the city show her face, and then let him depart in peace, showing him +friendship. He shall not know he hath not seen the beauty he would +befoul." + +After consultation, no better way could be found; but the heart of the +great Lady was heavy with foreboding. + +(A hi! that Beauty should wander a pilgrim in the ways of sorrow!) + +To Allah-u-Din therefore did the King dispatch this letter by swift +riders on mares of Mewar. + +After salutations--"Now whereas thou hast said thou wouldest look upon +the beauty of the Treasure of Chitor, know it is not the custom of the +Rajputs that any eye should light upon their treasure. Yet assuredly, +when requests arise between friends, there cannot fail to follow +distress of mind and division of soul if these are ungranted. So, under +promises that follow, I bid thee to a feast at my poor house of Chitor, +and thou shalt see that beauty reflected in a mirror, and so seeing, +depart in peace from the house of a friend." + +This being writ by the Twice-Born, the Brahman, did the Rana sign with +bitter rage in his heart. And the days passed. + + +III + +On a certain day found fortunate by the astrologers--a day of early +winter, when the dawns were pure gold and the nights radiant with a +cool moon--did a mighty troop of Moslems set their camp on the plain of +Chitor. It was as if a city had blossomed in an hour. Those who looked +from the walls muttered prayers to the Lord of the Trident; for these +men seemed like the swarms of the locust--people, warriors all, fierce +fighting-men. And in the ways of Chitor, and up the steep and winding +causeway from the plains, were warriors also, the chosen of the Rajputs, +thick as blades of corn hedging the path. + +(Ahi! that the blossom of beauty should have swords for thorns!) + +Then, leaving his camp, attended by many Chiefs,--may the mothers and +sires that begot them be accursed!--came Allah-u-Din, riding toward the +Lower Gate, and so upward along the causeway, between the two rows of +men who neither looked nor spoke, standing like the carvings of war in +the Caves of Ajunta. And the moon was rising through the sunset as he +came beneath the last and seventh gate. Through the towers and palaces +he rode with his following, but no woman, veiled or unveiled,--no, not +even an outcast of the city,--was there to see him come; only the men, +armed and silent. So he turned to Munim Khan that rode at his bridle, +saying,-- + +"Let not the eye of watchfulness close this night on the pillow of +forgetfulness!" + +And thus he entered the palace. + +Very great was the feast in Chitor, and the wines that those accursed +should not drink (since the Outcast whom they call their Prophet forbade +them) ran like water, and at the right hand of Allah-u-Din was set the +great crystal Cup inlaid with gold by a craft that is now perished; and +he filled and refilled it--may his own Prophet curse the swine! + +But because the sons of Kings eat not with the outcasts, the Rana +entered after, clothed in chain armor of blue steel, and having greeted +him, bid him to the sight of that Treasure. And Allah-u-Din, his eyes +swimming with wine, and yet not drunken, followed, and the two went +alone. + +Purdahs [curtains] of great splendour were hung in the great Hall that +is called the Raja's Hall, exceeding rich with gold, and in front of the +opening was a kneeling-cushion, and an a gold stool before it a polished +mirror. + +(Ahi! for gold and beauty, the scourges of the world!) + +And the Rana was pale to the lips. + +Now as the Princes stood by the purdah, a veiled woman, shrouded in +white so that no shape could be seen in her, came forth from within, +and kneeling upon the cushion, she unveiled her face bending until +the mirror, like a pool of water, held it, and that only. And the King +motioned his guest to look, and he looked over her veiled shoulder +and saw. Very great was the bowed beauty that the mirror held, but +Allah-u-Din turned to the Rana. + +"By the Bread and the Salt, by the Guest-Right, by the Honour of thy +House, I ask--is this the Treasure of Chitor?" + +And since the Sun-Descended cannot lie, no, not though they perish, the +Rana answered, flushing darkly,--"This is not the Treasure. Wilt thou +spare?" + +But he would not, and the woman slipped like a shadow behind the purdah +and no word said. + +Then was heard the tinkling of chooris, and the little noise fell upon +the silence like a fear, and, parting the curtains, came a woman veiled +like the other. She did not kneel, but took the mirror in her hand, and +Allah-u-Din drew up behind her back. From her face she raised the veil +of gold Dakka webs, and gazed into the mirror, holding it high, and that +Accursed stumbled back, blinded with beauty, saying this only,--"I have +seen the Treasure of Chitor." + +So the purdah fell about her. + +The next day, after the Imaum of the Accursed had called them to prayer, +they departed, and Allah-u-Din, paying thanks to the Rana for honours +given and taken, and swearing friendship, besought him to ride to his +camp, to see the marvels of gold and steel armor brought down from the +passes, swearing also safe-conduct. And because the Rajputs trust the +word even of a foe, he went. + +(A hi! that honour should strike hands with traitors!) + + +IV + +The hours went by, heavy-footed like mourners. Padmini the Rani knelt by +the window in her tower that overlooks the plains. Motionless she knelt +there, as the Goddess Uma lost in her penances, and she saw her Lord +ride forth, and the sparkle of steel where the sun shone on them, and +the Standard of the Cold Disk on its black ground. So the camp of the +Moslem swallowed them up, and they returned no more. Still she knelt and +none dared speak with her; and as the first shade of evening fell across +the hills of Rajasthan, she saw a horseman spurting over the flat; and +he rode like the wind, and, seeing, she implored the Gods. + +Then entered the Twice-Born, that saint of clear eyes, and he bore a +scroll; and she rose and seated herself, and he stood by her, as her +ladies cowered like frightened doves before the woe in his face as he +read. + +"To the Rose of Beauty, The Pearl among Women, the Chosen of the Palace. +Who, having seen thy loveliness, can look on another? Who, having tasted +the wine of the Houris, but thirsts forever? Behold, I have thy King as +hostage. Come thou and deliver him. I have sworn that he shall return in +thy place." + +And from a smaller scroll, the Brahman read this:-- + +"I am fallen in the snare. Act thou as becomes a Rajputni." + +Then that Daughter of the Sun lifted her head, for the thronging of +armed feet was heard in the Council Hall below. From the floor she +caught her veil and veiled herself in haste, and the Brahman with bowed +head followed, while her women mourned aloud. And, descending, between +the folds of the purdah she appeared white and veiled, and the Brahman +beside her, and the eyes of all the Princes were lowered to her shrouded +feet, while the voice they had not heard fell silvery upon the air, and +the echoes of the high roof repeated it. + +"Chief of the Rajputs, what is your counsel?" And he of Marwar stepped +forward, and not raising his eyes above her feet, answered,-- + +"Queen, what is thine?" + +For the Rajputs have ever heard the voice of their women. + +And she said,-- + +"I counsel that I die and my head be sent to him, that my blood may +quench his desire." + +And each talked eagerly with the other, but amid the tumult the +Twice-Born said,-- + +"This is not good talk. In his rage he will slay the King. By my yoga, I +have seen it. Seek another way." + +So they sought, but could determine nothing, and they feared to ride +against the dog, for he held the life of the King; and the tumult was +great, but all were for the King's safety. + +Then once more she spoke. + +"Seeing it is determined that the King's life is more than my honour, +I go this night. In your hand I leave my little son, the Prince Ajeysi. +Prepare my litters, seven hundred of the best, for all my women go with +me. Depart now, for I have a thought from the Gods." + +Then, returning to her bower, she spoke this letter to the saint, and he +wrote it, and it was sent to the camp. + +After salutations--"Wisdom and strength have attained their end. Have +ready for release the Rana of Chitor, for this night I come with my +ladies, the prize of the conqueror." + +When the sun sank, a great procession with torches descended the steep +way of Chitor--seven hundred litters, and in the first was borne the +Queen, and all her women followed. + +All the streets were thronged with women, weeping and beating their +breasts. Very greatly they wept, and no men were seen, for their livers +were black within them for shame as the Treasure of Chitor departed, +nor would they look upon the sight. And across the plains went that +procession; as if the stars had fallen upon the earth, so glittered the +sorrowful lights of the Queen. + +But in the camp was great rejoicing, for the Barbarians knew that many +fair women attended on her. + +Now, before the entrance to the camp they had made a great shamiana +[tent] ready, hung with shawls of Kashmir and the plunder of Delhi; and +there was set a silk divan for the Rani, and beside it stood the Loser +and the Gainer, Allah-u-Din and the King, awaiting the Treasure. + +Veiled she entered, stepping proudly, and taking no heed of the Moslem, +she stood before her husband, and even through the veil he could feel +the eyes he knew. + +And that Accursed spoke, laughing. + +"I have won-I have won, O King! Bid farewell to the Chosen of the +Palace--the Beloved of the Viceregent of Kings!" + +Then she spoke softly, delicately, in her own tongue, that the outcast +should not guess the matter of her speech. + +"Stand by me. Stir not. And when I raise my arm, cry the cry of the +Rajputs. NOW!" + +And she flung her arm above her head, and instantly, like a lion +roaring, he shouted, drawing his sword, and from every litter sprang an +armed man, glittering in steel, and the bearers, humble of mien, were +Rajput knights, every one. + +And Allah-u-Din thrust at the breast of the Queen; but around them +surged the war, and she was hedged with swords like a rose in the +thickets. + +Very full of wine, dull with feasting and lust and surprised, the +Moslems fled across the plains, streaming in a broken rabble, cursing +and shouting like low-caste women; and the Rajputs, wiping their swords, +returned from the pursuit and laughed upon each other. + +But what shall be said of the joy of the King and of her who had +imagined this thing, instructed of the Goddess who is the other half of +her Lord? + +So the procession returned, singing, to Chitor with those Two in the +midst; but among the dogs that fled was Allah-u-Din, his face blackened +with shame and wrath, the curses choking in his foul throat. + +(Aid! that the evil still walk the ways of the world!) + + +V + +So the time went by and the beauty of the Queen grew, and her King could +see none but hers. Like the moon she obscured the stars, and every day +he remembered her wisdom, her valour, and his soul did homage at her +feet, and there was great content in Chitor. + +It chanced one day that the Queen, looking from her high window that +like an eagle's nest overhung the precipice, saw, on the plain beneath, +a train of men, walking like ants, and each carried a basket on his +back, and behind them was a cloud of dust like a great army. Already the +city was astir because of this thing, and the rumours came thick and the +spies were sent out. + +In the dark they returned, and the Rana entered the bower of Padmini, +his eyes burning like coal with hate and wrath, and he flung his arm +round his wife like a shield. + +"He is returned, and in power. Counsel me again, O wife, for great is +thy wisdom!" + +But she answered only this,-- + +"Fight, for this time it is to the death." + +Then each day she watched bow the baskets of earth, emptied upon the +plain at first, made nothing, an ant heap whereat fools might laugh. But +each day as the trains of men came, spilling their baskets, the great +earthworks grew and their height mounted. Day after day the Rajputs rode +forth and slew; and as they slew it seemed that all the teeming millions +of the earth came forth to take the places of the slain. And the Rajputs +fell also, and under the pennons the thundering forces returned daily, +thinned of their best. + +(A hi! that Evil rules the world as God!) + +And still the earth grew up to the heights, and the protection of the +hills was slowly withdrawn from Chitor, for on the heights they made +they set their engines of war. + +Then in a red dawn that great saint Narayan came to the Queen, where she +watched by her window, and spoke. + +"O great lady, I have dreamed a fearful dream. Nay, rather have I seen a +vision." + +With her face set like a sword, the Queen said,-- + +"Say on." + +"In a light red like blood, I waked, and beside me stood the +Mother,--Durga,--awful to see, with a girdle of heads about her middle; +and the drops fell thick and slow from That which she held in her hand, +and in the other was her sickle of Doom. Nor did she speak, but my soul +heard her words." + +"Narrate them." + +"She commanded: 'Say this to the Rana: "In Chitor is My altar; in Chitor +is thy throne. If thou wouldest save either, send forth twelve crowned +Kings of Chitor to die.'" + +As he said this, the Rana, fore-spent with fighting, entered and heard +the Divine word. + +Now there were twelve princes of the Rajput blood, and the youngest was +the son of Padmini. What choice had these most miserable but to appease +the dreadful anger of the Goddess? So on each fourth day a King of +Chitor was crowned, and for three days sat upon the throne, and on the +fourth day, set in the front, went forth and died fighting. So perished +eleven Kings of Chitor, and now there was left but the little Ajeysi, +the son of the Queen. + +And that day was a great Council called. + +Few were there. On the plains many lay dead; holding the gates many +watched; but the blood was red in their hearts and flowed like Indus in +the melting of the snows. And to them spoke the Rana, his hand clenched +on his sword, and the other laid on the small dark head of the Prince +Ajeysi, who stood between his knees. And as he spoke his voice gathered +strength till it rang through the hall like the voice of Indra when he +thunders in the heavens. + +"Men of the Rajputs, this child shall not die. Are we become jackals +that we fall upon the weak and tear them? When have we put our women +and children in the forefront of the war? I--I only am King of Chitor. +Narayan shall save this child for the time that will surely come. And +for us--what shall we do? I die for Chitor!" + +And like the hollow waves of a great sea they answered him,-- + +"We will die for Chitor." + +There was silence and Marwar spoke. + +"The women?" + +"Do they not know the duty of a Rajputni?" said the King. "My household +has demanded that the caves be prepared." + +And the men clashed stew joy with their swords, and the council +dispersed. + +Then that very great saint, the Twice-Born, put off the sacred thread +that is the very soul of the Brahman. In his turban he wound it +secretly, and he stained his noble Aryan body until it resembled the +Pariahs, foul for the pure to see, loathsome for the pure to touch, +and he put on him the rags of the lowest of the earth, and taking the +Prince, he removed from the body of the child every trace of royal and +Rajput birth, and he appeared like a child of the Bhils--the vile forest +wanderers that shame not to defile their lips with carrion. And in this +guise they stood before the Queen; and when she looked on the saint, the +tears fell from her eyes like rain, not for grief for her son, nor for +death, but that for their sake the pure should be made impure and the +glory of the Brahman-hood be defiled. And she fell at the old man's feet +and laid her head on the ground before him. + +"Rise, daughter!" he said, "and take comfort! Are not the eyes of the +Gods clear that they should distinguish?--and this day we stand before +the God of Gods. Have not the Great Ones said, 'That which causes life +causes also decay and death'? Therefore we who go and you who stay are +alike a part of the Divine. Embrace now your child and bless him, for we +depart. And it is on account of the sacrifice of the Twelve that he is +saved alive." + +So, controlling her tears, she rose, and clasping the child to her +bosom, she bade him be of good cheer since he went with the Gods. And +that great saint took his hand from hers, and for the first time in the +life of the Queen he raised his aged eyes to her face, and she gazed at +him; but what she read, even the ascetic Visravas, who saw all by +the power of his yoga, could not tell, for it was beyond speech. Very +certainly the peace thereafter possessed her. + +So those two went out by the secret ways of the rocks, and wandering +far, were saved by the favour of Durga. + + +VI + +And the nights went by and the days, and the time came that no longer +could they hold Chitor, and all hope was dead. + +On a certain day the Rana and the Rani stood for the last time in her +bower, and looked down into the city; and in the streets were gathered +in a very wonderful procession the women of Chitor; and not one was +veiled. Flowers that had bloomed in the inner chambers, great ladies +jewelled for a festival, young brides, aged mothers, and girl children +clinging to the robes of their mothers who held their babes, crowded the +ways. Even the low-caste women walked with measured steps and proudly, +decked in what they had of best, their eyes lengthened with soorma, and +flowers in the darkness of their hair. + +The Queen was clothed in a gold robe of rejoicing, her bodice latticed +with diamonds and great gems, and upon her bosom the necklace of table +emeralds, alight with green fire, which is the jewel of the Queens of +Chitor. So she stood radiant as a vision of Shri, and it appeared that +rays encircled her person. + +And the Rana, unarmed save for his sword, had the saffron dress of a +bridegroom and the jeweled cap of the Rajput Kings, and below in the +hall were the Princes and Chiefs, clad even as he. + +Then, raising her lotus eyes to her lord, the Princess said,-- + +"Beloved, the time is come, and we have chosen rightly, for this is +the way of honour, and it is but another link forged in the chain of +existence; for until existence itself is ended and rebirth destroyed, +still shall we meet in lives to come and still be husband and wife. What +room then for despair?" + +And he answered,-- + +"This is true. Go first, wife, and I follow. Let not the door swing to +behind thee. But oh, to see thy beauty once more that is the very speech +of Gods with men! Wilt thou surely come again to me and again be fair?" + +And for all answer she smiled upon him, and at his feet performed the +obeisance of the Rajput wife when she departs upon a journey; and they +went out together, the Queen unveiled. + +As she passed through the Princes, they lowered their eyes so that none +saw her; but when she stood on the steps of the palace, the women all +turned eagerly toward her like stars about the moon, and lifting their +arms, they began to sing the dirge of the Rajput women. + +So they marched, and in great companies they marched, company behind +company, young and old, past the Queen, saluting her and drawing courage +from the loveliness and kindness of her unveiled face. + +In the rocks beneath the palaces of Chitor are very great caves--league +long and terrible, with ways of darkness no eyes have seen; and it +is believed that in times past spirits have haunted them with strange +wailings. In these was prepared great store of wood and oils and +fragrant matters for burning. So to these caves they marched and, +company by company, disappeared into the darkness; and the voice of +their singing grew faint and hollow, and died away, as the men stood +watching their women go. + +Now, when this was done and the last had gone, the Rani descended the +steps, and the Rana, taking a torch dipped in fragrant oils, followed +her, and the Princes walked after, clad like bridegrooms but with no +faces of bridal joy. At the entrance of the caves, having lit the torch, +he gave it into her hand, and she, receiving it and smiling, turned once +upon the threshold, and for the first time those Princes beheld the face +of the Queen, but they hid their eyes with their hands when they had +seen. So she departed within, and the Rana shut to the door and barred +and bolted it, and the men with him flung down great rocks before it so +that none should know the way, nor indeed is it known to this day; and +with their hands on their swords they waited there, not speaking, until +a great smoke rose between the crevices of the rocks, but no sound at +all. + +(Ashes of roses--ashes of roses!--Ahi! for beauty that is but touched +and remitted!) + +The sun was high when those men with their horses and on foot marched +down the winding causeway beneath the seven gates, and so forth into the +plains, and charging unarmed upon the Moslems, they perished every man. +After, it was asked of one who had seen the great slaughter,-- + +"Say how my King bore himself." + +And he who had seen told this:-- + +"Reaper of the harvest of battle, on the bed of honour he has spread a +carpet of the slain! He sleeps ringed about by his enemies. How can the +world tell of his deeds? The tongue is silent." + +When that Accursed, Allah-u-Din, came up the winding height of the +hills, he found only a dead city, and his heart was sick within him. + +Now this is the Sack of Chitor, and by the Oath of the Sack of Chitor do +the Rajputs swear when they bind their honour. + +But it is only the ascetic Visravas who by the power of his yoga has +heard every word, and with his eyes beheld that Flame of Beauty, who, +for a brief space illuminating the world as a Queen, returns to birth in +many a shape of sorrowful loveliness until the Blue-throated God shall +in his favour destroy her rebirths. + +Salutation to Ganesa the Elephant-Headed One, and to Shri the Lady of +Beauty! + + + + +THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL + + In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful--the Smiting! + A day when the soul shall know what it has sent on or kept back. + A day when no soul shall control aught for another. + And the bidding belongs to God. + + +THE KORAN. + +I + +Now the Shah-in-Shah, Shah Jahan, Emperor in India, loved his wife with +a great love. And of all the wives of the Mogul Emperors surely this +Lady Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal---the Chosen of the Palace--was the most +worthy of love. In the tresses of her silk-soft hair his heart was +bound, and for none other had he so much as a passing thought since +his soul had been submerged in her sweetness. Of her he said, using the +words of the poet Faisi,-- + +"How shall I understand the magic of Love the Juggler? For he made thy +beauty enter at that small gate the pupil of my eye, And now--and now my +heart cannot contain it!" + +But who should marvel? For those who have seen this Arjemand crowned +with the crown the Padishah set upon her sweet low brows, with the lamps +of great jewels lighting the dimples of her cheeks as they swung beside +them, have most surely seen perfection. He who sat upon the Peacock +Throne, where the outspread tail of massed gems is centred by that great +ruby, "The Eye of the Peacock, the Tribute of the World," valued it not +so much as one Jock of the dark and perfumed tresses that rolled to her +feet. Less to him the twelve throne columns set close with pearls than +the little pearls she showed in her sweet laughter. For if this lady was +all beauty, so too she was all goodness; and from the Shah-in-Shah to +the poorest, all hearts of the world knelt in adoration, before the +Chosen of the Palace. She was, indeed, an extraordinary beauty, in that +she had the soul of a child, and she alone remained unconscious of her +power; and so she walked, crowned and clothed with humility. + +Cold, haughty, and silent was the Shah-in-Shah before she blessed his +arms--flattered, envied, but loved by none. But the gift this Lady +brought with her was love; and this, shining like the sun upon ice, +melted his coldness, and he became indeed the kingly centre of a kingly +court May the Peace be upon her! + +Now it was the dawn of a sorrowful day when the pains of the Lady +Arjemand came strong and terrible, and she travailed in agony. The +hakims (physicians) stroked their beards and reasoned one with another; +the wise women surrounded her, and remedies many and great were tried; +and still her anguish grew, and in the hall without sat the Shah-in-Shah +upon his divan, in anguish of spirit yet greater. The sweat ran on his +brows, the knotted veins were thick on his temples, and his eyes, sunk +in their caves, showed as those of a maddened man. He crouched on his +cushions and stared at the purdah that divided him from the Lady; and +all day the people came and went about him, and there was silence from +the voice he longed to hear; for she would not moan, lest the sound +should slay the Emperor. Her women besought her, fearing that her strong +silence would break her heart; but still she lay, her hands clenched in +one another, enduring; and the Emperor endured without. The Day of the +Smiting! + +So, as the time of the evening prayer drew nigh, a child was born, +and the Empress, having done with pain, began to sink slowly into +that profound sleep that is the shadow cast by the Last. May Allah the +Upholder have mercy on our weakness! And the women, white with fear +and watching, looked upon her, and whispered one to another, "It is the +end." + +And the aged mother of Abdul Mirza, standing at her head, said, "She +heeds not the cry of the child. She cannot stay." And the newly wed +wife of Saif Khan, standing at her feet, said, "The voice of the beloved +husband is as the Call of the Angel. Let the Padishah be summoned." + +So, the evening prayer being over (but the Emperor had not prayed), the +wisest of the hakims, Kazim Sharif, went before him and spoke:-- + +"Inhallah! May the will of the Issuer of Decrees in all things be done! +Ascribe unto the Creator glory, bowing before his Throne." + +And he remained silent; but the Padishah, haggard in his jewels, with +his face hidden, answered thickly, "The truth! For Allah has forgotten +his slave." + +And Kazim Sharif, bowing at his feet and veiling his face with his +hands, replied: + +"The voice of the child cannot reach her, and the Lady of Delight +departs. He who would speak with her must speak quickly." + +Then the Emperor rose to his feet unsteadily, like a man drunk with +the forbidden juice; and when Kazim Sharif would have supported him, he +flung aside his hands, and he stumbled, a man wounded to death, as it +were, to the marble chamber where she lay. + +In that white chamber it was dusk, and they had lit the little cressets +so that a very faint light fell upon her face. A slender fountain a +little cooled the hot, still air with its thin music and its sprinkled +diamonds, and outside, the summer lightnings were playing wide and blue +on the river; but so still was it that the dragging footsteps of the +Emperor raised the hair on the flesh of those who heard, So the women +who should, veiled themselves, and the others remained like pillars of +stone. + +Now, when those steps were heard, a faint colour rose in the cheek of +the Lady Arjemand; but she did not raise the heavy lashes, or move her +hand. And he came up beside her, and the Shadow of God, who should kneel +to none, knelt, and his head fell forward upon her breast; and in the +hush the women glided out like ghosts, leaving the husband with the wife +excepting only that her foster-nurse stood far off, with eyes averted. + +So the minutes drifted by, falling audibly one by one into eternity, and +at the long last she slowly opened her eyes and, as from the depths of +a dream, beheld the Emperor; and in a voice faint as the fall of a +rose-leaf she said the one word, "Beloved!" + +And he from between his clenched teeth, answered, "Speak, wife." + +So she, who in all things had loved and served him,--she, Light of +all hearts, dispeller of all gloom,--gathered her dying breath for +consolation, and raised one hand slowly; and it fell across his, and so +remained. + +Now, her beauty had been broken in the anguish like a rose in storm; but +it returned to her, doubtless that the Padishah might take comfort in +its memory; and she looked like a houri of Paradise who, kneeling beside +the Zemzem Well, beholds the Waters of Peace. Not Fatmeh herself, the +daughter of the Prophet of God, shone more sweetly. She repeated the +word, "Beloved"; and after a pause she whispered on with lips that +scarcely stirred, "King of the Age, this is the end." + +But still he was like a dead man, nor lifted his face. + +"Surely all things pass. And though I go, in your heart I abide, and +nothing can sever us. Take comfort." + +But there was no answer. + +"Nothing but Love's own hand can slay Love. Therefore, remember me, and +I shall live." + +And he answered from the darkness of her bosom, "The whole world shall +remember. But when shall I be united to thee? O Allah, how long wilt +thou leave me to waste in this separation?" + +And she: "Beloved, what is time? We sleep and the night is gone. Now put +your arms about me, for I sink into rest. What words are needed between +us? Love is enough." + +So, making not the Profession of Faith,--and what need, since all her +life was worship,--the Lady Arjemand turned into his arms like a child. +And the night deepened. + +Morning, with its arrows of golden light that struck the river to +splendour! Morning, with its pure breath, its sunshine of joy, and the +koels fluting in the Palace gardens! Morning, divine and new from +the hand of the Maker! And in the innermost chamber of marble a white +silence; and the Lady, the Mirror of Goodness, lying in the Compassion +of Allah, and a broken man stretched on the ground beside her. For all +flesh, from the camel-driver to the Shah-in-Shah, is as one in the Day +of the Smiting. + + +II + +For weeks the Emperor lay before the door of death; and had it opened +to him, he had been blessed. So the months went by, and very slowly the +strength returned to him; but his eyes were withered and the bones stood +out in his cheeks. But he resumed his throne, and sat upon it kingly, +black-bearded, eagle-eyed, terribly apart in his grief and his royalty; +and so seated among his Usbegs, he declared his will. + +"For this Lady (upon whom be peace), departed to the mercy of the Giver +and Taker, shall a tomb-palace be made, the Like of which is not found +in the four corners of the world. Send forth therefore for craftsmen +like the builders of the Temple of Solomon the Wise; for I will build." + +So, taking counsel, they sent in haste into Agra for Ustad Isa, the +Master-Builder, a man of Shiraz; and he, being presented before the +Padishah, received his instructions in these words:-- + +"I will that all the world shall remember the Flower of the World, +that all hearts shall give thanks for her beauty, which was indeed the +perfect Mirror of the Creator. And since it is abhorrent of Islam that +any image be made in the likeness of anything that has life, make for me +a palace-tomb, gracious as she was gracious, lovely as she was lovely. +Not such as the tombs of the Kings and the Conquerors, but of a divine +sweetness. Make me a garden on the banks of Jumna, and build it there, +where, sitting in my Pavilion of Marble, I may see it rise." + +And Ustad Isa, having heard, said, "Upon my head and eyes!" and went out +from the Presence. + +So, musing upon the words of the Padishah, he went to his house in Agra, +and there pondered the matter long and deeply; and for a whole day and +night he refused all food and secluded himself from the society of all +men; for he said:-- + +"This is a weighty thing, for this Lady (upon whom be peace) must +visibly dwell in her tomb-palace on the shore of the river; and how +shall I, who have never seen her, imagine the grace that was in her, and +restore it to the world? Oh, had I but the memory of her face! Could I +but see it as the Shah-in-Shah sees it, remembering the past! Prophet +of God, intercede for me, that I may look through his eyes, if but for a +moment!" + +That night he slept, wearied and weakened with fasting; and whether it +were that the body guarded no longer the gates of the soul, I cannot +say; for, when the body ails, the soul soars free above its weakness. +But a strange marvel happened. + +For, as it seemed to him, he awoke at the mid-noon of the night, and +he was sitting, not in his own house, but upon the roof of the royal +palace, looking down on the gliding Jumna, where the low moon slept in +silver, and the light was alone upon the water; and there were no boats, +but sleep and dream, hovering hand-in-hand, moved upon the air, and his +heart was dilated in the great silence. + +Yet he knew well that he waked in some supernatural sphere: for his eyes +could see across the river as if the opposite shore lay at his feet; +and he could distinguish every leaf on every tree, and the flowers +moon-blanched and ghost-like. And there, in the blackest shade of the +pippala boughs, he beheld a faint light like a pearl; and looking with +unspeakable anxiety, he saw within the light, slowly growing, the figure +of a lady exceedingly glorious in majesty and crowned with a rayed crown +of mighty jewels of white and golden splendour. Her gold robe fell to +her feet, and--very strange to tell--her feet touched not the ground, +but hung a span's length above it, so that she floated in the air. + +But the marvel of marvels was her face--not, indeed, for its beauty, +though that transcended all, but for its singular and compassionate +sweetness, wherewith she looked toward the Palace beyond the river as if +it held the heart of her heart, while death and its river lay between. + +And Ustad Isa said:--"O dream, if this sweetness be but a dream, let me +never wake! Let me see forever this exquisite work of Allah the Maker, +before whom all the craftsmen are as children! For my knowledge is as +nothing, and I am ashamed in its presence." + +And as he spoke, she turned those brimming eyes on him, and he saw her +slowly absorbed into the glory of the moonlight; but as she faded into +dream, he beheld, slowly rising, where her feet had hung in the blessed +air, a palace of whiteness, warm as ivory, cold as chastity, domes and +cupolas, slender minars, arches of marble fretted into sea-foam, screen +within screen of purest marble, to hide the sleeping beauty of a great +Queen--silence in the heart of it, and in every line a harmony beyond +all music. Grace was about it--the grace of a Queen who prays and does +not command; who, seated in her royalty yet inclines all hearts to love. +And he saw that its grace was her grace, and its soul her soul, and +that she gave it for the consolation of the Emperor. + +And he fell on his face and worshipped the Master-Builder of the +Universe, saying,--"Praise cannot express thy Perfection. Thine Essence +confounds thought. Surely I am but the tool in the hand of the Builder." + +And when he awoke, he was lying in his own secret chamber, but beside +him was a drawing such as the craftsmen make of the work they have +imagined in their hearts. And it was the Palace of the Tomb. + +Henceforward, how should he waver? He was as a slave who obeys his +master, and with haste he summoned to Agra his Army of Beauty. + +Then were assembled all the master craftsmen of India and of the outer +world. From Delhi, from Shiraz, even from Baghdad and Syria, they came. +Muhammad Hanif, the wise mason, came from Kandahar, Muhammad Sayyid from +Mooltan. Amanat Khan, and other great writers of the holy Koran, who +should make the scripts of the Book upon fine marble. Inlayers from +Kanauj, with fingers like those of the Spirits that bowed before Solomon +the King, who should make beautiful the pure stone with inlay of jewels, +as did their forefathers for the Rajah of Mewar; mighty dealers with +agate, cornelian, and lapis lazuli. Came also, from Bokhara, Ata +Muhammad and Shakri Muhammad, that they might carve the lilies of the +field, very glorious, about that Flower of the World. Men of India, men +of Persia, men of the outer lands, they came at the bidding of Ustad +Isa, that the spirit of his vision might be made manifest. + +And a great council was held among these servants of beauty, so they +made a model in little of the glory that was to be, and laid it at the +feet of the Shah-in-Shah; and he allowed it, though not as yet fully +discerning their intent. And when it was approved, Ustad Isa called to +him a man of Kashmir; and the very hand of the Creator was upon this +man, for he could make gardens second only to the Gardens of Paradise, +having been born by that Dal Lake where are those roses of the earth, +the Shalimar and the Nishat Bagh; and to him said Ustad Isa,-- + +"Behold, Rain Lal Kashmiri, consider this design! Thus and thus shall +a white palace, exquisite in perfection, arise on the banks of Jumna. +Here, in little, in this model of sandalwood, see what shall be. +Consider these domes, rounded as the Bosom of Beauty, recalling the +mystic fruit of the lotus flower. Consider these four minars that stand +about them like Spirits about the Throne. And remembering that all this +shall stand upon a great dais of purest marble, and that the river shall +be its mirror, repeating to everlasting its loveliness, make me a garden +that shall be the throne room to this Queen." + +And Ram Lal Kashmiri salaamed and said, "Obedience!" and went forth and +pondered night and day, journeying even over the snows of the Pir Panjal +to Kashmir, that he might bathe his eyes in beauty where she walks, +naked and divine, upon the earth, and he it was who imagined the black +marble and white that made the way of approach. + +So grew the palace that should murmur, like a seashell, in the ear of +the world the secret of love. + +Veiled had that loveliness been in the shadow of the palace; but now the +sun should rise upon it and turn its ivory to gold, should set upon +it and flush its snow with rose. The moon should lie upon it like the +pearls upon her bosom, the visible grace of her presence breathe about +it, the music of her voice hover in the birds and trees of the garden. +Times there were when Ustad Isa despaired lest even these mighty +servants of beauty should miss perfection. Yet it grew and grew, rising +like the growth of a flower. + +So on a certain day it stood completed, and beneath the small tomb in +the sanctuary, veiled with screens of wrought marble so fine that +they might lift in the breeze,--the veils of a Queen,--slept the Lady +Arjemand; and above her a narrow coffer of white marble, enriched in +a great script with the Ninety-Nine Wondrous Names of God. And the +Shah-in-Shah, now grey and worn, entered and, standing by her, cried in +a loud voice,--"I ascribe to the Unity, the only Creator, the perfection +of his handiwork made visible here by the hand of mortal man. For the +beauty that was secret in my Palace is here revealed; and the Crowned +Lady shall sit forever upon the banks of the Jumna River. It was love +that commanded this Tomb." + +And the golden echo carried his voice up into the high dome, and it died +away in whispers of music. + +But Ustad Isa standing far off in the throng (for what are craftsmen +in the presence of the mighty?), said softly in his beard, "It was Love +also that built, and therefore it shall endure." + +Now it is told that, on a certain night in summer, when the moon is +full, a man who lingers by the straight water, where the cypresses stand +over their own image, may see a strange marvel--may see the Palace of +the Taj dissolve like a pearl, and so rise in a mist into the moonlight; +and in its place, on her dais of white marble, he shall see the Lady +Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal, the Chosen of the Palace, stand there in the +white perfection of beauty, smiling as one who hath attained unto the +Peace. For she is its soul. + +And kneeling before the dais, he shall see Ustad Isa, who made this body +of her beauty; and his face is hidden in his hands. + + + + +"HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!" + +A JAPANESE STORY + + +(O Lovely One-O thou Flower! With Thy beautiful face, with Thy beautiful +eyes, pour light upon the world! Adoration to Kwannon.) + +In Japan in the days of the remote Ancestors, near the little village of +Shiobara, the river ran through rocks of a very strange blue colour, and +the bed of the river was also composed of these rocks, so that the clear +water ran blue as turquoise gems to the sea. + +The great forests murmured beside it, and through their swaying boughs +was breathed the song of Eternity. Those who listen may hear if their +ears are open. To others it is but the idle sighing of the wind. + +Now because of all this beauty there stood in these forests a roughly +built palace of unbarked wood, and here the great Emperor would come +from City-Royal to seek rest for his doubtful thoughts and the cares of +state, turning aside often to see the moonlight in Shiobara. He sought +also the free air and the sound of falling water, yet dearer to him than +the plucked strings of sho and biwa. For he said; + +"Where and how shall We find peace even for a moment, and afford Our +heart refreshment even for a single second?" + +And it seemed to him that he found such moments at Shiobara. + +Only one of his great nobles would His Majesty bring with him--the +Dainagon, and him be chose because he was a worthy and honorable person +and very simple of heart. + +There was yet another reason why the Son of Heaven inclined to the +little Shiobara. It had reached the Emperor that a Recluse of the +utmost sanctity dwelt in that forest. His name was Semimaru. He had made +himself a small hut in the deep woods, much as a decrepit silkworm might +spin his last Cocoon and there had the Peace found him. + +It had also reached His Majesty that, although blind, he was exceedingly +skilled in the art of playing the biwa, both in the Flowing Fount manner +and the Woodpecker manner, and that, especially on nights when the moon +was full, this aged man made such music as transported the soul. This +music His Majesty desired very greatly to hear. + +Never had Semimaru left his hut save to gather wood or seek food until +the Divine Emperor commanded his attendance that he might soothe his +august heart with music. + +Now on this night of nights the moon was full and the snow heavy on the +pines, and the earth was white also, and when the moon shone through the +boughs it made a cold light like dawn, and the shadows of the trees were +black upon it. + +The attendants of His Majesty long since slept for sheer weariness, for +the night was far spent, but the Emperor and the Dainagon still sat +with their eyes fixed on the venerable Semimaru. For many hours he had +played, drawing strange music from his biwa. Sometimes it had been like +rain blowing over the plains of Adzuma, sometimes like the winds roaring +down the passes of the Yoshino Mountains, and yet again like the voice +of far cities. For many hours they listened without weariness, and +thought that all the stories of the ancients might flow past them in the +weird music that seemed to have neither beginning nor end. + +"It is as the river that changes and changes not, and is ever and ever +the same," said the Emperor in his own soul. + +And certainly had a voice announced to His Augustness that centuries +were drifting by as he listened, he could have felt no surprise. + +Before them, as they sat upon the silken floor cushions, was a small +shrine with a Buddha shelf, and a hanging picture of the Amida Buddha +within it--the expression one of rapt peace. Figures of Fugen and +Fudo were placed before the curtain doors of the shrine, looking up in +adoration to the Blessed One. A small and aged pine tree was in a pot of +grey porcelain from Chosen--the only ornament in the chamber. + +Suddenly His Majesty became aware that the Dainagon also had fallen +asleep from weariness, and that the recluse was no longer playing, but +was speaking in a still voice like a deeply flowing stream. The Emperor +had observed no change from music to speech, nor could he recall when +the music had ceased, so that it altogether resembled a dream. + +"When I first came here"--the Venerable one continued--"it was not my +intention to stay long in the forest. As each day dawned, I said; 'In +seven days I go.' And again--'In seven.' Yet have I not gone. The days +glided by and here have I attained to look on the beginnings of peace. +Then wherefore should I go?--for all life is within the soul. Shall the +fish weary of his pool? And I, who through my blind eyes feel the moon +illuming my forest by night and the sun by day, abide in peace, so that +even the wild beasts press round to hear my music. I have come by a path +overblown by autumn leaves. But I have come." + +Then said the Divine Emperor as if unconsciously; + +"Would that I also might come! But the august duties cannot easily be +laid aside. And I have no wife--no son." + +And Semimaru, playing very softly on the strings of his biwa made +no other answer, and His Majesty, collecting his thoughts, which had +become, as it were, frozen with the cold and the quiet and the strange +music, spoke thus, as if in a waking dream; + +"Why have I not wedded? Because I have desired a bride beyond the +women of earth, and of none such as I desire has the rumor reached me. +Consider that Ancestor who wedded Her Shining Majesty! Evil and lovely +was she, and the passions were loud about her. And so it is with women. +Trouble and vexation of spirit, or instead a great weariness. But if the +Blessed One would vouchsafe to my prayers a maiden of blossom and dew, +with a heart calm as moonlight, her would I wed. O, honorable One, whose +wisdom surveys the world, is there in any place near or far--in heaven +or in earth, such a one that I may seek and find?" + +And Semimaru, still making a very low music on his biwa, said this; + +"Supreme Master, where the Shiobara River breaks away through the gorges +to the sea, dwelt a poor couple--the husband a wood-cutter. They had no +children to aid in their toil, and daily the woman addressed her prayers +for a son to the Bodhisattwa Kwannon, the Lady of Pity who looketh down +for ever upon the sound of prayer. Very fervently she prayed, with such +offerings as her poverty allowed, and on a certain night she dreamed +this dream. At the shrine of the Senju Kwannon she knelt as was her +custom, and that Great Lady, sitting enthroned upon the Lotos of Purity, +opened Her eyes slowly from Her divine contemplation and heard the +prayer of the wood-cutter's wife. Then stooping like a blown willow +branch, she gathered a bud from the golden lotos plant that stood upon +her altar, and breathing upon it it became pure white and living, and it +exhaled a perfume like the flowers of Paradise, This flower the Lady +of Pity flung into the bosom of her petitioner, and closing Her eyes +returned into Her divine dream, whilst the woman awoke, weeping for joy. + +"But when she sought in her bosom for the Lotos it was gone. Of all this +she boasted loudly to her folk and kin, and the more so, when in due +time she perceived herself to be with child, for, from that august +favour she looked for nothing less than a son, radiant with the Five +Ornaments of riches, health, longevity, beauty, and success. Yet, when +her hour was come, a girl was born, and blind." + +"Was she welcomed?" asked the dreaming voice of the Emperor. + +"Augustness, but as a household drudge. For her food was cruelty and her +drink tears. And the shrine of the Senju Kwannon was neglected by her +parents because of the disappointment and shame of the unwanted gift. +And they believed that, lost in Her divine contemplation, the Great Lady +would not perceive this neglect. The Gods however are known by their +great memories." + +"Her name?" + +"Majesty, Tsuyu-Morning Dew. And like the morning dew she shines in +stillness. She has repaid good for evil to her evil parents, serving +them with unwearied service." + +"What distinguishes her from others?" + +"Augustness, a very great peace. Doubtless the shadow of the dream of +the Holy Kwannon. She works, she moves, she smiles as one who has tasted +of content." + +"Has she beauty?" + +"Supreme Master, am I not blind? But it is said that she has no beauty +that men should desire her. Her face is flat and round, and her eyes +blind." + +"And yet content?" + +"Philosophers might envy her calm. And her blindness is without doubt +a grace from the excelling Pity, for could she see her own exceeding +ugliness she must weep for shame. But she sees not. Her sight is inward, +and she is well content." + +"Where does she dwell?" + +"Supreme Majesty, far from here--where in the heart of the woods the +river breaks through the rocks." + +"Venerable One, why have you told me this? I asked for a royal maiden +wise and beautiful, calm as the dawn, and you have told me of a +wood-cutter's drudge, blind and ugly." + +And now Semimaru did not answer, but the tones of the biwa grew louder +and clearer, and they rang like a song of triumph, and the Emperor could +hear these words in the voice of the strings. + +"She is beautiful as the night, crowned with moon and stars for him +who has eyes to see. Princess Splendour was dim beside her; Prince +Fireshine, gloom! Her Shining Majesty was but a darkened glory before +this maid. All beauty shines within her hidden eyes." + +And having uttered this the music became wordless once more, but it +still flowed on more and more softly like a river that flows into the +far distance. + +The Emperor stared at the mats, musing--the light of the lamp was +burning low. His heart said within him; + +"This maiden, cast like a flower from the hand of Kwannon Sama, will I +see." + +And as he said this the music had faded away into a thread-like +smallness, and when after long thought he raised his august head, he was +alone save for the Dainagon, sleeping on the mats behind him, and the +chamber was in darkness. Semimaru had departed in silence, and His +Majesty, looking forth into the broad moonlight, could see the track of +his feet upon the shining snow, and the music came back very thinly like +spring rain in the trees. Once more he looked at the whiteness of the +night, and then, stretching his august person on the mats, he slept amid +dreams of sweet sound. + +The next day, forbidding any to follow save the Dainagon, His Majesty +went forth upon the frozen snow where the sun shone in a blinding +whiteness. They followed the track of Semimaru's feet far under the pine +trees so heavy with their load of snow that they were bowed as if with +fruit. And the track led on and the air was so still that the cracking +of a bough was like the blow of a hammer, and the sliding of a load of +snow from a branch like the fall of an avalanche. Nor did they speak as +they went. They listened, nor could they say for what. + +Then, when they had gone a very great way, the track ceased suddenly, +as if cut off, and at this spot, under the pines furred with snow, His +Majesty became aware of a perfume so sweet that it was as though all the +flowers of the earth haunted the place with their presence, and a music +like the biwa of Semimaru was heard in the tree tops. This sounded far +off like the whispering of rain when it falls in very small leaves, and +presently it died away, and a voice followed after, singing, alone in +the woods, so that the silence appeared to have been created that such a +music might possess the world. So the Emperor stopped instantly, and the +Dainagon behind him and he heard these words. + + "In me the Heavenly Lotos grew, + The fibres ran from head to feet, + And my heart was the august Blossom. + Therefore the sweetness flowed through the veins of my flesh, + And I breathed peace upon all the world, + And about me was my fragrance shed + That the souls of men should desire me." + +Now, as he listened, there came through the wood a maiden, bare--footed, +save for grass sandals, and clad in coarse clothing, and she came up and +passed them, still singing. + +And when she was past, His Majesty put up his hand to his eyes, like one +dreaming, and said; + +"What have you seen?" + +And the Dainagon answered; + +"Augustness, a country wench, flat--faced, ugly and blind, and with a +voice like a crow. Has not your Majesty seen this?" + +The Emperor, still shading his eyes, replied; + +"I saw a maiden so beautiful that her Shining Majesty would be a black +blot beside her. As she went, the Spring and all its sweetness blew from +her garments. Her robe was green with small gold flowers. Her eyes were +closed, but she resembled a cherry tree, snowy with bloom and dew. Her +voice was like the singing flowers of Paradise." + +The Dainagon looked at him with fear and compassion; + +"Augustness, how should such a lady carry in her arms a bundle of +firewood?" + +"She bore in her hands three lotos flowers, and where each foot fell I +saw a lotos bloom and vanish." + +They retraced their steps through the wood; His Majesty radiant as +Prince Fireshine with the joy that filled his soul; the Dainagon +darkened as Prince Firefade with fear, believing that the strange music +of Semimaru had bewitched His Majesty, or that the maiden herself might +possibly have the power of the fox in shape-changing and bewildering the +senses. + +Very sorrowful and careful was his heart for he loved his Master. + +That night His Majesty dreamed that he stood before the kakemono of the +Amida Buddha, and that as he raised his eyes in adoration to the Blessed +Face, he beheld the images of Fugen and Fudo, rise up and bow down +before that One Who Is. Then, gliding in, before these Holinesses stood +a figure, and it was the wood-cutter's daughter homely and blinded. She +stretched her hands upward as though invoking the supreme Buddha, and +then turning to His Majesty she smiled upon him, her eyes closed as in +bliss unutterable. And he said aloud. + +"Would that I might see her eyes!" and so saying awoke in a great +stillness of snow and moonlight. + +Having waked, he said within himself + +"This marvel will I wed and she shall be my Empress were she lower than +the Eta, and whether her face be lovely or homely. For she is certainly +a flower dropped from the hand of the Divine." + +So when the sun was high His Majesty, again followed by the Dainagon, +went through the forest swiftly, and like a man that sees his goal, +and when they reached the place where the maiden went by, His Majesty +straitly commanded the Dainagon that he should draw apart, and leave him +to speak with the maiden; yet that he should watch what befell. + +So the Dainagon watched, and again he saw her come, very poorly clad, +and with bare feet that shrank from the snow in her grass sandals, bowed +beneath a heavy load of wood upon her shoulders, and her face flat and +homely like a girl of the people, and her eyes blind and shut. + +And as she came she sang this. + + "The Eternal way lies before him, + The way that is made manifest in the Wise. + The Heart that loves reveals itself to man. + For now he draws nigh to the Source. + The night advances fast, + And lo! the moon shines bright." + +And to the Dainagon it seemed a harsh crying nor could he distinguish +any words at all. + +But what His Majesty beheld was this. The evening had come on and the +moon was rising. The snow had gone. It was the full glory of spring, and +the flowers sprang thick as stars upon the grass, and among them lotos +flowers, great as the wheel of a chariot, white and shining with +the luminance of the pearl, and upon each one of these was seated an +incarnate Holiness, looking upward with joined hands. In the trees were +the voices of the mystic Birds that are the utterance of the Blessed +One, proclaiming in harmony the Five Virtues, The Five Powers, the Seven +Steps ascending to perfect Illumination, the Noble Eightfold Path, and +all the Law. And, bearing, in the heart of the Son of Heaven awoke the +Three Remembrances--the Remembrance of Him who is Blessed, Remembrance +of the Law, and Remembrance of the Communion of the Assembly. + +So, looking upward to the heavens, he beheld the Infinite Buddha, +high and lifted up in a great raying glory. About Him were the exalted +Bodhisattwas, the mighty Disciples, great Arhats all, and all the +countless Angelhood. And these rose high into the infinite until they +could be seen but as a point of fire against the moon. With this golden +multitude beyond all numbering was He. + +Then, as His Majesty had seen in the dream of the night, the +wood-cutter's daughter, moving through the flowers like one blind that +gropes his way, advanced before the Blessed Feet, and uplifting her +hands, did adoration, and her face he could not see, but his heart +went with her, adoring also the infinite Buddha seated in the calms of +boundless Light. + +Then enlightenment entered at his eyes, as a man that wakes from sleep, +and suddenly he beheld the Maiden crowned and robed and terrible in +beauty, and her feet were stayed upon an open lotos, and his soul knew +the Senju Kwannon Herself, myriad-armed for the helping of mankind. + +And turning, she smiled as in the vision, but his eyes being now clear +her blinded eyes were opened, and that glory who shall tell as those +living founts of Wisdom rayed upon him their ineffable light? In that +ocean was his being drowned, and so, bowed before the Infinite Buddha, +he received the Greater Illumination. + +How great is the Glory of Kwannon! + +When the radiance and the vision were withdrawn and only the moon looked +over the trees, His Majesty rose upon his feet, and standing on the +snow, surrounded with calm, he called to the Dainagon, and asked this; + +"What have you seen?" + +"Augustness, nothing but the country wench and moon and snow." + +"And heard?" + +"Augustness, nothing but the harsh voice of the wood-cutter's daughter." + +"And felt?" + +"Augustness, nothing but the bone-piercing cold." So His Majesty adored +that which cannot be uttered, saying; + +"So Wisdom, so Glory encompass us about, and we see them not for we +are blinded with illusion. Yet every stone is a jewel and every clod +is spirit and to the hems of the Infinite Buddha all cling. Through the +compassion of the Supernal Mercy that walks the earth as the Bodhisattwa +Kwannon, am I admitted to wisdom and given sight and hearing. And what +is all the world to that happy one who has beheld Her eyes!" + +And His Majesty returned through the forest. + +When, the next day, he sent for the venerable Semimaru that holy recluse +had departed and none knew where. But still when the moon is full a +strange music moves in the tree tops of Shiobara. + +Then His sacred Majesty returned to City-Royal, having determined +to retire into the quiet life, and there, abandoning the throne to a +kinsman wise in greatness, he became a dweller in the deserted hut of +Semimaru. + +His life, like a descending moon approaching the hill that should hide +it, was passed in meditation on that Incarnate Love and Compassion whose +glory had augustly been made known to him, and having cast aside all +save the image of the Divine from his soul, His Majesty became even as +that man who desired enlightenment of the Blessed One. + +For he, desiring instruction, gathered precious flowers, and journeyed +to present them as an offering to the Guatama Buddha. Standing before +Him, he stretched forth both his hands holding the flowers. + +Then said the Holy One, looking upon his petitioner's right hand; + +"Loose your hold of these." + +And the man dropped the flowers from his right hand. And the Holy One +looking upon his left hand, said; + +"Loose your hold of these." + +And, sorrowing, he dropped the flowers from his left hand. And again the +Master said; + +"Loose your hold of that which is neither in the right nor in the left." + +And the disciple said very pitifully; + +"Lord, of what should I loose my hold for I have nothing left?" + +And He looked upon him steadfastly. + +Therefore at last understanding he emptied his soul of all desire, and +of fear that is the shadow of desire, and being enlightened relinquished +all burdens. + +So was it also with His Majesty. In peace he dwelt, and becoming a great +Arhat, in peace he departed to that Uttermost Joy where is the Blessed +One made manifest in Pure Light. + +As for the parents of the maiden, they entered after sore troubles into +peace, having been remembered by the Infinite. For it is certain that +the enemies also of the Supreme Buddha go to salvation by thinking on +Him, even though it be against Him. + +And he who tells this truth makes this prayer to the Lady of Pity; + + "Grant me, I pray, + One dewdrop from Thy willow spray, + And in the double Lotos keep + My hidden heart asleep." + +How great is the Glory of Kwannon! + + + + +THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY + +A STORY OF THE CHINESE COURT + +In the city of Chang-an music filled the palaces, and the festivities of +the Emperor were measured by its beat. Night, and the full moon swimming +like a gold-fish in the garden lakes, gave the signal for the Feather +Jacket and Rainbow Skirt dances. Morning, with the rising sun, summoned +the court again to the feast and wine-cup in the floating gardens. + +The Emperor Chung Tsu favored this city before all others. The Yen Tower +soaring heavenward, the Drum Towers, the Pearl Pagoda, were the only +fit surroundings of his magnificence; and in the Pavilion of Tranquil +Learning were held those discussions which enlightened the world and +spread the fame of the Jade Emperor far and wide. In all respects he +adorned the Dragon Throne--in all but one; for Nature, bestowing so +much, withheld one gift, and the Imperial heart, as precious as jade, +was also as hard, and he eschewed utterly the company of the Hidden +Palace Flowers. + +Yet the Inner Chambers were filled with ladies chosen from all parts of +the Celestial Empire--ladies of the most exquisite and torturing beauty, +moons of loveliness, moving coquettishly on little feet, with all the +grace of willow branches in a light breeze. They were sprinkled with +perfumes, adorned with jewels, robed in silks woven with gold and +embroidered with designs of flowers and birds. Their faces were painted +and their eyebrows formed into slender and perfect arches whence the +soul of man might well slip to perdition, and a breath of sweet odor +followed each wherever she moved. Every one might have been the Empress +of some lesser kingdom; but though rumours reached the Son of Heaven +from time to time of their charms,--especially when some new blossom was +added to the Imperial bouquet,--he had dismissed them from his august +thoughts, and they languished in a neglect so complete that the Great +Cold Palaces of the Moon were not more empty than their hearts. They +remained under the supervision of the Princess of Han, August Aunt +of the Emperor, knowing that their Lord considered the company of +sleeve-dogs and macaws more pleasant than their own. Nor had he as yet +chosen an Empress, and it was evident that without some miracle, such +as the intervention of the Municipal God, no heir to the throne could be +hoped for. + +Yet the Emperor one day remembered his imprisoned beauties, and it +crossed the Imperial thoughts that even these inferior creatures might +afford such interest as may be found in the gambols of trained fleas or +other insects of no natural attainments. + +Accordingly, he commanded that the subject last discussed in his +presence should be transferred to the Inner Chambers, and it was his +Order that the ladies should also discuss it, and their opinions be +engraved on ivory, bound together with red silk and tassels and thus +presented at the Dragon feet. The subject chosen was the following:-- + +Describe the Qualities of the Ideal Man + +Now when this command was laid before the August Aunt, the guardian of +the Inner Chambers, she was much perturbed in mind, for such a thing +was unheard of in all the annals of the Empire. Recovering herself, she +ventured to say that the discussion of such a question might raise +very disquieting thoughts in the minds of the ladies, who could not +be supposed to have any opinions at all on such a subject. Nor was it +desirable that they should have. To every woman her husband and no other +is and must be the Ideal Man. So it was always in the past; so it must +ever be. There are certain things which it is dangerous to question or +discuss, and how can ladies who have never spoken with any other man +than a parent or a brother judge such matters? + +"How, indeed," asked this lady of exalted merit, "can the bat form +an idea of the sunlight, or the carp of the motion of wings? If his +Celestial Majesty had commanded a discussion on the Superior Woman and +the virtues which should adorn her, some sentiments not wholly unworthy +might have been offered. But this is a calamity. They come unexpectedly, +springing up like mushrooms, and this one is probably due to the lack of +virtue of the inelegant and unintellectual person who is now speaking." + +This she uttered in the presence of the principal beauties of the +Inner Chambers. They sat or reclined about her in attitudes of perfect +loveliness. Two, embroidering silver pheasants, paused with their +needles suspended above the stretched silk, to hear the August Aunt. +One, threading beads of jewel jade, permitted them to slip from the +string and so distended the rose of her mouth in surprise that the small +pearl-shells were visible within. The Lady Tortoise, caressing a scarlet +and azure macaw, in her agitation so twitched the feathers that the +bird, shrieking, bit her finger. The Lady Golden Bells blushed deeply +at the thought of what was required of them; and the little Lady Summer +Dress, youngest of all the assembled beauties, was so alarmed at the +prospect that she began to sob aloud, until she met the eye of the +August Aunt and abruptly ceased. + +"It is not, however, to be supposed," said the August Aunt, opening her +snuff-bottle of painted crystal, "that the minds of our deplorable and +unattractive sex are wholly incapable of forming opinions. But speech +is a grave matter for women, naturally slow-witted and feeble-minded as +they are. This unenlightened person recalls the Odes as saying:-- + + 'A flaw in a piece of white jade + May be ground away, + But when a woman has spoken foolishly + Nothing can be done-' + +a consideration which should make every lady here and throughout the +world think anxiously before speech." So anxiously did the assembled +beauties think, that all remained mute as fish in a pool, and the August +Aunt continued:-- + +"Let Tsu-ssu be summoned. It is my intention to suggest to the Dragon +Emperor that the virtues of women be the subject of our discourse, and I +will myself open and conclude the discussion." + +Tsu-ssu was not long in kotowing before the August Aunt, who despatched +her message with the proper ceremonial due to its Imperial destination; +and meanwhile, in much agitation, the beauties could but twitter and +whisper in each other's ears, and await the response like condemned +prisoners who yet hope for reprieve. + +Scarce an hour had dripped away on the water-clock when an Imperial +Missive bound with yellow silk arrived, and the August Aunt, rising, +kotowed nine times before she received it in her jewelled hand with its +delicate and lengthy nails ensheathed in pure gold and set with gems +of the first water. She then read it aloud, the ladies prostrating +themselves. + +To the Princess of Han, the August Aunt, the Lady of the Nine Superior +Virtues:-- + +"Having deeply reflected on the wisdom submitted, We thus reply. Women +should not be the judges of their own virtues, since these exist only +in relation to men. Let Our Command therefore be executed, and tablets +presented before us seven days hence, with the name of each lady +appended to her tablet." + +It was indeed pitiable to see the anxiety of the ladies! A sacrifice to +Kwan-Yin, the Goddess of Mercy, of a jewel from each, with intercession +for aid, was proposed by the Lustrous Lady; but the majority shook their +heads sadly. The August Aunt, tossing her head, declared that, as the +Son of Heaven had made no comment on her proposal of opening and closing +the discussion, she should take no part other than safeguarding the +interests of propriety. This much increased the alarm, and, kneeling at +her feet, the swan-like beauties, Deep-Snow and Winter Moon implored her +aid and compassion. But, rising indignantly, the August Aunt sought her +own apartments, and for the first time the inmates of the Pepper Chamber +saw with regret the golden dragons embroidered on her back. + +It was then that the Round-Faced Beauty ventured a remark. This maiden, +having been born in the far-off province of Suchuan, was considered a +rustic by the distinguished elegance of the Palace and, therefore, had +never spoken unless decorum required. Still, even her detractors were +compelled to admit the charms that had gained her her name. Her face had +the flawless outline of the pearl, and like the blossom of the plum was +the purity of her complexion, upon which the darkness of her eyebrows +resembled two silk-moths alighted to flutter above the brilliance of her +eyes--eyes which even the August Aunt had commended after a banquet of +unsurpassed variety. Her hair had been compared to the crow's plumage; +her waist was like a roll of silk, and her discretion in habiting +herself was such that even the Lustrous Lady and the Lady Tortoise drew +instruction from the splendours of her robes. It created, however, a +general astonishment when she spoke. + +"Paragons of beauty, what is this dull and opaque-witted person that +she should speak?" + +"What, indeed!" said the Celestial Sister. "This entirely +undistinguished person cannot even imagine." + +A distressing pause followed, during which many whispered anxiously. The +Lustrous Lady broke it. + +"It is true that the highly ornamental Round-Faced Beauty is but lately +come, yet even the intelligent Ant may assist the Dragon; and in the +presence of alarm, what is decorum? With a tiger behind one, who can +recall the Book of Rites and act with befitting elegance?" + +"The high-born will at all times remember the Rites!" retorted the +Celestial Sister. "Have we not heard the August Aunt observe: 'Those who +understand do not speak. Those who speak do not understand'?" + +The Round-Faced Beauty collected her courage. + +"Doubtless this is wisdom; yet if the wise do not speak, who should +instruct us? The August Aunt herself would be silent." + +All were confounded by this dilemma, and the little Lady Summer-Dress, +still weeping, entreated that the Round-Faced Beauty might be heard. +The Heavenly Blossoms then prepared to listen and assumed attitudes of +attention, which so disconcerted the Round-Faced Beauty that she blushed +like a spring tulip in speaking. + +"Beautiful ladies, our Lord, who is unknown to us all, has issued an +august command. It cannot be disputed, for the whisper of disobedience +is heard as thunder in the Imperial Presence. Should we not aid each +other? If any lady has formed a dream in her soul of the Ideal +Man, might not such a picture aid us all? Let us not be +'say-nothing-do-nothing,' but act!" + +They hung their heads and smiled, but none would allow that she had +formed such an image. The little Lady Tortoise, laughing behind her +fan of sandalwood, said roguishly: "The Ideal Man should be handsome, +liberal in giving, and assuredly he should appreciate the beauty of his +wives. But this we cannot say to the Divine Emperor." + +A sigh rustled through the Pepper Chamber. The Celestial Sister looked +angrily at the speaker. + +"This is the talk of children," she said. "Does no one remember +Kung-fu-tse's [Confucius] description of the Superior Man?" + +Unfortunately none did--not even the Celestial Sister herself. + +"Is it not probable," said the Round-Faced Beauty, "that the Divine +Emperor remembers it himself and wishes--" + +But the Celestial Sister, yawning audibly, summoned the attendants to +bring rose-leaves in honey, and would hear no more. + +The Round-Faced Beauty therefore wandered forth among the mossy rocks +and drooping willows of the Imperial Garden, deeply considering the +matter. She ascended the bow-curved bridge of marble which crossed the +Pool of Clear Weather, and from the top idly observed the reflection of +her rose-and-gold coat in the water while, with her taper fingers, she +crumbled cake for the fortunate gold-fish that dwelt in it. And, so +doing, she remarked one fish, four-tailed among the six-tailed, and in +no way distinguished by elegance, which secured by far the largest share +of the crumbs dropped into the pool. Bending lower, she observed this +singular fish and its methods. + +The others crowded about the spot where the crumbs fell, all herded +together. In their eagerness and stupidity they remained like a cloud of +gold in one spot, slowly waving their tails. But this fish, concealing +itself behind a miniature rock, waited, looking upward, until the +crumbs were falling, and then, rushing forth with the speed of an +arrow, scattered the stupid mass of fish, and bore off the crumbs to its +shelter, where it instantly devoured them. + +"This is notable," said the Round-Faced Beauty. "Observation enlightens +the mind. To be apart--to be distinguished--secures notice!" And she +plunged into thought again, wandering, herself a flower, among the +gorgeous tree peonies. + +On the following day the August Aunt commanded that a writer among the +palace attendants should, with brush and ink, be summoned to transcribe +the wisdom of the ladies. She requested that each would give three +days to thought, relating the following anecdote. "There was a man who, +taking a piece of ivory, carved it into a mulberry leaf, spending three +years on the task. When finished it could not be told from the original, +and was a gift suitable for the Brother of the Sun and Moon. Do +likewise!" + +"But yet, O Augustness!" said the Celestial Sister, "if the Lord of +Heaven took as long with each leaf, there would be few leaves on the +trees, and if-" + +The August Aunt immediately commanded silence and retired. On the third +day she seated herself in her chair of carved ebony, while the attendant +placed himself by her feet and prepared to record her words. + +"This insignificant person has decided," began her Augustness, looking +round and unscrewing the amber top of her snuff-bottle, "to take an +unintelligent part in these proceedings. An example should be set. +Attendant, write!" + +She then dictated as follows: "The Ideal Man is he who now decorates +the Imperial Throne, or he who in all humility ventures to resemble the +incomparable Emperor. Though he may not hope to attain, his endeavor is +his merit. No further description it needed." + +With complacence she inhaled the perfumed snuff, as the writer appended +the elegant characters of her Imperial name. + +If it is permissible to say that the faces of the beauties lengthened +visibly, it should now be said. For it had been the intention of every +lady to make an illusion to the Celestial Emperor and depict him as the +Ideal Man. Nor had they expected that the August Aunt would take any +part in the matter. + +"Oh, but it was the intention of this commonplace and undignified person +to say this very thing!" cried the Lustrous Lady, with tears in the +jewels of her eyes. "I thought no other high-minded and distinguished +lady would for a moment think of it." + +"And it was my intention also!" fluttered the little Lady Tortoise, +wringing her hands! "What now shall this most unlucky and unendurable +person do? For three nights has sleep forsaken my unattractive eyelids, +and, tossing and turning on a couch deprived of all comfort, I could +only repeat, 'The Ideal Man is the Divine Dragon Emperor!'" + +"May one of entirely contemptible attainments make a suggestion in this +assemblage of scintillating wit and beauty?" inquired the Celestial +Sister. "My superficial opinion is that it would be well to prepare a +single paper to which all names should be appended, stating that His +Majesty in his Dragon Divinity comprises all ideals in his sacred +Person." + +"Let those words be recorded," said the August Aunt. "What else should +any lady of discretion and propriety say? In this Palace of Virtuous +Peace, where all is consecrated to the Son of Heaven, though he deigns +not to enter it, what other thought dare be breathed? Has any lady +ventured to step outside such a limit? If so, let her declare herself!" + +All shook their heads, and the August Aunt proceeded: "Let the writer +record this as the opinion of every lady of the Imperial Household, and +let each name be separately appended." + +Had any desired to object, none dared to confront the August Aunt; +but apparently no beauty so desired, for after three nights' sleepless +meditation, no other thought than this had occurred to any. + +Accordingly, the writer moved from lady to lady and, under the +supervision of the August Aunt, transcribed the following: "The Ideal +Man is the earthly likeness of the Divine Emperor. How should it be +otherwise?" And under this sentence wrote the name of each lovely one +in succession. The papers were then placed in the hanging sleeves of the +August Aunt for safety. + +By the decree of Fate, the father of the Round-Faced Beauty had, before +he became an ancestral spirit, been a scholar of distinction, having +graduated at the age of seventy-two with a composition commended by the +Grand Examiner. Having no gold and silver to give his daughter, he +had formed her mind, and had presented her with the sole jewel of his +family-a pearl as large as a bean. Such was her sole dower, but the +accomplished Aunt may excel the indolent Prince. + +Yet, before the thought in her mind, she hesitated and trembled, +recalling the lesson of the gold-fish; and it was with anxiety that +paled her roseate lips that, on a certain day, she had sought the Willow +Bridge Pavilion. There had awaited her a palace attendant skilled with +the brush, and there in secrecy and dire affright, hearing the footsteps +of the August Aunt in every rustle of leafage, and her voice in the +call of every crow, did the Round-Faced Beauty dictate the following +composition:-- + +"Though the sky rain pearls, it cannot equal the beneficence of the Son +of Heaven. Though the sky rain jade it cannot equal his magnificence. He +has commanded his slave to describe the qualities of the Ideal Man. +How should I, a mere woman, do this? I, who have not seen the Divine +Emperor, how should I know what is virtue? I, who have not seen the +glory of his countenance, how should I know what is beauty? Report +speaks of his excellencies, but I who live in the dark know not. But to +the Ideal Woman, the very vices of her husband are virtues. Should he +exalt another, this is a mark of his superior taste. Should he dismiss +his slave, this is justice. To the Ideal Woman there is but one Ideal +Man--and that is her lord. From the day she crosses his threshold, to +the day when they clothe her in the garments of Immortality, this is her +sole opinion. Yet would that she might receive instruction of what only +are beauty and virtue in his adorable presence." + +This being written, she presented her one pearl to the attendant and +fled, not looking behind her, as quickly as her delicate feet would +permit. + +On the seventh day the compositions, engraved on ivory and bound with +red silk and tassels, were presented to the Emperor, and for seven +days more he forgot their existence. On the eighth the High Chamberlain +ventured to recall them to the Imperial memory, and the Emperor glancing +slightly at one after another, threw them aside, yawning as he did so. +Finally, one arrested his eyes, and reading it more than once he laid it +before him and meditated. An hour passed in this way while the forgotten +Lord Chamberlain continued to kneel. The Son of Heaven, then raising his +head, pronounced these words: "In the society of the Ideal Woman, she to +whom jealousy is unknown, tranquillity might possibly be obtained. Let +prayer be made before the Ancestors with the customary offerings, for +this is a matter deserving attention." + +A few days passed, and an Imperial attendant, escorted by two mandarins +of the peacock-feather and crystal-button rank, desired an audience of +the August Aunt, and, speaking before the curtain, informed her that his +Imperial Majesty would pay a visit that evening to the Hall of Tranquil +Longevity. Such was her agitation at this honour that she immediately +swooned; but, reviving, summoned all the attendants and gave orders for +a banquet and musicians. + +Lanterns painted with pheasants and exquisite landscapes were hung on +all the pavilions. Tapestries of rose, decorated with the Five-Clawed +Dragons, adorned the chambers; and upon the High Seat was placed a robe +of yellow satin embroidered with pearls. All was hurry and excitement. +The Blossoms of the Palace were so exquisitely decked that one grain +more of powder would have made them too lily-like, and one touch more of +rouge, too rosecheeked. It was indeed perfection, and, like lotuses upon +a lake, or Asian birds, gorgeous of plumage, they stood ranged in the +outer chamber while the Celestial Emperor took his seat. + +The Round-Faced Beauty wore no jewels, having bartered her pearl for her +opportunity; but her long coat of jade-green, embroidered with golden +willows, and her trousers of palest rose left nothing to be desired. In +her hair two golden peonies were fastened with pins of kingfisher work. +The Son of Heaven was seated upon the throne as the ladies approached, +marshaled by the August Aunt. He was attired in the Yellow Robe with the +Flying Dragons, and upon the Imperial Head was the Cap, ornamented +with one hundred and forty-four priceless gems. From it hung the twelve +pendants of strings of pearls, partly concealing the august eyes of the +Jade Emperor. No greater splendour can strike awe into the soul of man. + +At his command the August Aunt took her seat upon a lesser chair at the +Celestial Feet. Her mien was majestic, and struck awe into the assembled +beauties, whose names she spoke aloud as each approached and prostrated +herself. She then pronounced these words: + +"Beautiful ones, the Emperor, having considered the opinions submitted +by you on the subject of the Superior Man, is pleased to express his +august commendation. Dismiss, therefore, anxiety from your minds, and +prepare to assist at the humble concert of music we have prepared for +his Divine pleasure." + +Slightly raising himself in his chair, the Son of Heaven looked down +upon that Garden of Beauty, holding in his hand an ivory tablet bound +with red silk. + +"Lovely ladies," he began, in a voice that assuaged fear, "who among you +was it that laid before our feet a composition beginning thus--'Though +the sky rain pearls'?" + +The August Aunt immediately rose. + +"Imperial Majesty, none! These eyes supervised every composition. No +impropriety was permitted." + +The Son of Heaven resumed: "Let that lady stand forth." + +The words were few, but sufficient. Trembling in every limb, the +Round-Faced Beauty separated herself from her companions and prostrated +herself, amid the breathless amazement of the Blossoms of the Palace. He +looked down upon her as she knelt, pale as a lady carved in ivory, but +lovely as the lotus of Chang-Su. He turned to the August Aunt. "Princess +of Han, my Imperial Aunt, I would speak with this lady alone." + +Decorum itself and the custom of Palaces could not conceal the +indignation of the August Aunt as she rose and retired, driving the +ladies before her as a shepherd drives his sheep. + +The Hall of Tranquil Longevity being now empty, the Jade Emperor +extended his hand and beckoned the Round-Faced Beauty to approach. This +she did, hanging her head like a flower surcharged with dew and swaying +gracefully as a wind-bell, and knelt on the lowest step of the Seat of +State. + +"Loveliest One," said the Emperor, "I have read your composition. +I would know the truth. Did any aid you as you spoke it? Was it the +thought of your own heart?" + +"None aided, Divine," said she, almost fainting with fear. "It +was indeed the thought of this illiterate slave, consumed with an +unwarranted but uncontrollable passion." + +"And have you in truth desired to see your Lord?" + +"As a prisoner in a dungeon desires the light, so was it with this low +person." + +"And having seen?" + +"Augustness, the dull eyes of this slave are blinded with beauty." + +She laid her head before his feet. + +"Yet you have depicted, not the Ideal Man, but the Ideal Woman. This was +not the Celestial command. How was this?" + +"Because, O versatile and auspicious Emperor, the blind cannot behold +the sunlight, and it is only the Ideal Woman who is worthy to comprehend +and worship the Ideal Man. For this alone is she created." + +A smile began to illuminate the Imperial Countenance. "And how, O +Round-Faced Beauty, did you evade the vigilance of the August Aunt?" + +She hung her head lower, speaking almost in a whisper. "With her one +pearl did this person buy the secrecy of the writer; and when the August +Aunt slept, did I conceal the paper in her sleeve with the rest, and her +own Imperial hand gave it to the engraver of ivory." + +She veiled her face with two jade-white hands that trembled excessively. +On hearing this statement the Celestial Emperor broke at once into a +very great laughter, and he laughed loud and long as a tiller of wheat. +The Round-Faced Beauty heard it demurely until, catching the Imperial +eye, decorum was forgotten and she too laughed uncontrollably. So they +continued, and finally the Emperor leaned back, drying the tears in his +eyes with his august sleeve, and the lady, resuming her gravity, hid her +face in her hands, yet regarded him through her fingers. + +When the August Aunt returned at the end of an hour with the ladies, +surrounded by the attendants with their instruments of music, the +Round-Faced Beauty was seated in the chair that she herself had +occupied, and on the whiteness of her brow was hung the chain of pearls, +which had formed the frontal of the Cap of the Emperor. + +It is recorded that, advancing from honour to honour, the Round-Faced +Beauty was eventually chosen Empress and became the mother of the +Imperial Prince. The celestial purity of her mind and the absence of all +flaws of jealousy and anger warranted this distinction. But it is also +recorded that, after her elevation, no other lady was ever exalted in +the Imperial favour or received the slightest notice from the Emperor. +For the Empress, now well acquainted with the Ideal Man, judged it +better that his experiences of the Ideal Woman should be drawn from +herself alone. And as she decreed, so it was done. Doubtless Her Majesty +did well. + +It is known that the Emperor departed to the Ancestral Spirits at an +early age, seeking, as the August Aunt observed, that repose which on +earth could never more be his. But no one has asserted that this lady's +disposition was free from the ordinary blemishes of humanity. + +As for the Celestial Empress (who survives in history as one of the most +astute rulers who ever adorned the Dragon Throne), she continued to rule +her son and the Empire, surrounded by the respectful admiration of all. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Ninth Vibration And Other Stories, by +L. 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ADAMS BECK + + + + +CONTENTS + +THE NINTH VIBRATION + +THE INTERPRETER +A ROMANCE OF THE EAST + +THE INCOMPARABLE LADY +A STORY OF CHINA WITH A MORAL + +THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN +A STORY OF BURMA + +FIRE OF BEAUTY + +THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL + +"HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!" + +"THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY" + + + +THE NINTH VIBRATION + +There is a place uplifted nine thousand feet in purest air where +one of the most ancient tracks in the world runs from India into +Tibet. It leaves Simla of the Imperial councils by a stately +road; it passes beyond, but now narrowing, climbing higher beside +the khuds or steep drops to the precipitous valleys beneath, and +the rumor of Simla grows distant and the way is quiet, for, owing +to the danger of driving horses above the khuds, such baggage as +you own must be carried by coolies, and you yourself must either +ride on horseback or in the little horseless carriage of the +Orient, here drawn and pushed by four men. And presently the +deodars darken the way with a solemn presence, for- + + These are the Friars of the wood, + The Brethren of the Solitude + Hooded and grave-" + +-their breath most austerely pure in the gradually chilling air. +Their companies increase and now the way is through a great wood +where it has become a trail and no more, and still it climbs for +many miles and finally a rambling bungalow, small and low, is +sighted in the deeps of the trees, a mountain stream from unknown +heights falling beside it. And this is known as the House in the +Woods. Very few people are permitted to go there, for the owner +has no care for money and makes no provision for guests. You must +take your own servant and the khansamah will cook you such simple +food as men expect in the wilds, and that is all. You stay as +long as you please and when you leave not even a gift to the +khansamah is permitted. + +I had been staying in Ranipur of the plains while I considered +the question of getting to Upper Kashmir by the route from Simla +along the old way to Chinese Tibet where I would touch Shipki in +the Dalai Lama's territory and then pass on to Zanskar and so +down to Kashmir - a tremendous route through the Himalaya and a +crowning experience of the mightiest mountain scenery in the +world. I was at Ranipur for the purpose of consulting my old +friend Olesen, now an irrigation official in the Rampur district +- a man who had made this journey and nearly lost his life in +doing it. It is not now perhaps so dangerous as it was, and my +life was of no particular value to any one but myself, and the +plan interested me. + +I pass over the long discussions of ways and means in the +blinding heat of Ranipur. Olesen put all his knowledge at my +service and never uttered a word of the envy that must have +filled him as he looked at the distant snows cool and luminous in +blue air, and, shrugging good-natured shoulders, spoke of the +work that lay before him on the burning plains until the terrible +summer should drag itself to a close. We had vanquished the +details and were smoking in comparative silence one night on the +veranda, when he said in his slow reflective way; + +"You don't like the average hotel, Ormond, and you'll like it +still less up Simla way with all the Simla crowd of grass-widows +and fellows out for as good a time as they can cram into the hot +weather. I wonder if I could get you a permit for The House in +the Woods while you re waiting to fix up your men and route for +Shipki." + +He explained and of course I jumped at the chance. It belonged, +he said, to a man named Rup Singh, a pandit, or learned man of +Ranipur. He had always spent the summer there, but age and +failing health made this impossible now, and under certain +conditions he would occasionally allow people known to friends of +his own to put up there. + +"And Rup Singh and I are very good friends," Olesen said; "I won +his heart by discovering the lost Sukh Mandir, or Hall of +Pleasure, built many centuries ago by a Maharao of Ranipur for a +summer retreat in the great woods far beyond Simla. There are +lots of legends about it here in Ranipur. They call it The House +of Beauty. Rup Singh's ancestor had been a close friend of the +Maharao and was with him to the end, and that's why he himself +sets such store on the place. You have a good chance if I ask for +a permit. + +He told me the story and since it is the heart of my own I give +it briefly. Many centuries ago the Ranipur Kingdom was ruled by +the Maharao Rai Singh a prince of the great lunar house of the +Rajputs. Expecting a bride from some far away kingdom (the name +of this is unrecorded) he built the Hall of Pleasure as a summer +palace, a house of rare and costly beauty. A certain great +chamber he lined with carved figures of the Gods and their +stories, almost unsurpassed for truth and life. So, with the pine +trees whispering about it the secret they sigh to tell, he hoped +to create an earthly Paradise with this Queen in whom all +loveliness was perfected. And then some mysterious tragedy ended +all his hopes. It was rumoured that when the Princess came to his +court, she was, by some terrible mistake, received with insult +and offered the position only of one of his women. After that +nothing was known. Certain only is it that he fled to the hills, +to the home of his broken hope, and there ended his days in +solitude, save for the attendance of two faithful friends who +would not abandon him even in the ghostly quiet of the winter +when the pine boughs were heavy with snow and a spectral moon +stared at the panthers shuffling through the white wastes +beneath. Of these two Rup Singh's ancestor was one. And in his +thirty fifth year the Maharao died and his beauty and strength +passed into legend and his kingdom was taken by another and the +jungle crept silently over his Hall of Pleasure and the story +ended. + +"There was not a memory of the place up there," Olesen went on. +"Certainly I never heard anything of it when I went up to the +Shipki in 1904. But I had been able to be useful to Rup Singh and +he gave me a permit for The House in the Woods, and I stopped +there for a few days' shooting. I remember that day so well. I +was wandering in the dense woods while my men got their midday +grub, and I missed the trail somehow and found myself in a part +where the trees were dark and thick and the silence heavy as +lead. It was as if the trees were on guard - they stood shoulder +to shoulder and stopped the way. Well, I halted, and had a notion +there was something beyond that made me doubt whether to go on. I +must have stood there five minutes hesitating. Then I pushed on, +bruising the thick ferns under my shooting boots and stooping +under the knotted boughs. Suddenly I tramped out of the jungle +into a clearing, and lo and behold a ruined House, with blocks of +marble lying all about it, and carved pillars and a great roof +all being slowly smothered by the jungle. The weirdest thing you +ever saw. I climbed some fallen columns to get a better look, and +as I did I saw a face flash by at the arch of a broken window. I +sang out in Hindustani, but no answer: only the echo from the +woods. Somehow that dampened my ardour, and I didn't go in to +what seemed like a great ruined hall for the place was so eerie +and lonely, and looked mighty snaky into the bargain. So I came +ingloriously away and told Rup Singh. And his whole face +changed. 'That is The House of Beauty,' he said. 'All my life +have I sought it and in vain. For, friend of my soul, a man must +lose himself that he may find himself and what lies beyond, and +the trodden path has ever been my doom. And you who have not +sought have seen. Most strange are the way of the Gods'. Later on +I knew this was why he had always gone up yearly, thinking and +dreaming God knows what. He and I tried for the place together, +but in vain and the whole thing is like a dream. Twice he has let +friends of mine stay at The House in the Woods, and I think he +won't refuse now." + +"Did he ever tell you the story?" + +"Never. I only know what I've picked up here. Some horrible +mistake about the Rani that drove the man almost mad with +remorse. I've heard bits here and there. There's nothing so vital +as tradition in India." + +"I wonder'. what really happened." + +"That we shall never know. I got a little old picture of the +Maharao - said to be painted by a Pahari artist. It's not likely +to be authentic, but you never can tell. A Brahman sold it to me +that he might complete his daughter's dowry, and hated doing it." + +"May I see it?" + +"Why certainly. Not a very good light, but - can do, as the +Chinks say. + +He brought it out rolled in silk stuff and I carried it under the +hanging lamp. A beautiful young man indeed, with the air of race +these people have beyond all others;- a cold haughty face, +immovably dignified. He sat with his hands resting lightly on the +arms of his chair of State. A crescent of rubies clasped the +folds of the turban and from this sprang an aigrette scattering +splendours. The magnificent hilt of a sword was ready beside him. +The face was not only beautiful but arresting. + +"A strange picture," I said. "The artist has captured the man +himself. I can see him trampling on any one who opposed him, and +suffering in the same cold secret way. It ought to he authentic +if it isn't. Don't you know any more?" + +"Nothing. Well - to bed, and tomorrow I'll see Rup Singh." + +I was glad when he returned with the permission. I was to be very +careful, he said, to make no allusion to the lost palace, for two +women were staying at the House in the Woods - a mother and +daughter to whom Rup Singh had granted hospitality because of an +obligation he must honor. But with true Oriental distrust of +women he had thought fit to make no confidence to them. I +promised and asked Olesen if he knew them. + +"Slightly. Canadians of Danish blood like my own. Their name is +Ingmar. Some people think the daughter good-looking. The mother +is supposed to be clever; keen on occult subjects which she came +back to India to study. The husband was a great naturalist and +the kindest of men. He almost lived in the jungle and the natives +had all sorts of rumours about his powers. You know what they +are. They said the birds and beasts followed him about. Any old +thing starts a legend." + +"What was the connection with Rup Singh?" + +"He was in difficulties and undeservedly, and Ingmar generously +lent him money at a critical time, trusting to his honour for +repayment. Like most Orientals he never forgets a good turn and +would do anything for any of the family - except trust the women +with any secret he valued. The father is long dead. By the way +Rup Singh gave me a queer message for you. He said; 'Tell the +Sahib these words - "Let him who finds water in the desert share +his cup with him who dies of thirst." He is certainly getting +very old. I don't suppose he knew himself what he meant." + +I certainly did not. However my way was thus smoothed for me and +I took the upward road, leaving Olesen to the long ungrateful +toil of the man who devotes his life to India without sufficient +time or knowledge to make his way to the inner chambers of her +beauty. There is no harder mistress unless you hold the pass-key +to her mysteries, there is none of whom so little can be told in +words but who kindles so deep a passion. Necessity sometimes +takes me from that enchanted land, but when the latest dawns are +shining in my skies I shall make my feeble way back to her and +die at her worshipped feet. So I went up from Kalka. + +I have never liked Simla. It is beautiful enough - eight +thousand feet up in the grip of the great hills looking toward +the snows, the famous summer home of the Indian Government. Much +diplomacy is whispered on Observatory Hill and many are the +lighter diversions of which Mr. Kipling and lesser men have +written. But Simla is also a gateway to many things - to the +mighty deodar forests that clothe the foot-hills of the +mountains, to Kulu, to the eternal snows, to the old, old bridle +way that leads up to the Shipki Pass and the mysteries of Tibet +- and to the strange things told in this story. So I passed +through with scarcely a glance at the busy gayety of the little +streets and the tiny shops where the pretty ladies buy their +rouge and powder. I was attended by my servant Ali Khan, a +Mohammedan from Nagpur, sent up with me by Olesen with strong +recommendation. He was a stout walker, so too am I, and an +inveterate dislike to the man-drawn carriage whenever my own legs +would serve me decided me to walk the sixteen miles to the House +in the Woods, sending on the baggage. Ali Khan despatched it and +prepared to follow me, the fine cool air of the hills giving us a +zest. + +"Subhan Alla! (Praise be to God!) the air is sweet!" he said, +stepping out behind me. "What time does the Sahib look to reach +the House?" + +"About five or six. Now, Ali Khan, strike out of the road. You +know the way." + +So we struck up into the glorious pine woods, mountains all about +us. Here and there as we climbed higher was a little bank of +forgotten snow, but spring had triumphed and everywhere was the +waving grace of maiden-hair ferns, banks of violets and strangely +beautiful little wild flowers. These woods are full of panthers, +but in day time the only precaution necessary is to take no dog, +- a dainty they cannot resist. The air was exquisite with the +sun-warm scent of pines, and here and there the trees broke away +disclosing mighty ranges of hills covered with rich blue shadows +like the bloom on a plum, - the clouds chasing the sunshine over +the mountain sides and the dark green velvet of the robe of +pines. I looked across ravines that did not seem gigantic and yet +the villages on the other side were like a handful of peas, so +tremendous was the scale. I stood now and then to see the +rhododendrons, forest trees here with great trunks and massive +boughs glowing with blood-red blossom, and time went by and I +took no count of it, so glorious was the climb. + +It must have been hours later when it struck me that the sun was +getting low and that by now we should be nearing The House in the +Woods. I said as much to Ali Khan. He looked perplexed and +agreed. We had reached a comparatively level place, the trail +faint but apparent, and it surprised me that we heard no sound of +life from the dense wood where our goal must be. + +"I know not, Presence," he said. "May his face be blackened that +directed me. I thought surely I could not miss the way, and +yet-" + +We cast back and could see no trail forking from the one we were +on. There was nothing for it but to trust to luck and push on. +But I began to be uneasy and so was the man. I had stupidly +forgotten to unpack my revolver, and worse, we had no food, and +the mountain air is an appetiser, and at night the woods have +their dangers, apart from being absolutely trackless. We had not +met a living being since we left the road and there seemed no +likelihood of asking for directions. I stopped no longer for +views but went steadily on, Ali Khan keeping up a running fire of +low-voiced invocations and lamentations. And now it was dusk and +the position decidely unpleasant. + +It was at that moment I saw a woman before us walking lightly and +steadily under the pines. She must have struck into the trail +from the side for she never could have kept before us all the +way. A native woman, but wearing the all-concealing boorka, more +like a town dweller than a woman of the hills. I put on speed and +Ali Khan, now very tired, toiled on behind me as I came up with +her and courteously asked the way. Her face was entirely hidden, +but the answering voice was clear and sweet. I made up my mind +she was young, for it had the bird-like thrill of youth. + +"If the Presence continues to follow this path he will arrive. It +is not far. They wait for him." + +That was all. It left me with a desire to see the veiled face. We +passed on and Ali Khan looked fearfully back. + +"Ajaib! (Wonderful!) A strange place to meet one of the +purdah-nashin (veiled women)" he muttered. "What would she be +doing up here in the heights? She walked like a Khanam (khan's +wife) and I saw the gleam of gold under the boorka." + +I turned with some curiosity as he spoke, and lo! there was no +human being in sight. She had disappeared from the track behind +us and it was impossible to say where. The darkening trees were +beginning to hold the dusk and it seemed unimaginable that a +woman should leave the way and take to the dangers of the woods. + +"Puna-i-Khoda - God protect us!" said Ali Khan in a shuddering +whisper. "She was a devil of the wilds. Press on, Sahib. We +should not be here in the dark." + +There was nothing else to do. We made the best speed we could, +and the trees grew more dense and the trail fainter between the +close trunks, and so the night came bewildering with the +expectation that we must pass the night unfed and unarmed in the +cold of the heights. They might send out a search party from The +House in the Woods - that was still a hope, if there were no +other. And then, very gradually and wonderfully the moon dawned +over the tree tops and flooded the wood with mysterious silver +lights and about her rolled the majesty of the stars. We pressed +on into the heart of the night. From the dense black depths we +emerged at last. An open glade lay before us - the trees falling +back to right and left to disclose - what? + +A long low house of marble, unlit, silent, bathed in pale +splendour and shadow. About it stood great deodars, clothed in +clouds of the white blossoming clematis, ghostly and still. +Acacias hung motionless trails of heavily scented bloom as if +carved in ivory. It was all silent as death. A flight of nobly +sculptured steps led up to a broad veranda and a wide open door +with darkness behind it. Nothing more. + +I forced myself to shout in Hindustani - the cry seeming a brutal +outrage upon the night, and an echo came back numbed in the black +woods. I tried once more and in vain. We stood absorbed also into +the silence. + +"Ya Alla! it is a house of the dead!" whispered Ali Khan, +shuddering at my shoulder, - and even as the words left his lips +I understood where we were. "It is the Sukh Mandir." I said. "It +is the House of the Maharao of Ranipur." + +It was impossible to be in Ranipur and hear nothing of the dead +house of the forest and Ali Khan had heard - God only knows what +tales. In his terror all discipline, all the inborn respect of +the native forsook him, and without word or sign he turned and +fled along the track, crashing through the forest blind and mad +with fear. It would have been insanity to follow him, and in +India the first rule of life is that the Sahib shows no fear, so +I left him to his fate whatever it might be, believing at the +same time that a little reflection and dread of the lonely forest +would bring him to heel quickly. + +I stood there and the stillness flowed like water about me. It +was as though I floated upon it - bathed in quiet. My thoughts +adjusted themselves. Possibly it was not the Sukh Mandir. Olesen +had spoken of ruin. I could see none. At least it was shelter +from the chill which is always present at these heights when the +sun sets, - and it was beautiful as a house not made with hands. +There was a sense of awe but no fear as I went slowly up the +great steps and into the gloom beyond and so gained the hall. + +The moon went with me and from a carven arch filled with marble +tracery rained radiance that revealed and hid. Pillars stood +about me, wonderful with horses ramping forward as in the Siva +Temple at Vellore. They appeared to spring from the pillars into +the gloom urged by invisible riders, the effect barbarously rich +and strange - motion arrested, struck dumb in a violent gesture, +and behind them impenetrable darkness. I could not see the end of +this hall - for the moon did not reach it, but looking up I +beheld the walls fretted in great panels into the utmost +splendour of sculpture, encircling the stories of the Gods amid a +twining and under-weaving of leaves and flowers. It was more like +a temple than a dwelling. Siva, as Nataraja the Cosmic Dancer, +the Rhythm of the Universe, danced before me, flinging out his +arms in the passion of creation. Kama, the Indian Eros, bore his +bow strung with honey-sweet black bees that typify the heart's +desire. Krishna the Beloved smiled above the herd-maidens +adoring at his feet. Ganesha the Elephant-Headed, sat in massive +calm, wreathing his wise trunk about him. And many more. But all +these so far as I could see tended to one centre panel larger +than any, representing two life-size figures of a dim beauty. At +first I could scarcely distinguish one from the other in the +upward-reflected light, and then, even as I stood, the moving +moon revealed the two as if floating in vapor. At once I +recognized the subject - I had seen it already in the ruined +temple of Ranipur, though the details differed. Parvati, the +Divine Daughter of the Himalaya, the Emanation of the mighty +mountains, seated upon a throne, listening to a girl who played +on a Pan pipe before her. The goddess sat, her chin leaned upon +her hand, her shoulders slightly inclined in a pose of gentle +sweetness, looking down upon the girl at her feet, absorbed in +the music of the hills and lonely places. A band of jewels, +richly wrought, clasped the veil on her brows, and below the bare +bosom a glorious girdle clothed her with loops and strings and +tassels of jewels that fell to her knees - her only garment. + +The girl was a lovely image of young womanhood, the proud swell +of the breast tapering to the slim waist and long limbs easily +folded as she half reclined at the divine feet, her lips pressed +to the pipe. Its silent music mysteriously banished fear. The +sleep must be sweet indeed that would come under the guardianship +of these two fair creatures - their gracious influence was dewy +in the air. I resolved that I would spend the night beside them. +Now with the march of the moon dim vistas of the walls beyond +sprang into being. Strange mythologies - the incarnations of +Vishnu the Preserver, the Pastoral of Krishna the Beautiful. I +promised myself that next day I would sketch some of the +loveliness about me. But the moon was passing on her way - I +folded the coat I carried into a pillow and lay down at the feet +of the goddess and her nymph. Then a moonlit quiet I slept in a +dream of peace. + +Sleep annihilates time. Was it long or short when I woke like a +man floating up to the surface from tranquil deeps? That I cannot +tell, but once more I possessed myself and every sense was on +guard. + +My hearing first. Bare feet were coming, falling softly as +leaves, but unmistakable. There was a dim whispering but I could +hear no word. I rose on my elbow and looked down the long hall. +Nothing. The moonlight lay in pools of light and seas of shadow +on the floor, and the feet drew nearer. Was I afraid? I cannot +tell, but a deep expectation possessed me as the sound grew like +the rustle of grasses parted in a fluttering breeze, and now a +girl came swiftly up the steps, irradiate in the moonlight, and +passing up the hall stood beside me. I could see her robe, her +feet bare from the jungle, but her face wavered and changed and +re- united like the face of a dream woman. I could not fix it for +one moment, yet knew this was the messenger for whom I had waited +all my life - for whom one strange experience, not to be told at +present, had prepared me in early manhood. Words came, and I +said: + +"Is this a dream?" + +"No. We meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is true." + +"Is a dream never true?" + +"Sometimes it is the echo of the Ninth Vibration and therefore a +harmonic of truth. You are awake now. It is the day-time that is +the sleep of the soul. You are in the Lower Perception, wherein +the truth behind the veil of what men call Reality is perceived." + +"Can I ascend?" + +"I cannot tell. That is for you, not me. + +"What do I perceive tonight?" + +"The Present as it is in the Eternal. Say no more. Come with me." + +She stretched her hand and took mine with the assurance of a +goddess, and we went up the hall where the night had been deepest +between the great pillars. + +Now it is very clear to me that in every land men, when the doors +of perception are opened, will see what we call the Supernatural +clothed in the image in which that country has accepted it. +Blake, the mighty mystic, will see the Angels of the Revelation, +driving their terrible way above Lambeth - it is not common nor +unclean. The fisherman, plying his coracle on the Thames will +behold the consecration of the great new Abbey of Westminster +celebrated with mass and chant and awful lights in the dead +mid-noon of night by that Apostle who is the Rock of the Church. +Before him who wanders in Thessaly Pan will brush the dewy lawns +and slim-girt Artemis pursue the flying hart. In the pale gold of +Egyptian sands the heavy brows of Osiris crowned with the pshent +will brood above the seer and the veil of Isis tremble to the +lifting. For all this is the rhythm to which the souls of men are +attuned and in that vibration they will see, and no other, since +in this the very mountains and trees of the land are rooted. So +here, where our remote ancestors worshipped the Gods of Nature, +we must needs stand before the Mystic Mother of India, the divine +daughter of the Himalaya. + +How shall I describe the world we entered? The carvings upon the +walls had taken life - they had descended. It was a gathering of +the dreams men have dreamed here of the Gods, yet most real and +actual. They watched in a serenity that set them apart in an +atmosphere of their own - forms of indistinct majesty and august +beauty, absolute, simple, and everlasting. I saw them as one sees +reflections in rippled water - no more. But all faces turned to +the place where now a green and flowering leafage enshrined and +partly hid the living Nature Goddess, as she listened to a voice +that was not dumb to me. I saw her face only in glimpses of an +indescribable sweetness, but an influence came from her presence +like the scent of rainy pine forests, the coolness that breathes +from great rivers, the passion of Spring when she breaks on the +world with a wave of flowers. Healing and life flowed from it. +Understanding also. It seemed I could interpret the very silence +of the trees outside into the expression of their inner life, the +running of the green life-blood in their veins, the delicate +trembling of their finger-tips. + +My companion and I were not heeded. We stood hand in hand like +children who have innocently strayed into a palace, gazing in +wonderment. The august life went its way upon its own occasions, +and, if we would, we might watch. Then the voice, clear and cold, +proceeding, as it were, with some story begun before we had +strayed into the Presence, the whole assembly listening in +silence. + +"- and as it has been so it will be, for the Law will have the +blind soul carried into a body which is a record of the sins it +has committed, and will not suffer that soul to escape from +rebirth into bodies until it has seen the truth -" + +And even as this was said and I listened, knowing myself on the +verge of some great knowledge, I felt sleep beginning to weigh +upon my eyelids. The sound blurred, flowed unsyllabled as a +stream, the girl's hand grew light in mine; she was fading, +becoming unreal; I saw her eyes like faint stars in a mist. They +were gone. Arms seemed to receive me - to lay me to sleep and I +sank below consciousness, and the night took me. + +When I awoke the radiant arrows of the morning were shooting +into the long hall where I lay, but as I rose and looked about +me, strange - most strange, ruin encircled me everywhere. The +blue sky was the roof. What I had thought a palace lost in the +jungle, fit to receive its King should he enter, was now a broken +hall of State; the shattered pillars were festooned with waving +weeds, the many coloured lantana grew between the fallen blocks +of marble. Even the sculptures on the walls were difficult to +decipher. Faintly I could trace a hand, a foot, the orb of a +woman's bosom, the gracious outline of some young God, standing +above a crouching worshipper. No more. Yes, and now I saw above +me as the dawn touched it the form of the Dweller in the Windhya +Hills, Parvati the Beautiful, leaning softly over something +breathing music at her feet. Yet I knew I could trace the almost +obliterated sculpture only because I had already seen it defined +in perfect beauty. A deep crack ran across the marble; it was +weathered and stained by many rains, and little ferns grew in the +crevices, but I could reconstruct every line from my own +knowledge. And how? The Parvati of Ranipur differed in many +important details. She stood, bending forward, wheras this sweet +Lady sat. Her attendants were small satyr-like spirits of the +wilds, piping and fluting, in place of the reclining maiden. The +sweeping scrolls of a great halo encircled her whole person. Then +how could I tell what this neary obliterated carving had been? I +groped for the answer and could not find it. I doubted- + + "Were such things here as we do speak about? + Or have we eaten of the insane root + That takes the reason captive?" + +Memory rushed over me like the sea over dry sands. A girl - there +had been a girl - we had stood with clasped hands to hear a +strange music, but in spite of the spiritual intimacy of those +moments I could not recall her face. I saw it cloudy against a +background of night and dream, the eyes remote as stars, and so +it eluded me. Only her presence and her words sur- vived; "We +meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is true." But the Ninth +Vibration itself was dream-land. I had never heard the phrase - I +could not tell what was meant, nor whether my apprehension was +true or false. I knew only that the night had taken her and the +dawn denied her, and that, dream or no dream, I stood there with +a pang of loss that even now leaves me wordless. + +A bird sang outside in the acacias, clear and shrill for day, and +this awakened my senses and lowered me to the plane where I +became aware of cold and hunger, and was chilled with dew. I +passed down the tumbled steps that had been a stately ascent the +night before and made my way into the jungle by the trail, small +and lost in fern, by which we had come. Again I wandered, and it +was high noon before I heard mule bells at a distance, and, thus +guided, struck down through the green tangle to find myself, +wearied but safe, upon the bridle way that leads to Fagu and the +far Shipki. Two coolies then directed me to The House in the +Woods. + +All was anxiety there. Ali Khan had arrived in the night, having +found his way under the guidance of blind flight and fear. He had +brought the news that I was lost in the jungle and amid the +dwellings of demons. It was, of course, hopeless to search in the +dark, though the khansamah and his man had gone as far as they +dared with lanterns and shouting, and with the daylight they +tried again and were even now away. It was useless to reproach +the man even if I had cared to do so. His ready plea was that as +far as men were concerned he was as brave as any (which was true +enough as I had reason to know later) but that when it came to +devilry the Twelve Imaums themselves would think twice before +facing it. + +"Inshalla ta-Alla! (If the sublime God wills!) this unworthy one +will one day show the Protector of the poor, that he is a +respectable person and no coward, but it is only the Sahibs who +laugh in the face of devils." + +He went off to prepare me some food, consumed with curiosity as +to my adventures, and when I had eaten I found my tiny +whitewashed cell, for the room was little more, and slept for +hours. + +Late in the afternoon I waked and looked out. A, low but glowing +sunlight suffused the wild garden reclaimed from the +strangle-hold of the jungle and hemmed in with rocks and forest. +A few simple flowers had been planted here and there, but its +chief beauty was a mountain stream, brown and clear as the eyes +of a dog, that fell from a crag above into a rocky basin, +maidenhair ferns growing in such masses about it that it was +henceforward scarcely more than a woodland voice. Beside it two +great deodars spread their canopies, and there a woman sat in a +low chair, a girl beside her reading aloud. She had thrown her +hat off and the sunshine turned her massed dark hair to bronze. +That was all I could see. I went out and joined them, taking the +note of introduction which Olesen had given me. + +I pass over the unessentials of my story; their friendly +greetings and sympathy for my adventure. It set us at ease at +once and I knew my stay would be the happier for their presence +though it is not every woman one would choose as a companion in +the great mountain country. But what is germane to my purpose +must be told, and of this a part is the per- sonality of Brynhild +Ingmar. That she was beautiful I never doubted, though I have +heard it disputed and smiled inwardly as the disputants urged lip +and cheek and shades of rose and lily, weighing and appraising. +Let me describe her as I saw her or, rather, as I can, adding +that even without all this she must still have been beautiful +because of the deep significance to those who had eyes to see or +feel some mysterious element which mingled itself with her +presence comparable only to the delight which the power and +spiritual essence of Nature inspires in all but the dullest +minds. I know I cannot hope to convey this in words. It means +little if I say I thought of all quiet lovely solitary things +when I looked into her calm eyes, - that when she moved it was +like clear springs renewed by flowing, that she seemed the +perfect flowering of a day in June, for these are phrases. Does +Nature know her wonders when she shines in her strength? Does a +woman know the infinite meanings her beauty may have for the +beholder? I cannot tell. Nor can I tell if I saw this girl as she +may have seemed to those who read only the letter of the book and +are blind to its spirit, or in the deepest sense as she really +was in the sight of That which created her and of which she was a +part. Surely it is a proof of the divinity of love that in and +for a moment it lifts the veil of so-called reality and shows +each to the other mysteriously perfect and inspiring as the world +will never see them, but as they exist in the Eternal, and in the +sight of those who have learnt that the material is but the +dream, and the vision of love the truth. + +I will say then, for the alphabet of what I knew but cannot tell, +that she had the low broad brows of a Greek Nature Goddess, the +hair swept back wing-like from the temples and massed with a +noble luxuriance. It lay like rippled bronze, suggesting +something strong and serene in its essence. Her eyes were clear +and gray as water, the mouth sweetly curved above a resolute +chin. It was a face which recalled a modelling in marble rather +than the charming pastel and aquarelle of a young woman's +colouring, and somehow I thought of it less as the beauty of a +woman than as some sexless emanation of natural things, and this +impression was strengthened by her height and the long limbs, +slender and strong as those of some youth trained in the +pentathlon, subject to the severest discipline until all that was +superfluous was fined away and the perfect form expressing the +true being emerged. The body was thus more beautiful than the +face, and I may note in passing that this is often the case, +because the face is more directly the index of the restless and +unhappy soul within and can attain true beauty only when the soul +is in harmony with its source. + +She was a little like her pale and wearied mother. She might +resemble her still more when the sorrow of this world that +worketh death should have had its will of her. I had yet to learn +that this would never be - that she had found the open door of +escape. + +We three spent much time together in the days that followed. I +never tired of their company and I think they did not tire of +mine, for my wanderings through the world and my studies in the +ancient Indian literatures and faiths with the Pandit Devaswami +were of interest to them both though in entirely different ways. +Mrs. Ingmar was a woman who centred all her interests in books +and chiefly in the scientific forms of occult research. She was +no believer in anything outside the range of what she called +human experience. The evidences had convinced her of nothing but +a force as yet unclassified in the scientific categories and all +her interest lay in the undeveloped powers of brain which might +be discovered in the course of ignorant and credulous experiment. +We met therefore on the common ground of rejection of the +so-called occultism of the day, though I knew even then, and how +infinitely better now, that her constructions were wholly +misleading. + +Nearly all day she would lie in her chair under the deodars by +the delicate splash and ripple of the stream. Living imprisoned +in the crystal sphere of the intellect she saw the world outside, +painted in few but distinct colours, small, comprehensible, +moving on a logical orbit. I never knew her posed for an +explanation. She had the contented atheism of a certain type of +French mind and found as much ease in it as another kind of sweet +woman does in her rosary and confessional. + +"I cannot interest Brynhild," she said, when I knew her better. +"She has no affinity with science. She is simply a nature +worshipper, and in such places as this she seems to draw life +from the inanimate life about her. I have sometimes wondered +whether she might not be developed into a kind of bridge between +the articulate and the inarticulate, so well does she understand +trees and flowers. Her father was like that - he had all sorts of +strange power with animals and plants, and thought he had more +than he had. He could never realize that the energy of nature is +merely mechanical." + +"You think all energy is mechanical?" + +"Certainly. We shall lay our finger on the mainspring one day and +the mystery will disappear. But as for Brynhild - I gave her the +best education possible and yet she has never understood the +conception of a universe moving on mathematical laws to which we +must submit in body and mind. She has the oddest ideas. I would +not willingly say of a child of mine that she is a mystic, and +yet -" + +She shook her head compassionately. But I scarcely heard. My eyes +were fixed on Brynhild, who stood apart, looking steadily out +over the snows. It was a glorious sunset, the west vibrating +with gorgeous colour spilt over in torrents that flooded the sky, +Terrible splendours - hues for which we have no thought - no +name. I had not thought of it as music until I saw her face but +she listened as well as saw, and her expression changed as it +changes when the pomp of a great orchestra breaks upon the +silence. It flashed to the chords of blood-red and gold that was +burning fire. It softened through the fugue of woven crimson +gold and flame, to the melancholy minor of ashes-of-roses and +paling green, and so through all the dying glories that faded +slowly to a tranquil grey and left the world to the silver +melody of one sole star that dawned above the ineffable heights +of the snows. Then she listened as a child does to a bird, +entranced, with a smile like a butterfly on her parted lips. I +never saw such a power of quiet. + +She and I were walking next day among the forest ways, the +pine-scented sunshine dappling the dropped frondage. We had been +speaking of her mother. "It is such a misfortune for her," she +said thoughtfully, "that I am not clever. She should have had a +daughter who could have shared her thoughts. She analyses +everything, reasons about everything, and that is quite out of my +reach." + +She moved beside me with her wonderful light step - the poise and +balance of a nymph in the Parthenon frieze. + +"How do you see things?" + +"See? That is the right word. I see things - I never reason about +them. They are. For her they move like figures in a sum. For me +every one of them is a window through which one may look to what +is beyond." + +"To where?" + +"To what they really are - not what they seem." + +I looked at her with interest. + +"Did you ever hear of the double vision?" + +For this is a subject on which the spiritually learned men of +India, like the great mystics of all the faiths, have much to +say. I had listened with bewilderment and doubt to the +expositions of my Pandit on this very head. Her simple words +seemed for a moment the echo of his deep and searching thought. +Yet it surely could not be. Impossible. + +"Never. What does it mean?" She raised clear unveiled eyes. "You +must forgive me for being so stupid, but it is my mother who is +at home with all these scientific phrases. I know none of them." + +"It means that for some people the material universe - the things +we see with our eyes - is only a mirage, or say, a symbol, which +either hides or shadows forth the eternal truth. And in that +sense they see things as they really are, not as they seem to the +rest of us. And whether this is the statement of a truth or the +wildest of dreams, I cannot tell." + +She did not answer for a moment; then said; + +"Are there people who believe this - know it?" + +"Certainly. There are people who believe that thought is the only +real thing - that the whole universe is thought made visible. +That we create with our thoughts the very body by which we shall +re-act on the universe in lives to be. + +"Do you believe it?" + +"I don't know. Do you?" + +She paused; looked at me, and then went on: + +"You see, I don't think things out. I only feel. But this cannot +interest you." + +I felt she was eluding the question. She began to interest me +more than any one I had ever known. She had extraordinary power +of a sort. Once, in the woods, where I was reading in so deep a +shade that she never saw me, I had an amazing vision of her. She +stood in a glade with the sunlight and shade about her; she had +no hat and a sunbeam turned her hair to pale bronze. A small +bright April shower was falling through the sun, and she stood in +pure light that reflected itself in every leaf and grass-blade. +But it was nothing of all this that arrested me, beautiful as it +was. She stood as though life were for the moment suspended;- +then, very softly, she made a low musical sound, infinitely +wooing, from scarcely parted lips, and instantly I saw a bird of +azure plumage flutter down and settle on her shoulder, pluming +himself there in happy security. Again she called softly and +another followed the first. Two flew to her feet, two more to her +breast and hand. They caressed her, clung to her, drew some +joyous influence from her presence. She stood in the glittering +rain like Spring with her birds about her - a wonderful sight. +Then, raising one hand gently with the fingers thrown back she +uttered a different note, perfectly sweet and intimate, and the +branches parted and a young deer with full bright eyes fixed on +her advanced and pushed a soft muzzle into her hand. + +In my astonishment I moved, however slightly, and the picture +broke up. The deer sprang back into the trees, the birds +fluttered up in a hurry of feathers, and she turned calm eyes +upon me, as unstartled as if she had known all the time that I +was there. + +"You should not have breathed," she said smiling. "They must have +utter quiet." + +I rose up and joined her. + +"It is a marvel. I can scarcely believe my eyes. How do you do +it?" + +"My father taught me. They come. How can I tell?" + +She turned away and left me. I thought long over this episode. I +recalled words heard in the place of my studies - words I had +dismissed without any care at the moment. "To those who see, +nothing is alien. They move in the same vibration with all that +has life, be it in bird or flower. And in the Uttermost also, for +all things are One. For such there is no death." + +That was beyond me still, but I watched her with profound +interest. She recalled also words I had half forgotten- + + "There was nought above me and nought below, + My childhood had not learnt to know; + For what are the voices of birds, + Aye, and of beasts, but words, our words, - + Only so much more sweet." + +That might have been written of her. And more. + +She had found one day in the woods a flower of a sort I had once +seen in the warm damp forests below Darjiling - ivory white and +shaped like a dove in flight. She wore it that evening on her +bosom. A week later she wore what I took to be another. + +"You have had luck," I said; "I never heard of such a thing being +seen so high up, and you have found it twice." + +"No, it is the same." + +"The same? Impossible. You found it more than a week ago." "I +know. It is ten days. Flowers don't die when one understands them +- not as most people think." + +Her mother looked up and said fretfully: + +"Since she was a child Brynhild has had that odd idea. That +flower is dead and withered. Throw it away, child. It looks +hideous." + +Was it glamour? What was it? I saw the flower dewy fresh in her +bosom She smiled and turned away. + +It was that very evening she left the veranda where we were +sitting in the subdued light of a little lamp and passed beyond +where the ray cut the darkness. She went down the perspective of +trees to the edge of he clearing and I rose to follow for it +seemed absolutely unsafe that she should be on the verge of the +panther-haunted woods alone. Mrs. Ingmar turned a page of her +book serenely; + +"She will not like it if you go. I cannot imagine that she should +come to harm. She always goes her own way - light or dark." + +I returned to my seat and watched steadfastly. At first I could +see nothing but as my sight adjusted itself I saw her a long way +down the clearing that opened the snows, and quite certainly also +I saw something like a huge dog detach itself from the woods and +bound to her feet. It mingled with her dark dress and I lost it. +Mrs. Ingmar said, seeing my anxiety but nothing else; "Her father +was just the same; - he had no fear of anything that lives. No +doubt some people have that power. I have never seen her attract +birds and beasts as he certainly did, but she is quite as fond of +them." + +I could not understand her blindness - what I myself had seen +raised questions I found unanswerable, and her mother saw +nothing! Which of us was right? presently she came back slowly +and I ventured no word. + +A woodland sorcery, innocent as the dawn, hovered about her. What +was it? Did the mere love of these creatures make a bond between +her soul and theirs, or was the ancient dream true and could she +at times move in the same vibration? I thought of her as a +wood-spirit sometimes, an expression herself of some passion of +beauty in Nature, a thought of snows and starry nights and +flowing rivers made visible in flesh. It is surely when seized +with the urge of some primeval yearning which in man is merely +sexual that Nature conceives her fair forms and manifests them, +for there is a correspondence that runs through all creation. + +Here I ask myself - Did I love her? In a sense, yes, deeply, but +not in the common reading of the phrase. I have trembled with +delight before the wild and terrible splendour of the Himalayan +heights-; low golden moons have steeped my soul longing, but I +did not think of these things as mine in any narrow sense, nor so +desire them. They were Angels of the Evangel of beauty. So too +was she. She had none of the "silken nets and traps of adamant," +she was no sister of the "girls of mild silver or of furious +gold"; - but fair, strong, and her own, a dweller in the House of +Quiet. I did not covet her. I loved her. + +Days passed. There came a night when the winds were loosed - no +moon, the stars flickering like blown tapers through driven +clouds, the trees swaying and lamenting. + +"There will be rain tomorrow." Mrs. Ingmar said, as we parted for +the night. I closed my door. Some great cat of the woods was +crying harshly outside my window, the sound receding towards the +bridle way. I slept in a dream of tossing seas and ships +labouring among them. + +With the sense of a summons I waked - I cannot tell when. +Unmistakable, as if I were called by name. I rose and dressed, +and heard distinctly bare feet passing my door. I opened it +noiselessly and looked out into the little passage way that made +for the entry, and saw nothing but pools of darkness and a dim +light from the square of the window at the end. But the wind had +swept the sky clear with its flying bosom and was sleeping now in +its high places and the air was filled with a mild moony radiance +and a great stillness. + +Now let me speak with restraint and exactness. I was not afraid +but felt as I imagine a dog feels in the presence of his master, +conscious of a purpose, a will entirely above his own and +incomprehensible, yet to be obeyed without question. I followed +my reading of the command, bewildered but docile, and +understanding nothing but that I was called. + +The lights were out. The house dead silent; the familiar veranda +ghostly in the night. And now I saw a white figure at the head of +the steps - Brynhild. She turned and looked over her shoulder, +her face pale in the moon, and made the same gesture with which +she summoned her birds. I knew her meaning, for now we were +moving in the same rhythm, and followed as she took the lead. How +shall I describe that strange night in the jungle. There were +fire-flies or dancing points of light that recalled them. Perhaps +she was only thinking them - only thinking the moon and the +quiet, for we were in the world where thought is the one reality. +But they went with us in a cloud and faintly lighted our way. +There were exquisite wafts of perfume from hidden flowers +breathing their dreams to the night. Here and there a drowsy bird +stirred and chirped from the roof of darkness, a low note of +content that greeted her passing. It was a path intricate and +winding and how long we went, and where, I cannot tell. But at +last she stooped and parting the boughs before her we stepped +into an open space, and before us - I knew it - I knew it! - The +House of Beauty. + +She paused at the foot of the great marble steps and looked at +me. + +"We have met here already." + +I did not wonder - I could not. In the Ninth vibration surprise +had ceased to be. Why had I not recognized her before - O dull of +heart! That was my only thought. We walk blindfold through the +profound darkness of material nature, the blinder because we +believe we see it. It is only when the doors of the material are +closed that the world appears to man as it exists in the eternal +truth. + +"Did you know this?" I asked, trembling before mystery. + +"I knew it, because I am awake. You forgot it in the dull sleep +which we call daily life. But we were here and THEY began the +story of the King who made this house. Tonight we shall hear it. +It he story of Beauty wandering through the world and the world +received her not. We hear it in this place because here he +agonized for what he knew too late." + +"Was that our only meeting?" + +"We meet every night, but you forget when the day brings the +sleep of the soul. - You do not sink deep enough into rest to +remember. You float on the surface where the little bubbles of +foolish dream are about you and I cannot reach you then." + +"How can I compel myself to the deeps?" + +"You cannot. It will come. But when you have passed up the bridle +way and beyond the Shipki, stop at Gyumur. There is the Monastery +of Tashigong, and there one will meet you- + +"His name?" + +"Stephen Clifden. He will tell you what you desire to know. +Continue on then with him to Yarkhand. There in the Ninth +Vibration we shall meet again. It is a long journey but you will +be content." + +"Do you certainly know that we shall meet again?" + +"When you have learnt, we can meet when we will. He will teach +you the Laya Yoga. You should not linger here in the woods any +longer. You should go on. In three days it will be possible." + +"But how have you learnt - a girl and young?" + +"Through a close union with Nature - that is one of the three +roads. But I know little as yet. Now take my hand and come. + +"One last question. Is this house ruined and abject as I have +seen it in the daylight, or royal and the house of Gods as we see +it now? Which is truth?" + +"In the day you saw it in the empty illusion of blind thought. +Tonight, eternally lovely as in the thought of the man who made +it. Nothing that is beautiful is lost, though in the sight of the +unwise it seems to die. Death is in the eyes we look through - +when they are cleansed we see Life only. Now take my hand and +come. Delay no more." + +She caught my hand and we entered the dim magnificence of the +great hall. The moon entered with us. + +Instantly I had the feeling of supernatural presence. Yet I only +write this in deference to common use, for it was absolutely +natural - more so than any I have met in the state called daily +life. It was a thing in which I had a part, and if this was +supernatural so also was I. + +Again I saw the Dark One, the Beloved, the young Krishna, above +the women who loved him. He motioned with his hand as we passed, +as though he waved us smiling on our way. Again the dancers moved +in a rhythmic tread to the feet of the mountain Goddess - again +we followed to where she bent to hear. But now, solemn listening +faces crowded in the shadows about her, grave eyes fixed +immovably upon what lay at her feet - a man, submerged in the +pure light that fell from her presence, his dark face stark and +fine, lips locked, eyes shut, arms flung out cross-wise in utter +abandonment, like a figure of grief invisibly crucified upon his +shame. I stopped a few feet from him, arrested by a barrier I +could not pass. Was it sleep or death or some mysterious state +that partook of both? Not sleep, for there was no flutter of +breath. Not death - no rigid immobility struck chill into the +air. It was the state of subjection where the spirit set free +lies tranced in the mighty influences which surround us +invisibly until we have entered, though but for a moment, the +Ninth Vibration. + +And now, with these Listeners about us, a clear voice began and +stirred the air with music. I have since been asked in what +tongue it spoke and could only answer that it reached my ears in +the words of my childhood, and that I know whatever that language +had been it would so have reached me. + +"Great Lady, hear the story of this man's fall, for it is the +story of man. Be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them light." + +There was long since in Ranipur a mighty King and at his birth +the wise men declared that unless he cast aside all passions that +debase the soul, relinquishing the lower desires for the higher +until a Princess laden with great gifts should come to be his +bride, he would experience great and terrible misfortunes. And +his royal parents did what they could to possess him with this +belief, but they died before he reached manhood. Behold him then, +a young King in his palace, surrounded with splendour. How should +he withstand the passionate crying of the flesh or believe that +through pleasure comes satiety and the loss of that in the spirit +whereby alone pleasure can be enjoyed? For his gift was that he +could win all hearts. They swarmed round him like hiving bees and +hovered about him like butterflies. Sometimes he brushed them +off. Often he caressed them, and when this happened, each thought +proudly "I am the Royal Favourite. There is none other than me." + +Also the Princess delayed who would be the crest-jewel of the +crown, bringing with her all good and the blessing of the High +Gods, and in consequence of all these things the King took such +pleasures as he could, and they were many, not knowing they +darken the inner eye whereby what is royal is known through +disguises. + +(Most pitiful to see, beneath the close-shut lids of the man at +the feet of the Dweller in the Heights, tears forced themselves, +as though a corpse dead to all else lived only to anguish. They +flowed like blood-drops upon his face as he lay enduring, and the +voice proceeded.) What was the charm of the King? Was it his +stately height and strength? Or his faithless gayety? Or his +voice, deep and soft as the sitar when it sings of love? His +women said - some one thing, some another, but none of these +ladies were of royal blood, and therefore they knew not. + +Now one day, the all-privileged jester of the King, said, +laughing harshly: + +"Maharaj, you divert yourself. But how if, while we feast and +play, the Far Away Princess glided past and was gone, unknown and +unwelcomed?" + +And the King replied: + +"Fool, content yourself. I shall know my Princess, but she delays +so long that I weary. + +Now in a far away country was a Princess, daughter of the +Greatest, and her Father hesitated to give her in marriage to +such a King for all reported that he was faithless of heart, but +having seen his portrait she loved him and fled in disguise from +the palaces of her Father, and being captured she was brought +before the King in Ranipur. + +He sat upon a cloth of gold and about him was the game he had +killed in hunting, in great masses of ruffled fur and plumage, +and he turned the beauty of his face carelessly upon her, and as +the Princess looked upon him, her heart yearned to him, and he +said in his voice that was like the male string of the sitar: + +"Little slave, what is your desire?" + +Then she saw that the long journey had scarred her feet and +dimmed her hair with dust, and that the King's eyes, worn with +days and nights of pleasure did not pierce her disguise. Now in +her land it is a custom that the blood royal must not proclaim +itself, so she folded her hands and said gently: + +"A place in the household of the King." And he, hearing that the +Waiting slave of his chief favorite Jayashri was dead, gave her +that place. So the Princess attended on those ladies, courteous +and obedient to all authority as beseemed her royalty, and she +braided her bright hair so that it hid the little crowns which +the Princesses of her House must wear always in token of their +rank, and every day her patience strengthened. + +Sometimes the King, carelessly desiring her laughing face and sad +eyes, would send for her to wile away an hour, and he would say; +"Dance, little slave, and tell me stories of the far countries. +You quite unlike my Women, doubtless because you are a slave." + +And she thought - "No, but because I am a Princess," - but this +she did not say. She laughed and told him the most marvellous +stories in the world until he laid his head upon her warm bosom, +dreaming awake. + +There were stories of the great Himalayan solitudes where in the +winter nights the white tiger stares at the witches' dance of the +Northern Lights dazzled by the hurtling of their myriad spears. +And she told how the King-eagle, hanging motionless over the +peaks of Gaurisankar, watches with golden eyes for his prey, and +falling like a plummet strikes its life out with his clawed heel +and, screaming with triumph, bears it to his fierce mate in her +cranny of the rocks. + +"A gallant story!" the King would say. "More!" Then she told of +the tropical heats and the stealthy deadly creatures of forest +and jungle, and the blue lotus of Buddha swaying on the still +lagoon,- And she spoke of loves of men and women, their passion +and pain and joy. And when she told of their fidelity and valour +and honour that death cannot quench, her voice was like the song +of a minstrel, for she had read all the stories of the ages and +the heart of a Princess told her the rest. And the King listened +unwearying though he believed this was but a slave. + +(The face of the man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights +twitched in a white agony. Pearls of sweat were distilled upon +his brows, but he moved neither hand nor foot, enduring as in a +flame of fire. And the voice continued.) + +So one day, in the misty green of the Spring, while she rested at +his feet in the garden Pavilion, he said to her: + +"Little slave, why do you love me?" + +And she answered proudly: + +"Because you have the heart of a King." + +He replied slowly; + +"Of the women who have loved me none gave this reason, though +they gave many." + +She laid her cheek on his hand. + +"That is the true reason." + +But he drew it away and was vaguely troubled, for her words, he +knew not why, reminded him of the Far Away Princess and of things +he had long forgotten, and he said; "What does a slave know of +the hearts of Kings?" And that night he slept or waked alone. + +Winter was at hand with its blue and cloudless days, and she was +commanded to meet the King where the lake lay still and shining +like an ecstasy of bliss, and she waited with her chin dropped +into the cup of her hands, looking over the water with eyes that +did not see, for her whole soul said; "How long 0 my Sovereign +Lord, how long before you know the truth and we enter together +into our Kingdom?" + +As she sat she heard the King's step, and the colour stole up +into her face in a flush like the earliest sunrise. "He is +coming," she said; and again; "He loves me." + +So he came beside the water, walking slowly. But the King was not +alone. His arm embraced the latest-come beauty from Samarkhand, +and, with his head bent, he whispered in her willing ear. + +Then clasping her hands, the Princess drew a long sobbing breath, +and he turned and his eyes grew hard as blue steel. + +"Go, slave," he cried. "What place have you in Kings' gardens? +Go. Let me see you no more." + +(The man lying at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights, raised +a heavy arm and flung it above his head, despairing, and it fell +again on the cross of his torment. And the voice went on.) + +And as he said this, her heart broke; and she went and her feet +were weary. So she took the wise book she loved and unrolled it +until she came to a certain passage, and this she read twice; +"If the heart of a slave be broken it may be mended with jewels +and soft words, but the heart of a Princess can be healed only by +the King who broke it, or in Yamapura, the City under the Sunset +where they make all things new. Now, Yama, the Lord of this City, +is the Lord of Death." And having thus read the Princess rolled +the book and put it from her. + +And next day, the King said to his women; "Send for her," for his +heart smote him and he desired to atone royally for the shame of +his speech. And they sought and came back saying; + +"Maharaj, she is gone. We cannot find her." + +Fear grew in the heart of the King - a nameless dread, and he +said, "Search." And again they sought and returned and the King +was striding up and down the great hall and none dared cross his +path. But, trembling, they told him, and he replied; "Search +again. I will not lose her, and, slave though be, she shall be my +Queen." + +So they ran, dispersing to the Four Quarters, and King strode up +and down the hall, and Loneliness kept step with him and clasped +his hand and looked his eyes. + +Then the youngest of the women entered with a tale to tell. +Majesty, we have found her. She lies beside the lake. When the +birds fled this morning she fled with them, but upon a longer +journey. Even to Yamapura, the City under the Sunset." + +And the King said; "Let none follow." And he strode forth +swiftly, white with thoughts he dared not think. + +The Princess lay among the gold of the fallen leaves. All was +gold, for her bright hair was out-spread in shining waves and in +it shone the glory of the hidden crown. On her face was no smile +- only at last was revealed the patience she had covered with +laughter so long that even the voice of the King could not now +break it into joy. The hands that had clung, the swift feet that +had run beside his, the tender body, mighty to serve and to love, +lay within touch but farther away than the uttermost star was the +Far Away Princess, known and loved too late. + +And he said; "My Princess - 0 my Princess!" and laid his head on +her cold bosom. + +"Too late!" a harsh Voice croaked beside him, and it was the +voice of the Jester who mocks at all things. "Too late! 0 +madness, to despise the blood royal because it humbled itself to +service and so was doubly royal. The Far Away Princess came laden +with great gifts, and to her the King's gift was the wage of a +slave and a broken heart. Cast your crown and sceptre in the +dust, 0 King - 0 King of Fools." + +(The man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights moved. Some +dim word shaped upon his locked lips. She listened in a divine +calm. It seemed that the very Gods drew nearer. Again the man +essayed speech, the body dead, life only in the words that none +could hear. The voice went on.) + +But the Princess flying wearily because of the sore wound in her +heart, came at last to the City under the Sunset, where the Lord +of Death rules in the House of Quiet, and was there received with +royal honours for in that land are no disguises. And she knelt +before the Secret One and in a voice broken with agony entreated +him to heal her. And with veiled and pitying eyes he looked upon +her, for many and grievous as are the wounds he has healed this +was more grievous still. And he said; + +"Princess, I cannot, But this I can do - I can give a new heart +in a new birth - happy and careless as the heart of a child. Take +this escape from the anguish you endure and be at peace." + +But the Princess, white with pain, asked only; + +"In this new heart and birth, is there room for the King?" + +And the Lord of Peace replied; + +"None. He too will be forgotten." + +Then she rose to her feet. + +"I will endure and when he comes I will serve him once more. If +he will he shall heal me, and if not I will endure for ever." + +And He who is veiled replied; + +"In this sacred City no pain may disturb the air, therefore you +must wait outside in the chill and the dark. Think better, +Princess! Also, he must pass through many rebirths, because he +beheld the face of Beauty unveiled and knew her not. And when he +comes he will be weary and weak as a new-born child, and no more +a great King." And the Princess smiled; + +"Then he will need me the more," she said; "I will wait and kiss +the feet of my King." + +And the Lord of Death was silent. So she went outside into the +darkness of the spaces, and the souls free passed her like homing +doves, and she sat with her hands clasped over the sore wound in +her heart, watching the earthward way. And the Princess is +keeping still the day of her long patience." + +The voice ceased. And there was a great silence, and the +listening faces drew nearer. + +Then the Dweller in the Heights spoke in a voice soft as the +falling of snow in the quiet of frost and moon. I could have wept +myself blind with joy to hear that music. More I dare not say. + +"He is in the Lower State of Perception. He sorrows for his loss. +Let him have one instant's light that still he may hope." + +She bowed above the man, gazing upon him as a mother might upon +her sleeping child. The dead eyelids stirred, lifted, a faint +gleam showed beneath them, an unspeakable weariness. I thought +they would fall unsatisfied. Suddenly he saw What looked upon +him, and a terror of joy no tongue can tell flashed over the dark +mirror of his face. He stretched a faint hand to touch her feet, +a sobbing sigh died upon his lips, and once more the swooning +sleep took him. He lay as a dead man before the Assembly. + +"The night is far spent," a voice said, from I know not where. +And I knew it was said not only for the sleeper but for all, for +though the flying feet of Beauty seem for a moment to outspeed us +she will one day wait our coming and gather us to her bosom. + +As before, the vision spread outward like rings in a broken +reflection in water. I saw the girl beside me, but her hand grew +light in mine. I felt it no longer. I heard the roaring wind in +the trees, or was it a great voice thundering in my ears? Sleep +took me. I waked in my little room. + +Strange and sad - I saw her next day and did not remember her +whom of all things I desired to know. I remembered the vision and +knew that whether in dream or waking I had heard an eternal +truth. I longed with a great longing to meet my beautiful +companion, and she stood at my side and I was blind. + +Now that I have climbed a little higher on the Mount of Vision it +seems even to myself that this could not be. Yet it was, and it +is true of not this only but of how much else! + +She knew me. I learnt that later, but she made no sign. Her +simplicities had carried her far beyond and above me, to places +where only the winged things attain- "as a bird among the +bird-droves of God." + +I have since known that this power of direct simplicity in her +was why among the great mountains we beheld the Divine as the +emanation of the terrible beauty about us. We cannot see it as it +is - only in some shadowing forth, gathering sufficient strength +for manifestation from the spiritual atoms that haunt the region +where that form has been for ages the accepted vehicle of +adoration. But I was now to set forth to find another knowledge - +to seek the Beauty that blinds us to all other. Next day the man +who was directing my preparations for travel sent me word from +Simla that all was ready and I could start two days later. I told +my friends the time of parting was near. + +"But it was no surprise to me," I added, "for I had heard already +that in a very few days I should be on my way. + +Mrs. Ingmar was more than kind. She laid a frail hand on mine. + +"We shall miss you indeed. If it is possible to send us word of +your adventures in those wild solitudes I hope you will do it. Of +course aviation will soon lay bare their secrets and leave them +no mysteries, so you don't go too soon. One may worship science +and yet feel it injures the beauty of the world. But what is +beauty compared with knowledge?" + +"Do you never regret it?" I asked. + +"Never, dear Mr. Ormond. I am a worshipper of hard facts and +however hideous they may be I prefer them to the prismatic +colours of romance." + +Brynhild, smiling, quoted; + + "Their science roamed from star to star + And than itself found nothing greater. + What wonder? In a Leyden jar + They bottled the Creator?" + +"There is nothing greater than science," said Mrs. Ingmar with +soft reverence. "The mind of man is the foot-rule of the +universe." + +She meditated for a moment and then added that my kind interests +in their plans decided her to tell me that she would be returning +to Europe and then to Canada in a few months with a favourite +niece as her companion while Brynhild would remain in India with +friends in Mooltan for a time. I looked eagerly at her but she +was lost in her own thoughts and it was evidently not the time to +say more. + +If I had hoped for a vision before I left the neighbourhood of +that strange House of Beauty where a spirit imprisoned appeared +to await the day of enlightenment I was disappointed. These +things do not happen as one expects or would choose. The wind +bloweth where it listeth until the laws which govern the inner +life are understood, and then we would not choose if we could for +we know that all is better than well. In this world, either in +the blinded sight of daily life or in the clarity of the true +sight I have not since seen it, but that has mattered little, for +having heard an authentic word within its walls I have passed on +my way elsewhere. + +Next day a letter from Olesen reached me. + +"Dear Ormond, I hope you have had a good time at the House in the +Woods. I saw Rup Singh a few days ago and he wrote the odd +message I enclose. You know what these natives are, even the most +sensible of them, and you will humour the old fellow for he ages +very fast and I think is breaking up. But this was not what I +wanted to say. I had a letter from a man I had not seen for years +- a fellow called Stephen Clifden, who lives in Kashmir. As a +matter of fact I had forgotten his existence but evidently he has +not repaid the compliment for he writes as follows - No, I had +better send you the note and you can do as you please. I am +rushed off my legs with work and the heat is hell with the lid +off. And-" + +But the rest was of no interest except to a friend of years' +standing. I read Rup Singh's message first. It was written in his +own tongue. + +"To the Honoured One who has attained to the favour of the +Favourable. + +"You have with open eyes seen what this humble one has dreamed +but has not known. If the thing be possible, write me this word +that I may depart in peace. 'With that one who in a former birth +you loved all is well. Fear nothing for him. The way is long but +at the end the lamps of love are lit and the Unstruck music is +sounded. He lies at the feet of Mercy and there awaits his hour.' +And if it be not possible to write these words, write nothing, 0 +Honoured, for though it be in the hells my soul shall find my +King, and again I shall serve him as once I served." + +I understood, and wrote those words as he had written them. +Strange mystery of life - that I who had not known should see, +and that this man whose fidelity had not deserted his broken King +in his utter downfall should have sought with passion for one +sight of the beloved face across the waters of death and sought +in vain. I thought of those Buddhist words of Seneca - "The soul +may be and is in the mass of men drugged and silenced by the +seductions of sense and the deceptions of the world. But if, in +some moment of detachment and elation, when its captors and +jailors relax their guard, it can escape their clutches, it will +seek at once the region of its birth and its true home." + +Well - the shell must break before the bird can fly, and the time +drew near for the faithful servant to seek his lord. My message +reached him in time and gladdened him. + +I turned then to Clifden's letter. + +"Dear Olesen, you will have forgotten me, and feeling sure of +this I should scarcely have intruded a letter into your busy life +were it not that I remember your good-nature as a thing +unforgettable though so many years have gone by. I hear of you +sometimes when Sleigh comes up the Sind valley, for I often camp +at Sonamarg and above the Zoji La and farther. I want you to give +a message to a man you know who should be expecting to hear from +me. Tell him I shall be at the Tashigong Monastery when he +reaches Gyumur beyond the Shipki. Tell him I have the +information he wants and I will willingly go on with him to +Yarkhand and his destination. He need not arrange for men beyond +Gyumur. All is fixed. So sorry to bother you, old man, but I +don't know Ormond's address, except that he was with you and has +gone up Simla way. And of course he will be keen to hear the +thing is settled." + +Amazing. I remembered the message I had heard and this man's +words rang true and kindly, but what could it mean? I really did +not question farther than this for now I could not doubt that I +was guided. Stronger hands than mine had me in charge, and it +only remained for me to set forth in confidence and joy to an end +that as yet I could not discern. I turned my face gladly to the +wonder of the mountains. + +Gladly - but with a reservation. I was leaving a friend and one +whom I dimly felt might one day be more than a friend - Brynhild +Ingmar. That problem must be met before I could take my way. I +thought much of what might be said at parting. True, she had the +deepest attraction for me, but true also that I now beheld a +quest stretching out into the unknown which I must accept in the +spirit of the knight errant. Dare I then bind my heart to any +allegiance which would pledge me to a future inconsistent with +what lay before me? How could I tell what she might think of the +things which to me were now real and external - the revelation of +the only reality that underlies all the seeming. Life can never +be the same for the man who has penetrated to this, and though it +may seem a hard saying there can be but a maimed understanding +between him and those who still walk amid the phantoms of death +and decay. + +Her sympathy with nature was deep and wonderful but might it not +be that though the earth was eloquent to her the skies were +silent? I was but a beginner myself - I knew little indeed. Dare +I risk that little in a sweet companionship which would sink me +into the contentment of the life lived by the happily deluded +between the cradle and the grave and perhaps close to me for ever +that still sphere where my highest hope abides? I had much to +ponder, for how could I lose her out of my life - though I knew +not at all whether she who had so much to make her happiness +would give me a single thought when I was gone. + +If all this seem the very uttermost of selfish vanity, forgive a +man who grasped in his hand a treasure so new, so wonderful that +he walked in fear and doubt lest it should slip away and leave +him in a world darkened for ever by the torment of the knowledge +that it might have been his and he had bartered it for the mess +of pottage that has bought so many birthrights since Jacob +bargained with his weary brother in the tents of Lahai-roi. I +thought I would come back later with my prize gained and throwing +it at her feet ask her wisdom in return, for whatever I might not +know I knew well she was wiser than I except in that one shining +of the light from Eleusis. I walked alone in the woods thinking +of these things and no answer satisfied me. + +I did not see her alone until the day I left, for I was compelled +by the arrangements I was making to go down to Simla for a night. +And now the last morning had come with golden sun - shot mists +rolling upward to disclose the far white billows of the sea of +eternity, the mountains awaking to their enormous joys. The trees +were dripping glory to the steaming earth; it flowed like rivers +into their most secret recesses, moss and flower, fern and leaf +floated upon the waves of light revealing their inmost soul in +triumphant gladness. Far off across the valleys a cuckoo was +calling - the very voice of spring, and in the green world above +my head a bird sang, a feathered joy, so clear, so passionate +that I thought the great summer morning listened in silence to +his rapture ringing through the woods. I waited until the +Jubilate was ended and then went in to bid good-bye to my +friends. + +Mrs. Ingmar bid me the kindest farewell and I left her serene in +the negation of all beauty, all hope save that of a world run on +the lines of a model municipality, disease a memory, sewerage, +light and air systems perfected, the charted brain sending its +costless messages to the outer parts of the habitable globe, and +at least a hundred years of life with a decent cremation at the +end of it assured to every eugenically born citizen. No more. But +I have long ceased to regret that others use their own eyes +whether clear or dim. Better the merest glimmer of light +perceived thus than the hearsay of the revelations of others. And +by the broken fragments of a bewildered hope a man shall +eventually reach the goal and rejoice in that dawn where the +morning stars sing together and the sons of God shout for joy. It +must come, for it is already here. + +Brynhild walked with me through the long glades in the fresh thin +air to the bridle road where my men and ponies waited, eager to +be off. We stood at last in the fringe of trees on a small height +which commanded the way; - a high uplifted path cut along the +shoulders of the hills and on the left the sheer drop of the +valleys. Perhaps seven or eight feet in width and dignified by +the name of the Great Hindustan and Tibet Road it ran winding far +away into Wonderland. Looking down into the valleys, so far +beneath that the solitudes seem to wall them in I thought of all +the strange caravans which have taken this way with tinkle of +bells and laughter now so long silenced, and as I looked I saw a +lost little monastery in a giant crevice, solitary as a planet on +the outermost ring of the system, and remembrance flashed into my +mind and I said; + +"I have marching orders that have countermanded my own plans. I +am to journey to the Buddhist Monastery of Tashigong, and there +meet a friend who will tell me what is necessary that I may +travel to Yarkhand and beyond. It will be long before I see +Kashmir." + +In those crystal clear eyes I saw a something new to me - a faint +smile, half pitying, half sad; + +"Who told you, and where?" + +"A girl in a strange place. A woman who has twice guided me -" + +I broke off. Her smile perplexed me. I could not tell what to +say. She repeated in a soft undertone; + +"Great Lady, be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them light." + +And instantly I knew. 0 blind - blind! Was the unhappy King of +the story duller of heart than I? And shame possessed me. Here +was the chrysoberyl that all day hides its secret in deeps of +lucid green but when the night comes flames with its fiery +ecstasy of crimson to the moon, and I - I had been complacently +considering whether I might not blunt my own spiritual instinct +by companionship with her, while she had been my guide, as +infinitely beyond me in insight as she was in all things +beautiful. I could have kissed her feet in my deep repentance. +True it is that the gateway of the high places is reverence and +he who cannot bow his head shall receive no crown. I saw that my +long travel in search of knowledge would have been utterly vain +if I had not learnt that lesson there and then. In those moments +of silence I learnt it once and for ever. + +She stood by me breathing the liquid morning air, her face turned +upon the eternal snows. I caught her hand in a recognition that +might have ended years of parting, and its warm youth vibrated in +mine, the foretaste of all understanding, all unions, of love +that asks nothing, that fears nothing, that has no petition to +make. She raised her eyes to mine and her tears were a rainbow of +hope. So we stood in silence that was more than any words, and +the golden moments went by. I knew her now for what she was, one +of whom it might have been written; + + "I come from where night falls clearer + Than your morning sun can rise; + From an earth that to heaven draws nearer + Than your visions of Paradise,- + For the dreams that your dreamers dream + We behold them with open eyes." + +With open eyes! Later I asked the nature of the strange bond that +had called her to my side. + +"I do not understand that fully myself," she said - "That is part +of the knowledge we must wait for. But you have the eyes that +see, and that is a tie nothing can break. I had waited long in +the House of Beauty for you. I guided you there. But between you +and me there is also love." + +I stretched an eager hand but she repelled it gently, drawing +back a little. "Not love of each other though we are friends and +in the future may be infinitely more. But - have you ever seen a +drawing of Blake's - a young man stretching his arms to a white +swan which flies from him on wings he cannot stay? That is the +story of both our lives. We long to be joined in this life, here +and now, to an unspeakable beauty and power whose true believers +we are because we have seen and known. There is no love so +binding as the same purpose. Perhaps that is the only true love. +And so we shall never be apart though we may never in this world +be together again in what is called companionship." + +"We shall meet," I said confidently. She smiled and was silent. + +"Do we follow a will-o'-the wisp in parting? Do we give up the +substance for the shadow? Shall I stay?" + +She laughed joyously; + +"We give a single rose for a rose-tree that bears seven times +seven. Daily I see more, and you are going where you will be +instructed. As you know my mother prefers for a time to have my +cousin with her to help her with the book she means to write. So +I shall have time to myself. What do you think I shall do?" + +"Blow away on a great wind. Ride on the crests of tossing waves. +Catch a star to light the fireflies!" + +She laughed like a bird's song. + +"Wrong - wrong! I shall be a student. All I know as yet has come +to me by intuition, but there is Law as well as Love and I will +learn. I have drifted like a happy cloud before the wind. Now I +will learn to be the wind that blows the clouds." + +I looked at her in astonishment. If a flower had desired the same +thing it could scarcely have seemed more incredible, for I had +thought her whole life and nature instinctive not intellective. +She smiled as one who has a beloved secret to keep. + +"When you have gained what in this country they call The +Knowledge of Regeneration, come back and ask me what I have +learnt." + +She would say no more of that and turned to another matter, +speaking with earnestness; + +"Before you came here I had a message for you, and Stephen +Clifden will tell you the same thing when you meet. Believe it +for it is true. Remember always that the psychical is not the +mystical and that what we seek is not marvel but vision. These +two things are very far apart, so let the first with all its +dangers pass you by, for our way lies to the heights, and for us +there is only one danger - that of turning back and losing what +the whole world cannot give in exchange. I have never seen +Stephen Clifden but I know much of him. He is a safe guide - a +man who has had much and strange sorrow which has brought him joy +that cannot be told. He will take you to those who know the +things that you desire. I wish I might have gone too." + +Something in the sweetness of her voice, its high passion, the +strong beauty of her presence woke a poignant longing in my +heart. I said; + +"I cannot leave you. You are the only guide I can follow. Let us +search together - you always on before." + +"Your way lies there," she pointed to the high mountains. "And +mine to the plains, and if we chose our own we should wander. But +we shall meet again in the way and time that will be best and +with knowledge so enlarged that what we have seen already will be +like an empty dream compared to daylight truth. If you knew what +waits for you you would not delay one moment." + +She stood radiant beneath the deodars, a figure of Hope, pointing +steadily to the heights. I knew her words were true though as yet +I could not tell how. I knew that whereas we had seen the +Wonderful in beautiful though local forms there is a plane where +the Formless may be apprehended in clear dream and solemn +vision-the meeting of spirit with Spirit. What that revelation +would mean I could not guess - how should I? - but I knew the +illusion we call death and decay would wither before it. There is +a music above and beyond the Ninth Vibration though I must love +those words for ever for what their hidden meaning gave me. + +I took her hand and held it. Strange - beyond all strangeness +that that story of an ancient sorrow should have made us what we +were to each other - should have opened to me the gates of that +Country where she wandered content. For the first time I had +realized in its fulness the loveliness of this crystal nature, +clear as flowing water to receive and transmit the light - itself +a prophecy and fulfilment of some higher race which will one day +inhabit our world when it has learnt the true values. She drew a +flower from her breast and gave it to me. It lies before me white +and living as I write these words. + +I sprang down the road and mounted, giving the word to march. The +men shouted and strode on - our faces to the Shipki Pass and what +lay beyond. + +We had parted. + +Once, twice, I looked back, and standing in full sunlight, she +waved her hand. + +We turned the angle of the rocks. + +What I found - what she found is a story strange and beautiful +which I may tell one day to those who care to hear. That for me +there were pauses, hesitancies, dreads, on the way I am not +concerned to deny, for so it must always be with the roots of the +old beliefs of fear and ignorance buried in the soil of our +hearts and ready to throw out their poisonous fibres. But there +was never doubt. For myself I have long forgotten the meaning of +that word in anything that is of real value. + +Do not let it be thought that the treasure is reserved for the +few or those of special gifts. And it is as free to the West as +to the East though I own it lies nearer to the surface in the +Orient where the spiritual genius of the people makes it possible +and the greater and more faithful teachers are found. It is not +without meaning that all the faiths of the world have dawned in +those sunrise skies. Yet it is within reach of all and asks only +recognition, for the universe has been the mine of its jewels- + + "Median gold it holds, and silver from Atropatene, Ruby and +emerald from Hindustan, and Bactrian agate, Bright with beryl +and pearl, sardonyx and sapphire."- + +-and more that cannot be uttered - the Lights and Perfections. + +So for all seekers I pray this prayer - beautiful in its sonorous +Latin, but noble in all the tongues; + +"Supplico tibi, Pater et Dux - I pray Thee, Guide of our vision, +that we may remember the nobleness with which Thou hast endowed +us, and that Thou wouldest be always on our right and on our left +in the motion of our wills, that we may be purged from the +contagion of the body and the affections of the brute and +overcome and rule them. And I pray also that Thou wouldest drive +away the blinding darkness from the eyes of our souls that we may +know well what is to be held for divine and what for mortal." + +"The nobleness with which Thou hast endowed us-" this, and not +the cry of the miserable sinner whose very repentance is no +virtue but the consequence of failure and weakness is the strong +music to which we must march. + +And the way is open to the mountains. + + + +THE INTERPRETER A ROMANCE OF THE EAST + +I + +There are strange things in this story, but, so far as I +understand them, I tell the truth. If you measure the East with a +Western foot-rule you will say, "Impossible." I should have said +it myself. + +Of myself I will say as little as I can, for this story is of +Vanna Loring. I am an incident only, though I did not know that +at first. + +My name is Stephen Clifden, and I was eight-and-thirty; plenty of +money, sound in wind and limb. I had been by way of being a +writer before the war, the hobby of a rich man; but if I picked +up anything in the welter in France, it was that real work is the +only salvation this mad world has to offer; so I meant to begin +at the beginning, and learn my trade like a journeyman labourer. +I had come to the right place. A very wonderful city is Peshawar +- rather let us say, two cities - the compounds, the +fortifications where Europeans dwell in such peace as their +strong right arms can secure them; and the native city and bazaar +humming and buzzing like a hive of angry bees with the rumours +that come up from Lower India or down the Khyber Pass with the +camel caravans loaded with merchandise from Afghanistan, +Bokhara, and farther. And it is because of this that Peshawar is +the Key of India, and a city of Romance that stands at every +corner, and cries aloud in the market - place. For at Peshawar +every able-bodied man sleeps with his revolver under his pillow, +and the old Fort is always ready in case it should be necessary +at brief and sharp notice to hurry the women and children into +it, and possibly, to die in their defense. So enlivening is the +neighbourhood of the frontier tribes that haunt the famous Khyber +Pass and the menacing hills where danger is always lurking. + +But there was society here, and I was swept into it - there was +chatter, and it galled me. + +I was beginning to feel that I had missed my mark, and must go +farther afield, perhaps up into Central Asia, when I met Vanna +Loring. If I say that her hair was soft and dark; that she had +the deepest hazel eyes I have ever seen, and a sensitive, tender +mouth; that she moved with a flowing grace like "a wave of the +sea - it sounds like the portrait of a beauty, and she was never +that. Also, incidentally, it gives none of her charm. I never +heard any one get any further than that she was "oddly +attractive" - let us leave it at that. She was certainly +attractive to me. + +She was the governess of little Winifred Meryon, whose father +held the august position of General Commanding the Frontier +Forces, and her mother the more commanding position of the +reigning beauty of Northern India, generally speaking. No one +disputed that. She was as pretty as a picture, and her charming +photograph had graced as many illustrated papers as there were +illustrated papers to grace. + +But Vanna - I gleaned her story by bits when I came across her +with the child in the gardens. I was beginning to piece it +together now. + +Her love of the strange and beautiful she had inherited from a +young Italian mother, daughter of a political refugee; her +childhood had been spent in a remote little village in the West +of England; half reluctantly she told me how she had brought +herself up after her mother's death and her father's second +marriage. Little was said of that, but I gathered that it had +been a grief to her, a factor in her flight to the East. + +We were walking in the Circular Road then with Winifred in front +leading her Pekingese by its blue ribbon, and we had it almost to +ourselves except for a few natives passing slow and dignified on +their own occasions, for fashionable Peshawar was finishing its +last rubber of bridge, before separating to dress for dinner, and +had no time to spare for trivialities and sunsets. + +"So when I came to three-and-twenty," she said slowly, "I felt I +must break away from our narrow life. I had a call to India +stronger than anything on earth. You would not understand but +that was so, and I had spent every spare moment in teaching +myself India - its history, legends, religions, everything! And I +was not wanted at home, and I had grown afraid." + +I could divine years of patience and repression under this plain +tale, but also a power that would be dynamic when the authentic +voice called. That was her charm - gentleness in strength - a +sweet serenity. + +"What were you afraid of?" + +"Of growing old and missing what was waiting for me out here. But +I could not get away like other people. No money, you see. So I +thought I would come out here and teach. Dare I? Would they let +me? I knew I was fighting life and chances and risks if I did it; +but it was death if I stayed there. And then- Do you really care +to hear?" + +"Of course. Tell me how you broke your chain." + +"I spare you the family quarrels. I can never go back. But I was +spurred - spurred to take some wild leap; and I took it. Six +years ago I came out. First I went to a doctor and his wife at +Cawnpore. They had a wonderful knowledge of the Indian peoples, +and there I learned Hindustani and much else. Then he died. But +an aunt had left me two hundred pounds, and I could wait a little +and choose; and so I came here." + +It interested me. The courage that pale elastic type of woman +has! + +"Have you ever regretted it? Would they take you back if you +failed?" + +"Never, to both questions," she said, smiling. "Life is glorious. +I've drunk of a cup I never thought to taste; and if I died +tomorrow I should know I had done right. I rejoice in every +moment I live - even when Winifred and I are wrestling with +arithmetic." + +"I shouldn't have thought life was very easy with Lady Meryon." + +"Oh, she is kind enough in an indifferent sort of way. I am not +the persecuted Jane Eyre sort of governess at all. But that is +all on the surface and does not matter. It is India I care for +-the people, the sun, the infinite beauty. It was coming home. +You would laugh if I told you I knew Peshawar long before I came +here. Knew it - walked here, lived. Before there were English in +India at all." She broke off. "You won't understand." + +"Oh, I have had that feeling, too," I said patronizingly. "If one +has read very much about a place-" + +"That was not quite what I meant. Never mind. The people, the +place - that is the real thing to me. All this is the dream." The +sweep of her hand took in not only Winifred and myself, but the +general's stately residence, which to blaspheme in Peshawar is +rank infidelity. + +"By George, I would give thousands to feel that! I can't get out +of Europe here. I want to write, Miss Loring," I found myself +saying. "I'd done a bit, and then the war came and blew my life +to pieces. Now I want to get inside the skin of the East, and I +can't do it. I see it from outside, with a pane of glass between. +No life in it. If you feel as you say, for God's sake be my +interpreter!" + +I really meant what I said. I knew she was a harp that any breeze +would sweep into music. I divined that temperament in her and +proposed to use it for my own ends. She had and I had not, the +power to be a part of all she saw, to feel kindred blood running +in her own veins. To the average European the native life of +India is scarcely interesting, so far is it removed from all +comprehension. To me it was interesting, but I could not tell +why. I stood outside and had not the fairy gold to pay for my +entrance. Here at all events she could buy her way where I could +not. Without cruelty, which honestly was not my besetting sin - +especially where women were concerned, the egoist in me felt I +would use her, would extract the last drop of the enchantment of +her knowledge before I went on my way. What more natural than +that Vanna or any other woman should minister to my thirst for +information? Men are like that. I pretend to be no better than +the rest. She pleased my fastidiousness - that fastidiousness +which is the only austerity in men not otherwise austere. + +"Interpret?" she said, looking at me with clear hazel eyes; "how +could I? You were in the native city yesterday. What did you +miss?" + +"Everything! I saw masses of colour, light, movement. Brilliantly +picturesque people. Children like Asiatic angels. Magnificently +scowling ruffians in sheepskin coats. In fact, a movie staged for +my benefit. I was afraid they would ring down the curtain before +I had had enough. It had no meaning. When I got back to my +diggings I tried to put down what I had just seen, and I swear +there's more inspiration in the guide-book." + +"Did you go alone?" + +"Yes, I certainly would not go sight-seeing with the Meryon +crowd. Tell me what you felt when you saw it first." + +"I went with Sir John's uncle. He was a great traveler. The +colour struck me dumb. It flames - it sings. Think of the grey +pinched life in the West! I saw a grave dark potter turning his +wheel, while his little girl stood by, glad at our pleasure, her +head veiled like a miniature woman, tiny baggy trousers, and a +silver nose-stud, like a star, in one delicate nostril. In her +thin arms she held a heavy baby in a gilt cap, like a monkey. And +the wheel turned and whirled until it seemed to be spinning +dreams, thick as motes in the sun. The clay rose in smooth +spirals under his hand, and the wheel sang, 'Shall the vessel +reprove him who made one to honour and one to dishonour?' And I +saw the potter thumping his wet clay, and the clay, plastic as +dream-stuff, shaped swift as light, and the three Fates stood at +his shoul- der. Dreams, dreams, and all in the spinning of the +wheel, and the rich shadows of the old broken courtyard where he +sat. And the wheel stopped and the thread broke, and the little +new shapes he had made stood all about him, and he was only a +potter in Peshawar." + +Her voice was like a song. She had utterly forgotten my +existence. I did not dislike it at the moment, for I wanted to +hear more, and the impersonal is the rarest gift a woman can give +a man. + +"Did you buy anything?" + +"He gave me a gift - a flawed jar of turquoise blue, faint +turquoise green round the lip. He saw I understood. And then I +bought a little gold cap and a wooden box of jade-green Kabul +grapes. About a rupee, all told. But it was Eastern merchandise, +and I was trading from Balsora and Baghdad, and Eleazar's camels +were swaying down from Damascus along the Khyber Pass, and coming +in at the great Darwazah, and friends' eyes met me everywhere. I +am profoundly happy here." + +The sinking sun lit an almost ecstatic face. + +I envied her more deeply than I had ever envied any one. She had +the secret of immortal youth, and I felt old as I looked at her. +One might be eighty and share that passionate impersonal joy. Age +could not wither nor custom stale the infinite variety of her +world's joys. She had a child's dewy youth in her eyes. + +There are great sunsets at Peshawar, flaming over the plain, +dying in melancholy splendour over the dangerous hills. They too +were hers, in a sense in which they could never be mine. But what +a companion! To my astonishment a wild thought of marriage +flashed across me, to be instantly rebuffed with a shrug. +Marriage - that one's wife might talk poetry to one about the +East! Absurd! But what was it these people felt and I could not +feel? Almost, shut up in the prison of self, I knew what Vanna +had felt in her village - a maddening desire to escape, to be a +part of the loveliness that lay beyond me. So might a man love a +king's daughter in her hopeless heights. + +"It may be very beautiful on the surface," I said morosely; "but +there's a lot of misery below - hateful, they tell me." + +"Of course. We shall get to work one day. But look at the sunset. +It opens like a mysterious flower. I must take Winifred home +now." + +"One moment," I pleaded; "I can only see it through your eyes. I +feel it while you speak, and then the good minute goes." + +She laughed. + +"And so must I. Come, Winifred. Look, there's an owl; not like +the owls in the summer dark in England- + + "Lovely are the curves of the white owl sweeping, Wavy in the +dark, lit by one low star." + +Suddenly she turned again and looked at me half wistfully. + +"It is good to talk to you. You want to know. You are so near it +all. I wish I could help you; I am so exquisitely happy myself." + +My writing was at a standstill. It seemed the groping of a blind +man in a radiant world. Once perhaps I had felt that life was +good in itself - when the guns came thundering toward the Vimy +Ridge in a mad gallop of horses, and men shouting and swearing +and frantically urging them on. Then, riding for more than life, +I had tasted life for an instant. Not before or since. But this +woman had the secret. + +Lady Meryon, with her escort of girls and subalterns, came +daintily past the hotel compound, and startled me from my +brooding with her pretty silvery voice. + +"Dreaming, Mr. Clifden? It isn't at all wholesome to dream in the +East. Come and dine with us tomorrow. A tiny dance afterwards, +you know; or bridge for those who like it." + +I had not the faintest notion whether governesses dined with the +family or came in afterward with the coffee; but it was a +sporting chance, and I took it. + +Then Sir John came up and joined us. + +"You can't well dance tomorrow, Kitty," he said to his wife. +"There's been an outpost affair in the Swat Hills, and young +Fitzgerald has been shot. Come to dinner of course, Clifden. Glad +to see you. But no dancing, I think." + +Kitty Meryon's mouth drooped like a pouting child's. Was it for +the lost dance, or the lost soldier lying out on the hills in the +dying sunset. Who could tell? In either case it was pretty enough +for the illustrated papers. + +"How sad! Such a dear boy. We shall miss him at tennis." Then +brightly; "Well, we'll have to put the dance off for a week, but +come tomorrow anyhow." + + + +II + + +Next evening I went into Lady Meryon's flower-scented +drawing-room. The electric fans were fluttering and the evening +air was cool. Five or six pretty girls and as many men made up +the party - Kitty Meryon the prettiest of them all, fashionably +undressed in faint pink and crystal, with a charming smile in +readiness, all her gay little flags flying in the rich man's +honour. I am no vainer than other men, but I saw that. Whatever +her charm might be it was none for me. What could I say to +interest her who lived in her foolish little world as one shut in +a bright bubble? And she had said the wrong word about young +Fitzgerald - I wanted Vanna, with her deep seeing eyes, to say +the right one and adjust those cruel values. + +Governesses dine, it appeared, only to fill an unexpected place, +or make a decorous entry afterward, to play accompaniments. +Fortunately Kitty Meryon sang, in a pinched little soprano, not +nearly so pretty as her silver ripple of talk. + +It was when the party had settled down to bridge and I was +standing out, that I ventured to go up to her as she sat knitting +by a window - not unwatched by the quick flash of Lady Meryon's +eyes as I did it. + +"I think you hypnotize me, Miss Loring. When I hear anything I +straightway want to know what you will say. Have you heard of +Fitzgerald's death?" + +"That is why we are not dancing tonight. Tomorrow the cable will +reach his home in England. He was an only child, and they are the +great people of the village where we are the little people. I +knew his mother as one knows a great lady who is kind to all the +village folk. It may kill her. It is travelling tonight like a +bullet to her heart, and she does not know." + +"His father?" + +"A brave man - a soldier himself. He will know it was a good +death and that Harry would not fail. He did not at Ypres. He +would not here. But all joy and hope will be dead in that house +tomorrow." + +"And what do you think?" + +"I am not sorry for Harry, if you mean that. He knew - we all +know - that he was on guard here holding the outposts against +blood and treachery and terrible things - playing the Great Game. +One never loses at that game if one plays it straight, and I am +sure that at the last it was joy he felt and not fear. He has not +lost. Did you notice in the church a niche before every soldier's +seat to hold his loaded gun? And the tablets on the walls; +"Killed at Kabul River, aged 22." - "Killed on outpost duty." - +"Murdered by an Afghan fanatic." This will be one memory more. +Why be sorry." + +Presently:- + +"I am going up to the hills tomorrow, to the Malakhand Fort, with +Mrs. Delany, Lady Meryon's aunt, and we shall see the wonderful +Tahkt-i-Bahi Monastery on the way. You should do that run before +you go. The fort is the last but one on the way to Chitral, and +beyond that the road is so beset that only soldiers may go +farther, and indeed the regiments escort each other up and down. +But it is an early start, for we must be back in Peshawar at six +for fear of raiding natives." + +"I know; they hauled me up in the dusk the other day, and told me +I should be swept off to the hills if I fooled about after dusk. +But I say - is it safe for you to go? You ought to have a man. +Could I go too?" + +I thought she did not look enthusiastic at the proposal. + +"Ask. You know I settle nothing. I go where I am sent." She said +it with the happiest smile. I knew they could send her nowhere +that she would not find joy. I thought her mere presence must +send the vibrations of happiness through the household. Yet again +- why? For where there is no receiver the current speaks in vain; +and for an instant I seemed to see the air full of messages - of +speech striving to utter its passionate truths to deaf ears +stopped for ever against the breaking waves of sound. But Vanna +heard. + +She left the room; and when the bridge was over, I made my +request. Lady Meryon shrugged her shoulders and declared it would +be a terribly dull run - the scenery nothing, "and only" (she +whispered) "Aunt Selina and poor Miss Loring?" + +Of course I saw at once that she did not like it; but Sir John +was all for my going, and that saved the situation. + +I certainly could have dispensed with Aunt Selina when the +automobile drew up in the golden river of the sunrise at the +hotel. There were only the driver, a personal servant, and the +two ladies; Mrs. Delany, comely, pleasant, talkative, and Vanna- + +Her face in its dark motoring veil, fine and delicate as a young +moon in a cloud drift - the sensitive sweet mouth that had +quivered a little when she spoke of Fitzgerald - the pure glance +that radiated such kindness to all the world. She sat there with +the Key of Dreams pressed against her slight bosom - her eyes +dreaming above it. Already the strange airs of her unknown world +were breathing about me, and as yet I knew not the things that +belonged unto my peace. + +We glided along the straight military road from Peshawar to +Nowshera, the gold-bright sun dazzling in its whiteness - a +strange drive through the flat, burned country, with the ominous +Kabul River flowing through it. Military preparations everywhere, +and the hills looking watchfully down - alive, as it were, with +keen, hostile eyes. War was at present about us as behind the +lines in France; and when we crossed the Kabul River on a bridge +of boats, and I saw its haunted waters, I began to feel the +atmosphere of the place closing down upon me. It had a sinister +beauty; it breathed suspense; and I wished, as I was sure Vanna +did, for silence that was not at our command. + +For Mrs. Delany felt nothing of it. A bright shallow ripple of +talk was her contribution to the joys of the day; though it was, +fortunately, enough for her happiness if we listened and agreed. +I knew Vanna listened only in show. Her intent eyes were fixed on +the Tahkt-i-Bahi hills after we had swept out of Nowshera; and +when the car drew up at the rough track, she had a strange look +of suspense and pallor. I remember I wondered at the time if she +were nervous in the wild open country. + +"Now pray don't be shocked," said Mrs. Delany comfortably; "but +you two young people may go up to the monastery, and I shall stay +here. I am dreadfully ashamed of myself, but the sight of that +hill is enough for me. Don't hurry. I may have a little doze, and +be all the better company when you get back. No, don't try to +persuade me, Mr. Clifden. It isn't the part of a friend." + +I cannot say I was sorry, though I had a moment of panic when +Vanna offered to stay with her - very much, too, as if she really +meant it. So we set out perforce, Vanna leading steadily, as if +she knew the way. She never looked up, and her wish for silence +was so evident, that I followed, lending my hand mutely when the +difficulties obliged it, she accepting absently, and as if her +thoughts were far away. + +Suddenly she quickened her pace. We had climbed about nine +hundred feet, and now the narrow track twisted through the rocks +- a track that looked as age-worn as no doubt it was. We +threaded it, and struggled over the ridge, and looked down +victorious on the other side. + +There she stopped. A very wonderful sight, of which I had never +seen the like, lay below us. Rock and waste and towering crags, +and the mighty ruin of the monastery set in the fangs of the +mountain like a robber baron's castle, looking far away to the +blue mountains of the Debatable Land - the land of mystery and +danger. It stood there - the great ruin of a vast habitation of +men. Building after building, mysterious and broken, corridors, +halls, refectories, cells; the dwelling of a faith so alien that +I could not reconstruct the life that gave it being. And all +sinking gently into ruin that in a century more would confound it +with the roots of the mountains. + +Grey and wonderful, it clung to the heights and looked with +eyeless windows at the past. Somehow I found it infinitely +pathetic; the very faith it expressed is dead in India, and none +left so poor to do it reverence. + +But Vanna knew her way. Unerringly she led me from point to +point, and she was visibly at home in the intricacies. Such +knowledge in a young woman bewildered me. Could she have studied +the plans in the Museum? How else should she know where the abbot +lived, or where the refractory brothers were punished? + +Once I missed her, while I stooped to examine some scroll-work, +and following, found her before one of the few images of the +Buddha that the rapacious Museum had spared - a singularly +beautiful bas-relief, the hand raised to enforce the truth the +calm lips were speaking, the drapery falling in stately folds to +the bare feet. As I came up, she had an air as if she had just +ceased from movement, and I had a distinct feeling that she had +knelt before it - I saw the look of worship! The thing troubled +me like a dream, haunting, impossible, but real. + +"How beautiful!" I said in spite of myself, as she pointed to the +image. "In this utter solitude it seems the very spirit of the +place." + +"He was. He is," said Vanna. + +"Explain to me. I don't understand. I know so little of him. What +is the subject?" + +She hesitated; then chose her words as if for a beginner;- "It is +the Blessed One preaching to the Tree-Spirits. See how eagerly +they lean from the boughs to listen. This other relief represents +him in the state of mystic vision. Here he is drowned in peace. +See how it overflows from the closed eyes; the closed lips. The +air is filled with his quiet." + +"What is he dreaming?" + +"Not dreaming - seeing. Peace. He sits at the point where time +and infinity meet. To attain that vision was the aim of the monks +who lived here." + +"Did they attain?" I found myself speaking as if she could +certainly answer. + +"A few. There was one, Vasettha, the Brahman, a young man who had +renounced all his possessions and riches, and seated here before +this image of the Blessed One, he fell often into the mystic +state. He had a strange vision at one time of the future of +India, which will surely be fulfilled. He did not forget it in +his rebirths. He remembers-" + +She broke off suddenly and said with forced indifference, - "He +would sit here often looking out over the mountains; the monks +sat at his feet to hear. He became abbot while still young. But +his story is a sad one." + +"I entreat you to tell me." + +She looked away over the mountains. "While he was abbot here,- +still a young man,- a famous Chinese Pilgrim came down through +Kashmir to visit the Holy Places in India. The abbot went forward +with him to Peshawar, that he might make him welcome. And there +came a dancer to Peshawar, named Lilavanti, most beautiful! I +dare not tell you her beauty. I tremble now to think-" + +Again she paused, and again the faint creeping sense of mystery +invaded me. + +She resumed;- + +"The abbot saw her and he loved her. He was young still, you +remember. She was a woman of the Hindu faith and hated Buddhism. +It swept him down into the lower worlds of storm and desire. He +fled with Lilavanti and never returned here. So in his rebirth he +fell-" + +She stopped dead; her face pale as death. + +"How do you know? Where have you read it? If I could only find +what you find and know what you know! The East is like an open +book to you. Tell me the rest." + +"How should I know any more?" she said hurriedly. "We must be +going back. You should study the plans of this place at +Peshawar. They were very learned monks who lived here. It is +famous for learning." + +The life had gone out of her words-out of the ruins. There was no +more to be said. + +We clambered down the hill in the hot sunshine, speaking only of +the view, the strange shrubs and flowers, and, once, the swift +gliding of a snake, and found Mrs. Delany blissfully asleep in +the most padded corner of the car. The spirit of the East +vanished in her comfortable presence, and luncheon seemed the +only matter of moment. + +"I wonder, my dears," she said, "if you would be very +disappointed and think me very dense if I proposed our giving up +the Malakhand Fort? The driver has been giving me in very poor +English such an account of the dangers of that awful road up the +hill that I feel no Fort would repay me for its terrors. Do say +what you feel, Miss Loring. Mr. Clifden can lunch with the +officers at Nowshera and come any time. I know I am an atrocity." + +There could be only one answer, though Vanna and I knew perfectly +well the crafty design of the driver to spare himself work. Mrs. +Delany remained brightly awake for the run home, and favored us +with many remarkable views on India and its shortcomings, Vanna, +who had a sincere liking for her, laughing with delight at her +description of a visit of condolence with Lady Meryon to the five +widows of one of the hill Rajas. + +But I own I was pre-occupied. I knew those moments at the +monastery had given me a glimpse into the wonderland of her soul +that made me long for more. It was rapidly becoming clear to me +that unless my intentions developed on very different lines I +must flee Peshawar. For love is born of sympathy, and sympathy +was strengthening daily, but for love I had no courage yet. + +I feared it as men fear the unknown. I despised myself - but I +feared. I will confess my egregious folly and vanity - I had no +doubt as to her reception of my offer if I should make it, but +possessed by a colossal selfishness, I thought only of myself, +and from that point of view could not decide how I stood to lose +or gain. In my wildest accesses of vanity I did not suppose Vanna +loved me, but I felt she liked me, and I believe the advantages I +had to offer would be overwhelming to a woman in her position. +So, tossed on the waves of indecision, I inclined to flight. + +That night I resolutely began my packing, and wrote a note of +farewell to Lady Meryon. The next morning I furiously undid it, +and destroyed the note. And that afternoon I took the shortest +way to the sun-set road to lounge about and wait for Vanna and +Winifred. She never came, and I was as unreasonably angry as if I +had deserved the blessing of her presence. + +Next day I could see that she tried gently hut clearly to +discourage our meeting and for three days I never saw her at all. +Yet I knew that in her solitary life our talks counted for a +pleasure, and when we met again I thought I saw a new softness in +the lovely hazel deeps of her eyes. + + + +III + + +On the day when things became clear to me, I was walking towards +the Meryons' gates when I met her coming alone along the sunset +road, in the late gold of the afternoon. She looked pale and a +little wearied, and I remembered I wished I did not know every +change of her face as I did. It was a symptom that alarmed my +selfishness - it galled me with the sense that I was no longer +my own despot. + +"So you have been up the Khyber Pass," she said as I fell into +step at her side. "Tell me - was it as wonderful as you +expected?" + +"No, no, -you tell me! It will give me what I missed. Begin at +the beginning. Tell me what I saw." + +I could not miss the delight of her words, and she laughed, +knowing my whim. + +"Oh, that Pass! -the wonder of those old roads that have borne +the traffic and romance of the world for ages. Do you think there +is anything in the world so fascinating as they are? But did you +go on Tuesday or Friday?" + +For these are the only days in the week when the Khyber can be +safely entered. The British then turn out the Khyber Rifles and +man every crag, and the loaded caravans move like a tide, and go +up and down the narrow road on their occasions. + +Naturally mere sightseers are not welcomed, for much business +must be got through in that urgent forty eight hours in which +life is not risked in entering. + +"Tuesday. But make a picture for me." + +"Well, you gave your word not to photograph or sketch - as if one +wanted to when every bit of it is stamped on one's brain! And you +went up to Jumrood Fort at the entrance. Did they tell you it is +an old Sikh Fort and has been on duty in that turbulent place for +five hundred years And did you see the machine guns in the court? +And every one armed - even the boys with belts of cartridges? +Then you went up the narrow winding track between the mountains, +and you said to yourself, 'This is the road of pure romance. It +goes up to silken Samarkhand, and I can ride to Bokhara of the +beautiful women and to all the dreams. Am I alive and is it +real?' You felt that?" + +"All. Every bit. Go on!" + +She smiled with pleasure. + +"And you saw the little forts on the crags and the men on guard +all along the bills, rifles ready! You could hear the guns rattle +as they saluted. Do you know that up there men plough with rifles +loaded beside them? They have to be men indeed." + +"Do you mean to imply that we are not men?" + +"Different men at least. This is life in a Border ballad. Such a +life as you knew in France but beautiful in a wild - hawk sort of +way. Don't the Khyber Rifles bewilder you? They are drawn from +these very Hill tribes, and will shoot their own fathers and +brothers in the way of duty as comfortably as if they were +jackals. Once there was a scrap here and one of the tribesmen +sniped our men unbearably. What do you suppose happened? A Khyber +Rifle came to the Colonel and said, 'Let me put an end to him, +Colonel Sahib. I know exactly where he sits. He is my +grandfather.' And he did it!" + +"The bond of bread and salt?" + +"Yes, and discipline. I'm sometimes half frightened of +discipline. It moulds a man like wax. Even God doesn't do that. +Well - then you had the traders - wild shaggy men in sheepskin +and women in massive jewelry of silver and turquoise,-great +earrings, heavy bracelets loading their arms, wild, fierce, +handsome. And the camels - thousands of them, some going up, some +coming down, a mass of human and animal life. Above you, moving +figures against the keen blue sky, or deep below you in the +ravines. + +"The camels were swaying along with huge bales of goods, and dark +beautiful women in wicker cages perched on them. Silks and +carpets from Bokhara, and blue - eyed Persian cats, and bluer +Persian turquoises. Wonderful! And the dust, gilded by the +sunshine, makes a vaporous golden atmosphere for it all." + +"What was the most wonderful thing you saw there?" + +"The most beautiful, I think, was a man - a splendid dark ruffian +lounging along. He wanted to show off, and his swagger was +perfect. Long black onyx eyes and a tumble of black curls, and +teeth like almonds. But what do you think he carried on his wrist +- a hawk with fierce yellow eyes, ringed and chained. Hawking is +a favourite sport in the hills. Oh, why doesn't some great +painter come and paint it all before they take to trains and +cars? I long to see it all again, but I never shall." + +"Why not," said I. "Surely Sir John can get you up there any +day?" + +"Not now. The fighting makes it difficult. But it isn't that. I +am leaving." + +"Leaving?" My heart gave a leap. "Why? Where?" + +"Leaving Lady Meryon." + +"Why - for Heaven's sake?" + +"I had rather not tell you." + +"But I must know." + +"You cannot." + +"I shall ask Lady Meryon." + +"I forbid you." + +And then the unexpected happened, and an unbearable impulse swept +me into folly - or was it wisdom? + +"Listen to me. I would not have said it yet, but this settles it. +I want you to marry me. I want it atrociously!" + +It was a strange word. What I felt for her at that moment was +difficult to describe. I endured it like a pain that could only +be assuaged by her presence, but I endured it angrily. We were +walking on the sunset road - very deserted and quiet at the time. +The place was propitious if nothing else was. + +She looked at me in transparent astonishment; + +"Mr. Clifden, are you dreaming? You can't mean what you say." + +"Why can't I? I do. I want you. You have the key of all I care +for. I think of the world without you and find it tasteless." + +"Surely you have all the world can give? What do you want more?" + +"The power to enjoy it - to understand it. You have got that - I +haven't. I want you always with me to interpret, like a guide to +a blind fellow. I am no better." + +"Say like a dog, at once!" she interrupted. "At least you are +frank enough to put it on that ground. You have not said you love +me. You could not say it." + +"I don't know whether I do or not. I know nothing about love. I +want you. Indescribably. Perhaps that is love - is it? I never +wanted any one before. I have tried to get away and I can't." + +I was brutally frank, you see. She compelled my very thoughts. + +"Why have you tried?" + +"Because every man likes freedom. But I like you better." "I can +tell you the reason," she said in her gentle unwavering voice. "I +am Lady Meryon's governess, and an undesirable. You have felt +that?" + +"Don't make me out such a snob. No - yes. You force me into +honesty. I did feel it at first like the miserable fool I am, but +I could kick myself when I think of that now. It is utterly +forgotten. Take me and make me what you will, and forgive me. +Only tell me your secret of joy. How is it you understand +everything alive or dead? I want to live - to see, to know." + +It was a rhapsody like a boy's. Yet at the moment I was not even +ashamed of it, so sharp was my need. + +"I think," she said, slowly, looking straight before her, "that I +had better be quite frank. I don't love you. I don't know what +love means in the Western sense. It has a very different meaning +for me. Your voice comes to me from an immense distance when you +speak in that way. You want me - but never with a thought of what +I might want. Is that love? I like you very deeply as a friend, +but we are of different races. There is a gulf." + +"A gulf? You are English." + +"By birth, yes. In mind, no. And there are things that go deeper, +that you could not understand. So I refuse quite definitely, and +our ways part here, for in a few days I go. I shall not see you +again, but I wish to say good-bye." + +The bitterest chagrin was working in my soul. I felt as if all +were deserting me-a sickening feeling of loneliness. I did not +know the man who was in me, and was a stranger to myself. + +"I entreat you to tell me why, and where." + +"Since you have made me this offer, I will tell you why. Lady +Meryon objected to my friendship with you, and objected in a way +which-" + +She stopped, flushing palely. I caught her hand. + +"That settles it!-that she should have dared! I'll go up this +minute and tell her we are engaged. Vanna-Vanna !" + +For she disengaged her hand, quietly but firmly. + +"On no account. How can I make it more plain to you? I should +have gone soon in any case. My place is in the native city - that +is the life I want. I have work there, I knew it before I came +out. My sympathies are all with them. They know what life is - +why even the beggars, poorer than poor, are perfectly happy, +basking in the great generous sun. Oh, the splendour and riot of +life and colour! That's my life - I sicken of this." + +"But I'll give it to you. Marry me, and we will travel till +you're tired of it." + +"Yes, and look on as at a play - sitting in the stalls, and +applauding when we are pleased. No, I'm going to work there." +"For God's sake, how? Let me come too." + +"You can't. You're not in it. I am going to attach myself to the +medical mission at Lahore and learn nursing, and then I shall go +to my own people." + +"Missionaries? You've nothing in common with them?" + +"Nothing. But they teach what I want. Mr. Clifden, I shall not +come this way again. If I remember - I'll write to you, and tell +you what the real world is like." + +She smiled, the absorbed little smile I knew and feared. I saw +pleading was useless then. I would wait, and never lose sight of +her and of hope. + +"Vanna, before you go, give me your gift of sight. Interpret for +me. Stay with me a little and make me see." + +"What do you mean exactly?" she asked in her gentlest voice, half +turning to me. + +"Make one journey with me, as my sister, if you will do no more. +Though I warn you that all the time I shall be trying to win my +wife. But come with me once, and after that - if you will go, you +must. Say yes." + +Madness! But she hesitated - a hesitation full of hope, and +looked at me with intent eyes. + +"I will tell you frankly," she said at last, "that I know my +knowledge of the East and kinship with it goes far beyond mere +words. In my case the doors were not shut. I believe - I know +that long ago this was my life. If I spoke for ever I could not +make you understand how much I know and why. So I shall quite +certainly go back to it. Nothing - you least of all, can hold me. +But you are my friend - that is a true bond. And if you would +wish me to give you two months before I go, I might do that if it +would in any way help you. As your friend only - you clearly +understand. You would not reproach me afterwards when I left you, +as I should most certainly do?" + +"I swear I would not. I swear I would protect you even from +myself. I want you for ever, but if you will only give me two +months - come! But have you thought that people will talk. It may +injure you. + +I'm not worth that, God knows. And you will take nothing I could +give you in return." + +She spoke very quietly. + +"That does not trouble me. - It would only trouble me if you +asked what I have not to give. For two months I would travel with +you as a friend, if, like a friend, I paid my own expenses-" + +I would have interrupted, but she brushed that firmly aside. "No, +I must do as I say, and I am quite able to or I should not +suggest it. I would go on no other terms. It would be hard if +because we are man and woman I might not do one act of friendship +for you before we part. For though I refuse your offer utterly, I +appreciate it, and I would make what little return I can. It +would be a sharp pain to me to distress you." + +Her gentleness and calm, the magnitude of the offer she was +making stunned me so that I could scarcely speak. There was such +an extraordinary simplicity and generosity in her manner that it +appeared to me more enthralling and bewildering than the most +finished coquetry I had ever known. She gave me opportunities +that the most ardent lover could in his wildest dream desire, and +with the remoteness in her eyes and her still voice she deprived +them of all hope. It kindled in me a flame that made my throat +dry when I tried to speak. + +"Vanna, is it a promise? You mean it?" + +"If you wish it, yes. But I warn you I think it will not make it +easier for you when the time is over. + +"Why two months?" + +"Partly because I can afford no more. No! I know what you would +say. Partly because I can spare no more time. But I will give you +that, if you wish, though, honestly, I had very much rather not. +I think it unwise for you. I would protect you if I could - +indeed I would!" + +It was my turn to hesitate now. Every moment revealed to me some +new sweetness, some charm that I saw would weave itself into the +very fibre of my I had been! Was I not now a fool? Would it not +being if the opportunity were given. Oh, fool that be better to +let her go before she had become a part of my daily experience? I +began to fear I was courting my own shipwreck. She read my +thoughts clearly. + +"Indeed you would be wise to decide against it. Release me from +my promise. It was a mad scheme." + +The superiority - or so I felt it - of her gentleness maddened +me. It might have been I who needed protection, who was running +the risk of misjudgment - not she, a lonely woman. She looked at +me, waiting - trying to be wise for me, never for one instant +thinking of herself. I felt utterly exiled from the real purpose +of her life. + +"I will never release you. I claim your promise. I hold to it." + +"Very well then - I will write, and tell you where I shall be. +Good-bye, and if you change your mind, as I hope you will, tell +me." + +She extended her hand cool as a snowflake, and was gone, walking +swiftly up the road. Ah, let a man beware when his wishes +fulfilled, rain down upon him! + +To what had I committed myself? She knew her strength and had no +fears. I could scarcely realize that she had liking enough for me +to make the offer. That it meant no shade more than she had said +I knew well. She was safe, but what was to be the result for me? +I knew nothing - she was a beloved mystery. + + "Strange she is and secret, Strange her eyes; her cheeks are +cold as cold sea-shells." + +Yet I would risk it, for I knew there was no hope if I let her go +now, and if I saw her again, some glimmer might fall upon my +dark. + +Next day this reached me:- Dear Mr. Clifden,- + +I am going to some Indian friends for a time. On the 15th of June +I shall he at Srinagar in Kashmir. A friend has allowed me to +take her little houseboat, the "Kedarnath." If you like this plan +we will share the cost for two months. I warn you it is not +luxurious, but I think you will like it. I shall do this whether +you come or no, for I want a quiet time before I take up my +nursing in Lahore. In thinking of all this will you remember that +I am not a girl but a woman. I shall he twenty-nine my next +birthday. Sincerely yours, VANNA LORING. + +P.S. But I still think you would be wiser not to come. I hope to +hear you will not. + +I replied only this :- Dear Miss Loring,- I think I understand +the position fully. I will be there. I thank you with all my +heart. Gratefully yours, STEPHEN CLIFDEN. + + + +IV + + +Three days later I met Lady Meryon, and was swept in to tea. Her +manner was distinctly more cordial as she mentioned casually +that Vanna had left - she understood to take up missionary work - +"which is odd," she added with a woman's acrimony, "for she had +no more in common with missionaries than I have, and that is +saying a good deal. Of course she speaks Hindustani perfectly, +and could be useful, but I haven't grasped the point of it yet" I +saw she counted on my knowing nothing of the real reason of +Vanna's going and left it, of course, at that. The talk drifted +away under my guidance. Vanna evidently puzzled her. She half +feared, and wholly misunderstood her. + +No message came to me, as time went by, and for the time she had +vanished completely, but I held fast to her promise and lived on +that only. + +I take up my life where it ceased to be a mere suspense and +became life once more. + +On the 15th of June, I found myself riding into Srinagar in +Kashmir, through the pure tremulous green of the mighty poplars +that hedge the road into the city. The beauty of the country had +half stunned me when I entered the mountain barrier of Baramula +and saw the snowy peaks that guard the Happy Valley, with the +Jhelum flowing through its tranquil loveliness. The flush of the +almond blossom was over, but the iris, like a blue sea of peace +had overflowed the world - the azure meadows smiled back at the +radiant sky. Such blossom! the blue shading into clear violet, +like a shoaling sea. The earth, like a cup held in the hand of a +god, brimmed with the draught of youth and summer and - love? But +no, for me the very word was sinister. Vanna's face, immutably +calm, confronted it. + +That night I slept in a boat at Sopor, and I remember that, +waking at midnight, I looked out and saw a mountain with a +gloriole of hazy silver about it, misty and faint as a cobweb +threaded with dew. The river, there spreading into a lake, was +dark under it, flowing in a deep smooth blackness of shadow, and +everything awaited - what? And even while I looked, the moon +floated serenely above the peak, and all was bathed in pure +light, the water rippling and shining in broken silver and pearl. +So had Vanna floated into my sky, luminous, sweet, remote. I did +not question my heart any more. I knew I loved her. + +Two days later I rode into Srinagar, and could scarcely see the +wild beauty of that strange Venice. of the East, my heart was so +beating in my eyes. I rode past the lovely wooden bridges where +the balconied houses totter to each other across the canals in +dim splendour of carving and age; where the many-coloured native +life crowds down to the river steps and cleanses its +flower-bright robes, its gold-bright brass vessels in the shining +stream, and my heart said only - Vanna, Vanna! + +One day, one thought, of her absence had taught me what she was +to me, and if humility and patient endeavor could raise me to her +feet, I was resolved that I would spend my life in labor and +think it well spent. + +My servant dismounted and led his horse, asking from every one +where the "Kedarnath" could be found, and eager black eyes +sparkled and two little bronze images detached themselves from +the crowd of boys, and ran, fleet as fauns, before us. + +Above the last bridge the Jhelum broadens out into a stately +river, controlled at one side by the banked walk known as the +Bund, with the Club House upon it and the line of houseboats +beneath. Here the visitors flutter up and down and exchange the +gossip, the bridge appointments, the little dinners that sit so +incongruously on the pure Orient that is Kashmir. + +She would not be here. My heart told me that, and sure enough the +boys were leading across the bridge and by a quiet shady way to +one of the many backwaters that the great river makes in the +enchanting city. There is one waterway stretching on afar to the +Dal Lake. It looks like a river - it is the very haunt of peace. +Under those mighty chenar, or plane trees, that are the glory of +Kashmir, clouding the water with deep green shadows, the sun can +scarcely pierce, save in a dipping sparkle here and there to +intensify the green gloom. The murmur of the city, the chatter of +the club, are hundreds of miles away. We rode downward under the +towering trees, and dismounting, saw a little houseboat tethered +to the bank. It was not of the richer sort that haunts the Bund, +where the native servants follow in a separate boat, and even the +electric light is turned on as part of the luxury. This was a +long low craft, very broad, thatched like a country cottage +afloat. In the forepart lived the native owner, and his family, +their crew, our cooks and servants; for they played many parts in +our service. And in the afterpart, room for a life, a dream, the +joy or curse & many days to be. + +But then, I saw only one thing - Vanna sat under the trees, +reading, or looking at the cool dim watery vista, with a single +boat, loaded to the river's edge with melons and scarlet +tomatoes, punting lazily down to Srinagar in the sleepy +afternoon. + +She was dressed in white with a shady hat, and her delicate dark +face seemed to glow in the shadow like the heart of a pale rose. +For the first time I knew she was beautiful. Beauty shone in her +like the flame in an alabaster lamp, serene, diffused in the very +air about her, so that to me she moved in a mild radiance. She +rose to meet me with both hands outstretched - the kindest, most +cordial welcome. Not an eyelash flickered, not a trace of self- +consciousness. If I could have seen her flush or tremble - but no +- her eyes were clear and calm as a forest pool. So I remembered +her. So I saw her once more. + +I tried, with a hopeless pretence, to follow her example and hide +what I felt, where she had nothing to hide. + +"What a place you have found. Why, it's like the deep heart of a +wood!" + +"Yes, I saw it once when I was here with the Meryons. But we lay +at the Bund then - just under the Club. This is better. Did you +like the ride up?" + +I threw myself on the grass beside her with a feeling of perfect +rest. + +"It was like a new heaven and a new earth. What a country!" + +The very spirit of Quiet seemed to be drowsing in those branches +towering up into the blue, dipping their green fingers into the +crystal of the water. What a heaven! + +"Now you shall have your tea and then I will show you your +rooms," she said, smiling at my delight. "We shall stay here a +few days more that you may see Srinagar, and then they tow us up +into the Dal Lake opposite the Gardens of the Mogul Emperors. And +if you think this beautiful what will you say then?" + +I shut my eyes and see still that first meal of my new life. The +little table that Pir Baksh, breathing full East in his +jade-green turban, set before her, with its cloth worked in a +pattern of the chenar leaves that are the symbol of Kashmir; the +brown cakes made by Ahmad Khan in a miraculous kitchen of his own +invention - a few holes burrowed in the river bank, a smoldering +fire beneath them, and a width of canvas for a roof. But it +served, and no more need be asked of luxury. And Vanna, making it +mysteriously the first home I ever had known, the central joy of +it all. Oh, wonderful days of life that breathe the spirit of +immortality and pass so quickly - surely they must be treasured +somewhere in Eternity that we may look upon their beloved light +once more. + +"Now you must see the boat. The Kedarnath is not a Dreadnought, +but she is broad and very comfortable. And we have many +chaperons. They all live in the bows, and exist simply to +protect the Sahiblog from all discomfort, and very well they do +it. That is Ahmad Khan by the kitchen. He cooks for us. Salama +owns the boat, and steers her and engages the men to tow us when +we move. And when I arrived he aired a little English and said +piously; The Lord help me to give you no trouble, and the Lord +help you!" That is his wife sitting on the bank. She speaks +little but Kashmiri, but I know a little of that. Look at the +hundred rat-tail plaits of her hair, lengthened with wool, and +see her silver and turquoise jewelry. She wears much of the +family fortune and is quite a walking bank. Salama, Ahmad Khan +and I talk by the hour. Ahmad comes from Fyzabad. Look at +Salama's boy - I call him the Orange Imp. Did you ever see +anything so beautiful?" + +I looked in sheer delight, and grasped my camera. Sitting near us +was a lovely little Kashmiri boy of about eight, in a faded +orange coat, and a turban exactly like his father's. His curled +black eyelashes were so long that they made a soft gloom over the +upper part of the little golden face. The perfect bow of the +scarlet lips, the long eyes, the shy smile, suggested an Indian +Eros. He sat dipping his feet in the water with little +pigeon-like cries of content. + +"He paddles at the bow of our little shikara boat with a paddle +exactly like a water-lily leaf. Do you like our friends? I love +them already, and know all their affairs. And now for the boat." + +"One moment - If we are friends on a great adventure, I must call +you Vanna, and you me Stephen." + +"Yes, I suppose that is part of it," she said, smiling. "Come, +Stephen." + +It was like music, but a cold music that chilled me. She should +have hesitated, should have flushed - it was I who trembled. So I +followed her across the broad plank into our new home. + +"This is our sitting-room. Look, how charming!" + +It was better than charming; it was home indeed. Windows at each +side opening down almost to the water, a little table for meals +that lived mostly on the bank, with a grey pot of iris in the +middle. Another table for writing, photography, and all the +little pursuits of travel. A bookshelf with some well - worn +friends. Two long cushioned chairs. Two for meals, and a Bokhara +rug, soft and pleasant for the feet. The interior was plain +unpainted wood, but set so that the grain showed like satin in +the rippling lights from the water. + +That is the inventory of the place I have loved best in the +world, but what eloquence can describe what it gave me, what its +memory gives me to this day? And I have no eloquence - what I +felt leaves me dumb. + +"It is perfect," was all I said as she waved her hand proudly. +"It is home." + +"And if you had come alone to Kashmir you would have had a great +rich boat with electric light and a butler. You would never have +seen the people except at meal - times. I think you will like +this better. Well, this is your tiny bedroom, and your bathroom, +and beyond the sitting - room are mine. Do you like it all?" + +But I could say no more. The charm of her own personality had +touched everything and left its fragrance like a flower - breath +in the air. I was beggared of thanks, but my whole soul was +gratitude. We dined on the bank that evening, the lamp burning +steadily in the still air and throwing broken reflections in the +water, while the moon looked in upon them through the leaves. I +felt extraordinarily young and happy. + +The quiet of her voice was soft as the little lap of water +against the bows of the boat, and Kahdra, the Orange Imp, was +singing a little wordless song to himself as he washed the plates +beside us. It was a simple meal, and Vanna, abstemious as a +hermit never ate anything but rice and fruit, but I could +remember no meal in all my days of luxury where I had eaten with +such zest. + +"It looks very grand to have so many to wait upon us, doesn't it? +But this is one of the cheapest countries in the world though the +old timers mourn over present expenses. You will laugh when I +show you your share of the cost." + +"The wealth of the world could not buy this," I said, and was +silent. + +"But you must listen to my plans. We must do a little camping the +last three weeks before we part. Up in the mountains. Are they +not marvellous? They stand like a rampart round us, but not cold +and terrible, but "Like as the hills stand round about Jerusalem" +- they are guardian presences. And running up into them, high +-very high, are the valleys and hills where we shall camp. +Tomorrow we shall row through Srinagar, by the old Maharaja's +palace." + + + +V + +And so began a life of sheer enchantment. We knew no one. The +visitors in Kashmir change nearly every season, and no one +cared-no one asked anything of us, and as for our shipmates, a +willing affectionate service was their gift, and no more. Looking +back, I know in what a wonder-world I was privileged to live. +Vanna could talk with them all. She did not move apart, a +condescending or indifferent foreigner. Kahdra would come to her +knee and prattle to her of the great snake that lived up on +Mahadeo to devour erring boys who omitted their prayers at proper +Moslem intervals. She would sit with the baby in her lap while +the mother busied herself in the sunny bows with the mysterious +dishes that smelt so savory to a hungry man. The cuts, the +bruises of the neighbourhood all came to Vanna for treatment. + +"I am graduating as a nurse," she would say laughing as she bent +over the lean arm of some weirdly wrinkled old lady, bandaging +and soothing at the same moment. Her reward would be some bit of +folk-lore, some quaintness of gratitude that I noted down in the +little book I kept for remembrance - that I do not need, for +every word is in my heart. + +We rowed down through the city next day - Salama rowing, and +little Kahdra lazily paddling at the bow - a wonderful city, +with its narrow ways begrimed with the dirt of ages, and its +balconied houses looking as if disease and sin had soaked into +them and given them a vicious tottering beauty, horrible and yet +lovely too. We saw the swarming life of the bazaar, the white +turbans coming and going, diversified by the rose and yellow +Hindu turbans, and the caste-marks, orange and red, on the dark +brows. + +I saw two women - girls - painted and tired like Jezebel, +looking out of one window carved and old, and the grey burnished +doves flying about it. They leaned indolently, like all the old, +old wickedness of the East that yet is ever young - "Flowers of +Delight," with smooth black hair braided with gold and blossoms, +and covered with pale rose veils, and gold embossed disks +swinging like lamps beside the olive cheeks, the great eyes +artificially lengthened and darkened with soorma, and the curves +of the full lips emphasized with vermilion. They looked down on +us with apathy, a dull weariness that held all the old evil of +the wicked humming city. + +It had taken shape in those indolent bodies and heavy eyes that +could flash into life as a snake wakes into fierce darting energy +when the time comes to spring - direct inheritrixes from Lilith, +in the fittest setting in the world - the almost exhausted vice +of an Oriental city as old as time. + +"And look-below here," said Vanna, pointing to one of the ghauts +- long rugged steps running down to the river. + +"When I came yesterday, a great broken crowd was collected here, +almost shouldering each other into the water where a boat lay +rocking. In it lay the body of a man brutally murdered for the +sake of a few rupees and flung into the river. I could see the +poor brown body stark in the boat with a friend weeping beside +it. On the lovely deodar bridge people leaned over, watching with +a grim open-mouthed curiosity, and business went on gaily where +the jewelers make the silver bangles for slender wrists, and the +rows of silver chains that make the necks like 'the Tower of +Damascus builded for an armory.' It was all very wild and cruel. +I went down to them-" + +"Vanna - you went down? Horrible!" + +"No, you see I heard them say the wife was almost a child and +needs help. So I went. Once long ago at Peshawar I saw the same +thing happen, and they came and took the child for the service of +the gods, for she was most lovely, and she clung to the feet of a +man in terror, and the priest stabbed her to the heart. She died +in my arms. + +"Good God!" I said, shuddering; "what a sight for you! Did they +never hang him?" + +"He was not punished. I told you it was a very long time ago. Her +expression had a brooding quiet as she looked down into the +running river, almost it might be as if she saw the picture of +that past misery in the deep water. She said no more. But in her +words and the terrible crowding of its life, Srinagar seemed to +me more of a nightmare than anything I had seen, excepting only +Benares; for the holy Benares is a memory of horror, with a sense +of blood hidden under its frantic crazy devotion, and not far +hidden either. + +Our own green shade, when we pulled back to it in the evening +cool, was a refuge of unspeakable quiet. She read aloud to me +that evening by the small light of our lamp beneath the trees, +and, singularly, she read of joy. + +"I have drunk of the Cup of the Ineffable, I have found the key +of the Mystery, Travelling by no track I have come to the +Sorrowless Land; very easily has the mercy of the great Lord +come upon me. Wonderful is that Land of rest to which no merit +can win. There have I seen joy filled to the brim, perfection of +joy. He dances in rapture and waves of form arise from His dance. +He holds all within his bliss." + +"What is that?" + +"It is from the songs of the great Indian mystic - Kabir. Let me +read you more. It is like the singing of a lark, lost in the +infinite of light and heaven." + +So in the soft darkness I heard for the first time those immortal +words; and hearing, a faint glimmer of understanding broke upon +me as to the source of the peace that surrounded her. I had +accepted it as an emanation of her own heart when it was the +pulsing of the tide of the Divine. She read, choosing a verse +here and there, and I listened with absorption. + +Suppose I had been wrong in believing that sorrow is the keynote +of life; that pain is the road of ascent, if road there be; that +an implacable Nature and that only, presides over all our pitiful +struggles and seekings and writes a black "Finis" to the +holograph of our existence? + +What then? What was she teaching me? Was she the Interpreter of a +Beauty eternal in the heavens, and reflected like a broken prism +in the beauty that walked visible beside me? So I listened like a +child to an unknown language, yet ventured my protest. + +"In India, in this wonderful country where men have time and will +for speculation such thoughts may be natural. Can they be found +in the West?" + +"This is from the West - might not Kabir himself have said it? +Certainly he would have felt it. 'Happy is he who seeks not to +understand the Mystery of God, but who, merging his spirit into +Thine, sings to Thy face, 0 Lord, like a harp, understanding how +difficult it is to know - how easy to love Thee.' We debate and +argue and the Vision passes us by. We try to prove it, and kill +it in the laboratory of our minds, when on the altar of our +souls it will dwell for ever." + +Silence - and I pondered. Finally she laid the book aside, and +repeated from memory and in a tone of perfect music; "Kabir says, +'I shall go to the House of my Lord with my Love at my side; then +shall I sound the trumpet of triumph.'" + +And when she left me alone in the moonlight silence the old +doubts came back to me - the fear that I saw only through her +eyes, and began to believe in joy only because I loved her. I +remember I wrote in the little book I kept for my stray thoughts, +these words which are not mine but reflect my thought of her; +"Thine is the skill of the Fairy Woman, and the virtue of St. +Bride, and the faith of Mary the Mild, and the gracious way of +the Greek woman, and the beauty of lovely Emer, and the +tenderness of heart-sweet Deirdre, and the courage of Maev the +great Queen, and the charm of Mouth-of-Music." + +Yes, all that and more, but I feared lest I should see the heaven +of joy through her eyes only and find it mirage as I had found so +much else. + +SECOND PART Early in the pure dawn the men came and our boat was +towed up into the Dal Lake through crystal waterways and flowery +banks, the men on the path keeping step and straining at the rope +until the bronze muscles stood out on their legs and backs, +shouting strong rhythmic phrases to mark the pull. + +"They shout the Wondrous Names of God - as they are called," said +Vanna when I asked. "They always do that for a timid effort. Bad +shah! The Lord, the Compassionate, and so on. I don't think there +is any religion about it but it is as natural to them as One, +Two, Three, to us. It gives a tremendous lift. Watch and see." + +It was part of the delightful strangeness that we should move to +that strong music. We sat on the upper deck and watched the dream +- like beauty drift slowly by until we emerged beneath a little +bridge into the fairy land of the lake which the Mogul Emperors +loved so well that they made their noble pleasance gardens on the +banks, and thought it little to travel up yearly from far - off +Delhi over the snowy Pir Panjal with their Queens and courts for +the perfect summer of Kashmir. + +We moored by a low bank under a great wood of chenar trees, and +saw the little table in the wilderness set in the greenest shade +with our chairs beside it, and my pipe laid reverently upon it by +Kahdra. + +Across the glittering water lay on one side the Shalimar Garden +known to all readers of "Lalla Ruhk" - a paradise of roses; and +beyond it again the lovelier gardens of Nour-Mahal, the Light of +the Palace, that imperial woman who ruled India under the weak +Emperor's name - she whose name he set thus upon his coins: + +"By order of King Jehangir. Gold has a hundred splendours added +to it by receiving the name of Nour-Jahan the Queen." + +Has any woman ever had a more royal homage than this most royal +lady - known first as Mihr-u- nissa - Sun of Women, and later, +Nour-Mahal, Light of the Palace, and latest, Nour-Jahan- Begam, +Queen, Light of the World? + +Here in these gardens she had lived - had seen the snow mountains +change from the silver of dawn to the illimitable rose of sunset. +The life, the colour beat insistently upon my brain. They built a +world of magic where every moment was pure gold. Surely - surely +to Vanna it must be the same. I believed in my very soul that she +who gave and shared such joy could not be utterly apart from me? +Could I then feel certain that I had gained any ground in these +days we had been together? Could she still define the cruel +limits she had laid down, or were her eyes kinder, her tones a +more broken music? I did not know. Whenever I could hazard a +guess the next minute baffled me. + +Just then, in the sunset, she was sitting on deck, singing under +her breath and looking absently away to the Gardens across the +Lake. I could catch the words here and there, and knew them. + + "Pale hands I loved beside the Shalimar, + Where are you now - who lies beneath your spell? + Whom do you lead on Rapture's roadway far, + Before you agonize them in farewell?" + +"Don't!" I said abruptly. It stung me. + +"What?" she asked in surprise. "That is the song every one +remembers here. Poor Laurence Hope! How she knew and loved this +India! What are you grumbling at?" + +Her smile stung me. + +"Never mind," I said morosely. "You don't understand. You never +will." + +And yet I believed sometimes that she would - that time was on my +side. + +When Kahdra and I pulled her across to Nour-Mahal's garden next +day, how could I not believe it - her face was so full of joy as +she looked at me for sympathy? + +"I don't think so much beauty is crowded into any other few miles +in the world - beauty of association, history, nature, +everything!" she said with shining eyes. "The lotus flowers are +not out yet but when they come that is the last touch of +perfection. Do you remember Homer - 'But whoso ate of the +honey-sweet fruit of the lotus, was neither willing to bring me +word again, nor to depart. Nay, their desire was to remain there +for ever, feeding on the lotus with the Lotus Eaters, forgetful +of all return.' You know the people here eat the roots and seeds? +I ate them last year and perhaps that is why I cannot stay away. +But look at Nour- Mahal's garden!" + +We were pulling in among the reeds and the huge carven leaves of +the water plants, and the snake-headed buds lolling upon them +with the slippery half-sinister look that water-flowers have, as +though their cold secret life belonged to the hidden water world +and not to ours. But now the boat was touching the little wooden +steps. + +O beautiful - most beautiful the green lawns, shaded with huge +pyramids of the chenar trees, the terraced gardens where the +marble steps climbed from one to the other, and the mountain +streams flashed singing and shining down the carved marble slopes +that cunning hands had made to delight the Empress of Beauty, +between the wildernesses of roses. Her pavilion stands still +among the flowers, and the waters ripple through it to join the +lake - and she is - where? Even in the glory of sunshine the +passing of all fair things was present with me as I saw the empty +shell that had held the Pearl of Empire, and her roses that still +bloom, her waters that still sing for others. + +The spray of a hundred fountains was misty diamond dust in the +warm air laden with the scent of myriad flowers. Kahdra followed +us everywhere, singing his little tuneless happy song. The world +brimmed with beauty and joy. And we were together. Words broke +from me. + +"Vanna, let it be for ever! Let us live here. I'll give up all +the world for this and you." + +"But you see," she said delicately, "it would be 'giving up.' You +use the right word. It is not your life. It is a lovely holiday, +no more. You would weary of it. You would want the city life and +your own kind." + +I protested with all my soul. + +"No. Indeed I will say frankly that it would be lowering yourself +to live a lotus-eating life among my people. It is a life with +which you have no tie. A Westerner who lives like that steps +down; he loses his birthright just as an Oriental does who +Europeanizes himself. He cannot live your life nor you his. If +you had work here it would be different. No - six or eight weeks +more; then go away and forget it." + +I turned from her. The serpent was in Paradise. When is he +absent? + +On one of the terraces a man was beating a tom-tom, and veiled +women listened, grouped about him in brilliant colours. + +"Isn't that all India?" she said; "that dull reiterated sound? It +half stupefies, half maddens. Once at Darjiling I saw the Lamas' +Devil Dance - the soul, a white-faced child with eyes unnaturally +enlarged, fleeing among a rabble of devils - the evil passions. +It fled wildly here and there and every way was blocked. The +child fell on its knees, screaming dumbly - you could see the +despair in the staring eyes, but all was drowned in the thunder +of Tibetan drums. No mercy - no escape. Horrible!" + +"Even in Europe the drum is awful," I said. "Do you remember in +the French Revolution how they Drowned the victims' voices in a +thunder roll of drums?" + +"I shall always see the face of the child, hunted down to hell, +falling on its knees, and screaming without a sound, when I hear +the drum. But listen - a flute! Now if that were the Flute of +Krishna you would have to follow. Let us come!" + +I could hear nothing of it, but she insisted and we followed the +music, inaudible to me, up the slopes of the garden that is the +foot-hill of the mighty mountain of Mahadeo, and still I could +hear nothing. And Vanna told me strange stories of the Apollo of +India whom all hearts must adore, even as the herd-girls adored +him in his golden youth by Jumna river and in the pastures of +Brindaban. + +Next day we were climbing the hill to the ruins where the evil +magician brought the King's daughter nightly to his will, flying +low under a golden moon. Vanna took my arm and I pulled her +laughing up the steepest flowery slopes until we reached the +height, and lo! the arched windows were eyeless and a lonely +breeze blowing through the cloisters, and the beautiful yellowish +stone arches supported nothing and were but frames for the blue +of far lake and mountain and the divine sky. We climbed the +broken stairs where the lizards went by like flashes, and had I +the tongue of men and angels I could not tell the wonder that lay +before us, - the whole wide valley of Kashmir in summer glory, +with its scented breeze singing, singing above it. + +We sat on the crushed aromatic herbs and among the wild roses and +looked down. + +"To think," she said, "that we might have died and never seen +it!" + +There followed a long silence. I thought she was tired, and would +not break it. Suddenly she spoke in a strange voice, low and +toneless; + +"The story of this place. She was the Princess Padmavati, and her +home was in Ayodhya. When she woke and found herself here by the +lake she was so terrified that she flung herself in and was +drowned. They held her back, but she died." + +"How do you know?" + +"Because a wandering monk came to the abbey of Tahkt-i-Bahi near +Peshawar and told Vasettha the Abbot." + +I had nearly spoilt all by an exclamation, but I held myself +back. I saw she was dreaming awake and was unconscious of what +she said. + +"The Abbot said, 'Do not describe her. What talk is this for holy +men? The young monks must not hear. Some of them have never seen +a woman. Should a monk speak of such toys?' But the wanderer +disobeyed and spoke, and there was a great tumult, and the monks +threw him out at the command of the young Abbot, and he wandered +down to Peshawar, and it was he later - the evil one! - that +brought his sister, Lilavanti the Dancer, to Peshawar, and the +Abbot fell into her snare. That was his revenge!" + +Her face was fixed and strange, for a moment her cheek looked +hollow, her eyes dim and grief- worn. What was she seeing? - what +remembering? Was it a story - a memory? What was it? + +"She was beautiful?" I prompted. + +"Men have said so, but for it he surrendered the Peace. Do not +speak of her accursed beauty." + +Her voice died away to a drowsy murmur; her head dropped on my +shoulder and for the mere de- light of contact I sat still and +scarcely breathed, praying that she might speak again, but the +good minute was gone. She drew one or two deep breaths, and sat +up with a bewildered look that quickly passed. + +"I was quite sleepy for a minute. The climb was so strenuous. +Hark - I hear the Flute of Krishna again." + +And again I could hear nothing, but she said it was sounding from +the trees at the base of the hill. Later when we climbed down I +found she was right - that a peasant lad, dark and amazingly +beautiful as these Kashmiris often are, was playing on the flute +to a girl at his feet - looking up at him with rapt eyes. He +flung Vanna a flower as we passed. She caught it and put it in +her bosom. A singular blossom, three petals of purest white, set +against three leaves of purest green, and lower down the stem the +three green leaves were repeated. It was still in her bosom after +dinner, and I looked at it more closely. + +"That is a curious flower," I said. "Three and three and three. +Nine. That makes the mystic number. I never saw a purer white. +What is it?" + +"Of course it is mystic," she said seriously. "It is the Ninefold +Flower. You saw who gave it?" + +"That peasant lad." + +She smiled. + +"You will see more some day. Some might not even have seen that." + +"Does it grow here?" + +"This is the first I have seen. It is said to grow only where the +gods walk. Do you know that throughout all India Kashmir is said +to be holy ground? It was called long ago the land of the gods, +and of strange, but not evil, sorceries. Great marvels were seen +here." + +I felt the labyrinthine enchantments of that enchanted land were +closing about me - a slender web, grey, almost impalpable, finer +than fairy silk, was winding itself about my feet. My eyes were +opening to things I had not dreamed. She saw my thought. + +"Yes, you could not have seen even that much of him in Peshawar. +You did not know then." + +"He was not there," I answered, falling half unconsciously into +her tone. + +"He is always there - everywhere, and when he plays, all who hear +must follow. He was the Pied Piper in Hamelin, he was Pan in +Hellas. You will hear his wild fluting in many strange places +when you know how to listen. When one has seen him the rest comes +soon. And then you will follow." + +"Not away from you, Vanna." + +"From the marriage feast, from the Table of the Lord," she said, +smiling strangely. "The man who wrote that spoke of another call, +but it is the same - Krishna or Christ. When we hear the music we +follow. And we may lose or gain heaven." + +It might have been her compelling personality - it might have +been the marvels of beauty about me, but I knew well I had +entered at some mystic gate. A pass word had been spoken for me - +I was vouched for and might go in. Only a little way as yet. +Enchanted forests lay beyond, and perilous seas, but there were +hints, breaths like the wafting of the garments of unspeakable +Presences. My talk with Vanna grew less personal, and more +introspective. I felt the touch of her finger-tips leading me +along the ways of Quiet - my feet brushed a shining dew. Once, in +the twilight under the chenar trees, I saw a white gleaming and +thought it a swiftly passing Being, but when in haste I gained +the tree I found there only a Ninefold flower, white as a spirit +in the evening calm. I would not gather it but told Vanna what I +had seen. + +"You nearly saw;' she said. "She passed so quickly. It was the +Snowy One, Uma, Parvati, the Daughter of the Himalaya. That +mountain is the mountain of her lord - Shiva. It is natural she +should be here. I saw her last night lean over the height - her +face pillowed on her folded arms, with a low star in the mists of +her hair. Her eyes were like lakes of blue darkness. Vast and +wonderful. She is the Mystic Mother of India. You will see soon. +You could not have seen the flower until now." + +"Do you know," she added, "that in the mountains there are +poppies of clear blue - blue as turquoise. We will go up into the +heights and find them." + +And next moment she was planning the camping details, the men, +the ponies, with a practical zest that seemed to relegate the +occult to the absurd. Yet the very next day came a wonderful +moment. + +The sun was just setting and, as it were, suddenly the purple +glooms banked up heavy with thunder. The sky was black with fury, +the earth passive with dread. I never saw such lightning - it was +continuous and tore in zigzag flashes down the mountains like +rents in the substance of the world's fabric. And the thunder +roared up in the mountain gorges with shattering echoes. Then +fell the rain, and the whole lake seemed to rise to meet it, and +the noise was like the rattle of musketry. We were standing by +the cabin window and she suddenly caught my hand, and I saw in a +light of their own two dancing figures on the tormented water +before us. Wild in the tumult, embodied delight, with arms tossed +violently above their heads, and feet flung up behind them, +skimming the waves like seagulls, they passed. Their sex I could +not tell - I think they had none, but were bubble emanations of +the rejoicing rush of the rain and the wild retreating laughter +of the thunder. I saw the fierce aerial faces and their inhuman +glee as they fled by, and she dropped my hand and they were gone. +Slowly the storm lessened, and in the west the clouds tore +raggedly asunder and a flood of livid yellow light poured down +upon the lake - an awful light that struck it into an abyss of +fire. Then, as if at a word of command, two glorious rainbows +sprang across the water with the mountains for their piers, each +with its proper colours chorded. They made a Bridge of Dread that +stood out radiant against the background of storm - the Twilight +of the Gods, and the doomed gods marching forth to the last +fight. And the thunder growled sullenly away into the recesses of +the hill and the terrible rainbows faded until the stars came +quietly out and it was a still night. + +But I had seen that what is our dread is the joy of the spirits +of the Mighty Mother, and though the vision faded and I doubted +what I had seen, it prepared the way for what I was yet to see. A +few days later we started on what was to be the most exquisite +memory of my life. A train of ponies carried our tents and +camping necessaries and there was a pony for each of us. And so, +in the cool grey of a divine morning, with little rosy clouds +flecking the eastern sky, we set out from Islamabad for Vernag. +And this was the order of our going. She and I led the way, +attended by a sais (groom) and a coolie carrying the luncheon +basket. Half way we would stop in some green dell, or by some +rushing stream, and there rest and eat our little meal while the +rest of the cavalcade passed on to the appointed camping place, +and in the late afternoon we would follow, riding slowly, and +find the tents pitched and the kitchen department in full swing. +If the place pleased us we lingered for some days; - if not, the +camp was struck next morning, and again we wandered in search of +beauty. + +The people were no inconsiderable part of my joy. I cannot see +what they have to gain from such civilization as ours - a kindly +people and happy. Courtesy and friendliness met us everywhere, +and if their labor was hard, their harvest of beauty and laughter +seemed to be its reward. The little villages with their groves of +walnut and fruit trees spoke of no unfulfilled want, the +mulberries which fatten the sleek bears in their season fattened +the children too. I compared their lot with that of the toilers +in our cities and knew which I would choose. We rode by +shimmering fields of barley, with red poppies floating in the +clear transparent green as in deep sea water, through fields of +millet like the sky fallen on the earth, so innocently blue were +its blossoms, and the trees above us were trellised with the +wild roses, golden and crimson, and the ways tapestried with the +scented stars of the large white jasmine. + +It was strange that later much of what she said, escaped me. Some +I noted down at the time, but there were hints, shadows of +lovelier things beyond that eluded all but the fringes of memory +when I tried to piece them together and make a coherence of a +living wonder. For that reason, the best things cannot be told in +this history. It is only the cruder, grosser matters that words +will hold. The half-touchings -vanishing looks, breaths - O God, +I know them, but cannot tell. + +In the smaller villages, the head man came often to greet us and +make us welcome, bearing on a flat dish a little offering of +cakes and fruit, the produce of the place. One evening a man so +approached, stately in white robes and turban, attended by a +little lad who carried the patriarchal gift beside him. Our tents +were pitched under a glorious walnut tree with a run- ning stream +at our feet. + +Vanna of course, was the interpreter, and I called her from her +tent as the man stood salaaming before me. It was strange that +when she came, dressed in white, he stopped in his salutation, +and gazed at her in what, I thought, was silent wonder. + +She spoke earnestly to him, standing before him with clasped +hands, almost, I could think, in the attitude of a suppliant. The +man listened gravely, with only an interjection, now and again, +and once he turned and looked curiously at me. Then he spoke, +evidently making some announcement which she received with bowed +head - and when he turned to go with a grave salute, she +performed a very singular ceremony, moving slowly round him three +times with clasped hands; keeping him always on the right. He +repaid it with the usual salaam and greeting of peace, which he +bestowed also on me, and then departed in deep meditation, his +eyes fixed on the ground. I ventured to ask what it all meant, +and she looked thoughtfully at me before replying. + +"It was a strange thing. I fear you will not altogether +understand, but I will tell you what I can. That man though +living here among Mahomedans, is a Brahman from Benares, and, +what is very rare in India, a Buddhist. And when he saw me he +believed he remembered me in a former birth. The ceremony you +saw me perform is one of honour in India. It was his due." + +"Did you remember him?" I knew my voice was incredulous. + +"Very well. He has changed little but is further on the upward +path. I saw him with dread for he holds the memory of a great +wrong I did. Yet he told me a thing that has filled my heart with +joy." + +"Vanna-what is it?" + +She had a clear uplifted look which startled me. There was +suddenly a chill air blowing between us. + +"I must not tell you yet but you will know soon. He was a good +man. I am glad we have met." + +She buried herself in writing in a small book I had noticed and +longed to look into, and no more was said. + +We struck camp next day and trekked on towards Vernag - a rough +march, but one of great beauty, beneath the shade of forest +trees, garlanded with pale roses that climbed from bough to bough +and tossed triumphant wreaths into the uppermost blue. + +In the afternoon thunder was flapping its wings far off in the +mountains and a little rain fell while we were lunching under a +big tree. I was considering anxiously how to shelter Vanna, when +a farmer invited us to his house - a scene of Biblical +hospitality that delighted us both. He led us up some break-neck +little stairs to a large bare room, open to the clean air all +round the roof, and with a kind of rough enclosure on the wooden +floor where the family slept at night. There he opened our +basket, and then, with anxious care, hung clothes and rough +draperies about us that our meal might be unwatched by one or two +friends who had followed us in with breathless interest. Still +further to entertain us a great rarity was brought out and laid +at Vanna's feet as something we might like to watch - a curious +bird in a cage, with brightly barred wings and a singular cry. +She fed it with fruit, and it fluttered to her hand. Just so +Abraham might have welcomed his guests, and when we left with +words of deepest gratitude, our host made the beautiful obeisance +of touching his forehead with joined hands as he bowed. To me the +whole incident had an extraordinary grace, and ennobled both host +and guest. But we met an ascending scale of loveliness so varied +in its aspects that I passed from one emotion to another and knew +no sameness. + +That afternoon the camp was pitched at the foot of a mighty hill, +under the waving pyramids of the chenars, sweeping their green +like the robes of a goddess. Near by was a half circle of low +arches falling into ruin, and as we went in among them I beheld a +wondrous sight - the huge octagonal tank or basin made by the +Mogul Emperor Jehangir to receive the waters of a mighty Spring +which wells from the hill and has been held sacred by Hindu and +Moslem. And if loveliness can sanctify surely it is sacred +indeed. + +The tank was more than a hundred feet in diameter and circled by +a roughly paved pathway where the little arched cells open that +the devotees may sit and contemplate the lustral waters. There on +a black stone, is sculptured the Imperial inscription comparing +this spring to the holier wells of Paradise, and I thought no +less of it, for it rushes straight from the rock with no aiding +stream, and its waters are fifty feet deep, and sweep away from +this great basin through beautiful low arches in a wild foaming +river - the crystal life-blood of the mountains for ever welling +away. The colour and perfect purity of this living jewel were +most marvellous -clear blue-green like a chalcedony, but changing +as the lights in an opal - a wonderful quivering brilliance, +flickering with the silver of shoals of sacred fish. + +But the Mogul Empire is with the snows of yesteryear and the +wonder has passed from the Moslems into the keeping of the Hindus +once more, and the Lingam of Shiva, crowned with flowers, is the +symbol in the little shrine by the entrance. Surely in India, the +gods are one and have no jealousies among them - so swiftly do +their glories merge the one into the other. + +"How all the Mogul Emperors loved running water," said Vanna. "I +can see them leaning over it in their carved pavilions with +delicate dark faces and pensive eyes beneath their turbans, lost +in the endless reverie of the East while liquid melody passes +into their dream. It was the music they best loved." + +She was leading me into the royal garden below, where the young +river flows beneath the pavilion set above and across the rush of +the water. + +"I remember before I came to India," she went on, "there were +certain words and phrases that meant the whole East to me. It was +an enchantment. The. first flash picture I had was Milton's- + + 'Dark faces with white silken turbans wreathed.' + +and it still is. I have thought ever since that every man should +wear a turban. It dignifies the un-comeliest and it is quite +curious to see how many inches a man descends in the scale of +beauty the moment he takes it off and you see only the skull-cap +about which they wind it. They wind it with wonderful skill too. +I have seen a man take eighteen yards of muslin and throw it +round his head with a few turns, and in five or six minutes the +beautiful folds were all in order and he looked like a king. Some +of the Gujars here wear black ones and they are very effective +and worth painting - the black folds and the sullen tempestuous +black brows underneath." + +We sat in the pavilion for awhile looking down on the rushing +water, and she spoke of Akbar, the greatest of the Moguls, and +spoke with a curious personal touch, as I thought. + +"I wish you would try to write a story of him - one on more human +lines than has been done yet. No one has accounted for the +passionate quest of truth that was the real secret of his life. +Strange in an Oriental despot if you think of it! It really can +only be understood from the Buddhist belief, which curiously +seems to have been the only one he neglected, that a mysterious +Karma influenced all his thoughts. If I tell you as a key-note +for your story, that in a past life he had been a Buddhist priest +- one who had fallen away, would that in any way account to you +for attempts to recover the lost way? Try to think that out, and +to write the story, not as a Western mind sees it, but pure +East." + +"That would be a great book to write if one could catch the +voices of the past. But how to do it?" + +"I will give you one day a little book that may help you. The +other story I wish you would write is the story of a Dancer of +Peshawar. There is a connection between the two - a story of ruin +and repentance." + +"Will you tell it to me?" + +"A part. In this same book you will find much more, hut not all. +All cannot be told. You must imagine much. But I think your +imagination will be true." + +"Why do you think so?" + +"Because in these few days you have learnt so much. You have seen +the Ninefold Flower, and the rain spirits. You will soon hear the +Flute of Krishna which none can hear who cannot dream true." + +That night I heard it. I waked, suddenly, to music, and standing +in the door of my tent, in the dead silence of the night, lit +only by a few low stars, I heard the poignant notes of a flute. +If it had called my name it could not have summoned me more +clearly, and I followed without a thought of delay, forgetting +even Vanna in the strange urgency that filled me. The music was +elusive, seeming to come first from one side, then from the +other, but finally I tracked it as a bee does a flower by the +scent, to the gate of the royal garden - the pleasure place of +the dead Emperors. + +The gate stood ajar - strange! for I had seen the custodian close +it that evening. Now it stood wide and I went in, walking +noiselessly over the dewy grass. I knew and could not tell how, +that I must be noiseless. Passing as if I were guided, down the +course of the strong young river, I came to the pavilion that +spanned it - the place where we had stood that afternoon - and +there to my profound amazement, I saw Vanna, leaning against a +slight wooden pillar. As if she had expected me, she laid one +finger on her lip, and stretching out her hand, took mine and +drew me beside her as a mother might a child. And instantly I +saw! + +On the further bank a young man in a strange diadem or miter of +jewels, bare-breasted and beautiful, stood among the flowering +oleanders, one foot lightly crossed over the other as he stood. +He was like an image of pale radiant gold, and I could have sworn +that the light came from within rather than fell upon him, for +the night was very dark. He held the flute to his lips, and as I +looked, I became aware that the noise of the rushing water was +tapering off into a murmur scarcely louder than that of a summer +bee in the heart of a rose. Therefore the music rose like a +fountain of crystal drops, cold, clear, and of an entrancing +sweetness, and the face above it was such that I had no power to +turn my eyes away. How shall I say what it was? All I had ever +desired, dreamed, hoped, prayed, looked at me from the remote +beauty of the eyes and with the most persuasive gentleness +entreated me, rather than commanded to follow fearlessly and win. +But these are words, and words shaped in the rough mould of +thought cannot convey the deep desire that would have hurled me +to his feet if Vanna had not held me with a firm restraining +hand. Looking up in adoring love to the dark face was a ring of +woodland creatures. I thought I could distinguish the white +clouded robe of a snow- leopard, the soft clumsiness of a young +bear, and many more, but these shifted and blurred like dream +creatures - I could not be sure of them nor define their numbers. +The eyes of the Player looked down upon their passionate delight +with careless kindness. + +Dim images passed through my mind. Orpheus - No, this was no +Greek. Pan-yet again, No. Where were the pipes, the goat hoofs? +The young Dionysos - No, there were strange jewels instead of his +vines. And then Vanna's voice said as if from a great distance; + +"Krishna - the Beloved." And I said aloud, "I see!" And even as I +said it the whole picture blurred together like a dream, and I +was alone in the pavilion and the water was foaming past me. Had +I walked in my sleep, I thought, as I made my way hack? As I +gained the garden gate, before me, like a snowflake, I saw the +Ninefold Flower. + +When I told her next day, speaking of it as a dream, she said +simply; "They have opened the door to you. You will not need me +soon. + +"I shall always need you. You have taught me everything. I could +see nothing last night until you took my hand." + +"I was not there," she said smiling. "It was only the thought of +me, and you can have that when I am very far away. I was sleeping +in my tent. What you called in me then you can always call, even +if I am - dead." + +"That is a word which is beginning to have no meaning for me. You +have said things to me - no, thought them, that have made me +doubt if there is room in the universe for the thing we have +called death." + +She smiled her sweet wise smile. + +"Where we are death is not. Where death is we are not. But you +will understand better soon." + +Our march curving took us by the Mogul gardens of Achibal, and +the glorious ruins of the great Temple at Martund, and so down to +Bawan with its crystal waters and that loveliest camping ground +beside them. A mighty grove of chenar trees, so huge that I felt +as if we were in a great sea cave where the air is dyed with the +deep shadowy green of the inmost ocean, and the murmuring of the +myriad leaves was like a sea at rest. I looked up into the noble +height and my memory of Westminster dwindled, for this led on and +up to the infinite blue, and at night the stars hung like fruit +upon the branches. The water ran with a great joyous rush of +release from the mountain behind, but was first received in a +broad basin full of sacred fish and reflecting a little temple of +Maheshwara and one of Surya the Sun. Here in this basin the water +lay pure and still as an ecstasy, and beside it was musing the +young Brahman priest who served the temple. Since I had joined +Vanna I had begun with her help to study a little Hindustani, and +with an aptitude for language could understand here and there. I +caught a word or two as she spoke with him that startled me, when +the high-bred ascetic face turned serenely upon her, and he +addressed her as "My sister," adding a sentence beyond my +learning, but which she willingly translated later. - "May He who +sits above the Mysteries, have mercy upon thy rebirth." + +She said afterwards; + +"How beautiful some of these men are. It seems a different type +of beauty from ours, nearer to nature and the old gods. Look at +that priest - the tall figure, the clear olive skin, the dark +level brows, the long lashes that make a soft gloom about the +eyes - eyes that have the fathomless depth of a deer's, the proud +arch of the lip. I think there is no country where aristocracy is +more clearly marked than in India. The Brahmans are aristocrats +of the world. You see it is a religious aristocracy as well. It +has everything that can foster pride and exclusiveness. They +spring from the Mouth of Deity. They are His word incarnate. Not +many kings are of the Brahman caste, and the Brahmans look down +upon them from Sovereign heights. I have known men who would not +eat with their own rulers who would have drunk the water that +washed the Brahmans' feet." + +She took me that day, the Brahman with us, to see a cave in the +mountain. We climbed up the face of the cliff to where a little +tree grew on a ledge, and the black mouth yawned. We went in and +often it was so low we had to stoop, leaving the sunlight behind +until it was like a dim eye glimmering in the velvet blackness. +The air was dank and cold and presently obscene with the smell of +bats, and alive with their wings, as they came sweeping about us, +gibbering and squeaking. I thought of the rush of the ghosts, +blown like dead leaves in the Odyssey. And then a small rock +chamber branched off, and in this, lit by a bit of burning wood, +we saw the bones of a holy man who lived and died there four +hundred years ago. Think of it! He lived there always, with the +slow dropping of water from the dead weight of the mountain above +his head, drop by drop tolling the minutes away: the little +groping feet through the cave that would bring him food and +drink, hurrying into the warmth and sunlight again, and his only +companion the sacred Lingam which means the Creative Energy that +sets the worlds dancing for joy round the sun - that, and the +black solitude to sit down beside him. Surely his bones can +hardly be dryer and colder now than they were then! There must be +strange ecstasies in such a life - wild visions in the dark, or +it could never be endured. + +And so, in marches of about ten miles a day, we came to Pahlgam +on the banks of the dancing Lidar. There was now only three weeks +left of the time she had promised. After a few days at Pahlgam +the march would turn and bend its way back to Srinagar, and to - +what? I could not believe it was to separation - in her lovely +kindness she had grown so close to me that, even for the sake of +friendship, I believed our paths must run together to the end, +and there were moments when I could still half convince myself +that I had grown as necessary to her as she was to me. No - not +as necessary, for she was life and soul to me, but a part of her +daily experience that she valued and would not easily part with. +That evening we were sitting outside the tents, near the camp +fire, of pine logs and cones, the leaping flames making the night +beautiful with gold and leaping sparks, in an attempt to reach +the mellow splendours of the moon. The men, in various attitudes +of rest, were lying about, and one had been telling a story which +had just ended in excitement and loud applause. + +"These are Mahomedans," said Vanna, "and it is only a story of +love and fighting like the Arabian Nights. If they had been +Hindus, it might well have been of Krishna or of Rama and Sita. +Their faith comes from an earlier time and they still see +visions. The Moslem is a hard practical faith for men - men of +the world too. It is not visionary now, though it once had its +great mysteries." + +"I wish you would tell me what you think of the visions or +apparitions of the gods that are seen here. Is it all illusion? +Tell me your thought." + +"How difficult that is to answer. I suppose if love and faith are +strong enough they will always create the vibrations to which the +greater vibrations respond, and so make God in their own image at +any time or place. But that they call up what is the truest +reality I have never doubted. There is no shadow without a +substance. The substance is beyond us but under certain +conditions the shadow is projected and we see it. + +"Have I seen or has it been dream?" + +"I cannot tell. It may have been the impress of my mind on yours, +for I see such things always. You say I took your hand?" + +"Take it now." + +She obeyed, and instantly, as I felt the firm cool clasp, I heard +the rain of music through the pines - the Flute Player was +passing. She dropped it smiling and the sweet sound ceased. + +"You see! How can I tell what you have seen? You will know better +when I am gone. You will stand alone then." + +"You will not go - you cannot. I have seen how you have loved all +this wonderful time. I believe it has been as dear to you as to +me. And every day I have loved you more. I depend upon you for +everything that makes life worth living. You could not - you who +are so gentle - you could not commit the senseless cruelty of +leaving me when you have taught me to love you with every beat of +my heart. I have been patient - I have held myself in, but I must +speak now. Marry me, and teach me. I know nothing. You know all I +need to know. For pity's sake be my wife." + +I had not meant to say it; it broke from me in the firelight +moonlight with a power that I could not stay. She looked at me +with a disarming gentleness. + +"Is this fair? Do you remember how at Peshawar I told you I +thought it was a dangerous experiment, and that it would make +things harder for you. But you took the risk like a brave man +because you felt there were things to be gained - knowledge, +insight, beauty. Have you not gained them?" + +"Yes. Absolutely." + +"Then, is it all loss if I go?" + +"Not all. But loss I dare not face." + +"I will tell you this. I could not stay if I would. Do you +remember the old man on the way to Vernag? He told me that I must +very soon take up an entirely new life. I have no choice, though +if I had I would still do it." + +There was silence and down a long arcade, without any touch of +her hand I heard the music, receding with exquisite modulations +to a very great distance, and between the pillared stems, I saw a +faint light. + +"Do you wish to go?" + +"Entirely. But I shall not forget you, Stephen. I will tell you +something. For me, since I came to India, the gate that shuts us +out at birth has opened. How shall I explain? Do you remember +Kipling's 'Finest Story in the World'?" + +"Yes. Fiction!" + +"Not fiction - true, whether he knew it or no. But for me the +door has opened wide. First, I remembered piecemeal, with wide +gaps, then more connectedly. Then, at the end of the first year, +I met one day at Cawnpore, an ascetic, an old man of great beauty +and wisdom, and he was able by his own knowledge to enlighten +mine. Not wholly - much has come since then. Has come, some of it +in ways you could not understand now, but much by direct sight +and hearing. Long, long ago I lived in Peshawar, and my story was +a sorrowful one. I will tell you a little before I go." + +"I hold you to your promise. What is there I cannot believe when +you tell me? But does that life put you altogether away from me? +Was there no place for me in any of your memories that has drawn +us together now? Give me a little hope that in the eternal +pilgrimage there is some bond between us and some rebirth where +we may met again." + +"I will tell you that also before we part. I have grown to +believe that you do love me - and therefore love something which +is infinitely above me." + +"And do you love me at all? Am I nothing, Vanna - Vanna?" + +"My friend," she said, and laid her hand on mine. + +A silence, and then she spoke, very low. + +"You must be prepared for very great change, Stephen, and yet +believe that it does not really change things at all. See how +even the gods pass and do not change! The early gods of India are +gone and Shiva, Vishnu, Krishna have taken their places and are +one and the same. The old Buddhist stories say that in heaven +"The flowers of the garland the God wore are withered, his robes +of majesty are waxed old and faded; he falls from his high +estate, and is re-born into a new life." But he lives still in +the young God who is born among men. The gods cannot die, nor can +we nor anything that has life. Now I must go in. + +I sat long in the moonlight thinking. The whole camp was sunk in +sleep and the young dawn was waking upon the peaks when I turned +in. + +The days that were left we spent in wandering up the Lidar River +to the hills that are the first ramp of the ascent to the great +heights. We found the damp corners where the mushrooms grow like +pearls - the mushrooms of which she said - "To me they have +always been fairy things. To see them in the silver-grey dew of +the early mornings - mysteriously there like the manna in the +desert - they are elfin plunder, and as a child I was half afraid +of them. No wonder they are the darlings of folklore, especially +in Celtic countries where the Little People move in the +starlight. Strange to think they are here too among strange +gods!" + +We climbed to where the wild peonies bloom in glory that few eyes +see, and the rosy beds of wild sweet strawberries ripen. Every +hour brought with it some new delight, some exquisiteness of +sight or of words that I shall remember for ever. She sat one day +on a rock, holding the sculptured leaves and massive seed-vessels +of some glorious plant that the Kashmiris believe has magic +virtues hidden in the seeds of pure rose embedded in the white +down. + +"If you fast for three days and eat nine of these in the Night of +No Moon, you can rise on the air light as thistledown and stand +on the peak of Haramoukh. And on Haramoukh, as you know it is +believed, the gods dwell. There was a man here who tried this +enchantment. He was a changed man for ever after, wandering and +muttering to himself and avoiding all human intercourse as far as +he could. He was no Kashmiri - A Jat from the Punjab, and they +showed him to me when I was here with the Meryons, and told me he +would speak to none. But I knew he would speak to me, and he +did." + +"Did he tell you anything of what he had seen in the high world +up yonder?" + +"He said he had seen the Dream of the God. I could not get more +than that. But there are many people here who believe that the +Universe as we know it is but an image in the dream of Ishvara, +the Universal Spirit - in whom are all the gods - and that when +He ceases to dream we pass again into the Night of Brahm, and all +is darkness until the Spirit of God moves again on the face of +the waters. There are few temples to Brahm. He is above and +beyond all direct worship." + +"Do you think he had seen anything?" + +"What do I know? Will you eat the seeds? The Night of No Moon +will soon be here." + +She held out the seed-vessels, laughing. I write that down but +how record the lovely light of kindliness in her eyes - the +almost submissive gentleness that yet was a defense stronger +than steel. I never knew - how should I? - whether she was +sitting by my side or heavens away from me in her own strange +world. But always she was a sweetness that I could not reach, a +cup of nectar that I might not drink, unalterably her own and +never mine, and yet - my friend. + +She showed me the wild track up into the mountains where the +Pilgrims go to pay their devotions at the Great God's shrine in +the awful heights, regretting that we were too early for that +most wonderful sight. Above where we were sitting the river fell +in a tormented white cascade, crashing arid feathering into +spray-dust of diamonds. An eagle was flying above it with a +mighty spread of wings that seemed almost double-jointed in the +middle - they curved and flapped so wide and free. The fierce +head was outstretched with the rake of a plundering galley as he +swept down the wind, seeking his meat from God, and passed +majestic from our sight. The valley beneath us was littered with +enormous boulders spilt from the ancient hollows of the hills. It +must have been a great sight when the giants set them trundling +down in work or play! - I said this to Vanna, who was looking +down upon it with meditative eyes. She roused herself. + +"Yes, this really is Giant-Land up here - everything is so huge. +And when they quarrel up in the heights - in Jotunheim - and the +black storms come down the valleys it is like colossal laughter +or clumsy boisterous anger. And the Frost giants are still at +work up there with their great axes of frost and rain. They fling +down the side of a mountain or make fresh ways for the rivers. +About sixty years ago - far above here - they tore down a +mountain side and damned up the mighty Indus, so that for months +he was a lake, shut back in the hills. But the river giants are +no less strong up here in the heights of the world, and lie lay +brooding and hiding his time. And then one awful day he tore the +barrier down and roared down the valley carrying death and ruin +with him, and swept away a whole Sikh army among other +unconsidered trifles. That must have been a soul-shaking sight." + +She spoke on, and as she spoke I saw. What are her words as I +record them? Stray dead leaves pressed in a book - the life and +grace dead. Yet I record, for she taught me what I believe the +world should learn, that the Buddhist philosophers are right when +they teach that all forms of what we call matter are really but +aggregates of spiritual units, and that life itself is a curtain +hiding reality as the vast veil of day conceals from our sight +the countless orbs of space. So that the purified mind even while +prisoned in the body, may enter into union with the Real and, +according to attainment, see it as it is. + +She was an interpreter because she believed this truth +profoundly. She saw the spiritual essence beneath the lovely +illusion of matter, and the air about her was radiant with the +motion of strange forces for which the dull world has many names +aiming indeed at the truth, but falling - O how far short of her +calm perception! She was indeed of a Household higher than the +Household of Faith. She had received enlightenment. She beheld +with open eyes. + +Next day our camp was struck and we turned our faces again to +Srinagar and to the day of parting. I set down but one strange +incident of our journey, of which I did not speak even to her. + +We were camping at Bijbehara, awaiting our house boat, and the +site was by the Maharaja's lodge above the little town. It was +midnight and I was sleepless - the shadow of the near future was +upon me. I wandered down to the lovely old wooded bridge across +the Jhelum, where the strong young trees grow up from the piles. +Beyond it the moon was shining on the ancient Hindu remains close +to the new temple, and as I stood on the bridge I could see the +figure of a man in deepest meditation by the ruins. He was no +European. I saw the straight dignified folds of the robes. But it +was not surprising he should be there and I should have thought +no more of it, had I not heard at that instant from the further +side of the river the music of the Flute. I cannot hope to +describe that music to any who have not heard it. Suffice it to +say that where it calls he who hears must follow whether in the +body or the spirit. Nor can I now tell in which I followed. One +day it will call me across the River of Death, and I shall ford +it or sink in the immeasurable depths and either will be well. + +But immediately I was at the other side of the river, standing by +the stone Bull of Shiva where he kneels before the Symbol, and +looking steadfastly upon me a few paces away was a man in the +dress of a Buddhist monk. He wore the yellow robe that leaves one +shoulder bare; his head was bare also and he held in one hand a +small bowl like a stemless chalice. I knew I was seeing a very +strange inexplicable sight - one that in Kashmir should be +incredible, but I put wonder aside for I knew now that I was +moving in the sphere where the incredible may well be the actual. +His expression was of the most unbroken calm. If I compare it to +the passionless gaze of the Sphinx I misrepresent, for the Riddle +of the Sphinx still awaits solution, but in this face was a noble +acquiescence and a content that had it vibrated must have passed +into joy. + +Words or their equivalent passed between us. I felt his voice. + +"You have heard the music of the Flute?" + +"I have heard." + +"What has it given?" + +"A consuming longing." + +"It is the music of the Eternal. The creeds and the faiths are +the words that men have set to that melody. Listening, it will +lead you to Wisdom. Day by day you will interpret more surely." + +"I cannot stand alone." + +"You will not need. What has led you will lead you still. Through +many births it has led you. How should it fail?" + +"What should I do?" + +"Go forward." + +"What should I shun?" + +"Sorrow and fear." + +"What should I seek?" + +"Joy." + +"And the end?" + +"Joy. Wisdom. They are the Light and Dark of the Divine." A cold +breeze passed and touched my forehead. I was still standing in +the middle of the bridge above the water gliding to the Ocean, +and there was no figure by the Bull of Shiva. I was alone. I +passed back to the tents with the shudder that is not fear but +akin to death upon me. I knew I had been profoundly withdrawn +from what we call actual life, and the return is dread. + +The days passed as we floated down the river to Srinagar. On +board the Kedarnath, now lying in our first berth beneath the +chenars near and yet far from the city, the last night had come. +Next morning I should begin the long ride to Baramula and beyond +that barrier of the Happy Valley down to Murree and the Punjab. +Where afterwards? I neither knew nor cared. My lesson was before +me to be learned. I must try to detach myself from all I had +prized - to say to my heart it was but a loan and no gift, and to +cling only to the imperishable. And did I as yet certainly know +more than the A B C of the hard doctrine by which I must live? +"Que vivre est difficile, 0 mon cocur fatigue!" - an immense +weariness possessed me - a passive grief. + +Vanna would follow later with the wife of an Indian doctor. I +believed she was bound for Lahore but on that point she had not +spoken certainly and I felt we should not meet again. + +And now my packing was finished, and, as far as my possessions +went, the little cabin had the soulless emptiness that comes with +departure. I was enduring as best I could. If she had held +loyally to her pact, could I do less. Was she to blame for my +wild hope that in the end she would relent and step down to the +household levels of love? + +She sat by the window - the last time I should see the moonlit +banks and her clear face against them. I made and won my fight +for the courage of words. + +"And now I've finished everything - thank goodness! and we can +talk. Vanna - you will write to me?" + +"Once. I promise that." + +"Only once? Why? I counted on your words." + +"I want to speak to you of something else now. I want to tell you +a memory. But look first at the pale light behind the +Takht-i-Suliman." + +So I had seen it with her. So I should not see it again. We +watched until a line of silver sparkled on the black water, and +then she spoke again. + +"Stephen, do you remember in the ruined monastery near Peshawar, +how I told you of the young Abbot, who came down to Peshawar with +a Chinese pilgrim? And he never returned." + +"I remember. There was a Dancer." + +"There was a Dancer. She was Lilavanti, and she was brought there +to trap him but when she saw him she loved him, and that was his +ruin and hers. Trickery he would have known and escaped. Love +caught him in an unbreakable net, and they fled down the Punjab +and no one knew any more. But I know. For two years they lived +together and she saw the agony in his heart - the anguish of his +broken vows, the face of the Blessed One receding into an +infinite distance. She knew that every day added a link to the +heavy Karma that was bound about the feet she loved, and her soul +said "Set him free," and her heart refused the torture. But her +soul was the stronger. She set him free." + +"How?" + +"She took poison. He became an ascetic in the hills and died in +peace but with a long expiation upon him." + +"And she?" + +"I am she." + +"You!" I heard my voice as if it were another man's. Was it +possible that I - a man of the twentieth century, believed this +impossible thing? Impossible, and yet - what had I learnt if not +the unity of Time, the illusion of matter? What is the twentieth +century, what the first? Do they not lie before the Supreme as +one, and clean from our petty divisions? And I myself had seen +what, if I could trust it, asserted the marvels that are no +marvels to those who know. + +"You loved him?" + +"I love him." + +"Then there is nothing at all for me." + +She resumed as if she had heard nothing. + +"I have lost him for many lives. He stepped above me at once, for +he was clean gold though he fell, and though I have followed I +have not found. But that Buddhist beyond Islamabad - you shall +hear now what he said. It was this. 'The shut door opens, and +this time he awaits.' I cannot yet say all it means, but there is +no Lahore for me. I shall meet him soon." + +"Vanna, you would not harm yourself again?" + +"Never. I should not meet him. But you will see. Now I can talk +no more. I will be there tomorrow when you go, and I will ride +with you to the poplar road." + +She passed like a shadow into her little dark cabin, and I was +left alone. I will not dwell on that black loneliness of the +spirit, for it has passed - it was the darkness of hell, a +madness of jealousy, and could have no enduring life in any heart +that had known her. But it was death while it lasted. I had +moments of horrible belief, of horrible disbelief, but however it +might be I knew that she was out of reach for ever. Near me - +yes! but only as the silver image of the moon floated in the +water by the boat, with the moon herself cold myriads of miles +away. I will say no more of that last eclipse of what she had +wrought in me. + +The bright morning came, sunny as if my joys were beginning +instead of ending. Vanna mounted her horse and led the way from +the boat. I cast one long look at the little Kedarnath, the home +of those perfect weeks, of such joy and sorrow as would have +seemed impossible to me in the chrysalis of my former existence. +Little Kahdra stood crying bitterly on the bank - the kindly folk +who had served us were gathered saddened and quiet. I set my +teeth and followed her. + +How dear she looked, how kind, how gentle her appealing eyes, as +I drew up beside her. She knew what I felt. She knew that the +sight of little Kahdra crying as he said good - bye was the last +pull at my sore heart. Still she rode steadily on, and still I +followed. Once she spoke. + +"Stephen, there was a man in Peshawar, kind and true, who loved +that Lilavanti who had no heart for him. And when she died, it +was in his arms, as a sister might cling to a brother, for the +man she loved had left her. It seems that will not be in this +life, but do not think I have been so blind that I did not know +my friend." + +I could not answer - it was the realization of the utmost I could +hope and it came like healing to my spirit. Better that bond +between us, slight as most men might think it, than the dearest +and closest with a woman not Vanna. It was the first thrill of a +new joy in my heart - the first, I thank the Infinite, of many +and steadily growing joys and hopes that cannot be uttered here. + +I bent to take the hand she stretched to me, but even as they +touched, I saw, passing behind the trees by the road, the young +man I had seen in the garden at Vernag - most beautiful, in the +strange miter of his jewelled diadem. His flute was at his lips +and the music rang out sudden and crystal clear as though a +woodland god were passing to awaken all the joys of the dawn. + +The horses heard too. In an instant hers had swerved wildly, and +she lay on the ground at my feet. The music had ceased. + +Days had gone before I could recall what had happened then. I +lifted her in my arms and carried her into the rest-house near at +hand, and the doctor came and looked grave, and a nurse was sent +from the Mission Hospital. No doubt all was done that was +possible, hut I knew from the first what it meant and how it +would be. She lay in a white stillness, and the room was quiet as +death. I remembered with unspeakable gratitude later that the +nurse had been merciful and had not sent me away. + +So Vanna lay all day and through the night, and when the dawn +came again she stirred and motioned with her hand, although her +eyes were closed. I understood, and kneeling, I put my hand +under her head, and rested it against my shoulder. Her faint +voice murmured at my ear. + +"I dreamed - I was in the pine wood at Pahlgam and it was the +Night of No Moon, and I was afraid for it was dark, but suddenly +all the trees were covered with little lights like stars, and the +greater light was beyond. Nothing to be afraid of." + +"Nothing, Beloved." + +"And I looked beyond Peshawar, further than eyes could see, and +in the ruins of the monastery where we stood, you and I - I saw +him, and he lay with his head at the feet of the Blessed One. +That is well, is it not?" + +"Well, Beloved." + +"And it is well I go? Is it not?" + +"It is well." + +A long silence. The first sun ray touched the floor. Again the +whisper. + +"Believe what I have told you. For we shall meet again." I +repeated- + +"We shall meet again." + +In my arms she died. + +Later, when all was over I asked myself if I believed this and +answered with full assurance - Yes. + +If the story thus told sounds incredible it was not incredible to +me. I had had a profound experience. What is a miracle? It is +simply the vision of the Divine behind nature. It will come in +different forms according to the eyes that see, but the soul will +know that its perception is authentic. + +I could not leave Kashmir, nor was there any need. On the +contrary I saw that there was work for me here among the people +she had loved, and my first aim was to fit myself for that and +for the writing I now felt was to be my career in life. After +much thought I bought the little Kedarnath and made it my home, +very greatly to the satisfaction of little Kahdra and all the +friendly people to whom I owed so much. + +Vanna's cabin I made my sleeping room, and it is the simple truth +that the first night I slept in the place that was a Temple of +Peace in my thoughts, I had a dream of wordless bliss, and +starting awake for sheer joy I saw her face in the night, human +and dear, looking down upon me with that poignant sweetness +which would seem to be the utmost revelation of love and pity. +And as I stretched my hands, another face dawned solemnly from +the shadow beside her with grave brows bent on mine - one I had +known and seen in the ruins at Bijbehara. Outside and very near I +could hear the silver weaving of the Flute that in India is the +symbol of the call of the Divine. A dream - yes, but it taught me +to live. At first, in my days of grief and loss, I did but dream +- the days were hard to endure. I will not dwell on that illusion +of sorrow, now long dead. I lived only for the night. + + "When sleep comes to close each difficult day, + When night gives pause to the long watch I keep, + And all my bonds I needs must loose apart, + Must doff my will as raiment laid away- + With the first dream that comes with the first sleep, + I run - I run! I am gathered to thy heart!" + +To the heart of her pity. Thus for awhile I lived. Slowly I +became conscious of her abiding presence about me, day or night +It grew clearer, closer. + +Like the austere Hippolytus to his unseen Goddess, I could say; + + "Who am more to thee than other mortals are, + Whose is the holy lot, + As friend with friend to walk and talk with thee, + Hearing thy sweet mouth's music in mine ear, + But thee beholding not." + +That was much, but later, the sunshine was no bar, the bond +strengthened and there have been days in the heights of the +hills, in the depths of the woods, when I saw her as in life, +passing at a distance, but real and lovely. Life? She had never +lived as she did now - a spirit, freed and rejoicing. For me the +door she had opened would never shut. The Presences were about +me, and I entered upon my heritage of joy, knowing that in +Kashmir, the holy land of Beauty, they walk very near, and lift +up the folds of the Dark that the initiate may see the light +behind. + +So I began my solitary life of gladness. I wrote, aided by the +little book she had left me, full of strangest stories, stranger +by far than my own brain could conceive. Some to be revealed - +some to be hidden. And thus the world will one day receive the +story of the Dancer of Peshawar in her upward lives, that it may +know, if it will, that death is nothing - for Life and Love are +all. + + + +THE INCOMPARABLE LADY + +A STORY OF CHINA WITH A MORAL + +It is recorded that when the Pearl Empress (his mother) asked of +the philosophic Yellow Emperor which he considered the most +beautiful of the Imperial concubines, he replied instantly: "The +Lady A-Kuei": and when the Royal Parent in profound astonishment +demanded bow this could be, having regard to the exquisite +beauties in question, the Emperor replied; + +"I have never seen her. It was dark when I entered the Dragon +Chamber and dusk of dawn when I rose and left her." + +Then said the Pearl Princess; + +"Possibly the harmony of her voice solaced the Son of Heaven?" + +But he replied; + +"She spoke not." + +And the Pearl Empress rejoined: + +"Her limbs then are doubtless softer than the kingfisher's +plumage?" + +But the Yellow Emperor replied; + +"Doubtless. Yet I have not touched them. I was that night +immersed in speculations on the Yin and the Yang. How then should +I touch a woman?" + +And the Pearl Empress was silent from very great amazement, not +daring to question further but marveling how the thing might be. +And seeing this, the Yellow Emperor recited a poem to the +following effect: + + "It is said that Power rules the world + And who shall gainsay it? + But Loveliness is the head-jewel upon the brow of Power." + +And when the Empress had listened with reverence to the Imperial +Poet, she quitted the August Presence. + +Immediately, having entered her own palace of the Tranquil +Motherly Virtues, she caused the Lady A-Kuei to be summoned to +her presence, who came, habited in a purple robe and with pins of +jade and coral in her hair. And the Pearl Empress considered her +attentively, recalling the perfect features of the White Jade +Concubine, the ambrosial smile of the Princess of Feminine +Propriety, and the willow-leaf eyebrows of the Lady of Chen, and +her astonishment was excessive, because the Lady A-Kuei could not +in beauty approach any one of these ladies. Reflecting further +she then placed her behind the screen, and summoned the court +artist, Lo Cheng, who had been formerly commissioned to paint the +heavenly features of the Emperor's Ladies, mirrored in still +water, though he had naturally not been permitted to view the +beauties themselves. Of him the Empress demanded: + +"Who is the most beautiful - which the most priceless jewel of +the dwellers in the Dragon Palace?" + +And, with humility, Lo Cheng replied: + +"What mortal man shall decide between the white Crane and the +Swan, or between the paeony flower and the lotus?" And having +thus said he remained silent, and in him was no help. Finally and +after exhortation the Pearl Empress condescended to threaten him +with the loss of a head so useless to himself and to her majesty. +Then, in great fear and haste he replied: + +"Of all the flowers that adorn the garden of the Sun of Heaven, +the Lady A-Kuei is the fittest to be gathered by the Imperial +Hand, and this is my deliberate opinion." + +Now, hearing this statement, the Pearl Empress was submerged in +bewilderment, knowing that the Lady A-Kuei had modestly retired +when the artist had depicted the reflection of the assembled +loveliness of the Inner Chambers, as not counting herself worthy +of portraiture, and her features were therefore unknown to him. +Nor could the Empress further question the artist, for when she +had done so, he replied only: + +"This is the secret of the Son of Heaven," and, having gained +permission, he swiftly departed. + +Nor could the Lady A-Kuei herself aid her Imperial Majesty, for +on being questioned she was overwhelmed with modesty and +confusion, and with stammering lips could only repeat: + +"This is the secret of his Divine Majesty," imploring with the +utmost humility, forgiveness from the Imperial Mother. + +The Pearl Empress was unable to eat her supper. In vain were +spread before her the delicacies of the Empire. She could but +trifle with a shark's fin and a "Silver Ear" fungus and a dish of +slugs entrapped upon roses, with the dew-like pearls upon them. +Her burning curiosity had wholly deprived her of appetite, nor +could the amusing exertions of the Palace mimes, or a lantern +fete upon the lake restore her to any composure. "This +circumstance will cause my flight on the Dragon (death)," she +said to herself, "unless I succeed in unveiling the mystery. What +therefore should be my next proceeding?" + +And so, deeply reflecting, she caused the Chief of the Eunuchs to +summon the Princess of Feminine Propriety, the White Jade +Concubine and all the other exalted beauties of the Heavenly +Palace. + +In due course of time these ladies arrived, paying suitable +respect and obeisance to the Mother of his Divine Majesty. They +were resplendent in king-fisher ornaments, in jewels of jade, +crystal and coral, in robes of silk and gauze, and still more +resplendent in charms that not the Celestial Empire itself could +equal, setting aside entirely all countries of the foreign +barbarians. And in grace and elegance of manners, in skill in the +arts of poetry and the lute, what could surpass them? + +Like a parterre of flowers they surrounded her Majesty, and +awaited her pleasure with perfect decorum, when, having saluted +them with affability she thus addressed them - "Lovely ones - +ladies distinguished by the particular attention of your +sovereign and mine, I have sent for you to resolve a doubt and a +difficulty. On questioning our sovereign as to whom he regarded +as the loveliest of his garden of beauty he benignantly replied: +"The Lady A-Kuei is incomparable," and though this may well be, +he further graciously added that he had never seen her. Nor, on +pursuing the subject, could I learn the Imperial reason. The +artist Lo Cheng follows in his Master's footsteps, he also never +having seen the favored lady, and he and she reply to me that +this is an Imperial secret. Declare to me therefore if your +perspicacity and the feminine interest which every lady property +takes in the other can unravel this mystery, for my liver is +tormented with anxiety beyond measure." + +As soon as the Pearl Empress had spoken she realized that she had +committed a great indiscretion. A babel of voices, of cries, +questions and contradictions instantly arose. Decorum was +abandoned. The Lady of Chen swooned, nor could she be revived for +an hour, and the Princess of Feminine Propriety and the White +Jade Concubine could be dragged apart only by the united efforts +of six of the Palace matrons, so great was their fury the one +with the other, each accusing each of encouragement to the Lady +A-Kuei's pretensions. So also with the remaining ladies. Shrieks +resounded through the Hall of Virtuous Tranquillity, and when the +Pearl Empress attempted to pour oil on the troubled waters by +speaking soothing and comfortable words, the august Voice was +entirely inaudible in the tumult. + +All sought at length in united indignation for the Lady A-Kuei, +but she had modestly withdrawn to the Pearl Pavilion in the +Imperial Garden and, foreseeing anxieties, had there secured +herself on hearing the opening of the Royal Speech. + +Finally the ladies were led away by their attendants, weeping, +lamenting, raging, according to their several dispositions, and +the Pearl Empress, left with her own maidens, beheld the floor +strewn with jade pins, kingfisher and coral jewels, and even with +fragments of silk and gauze. Nor was she any nearer the solution +of the desired secret. + +That night she tossed upon a bed sleepless though heaped with +down, and her mind raged like a fire up and down all possible +answers to the riddle, but none would serve. Then, at the dawn, +raising herself on one august elbow she called to her venerable +nurse and foster mother, the Lady Ma, wise and resourceful in the +affairs and difficulties of women, and, repeating the +circumstances, demanded her counsel. + +The Lady Ma considering the matter long and deeply, slowly +replied: + +"This is a great riddle and dangerous, for to intermeddle with +the divine secrets is the high road to the Yellow Springs +(death). But the child of my breasts and my exalted Mistress +shall never ask in vain, for a thwarted curiosity is dangerous as +a suppressed fever. I will conceal myself nightly in the Dragon +Bedchamber and this will certainly unveil the truth. And if I +perish I perish." + +It is impossible to describe how the Empress heaped Lady Ma with +costly jewels and silken brocades and taels of silver beyond +measuring - how she placed on her breast the amulet of jade that +had guarded herself from all evil influences, how she called the +ancestral spirits to witness that she would provide for the Lady +Ma's remotest descendants if she lost her life in this sublime +devotion to duty. + +That night Lady Ma concealed herself behind the Imperial couch in +the Dragon Chamber, to await the coming of the Son of Heaven. +Slowly dripped the water-clock as the minutes fled away; sorely +ached the venerable limbs of the Lady Ma as she crouched in the +shadows and saw the rising moon scattering silver through the +elegant traceries of carved ebony and ivory; wildly beat her +heart as delicately tripping footsteps approached the Dragon +Chamber, and the Princess of Feminine Propriety, attended by her +maidens, ascended the Imperial Couch and hastily dismissed them. +Yet no sweet repose awaited this favored lady. The Lady Ma could +hear her smothered sobs, her muttered exclamations - nay could +even feel the couch itself tremble as the Princess uttered the +hated name of the Lady A-Kuei, the poison of jealousy running in +every vein. It was impossible for Lady Ma to decide which was the +most virulent, this, or the poison of curiosity in the heart of +the Pearl Empress. Though she loved not the Princess she was +compelled to pity such suffering. But all thought was banished by +the approach of the Yellow Emperor, prepared for repose and +unattended, in simple but divine grandeur. + +It cannot indeed be supposed that a Celestial Emperor is human, +yet there was mortality in the start which his Augustness gave +when the Princess of Feminine Propriety flinging herself from the +Dragon couch, threw herself at his feet and with tears that +flowed like that river known as "The Sorrow of China," demanded +to know what she had done that another should be preferred before +her; reciting in frantic haste such imperfections of the Lady +A-Kuei's appearance as she could recall (or invent) in the haste +of that agitating moment. + +"That one of her eyes is larger than the other - no human being +can doubt" sobbed the lady -" and surely your Divine Majesty +cannot be aware that her hair reaches but to her waist, and that +there is a brown mole on the nape of her neck? When she sings it +resembles the croak of the crow. It is true that most of the +Palace ladies are chosen for anything but beauty, yet she is the +most ill-favored. And is it this - this bat-faced lady who is +preferred to me! Would I had never been born: Yet even your +Majesty's own lips have told me I am fair!" + +The Yellow Emperor supported the form of the Princess in his +arms. There are moments when even a Son of Heaven is but human. +"Fair as the rainbow," he murmured, and the Princess faintly +smiled; then gathering the resolution of the Philosopher he added +manfully - "But the Lady A-Kuei is incomparable. And the reason +is -" + +The Lady Ma eagerly stretched her head forward with a hand to +either ear. But the Princess of Feminine Propriety with one +shriek had swooned and in the hurry of summoning attendants and +causing her to be conveyed to her own apartments that precious +sentence was never completed. + +Still the Lady Ma groveled behind the Dragon Couch as the Son of +Heaven, left alone, approached the veranda and apostrophizing the +moon, murmured - + +"0 loveliest pale watcher of the destinies of men, illuminate the +beauty of the Lady A-Kuei, and grant that I who have never seen +that beauty may never see it, but remain its constant admirer!" +So saying, he sought his solitary couch and slept, while the Lady +Ma, in a torment of bewilderment, glided from the room. + +The matter remained in suspense for several days. The White Jade +Concubine was the next lady commanded to the Dragon Chamber, and +again the Lady Ma was in her post of observation. Much she heard, +much she saw that was not to the point, but the scene ended as +before by the dismissal of the lady in tears, and the departure +of the Lady Ma in ignorance of the secret. + +The Emperor's peace was ended. + +The singular circumstance was that the Lady A-Kuei was never +summoned by the Yellow Emperor. Eagerly as the Empress watched, +no token of affection for her was ever visible. Nothing could be +detected. It was inexplicable. Finally, devoured by curiosity +that gave her no respite, she resolved on a stratagem that should +dispel the mystery, though it carried with it a risk on which she +trembled to reflect. It was the afternoon of a languid summer +day, and the Yellow Emperor, almost unattended, had come to pay a +visit of filial respect to the Pearl Empress. She received him +with the ceremony due to her sovereign in the porcelain pavilion +of the Eastern Gardens, with the lotos fish ponds before them, +and a faint breeze occasionally tinkling the crystal wind-bells +that decorated the shrubs on the cloud and dragon-wrought slopes +of the marble approach. A bird of brilliant plumage uttered a cry +of reverence from its gold cage as the Son of Heaven entered. As +was his occasional custom, and after suitable inquiries as to his +parent's health, the attendants were all dismissed out of earshot +and the Emperor leaned on his cushions and gazed reflectively +into the sunshine outside. So had the Court Artist represented +him as "The Incarnation of Philosophic Calm." + +"These gardens are fair," said the Empress after a respectful +silence, moving her fan illustrated with the emblem of +Immortality - the Ho Bird. + +"Fair indeed," returned the Emperor. - "It might be supposed that +all sorrow and disturbance would be shut without the Forbidden +Precincts. Yet it is not so. And though the figures of my ladies +moving among the flowers appear at this distance instinct with +joy, yet -" + +He was silent. + +"They know not," said the Empress with solemnity "that death +entered the Forbidden Precincts but last night. A disembodied +spirit has returned to its place and doubtless exists in bliss." +"Indeed?" returned the Yellow Emperor with indifference - "yet if +the spirit is absorbed into the Source whence it came, and the +bones have crumbled into nothingness, where does the Ego exist? +The dead are venerable, but no longer of interest." + +"Not even when they were loved in life?" said the Empress, +caressing the bird in the cage with one jewelled finger, but +attentively observing her son from the corner of her august eye. +"They were; they are not," he remarked sententiously and stifling +a yawn; it was a drowsy afternoon. "But who is it that has +abandoned us? Surely not the Lady Ma - your Majesty's faithful +foster-mother?" + +"A younger, a lovelier spirit has sought the Yellow Springs" +replied the trembling Empress. "I regret to inform your Majesty +that a sudden convulsion last night deprived the Lady A-Kuei of +life. I would not permit the news to reach you lest it should +break your august night's rest." + +There was a silence, then the Emperor turned his eyes serenely +upon his Imperial Mother. "That the statement of my august Parent +is merely - let us say - allegoric - does not detract from its +interest. But had the Lady A-Kuei in truth departed to the Yellow +Springs I should none the less have received the news without +uneasiness. What though the sun set - is not the memory of his +light all surpassing?" + +No longer could the Pearl Empress endure the excess of her +curiosity. Deeply kowtowing, imploring pardon, with raised hands +and tears which no son dare neglect, she besought the Emperor to +enlighten her as to this mystery, recounting his praises of the +lady and his admission that he had never beheld her, and all the +circumstances connected with this remark- able episode. She +omitted only, (from considerations of delicacy and others,) the +vigils of the Lady Ma in the Dragon Chamber. The Emperor, +sighing, looked upon the ground, and for a time was silent. Then +he replied as follows: + +"Willingly would I have kept silence, but what child dare +withstand the plea of a parent? Is it necessary to inform the +Heavenly Empress that beauty seen is beauty made familiar and +that familiarity is the foe of admiration? How is it possible +that I should see the Princess of Feminine Propriety, for +instance, by night and day without becoming aware of her +imperfections as well as her graces? How awake in the night +without hearing the snoring of the White Jade Concubine and +considering the mouth from which it issues as the less lovely. +How partake of the society of any woman without finding her +chattering as the crane, avid of admiration, jealous, destructive +of philosophy, fatal to composure, fevered with curiosity; a +creature, in short, a little above the gibbon, but infinitely +below the notice of the sage, save as a temporary measure of +amusement in itself unworthy the philosopher. The faces of all +my ladies are known to me. All are fair and all alike. But one +night, as I lay in the Dragon Couch, lost in speculation, +absorbed in contemplation of the Yin and the Yang, the night +passed for the solitary dreamer as a dream. In the darkness of +the dawn I rose still dreaming, and departed to the Pearl +Pavilion in the garden, and there remained an hour viewing the +sunrise and experiencing ineffable opinions on the destiny of +man. Returning then to a couch which I believed to have been that +of the solitary philosopher I observed a depression where another +form had lain, and in it a jade hairpin such as is worn by my +junior beauties. Petrified with amazement at the display of such +reserve, such continence, such august self-restraint, I perceived +that, lost in my thoughts, I had had an unimagined companion and +that this gentle reminder was from her gentle hand. But whom? I +knew not. I then observed Lo Cheng the Court Artist in attendance +and immediately despatched him to make secret enquiry and +ascertain the name and circumstances of that beauty who, unknown, +had shared my vigil. I learnt on his return that it was the Lady +A-Kuei. I had entered the Dragon Chamber in a low moonlight, and +guessed not her presence. She spoke no word. Finding her +Imperial Master thus absorbed, she invited no attention, nor in +any way obtruded her beauties upon my notice. Scarcely did she +draw breath. Yet reflect upon what she might have done! The +night passed and I remained entirely unconscious of her presence, +and out of respect she would not sleep but remained reverently +and modestly awake, assisting, if it may so be expressed, at a +humble distance, in the speculations which held me prisoner. What +a pearl was here! On learning these details by Lo Cheng from her +own roseate lips, and remembering the unexampled temptation she +had resisted (for well she knew that had she touched the Emperor +the Philosopher had vanished) I despatched an august rescript to +this favored Lady, conferring on her the degree of Incomparable +Beauty of the First Rank. On condition of secrecy." + +The Pearl Empress, still in deepest bewilderment, besought his +majesty to proceed. He did so, with his usual dignity. + +"Though my mind could not wholly restrain its admiration, yet +secrecy was necessary, for had the facts been known, every lady, +from the Princess of Feminine Propriety to the Junior Beauty of +the Bed Chamber would henceforward have observed only silence and +a frigid decorum in the Dragon Bed Chamber. And though the +Emperor be a philosopher, yet a philosopher is still a man, and +there are moments when decorum -" + +The Emperor paused discreetly; then resumed. + +"The world should not be composed entirely of A-Kueis, yet in my +mind I behold the Incomparable Lady fair beyond expression. Like +the moon she sails glorious in the heavens to be adored only in +vision as the one woman who could respect the absorption of the +Emperor, and of whose beauty as she lay beside him the +philosopher could remain unconscious and therefore untroubled in +body. To see her, to find her earthly, would be an experience for +which the Emperor might have courage, but the philosopher never. +And attached to all this is a moral:" + +The Pearl Empress urgently inquired its nature. + +"Let the wisdom of my august parent discern it," said the Emperor +sententiously. + +"And the future?" she inquired. + +"The - let us call it parable -" said the Emperor politely -"with +which your Majesty was good enough to entertain me, has suggested +a precaution to my mind. I see now a lovely form moving among the +flowers. It is possible that it may be the Incomparable Lady, or +that at any moment I may come upon her and my ideal be shattered. +This must be safeguarded. I might command her retirement to her +native province, but who shall insure me against the weakness of +my own heart demanding her return? No. Let Your Majesty's words +spoken - well - in parable, be fulfilled in truth. I shall give +orders to the Chief Eunuch that the Incomparable Lady tonight +shall drink the Draught of Crushed Pearls, and be thus restored +to the sphere that alone is worthy of her. Thus are all anxieties +soothed, and the honours offered to her virtuous spirit shall be +a glorious repayment of the ideal that will ever illuminate my +soul." + +The Empress was speechless. She had borne the Emperor in her +womb, but the philosopher outsoared her comprehension. She +retired, leaving his Majesty in a reverie, endeavoring herself to +grasp the moral of which he had spoken, for the guidance of +herself and the ladies concerned. But whether it inculcated +reserve or the reverse in the Dragon Chamber, and what the +Imperial ladies should follow as an example she was, to the end +of her life, totally unable to say. Philosophy indeed walks on +the heights. We cannot all expect to follow it. + +That night the Incomparable Lady drank the Draught of Crushed +Pearls. + +The Princess of Feminine Propriety and the White Jade Concubine, +learning these circumstances, redoubled their charms, their +coquetries and their efforts to occupy what may be described as +the inner sanctuary of the Emperor's esteem. Both lived to a +green old age, wealthy and honored, alike firm in the conviction +that if the Incomparable Lady had not shown herself so superior +to temptation the Emperor might have been on the whole better +pleased, whatever the sufferings of the philosopher. Both lived +to be the tyrants of many generations of beauties at the +Celestial Court. Both were assiduous in their devotions before +the spirit tablet of the departed lady, and in recommending her +example of reserve and humility to every damsel whom it might +concern. + +It will probably occur to the reader of this unique but +veracious story that there is more in it than meets the eye, and +more than the one moral alluded to by the Emperor according to +the point of view of the different actors. + +To the discernment of the reader it must accordingly be left. + + + +THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN + +A Story of Burma + +Most wonderful is the Irawadi, the mighty river of Burma. In all +the world elsewhere is no such river, bearing the melted snows +from its mysterious sources in the high places of the mountains. +The dawn rises upon its league. wide flood; the moon walks upon +it with silver feet. It is the pulsing heart of the land, living +still though so many rules and rulers have risen and fallen +beside it, their pomps and glories drifting like flotsam dawn the +river to the eternal ocean that is the end of all - and the +beginning. Dead civilizations strew its banks, dreaming in the +torrid sunshine of glories that were - of blood-stained gold, +jewels wept from woeful crowns, nightmare dreams of murder and +terror; dreaming also of heavenly beauty, for the Lord Buddha +looks down in moonlight peace upon the land that leaped to kiss +His footprints, that has laid its heart in the hand of the +Blessed One, and shares therefore in His bliss and content. The +Land of the Lord Buddha, where the myriad pagodas lift their +golden flames of worship everywhere, and no idlest wind can pass +but it ruffles the bells below the htees until they send forth +their silver ripple of music to swell the hymn of praise! + +There is a little bay on the bank of the flooding river - a +silent, deserted place of sand- dunes and small bills. When a +ship is in sight, some poor folk come and spread out the red +lacquer that helps their scanty subsistence, and the people from +the passing ship land and barter and in a few minutes are gone on +their busy way and silence settles down once more. They neither +know nor care that, near by, a mighty city spread its splendour +for miles along the river bank, that the king known as Lord of +the Golden Palace, The Golden Foot, Lord of the White Elephant, +held his state there with balls of magnificence, obsequious +women, fawning courtiers and all the riot and colour of an +Eastern tyranny. How should they care? Now there are ruins - +ruins, and the cobras slip in and out through the deserted holy +places. They breed their writhing young in the sleeping-chambers +of queens, the tigers mew in the moonlight, and the giant spider, +more terrible than the cobra, strikes with its black poison- claw +and, paralyzing the life of the victim, sucks its brain with +slow, lascivious pleasure. + +Are these foul creatures more dreadful than some of the men, the +women, who dwelt in these palaces - the more evil because of the +human brain that plotted and foresaw? That is known only to the +mysterious Law that in silence watches and decrees. + +But this is a story of the dead days of Pagan, by the Irawadi, +and it will be shown that, as the Lotus of the Lord Buddha grows +up a white splendour from the black mud of the depths, so also +may the soul of a woman. + +In the days of the Lord of the White Elephant, the King Pagan +Men, was a boy named Mindon, son of second Queen and the King. +So, at least, it was said in the Golden Palace, but those who +knew the secrets of such matters whispered that, when the King +had taken her by the hand she came to him no maid, and that the +boy was the son of an Indian trader. Furthermore it was said +that she herself was woman of the Rajputs, knowledgeable in +spells, incantations and elemental spirits such as the Beloos +that terribly haunt waste places, and all Powers that move in the +dark, and that thus she had won the King. Certainly she had been +captured by the King's war-boats off the coast from a +trading-ship bound for Ceylon, and it was her story that, because +of her beauty, she was sent thither to serve as concubine to the +King, Tissa of Ceylon. Being captured, she was brought to the +Lord of the Golden Palace. The tongue she spoke was strange to +all the fighting men, but it was wondrous to see how swiftly she +learnt theirs and spoke it with a sweet ripple such as is in the +throat of a bird. + +She was beautiful exceedingly, with a colour of pale gold upon +her and lengths of silk-spun hair, and eyes like those of a +jungle-deer, and water might run beneath the arch of her foot +without wetting it, and her breasts were like the cloudy pillows +where the sun couches at setting. Now, at Pagan, the name they +called her was Dwaymenau, but her true name, known only to +herself, was Sundari, and she knew not the Law of the Blessed +Buddha but was a heathen accursed. In the strong hollow of her +hand she held the heart of the King, so that on the birth of her +son she had risen from a mere concubine to be the second Queen +and a power to whom all bowed. The First Queen, Maya, languished +in her palace, her pale beauty wasting daily, deserted and +lonely, for she had been the light of the King's eyes until the +coming of the Indian woman, and she loved her lord with a great +love and was a noble woman brought up in honour and all things +becoming a queen. But sigh as she would, the King came never. All +night he lay in the arms of Dwaymenau, all day he sat beside her, +whether at the great water pageants or at the festival when the +dancing-girls swayed and postured before him in her gilded +chambers. Even when be went forth to hunt the tiger, she went +with him as far as a woman may go, and then stood back only +because he would not risk his jewel, her life. So all that was +evil in the man she fostered and all that was good she cherished +not at all, fearing lest he should return to the Queen. At her +will he had consulted the Hlwot Daw, the Council of the +Woon-gyees or Ministers, concerning a divorce of the Queen, but +this they told him could not be since she had kept all the laws +of Manu, being faithful, noble and beautiful and having borne him +a son. + +For, before the Indian woman had come to the King, the Queen had +borne a son, Ananda, and he was pale and slender and the King +despised him because of the wiles of Dwaymenau, saying he was fit +only to sit among the women, having the soul of a slave, and he +laughed bitterly as the pale child crouched in the corner to see +him pass. If his eyes had been clear, he would have known that +here was no slave, but a heart as much greater than his own as +the spirit is stronger than the body. But this he did not know +and he strode past with Dwaymenau's boy on his shoulder, laughing +with cruel glee. + +And this boy, Mindon, was beautiful and strong as his mother, +pale olive of face, with the dark and crafty eyes of the cunning +Indian traders, with black hair and a body straight, strong and +long in the leg for his years - apt at the beginnings of bow, +sword and spear - full of promise, if the promise was only words +and looks. + +And so matters rested in the palace until Ananda had ten years +and Mindon nine. + +It was the warm and sunny winter and the days were pleasant, and +on a certain day the Queen, Maya, went with her ladies to worship +the Blessed One at the Thapinyu Temple, looking down upon the +swiftly flowing river. The temple was exceedingly rich and +magnificent, so gilded with pure gold-leaf that it appeared of +solid gold. And about the upper part were golden bells beneath +the jewelled htee, which wafted very sweetly in the wind and gave +forth a crystal-clear music. The ladies bore in their hands more +gold-leaf, that they might acquire merit by offering this for the +service of the Master of the Law, and indeed this temple was the +offering of the Queen herself, who, because she bore the name of +the Mother of the Lord, excelled in good works and was the Moon +of this lower world in charity and piety. + +Though wan with grief and anxiety, this Queen was beautiful. Her +eyes, like mournful lakes of darkness, were lovely in the pale +ivory of her face. Her lips were nobly cut and calm, and by the +favour of the Guardian Nats, she was shaped with grace and +health, a worthy mother of kings. Also she wore her jewels like a +mighty princess, a magnificence to which all the people shikoed +as she passed, folding their hands and touching the forehead +while they bowed down, kneeling. + +Before the colossal image of the Holy One she made her offering +and, attended by her women, she sat in meditation, drawing +consolation from the Tranquillity above her and the silence of +the shrine. This ended, the Queen rose and did obeisance to the +Lord and, retiring, paced back beneath the White Canopy and +entered the courtyard where the palace stood - a palace of noble +teakwood, brown and golden and carved like lace into strange +fantasies of spires and pinnacles and branches where Nats and +Tree Spirits and Beloos and swaying river maidens mingled and met +amid fruits and leaves and flowers in a wild and joyous +confusion. The faces, the blowing garments, whirled into points +with the swiftness of the dance, were touched with gold, and so +glad was the building that it seemed as if a very light wind +might whirl it to the sky, and even the sad Queen stopped to +rejoice in its beauty as it blossomed in the sunlight. + +And even as she paused, her little son Ananda rushed to meet her, +pale and panting, and flung himself into her arms with dry sobs +like those of an overrun man. She soothed him until he could +speak, and then the grief made way in a rain of tears. + +"Mindon has killed my deer. He bared his knife, slit his throat +and cast him in the ditch and there he lies." + +"There will he not lie long!" shouted Mindon, breaking from the +palace to the group where all were silent now. "For the worms +will eat him and the dogs pick clean his bones, and he will show +his horns at his lords no more. If you loved him, White-liver, +you should have taught him better manners to his betters. + +With a stifled shriek Ananda caught the slender knife from his +girdle and flew at Mindon like a cat of the woods. Such things +were done daily by young and old, and this was a long sorrow come +to a head between the boys. + +Suddenly, lifting the hangings of the palace gateway, before them +stood the mother of Mindon, the Lady Dwaymenau, pale as wool, +having heard the shout of her boy, so that the two Queens faced +each other, each holding the shoulders of her son, and the ladies +watched, mute as fishes, for it was years since these two had +met. + +"What have you done to my son?" breathed Maya the Queen, dry in +the throat and all but speechless with passion. For indeed his +face, for a child, was ghastly. + +"Look at his knife! What would he do to my son?" Dwaymenau was +stiff with hate and spoke as to a slave. + +"He has killed my deer and mocks me because I loved him, He is +the devil in this place. Look at the devils in his eyes. Look +quick before he smiles, my mother." + +And indeed, young as the boy was, an evil thing sat in either eye +and glittered upon them. Dwaymenau passed her hand across his +brow, and he smiled and they were gone. + +"The beast ran at me and would have flung me with his horns," he +said, looking up brightly at his mother. "He had the madness upon +him. I struck once and he was dead. My father would have done the +same. + +"That would he not!" said Queen Maya bitterly. "Your father would +have crept up, fawning on the deer, and offered him the fruits he +loved, stroking him the while. And in trust the beast would have +eaten, and the poison in the fruit would have slain him. For the +people of your father meet neither man nor beast in fair fight. +With a kiss they stab!" + +Horror kept the women staring and silent. No one had dreamed that +the scandal had reached the Queen. Never had she spoken or looked +her knowledge but endured all in patience. Now it sprang out like +a sword among them, and they feared for Maya, whom all loved. + +Mindon did not understand. It was beyond him, but he saw he was +scorned. Dwaymenau, her face rigid as a mask, looked pitilessly +at the shaking Queen, and each word dropped from her mouth, hard +and cold as the falling of diamonds. She refused the insult. + +"If it is thus you speak of our lord and my love, what wonder he +forsakes you? Mother of a craven milk runs in your veins and his +for blood. Take your slinking brat away and weep together! My son +and I go forth to meet the King as he comes from hunting, and to +welcome him kingly!" She caught her boy to her with a magnificent +gesture; he flung his little arm about her, and laughing loudly +they went off together. + +The tension relaxed a little when they were out of sight. The +women knew that, since Dwaymenau had refused to take the Queen's +meaning, she would certainly not carry her complaint to the King. +They guessed at her reason for this forbearance, but, be that as +it might, it was Certain that no other person would dare to tell +him and risk the fate that waits the messenger of evil. + +The eldest lady led away the Queen, now almost tottering in the +reaction of fear and pain. Oh, that she had controlled her +speech! Not for her own sake - for she had lost all and the +beggar can lose no more - but for the boy's sake, the unloved +child that stood between the stranger and her hopes. For him she +had made a terrible enemy. Weeping, the boy followed her. + +"Take comfort, little son," she said, drawing him to her +tenderly. "The deer can suffer no more. For the tigers, he does +not fear them. He runs in green woods now where there is none to +hunt. He is up and away. The Blessed One was once a deer as +gentle as yours." + +But still the child wept, and the Queen broke down utterly. "Oh, +if life be a dream, let us wake, let us wake!" she sobbed. "For +evil things walk in it that cannot live in the light. Or let us +dream deeper and forget. Go, little son, yet stay - for who can +tell what waits us when the King comes. Let us meet him here." + +For she believed that Dwaymenau would certainly carry the tale of +her speech to the King, and, if so, what hope but death together? + +That night, after the feasting, when the girls were dancing the +dance of the fairies and spirits, in gold dresses, winged on the +legs and shoulders, and high, gold-spired and pinnacled caps, the +King missed the little Prince, Ananda, and asked why he was +absent. + +No one answered, the women looking upon each other, until +Dwaymenau, sitting beside him, glimmering with rough pearls and +rubies, spoke smoothly: "Lord, worshipped and beloved, the two +boys quarreled this day, and Ananda's deer attacked our Mindon. +He had a madness upon him and thrust with his horns. But, Mindon, +your true son, flew in upon him and in a great fight he slit the +beast's throat with the knife you gave him. Did he not well?" + +"Well," said the King briefly. "But is there no hurt? Have +searched? For he is mine." + +There was arrogance in the last sentence and her proud soul +rebelled, but smoothly as ever she spoke: "I have searched and +there is not the littlest scratch. But Ananda is weeping because +the deer is dead, and his mother is angry. What should I do?" + +"Nothing. Ananda is worthless and worthless let him be! And for +that pale shadow that was once a woman, let her be forgotten. +And now, drink, my Queen!" + +And Dwaymenau drank but the drink was bitter to her, for a ghost +had risen upon her that day. She had never dreamed that such a +scandal had been spoken, and it stunned her very soul with fear, +that the Queen should know her vileness and the cheat she had put +upon the King. As pure maid he had received her, and she knew, +none better, what the doom would be if his trust were broken and +he knew the child not his. She herself had seen this thing done +to a concubine who had a little offended. She was thrust living +in a sack and this hung between two earthen jars pierced with +small holes, and thus she was set afloat on the terrible river. +And not till the slow filling and sinking of the jars was the +agony over and the cries for mercy stilled. No, the Queen's +speech was safe with her, but was it safe with the Queen? For her +silence, Dwaymenau must take measures. + +Then she put it all aside and laughed and jested with the King +and did indeed for a time forget, for she loved him for his +black-browed beauty and his courage and royalty and the +childlike trust and the man's passion that mingled in him for +her. Daily and nightly such prayers as she made to strange gods +were that she might bear a son, true son of his. + +Next day, in the noonday stillness when all slept, she led her +young son by the hand to her secret chamber, and, holding him +upon her knees in that rich and golden place, she lifted his face +to hers and stared into his eyes. And so unwavering was her gaze, +so mighty the hard, unblinking stare that his own was held +against it, and he stared back as the earth stares breathless at +the moon. Gradually the terror faded out of his eyes; they glazed +as if in a trance; his head fell stupidly against her bosom; his +spirit stood on the borderland of being and waited. + +Seeing this, she took his palm and, molding it like wax, into the +cup of it she dropped clear fluid from a small vessel of pottery +with the fylfot upon its side and the disks of the god Shiva. And +strange it was to see that lore of India in the palace where the +Blessed Law reigned in peace. Then, fixing her eyes with power +upon Mindon, she bade him, a pure child, see for her in its +clearness. + +"Only virgin-pure can see!" she muttered, staring into his eyes. +"See! See!" + +The eyes of Mindon were closing. He half opened them and looked +dully at his palm. His face was pinched and yellow. + +"A woman - a child, on a long couch. Dead! I see!" + +"See her face. Is her head crowned with the Queen's jewels? See!" + +"Jewels. I cannot see her face. It is hidden." + +"Why is it hidden?" + +"A robe across her face. Oh, let me go!" + +"And the child? See!" + +"Let me go. Stop - my head - my head! I cannot see. The child is +hidden. Her arm holds it. A woman stoops above them." + +"A woman? Who? Is it like me? Speak! See!" + +"A woman. It is like you, mother - it is like you. I fear very +greatly. A knife - a knife! Blood! I cannot see - I cannot +speak! I - I sleep." + +His face was ghastly white now, his body cold and collapsed. +Terrified, she caught him to her breast and relaxed the power of +her will upon him. For that moment, she was only the passionate +mother and quaked to think she might have hurt him. An hour +passed and he slept heavily in her arms, and in agony she watched +to see the colour steal back into the olive cheek and white lips. +In the second hour he waked and stretched himself indolently, +yawning like a cat. Her tears dropped like rain upon him as she +clasped him violently to her. + +He writhed himself free, petulant and spoilt. "Let me be. I hate +kisses and women's tricks. I want to go forth and play. I have +had a devil's dream. + +"What did you see in your dream, prince of my heart?" She caught +frantically at the last chance. + +"A deer - a tiger. I have forgotten. Let me go." He ran off and +she sat alone with her doubts and fears. Yet triumph coloured +them too. She saw a dead woman, a dead child, and herself bending +above them. She hid the vessel in her bosom and went out among +her women. + +Weeks passed, and never a word that she dreaded from Maya the +Queen. The women of Dwaymenau, questioning the Queen's women, +heard that she seemed to have heavy sorrow upon her. Her eyes +were like dying lamps and she faded as they. The King never +entered her palace. Drowned in Dwaymenau's wiles and beauty, her +slave, her thrall, he forgot all else but his fighting, his +hunting and his long war-boats, and whether the Queen lived or +died, he cared nothing. Better indeed she should die and her +place be emptied for the beloved, without offence to her powerful +kindred. + +And now he was to sail upon a raid against the Shan Tsaubwa, who +had denied him tribute of gold and jewels and slaves. Glorious +were the boats prepared for war, of brown teak and gilded until +they shone like gold. Seventy men rowed them, sword and lance +beside each. Warriors crowded them, flags and banners fluttered +about them; the shining water reflected the pomp like a mirror +and the air rang with song. Dwaymenau stood beside the water with +her women, bidding the King farewell, and so he saw her, radiant +in the dawn, with her boy beside her, and waved his hand to the +last. + +The ships were gone and the days languished a little at Pagan. +They missed the laughter and royalty of the King, and few men, +and those old and weak, were left in the city. The pulse of life +beat slower. + +And Dwaymenau took rule in the Golden Palace. Queen Maya sat like +one in a dream and questioned nothing, and Dwaymenau ruled with +wisdom but none loved her. To all she was the interloper, the +witch-woman, the out-land upstart. Only the fear of the King +guarded her and her boy, but that was strong. The boys played +together sometimes, Mindon tyrannizing and cruel, Ananda fearing +and complying, broken in spirit. + +Maya the Queen walked daily in the long and empty Golden Hall of +Audience, where none came now that the King was gone, pacing up +and down, gazing wearily at the carved screens and all their +woodland beauty of gods that did not hear, of happy spirits that +had no pity. Like a spirit herself she passed between the red +pillars, appearing and reappearing with steps that made no sound, +consumed with hate of the evil woman that had stolen her joy. +Like a slow fire it burned in her soul, and the face of the +Blessed One was hidden from her, and she had forgotten His peace. +In that atmosphere of hate her life dwindled. Her son's dwindled +also, and there was talk among the women of some potion that +Dwaymenau had been seen to drop into his noontide drink as she +went swiftly by. That might he the gossip of malice, but he +pined. His eyes were large like a young bird's; his hands like +little claws. They thought the departing year would take him with +it. What harm? Very certainly the King would shed no tear. + +It was a sweet and silent afternoon and she wandered in the great +and lonely hall, sickened with the hate in her soul and her fear +for her boy. Suddenly she heard flying footsteps - a boy's, +running in mad haste in the outer hall, and, following them, bare +feet, soft, thudding. + +She stopped dead and every pulse cried - Danger! No time to think +or breathe when Mindon burst into sight, wild with terror and +following close beside him a man - a madman, a short bright dah +in his grasp, his jaws grinding foam, his wild eyes starting - +one passion to murder. So sometimes from the Nats comes pitiless +fury, and men run mad and kill and none knows why. + +Maya the Queen stiffened to meet the danger. Joy swept through +her soul; her weariness was gone. A fierce smile showed her teeth +- a smile of hate, as she stood there and drew her dagger for +defense. For defense - the man would rend the boy and turn on her +and she would not die. She would live to triumph that the mongrel +was dead, and her son, the Prince again and his father's joy - +for his heart would turn to the child most surely. Justice was +rushing on its victim. She would see it and live content, the +long years of agony wiped out in blood, as was fitting. She would +not flee; she would see it and rejoice. And as she stood in +gladness - these broken thoughts rushing through her like flashes +of lightning - Mindon saw her by the pillar and, screaming in +anguish for the first time, fled to her for refuge. + +She raised her knife to meet the staring eyes, the chalk white +face, and drive him back on the murderer. If the man failed, she +would not! And even as she did this a strange thing befell. +Something stronger than hate swept her away like a leaf on the +river; something primeval that lives in the lonely pangs of +childbirth, that hides in the womb and breasts of the mother. It +was stronger than she. It was not the hated Mindoin - she saw +him no more. Suddenly it was the eternal Child, lifting dying, +appealing eyes to the Woman, as he clung to her knees. She did +not think this - she felt it, and it dominated her utterly. The +Woman answered. As if it had been her own flesh and blood, she +swept the panting body behind her and faced the man with uplifted +dagger and knew her victory assured, whether in life or death. On +came the horrible rush, the flaming eyes, and, if it was chance +that set the dagger against his throat, it was cool strength that +drove it home and never wavered until the blood welling from the +throat quenched the flame in the wild eyes, and she stood +triumphing like a war-goddess, with the man at her feet. Then, +strong and flushed, Maya the Queen gathered the half-dead boy in +her arms, and, both drenched with blood, they moved slowly down +the hall and outside met the hurrying crowd, with Dwaymenau, whom +the scream had brought to find her son. + +"You have killed him! She has killed him!" Scarcely could the +Rajput woman speak. She was kneeling beside him - he hideous with +blood. "She hated him always. She has murdered him. Seize her!" + +"Woman, what matter your hates and mine?" the Queen said slowly. +"The boy is stark with fear. Carry him in and send for old Meh +Shway Gon. Woman, be silent!" + +When a Queen commands, men and women obey, and a Queen commanded +then. A huddled group lifted the child and carried him away, +Dwaymenau with them, still uttering wild threats, and the Queen +was left alone. + +She could not realize what she had done and left undone. She +could not understand it. She had hated, sickened with loathing, +as it seemed for ages, and now, in a moment it had blown away +like a whirlwind that is gone. Hate was washed out of her soul +and had left it cool and white as the Lotus of the Blessed One. +What power had Dwaymenau to hurt her when that other Power walked +beside her? She seemed to float above her in high air and look +down upon her with compassion. Strength, virtue flowed in her +veins; weakness, fear were fantasies. She could not understand, +but knew that here was perfect enlightenment. About her echoed +the words of the Blessed One: "Never in this world doth hatred +cease by hatred, but only by love. This is an old rule." + +"Whereas I was blind, now I see," said Maya the Queen slowly to +her own heart. She had grasped the hems of the Mighty. + +Words cannot speak the still passion of strength and joy that +possessed her. Her step was light. As she walked, her soul sang +within her, for thus it is with those that have received the Law. +About them is the Peace. + +In the dawn she was told that the Queen, Dwaymenau, would speak +with her, and without a tremor she who had shaken like a leaf at +that name commanded that she should enter. It was Dwaymenau that +trembled as she came into that unknown place. + +With cloudy brows and eyes that would reveal no secret, she stood +before the high seat where the Queen sat pale and majestic. + +"Is it well with the boy?" the Queen asked earnestly. + +"Well," said Dwaymenau, fingering the silver bosses of her +girdle. + +"Then - is there more to say?" The tone was that of the great +lady who courteously ends an audience. "There is more. The men +brought in the body and in its throat your dagger was sticking. +And my son has told me that your body was a shield to him. You +offered your life for his. I did not think to thank you - but I +thank you." She ended abruptly and still her eyes had never met +the Queen's. + +"I accept your thanks. Yet a mother could do no less." + +The tone was one of dismissal but still Dwaymenau lingered. + +"The dagger," she said and drew it from her bosom. On the clear, +pointed blade the blood had curdled and dried. "I never thought +to ask a gift of you, but this dagger is a memorial of my son's +danger. May I keep it?" + +"As you will. Here is the sheath." From her girdle she drew it - +rough silver, encrusted with rubies from the mountains. + +The hand rejected it. + +"Jewels I cannot take, but bare steel is a fitting gift between +us two." + +"As you will." + +The Queen spoke compassionately, and Dwaymenau, still with veiled +eyes, was gone without fare well. The empty sheath lay on the +seat - a symbol of the sharp-edged hate that had passed out of +her life. She touched the sheath to her lips and, smiling, laid +it away. + +And the days went by and Dwaymenau came no more before her, and +her days were fulfilled with peace. And now again the Queen ruled +in the palace wisely and like a Queen, and this Dwaymenau did not +dispute, but what her thoughts were no man could tell. + +Then came the end. + +One night the city awakened to a wild alarm. A terrible fleet of +war-boats came sweeping along the river thick as locusts - the +war fleet of the Lord of Prome. Battle shouts broke tile peace of +the night to horror; axes battered on the outer doors; the roofs +of the outer buildings were all aflame. It was no wonderful +incident, but a common one enough of those turbulent days - +reprisal by a powerful ruler with raids and hates to avenge on +the Lord of the Golden Palace. It was indeed a right to be +gainsaid only by the strong arm, and the strong arm was absent; +as for the men of Pagan, if the guard failed and the women's +courage sank, they would return to blackened walls, empty +chambers and desolation. + +At Pagan the guard was small, indeed, for the King's greed of +plunder had taken almost every able man with him. Still, those +who were left did what they could, and the women, alert and +brave, with but few exceptions, gathered the children and handed +such weapons as they could muster to the men, and themselves, +taking knives and daggers, helped to defend the inner rooms. + +In the farthest, the Queen, having given her commands and +encouraged all with brave words, like a wise, prudent princess, +sat with her son beside her. Her duty was now to him. Loved or +unloved, he was still the heir, the root of the House tree. If +all failed, she must make ransom and terms for him, and, if they +died, it must be together. He, with sparkling eyes, gay in the +danger, stood by her. Thus Dwaymenau found them. + +She entered quietly and without any display of emotion and stood +before the high seat. + +"Great Queen" - she used that title for the first time - "the +leader is Meng Kyinyo of Prome. There is no mercy. The end is +near. Our men fall fast, the women are fleeing. I have come to +say this thing: Save the Prince." + +"And how?" asked the Queen, still seated. "I have no power." + +"I have sent to Maung Tin, abbot of the Golden Monastery, and he +has said this thing. In the Kyoung across the river he can hide +one child among the novices. Cut his hair swiftly and put upon +him this yellow robe. The time is measured in minutes." + +Then the Queen perceived, standing by the pillar, a monk of a +stern, dark presence, the creature of Dwaymenau. For an instant +she pondered. Was the woman selling the child to death? Dwaymenau +spoke no word. Her face was a mask. A minute that seemed an hour +drifted by, and the yelling and shrieks for mercy drew nearer. + +"There will be pursuit," said the Queen. "They will slay him on +the river. Better here with me." + +"There will be no pursuit." Dwaymenau fixed her strange eyes on +the Queen for the first time. + +What moved in those eyes? The Queen could not tell. But +despairing, she rose and went to the silent monk, leading the +Prince by the hand. Swiftly he stripped the child of the silk +pasoh of royalty, swiftly he cut the long black tresses knotted +on the little head, and upon the slender golden body he set the +yellow robe worn by the Lord Himself on earth, and in the small +hand he placed the begging-bowl of the Lord. And now, remote and +holy, in the dress that is of all most sacred, the Prince, +standing by the monk, turned to his mother and looked with grave +eyes upon her, as the child Buddha looked upon his Mother - also +a Queen. But Dwaymenau stood by silent and lent no help as the +Queen folded the Prince in her arms and laid his hand in the hand +of the monk and saw them pass away among the pillars, she +standing still and white. + +She turned to her rival. "If you have meant truly, I thank you." + +"I have meant truly." + +She turned to go, but the Queen caught her by the hand. + +"Why have you done this?" she asked, looking into the strange +eyes of the strange woman. + +Something like tears gathered in them for a moment, but she +brushed them away as she said hurriedly: + +"I was grateful. You saved my son. Is it not enough?" + +"No, not enough!" cried the Queen. "There is more. Tell me, for +death is upon us." + +"His footsteps are near," said the Indian. "I will speak. I love +my lord. In death I will not cheat him. What you have known is +true. My child is no child of his. I will not go down to death +with a lie upon my lips. Come and see." + +Dwaymenau was no more. Sundari, the Indian woman, awful and calm, +led the Queen down the long ball and into her own chamber, where +Mindon, the child, slept a drugged sleep. The Queen felt that she +had never known her; she herself seemed diminished in stature as +she followed the stately figure, with its still, dark face. Into +this room the enemy were breaking, shouldering their way at the +door - a rabble of terrible faces. Their fury was partly checked +when only a sleeping child and two women confronted them, but +their leader, a grim and evil- looking man, strode from the +huddle. + +"Where is the son of the King?" be shouted. "Speak, women! Whose +is this boy?" + +Sundari laid her hand upon her son's shoulder. Not a muscle of +her face flickered. + +"This is his son." + +"His true son - the son of Maya the Queen?" + +"His true son, the son of Maya the Queen." + +"Not the younger - the mongrel?" + +"The younger - the mongrel died last week of a fever." + +Every moment of delay was precious. Her eyes saw only a monk and +a boy fleeing across the wide river. + +"Which is Maya the Queen?" + +"This," said Sundari. "She cannot speak. It is her son - the +Prince." + +Maya had veiled her face with her hands. Her brain swam, but she +understood the noble lie. This woman could love. Their lord would +not be left childless. Thought beat like pulses in her - raced +along her veins. She held her breath and was dumb. + +His doubt was assuaged and the lust of vengeance was on him - a +madness seized the man. But even his own wild men shrank back a +moment, for to slay a sleeping child in cold blood is no man's +work. + +"You swear it is the Prince. But why? Why do you not lie to save +him if you are the King's woman?" + +"Because his mother has trampled me to the earth. I am the Indian +woman - the mother of the younger, who is dead and safe. She +jeered at me - she mocked me. It is time I should see her suffer. +Suffer now as I have suffered, Maya the Queen!" + +This was reasonable - this was like the women he bad known. His +doubt was gone - he laughed aloud. + +"Then feed full of vengeance!" he cried, and drove his knife +through the child's heart. + +For a moment Sundari wavered where she stood, but she held +herself and was rigid as the dead. + +"Tha-du! Well done!" she said with an awful smile. "The tree is +broken, the roots cut. And now for us women - our fate, 0 +master?" + +"Wait here," he answered. "Let not a hair of their heads be +touched. Both are fair. The two for me. For the rest draw lots +when all is done." + +The uproar surged away. The two stood by the dead boy. So swift +had been his death that he lay as though he still slept - the +black lashes pressed upon his cheek. + +With the heredity of their different races upon them, neither +wept. But silently the Queen opened her arms; wide as a woman +that entreats she opened them to the Indian Queen, and +speechlessly the two clung together. For a while neither spoke. + +"My sister!" said Maya the Queen. And again, "0 great of heart!" + +She laid her cheek against Sundari's, and a wave of solemn joy +seemed to break in her soul and flood it with life and light. + +"Had I known sooner!" she said. "For now the night draws on." + +"What is time?" answered the Rajput woman. "We stand before the +Lords of Life and Death. The life you gave was yours, and I am +unworthy to kiss the feet of the Queen. Our lord will return and +his son is saved. The House can be rebuilt. My son and I were +waifs washed up from the sea. Another wave washes us back to +nothingness. Tell him my story and he will loathe me." + +"My lips are shut," said the Queen. "Should I betray my sister's +honour? When he speaks of the noble women of old, your name will +be among them. What matters which of us he loves and remembers? +Your soul and mine have seen the same thing, and we are one. But +I - what have I to do with life? The ship and the bed of the +conqueror await us. Should we await them, my sister?" + +The bright tears glittered in the eyes of Sundari at the tender +name and the love in the face of the Queen. At last she accepted +it. + +"My sister, no," she said, and drew from her bosom the dagger of +Maya, with the man's blood rusted upon it. "Here is the way. I +have kept this dagger in token of my debt. Nightly have I kissed +it, swearing that, when the time came, I would repay my debt to +the great Queen. Shall I go first or follow, my sister?" + +Her voice lingered on the word. It was precious to her. It was +like clear water, laying away the stain of the shameful years. + +"Your arm is strong," answered the Queen. "I go first. Because +the King's son is safe, I bless you. For your love of the King, I +love you. And here, standing on the verge of life, I testify that +the words of the Blessed One are truth - that love is All; that +hatred is Nothing." + +She bared the breast that this woman had made desolate - that, +with the love of this woman, was desolate ho longer, and, +stooping, laid her hand on the brow of Mindon. Once more they +embraced, and then, strong and true, and with the Rajput passion +behind the blow, the stroke fell and Sundari had given her sister +the crowning mercy of deliverance. She laid the body beside her +own son, composing the stately limbs, the quiet eyelids, the +black lengths of hair into majesty. So, she thought, in the great +temple of the Rajput race, the Mother Goddess shed silence and +awe upon her worshippers. The two lay like mother and son - one +slight hand of the Queen she laid across the little body as if to +guard it. + +Her work done, she turned to the entrance and watched the dawn +coming glorious over the river. The men shouted and quarreled in +the distance, but she heeded them no more than the chattering of +apes. Her heart was away over the distance to the King, but with +no passion now: so might a mother have thought of her son. He was +sleeping, forgetful of even her in his dreams. What matter? She +was glad at heart. The Queen was dearer to her than the King - so +strange is life; so healing is death. She remembered without +surprise that she had asked no forgiveness of the Queen for all +the cruel wrongs, for the deadly intent - had made no confession. +Again what matter? What is forgiveness when love is all? + +She turned from the dawn-light to the light in the face of the +Queen. It was well. Led by such a hand, she could present herself +without fear before the Lords of Life and Death - she and the +child. She smiled. Life is good, but death, which is more life, +is better. The son of the King was safe, but her own son safer. + +When the conqueror reentered the chamber, he found the dead Queen +guarding the dead child, and across her feet, as not worthy to +lie beside her, was the body of the Indian woman, most beautiful +in death. + + + +FIRE OF BEAUTY + +(Salutation to Ganesa the Lord of Wisdom, and to Saraswate the +Lady of Sweet Speech!) + +This story was composed by the Brahmin Visravas, that dweller on +the banks of holy Kashi; and though the events it records are +long past, yet it is absolutely and immutably true because, by +the power of his yoga, he summoned up every scene before him, and +beheld the persons moving and speaking as in life. Thus he had +naught to do but to set down what befell. + +What follows, that hath he seen. + + +I + +Wide was the plain, the morning sun shining full upon it, +drinking up the dew as the Divine drinks up the spirit of man. +Far it stretched, resembling the ocean, and riding upon it like a +stately ship was the league-long Rock of Chitor. It is certainly +by the favour of the Gods that this great fortress of the Rajput +Kings thus rises from the plain, leagues in length, noble in +height; and very strange it is to see the flat earth fall away +from it like waters from the bows of a boat, as it soars into the +sky with its burden of palaces and towers. + +Here dwelt the Queen Padmini and her husband Bhimsi, the Rana of +the Rajputs. + +The sight of the holy ascetic Visravas pierced even the secrets +of the Rani's bower, where, in the inmost chamber of marble, +carved until it appeared like lace of the foam of the sea, she +was seated upon cushions of blue Bokhariot silk, like the lotus +whose name she bore floating upon the blue depths of the lake. +She had just risen from the shallow bath of marble at her feet. + +Most beautiful was this Queen, a haughty beauty such as should be +a Rajput lady; for the name "Rajput" signifies Son of a King, and +this lady was assuredly the daughter of Kings and of no lesser +persons. And since that beauty is long since ashes (all things +being transitory), it is permitted to describe the mellowed ivory +of her body, the smooth curves of her hips, and the defiance of +her glimmering bosom, half veiled by the long silken tresses of +sandal- scented hair which a maiden on either side, bowing toward +her, knotted upon her head. But even he who with his eyes has +seen it can scarce tell the beauty of her face - the slender +arched nose, the great eyes like lakes of darkness in the reeds +of her curled lashes, the mouth of roses, the glance, deer-like +but proud, that courted and repelled admiration. This cannot be +told, nor could the hand of man paint it. Scarcely could that +fair wife of the Pandava Prince, Draupadi the Beautiful (who bore +upon her perfect form every auspicious mark) excel this lady. + +(Ashes - ashes! May Maheshwara have mercy upon her rebirths!) + +Throughout India had run the fame of this beauty. In the bazaar +of Kashmir they told of it. It was recorded in the palaces of +Travancore, and all the lands that lay between; and in an evil +hour - may the Gods curse the mother that bore him! - it reached +the ears of Allah-u- Din, the Moslem dog, a very great fighting +man who sat in Middle India, looting and spoiling. + +(Ahi! for the beauty that is as a burning flame!) + +In the gardens beneath the windows of the Queen, the peacocks, +those maharajas of the birds, were spreading the bronze and +emerald of their tails. The sun shone on them as on heaps of +jewels, so that they dazzled the eyes. They stood about the feet +of the ancient Brahmin sage, he who had tutored the Queen in her +childhood and given her wisdom as the crest-jeweled of her +loveliness. He, the Twice-born sat under the shade of a neem +tree, hearing the gurgle of the sacred waters from the Cow's +Mouth, where the great tank shone under the custard-apple boughs; +and, at peace with all the world, he read in the Scripture which +affirms the transience of all things drifting across the thought +of the Supreme like clouds upon the surface of the Ocean. + +(Ahi! that loveliness is also illusion!) + +Her women placed about the Queen - that Lotus of Women - a robe +of silk of which none could say that it was green or blue, the +noble colours so mingled into each other under the latticed gold +work of Kashi. They set the jewels on her head, and wide thin +rings of gold heavy with great pearls in her ears. Upon the swell +of her bosom they clasped the necklace of table emeralds, large, +deep, and full of green lights, which is the token of the Chitor +queens. Upon her slender ankles they placed the chooris of pure +soft gold, set also with grass-green emeralds, and the delicate +souls of her feet they reddened with lac. Nor were her arms +forgotten, but loaded with bangles so free from alloy that they +could be bent between the hands of a child. Then with fine paste +they painted the Symbol between her dark brows, and, rising, she +shone divine as a nymph of heaven who should cause the righteous +to stumble in his austerities and arrest even the glances of +Gods. + +(Ahi! that the Transient should be so fair!) + + +II + +Now it was the hour that the Rana should visit her; for since the +coming of the Lotus Lady, be had forgotten his other women, and +in her was all his heart. He came from the Hall of Audience where +petitions were heard, and justice done to rich and poor; and as +he came, the Queen, hearing his step on the stone, dismissed her +women, and smiling to know her loveliness, bowed before him, even +as the Goddess Uma bows before Him who is her other half. + +Now he was a tall man, with the falcon look of the Hill Rajputs, +and moustaches that curled up to his eyes, lion-waisted and lean +in the flanks like Arjoon himself, a very ruler of men; and as he +came, his hand was on the hilt of the sword that showed beneath +his gold coat of khincob. On the high cushions he sat, and the +Rani a step beneath him; and she said, raising her lotus eyes:- + +"Speak, Aryaputra, (son of a noble father)-what hath befallen?" + +And he, looking upon her beauty with fear, replied,- + +"It is thy beauty, 0 wife, that brings disaster." + +"And how is this?" she asked very earnestly. + +For a moment he paused, regarding her as might a stranger, as one +who considers a beauty in which he hath no part; and, drawn by +this strangeness, she rose and knelt beside him, pillowing her +head upon his heart. + +"Say on," she said in her voice of music. + +He unfurled a scroll that he had crushed in his strong right +hand, and read aloud:- + + "`Thus says Allah-u-Din, Shadow of God, Wonder of the Age, +Viceregent of Kings. We have heard that in the Treasury of Chitor +is a jewel, the like of which is not in the Four Seas - the work +of the hand of the Only God, to whom be praise! This jewel is thy +Queen, the Lady Padmini. Now, since the sons of the Prophet are +righteous, I desire but to look upon this jewel, and ascribing +glory to the Creator, to depart in peace. Granted requests are +the bonds of friendship; therefore lay the head of acquiescence +in the dust of opportunity and name an auspicious day.'" + +He crushed it again and flung it furiously from him on the +marble. + +"The insult is deadly. The soor! son of a debased mother! Well he +knows that to the meanest Rajput his women are sacred, and how +much more the daughters and wives of the Kings! The jackals feast +on the tongue that speaks this shame! But it is a threat, Beloved +- a threat! Give me thy counsel that never failed me yet." + +For the Rajputs take counsel with their women who are wise. + +They were silent, each weighing the force of resistance that +could be made; and this the Rani knew even as he. + +"It cannot be," she said; "the very ashes of the dead would +shudder to hear. Shall the Queens of India be made the sport of +the barbarians?" + +Her husband looked upon her fair face. She could feel his heart +labor beneath her ear. + +"True, wife; but the barbarians are strong. Our men are tigers, +each one, but the red dogs of the Dekkan can pull down the tiger, +for they are many, and he alone." + +Then that great Lady, accepting his words, and conscious of the +danger, murmured this, clinging to her husband:- + +"There was a Princess of our line whose beauty made all other +women seem as waning moons in the sun's splendour. And many great +Kings sought her, and there was contention and war. And, she, +fearing that the Rajputs would be crushed to powder between the +warring Kings, sent unto each this message: `Come on such and +such a day, and thou shalt see my face and hear my choice.' And +they, coming, rejoiced exceedingly, thinking each one that he was +the Chosen. So they came into the great Hall, and there was a +table, and somewhat upon it covered with a gold cloth; and an old +veiled woman lifted the gold, and the head of the Princess lay +there with the lashes like night upon her cheek, and between her +lips was a little scroll, saying this: `I have chosen my Lover +and my Lord, and he is mightiest, for he is Death.' - So the +Kings went silently away. And there was Peace." + +The music of her voice ceased, and the Rana clasped her closer. + +"This I cannot do. Better die together. Let us take counsel with +the ancient Brahman, thy guru [teacher], for he is very wise." + +She clapped her hands, and the maidens returned, and, bowing, +brought the venerable Prabhu Narayan into the Presence, and again +those roses retired. + +Respectful salutation was then offered by the King and the Queen +to that saint, hoary with wisdom - he who had seen her grow into +the loveliness of the sea-born Shri, yet had never seen that +loveliness; for he had never raised his eyes above the chooris +about her ankles. To him the King related his anxieties; and he +sat rapt in musing, and the two waited in dutiful silence until +long minutes had fallen away; and at the last he lifted his head, +weighted with wisdom, and spoke. + +"0 King, Descendant of Rama! this outrage cannot be. Yet, knowing +the strength and desire of this obscene one and the weakness of +our power, it is plain that only with cunning can cunning be met. +Hear, therefore, the history of the Fox and the Drum. + +"A certain Fox searched for food in the jungle, and so doing +beheld a tree on which hung a drum; and when the boughs knocked +upon the parchment, it sounded aloud. Considering, he believed +that so round a form and so great a voice must portend much good +feeding. Neglecting on this account a fowl that fed near by, he +ascended to the drum. The drum being rent was but air and +parchment, and meanwhile the fowl fled away. And from the eye of +folly he shed the tear of disappointment, having bartered the +substance for the shadow. So must we act with this budmash +[scoundrel]. First, receiving his oath that he will depart +without violence, hid him hither to a great feast, and say that +he shall behold the face of the Queen in a mirror. Provide that +some fair woman of the city show her face, and then let him +depart in peace, showing him friendship. He shall not know he +hath not seen the beauty he would befoul." + +After consultation, no better way could be found; but the heart +of the great Lady was heavy with foreboding. + +(A hi! that Beauty should wander a pilgrim in the ways of +sorrow!) + +To Allah-u-Din therefore did the King dispatch this letter by +swift riders on mares of Mewar. + +After salutations - "Now whereas thou hast said thou wouldest +look upon the beauty of the Treasure of Chitor, know it is not +the custom of the Rajputs that any eye should light upon their +treasure. Yet assuredly, when requests arise between friends, +there cannot fail to follow distress of mind and division of soul +if these are ungranted. So, under promises that follow, I bid +thee to a feast at my poor house of Chitor, and thou shalt see +that beauty reflected in a mirror, and so seeing, depart in peace +from the house of a friend." + +This being writ by the Twice-Born, the Brahman, did the Rana sign +with bitter rage in his heart. And the days passed. + + +III + +On a certain day found fortunate by the astrologers - a day of +early winter, when the dawns were pure gold and the nights +radiant with a cool moon - did a mighty troop of Moslems set +their camp on the plain of Chitor. It was as if a city had +blossomed in an hour. Those who looked from the walls muttered +prayers to the Lord of the Trident; for these men seemed like the +swarms of the locust - people, warriors all, fierce fighting-men. +And in the ways of Chitor, and up the steep and winding causeway +from the plains, were warriors also, the chosen of the Rajputs, +thick as blades of corn hedging the path. + +(Ahi! that the blossom of beauty should have swords for thorns!) + +Then, leaving his camp, attended by many Chiefs, - may the +mothers and sires that begot them be accursed! - came +Allah-u-Din, riding toward the Lower Gate, and so upward along +the causeway, between the two rows of men who neither looked nor +spoke, standing like the carvings of war in the Caves of Ajunta. +And the moon was rising through the sunset as he came beneath the +last and seventh gate. Through the towers and palaces he rode +with his following, but no woman, veiled or unveiled, - no, not +even an outcast of the city, - was there to see him come; only +the men, armed and silent. So he turned to Munim Khan that rode +at his bridle, saying,- + +"Let not the eye of watchfulness close this night on the pillow +of forgetfulness!" + +And thus he entered the palace. + +Very great was the feast in Chitor, and the wines that those +accursed should not drink (since the Outcast whom they call their +Prophet forbade them) ran like water, and at the right hand of +Allah-u-Din was set the great crystal Cup inlaid with gold by a +craft that is now perished; and he filled and refilled it - may +his own Prophet curse the swine! + +But because the sons of Kings eat not with the outcasts, the Rana +entered after, clothed in chain armor of blue steel, and having +greeted him, bid him to the sight of that Treasure. And +Allah-u-Din, his eyes swimming with wine, and yet not drunken, +followed, and the two went alone. + +Purdahs [curtains] of great splendour were hung in the great Hall +that is called the Raja's Hall, exceeding rich with gold, and in +front of the opening was a kneeling-cushion, and an a gold stool +before it a polished mirror. + +(Ahi! for gold and beauty, the scourges of the world!) + +And the Rana was pale to the lips. + +Now as the Princes stood by the purdah, a veiled woman, shrouded +in white so that no shape could he seen in her, came forth from +within, and kneeling upon the cushion, she unveiled her face +bending until the mirror, like a pool of water, held it, and that +only. And the King motioned his guest to look, and he looked over +her veiled shoulder and saw. Very great was the bowed beauty that +the mirror held, but Allah-u-Din turned to the Rana. + +"By the Bread and the Salt, by the Guest-Right, by the Honour of +thy House, I ask - is this the Treasure of Chitor?" + +And since the Sun-Descended cannot lie, no, not though they +perish, the Rana answered, flushing darkly, - "This is not the +Treasure. Wilt thou spare?" + +But he would not, and the woman slipped like a shadow behind the +purdah and no word said. + +Then was heard the tinkling of chooris, and the little noise fell +upon the silence like a fear, and, parting the curtains, came a +woman veiled like the other. She did not kneel, but took the +mirror in her hand, and Allah-u-Din drew up behind her back. From +her face she raised the veil of gold Dakka webs, and gazed into +the mirror, holding it high, and that Accursed stumbled back, +blinded with beauty, saying this only,- "I have seen the Treasure +of Chitor." + +So the purdah fell about her. + +The next day, after the Imaum of the Accursed had called them to +prayer, they departed, and Allah-u-Din, paying thanks to the Rana +for honours given and taken, and swearing friendship, besought +him to ride to his camp, to see the marvels of gold and steel +armor brought down from the passes, swearing also safe-conduct. +And because the Rajputs trust the word even of a foe, he went. + +(A hi! that honour should strike hands with traitors!) + + +IV + +The hours went by, heavy-footed like mourners. Padmini the Rani +knelt by the window in her tower that overlooks the plains. +Motionless she knelt there, as the Goddess Uma lost in her +penances, and she saw her Lord ride forth, and the sparkle of +steel where the sun shone on them, and the Standard of the Cold +Disk on its black ground. So the camp of the Moslem swallowed +them up, and they returned no more. Still she knelt and none +dared speak with her; and as the first shade of evening fell +across the hills of Rajasthan, she saw a horseman spurting over +the flat; and he rode like the wind, and, seeing, she implored +the Gods. + +Then entered the Twice-Born, that saint of clear eyes, and he +bore a scroll; and she rose and seated herself, and he stood by +her, as her ladies cowered like frightened doves before the woe +in his face as he read. + +"To the Rose of Beauty, The Pearl among Women, the Chosen of the +Palace. Who, having seen thy loveliness, can look on another? +Who, having tasted the wine of the Houris, but thirsts forever? +Behold, I have thy King as hostage. Come thou and deliver him. I +have sworn that he shall return in thy place." + +And from a smaller scroll, the Brahman read this:- + +"I am fallen in the snare. Act thou as becomes a Rajputni." + +Then that Daughter of the Sun lifted her head, for the thronging +of armed feet was heard in the Council Hall below. From the floor +she caught her veil and veiled herself in haste, and the Brahman +with bowed head followed, while her women mourned aloud. And, +descending, between the folds of the purdah she appeared white +and veiled, and the Brahman beside her, and the eyes of all the +Princes were lowered to her shrouded feet, while the voice they +had not heard fell silvery upon the air, and the echoes of the +high roof repeated it. + +"Chief of the Rajputs, what is your counsel?" And he of Marwar +stepped forward, and not rais- ing his eyes above her feet, +answered,- + +"Queen, what is thine?" + +For the Rajputs have ever heard the voice of their women. + +And she said,- + +"I counsel that I die and my head be sent to him, that my blood +may quench his desire." + +And each talked eagerly with the other, but amid the tumult the +Twice-Born said,- + +"This is not good talk. In his rage he will slay the King. By my +yoga, I have seen it. Seek another way." + +So they sought, but could determine nothing, and they feared to +ride against the dog, for he held the life of the King; and the +tumult was great, but all were for the King's safety. + +Then once more she spoke. + +"Seeing it is determined that the King's life is more than my +honour, I go this night. In your hand I leave my little son, the +Prince Ajeysi. Prepare my litters, seven hundred of the best, for +all my women go with me. Depart now, for I have a thought from +the Gods." + +Then, returning to her bower, she spoke this letter to the saint, +and he wrote it, and it was sent to the camp. + +After salutations - "Wisdom and strength have attained their end. +Have ready for release the Rana of Chitor, for this night I come +with my ladies, the prize of the conqueror." + +When the sun sank, a great procession with torches descended the +steep way of Chitor - seven hundred litters, and in the first was +borne the Queen, and all her women followed. + +All the streets were thronged with women, weeping and beating +their breasts. Very greatly they wept, and no men were seen, for +their livers were black within them for shame as the Treasure of +Chitor departed, nor would they look upon the sight. And across +the plains went that procession; as if the stars had fallen upon +the earth, so glittered the sorrowful lights of the Queen. + +But in the camp was great rejoicing, for the Barbarians knew that +many fair women attended on her. + +Now, before the entrance to the camp they had made a great +shamiana [tent] ready, hung with shawls of Kashmir and the +plunder of Delhi; and there was set a silk divan for the Rani, +and beside it stood the Loser and the Gainer, Allah-u-Din and the +King, awaiting the Treasure. + +Veiled she entered, stepping proudly, and taking no heed of the +Moslem, she stood before her husband, and even through the veil +he could feel the eyes he knew. + +And that Accursed spoke, laughing. + +"I have won-I have won, 0 King! Bid farewell to the Chosen of the +Palace - the Beloved of the Viceregent of Kings!" + +Then she spoke softly, delicately, in her own tongue, that the +outcast should not guess the matter of her speech. + +"Stand by me. Stir not. And when I raise my arm, cry the cry of +the Rajputs. NOW!" + +And she flung her arm above her head, and instantly, like a lion +roaring, he shouted, drawing his sword, and from every litter +sprang an armed man, glittering in steel, and the bearers, humble +of mien, were Rajput knights, every one. + +And Allah-u-Din thrust at the breast of the Queen; but around +them surged the war, and she was hedged with swords like a rose +in the thickets. + +Very full of wine, dull with feasting and lust and surprised, the +Moslems fled across the plains, streaming in a broken rabble, +cursing and shouting like low-caste women; and the Rajputs, +wiping their swords, returned from the pursuit and laughed upon +each other. + +But what shall be said of the joy of the King and of her who had +imagined this thing, in- structed of the Goddess who is the other +half of her Lord? + +So the procession returned, singing, to Chitor with those Two in +the midst; but among the dogs that fled was Allah-u-Din, his face +blackened with shame and wrath, the curses choking in his foul +throat. + +(Aid! that the evil still walk the ways of the world!) + + +V + +So the time went by and the beauty of the Queen grew, and her +King could see none but hers. Like the moon she obscured the +stars, and every day he remembered her wisdom, her valour, and +his soul did homage at her feet, and there was great content in +Chitor. + +It chanced one day that the Queen, looking from her high window +that like an eagle's nest overhung the precipice, saw, on the +plain beneath, a train of men, walking like ants, and each +carried a basket on his back, and behind them was a cloud of dust +like a great army. Already the city was astir because of this +thing, and the rumours came thick and the spies were sent out. + +In the dark they returned, and the Rana entered the bower of +Padmini, his eyes burning like coal with hate and wrath, and he +flung his arm round his wife like a shield. + +"He is returned, and in power. Counsel me again, 0 wife, for +great is thy wisdom!" + +But she answered only this,- + +"Fight, for this time it is to the death." + +Then each day she watched bow the baskets of earth, emptied upon +the plain at first, made nothing, an ant heap whereat fools might +laugh. But each day as the trains of men came, spilling their +baskets, the great earthworks grew and their height mounted. Day +after day the Rajputs rode forth and slew; and as they slew it +seemed that all the teeming millions of the earth came forth to +take the places of the slain. And the Rajputs fell also, and +under the pennons the thundering forces returned daily, thinned +of their best. + +(A hi! that Evil rules the world as God!) + +And still the earth grew up to the heights, and the protection of +the hills was slowly withdrawn from Chitor, for on the heights +they made they set their engines of war. + +Then in a red dawn that great saint Narayan came to the Queen, +where she watched by her window, and spoke. + +"0 great lady, I have dreamed a fearful dream. Nay, rather have I +seen a vision." + +With her face set like a sword, the Queen said,- + +"Say on." + +"In a light red like blood, I waked, and beside me stood the +Mother, - Durga, - awful to see, with a girdle of heads about her +middle; and the drops fell thick and slow from That which she +held in her hand, and in the other was her sickle of Doom. Nor +did she speak, but my soul heard her words." + +"Narrate them." + +"She commanded: `Say this to the Rana: "In Chitor is My altar; in +Chitor is thy throne. If thou wouldest save either, send forth +twelve crowned Kings of Chitor to die.'" + +As he said this, the Rana, fore-spent with fighting, entered and +heard the Divine word. + +Now there were twelve princes of the Rajput blood, and the +youngest was the son of Padmini. What choice had these most +miserable but to appease the dreadful anger of the Goddess? So on +each fourth day a King of Chitor was crowned, and for three days +sat upon the throne, and on the fourth day, set in the front, +went forth and died fighting. So perished eleven Kings of Chitor, +and now there was left but the little Ajeysi, the son of the +Queen. + +And that day was a great Council called. + +Few were there. On the plains many lay dead; holding the gates +many watched; but the blood was red in their hearts and flowed +like Indus in the melting of the snows. And to them spoke the +Rana, his hand clenched on his sword, and the other laid on the +small dark head of the Prince Ajeysi, who stood between his +knees. And as he spoke his voice gathered strength till it rang +through the hall like the voice of Indra when he thunders in the +heavens. + +"Men of the Rajputs, this child shall not die. Are we become +jackals that we fall upon the weak and tear them? When have we +put our women and children in the forefront of the war? I - I +only am King of Chitor. Narayan shall save this child for the +time that will surely come. And for us - what shall we do? I die +for Chitor!" + +And like the hollow waves of a great sea they answered him,- + +"We will die for Chitor." + +There was silence and Marwar spoke. + +"The women?" + +"Do they not know the duty of a Rajputni?" said the King. "My +household has demanded that the caves be prepared." + +And the men clashed stew joy with their swords, and the council +dispersed. + +Then that very great saint, the Twice-Born, put off the sacred +thread that is the very soul of the Brahman. In his turban he +wound it secretly, and he stained his noble Aryan body until it +resembled the Pariahs, foul for the pure to see, loathsome for +the pure to touch, and he put on him the rags of the lowest of +the earth, and taking the Prince, he removed from the body of the +child every trace of royal and Rajput birth, and he appeared like +a child of the Bhils - the vile forest wanderers that shame not +to defile their lips with carrion. And in this guise they stood +before the Queen; and when she looked on the saint, the tears +fell from her eyes like rain, not for grief for her son, nor for +death, but that for their sake the pure should be made impure and +the glory of the Brahman-hood be defiled. And she fell at the old +man's feet and laid her head on the ground before him. + +"Rise, daughter!" he said, "and take comfort! Are not the eyes of +the Gods clear that they should distinguish? - and this day we +stand before the God of Gods. Have not the Great Ones said, `That +which causes life causes also decay and death'? Therefore we who +go and you who stay are alike a part of the Divine. Embrace now +your child and bless him, for we depart. And it is on account of +the sacrifice of the Twelve that he is saved alive." + +So, controlling her tears, she rose, and clasping the child to +her bosom, she bade him be of good cheer since he went with the +Gods. And that great saint took his hand from hers, and for the +first time in the life of the Queen he raised his aged eyes to +her face, and she gazed at him; but what she read, even the +ascetic Visravas, who saw all by the power of his yoga, could not +tell, for it was beyond speech. Very certainly the peace +thereafter possessed her. + +So those two went out by the secret ways of the rocks, and +wandering far, were saved by the favour of Durga. + + +VI + +And the nights went by and the days, and the time came that no +longer could they hold Chitor, and all hope was dead. + +On a certain day the Rana and the Rani stood for the last time in +her bower, and looked down into the city; and in the streets were +gathered in a very wonderful procession the women of Chitor; and +not one was veiled. Flowers that had bloomed in the inner +chambers, great ladies jewelled for a festival, young brides, +aged mothers, and girl children clinging to the robes of their +mothers who held their babes, crowded the ways. Even the +low-caste women walked with measured steps and proudly, decked in +what they had of best, their eyes lengthened with soorma, and +flowers in the darkness of their hair. + +The Queen was clothed in a gold robe of rejoicing, her bodice +latticed with diamonds and great gems, and upon her bosom the +necklace of table emeralds, alight with green fire, which is the +jewel of the Queens of Chitor. So she stood radiant as a vision +of Shri, and it appeared that rays encircled her person. + +And the Rana, unarmed save for his sword, had the saffron dress +of a bridegroom and the jeweled cap of the Rajput Kings, and +below in the hall were the Princes and Chiefs, clad even as he. + +Then, raising her lotus eyes to her lord, the Princess said,- + +"Beloved, the time is come, and we have chosen rightly, for this +is the way of honour, and it is but another link forged in the +chain of existence; for until existence itself is ended and +rebirth destroyed, still shall we meet in lives to come and still +be husband and wife. What room then for despair?" + +And he answered,- + +"This is true. Go first, wife, and I follow. Let not the door +swing to behind thee. But oh, to see thy beauty once more that is +the very speech of Gods with men! Wilt thou surely come again to +me and again be fair?" + +And for all answer she smiled upon him, and at his feet performed +the obeisance of the Rajput wife when she departs upon a journey; +and they went out together, the Queen unveiled. + +As she passed through the Princes, they lowered their eyes so +that none saw her; but when she stood on the steps of the palace, +the women all turned eagerly toward her like stars about the +moon, and lifting their arms, they began to sing the dirge of the +Rajput women. + +So they marched, and in great companies they marched, company +behind company, young and old, past the Queen, saluting her and +drawing courage from the loveliness and kindness of her unveiled +face. + +In the rocks beneath the palaces of Chitor are very great caves - +league long and terrible, with ways of darkness no eyes have +seen; and it is believed that in times past spirits have haunted +them with strange wailings. In these was prepared great store of +wood and oils and fragrant matters for burning. So to these caves +they marched and, company by company, disappeared into the +darkness; and the voice of their singing grew faint and hollow, +and died away, as the men stood watching their women go. + +Now, when this was done and the last had gone, the Rani descended +the steps, and the Rana, taking a torch dipped in fragrant oils, +followed her, and the Princes walked after, clad like bridegrooms +but with no faces of bridal joy. At the entrance of the caves, +having lit the torch, he gave it into her hand, and she, +receiving it and smiling, turned once upon the threshold, and for +the first time those Princes beheld the face of the Queen, but +they hid their eyes with their hands when they had seen. So she +departed within, and the Rana shut to the door and barred and +bolted it, and the men with him flung down great rocks before it +so that none should know the way, nor indeed is it known to this +day; and with their hands on their swords they waited there, not +speaking, until a great smoke rose between the crevices of the +rocks, but no sound at all. + +(Ashes of roses - ashes of roses! . . Ahi! for beauty that is but +touched and remitted!) + +The sun was high when those men with their horses and on foot +marched down the winding causeway beneath the seven gates, and so +forth into the plains, and charging unarmed upon the Moslems, +they perished every man. After, it was asked of one who had seen +the great slaughter,- + +"Say how my King bore himself." + +And he who had seen told this:- + +"Reaper of the harvest of battle, on the bed of honour he has +spread a carpet of the slain! He sleeps ringed about by his +enemies. How can the world tell of his deeds? The tongue is +silent." + +When that Accursed, Allah-u-Din, came up the winding height of +the hills, he found only a dead city, and his heart was sick +within him. + +Now this is the Sack of Chitor, and by the Oath of the Sack of +Chitor do the Rajputs swear when they bind their honour. + +But it is only the ascetic Visravas who by the power of his yoga +has heard every word, and with his eyes beheld that Flame of +Beauty, who, for a brief space illuminating the world as a Queen, +returns to birth in many a shape of sorrowful loveliness until +the Blue-throated God shall in his favour destroy her rebirths. + +Salutation to Ganesa the Elephant-Headed One, and to Shri the +Lady of Beauty! + + + +THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL + +In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful- the Smiting! +A day when the soul shall know what it has sent on or kept back. +A day when no soul shall control aught for another. And the +bidding belongs to God. + + +THE KORAN. + +I + +Now the Shah-in-Shah, Shah Jahan, Emperor in India, loved his +wife with a great love. And of all the wives of the Mogul +Emperors surely this Lady Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal - the Chosen +of the Palace - was the most worthy of love. In the tresses of +her silk-soft hair his heart was bound, and for none other had he +so much as a passing thought since his soul had been submerged in +her sweetness. Of her he said, using the words of the poet Faisi, +- + +"How shall I understand the magic of Love the Juggler? For he +made thy beauty enter at that small gate the pupil of my eye, And +now - and now my heart cannot contain it!" + +But who should marvel? For those who have seen this Arjemand +crowned with the crown the Padishah set upon her sweet low brows, +with the lamps of great jewels lighting the dimples of her cheeks +as they swung beside them, have most surely seen perfection. lie +who sat upon the Peacock Throne, where the outspread tail of +massed gems is centred by that great ruby, "The Eye of the +Peacock, the Tribute of the World," valued it not so much as one +Jock of the dark and perfumed tresses that rolled to her feet. +Less to him the twelve throne columns set close with pearls than +the little pearls she showed in her sweet laughter. For if this +lady was all beauty, so too she was all goodness; and from the +Shah-in-Shah to the poorest, all hearts of the world knelt in +adoration, before the Chosen of the Palace. She was, indeed, an +extraor- dinary beauty, in that she had the soul of a child, and +she alone remained unconscious of her power; and so she walked, +crowned and clothed with humility. + +Cold, haughty, and silent was the Shah-in-Shah before she blessed +his arms - flattered, envied, but loved by none. But the gift +this Lady brought with her was love; and this, shining like the +sun upon ice, melted his coldness, and he became indeed the +kingly centre of a kingly court May the Peace be upon her! + +Now it was the dawn of a sorrowful day when the pains of the Lady +Arjemand came strong and terrible, and she travailed in agony. +The hakims (physicians) stroked their beards and reasoned one +with another; the wise women surrounded her, and remedies many +and great were tried; and still her anguish grew, and in the +hall without sat the Shah-in-Shah upon his divan, in anguish of +spirit yet greater. The sweat ran on his brows, the knotted veins +were thick on his temples, and his eyes, sunk in their caves, +showed as those of a maddened man. He crouched on his cushions +and stared at the purdah that divided him from the Lady; and all +day the people came and went about him, and there was silence +from the voice he longed to hear; for she would not moan, lest +the sound should slay the Emperor. Her women besought her, +fearing that her strong silence would break her heart; but still +she lay, her hands clenched in one another, enduring; and the +Emperor endured without. The Day of the Smiting! + +So, as the time of the evening prayer drew nigh, a child was +born, and the Empress, having done with pain, began to sink +slowly into that profound sleep that is the shadow cast by the +Last. May Allah the Upholder have mercy on our weakness! And the +women, white with fear and watching, looked upon her, and +whispered one to another, "It is the end." + +And the aged mother of Abdul Mirza, standing at her head, said, +"She heeds not the cry of the child. She cannot stay." And the +newly wed wife of Saif Khan, standing at her feet, said, "The +voice of the beloved husband is as the Call of the Angel. Let the +Padishah be summoned." + +So, the evening prayer being over (but the Emperor had not +prayed), the wisest of the hakims, Kazim Sharif, went before him +and spoke:- + +"Inhallah! May the will of the Issuer of Decrees in all things be +done! Ascribe unto the Creator glory, bowing before his Throne." + +And he remained silent; but the Padishah, haggard in his jewels, +with his face hidden, answered thickly, "The truth! For Allah has +forgotten his slave." + +And Kazim Sharif, bowing at his feet and veiling his face with +his hands, replied: + +"The voice of the child cannot reach her, and the Lady of Delight +departs. He who would speak with her must speak quickly." + +Then the Emperor rose to his feet unsteadily, like a man drunk +with the forbidden juice; and when Kazim Sharif would have +supported him, be flung aside his hands, and he stumbled, a man +wounded to death, as it were, to the marble chamber where she +lay. + +In that white chamber it was dusk, and they had lit the little +cressets so that a very faint light fell upon her face. A slender +fountain a little cooled the hot, still air with its thin music +and its sprinkled diamonds, and outside, the summer lightnings +were playing wide and blue on the river; but so still was it that +the dragging footsteps of the Emperor raised the hair on the +flesh of those who heard, So the women who should, veiled +themselves, and the others remained like pillars of stone. + +Now, when those steps were heard, a faint colour rose in the +cheek of the Lady Arjemand; but she did not raise the heavy +lashes, or move her hand. And he came up beside her, and the +Shadow of God, who should kneel to none, knelt, and his head fell +forward upon her breast; and in the hush the women glided out +like ghosts, leaving the husband with the wife excepting only +that her foster-nurse stood far off, with eyes averted. + +So the minutes drifted by, falling audibly one by one into +eternity, and at the long last she slowly opened her eyes and, as +from the depths of a dream, beheld the Emperor; and in a voice +faint as the fall of a rose-leaf she said the one word, +"Beloved!" + +And he from between his clenched teeth, answered, "Speak, wife." + +So she, who in all things had loved and served him, - she, Light +of all hearts, dispeller of all gloom, - gathered her dying +breath for consolation, and raised one hand slowly; and it fell +across his, and so remained. + +Now, her beauty had been broken in the anguish like a rose in +storm; but it returned to her, doubtless that the Padishah might +take comfort in its memory; and she looked like a houri of +Paradise who, kneeling beside the Zemzem Well, beholds the Waters +of Peace. Not Fatmeh herself, the daughter of the Prophet of God, +shone more sweetly. She repeated the word, "Beloved"; and after a +pause she whispered on with lips that scarcely stirred, "King of +the Age, this is the end." + +But still he was like a dead man, nor lifted his face. + +"Surely all things pass. And though I go, in your heart I abide, +and nothing can sever us. Take comfort." + +But there was no answer. + +"Nothing but Love's own hand can slay Love. Therefore, remember +me, and I shall live." + +And he answered from the darkness of her bosom, "The whole world +shall remember. But when shall I be united to thee? 0 Allah, how +long wilt thou leave me to waste in this separation?" + +And she: "Beloved, what is time? We sleep and the night is gone. +Now put your arms about me, for I sink into rest. What words are +needed between us? Love is enough." + +So, making not the Profession of Faith, - and what need, since +all her life was worship, - the Lady Arjemand turned into his +arms like a child. And the night deepened. + +Morning, with its arrows of golden light that struck the river to +splendour! Morning, with its pure breath, its sunshine of joy, +and the koels fluting in the Palace gardens! Morning, divine and +new from the hand of the Maker! And in the innermost chamber of +marble a white silence; and the Lady, the Mirror of Goodness, +lying in the Compassion of Allah, and a broken man stretched on +the ground beside her. For all flesh, from the camel-driver to +the Shah-in- Shah, is as one in the Day of the Smiting. + + +II + +For weeks the Emperor lay before the door of death; and had it +opened to him, he had been blessed. So the months went by, and +very slowly the strength returned to him; but his eyes were +withered and the bones stood out in his cheeks. But he resumed +his throne, and sat upon it kingly, black-bearded, eagle-eyed, +terribly apart in his grief and his royalty; and so seated among +his Usbegs, he declared his will. + +"For this Lady (upon whom be peace), departed to the mercy of the +Giver and Taker, shall a tomb-palace be made, the Like of which +is not found in the four corners of the world. Send forth +therefore for craftsmen like the builders of the Temple of +Solomon the Wise; for I will build." + +So, taking counsel, they sent in haste into Agra for Ustad Isa, +the Master-Builder, a man of Shiraz; and he, being presented +before the Padishah, received his instructions in these words:- + +"I will that all the world shall remember the Flower of the +World, that all hearts shall give thanks for her beauty, which +was indeed the perfect Mirror of the Creator. And since it is +abhorrent of Islam that any image be made in the likeness of +anything that has life, make for me a palace-tomb, gracious as +she was gracious, lovely as she was lovely. Not such as the tombs +of the Kings and the Conquerors, but of a divine sweetness. Make +me a garden on the banks of Jumna, and build it there, where, +sitting in my Pavilion of Marble, I may see it rise." + +And Ustad Isa, having heard, said, "Upon my head and eyes!" and +went out from the Presence. + +So, musing upon the words of the Padishah, he went to his house +in Agra, and there pondered the matter long and deeply; and for a +whole day and night he refused all food and secluded himself from +the society of all men; for he said:- + +"This is a weighty thing, for this Lady (upon whom be peace) must +visibly dwell in her tomb- palace on the shore of the river; and +how shall I, who have never seen her, imagine the grace that was +in her, and restore it to the world? Oh, had I but the memory of +her face! Could I but see it as the Shah-in-Shah sees it, +remembering the past! Prophet of God, intercede for me, that I +may look through his eyes, if but for a moment!" + +That night he slept, wearied and weakened with fasting; and +whether it were that the body guarded no longer the gates of the +soul, I cannot say; for, when the body ails, the soul soars free +above its weakness. But a strange marvel happened. + +For, as it seemed to him, he awoke at the mid-noon of the night, +and he was sitting, not in his own house, but upon the roof of +the royal palace, looking down on the gliding Jumna, where the +low moon slept in silver, and the light was alone upon the water; +and there were no boats, but sleep and dream, hovering +hand-in-hand, moved upon the air, and his heart was dilated in +the great silence. + +Yet he knew well that he waked in some supernatural sphere: for +his eyes could see across the river as if the opposite shore lay +at his feet; and he could distinguish every leaf on every tree, +and the flowers moon-blanched and ghost-like. And there, in the +blackest shade of the pippala boughs, he beheld a faint light +like a pearl; and looking with unspeakable anxiety, he saw within +the light, slowly growing, the figure of a lady exceedingly +glorious in majesty and crowned with a rayed crown of mighty +jewels of white and golden splendour. Her gold robe fell to her +feet, and - very strange to tell - her feet touched not the +ground, but hung a span's length above it, so that she floated in +the air. + +But the marvel of marvels was her face - not, indeed, for its +beauty, though that transcended all, but for its singular and +compassionate sweetness, wherewith she looked toward the Palace +beyond the river as if it held the heart of her heart, while +death and its river lay between. + +And Ustad Isa said:- "0 dream, if this sweetness be but a dream, +let me never wake! Let me see forever this exquisite work of +Allah the Maker, before whom all the craftsmen are as children! +For my knowledge is as nothing, and I am ashamed in its +presence." + +And as he spoke, she turned those brimming eyes on him, and he +saw her slowly absorbed into the glory of the moonlight; but as +she faded into dream, he beheld, slowly rising, where her feet +had hung in the blessed air, a palace of whiteness, warm as +ivory, cold as chastity, domes and cupolas, slender minars, +arches of marble fretted into sea-foam, screen within screen of +purest marble, to hide the sleeping beauty of a great Queen - +silence in the heart of it, and in every line a harmony beyond +all music. Grace was about it - the grace of a Queen who prays +and does not command; who, seated in her royalty yet inclines all +hearts to love. Arid he saw that its grace was her grace, and its +soul her soul, and that she gave it for the consolation of the +Emperor. + +And he fell on his face and worshipped the Master-Builder of the +Universe, saying,- "Praise cannot express thy Perfection. Thine +Essence confounds thought. Surely I am but the tool in the hand +of the Builder." + +And when he awoke, he was lying in his own secret chamber, but +beside him was a drawing such as the craftsmen make of the work +they have imagined in their hearts. And it was the Palace of the +Tomb. + +Henceforward, how should he waver? He was as a slave who obeys +his master, and with haste he summoned to Agra his Army of +Beauty. + +Then were assembled all the master craftsmen of India and of the +outer world. From Delhi, from Shiraz, even from Baghdad and +Syria, they came. Muhammad Hanif, the wise mason, came from +Kandahar, Muhammad Sayyid from Mooltan. Amanat Khan, and other +great writers of the holy Koran, who should make the scripts of +the Book upon fine marble. Inlayers from Kanauj, with fingers +like those of the Spirits that bowed before Solomon the King, who +should make beautiful the pure stone with inlay of jewels, as did +their forefathers for the Rajah of Mewar; mighty dealers with +agate, cornelian, and lapis lazuli. Came also, from Bokhara, Ata +Muhammad and Shakri Muhammad, that they might carve the lilies of +the field, very glorious, about that Flower of the World. Men of +India, men of Persia, men of the outer lands, they came at the +bidding of Ustad Isa, that the spirit of his vision might be made +manifest. + +And a great council was held among these servants of beauty. so +they made a model in little of the glory that was to be, and laid +it at the feet of the Shah-in-Shah; and he allowed it, though not +as yet fully discerning their intent. And when it was approved, +Ustad Isa called to him a man of Kashmir; and the very hand of +the Creator was upon this man, for he could make gardens second +only to the Gardens of Paradise, having been born by that Dal +Lake where are those roses of the earth, the Shalimar and the +Nishat Bagh; and to him said Ustad Isa,- + +"Behold, Rain Lal Kashmiri, consider this design! Thus and thus +shall a white palace, exquisite in perfection, arise on the +banks of Jumna. Here, in little, in this model of sandalwood, see +what shall be. Consider these domes, rounded as the Bosom of +Beauty, recalling the mystic fruit of the lotus flower. Consider +these four minars that stand about them like Spirits about the +Throne. And remembering that all this shall stand upon a great +dais of purest marble, and that the river shall be its mirror, +repeating to everlasting its loveliness, make me a garden that +shall be the throne room to this Queen." + +And Ram Lal Kashmiri salaamed and said, "Obedience!" and went +forth and pondered night and day, journeying even over the snows +of the Pir Panjal to Kashmir, that he might bathe his eyes in +beauty where she walks, naked and divine, upon the earth. and he +it was who imagined the black marble and white that made the way +of approach. + +So grew the palace that should murmur, like a seashell, in the +ear of the world the secret of love. + +Veiled had that loveliness been in the shadow of the palace; but +now the sun should rise upon it and turn its ivory to gold, +should set upon it and flush its snow with rose. The moon should +lie upon it like the pearls upon her bosom, the visible grace of +her presence breathe about it, the music of her voice hover in +the birds and trees of the garden. Times there were when Ustad +Isa despaired lest even these mighty servants of beauty should +miss perfection. Yet it grew and grew, rising like the growth of +a flower. + +So on a certain day it stood completed, and beneath the small +tomb in the sanctuary, veiled with screens of wrought marble so +fine that they might lift in the breeze, - the veils of a Queen, +- slept the Lady Arjemand; and above her a narrow coffer of white +marble, enriched in a great script with the Ninety-Nine Wondrous +Names of God. And the Shah-in-Shah, now grey and worn, entered +and, standing by her, cried in a loud voice, - "I ascribe to the +Unity, the only Creator, the perfection of his handiwork made +visible here by the hand of mortal man. For the beauty that was +secret in my Palace is here revealed; and the Crowned Lady shall +sit forever upon the banks of the Jumna River. It was love that +commanded this Tomb." + +And the golden echo carried his voice up into the high dome, and +it died away in whispers of music. + +But Ustad Isa standing far off in the throng (for what are +craftsmen in the presence of the mighty?), said softly in his +beard, "It was Love also that built, and therefore it shall +endure." + +Now it is told that, on a certain night in summer, when the moon +is full, a man who lingers by the straight water, where the +cypresses stand over their own image, may see a strange marvel - +may see the Palace of the Taj dissolve like a pearl, and so rise +in a mist into the moonlight; and in its place, on her dais of +white marble, he shall see the Lady Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal, the +Chosen of the Palace, stand there in the white perfection of +beauty, smiling as one who hath attained unto the Peace. For she +is its soul. + +And kneeling before the dais, he shall see Ustad Isa, who made +this body of her beauty; and his face is hidden in his hands. + + + + +"HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!" + +A JAPANESE STORY + + +(0 Lovely One-O thou Flower! With Thy beautiful face, with Thy +beautiful eyes, pour light upon the world! Adoration to Kwannon.) + +In Japan in the days of the remote Ancestors, near the little +village of Shiobara, the river ran through rocks of a very +strange blue colour, and the bed of the river was also composed +of these rocks, so that the clear water ran blue as turquoise +gems to the sea. + +The great forests murmured beside it, and through their swaying +boughs was breathed the song of Eternity. Those who listen may +hear if their ears are open. To others it is but the idle sighing +of the wind. + +Now because of all this beauty there stood in these forests a +roughly built palace of unbarked wood, and here the great Emperor +would come from City-Royal to seek rest for his doubtful thoughts +and the cares of state, turning aside often to see the moonlight +in Shiobara. He sought also the free air and the sound of falling +water, yet dearer to him than the plucked strings of sho and +biwa. For he said; + +"Where and how shall We find peace even for a moment, and afford +Our heart refreshment even for a single second?" + +And it seemed to him that he found such moments at Shiobara. + +Only one of his great nobles would His Majesty bring with him - +the Dainagon, and him be chose because he was a worthy and +honorable person and very simple of heart. + +There was yet another reason why the Son of Heaven inclined to +the little Shiobara. It had reached the Emperor that a Recluse of +the utmost sanctity dwelt in that forest. His name was Semimaru. +He had made himself a small hut in the deep woods, much as a +decrepit silkworm might spin his last Cocoon and there had the +Peace found him. + +It had also reached His Majesty that, although blind, be was +exceedingly skilled in the art of playing the biwa, both in the +Flowing Fount manner and the Woodpecker manner, and that, +especially on nights when the moon was full, this aged man made +such music as transported the soul. This music His Majesty +desired very greatly to hear. + +Never had Semimaru left his hut save to gather wood or seek food +until the Divine Emperor commanded his attendance that he might +soothe his august heart with music. + +Now on this night of nights the moon was full and the snow heavy +on the pines, and the earth was white also, and when the moon +shone through the boughs it made a cold light like dawn, and the +shadows of the trees were black upon it. + +The attendants of His Majesty long since slept for sheer +weariness, for the night was far spent, but the Emperor and the +Dainagon still sat with their eyes fixed on the venerable +Semimaru. For many hours he had played, drawing strange music +from his biwa. Sometimes it had been like rain blowing over the +plains of Adzuma, sometimes like the winds roaring down the +passes of the Yoshino Mountains, and yet again like the voice of +far cities. For many hours they listened without weariness, and +thought that all the stories of the ancients might flow past them +in the weird music that seemed to have neither beginning nor +end. + +"It is as the river that changes and changes not, and is ever and +ever the same," said the Emperor in his own soul. + +And certainly had a voice announced to His Augustness that +centuries were drifting by as he listened, he could have felt no +surprise. + +Before them, as they sat upon the silken floor cushions, was a +small shrine with a Buddha shelf, and a hanging picture of the +Amida Buddha within it - the expression one of rapt peace. +Figures of Fugen and Fudo were placed before the curtain doors of +the shrine, looking up in adoration to the Blessed One. A small +and aged pine tree was in a pot of grey porcelain from Chosen - +the only ornament in the chamber. + +Suddenly His Majesty became aware that the Dainagon also had +fallen asleep from weariness, and that the recluse was no longer +playing, but was speaking in a still voice like a deeply flowing +stream. The Emperor had observed no change from music to speech, +nor could he recall when the music had ceased, so that it +altogether resembled a dream. + +"When I first came here - "the Venerable one continued-" it was +not my intention to stay long in the forest. As each day dawned, +I said; `In seven days I go.' And again - 'In seven.' Yet have I +not gone. The days glided by and here have I attained to look on +the beginnings of peace. Then wherefore should I go? - for all +life is within the soul. Shall the fish weary of his pool? And I, +who through my blind eyes feel the moon illuming my forest by +night and the sun by day, abide in peace, so that even the wild +beasts press round to hear my music. I have come by a path +overblown by autumn leaves. But I have come." + +Then said the Divine Emperor as if unconsciously; + +"Would that I also might come! But the august duties cannot +easily be laid aside. And I have no wife - no son." + +And Semimaru, playing very softly on the strings of his biwa made +no other answer, and His Majesty, collecting his thoughts, which +had become, as it were, frozen with the cold and the quiet and +the strange music, spoke thus, as if in a waking dream; + +"Why have I not wedded? Because I have desired a bride beyond the +women of earth, and of none such as I desire has the rumor +reached me. Consider that Ancestor who wedded Her Shining +Majesty! Evil and lovely was she, and the passions were loud +about her. And so it is with women. Trouble and vexation of +spirit, or instead a great weariness. But if the Blessed One +would vouchsafe to my prayers a maiden of blossom and dew, with a +heart calm as moonlight, her would I wed. 0, honorable One, whose +wisdom surveys the world, is there in any place near or far - in +heaven or in earth, such a one that I may seek and find?" + +And Semimaru, still making a very low music on his biwa, said +this; + +"Supreme Master, where the Shiobara River breaks away through the +gorges to the sea, dwelt a poor couple - the husband a +wood-cutter. They had no children to aid in their toil, and +daily the woman addressed her prayers for a son to the +Bodhisattwa Kwannon, the Lady of Pity who looketh down for ever +upon the sound of prayer. Very fervently she prayed, with such +offerings as her poverty allowed, and on a certain night she +dreamed this dream. At the shrine of the Senju Kwannon she knelt +as was her custom, and that Great Lady, sitting enthroned upon +the Lotos of Purity, opened Her eyes slowly from Her divine +contemplation and heard the prayer of the wood-cutter's wife. +Then stooping like a blown willow branch, she gathered a bud from +the golden lotos plant that stood upon her altar, and breathing +upon it it became pure white and living, and it exhaled a perfume +like the flowers of Paradise, This flower the Lady of Pity flung +into the bosom of her petitioner, and closing Her eyes returned +into Her divine dream, whilst the woman awoke, weeping for joy. + +But when she sought in her bosom for the Lotos it was gone. Of +all this she boasted loudly to her folk and kin, and the more +so, when in due time she perceived herself to be with child, +for, from that august favour she looked for nothing less than a +son, radiant with the Five Ornaments of riches, health, +longevity, beauty, and success. Yet, when her hour was come, a +girl was born, and blind." + +"Was she welcomed?" asked the dreaming voice of the Emperor. + +"Augustness, but as a household drudge. For her food was cruelty +and her drink tears. And the shrine of the Senju Kwannon was +neglected by her parents because of the disappointment and shame +of the unwanted gift. And they believed that, lost in Her divine +contemplation, the Great Lady would not perceive this neglect. +The Gods however are known by their great memories." + +"Her name?" + +"Majesty, Tsuyu-Morning Dew. And like the morning dew she shines +in stillness. She has repaid good for evil to her evil parents, +serving them with unwearied service." + +"What distinguishes her from others?" + +"Augustness, a very great peace. Doubtless the shadow of the +dream of the Holy Kwannon. She works, she moves, she smiles as +one who has tasted of content." + +"Has she beauty?" + +"Supreme Master, am I not blind? But it is said that she has no +beauty that men should desire her. Her face is flat and round, +and her eyes blind." + +"And yet content?" + +"Philosophers might envy her calm. And her blindness is without +doubt a grace from the excelling Pity, for could she see her own +exceeding ugliness she must weep for shame. But she sees not. Her +sight is inward, and she is well content." + +"Where does she dwell?" + +"Supreme Majesty, far from here - where in the heart of the woods +the river breaks through the rocks." + +"Venerable One, why have you told me this? I asked for a royal +maiden wise and beautiful, calm as the dawn, and you have told me +of a wood-cutter's drudge, blind and ugly." + +And now Semimaru did not answer, but the tones of the biwa grew +louder and clearer, and they rang like a song of triumph, and the +Emperor could hear these words in the voice of the strings. + +"She is beautiful as the night, crowned with moon and stars for +him who has eyes to see. Princess Splendour was dim beside her; +Prince Fireshine, gloom! Her Shining Majesty was but a darkened +glory before this maid. All beauty shines within her hidden +eyes." + +And having uttered this the music became wordless once more, but +it still flowed on more and more softly like a river that flows +into the far distance. + +The Emperor stared at the mats, musing - the light of the lamp +was burning low. His heart said within him; + +"This maiden, cast like a flower from the hand of Kwannon Sama, +will I see." + +And as he said this the music had faded away into a thread-like +smallness, and when after long thought he raised his august head, +he was alone save for the Dainagon, sleeping on the mats behind +him, and the chamber was in darkness. Semimaru had departed in +silence, and His Majesty, looking forth into the broad moonlight, +could see the track of his feet upon the shining snow, and the +music came back very thinly like spring rain in the trees. Once +more he looked at the whiteness of the night, and then, +stretching his august person on the mats, he slept amid dreams of +sweet sound. + +The next day, forbidding any to follow save the Dainagon, His +Majesty went forth upon the frozen snow where the sun shone in a +blinding whiteness. They followed the track of Semimaru's feet +far under the pine trees so heavy with their load of snow that +they were bowed as if with fruit. And the track led on and the +air was so still that the cracking of a bough was like the blow +of a hammer, and the sliding of a load of snow from a branch like +the fall of an avalanche. Nor did they speak as they went. They +listened, nor could they say for what. + +Then, when they had gone a very great way, the track ceased +suddenly, as if cut off, and at this spot, under the pines furred +with snow, His Majesty became aware of a perfume so sweet that it +was as though all the flowers of the earth haunted the place with +their presence, and a music like the biwa of Semimaru was heard +in the tree tops. This sounded far off like the whispering of +rain when it falls in very small leaves, and presently it died +away, and a voice followed after, singing, alone in the woods, so +that the silence appeared to have been created that such a music +might possess the world. So the Emperor stopped instantly, and +the Dainagon behind him and he heard these words. + + "In me the Heavenly Lotos grew, + The fibres ran from head to feet, + And my heart was the august Blossom. + Therefore the sweetness flowed through the veins of my flesh, + And I breathed peace upon all the world, + And about me was my fragrance shed + That the souls of men should desire me." + +Now, as he listened, there came through the wood a maiden, bare - +footed, save for grass sandals, and clad in coarse clothing, and +she came up and passed them, still singing. + +And when she was past, His Majesty put up his hand to his eyes, +like one dreaming, and said; + +"What have you seen?" + +And the Dainagon answered; + +"Augustness, a country wench, flat - faced, ugly and blind, and +with a voice like a crow. Has not your Majesty seen this?" + +The Emperor, still shading his eyes, replied; + +"I saw a maiden so beautiful that her Shining Majesty would be a +black blot beside her. As she went, the Spring and all its +sweetness blew from her garments. Her robe was green with small +gold flowers. Her eyes were closed, but she resembled a cherry +tree, snowy with bloom and dew. Her voice was like the singing +flowers of Paradise." + +The Dainagon looked at him with fear and compassion; + +"Augustness, how should such a lady carry in her arms a bundle of +firewood?" + +"She bore in her hands three lotos flowers, and where each foot +fell I saw a lotos bloom and vanish." + +They retraced their steps through the wood; His Majesty radiant +as Prince Fireshine with the joy that filled his soul; the +Dainagon darkened as Prince Firefade with fear, believing that +the strange music of Semimaru had bewitched His Majesty, or that +the maiden herself might possibly have the power of the fox in +shape-changing and bewildering the senses. + +Very sorrowful and careful was his heart for he loved his Master. + +That night His Majesty dreamed that he stood before the kakemono +of the Amida Buddha, and that as he raised his eyes in adoration +to the Blessed Face, he beheld the images of Fugen and Fudo, rise +up and bow down before that One Who Is. Then, gliding in, before +these Holinesses stood a figure, and it was the wood-cutter's +daughter homely and blinded. She stretched her hands upward as +though invoking the supreme Buddha, and then turning to His +Majesty she smiled upon him, her eyes closed as in bliss +unutterable. And he said aloud. + +"Would that I might see her eyes!" and so saying awoke in a great +stillness of snow and moonlight. + +Having waked, he said within himself + +"This marvel will I wed and she shall be my Empress were she +lower than the Eta, and whether her face be lovely or homely. For +she is certainly a flower dropped from the hand of the Divine." + +So when the sun was high His Majesty, again followed by the +Dainagon, went through the forest swiftly, and like a man that +sees his goal, and when they reached the place where the maiden +went by, His Majesty straitly commanded the Dainagon that he +should draw apart, and leave him to speak with the maiden; yet +that he should watch what befell. + +So the Dainagon watched, and again he saw her come, very poorly +clad, and with bare feet that shrank from the snow in her grass +sandals, bowed beneath a heavy load of wood upon her shoulders, +and her face flat and homely like a girl of the people, and her +eyes blind and shut. + +And as she came she sang this. + + "The Eternal way lies before him, + The way that is made manifest in the Wise. + The Heart that loves reveals itself to man. + For now he draws nigh to the Source. + The night advances fast, + And lo! the moon shines bright." + +And to the Dainagon it seemed a harsh crying nor could he +distinguish any words at all. + +But what His Majesty beheld was this. The evening had come on and +the moon was rising. The snow had gone. It was the full glory of +spring, and the flowers sprang thick as stars upon the grass, and +among them lotos flowers, great as the wheel of a chariot, white +and shining with the luminance of the pearl, and upon each one of +these was seated an incarnate Holiness, looking upward with +joined hands. In the trees were the voices of the mystic Birds +that are the utterance of the Blessed One, proclaiming in harmony +the Five Virtues, The Five Powers, the Seven Steps ascending to +perfect Illumination, the Noble Eightfold Path, and all the Law. +And, bearing, in the heart of the Son of Heaven awoke the Three +Remembrances - the Remembrance of Him who is Blessed, Remembrance +of the Law, and Remembrance of the Communion of the Assembly. + +So, looking upward to the heavens, he beheld the Infinite Buddha, +high and lifted up in a great raying glory. About Him were the +exalted Bodhisattwas, the mighty Disciples, great Arhats all, and +all the countless Angelhood. And these rose high into the +infinite until they could be seen but as a point of fire against +the moon. With this golden multitude beyond all numbering was He. + +Then, as His Majesty had seen in the dream of the night, the +wood-cutter's daughter, moving through the flowers like one blind +that gropes his way, advanced before the Blessed Feet, and +uplifting her hands, did adoration, and her face he could not +see, but his heart went with her, adoring also the infinite +Buddha seated in the calms of boundless Light. + +Then enlightenment entered at his eyes, as a man that wakes from +sleep, and suddenly he beheld the Maiden crowned and robed and +terrible in beauty, and her feet were stayed upon an open lotos, +and his soul knew the Senju Kwannon Herself, myriad-armed for the +helping of mankind. + +And turning, she smiled as in the vision, but his eyes being now +clear her blinded eyes were opened, and that glory who shall tell +as those living founts of Wisdom rayed upon him their ineffable +light? In that ocean was his being drowned, and so, bowed before +the Infinite Buddha, he received the Greater Illumination. + +How great is the Glory of Kwannon! + +When the radiance and the vision were withdrawn and only the moon +looked over the trees, His Majesty rose upon his feet, and +standing on the snow, surrounded with calm, he called to the +Dainagon, and asked this; + +"What have you seen?" + +"Augustness, nothing but the country wench and moon and snow." + +"And heard?" + +"Augustness, nothing but the harsh voice of the wood-cutter's +daughter." + +"And felt?" + +"Augustness, nothing but the bone-piercing cold." So His Majesty +adored that which cannot be uttered, saying; + +"So Wisdom, so Glory encompass us about, and we see them not for +we are blinded with illusion. Yet every stone is a jewel and +every clod is spirit and to the hems of the Infinite Buddha all +cling. Through the compassion of the Supernal Mercy that walks +the earth as the Bodhisattwa Kwannon, am I admitted to wisdom and +given sight and hearing. And what is all the world to that happy +one who has beheld Her eyes!" + +And His Majesty returned through the forest. + +When, the next day, he sent for the venerable Semimaru that holy +recluse had departed and none knew where. But still when the moon +is full a strange music moves in the tree tops of Shiobara. + +Then His sacred Majesty returned to City-Royal, having determined +to retire into the quiet life, and there, abandoning the throne +to a kinsman wise in greatness, he became a dweller in the +deserted hut of Semimaru. + +His life, like a descending moon approaching the hill that should +hide it, was passed in meditation on that Incarnate Love and +Compassion whose glory had augustly been made known to him, and +having cast aside all save the image of the Divine from his soul, +His Majesty became even as that man who desired enlightenment of +the Blessed One. + +For he, desiring instruction, gathered precious flowers, and +journeyed to present them as an offering to the Guatama Buddha. +Standing before Him, he stretched forth both his hands holding +the flowers. + +Then said the Holy One, looking upon his petitioner's right hand; + +"Loose your hold of these." + +And the man dropped the flowers from his right hand. And the Holy +One looking upon his left hand, said; + +"Loose your hold of these." + +And, sorrowing, he dropped the flowers from his left hand. And +again the Master said; + +"Loose your hold of that which is neither in the right nor in the +left" + +And the disciple said very pitifully; + +"Lord, of what should I loose my hold for I have nothing left?" + +And He looked upon him steadfastly. + +Therefore at last understanding he emptied his soul of all +desire, and of fear that is the shadow of desire, and being +enlightened relinquished all burdens. + +So was it also with His Majesty. In peace he dwelt, and becoming +a great Arhat, in peace he departed to that Uttermost Joy where +is the Blessed One made manifest in Pure Light. + +As for the parents of the maiden, they entered after sore +troubles into peace, having been remembered by the Infinite. For +it is certain that the enemies also of the Supreme Buddha go to +salvation by thinking on Him, even though it be against Him. + +And he who tells this truth makes this prayer to the Lady of +Pity; + + "Grant me, I pray, + One dewdrop from Thy willow spray, + And in the double Lotos keep + My hidden heart asleep." + +How great is the Glory of Kwannon! + + + +THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY + +A STORY OF THE CHINESE COURT + +In the city of Chang-an music filled the palaces, and the +festivities of the Emperor were measured by its beat. Night, and +the full moon swimming like a gold-fish in the garden lakes, +gave the signal for the Feather Jacket and Rainbow Skirt dances. +Morning, with the rising sun, summoned the court again to the +feast and wine-cup in the floating gardens. + +The Emperor Chung Tsu favored this city before all others. The +Yen Tower soaring heavenward, the Drum Towers, the Pearl Pagoda, +were the only fit surroundings of his magnificence; and in the +Pavilion of Tranquil Learning were held those discussions which +enlightened the world and spread the fame of the Jade Emperor far +and wide. In all respects he adorned the Dragon Throne - in all +but one; for Nature, bestowing so much, withheld one gift, and +the Imperial heart, as precious as jade, was also as hard, and he +eschewed utterly the company of the Hidden Palace Flowers. + +Yet the Inner Chambers were filled with ladies chosen from all +parts of the Celestial Empire - ladies of the most exquisite and +torturing beauty, moons of loveliness, moving coquettishly on +little feet, with all the grace of willow branches in a light +breeze. They were sprinkled with perfumes, adorned with jewels, +robed in silks woven with gold and embroidered with designs of +flowers and birds. Their faces were painted and their eyebrows +formed into slender and perfect arches whence the soul of man +might well slip to perdition, and a breath of sweet odor followed +each wherever she moved. Every one might have been the Empress of +some lesser kingdom; but though rumours reached the Son of Heaven +from time to time of their charms, - especially when some new +blossom was added to the Imperial bouquet,- he had dismissed them +from his august thoughts, and they languished in a neglect so +complete that the Great Cold Palaces of the Moon were not more +empty than their hearts. They remained under the supervision of +the Princess of Han, August Aunt of the Emperor, knowing that +their Lord considered the company of sleeve-dogs and macaws more +pleasant than their own. Nor had he as yet chosen an Empress, and +it was evident that without some miracle, such as the +intervention of the Municipal God, no heir to the throne could be +hoped for. + +Yet the Emperor one day remembered his imprisoned beauties, and +it crossed the Imperial thoughts that even these inferior +creatures might afford such interest as may be found in the +gambols of trained fleas or other insects of no natural +attainments. + +Accordingly, he commanded that the subject last discussed in his +presence should be transferred to the Inner Chambers, and it was +his Order that the ladies should also discuss it, and their +opinions be engraved on ivory, bound together with red silk and +tassels and thus presented at the Dragon feet. The subject chosen +was the following:- + +Describe the Qualities of the Ideal Man + +Now when this command was laid before the August Aunt, the +guardian of the Inner Chambers, she was much perturbed in mind, +for such a thing was unheard of in all the annals of the Empire. +Recovering herself, she ventured to say that the discussion of +such a question might raise very disquieting thoughts in the +minds of the ladies, who could not be supposed to have any +opinions at all on such a subject. Nor was it desirable that they +should have. To every woman her husband and no other is and must +be the Ideal Man. So it was always in the past; so it must ever +be. There are certain things which it is dangerous to question or +discuss, and how can ladies who have never spoken with any other +man than a parent or a brother judge such matters? + +"How, indeed," asked this lady of exalted merit, "can the bat +form an idea of the sunlight, or the carp of the motion of wings? +If his Celestial Majesty had commanded a discussion on the +Superior Woman and the virtues which should adorn her, some +sentiments not wholly unworthy might have been offered. But this +is a calamity. They come unexpectedly, springing up like +mushrooms, and this one is probably due to the lack of virtue of +the inelegant and unintellectual person who is now speaking." + +This she uttered in the presence of the principal beauties of the +Inner Chambers. They sat or reclined about her in attitudes of +perfect loveliness. Two, embroidering silver pheasants, paused +with their needles suspended above the stretched silk, to hear +the August Aunt. One, threading beads of jewel jade, permitted +them to slip from the string and so distended the rose of her +mouth in surprise that the small pearl-shells were visible +within. The Lady Tortoise, caressing a scarlet and azure macaw, +in her agitation so twitched the feathers that the bird, +shrieking, bit her finger. The Lady Golden Bells blushed deeply +at the thought of what was required of them; and the little Lady +Summer Dress, youngest of all the assembled beauties, was so +alarmed at the prospect that she began to sob aloud, until she +met the eye of the August Aunt and abruptly ceased. + +"It is not, however, to be supposed," said the August Aunt, +opening her snuff-bottle of painted crystal, "that the minds of +our deplorable and unattractive sex are wholly incapable of +forming opinions. But speech is a grave matter for women, +naturally slow-witted and feeble-minded as they are. This +unenlightened person recalls the Odes as saying:- + + `A flaw in a piece of white jade + May be ground away, + But when a woman has spoken foolishly + Nothing can be done-' + +a consideration which should make every lady here and throughout +the world think anxiously before speech." So anxiously did the +assembled beauties think, that all remained mute as fish in a +pool, and the August Aunt continued:- + +"Let Tsu-ssu be summoned. It is my intention to suggest to the +Dragon Emperor that the virtues of women be the subject of our +discourse, and I will myself open and conclude the discussion." + +Tsu-ssu was not long in kotowing before the August Aunt, who +despatched her message with the proper ceremonial due to its +Imperial destination; and meanwhile, in much agitation, the +beauties could but twitter and whisper in each other's ears, and +await the response like condemned prisoners who yet hope for +reprieve. + +Scarce an hour had dripped away on the water-clock when an +Imperial Missive bound with yellow silk arrived, and the August +Aunt, rising, kotowed nine times before she received it in her +jewelled hand with its delicate and lengthy nails ensheathed in +pure gold and set with gems of the first water. She then read it +aloud, the ladies prostrating themselves. + +To the Princess of Han, the August Aunt, the Lady of the Nine +Superior Virtues:- + +"Having deeply reflected on the wisdom submitted, We thus reply. +Women should not be the judges of their own virtues, since these +exist only in relation to men. Let Our Command therefore be +executed, and tablets presented before us seven days hence, with +the name of each lady appended to her tablet." + +It was indeed pitiable to see the anxiety of the ladies! A +sacrifice to Kwan-Yin, the Goddess of Mercy, of a jewel from +each, with intercession for aid, was proposed by the Lustrous +Lady; but the majority shook their heads sadly. The August Aunt, +tossing her head, declared that, as the Son of Heaven had made no +comment on her proposal of opening and closing the discussion, +she should take no part other than safeguarding the interests of +propriety. This much increased the alarm, and, kneeling at her +feet, the swan-like beauties, Deep-Snow and Winter Moon implored +her aid and compassion. But, rising indignantly, the August Aunt +sought her own apartments, and for the first time the inmates of +the Pepper Chamber saw with regret the golden dragons embroidered +on her back. + +It was then that the Round-Faced Beauty ventured a remark. This +maiden, having been born in the far-off province of Ssuch-uan, +was considered a rustic by the distinguished elegance of the +Palace and, therefore, had never spoken unless decorum required. +Still, even her detractors were compelled to admit the charms +that had gained her her name. Her face had the flawless outline +of the pearl, and like the blossom of the plum was the purity of +her complexion, upon which the darkness of her eyebrows +resembled two silk-moths alighted to flutter above the brilliance +of her eyes - eyes which even the August Aunt had commended +after a banquet of unsurpassed variety. Her hair had been +compared to the crow's plumage; her waist was like a roll of +silk, and her discretion in habiting herself was such that even +the Lustrous Lady and the Lady Tortoise drew instruction from the +splendours of her robes. It created, however, a general +astonishment when she spoke. + +"Paragons of beauty, what is this dull and opaque. witted person +that she should speak?" + +"What, indeed!" said the Celestial Sister. "This entirely +undistinguished person cannot even imagine." + +A distressing pause followed, during which many whispered +anxiously. The Lustrous Lady broke it. + +"It is true that the highly ornamental Round-Faced Beauty is but +lately come, yet even the intelligent Ant may assist the Dragon; +and in the presence of alarm, what is decorum? With a tiger +behind one, who can recall the Book of Rites and act with +befitting elegance?" + +"The high-born will at all times remember the Rites!" retorted +the Celestial Sister. "Have we not heard the August Aunt observe: +`Those who understand do not speak. Those who speak do not +understand'?" + +The Round-Faced Beauty collected her courage. + +"Doubtless this is wisdom; yet if the wise do not speak, who +should instruct us? The August Aunt herself would be silent." + +All were confounded by this dilemma, and the little Lady +Summer-Dress, still weeping, entreated that the Round-Faced +Beauty might be heard. The Heavenly Blossoms then prepared to +listen and assumed attitudes of attention, which so disconcerted +the Round-Faced Beauty that she blushed like a spring tulip in +speaking. + +"Beautiful ladies, our Lord, who is unknown to us all, has issued +an august command. It cannot be disputed, for the whisper of +disobedience is heard as thunder in the Imperial Presence. Should +we not aid each other? If any lady has formed a dream in her soul +of the Ideal Man, might not such a picture aid us all? Let us not +be `say-nothing-do-nothing,' but act!" + +They hung their heads and smiled, but none would allow that she +had formed such an image. The little Lady Tortoise, laughing +behind her fan of sandalwood, said roguishly: "The Ideal Man +should be handsome, liberal in giving, and assuredly he should +appreciate the beauty of his wives. But this we cannot say to the +Divine Emperor." + +A sigh rustled through the Pepper Chamber. The Celestial Sister +looked angrily at the speaker. + +"This is the talk of children," she said. "Does no one remember +Kung-fu-tse's [Confucius] description of the Superior Man?" + +Unfortunately none did - not even the Celestial Sister herself. + +"Is it not probable," said the Round-Faced Beauty, "that the +Divine Emperor remembers it him- self and wishes-" + +But the Celestial Sister, yawning audibly, summoned the +attendants to bring rose-leaves in honey, and would hear no more. + +The Round-Faced Beauty therefore wandered forth among the mossy +rocks and drooping willows of the Imperial Garden, deeply +considering the matter. She ascended the bow-curved bridge of +marble which crossed the Pool of Clear Weather, and from the top +idly observed the reflection of her rose-and-gold coat in the +water while, with her taper fingers, she crumbled cake for the +fortunate gold-fish that dwelt in it. And, so doing, she remarked +one fish, four-tailed among the six-tailed, and in no way +distinguished by elegance, which secured by far the largest share +of the crumbs dropped into the pool. Bending lower, she observed +this singular fish and its methods. + +The others crowded about the spot where the crumbs fell, all +herded together. In their eagerness and stupidity they remained +like a cloud of gold in one spot, slowly waving their tails. But +this fish, concealing itself behind a miniature rock, waited, +looking upward, until the crumbs were falling, and then, rushing +forth with the speed of an arrow, scattered the stupid mass of +fish, and bore off the crumbs to its shelter, where it instantly +devoured them. + +"This is notable," said the Round-Faced Beauty. "Observation +enlightens the mind. To be apart - to be distinguished - secures +notice!" And she plunged into thought again, wandering, herself a +flower, among the gorgeous tree peonies. + +On the following day the August Aunt commanded that a writer +among the palace attendants should, with brush and ink, be +summoned to transcribe the wisdom of the ladies. She requested +that each would give three days to thought, relating the +following anecdote. "There was a man who, taking a piece of +ivory, carved it into a mulberry leaf, spending three years on +the task. When finished it could not be told from the original, +and was a gift suitable for the Brother of the Sun and Moon. Do +likewise!" + +"But yet, 0 Augustness!" said the Celestial Sister, "if the Lord +of Heaven took as long with each leaf, there would be few leaves +on the trees, and if-" + +The August Aunt immediately commanded silence and retired. On the +third day she seated herself in her chair of carved ebony, while +the attendant placed himself by her feet and prepared to record +her words. + +"This insignificant person has decided," began her Augustness, +looking round and unscrewing the amber top of her snuff-bottle, +"to take an unintelligent part in these proceedings. An example +should be set. Attendant, write!" + +She then dictated as follows: "The Ideal Man is he who now +decorates the Imperial Throne, or he who in all humility ventures +to resemble the incomparable Emperor. Though he may not hope to +attain, his endeavor is his merit. No further description it +needed." + +With complacence she inhaled the perfumed snuff, as the writer +appended the elegant characters of her Imperial name. + +If it is permissible to say that the faces of the beauties +lengthened visibly, it should now be said. For it had been the +intention of every lady to make an illusion to the Celestial +Emperor and depict him as the Ideal Man. Nor had they expected +that the August Aunt would take any part in the matter. + +"Oh, but it was the intention of this commonplace and +undignified person to say this very thing!" cried the Lustrous +Lady, with tears in the jewels of her eyes. "I thought no other +high-minded and distinguished lady would for a moment think of +it" + +"And it was my intention also!" fluttered the little Lady +Tortoise, wringing her hands! "What now shall this most unlucky +and unendurable person do? For three nights has sleep forsaken my +unattractive eyelids, and, tossing and turning on a couch +deprived of all comfort, I could only repeat, `The Ideal Man is +the Divine Dragon Emperor!'" + +"May one of entirely contemptible attainments make a suggestion +in this assemblage of scintillating wit and beauty?" inquired the +Celestial Sister. "My superficial opinion is that it would be +well to prepare a single paper to which all names should be +appended, stating that His Majesty in his Dragon Divinity +comprises all ideals in his sacred Person." + +"Let those words be recorded," said the August Aunt. "What else +should any lady of discretion and propriety say? In this Palace +of Virtuous Peace, where all is consecrated to the Son of Heaven, +though he deigns not to enter it, what other thought dare be +breathed? Has any lady ventured to step outside such a limit? If +so, let her declare herself!" + +All shook their heads, and the August Aunt proceeded: "Let the +writer record this as the opinion of every lady of the Imperial +Household, and let each name be separately appended." + +Had any desired to object, none dared to confront the August +Aunt; but apparently no beauty so desired, for after three +nights' sleepless meditation, no other thought than this had +occurred to any. + +Accordingly, the writer moved from lady to lady and, under the +supervision of the August Aunt, transcribed the following: "The +Ideal Man is the earthly likeness of the Divine Emperor. How +should it be otherwise?" And under this sentence wrote the name +of each lovely one in succession. The papers were then placed in +the hanging sleeves of the August Aunt for safety. + +By the decree of Fate, the father of the Round-Faced Beauty had, +before he became an ancestral spirit, been a scholar of +distinction, having graduated at the age of seventy-two with a +composition commended by the Grand Examiner. Having no gold and +silver to give his daughter, he had formed her mind, and had +presented her with the sole jewel of his family-a pearl as large +as a bean. Such was her sole dower, but the accomplished Aunt may +excel the indolent Prince. + +Yet, before the thought in her mind, she hesitated and trembled, +recalling the lesson of the gold-fish; and it was with anxiety +that paled her roseate lips that, on a certain day, she had +sought the Willow Bridge Pavilion. There had awaited her a +palace attendant skilled with the brush, and there in secrecy and +dire affright, hearing the footsteps of the August Aunt in every +rustle of leafage, and her voice in the call of every crow, did +the Round-Faced Beauty dictate the following composition:- + +"Though the sky rain pearls, it cannot equal the beneficence of +the Son of Heaven. Though the sky rain jade it cannot equal his +magnificence. He has commanded his slave to describe the +qualities of the Ideal Man. How should I, a mere woman, do this? +I, who have not seen the Divine Emperor, how should I know what +is virtue? I, who have not seen the glory of his countenance, how +should I know what is beauty? Report speaks of his excellencies, +but I who live in the dark know not. But to the Ideal Woman, the +very vices of her husband are virtues. Should he exalt another, +this is a mark of his superior taste. Should he dismiss his +slave, this is justice. To the Ideal Woman there is but one Ideal +Man - and that is her lord. From the day she crosses his +threshold, to the day when they clothe her in the garments of +Immortality, this is her sole opinion. Yet would that she might +receive instruction of what only are beauty and virtue in his +adorable presence." + +This being written, she presented her one pearl to the attendant +and fled, not looking behind her, as quickly as her delicate feet +would permit. + +On the seventh day the compositions, engraved on ivory and bound +with red silk and tassels, were presented to the Emperor, and for +seven days more he forgot their existence. On the eighth the High +Chamberlain ventured to recall them to the Imperial memory, and +the Emperor glancing slightly at one after another, threw them +aside, yawning as he did so. Finally, one arrested his eyes, and +reading it more than once he laid it before him and meditated. An +hour passed in this way while the forgotten Lord Chamberlain +continued to kneel. The Son of Heaven, then raising his head, +pronounced these words: "In the society of the Ideal Woman, she +to whom jealousy is unknown, tranquillity might possibly be +obtained. Let prayer be made before the Ancestors with the +customary offerings, for this is a matter deserving attention." + +A few days passed, and an Imperial attendant, escorted by two +mandarins of the peacock- feather and crystal-button rank, +desired an audience of the August Aunt, and, speaking before the +curtain, informed her that his Imperial Majesty would pay a visit +that evening to the Hall of Tranquil Longevity. Such was her +agitation at this honour that she immediately swooned; but, +reviving, summoned all the attendants and gave orders for a +banquet and musicians. + +Lanterns painted with pheasants and exquisite landscapes were +hung on all the pavilions. Tap- estries of rose, decorated with +the Five-Clawed Dragons, adorned the chambers; and upon the High +Seat was placed a robe of yellow satin embroidered with pearls. +All was hurry and excitement. The Blossoms of the Palace were so +exquisitely decked that one grain more of powder would have made +them too lily-like, and one touch more of rouge, too rosecheeked. +It was indeed perfection, and, like lotuses upon a lake, or Asian +birds, gorgeous of plumage, they stood ranged in the outer +chamber while the Celestial Emperor took his seat. + +The Round-Faced Beauty wore no jewels, having bartered her pearl +for her opportunity; but her long coat of jade-green, embroidered +with golden willows, and her trousers of palest rose left nothing +to be desired. In her hair two golden peonies were fastened with +pins of kingfisher work. The Son of Heaven was seated upon the +throne as the ladies approached, marshaled by the August Aunt. He +was attired in the Yellow Robe with the Flying Dragons, and upon +the Imperial Head was the Cap, ornamented with one hundred and +forty-four priceless gems. From it hung the twelve pendants of +strings of pearls, partly concealing the august eyes of the Jade +Emperor. No greater splendour can strike awe into the soul of +man. + +At his command the August Aunt took her seat upon a lesser chair +at the Celestial Feet. Her mien was majestic, and struck awe into +the assembled beauties, whose names she spoke aloud as each +approached and prostrated herself. She then pronounced these +words: + +"Beautiful ones, the Emperor, having considered the opinions +submitted by you on the subject of the Superior Man, is pleased +to express his august commendation. Dismiss, therefore, anxiety +from your minds, and prepare to assist at the humble concert of +music we have prepared for his Divine pleasure." + +Slightly raising himself in his chair, the Son of Heaven looked +down upon that Garden of Beauty, holding in his hand an ivory +tablet bound with red silk. + +"Lovely ladies," he began, in a voice that assuaged fear, "who +among you was it that laid before our feet a composition +beginning thus - 'Though the sky rain pearls'?" + +The August Aunt immediately rose. + +"Imperial Majesty, none! These eyes supervised every composition. +No impropriety was permitted." + +The Son of Heaven resumed: "Let that lady stand forth." + +The words were few, but sufficient. Trembling in every limb, the +Round-Faced Beauty separated herself from her companions and +prostrated herself, amid the breathless amazement of the Blossoms +of the Palace. He looked down upon her as she knelt, pale as a +lady carved in ivory, but lovely as the lotus of Chang-Su. He +turned to the August Aunt. "Princess of Han, my Imperial Aunt, I +would speak with this lady alone." + +Decorum itself and the custom of Palaces could not conceal the +indignation of the August Aunt as she rose and retired, driving +the ladies before her as a shepherd drives his sheep. + +The Hall of Tranquil Longevity being now empty, the Jade Emperor +extended his hand and beckoned the Round-Faced Beauty to +approach. This she did, hanging her head like a flower surcharged +with dew and swaying gracefully as a wind-bell, and knelt on the +lowest step of the Seat of State. + +"Loveliest One," said the Emperor, "I have read your composition. +I would know the truth. Did any aid you as you spoke it? Was it +the thought of your own heart?" + +"None aided, Divine," said she, almost fainting with fear. "It +was indeed the thought of this illiterate slave, consumed with an +unwarranted but uncontrollable passion." + +"And have you in truth desired to see your Lord?" + +"As a prisoner in a dungeon desires the light, so was it with +this low person." + +"And having seen?" + +"Augustness, the dull eyes of this slave are blinded with +beauty." + +She laid her head before his feet. + +"Yet you have depicted, not the Ideal Man, but the Ideal Woman. +This was not the Celestial command. How was this?" + +"Because, 0 versatile and auspicious Emperor, the blind cannot +behold the sunlight, and it is only the Ideal Woman who is worthy +to comprehend and worship the Ideal Man. For this alone is she +created." + +A smile began to illuminate the Imperial Countenance. "And how, 0 +Round-Faced Beauty, did you evade the vigilance of the August +Aunt?" + +She hung her head lower, speaking almost in a whisper. "With her +one pearl did this person buy the secrecy of the writer; and when +the August Aunt slept, did I conceal the paper in her sleeve with +the rest, and her own Imperial hand gave it to the engraver of +ivory." + +She veiled her face with two jade-white hands that trembled +excessively. On hearing this statement the Celestial Emperor +broke at once into a very great laughter, and he laughed loud and +long as a tiller of wheat. The Round-Faced Beauty heard it +demurely until, catching the Imperial eye, decorum was forgotten +and she too laughed uncontrollably. So they continued, and +finally the Emperor leaned back, drying the tears in his eyes +with his august sleeve, and the lady, resuming her gravity, hid +her face in her hands, yet regarded him through her fingers. + +When the August Aunt returned at the end of an hour with the +ladies, surrounded by the attendants with their instruments of +music, the Round-Faced Beauty was seated in the chair that she +herself had occupied, and on the whiteness of her brow was hung +the chain of pearls, which had formed the frontal of the Cap of +the Emperor. + +It is recorded that, advancing from honour to honour, the +Round-Faced Beauty was eventually chosen Empress and became the +mother of the Imperial Prince. The celestial purity of her mind +and the absence of all flaws of jealousy and anger warranted this +distinction. But it is also recorded that, after her elevation, +no other lady was ever exalted in the Imperial favour or received +the slightest notice from the Emperor. For the Empress, now well +acquainted with the Ideal Man, judged it better that his +experiences of the Ideal Woman should be drawn from herself +alone. And as she decreed, so it was done. Doubtless Her Majesty +did well. + +It is known that the Emperor departed to the Ancestral Spirits at +an early age, seeking, as the August Aunt observed, that repose +which on earth could never more be his. But no one has asserted +that this lady's disposition was free from the ordinary blemishes +of humanity. + +As for the Celestial Empress (who survives in history as one of +the most astute rulers who ever adorned the Dragon Throne), she +continued to rule her son and the Empire, surrounded by the +respectful admiration of all. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg Etext of The Ninth Vibration, et. al., by Beck + diff --git a/old/9thvb10.zip b/old/9thvb10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..bba7399 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/9thvb10.zip diff --git a/old/9thvb10h.htm b/old/9thvb10h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7a91759 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/9thvb10h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,8528 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<title>New File</title> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content= +"text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> +<style type="text/css"> +<!-- +body {margin:10%; text-align:justify} +blockquote {font-size:14pt} +P {font-size:14pt} +--> +</style> +</head> +<body> +<pre> +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The Ninth Vibration, et. al. + +Author: L. Adams Beck + +Release Date: August, 1999 [EBook #1853] +[Most recently updated: February 17, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE NINTH VIBRATION, ET. AL. *** + + + + +</pre> + +<h2>THE NINTH VIBRATION AND OTHER STORIES</h2> + +<h3>BY L. ADAMS BECK</h3> + +<h3></h3> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<p>THE NINTH VIBRATION</p> + +<p>THE INTERPRETER A ROMANCE OF THE EAST</p> + +<p>THE INCOMPARABLE LADY A STORY OF CHINA WITH A MORAL</p> + +<p>THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN A STORY OF BURMA</p> + +<p>FIRE OF BEAUTY</p> + +<p>THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL</p> + +<p>"HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!"</p> + +<p>"THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY"</p> + +<p></p> + +<p></p> + +<h2 align="center">THE NINTH VIBRATION</h2> + +<p></p> + +<p>There is a place uplifted nine thousand feet in purest air +where one of the most ancient tracks in the world runs from India +into Tibet. It leaves Simla of the Imperial councils by a stately +road; it passes beyond, but now narrowing, climbing higher beside +the khuds or steep drops to the precipitous valleys beneath, and +the rumor of Simla grows distant and the way is quiet, for, owing +to the danger of driving horses above the khuds, such baggage as +you own must be carried by coolies, and you yourself must either +ride on horseback or in the little horseless carriage of the +Orient, here drawn and pushed by four men. And presently the +deodars darken the way with a solemn presence, for-</p> + +<p>These are the Friars of the wood,</p> + +<p>The Brethren of the Solitude</p> + +<p>Hooded and grave-"</p> + +<p>-their breath most austerely pure in the gradually chilling +air. Their companies increase and now the way is through a great +wood where it has become a trail and no more, and still it climbs +for many miles and finally a rambling bungalow, small and low, is +sighted in the deeps of the trees, a mountain stream from unknown +heights falling beside it. And this is known as the House in the +Woods. Very few people are permitted to go there, for the owner +has no care for money and makes no provision for guests. You must +take your own servant and the khansamah will cook you such simple +food as men expect in the wilds, and that is all. You stay as +long as you please and when you leave not even a gift to the +khansamah is permitted.</p> + +<p>I had been staying in Ranipur of the plains while I considered +the question of getting to Upper Kashmir by the route from Simla +along the old way to Chinese Tibet where I would touch Shipki in +the Dalai Lama's territory and then pass on to Zanskar and so +down to Kashmir - a tremendous route through the Himalaya and a +crowning experience of the mightiest mountain scenery in the +world. I was at Ranipur for the purpose of consulting my old +friend Olesen, now an irrigation official in the Rampur district +- a man who had made this journey and nearly lost his life in +doing it. It is not now perhaps so dangerous as it was, and my +life was of no particular value to any one but myself, and the +plan interested me.</p> + +<p>I pass over the long discussions of ways and means in the +blinding heat of Ranipur. Olesen put all his knowledge at my +service and never uttered a word of the envy that must have +filled him as he looked at the distant snows cool and luminous in +blue air, and, shrugging good-natured shoulders, spoke of the +work that lay before him on the burning plains until the terrible +summer should drag itself to a close. We had vanquished the +details and were smoking in comparative silence one night on the +veranda, when he said in his slow reflective way;</p> + +<p>"You don't like the average hotel, Ormond, and you'll like it +still less up Simla way with all the Simla crowd of grass-widows +and fellows out for as good a time as they can cram into the hot +weather. I wonder if I could get you a permit for The House in +the Woods while you re waiting to fix up your men and route for +Shipki."</p> + +<p>He explained and of course I jumped at the chance. It +belonged, he said, to a man named Rup Singh, a pandit, or learned +man of Ranipur. He had always spent the summer there, but age and +failing health made this impossible now, and under certain +conditions he would occasionally allow people known to friends of +his own to put up there.</p> + +<p>"And Rup Singh and I are very good friends," Olesen said; "I +won his heart by discovering the lost Sukh Mandir, or Hall of +Pleasure, built many centuries ago by a Maharao of Ranipur for a +summer retreat in the great woods far beyond Simla. There are +lots of legends about it here in Ranipur. They call it The House +of Beauty. Rup Singh's ancestor had been a close friend of the +Maharao and was with him to the end, and that's why he himself +sets such store on the place. You have a good chance if I ask for +a permit.</p> + +<p>He told me the story and since it is the heart of my own I +give it briefly. Many centuries ago the Ranipur Kingdom was ruled +by the Maharao Rai Singh a prince of the great lunar house of the +Rajputs. Expecting a bride from some far away kingdom (the name +of this is unrecorded) he built the Hall of Pleasure as a summer +palace, a house of rare and costly beauty. A certain great +chamber he lined with carved figures of the Gods and their +stories, almost unsurpassed for truth and life. So, with the pine +trees whispering about it the secret they sigh to tell, he hoped +to create an earthly Paradise with this Queen in whom all +loveliness was perfected. And then some mysterious tragedy ended +all his hopes. It was rumoured that when the Princess came to his +court, she was, by some terrible mistake, received with insult +and offered the position only of one of his women. After that +nothing was known. Certain only is it that he fled to the hills, +to the home of his broken hope, and there ended his days in +solitude, save for the attendance of two faithful friends who +would not abandon him even in the ghostly quiet of the winter +when the pine boughs were heavy with snow and a spectral moon +stared at the panthers shuffling through the white wastes +beneath. Of these two Rup Singh's ancestor was one. And in his +thirty fifth year the Maharao died and his beauty and strength +passed into legend and his kingdom was taken by another and the +jungle crept silently over his Hall of Pleasure and the story +ended.</p> + +<p>"There was not a memory of the place up there," Olesen went +on. "Certainly I never heard anything of it when I went up to the +Shipki in 1904. But I had been able to be useful to Rup Singh and +he gave me a permit for The House in the Woods, and I stopped +there for a few days' shooting. I remember that day so well. I +was wandering in the dense woods while my men got their midday +grub, and I missed the trail somehow and found myself in a part +where the trees were dark and thick and the silence heavy as +lead. It was as if the trees were on guard - they stood shoulder +to shoulder and stopped the way. Well, I halted, and had a notion +there was something beyond that made me doubt whether to go on. I +must have stood there five minutes hesitating. Then I pushed on, +bruising the thick ferns under my shooting boots and stooping +under the knotted boughs. Suddenly I tramped out of the jungle +into a clearing, and lo and behold a ruined House, with blocks of +marble lying all about it, and carved pillars and a great roof +all being slowly smothered by the jungle. The weirdest thing you +ever saw. I climbed some fallen columns to get a better look, and +as I did I saw a face flash by at the arch of a broken window. I +sang out in Hindustani, but no answer: only the echo from the +woods. Somehow that dampened my ardour, and I didn't go in to +what seemed like a great ruined hall for the place was so eerie +and lonely, and looked mighty snaky into the bargain. So I came +ingloriously away and told Rup Singh. And his whole face changed. +'That is The House of Beauty,' he said. 'All my life have I +sought it and in vain. For, friend of my soul, a man must lose +himself that he may find himself and what lies beyond, and the +trodden path has ever been my doom. And you who have not sought +have seen. Most strange are the way of the Gods'. Later on I knew +this was why he had always gone up yearly, thinking and dreaming +God knows what. He and I tried for the place together, but in +vain and the whole thing is like a dream. Twice he has let +friends of mine stay at The House in the Woods, and I think he +won't refuse now."</p> + +<p>"Did he ever tell you the story?"</p> + +<p>"Never. I only know what I've picked up here. Some horrible +mistake about the Rani that drove the man almost mad with +remorse. I've heard bits here and there. There's nothing so vital +as tradition in India."</p> + +<p>"I wonder'. what really happened."</p> + +<p>"That we shall never know. I got a little old picture of the +Maharao - said to be painted by a Pahari artist. It's not likely +to be authentic, but you never can tell. A Brahman sold it to me +that he might complete his daughter's dowry, and hated doing +it."</p> + +<p>"May I see it?"</p> + +<p>"Why certainly. Not a very good light, but - can do, as the +Chinks say.</p> + +<p>He brought it out rolled in silk stuff and I carried it under +the hanging lamp. A beautiful young man indeed, with the air of +race these people have beyond all others;- a cold haughty face, +immovably dignified. He sat with his hands resting lightly on the +arms of his chair of State. A crescent of rubies clasped the +folds of the turban and from this sprang an aigrette scattering +splendours. The magnificent hilt of a sword was ready beside him. +The face was not only beautiful but arresting.</p> + +<p>"A strange picture," I said. "The artist has captured the man +himself. I can see him trampling on any one who opposed him, and +suffering in the same cold secret way. It ought to he authentic +if it isn't. Don't you know any more?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing. Well - to bed, and tomorrow I'll see Rup Singh."</p> + +<p>I was glad when he returned with the permission. I was to be +very careful, he said, to make no allusion to the lost palace, +for two women were staying at the House in the Woods - a mother +and daughter to whom Rup Singh had granted hospitality because of +an obligation he must honor. But with true Oriental distrust of +women he had thought fit to make no confidence to them. I +promised and asked Olesen if he knew them.</p> + +<p>"Slightly. Canadians of Danish blood like my own. Their name +is Ingmar. Some people think the daughter good-looking. The +mother is supposed to be clever; keen on occult subjects which +she came back to India to study. The husband was a great +naturalist and the kindest of men. He almost lived in the jungle +and the natives had all sorts of rumours about his powers. You +know what they are. They said the birds and beasts followed him +about. Any old thing starts a legend."</p> + +<p>"What was the connection with Rup Singh?"</p> + +<p>"He was in difficulties and undeservedly, and Ingmar +generously lent him money at a critical time, trusting to his +honour for repayment. Like most Orientals he never forgets a good +turn and would do anything for any of the family - except trust +the women with any secret he valued. The father is long dead. By +the way Rup Singh gave me a queer message for you. He said; 'Tell +the Sahib these words - "Let him who finds water in the desert +share his cup with him who dies of thirst." He is certainly +getting very old. I don't suppose he knew himself what he +meant."</p> + +<p>I certainly did not. However my way was thus smoothed for me +and I took the upward road, leaving Olesen to the long ungrateful +toil of the man who devotes his life to India without sufficient +time or knowledge to make his way to the inner chambers of her +beauty. There is no harder mistress unless you hold the pass-key +to her mysteries, there is none of whom so little can be told in +words but who kindles so deep a passion. Necessity sometimes +takes me from that enchanted land, but when the latest dawns are +shining in my skies I shall make my feeble way back to her and +die at her worshipped feet. So I went up from Kalka.</p> + +<p>I have never liked Simla. It is beautiful enough - eight +thousand feet up in the grip of the great hills looking toward +the snows, the famous summer home of the Indian Government. Much +diplomacy is whispered on Observatory Hill and many are the +lighter diversions of which Mr. Kipling and lesser men have +written. But Simla is also a gateway to many things - to the +mighty deodar forests that clothe the foot-hills of the +mountains, to Kulu, to the eternal snows, to the old, old bridle +way that leads up to the Shipki Pass and the mysteries of Tibet - +and to the strange things told in this story. So I passed through +with scarcely a glance at the busy gayety of the little streets +and the tiny shops where the pretty ladies buy their rouge and +powder. I was attended by my servant Ali Khan, a Mohammedan from +Nagpur, sent up with me by Olesen with strong recommendation. He +was a stout walker, so too am I, and an inveterate dislike to the +man-drawn carriage whenever my own legs would serve me decided me +to walk the sixteen miles to the House in the Woods, sending on +the baggage. Ali Khan despatched it and prepared to follow me, +the fine cool air of the hills giving us a zest.</p> + +<p>"Subhan Alla! (Praise be to God!) the air is sweet!" he said, +stepping out behind me. "What time does the Sahib look to reach +the House?"</p> + +<p>"About five or six. Now, Ali Khan, strike out of the road. You +know the way."</p> + +<p>So we struck up into the glorious pine woods, mountains all +about us. Here and there as we climbed higher was a little bank +of forgotten snow, but spring had triumphed and everywhere was +the waving grace of maiden-hair ferns, banks of violets and +strangely beautiful little wild flowers. These woods are full of +panthers, but in day time the only precaution necessary is to +take no dog, - a dainty they cannot resist. The air was exquisite +with the sun-warm scent of pines, and here and there the trees +broke away disclosing mighty ranges of hills covered with rich +blue shadows like the bloom on a plum, - the clouds chasing the +sunshine over the mountain sides and the dark green velvet of the +robe of pines. I looked across ravines that did not seem gigantic +and yet the villages on the other side were like a handful of +peas, so tremendous was the scale. I stood now and then to see +the rhododendrons, forest trees here with great trunks and +massive boughs glowing with blood-red blossom, and time went by +and I took no count of it, so glorious was the climb.</p> + +<p>It must have been hours later when it struck me that the sun +was getting low and that by now we should be nearing The House in +the Woods. I said as much to Ali Khan. He looked perplexed and +agreed. We had reached a comparatively level place, the trail +faint but apparent, and it surprised me that we heard no sound of +life from the dense wood where our goal must be.</p> + +<p>"I know not, Presence," he said. "May his face be blackened +that directed me. I thought surely I could not miss the way, and +yet-"</p> + +<p>We cast back and could see no trail forking from the one we +were on. There was nothing for it but to trust to luck and push +on. But I began to be uneasy and so was the man. I had stupidly +forgotten to unpack my revolver, and worse, we had no food, and +the mountain air is an appetiser, and at night the woods have +their dangers, apart from being absolutely trackless. We had not +met a living being since we left the road and there seemed no +likelihood of asking for directions. I stopped no longer for +views but went steadily on, Ali Khan keeping up a running fire of +low-voiced invocations and lamentations. And now it was dusk and +the position decidely unpleasant.</p> + +<p>It was at that moment I saw a woman before us walking lightly +and steadily under the pines. She must have struck into the trail +from the side for she never could have kept before us all the +way. A native woman, but wearing the all-concealing boorka, more +like a town dweller than a woman of the hills. I put on speed and +Ali Khan, now very tired, toiled on behind me as I came up with +her and courteously asked the way. Her face was entirely hidden, +but the answering voice was clear and sweet. I made up my mind +she was young, for it had the bird-like thrill of youth.</p> + +<p>"If the Presence continues to follow this path he will arrive. +It is not far. They wait for him."</p> + +<p>That was all. It left me with a desire to see the veiled face. +We passed on and Ali Khan looked fearfully back.</p> + +<p>"Ajaib! (Wonderful!) A strange place to meet one of the +purdah-nashin (veiled women)" he muttered. "What would she be +doing up here in the heights? She walked like a Khanam (khan's +wife) and I saw the gleam of gold under the boorka."</p> + +<p>I turned with some curiosity as he spoke, and lo! there was no +human being in sight. She had disappeared from the track behind +us and it was impossible to say where. The darkening trees were +beginning to hold the dusk and it seemed unimaginable that a +woman should leave the way and take to the dangers of the +woods.</p> + +<p>"Puna-i-Khoda - God protect us!" said Ali Khan in a shuddering +whisper. "She was a devil of the wilds. Press on, Sahib. We +should not be here in the dark."</p> + +<p>There was nothing else to do. We made the best speed we could, +and the trees grew more dense and the trail fainter between the +close trunks, and so the night came bewildering with the +expectation that we must pass the night unfed and unarmed in the +cold of the heights. They might send out a search party from The +House in the Woods - that was still a hope, if there were no +other. And then, very gradually and wonderfully the moon dawned +over the tree tops and flooded the wood with mysterious silver +lights and about her rolled the majesty of the stars. We pressed +on into the heart of the night. From the dense black depths we +emerged at last. An open glade lay before us - the trees falling +back to right and left to disclose - what?</p> + +<p>A long low house of marble, unlit, silent, bathed in pale +splendour and shadow. About it stood great deodars, clothed in +clouds of the white blossoming clematis, ghostly and still. +Acacias hung motionless trails of heavily scented bloom as if +carved in ivory. It was all silent as death. A flight of nobly +sculptured steps led up to a broad veranda and a wide open door +with darkness behind it. Nothing more.</p> + +<p>I forced myself to shout in Hindustani - the cry seeming a +brutal outrage upon the night, and an echo came back numbed in +the black woods. I tried once more and in vain. We stood absorbed +also into the silence.</p> + +<p>"Ya Alla! it is a house of the dead!" whispered Ali Khan, +shuddering at my shoulder, - and even as the words left his lips +I understood where we were. "It is the Sukh Mandir." I said. "It +is the House of the Maharao of Ranipur."</p> + +<p>It was impossible to be in Ranipur and hear nothing of the +dead house of the forest and Ali Khan had heard - God only knows +what tales. In his terror all discipline, all the inborn respect +of the native forsook him, and without word or sign he turned and +fled along the track, crashing through the forest blind and mad +with fear. It would have been insanity to follow him, and in +India the first rule of life is that the Sahib shows no fear, so +I left him to his fate whatever it might be, believing at the +same time that a little reflection and dread of the lonely forest +would bring him to heel quickly.</p> + +<p>I stood there and the stillness flowed like water about me. It +was as though I floated upon it - bathed in quiet. My thoughts +adjusted themselves. Possibly it was not the Sukh Mandir. Olesen +had spoken of ruin. I could see none. At least it was shelter +from the chill which is always present at these heights when the +sun sets, - and it was beautiful as a house not made with hands. +There was a sense of awe but no fear as I went slowly up the +great steps and into the gloom beyond and so gained the hall.</p> + +<p>The moon went with me and from a carven arch filled with +marble tracery rained radiance that revealed and hid. Pillars +stood about me, wonderful with horses ramping forward as in the +Siva Temple at Vellore. They appeared to spring from the pillars +into the gloom urged by invisible riders, the effect barbarously +rich and strange - motion arrested, struck dumb in a violent +gesture, and behind them impenetrable darkness. I could not see +the end of this hall - for the moon did not reach it, but looking +up I beheld the walls fretted in great panels into the utmost +splendour of sculpture, encircling the stories of the Gods amid a +twining and under-weaving of leaves and flowers. It was more like +a temple than a dwelling. Siva, as Nataraja the Cosmic Dancer, +the Rhythm of the Universe, danced before me, flinging out his +arms in the passion of creation. Kama, the Indian Eros, bore his +bow strung with honey-sweet black bees that typify the heart's +desire. Krishna the Beloved smiled above the herd-maidens adoring +at his feet. Ganesha the Elephant-Headed, sat in massive calm, +wreathing his wise trunk about him. And many more. But all these +so far as I could see tended to one centre panel larger than any, +representing two life-size figures of a dim beauty. At first I +could scarcely distinguish one from the other in the +upward-reflected light, and then, even as I stood, the moving +moon revealed the two as if floating in vapor. At once I +recognized the subject - I had seen it already in the ruined +temple of Ranipur, though the details differed. Parvati, the +Divine Daughter of the Himalaya, the Emanation of the mighty +mountains, seated upon a throne, listening to a girl who played +on a Pan pipe before her. The goddess sat, her chin leaned upon +her hand, her shoulders slightly inclined in a pose of gentle +sweetness, looking down upon the girl at her feet, absorbed in +the music of the hills and lonely places. A band of jewels, +richly wrought, clasped the veil on her brows, and below the bare +bosom a glorious girdle clothed her with loops and strings and +tassels of jewels that fell to her knees - her only garment.</p> + +<p>The girl was a lovely image of young womanhood, the proud +swell of the breast tapering to the slim waist and long limbs +easily folded as she half reclined at the divine feet, her lips +pressed to the pipe. Its silent music mysteriously banished fear. +The sleep must be sweet indeed that would come under the +guardianship of these two fair creatures - their gracious +influence was dewy in the air. I resolved that I would spend the +night beside them. Now with the march of the moon dim vistas of +the walls beyond sprang into being. Strange mythologies - the +incarnations of Vishnu the Preserver, the Pastoral of Krishna the +Beautiful. I promised myself that next day I would sketch some of +the loveliness about me. But the moon was passing on her way - I +folded the coat I carried into a pillow and lay down at the feet +of the goddess and her nymph. Then a moonlit quiet I slept in a +dream of peace.</p> + +<p>Sleep annihilates time. Was it long or short when I woke like +a man floating up to the surface from tranquil deeps? That I +cannot tell, but once more I possessed myself and every sense was +on guard.</p> + +<p>My hearing first. Bare feet were coming, falling softly as +leaves, but unmistakable. There was a dim whispering but I could +hear no word. I rose on my elbow and looked down the long hall. +Nothing. The moonlight lay in pools of light and seas of shadow +on the floor, and the feet drew nearer. Was I afraid? I cannot +tell, but a deep expectation possessed me as the sound grew like +the rustle of grasses parted in a fluttering breeze, and now a +girl came swiftly up the steps, irradiate in the moonlight, and +passing up the hall stood beside me. I could see her robe, her +feet bare from the jungle, but her face wavered and changed and +re- united like the face of a dream woman. I could not fix it for +one moment, yet knew this was the messenger for whom I had waited +all my life - for whom one strange experience, not to be told at +present, had prepared me in early manhood. Words came, and I +said:</p> + +<p>"Is this a dream?"</p> + +<p>"No. We meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is true."</p> + +<p>"Is a dream never true?"</p> + +<p>"Sometimes it is the echo of the Ninth Vibration and therefore +a harmonic of truth. You are awake now. It is the day-time that +is the sleep of the soul. You are in the Lower Perception, +wherein the truth behind the veil of what men call Reality is +perceived."</p> + +<p>"Can I ascend?"</p> + +<p>"I cannot tell. That is for you, not me.</p> + +<p>"What do I perceive tonight?"</p> + +<p>"The Present as it is in the Eternal. Say no more. Come with +me."</p> + +<p>She stretched her hand and took mine with the assurance of a +goddess, and we went up the hall where the night had been deepest +between the great pillars.</p> + +<p>Now it is very clear to me that in every land men, when the +doors of perception are opened, will see what we call the +Supernatural clothed in the image in which that country has +accepted it. Blake, the mighty mystic, will see the Angels of the +Revelation, driving their terrible way above Lambeth - it is not +common nor unclean. The fisherman, plying his coracle on the +Thames will behold the consecration of the great new Abbey of +Westminster celebrated with mass and chant and awful lights in +the dead mid-noon of night by that Apostle who is the Rock of the +Church. Before him who wanders in Thessaly Pan will brush the +dewy lawns and slim-girt Artemis pursue the flying hart. In the +pale gold of Egyptian sands the heavy brows of Osiris crowned +with the pshent will brood above the seer and the veil of Isis +tremble to the lifting. For all this is the rhythm to which the +souls of men are attuned and in that vibration they will see, and +no other, since in this the very mountains and trees of the land +are rooted. So here, where our remote ancestors worshipped the +Gods of Nature, we must needs stand before the Mystic Mother of +India, the divine daughter of the Himalaya.</p> + +<p>How shall I describe the world we entered? The carvings upon +the walls had taken life - they had descended. It was a gathering +of the dreams men have dreamed here of the Gods, yet most real +and actual. They watched in a serenity that set them apart in an +atmosphere of their own - forms of indistinct majesty and august +beauty, absolute, simple, and everlasting. I saw them as one sees +reflections in rippled water - no more. But all faces turned to +the place where now a green and flowering leafage enshrined and +partly hid the living Nature Goddess, as she listened to a voice +that was not dumb to me. I saw her face only in glimpses of an +indescribable sweetness, but an influence came from her presence +like the scent of rainy pine forests, the coolness that breathes +from great rivers, the passion of Spring when she breaks on the +world with a wave of flowers. Healing and life flowed from it. +Understanding also. It seemed I could interpret the very silence +of the trees outside into the expression of their inner life, the +running of the green life-blood in their veins, the delicate +trembling of their finger-tips.</p> + +<p>My companion and I were not heeded. We stood hand in hand like +children who have innocently strayed into a palace, gazing in +wonderment. The august life went its way upon its own occasions, +and, if we would, we might watch. Then the voice, clear and cold, +proceeding, as it were, with some story begun before we had +strayed into the Presence, the whole assembly listening in +silence.</p> + +<p>"- and as it has been so it will be, for the Law will have the +blind soul carried into a body which is a record of the sins it +has committed, and will not suffer that soul to escape from +rebirth into bodies until it has seen the truth -"</p> + +<p>And even as this was said and I listened, knowing myself on +the verge of some great knowledge, I felt sleep beginning to +weigh upon my eyelids. The sound blurred, flowed unsyllabled as a +stream, the girl's hand grew light in mine; she was fading, +becoming unreal; I saw her eyes like faint stars in a mist. They +were gone. Arms seemed to receive me - to lay me to sleep and I +sank below consciousness, and the night took me.</p> + +<p>When I awoke the radiant arrows of the morning were shooting +into the long hall where I lay, but as I rose and looked about +me, strange - most strange, ruin encircled me everywhere. The +blue sky was the roof. What I had thought a palace lost in the +jungle, fit to receive its King should he enter, was now a broken +hall of State; the shattered pillars were festooned with waving +weeds, the many coloured lantana grew between the fallen blocks +of marble. Even the sculptures on the walls were difficult to +decipher. Faintly I could trace a hand, a foot, the orb of a +woman's bosom, the gracious outline of some young God, standing +above a crouching worshipper. No more. Yes, and now I saw above +me as the dawn touched it the form of the Dweller in the Windhya +Hills, Parvati the Beautiful, leaning softly over something +breathing music at her feet. Yet I knew I could trace the almost +obliterated sculpture only because I had already seen it defined +in perfect beauty. A deep crack ran across the marble; it was +weathered and stained by many rains, and little ferns grew in the +crevices, but I could reconstruct every line from my own +knowledge. And how? The Parvati of Ranipur differed in many +important details. She stood, bending forward, wheras this sweet +Lady sat. Her attendants were small satyr-like spirits of the +wilds, piping and fluting, in place of the reclining maiden. The +sweeping scrolls of a great halo encircled her whole person. Then +how could I tell what this neary obliterated carving had been? I +groped for the answer and could not find it. I doubted-</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>"Were such things here as we do speak about?</p> + +<p>Or have we eaten of the insane root</p> + +<p>That takes the reason captive?"</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>Memory rushed over me like the sea over dry sands. A girl - +there had been a girl - we had stood with clasped hands to hear a +strange music, but in spite of the spiritual intimacy of those +moments I could not recall her face. I saw it cloudy against a +background of night and dream, the eyes remote as stars, and so +it eluded me. Only her presence and her words sur- vived; "We +meet in the Ninth Vibration. All here is true." But the Ninth +Vibration itself was dream-land. I had never heard the phrase - I +could not tell what was meant, nor whether my apprehension was +true or false. I knew only that the night had taken her and the +dawn denied her, and that, dream or no dream, I stood there with +a pang of loss that even now leaves me wordless.</p> + +<p>A bird sang outside in the acacias, clear and shrill for day, +and this awakened my senses and lowered me to the plane where I +became aware of cold and hunger, and was chilled with dew. I +passed down the tumbled steps that had been a stately ascent the +night before and made my way into the jungle by the trail, small +and lost in fern, by which we had come. Again I wandered, and it +was high noon before I heard mule bells at a distance, and, thus +guided, struck down through the green tangle to find myself, +wearied but safe, upon the bridle way that leads to Fagu and the +far Shipki. Two coolies then directed me to The House in the +Woods.</p> + +<p>All was anxiety there. Ali Khan had arrived in the night, +having found his way under the guidance of blind flight and fear. +He had brought the news that I was lost in the jungle and amid +the dwellings of demons. It was, of course, hopeless to search in +the dark, though the khansamah and his man had gone as far as +they dared with lanterns and shouting, and with the daylight they +tried again and were even now away. It was useless to reproach +the man even if I had cared to do so. His ready plea was that as +far as men were concerned he was as brave as any (which was true +enough as I had reason to know later) but that when it came to +devilry the Twelve Imaums themselves would think twice before +facing it.</p> + +<p>"Inshalla ta-Alla! (If the sublime God wills!) this unworthy +one will one day show the Protector of the poor, that he is a +respectable person and no coward, but it is only the Sahibs who +laugh in the face of devils."</p> + +<p>He went off to prepare me some food, consumed with curiosity +as to my adventures, and when I had eaten I found my tiny +whitewashed cell, for the room was little more, and slept for +hours.</p> + +<p>Late in the afternoon I waked and looked out. A, low but +glowing sunlight suffused the wild garden reclaimed from the +strangle-hold of the jungle and hemmed in with rocks and forest. +A few simple flowers had been planted here and there, but its +chief beauty was a mountain stream, brown and clear as the eyes +of a dog, that fell from a crag above into a rocky basin, +maidenhair ferns growing in such masses about it that it was +henceforward scarcely more than a woodland voice. Beside it two +great deodars spread their canopies, and there a woman sat in a +low chair, a girl beside her reading aloud. She had thrown her +hat off and the sunshine turned her massed dark hair to bronze. +That was all I could see. I went out and joined them, taking the +note of introduction which Olesen had given me.</p> + +<p>I pass over the unessentials of my story; their friendly +greetings and sympathy for my adventure. It set us at ease at +once and I knew my stay would be the happier for their presence +though it is not every woman one would choose as a companion in +the great mountain country. But what is germane to my purpose +must be told, and of this a part is the per- sonality of Brynhild +Ingmar. That she was beautiful I never doubted, though I have +heard it disputed and smiled inwardly as the disputants urged lip +and cheek and shades of rose and lily, weighing and appraising. +Let me describe her as I saw her or, rather, as I can, adding +that even without all this she must still have been beautiful +because of the deep significance to those who had eyes to see or +feel some mysterious element which mingled itself with her +presence comparable only to the delight which the power and +spiritual essence of Nature inspires in all but the dullest +minds. I know I cannot hope to convey this in words. It means +little if I say I thought of all quiet lovely solitary things +when I looked into her calm eyes, - that when she moved it was +like clear springs renewed by flowing, that she seemed the +perfect flowering of a day in June, for these are phrases. Does +Nature know her wonders when she shines in her strength? Does a +woman know the infinite meanings her beauty may have for the +beholder? I cannot tell. Nor can I tell if I saw this girl as she +may have seemed to those who read only the letter of the book and +are blind to its spirit, or in the deepest sense as she really +was in the sight of That which created her and of which she was a +part. Surely it is a proof of the divinity of love that in and +for a moment it lifts the veil of so-called reality and shows +each to the other mysteriously perfect and inspiring as the world +will never see them, but as they exist in the Eternal, and in the +sight of those who have learnt that the material is but the +dream, and the vision of love the truth.</p> + +<p>I will say then, for the alphabet of what I knew but cannot +tell, that she had the low broad brows of a Greek Nature Goddess, +the hair swept back wing-like from the temples and massed with a +noble luxuriance. It lay like rippled bronze, suggesting +something strong and serene in its essence. Her eyes were clear +and gray as water, the mouth sweetly curved above a resolute +chin. It was a face which recalled a modelling in marble rather +than the charming pastel and aquarelle of a young woman's +colouring, and somehow I thought of it less as the beauty of a +woman than as some sexless emanation of natural things, and this +impression was strengthened by her height and the long limbs, +slender and strong as those of some youth trained in the +pentathlon, subject to the severest discipline until all that was +superfluous was fined away and the perfect form expressing the +true being emerged. The body was thus more beautiful than the +face, and I may note in passing that this is often the case, +because the face is more directly the index of the restless and +unhappy soul within and can attain true beauty only when the soul +is in harmony with its source.</p> + +<p>She was a little like her pale and wearied mother. She might +resemble her still more when the sorrow of this world that +worketh death should have had its will of her. I had yet to learn +that this would never be - that she had found the open door of +escape.</p> + +<p>We three spent much time together in the days that followed. I +never tired of their company and I think they did not tire of +mine, for my wanderings through the world and my studies in the +ancient Indian literatures and faiths with the Pandit Devaswami +were of interest to them both though in entirely different ways. +Mrs. Ingmar was a woman who centred all her interests in books +and chiefly in the scientific forms of occult research. She was +no believer in anything outside the range of what she called +human experience. The evidences had convinced her of nothing but +a force as yet unclassified in the scientific categories and all +her interest lay in the undeveloped powers of brain which might +be discovered in the course of ignorant and credulous experiment. +We met therefore on the common ground of rejection of the +so-called occultism of the day, though I knew even then, and how +infinitely better now, that her constructions were wholly +misleading.</p> + +<p>Nearly all day she would lie in her chair under the deodars by +the delicate splash and ripple of the stream. Living imprisoned +in the crystal sphere of the intellect she saw the world outside, +painted in few but distinct colours, small, comprehensible, +moving on a logical orbit. I never knew her posed for an +explanation. She had the contented atheism of a certain type of +French mind and found as much ease in it as another kind of sweet +woman does in her rosary and confessional.</p> + +<p>"I cannot interest Brynhild," she said, when I knew her +better. "She has no affinity with science. She is simply a nature +worshipper, and in such places as this she seems to draw life +from the inanimate life about her. I have sometimes wondered +whether she might not be developed into a kind of bridge between +the articulate and the inarticulate, so well does she understand +trees and flowers. Her father was like that - he had all sorts of +strange power with animals and plants, and thought he had more +than he had. He could never realize that the energy of nature is +merely mechanical."</p> + +<p>"You think all energy is mechanical?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly. We shall lay our finger on the mainspring one day +and the mystery will disappear. But as for Brynhild - I gave her +the best education possible and yet she has never understood the +conception of a universe moving on mathematical laws to which we +must submit in body and mind. She has the oddest ideas. I would +not willingly say of a child of mine that she is a mystic, and +yet -"</p> + +<p>She shook her head compassionately. But I scarcely heard. My +eyes were fixed on Brynhild, who stood apart, looking steadily +out over the snows. It was a glorious sunset, the west vibrating +with gorgeous colour spilt over in torrents that flooded the sky, +Terrible splendours - hues for which we have no thought - no +name. I had not thought of it as music until I saw her face but +she listened as well as saw, and her expression changed as it +changes when the pomp of a great orchestra breaks upon the +silence. It flashed to the chords of blood-red and gold that was +burning fire. It softened through the fugue of woven crimson gold +and flame, to the melancholy minor of ashes-of-roses and paling +green, and so through all the dying glories that faded slowly to +a tranquil grey and left the world to the silver melody of one +sole star that dawned above the ineffable heights of the snows. +Then she listened as a child does to a bird, entranced, with a +smile like a butterfly on her parted lips. I never saw such a +power of quiet.</p> + +<p>She and I were walking next day among the forest ways, the +pine-scented sunshine dappling the dropped frondage. We had been +speaking of her mother. "It is such a misfortune for her," she +said thoughtfully, "that I am not clever. She should have had a +daughter who could have shared her thoughts. She analyses +everything, reasons about everything, and that is quite out of my +reach."</p> + +<p>She moved beside me with her wonderful light step - the poise +and balance of a nymph in the Parthenon frieze.</p> + +<p>"How do you see things?"</p> + +<p>"See? That is the right word. I see things - I never reason +about them. They are. For her they move like figures in a sum. +For me every one of them is a window through which one may look +to what is beyond."</p> + +<p>"To where?"</p> + +<p>"To what they really are - not what they seem."</p> + +<p>I looked at her with interest.</p> + +<p>"Did you ever hear of the double vision?"</p> + +<p>For this is a subject on which the spiritually learned men of +India, like the great mystics of all the faiths, have much to +say. I had listened with bewilderment and doubt to the +expositions of my Pandit on this very head. Her simple words +seemed for a moment the echo of his deep and searching thought. +Yet it surely could not be. Impossible.</p> + +<p>"Never. What does it mean?" She raised clear unveiled eyes. +"You must forgive me for being so stupid, but it is my mother who +is at home with all these scientific phrases. I know none of +them."</p> + +<p>"It means that for some people the material universe - the +things we see with our eyes - is only a mirage, or say, a symbol, +which either hides or shadows forth the eternal truth. And in +that sense they see things as they really are, not as they seem +to the rest of us. And whether this is the statement of a truth +or the wildest of dreams, I cannot tell."</p> + +<p>She did not answer for a moment; then said;</p> + +<p>"Are there people who believe this - know it?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly. There are people who believe that thought is the +only real thing - that the whole universe is thought made +visible. That we create with our thoughts the very body by which +we shall re-act on the universe in lives to be.</p> + +<p>"Do you believe it?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Do you?"</p> + +<p>She paused; looked at me, and then went on:</p> + +<p>"You see, I don't think things out. I only feel. But this +cannot interest you."</p> + +<p>I felt she was eluding the question. She began to interest me +more than any one I had ever known. She had extraordinary power +of a sort. Once, in the woods, where I was reading in so deep a +shade that she never saw me, I had an amazing vision of her. She +stood in a glade with the sunlight and shade about her; she had +no hat and a sunbeam turned her hair to pale bronze. A small +bright April shower was falling through the sun, and she stood in +pure light that reflected itself in every leaf and grass-blade. +But it was nothing of all this that arrested me, beautiful as it +was. She stood as though life were for the moment suspended;- +then, very softly, she made a low musical sound, infinitely +wooing, from scarcely parted lips, and instantly I saw a bird of +azure plumage flutter down and settle on her shoulder, pluming +himself there in happy security. Again she called softly and +another followed the first. Two flew to her feet, two more to her +breast and hand. They caressed her, clung to her, drew some +joyous influence from her presence. She stood in the glittering +rain like Spring with her birds about her - a wonderful sight. +Then, raising one hand gently with the fingers thrown back she +uttered a different note, perfectly sweet and intimate, and the +branches parted and a young deer with full bright eyes fixed on +her advanced and pushed a soft muzzle into her hand.</p> + +<p>In my astonishment I moved, however slightly, and the picture +broke up. The deer sprang back into the trees, the birds +fluttered up in a hurry of feathers, and she turned calm eyes +upon me, as unstartled as if she had known all the time that I +was there.</p> + +<p>"You should not have breathed," she said smiling. "They must +have utter quiet."</p> + +<p>I rose up and joined her.</p> + +<p>"It is a marvel. I can scarcely believe my eyes. How do you do +it?"</p> + +<p>"My father taught me. They come. How can I tell?"</p> + +<p>She turned away and left me. I thought long over this episode. +I recalled words heard in the place of my studies - words I had +dismissed without any care at the moment. "To those who see, +nothing is alien. They move in the same vibration with all that +has life, be it in bird or flower. And in the Uttermost also, for +all things are One. For such there is no death."</p> + +<p>That was beyond me still, but I watched her with profound +interest. She recalled also words I had half forgotten-</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>"There was nought above me and nought below,</p> + +<p>My childhood had not learnt to know;</p> + +<p>For what are the voices of birds,</p> + +<p>Aye, and of beasts, but words, our words, -</p> + +<p>Only so much more sweet."</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>That might have been written of her. And more.</p> + +<p>She had found one day in the woods a flower of a sort I had +once seen in the warm damp forests below Darjiling - ivory white +and shaped like a dove in flight. She wore it that evening on her +bosom. A week later she wore what I took to be another.</p> + +<p>"You have had luck," I said; "I never heard of such a thing +being seen so high up, and you have found it twice."</p> + +<p>"No, it is the same."</p> + +<p>"The same? Impossible. You found it more than a week ago." "I +know. It is ten days. Flowers don't die when one understands them +- not as most people think."</p> + +<p>Her mother looked up and said fretfully:</p> + +<p>"Since she was a child Brynhild has had that odd idea. That +flower is dead and withered. Throw it away, child. It looks +hideous."</p> + +<p>Was it glamour? What was it? I saw the flower dewy fresh in +her bosom She smiled and turned away.</p> + +<p>It was that very evening she left the veranda where we were +sitting in the subdued light of a little lamp and passed beyond +where the ray cut the darkness. She went down the perspective of +trees to the edge of he clearing and I rose to follow for it +seemed absolutely unsafe that she should be on the verge of the +panther-haunted woods alone. Mrs. Ingmar turned a page of her +book serenely;</p> + +<p>"She will not like it if you go. I cannot imagine that she +should come to harm. She always goes her own way - light or +dark."</p> + +<p>I returned to my seat and watched steadfastly. At first I +could see nothing but as my sight adjusted itself I saw her a +long way down the clearing that opened the snows, and quite +certainly also I saw something like a huge dog detach itself from +the woods and bound to her feet. It mingled with her dark dress +and I lost it. Mrs. Ingmar said, seeing my anxiety but nothing +else; "Her father was just the same; - he had no fear of anything +that lives. No doubt some people have that power. I have never +seen her attract birds and beasts as he certainly did, but she is +quite as fond of them."</p> + +<p>I could not understand her blindness - what I myself had seen +raised questions I found unanswerable, and her mother saw +nothing! Which of us was right? presently she came back slowly +and I ventured no word.</p> + +<p>A woodland sorcery, innocent as the dawn, hovered about her. +What was it? Did the mere love of these creatures make a bond +between her soul and theirs, or was the ancient dream true and +could she at times move in the same vibration? I thought of her +as a wood-spirit sometimes, an expression herself of some passion +of beauty in Nature, a thought of snows and starry nights and +flowing rivers made visible in flesh. It is surely when seized +with the urge of some primeval yearning which in man is merely +sexual that Nature conceives her fair forms and manifests them, +for there is a correspondence that runs through all creation.</p> + +<p>Here I ask myself - Did I love her? In a sense, yes, deeply, +but not in the common reading of the phrase. I have trembled with +delight before the wild and terrible splendour of the Himalayan +heights-; low golden moons have steeped my soul longing, but I +did not think of these things as mine in any narrow sense, nor so +desire them. They were Angels of the Evangel of beauty. So too +was she. She had none of the "silken nets and traps of adamant," +she was no sister of the "girls of mild silver or of furious +gold"; - but fair, strong, and her own, a dweller in the House of +Quiet. I did not covet her. I loved her.</p> + +<p>Days passed. There came a night when the winds were loosed - +no moon, the stars flickering like blown tapers through driven +clouds, the trees swaying and lamenting.</p> + +<p>"There will be rain tomorrow." Mrs. Ingmar said, as we parted +for the night. I closed my door. Some great cat of the woods was +crying harshly outside my window, the sound receding towards the +bridle way. I slept in a dream of tossing seas and ships +labouring among them.</p> + +<p>With the sense of a summons I waked - I cannot tell when. +Unmistakable, as if I were called by name. I rose and dressed, +and heard distinctly bare feet passing my door. I opened it +noiselessly and looked out into the little passage way that made +for the entry, and saw nothing but pools of darkness and a dim +light from the square of the window at the end. But the wind had +swept the sky clear with its flying bosom and was sleeping now in +its high places and the air was filled with a mild moony radiance +and a great stillness.</p> + +<p>Now let me speak with restraint and exactness. I was not +afraid but felt as I imagine a dog feels in the presence of his +master, conscious of a purpose, a will entirely above his own and +incomprehensible, yet to be obeyed without question. I followed +my reading of the command, bewildered but docile, and +understanding nothing but that I was called.</p> + +<p>The lights were out. The house dead silent; the familiar +veranda ghostly in the night. And now I saw a white figure at the +head of the steps - Brynhild. She turned and looked over her +shoulder, her face pale in the moon, and made the same gesture +with which she summoned her birds. I knew her meaning, for now we +were moving in the same rhythm, and followed as she took the +lead. How shall I describe that strange night in the jungle. +There were fire-flies or dancing points of light that recalled +them. Perhaps she was only thinking them - only thinking the moon +and the quiet, for we were in the world where thought is the one +reality. But they went with us in a cloud and faintly lighted our +way. There were exquisite wafts of perfume from hidden flowers +breathing their dreams to the night. Here and there a drowsy bird +stirred and chirped from the roof of darkness, a low note of +content that greeted her passing. It was a path intricate and +winding and how long we went, and where, I cannot tell. But at +last she stooped and parting the boughs before her we stepped +into an open space, and before us - I knew it - I knew it! - The +House of Beauty.</p> + +<p>She paused at the foot of the great marble steps and looked at +me.</p> + +<p>"We have met here already."</p> + +<p>I did not wonder - I could not. In the Ninth vibration +surprise had ceased to be. Why had I not recognized her before - +O dull of heart! That was my only thought. We walk blindfold +through the profound darkness of material nature, the blinder +because we believe we see it. It is only when the doors of the +material are closed that the world appears to man as it exists in +the eternal truth.</p> + +<p>"Did you know this?" I asked, trembling before mystery.</p> + +<p>"I knew it, because I am awake. You forgot it in the dull +sleep which we call daily life. But we were here and THEY began +the story of the King who made this house. Tonight we shall hear +it. It he story of Beauty wandering through the world and the +world received her not. We hear it in this place because here he +agonized for what he knew too late."</p> + +<p>"Was that our only meeting?"</p> + +<p>"We meet every night, but you forget when the day brings the +sleep of the soul. - You do not sink deep enough into rest to +remember. You float on the surface where the little bubbles of +foolish dream are about you and I cannot reach you then."</p> + +<p>"How can I compel myself to the deeps?"</p> + +<p>"You cannot. It will come. But when you have passed up the +bridle way and beyond the Shipki, stop at Gyumur. There is the +Monastery of Tashigong, and there one will meet you-</p> + +<p>"His name?"</p> + +<p>"Stephen Clifden. He will tell you what you desire to know. +Continue on then with him to Yarkhand. There in the Ninth +Vibration we shall meet again. It is a long journey but you will +be content."</p> + +<p>"Do you certainly know that we shall meet again?"</p> + +<p>"When you have learnt, we can meet when we will. He will teach +you the Laya Yoga. You should not linger here in the woods any +longer. You should go on. In three days it will be possible."</p> + +<p>"But how have you learnt - a girl and young?"</p> + +<p>"Through a close union with Nature - that is one of the three +roads. But I know little as yet. Now take my hand and come.</p> + +<p>"One last question. Is this house ruined and abject as I have +seen it in the daylight, or royal and the house of Gods as we see +it now? Which is truth?"</p> + +<p>"In the day you saw it in the empty illusion of blind thought. +Tonight, eternally lovely as in the thought of the man who made +it. Nothing that is beautiful is lost, though in the sight of the +unwise it seems to die. Death is in the eyes we look through - +when they are cleansed we see Life only. Now take my hand and +come. Delay no more."</p> + +<p>She caught my hand and we entered the dim magnificence of the +great hall. The moon entered with us.</p> + +<p>Instantly I had the feeling of supernatural presence. Yet I +only write this in deference to common use, for it was absolutely +natural - more so than any I have met in the state called daily +life. It was a thing in which I had a part, and if this was +supernatural so also was I.</p> + +<p>Again I saw the Dark One, the Beloved, the young Krishna, +above the women who loved him. He motioned with his hand as we +passed, as though he waved us smiling on our way. Again the +dancers moved in a rhythmic tread to the feet of the mountain +Goddess - again we followed to where she bent to hear. But now, +solemn listening faces crowded in the shadows about her, grave +eyes fixed immovably upon what lay at her feet - a man, submerged +in the pure light that fell from her presence, his dark face +stark and fine, lips locked, eyes shut, arms flung out cross-wise +in utter abandonment, like a figure of grief invisibly crucified +upon his shame. I stopped a few feet from him, arrested by a +barrier I could not pass. Was it sleep or death or some +mysterious state that partook of both? Not sleep, for there was +no flutter of breath. Not death - no rigid immobility struck +chill into the air. It was the state of subjection where the +spirit set free lies tranced in the mighty influences which +surround us invisibly until we have entered, though but for a +moment, the Ninth Vibration.</p> + +<p>And now, with these Listeners about us, a clear voice began +and stirred the air with music. I have since been asked in what +tongue it spoke and could only answer that it reached my ears in +the words of my childhood, and that I know whatever that language +had been it would so have reached me.</p> + +<p>"Great Lady, hear the story of this man's fall, for it is the +story of man. Be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them +light."</p> + +<p>There was long since in Ranipur a mighty King and at his birth +the wise men declared that unless he cast aside all passions that +debase the soul, relinquishing the lower desires for the higher +until a Princess laden with great gifts should come to be his +bride, he would experience great and terrible misfortunes. And +his royal parents did what they could to possess him with this +belief, but they died before he reached manhood. Behold him then, +a young King in his palace, surrounded with splendour. How should +he withstand the passionate crying of the flesh or believe that +through pleasure comes satiety and the loss of that in the spirit +whereby alone pleasure can be enjoyed? For his gift was that he +could win all hearts. They swarmed round him like hiving bees and +hovered about him like butterflies. Sometimes he brushed them +off. Often he caressed them, and when this happened, each thought +proudly "I am the Royal Favourite. There is none other than +me."</p> + +<p>Also the Princess delayed who would be the crest-jewel of the +crown, bringing with her all good and the blessing of the High +Gods, and in consequence of all these things the King took such +pleasures as he could, and they were many, not knowing they +darken the inner eye whereby what is royal is known through +disguises.</p> + +<p>(Most pitiful to see, beneath the close-shut lids of the man +at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights, tears forced +themselves, as though a corpse dead to all else lived only to +anguish. They flowed like blood-drops upon his face as he lay +enduring, and the voice proceeded.) What was the charm of the +King? Was it his stately height and strength? Or his faithless +gayety? Or his voice, deep and soft as the sitar when it sings of +love? His women said - some one thing, some another, but none of +these ladies were of royal blood, and therefore they knew +not.</p> + +<p>Now one day, the all-privileged jester of the King, said, +laughing harshly:</p> + +<p>"Maharaj, you divert yourself. But how if, while we feast and +play, the Far Away Princess glided past and was gone, unknown and +unwelcomed?"</p> + +<p>And the King replied:</p> + +<p>"Fool, content yourself. I shall know my Princess, but she +delays so long that I weary.</p> + +<p>Now in a far away country was a Princess, daughter of the +Greatest, and her Father hesitated to give her in marriage to +such a King for all reported that he was faithless of heart, but +having seen his portrait she loved him and fled in disguise from +the palaces of her Father, and being captured she was brought +before the King in Ranipur.</p> + +<p>He sat upon a cloth of gold and about him was the game he had +killed in hunting, in great masses of ruffled fur and plumage, +and he turned the beauty of his face carelessly upon her, and as +the Princess looked upon him, her heart yearned to him, and he +said in his voice that was like the male string of the sitar:</p> + +<p>"Little slave, what is your desire?"</p> + +<p>Then she saw that the long journey had scarred her feet and +dimmed her hair with dust, and that the King's eyes, worn with +days and nights of pleasure did not pierce her disguise. Now in +her land it is a custom that the blood royal must not proclaim +itself, so she folded her hands and said gently:</p> + +<p>"A place in the household of the King." And he, hearing that +the Waiting slave of his chief favorite Jayashri was dead, gave +her that place. So the Princess attended on those ladies, +courteous and obedient to all authority as beseemed her royalty, +and she braided her bright hair so that it hid the little crowns +which the Princesses of her House must wear always in token of +their rank, and every day her patience strengthened.</p> + +<p>Sometimes the King, carelessly desiring her laughing face and +sad eyes, would send for her to wile away an hour, and he would +say; "Dance, little slave, and tell me stories of the far +countries. You quite unlike my Women, doubtless because you are a +slave."</p> + +<p>And she thought - "No, but because I am a Princess," - but +this she did not say. She laughed and told him the most +marvellous stories in the world until he laid his head upon her +warm bosom, dreaming awake.</p> + +<p>There were stories of the great Himalayan solitudes where in +the winter nights the white tiger stares at the witches' dance of +the Northern Lights dazzled by the hurtling of their myriad +spears. And she told how the King-eagle, hanging motionless over +the peaks of Gaurisankar, watches with golden eyes for his prey, +and falling like a plummet strikes its life out with his clawed +heel and, screaming with triumph, bears it to his fierce mate in +her cranny of the rocks.</p> + +<p>"A gallant story!" the King would say. "More!" Then she told +of the tropical heats and the stealthy deadly creatures of forest +and jungle, and the blue lotus of Buddha swaying on the still +lagoon,- And she spoke of loves of men and women, their passion +and pain and joy. And when she told of their fidelity and valour +and honour that death cannot quench, her voice was like the song +of a minstrel, for she had read all the stories of the ages and +the heart of a Princess told her the rest. And the King listened +unwearying though he believed this was but a slave.</p> + +<p>(The face of the man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights +twitched in a white agony. Pearls of sweat were distilled upon +his brows, but he moved neither hand nor foot, enduring as in a +flame of fire. And the voice continued.)</p> + +<p>So one day, in the misty green of the Spring, while she rested +at his feet in the garden Pavilion, he said to her:</p> + +<p>"Little slave, why do you love me?"</p> + +<p>And she answered proudly:</p> + +<p>"Because you have the heart of a King."</p> + +<p>He replied slowly;</p> + +<p>"Of the women who have loved me none gave this reason, though +they gave many."</p> + +<p>She laid her cheek on his hand.</p> + +<p>"That is the true reason."</p> + +<p>But he drew it away and was vaguely troubled, for her words, +he knew not why, reminded him of the Far Away Princess and of +things he had long forgotten, and he said; "What does a slave +know of the hearts of Kings?" And that night he slept or waked +alone.</p> + +<p>Winter was at hand with its blue and cloudless days, and she +was commanded to meet the King where the lake lay still and +shining like an ecstasy of bliss, and she waited with her chin +dropped into the cup of her hands, looking over the water with +eyes that did not see, for her whole soul said; "How long 0 my +Sovereign Lord, how long before you know the truth and we enter +together into our Kingdom?"</p> + +<p>As she sat she heard the King's step, and the colour stole up +into her face in a flush like the earliest sunrise. "He is +coming," she said; and again; "He loves me."</p> + +<p>So he came beside the water, walking slowly. But the King was +not alone. His arm embraced the latest-come beauty from +Samarkhand, and, with his head bent, he whispered in her willing +ear.</p> + +<p>Then clasping her hands, the Princess drew a long sobbing +breath, and he turned and his eyes grew hard as blue steel.</p> + +<p>"Go, slave," he cried. "What place have you in Kings' gardens? +Go. Let me see you no more."</p> + +<p>(The man lying at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights, +raised a heavy arm and flung it above his head, despairing, and +it fell again on the cross of his torment. And the voice went +on.)</p> + +<p>And as he said this, her heart broke; and she went and her +feet were weary. So she took the wise book she loved and unrolled +it until she came to a certain passage, and this she read twice; +"If the heart of a slave be broken it may be mended with jewels +and soft words, but the heart of a Princess can be healed only by +the King who broke it, or in Yamapura, the City under the Sunset +where they make all things new. Now, Yama, the Lord of this City, +is the Lord of Death." And having thus read the Princess rolled +the book and put it from her.</p> + +<p>And next day, the King said to his women; "Send for her," for +his heart smote him and he desired to atone royally for the shame +of his speech. And they sought and came back saying;</p> + +<p>"Maharaj, she is gone. We cannot find her."</p> + +<p>Fear grew in the heart of the King - a nameless dread, and he +said, "Search." And again they sought and returned and the King +was striding up and down the great hall and none dared cross his +path. But, trembling, they told him, and he replied; "Search +again. I will not lose her, and, slave though be, she shall be my +Queen."</p> + +<p>So they ran, dispersing to the Four Quarters, and King strode +up and down the hall, and Loneliness kept step with him and +clasped his hand and looked his eyes.</p> + +<p>Then the youngest of the women entered with a tale to tell. +Majesty, we have found her. She lies beside the lake. When the +birds fled this morning she fled with them, but upon a longer +journey. Even to Yamapura, the City under the Sunset."</p> + +<p>And the King said; "Let none follow." And he strode forth +swiftly, white with thoughts he dared not think.</p> + +<p>The Princess lay among the gold of the fallen leaves. All was +gold, for her bright hair was out-spread in shining waves and in +it shone the glory of the hidden crown. On her face was no smile +- only at last was revealed the patience she had covered with +laughter so long that even the voice of the King could not now +break it into joy. The hands that had clung, the swift feet that +had run beside his, the tender body, mighty to serve and to love, +lay within touch but farther away than the uttermost star was the +Far Away Princess, known and loved too late.</p> + +<p>And he said; "My Princess - 0 my Princess!" and laid his head +on her cold bosom.</p> + +<p>"Too late!" a harsh Voice croaked beside him, and it was the +voice of the Jester who mocks at all things. "Too late! 0 +madness, to despise the blood royal because it humbled itself to +service and so was doubly royal. The Far Away Princess came laden +with great gifts, and to her the King's gift was the wage of a +slave and a broken heart. Cast your crown and sceptre in the +dust, 0 King - 0 King of Fools."</p> + +<p>(The man at the feet of the Dweller in the Heights moved. Some +dim word shaped upon his locked lips. She listened in a divine +calm. It seemed that the very Gods drew nearer. Again the man +essayed speech, the body dead, life only in the words that none +could hear. The voice went on.)</p> + +<p>But the Princess flying wearily because of the sore wound in +her heart, came at last to the City under the Sunset, where the +Lord of Death rules in the House of Quiet, and was there received +with royal honours for in that land are no disguises. And she +knelt before the Secret One and in a voice broken with agony +entreated him to heal her. And with veiled and pitying eyes he +looked upon her, for many and grievous as are the wounds he has +healed this was more grievous still. And he said;</p> + +<p>"Princess, I cannot, But this I can do - I can give a new +heart in a new birth - happy and careless as the heart of a +child. Take this escape from the anguish you endure and be at +peace."</p> + +<p>But the Princess, white with pain, asked only;</p> + +<p>"In this new heart and birth, is there room for the King?"</p> + +<p>And the Lord of Peace replied;</p> + +<p>"None. He too will be forgotten."</p> + +<p>Then she rose to her feet.</p> + +<p>"I will endure and when he comes I will serve him once more. +If he will he shall heal me, and if not I will endure for +ever."</p> + +<p>And He who is veiled replied;</p> + +<p>"In this sacred City no pain may disturb the air, therefore +you must wait outside in the chill and the dark. Think better, +Princess! Also, he must pass through many rebirths, because he +beheld the face of Beauty unveiled and knew her not. And when he +comes he will be weary and weak as a new-born child, and no more +a great King." And the Princess smiled;</p> + +<p>"Then he will need me the more," she said; "I will wait and +kiss the feet of my King."</p> + +<p>And the Lord of Death was silent. So she went outside into the +darkness of the spaces, and the souls free passed her like homing +doves, and she sat with her hands clasped over the sore wound in +her heart, watching the earthward way. And the Princess is +keeping still the day of her long patience."</p> + +<p>The voice ceased. And there was a great silence, and the +listening faces drew nearer.</p> + +<p>Then the Dweller in the Heights spoke in a voice soft as the +falling of snow in the quiet of frost and moon. I could have wept +myself blind with joy to hear that music. More I dare not +say.</p> + +<p>"He is in the Lower State of Perception. He sorrows for his +loss. Let him have one instant's light that still he may +hope."</p> + +<p>She bowed above the man, gazing upon him as a mother might +upon her sleeping child. The dead eyelids stirred, lifted, a +faint gleam showed beneath them, an unspeakable weariness. I +thought they would fall unsatisfied. Suddenly he saw What looked +upon him, and a terror of joy no tongue can tell flashed over the +dark mirror of his face. He stretched a faint hand to touch her +feet, a sobbing sigh died upon his lips, and once more the +swooning sleep took him. He lay as a dead man before the +Assembly.</p> + +<p>"The night is far spent," a voice said, from I know not where. +And I knew it was said not only for the sleeper but for all, for +though the flying feet of Beauty seem for a moment to outspeed us +she will one day wait our coming and gather us to her bosom.</p> + +<p>As before, the vision spread outward like rings in a broken +reflection in water. I saw the girl beside me, but her hand grew +light in mine. I felt it no longer. I heard the roaring wind in +the trees, or was it a great voice thundering in my ears? Sleep +took me. I waked in my little room.</p> + +<p>Strange and sad - I saw her next day and did not remember her +whom of all things I desired to know. I remembered the vision and +knew that whether in dream or waking I had heard an eternal +truth. I longed with a great longing to meet my beautiful +companion, and she stood at my side and I was blind.</p> + +<p>Now that I have climbed a little higher on the Mount of Vision +it seems even to myself that this could not be. Yet it was, and +it is true of not this only but of how much else!</p> + +<p>She knew me. I learnt that later, but she made no sign. Her +simplicities had carried her far beyond and above me, to places +where only the winged things attain- "as a bird among the +bird-droves of God."</p> + +<p>I have since known that this power of direct simplicity in her +was why among the great mountains we beheld the Divine as the +emanation of the terrible beauty about us. We cannot see it as it +is - only in some shadowing forth, gathering sufficient strength +for manifestation from the spiritual atoms that haunt the region +where that form has been for ages the accepted vehicle of +adoration. But I was now to set forth to find another knowledge - +to seek the Beauty that blinds us to all other. Next day the man +who was directing my preparations for travel sent me word from +Simla that all was ready and I could start two days later. I told +my friends the time of parting was near.</p> + +<p>"But it was no surprise to me," I added, "for I had heard +already that in a very few days I should be on my way.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Ingmar was more than kind. She laid a frail hand on +mine.</p> + +<p>"We shall miss you indeed. If it is possible to send us word +of your adventures in those wild solitudes I hope you will do it. +Of course aviation will soon lay bare their secrets and leave +them no mysteries, so you don't go too soon. One may worship +science and yet feel it injures the beauty of the world. But what +is beauty compared with knowledge?"</p> + +<p>"Do you never regret it?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"Never, dear Mr. Ormond. I am a worshipper of hard facts and +however hideous they may be I prefer them to the prismatic +colours of romance."</p> + +<p>Brynhild, smiling, quoted;</p> + +<p>"Their science roamed from star to star And than itself found +nothing greater. What wonder? In a Leyden jar They bottled the +Creator?"</p> + +<p>"There is nothing greater than science," said Mrs. Ingmar with +soft reverence. "The mind of man is the foot-rule of the +universe."</p> + +<p>She meditated for a moment and then added that my kind +interests in their plans decided her to tell me that she would be +returning to Europe and then to Canada in a few months with a +favourite niece as her companion while Brynhild would remain in +India with friends in Mooltan for a time. I looked eagerly at her +but she was lost in her own thoughts and it was evidently not the +time to say more.</p> + +<p>If I had hoped for a vision before I left the neighbourhood of +that strange House of Beauty where a spirit imprisoned appeared +to await the day of enlightenment I was disappointed. These +things do not happen as one expects or would choose. The wind +bloweth where it listeth until the laws which govern the inner +life are understood, and then we would not choose if we could for +we know that all is better than well. In this world, either in +the blinded sight of daily life or in the clarity of the true +sight I have not since seen it, but that has mattered little, for +having heard an authentic word within its walls I have passed on +my way elsewhere.</p> + +<p>Next day a letter from Olesen reached me.</p> + +<p>"Dear Ormond, I hope you have had a good time at the House in +the Woods. I saw Rup Singh a few days ago and he wrote the odd +message I enclose. You know what these natives are, even the most +sensible of them, and you will humour the old fellow for he ages +very fast and I think is breaking up. But this was not what I +wanted to say. I had a letter from a man I had not seen for years +- a fellow called Stephen Clifden, who lives in Kashmir. As a +matter of fact I had forgotten his existence but evidently he has +not repaid the compliment for he writes as follows - No, I had +better send you the note and you can do as you please. I am +rushed off my legs with work and the heat is hell with the lid +off. And-"</p> + +<p>But the rest was of no interest except to a friend of years' +standing. I read Rup Singh's message first. It was written in his +own tongue.</p> + +<p>"To the Honoured One who has attained to the favour of the +Favourable.</p> + +<p>"You have with open eyes seen what this humble one has dreamed +but has not known. If the thing be possible, write me this word +that I may depart in peace. 'With that one who in a former birth +you loved all is well. Fear nothing for him. The way is long but +at the end the lamps of love are lit and the Unstruck music is +sounded. He lies at the feet of Mercy and there awaits his hour.' +And if it be not possible to write these words, write nothing, 0 +Honoured, for though it be in the hells my soul shall find my +King, and again I shall serve him as once I served."</p> + +<p>I understood, and wrote those words as he had written them. +Strange mystery of life - that I who had not known should see, +and that this man whose fidelity had not deserted his broken King +in his utter downfall should have sought with passion for one +sight of the beloved face across the waters of death and sought +in vain. I thought of those Buddhist words of Seneca - "The soul +may be and is in the mass of men drugged and silenced by the +seductions of sense and the deceptions of the world. But if, in +some moment of detachment and elation, when its captors and +jailors relax their guard, it can escape their clutches, it will +seek at once the region of its birth and its true home."</p> + +<p>Well - the shell must break before the bird can fly, and the +time drew near for the faithful servant to seek his lord. My +message reached him in time and gladdened him.</p> + +<p>I turned then to Clifden's letter.</p> + +<p>"Dear Olesen, you will have forgotten me, and feeling sure of +this I should scarcely have intruded a letter into your busy life +were it not that I remember your good-nature as a thing +unforgettable though so many years have gone by. I hear of you +sometimes when Sleigh comes up the Sind valley, for I often camp +at Sonamarg and above the Zoji La and farther. I want you to give +a message to a man you know who should be expecting to hear from +me. Tell him I shall be at the Tashigong Monastery when he +reaches Gyumur beyond the Shipki. Tell him I have the information +he wants and I will willingly go on with him to Yarkhand and his +destination. He need not arrange for men beyond Gyumur. All is +fixed. So sorry to bother you, old man, but I don't know Ormond's +address, except that he was with you and has gone up Simla way. +And of course he will be keen to hear the thing is settled."</p> + +<p>Amazing. I remembered the message I had heard and this man's +words rang true and kindly, but what could it mean? I really did +not question farther than this for now I could not doubt that I +was guided. Stronger hands than mine had me in charge, and it +only remained for me to set forth in confidence and joy to an end +that as yet I could not discern. I turned my face gladly to the +wonder of the mountains.</p> + +<p>Gladly - but with a reservation. I was leaving a friend and +one whom I dimly felt might one day be more than a friend - +Brynhild Ingmar. That problem must be met before I could take my +way. I thought much of what might be said at parting. True, she +had the deepest attraction for me, but true also that I now +beheld a quest stretching out into the unknown which I must +accept in the spirit of the knight errant. Dare I then bind my +heart to any allegiance which would pledge me to a future +inconsistent with what lay before me? How could I tell what she +might think of the things which to me were now real and external +- the revelation of the only reality that underlies all the +seeming. Life can never be the same for the man who has +penetrated to this, and though it may seem a hard saying there +can be but a maimed understanding between him and those who still +walk amid the phantoms of death and decay.</p> + +<p>Her sympathy with nature was deep and wonderful but might it +not be that though the earth was eloquent to her the skies were +silent? I was but a beginner myself - I knew little indeed. Dare +I risk that little in a sweet companionship which would sink me +into the contentment of the life lived by the happily deluded +between the cradle and the grave and perhaps close to me for ever +that still sphere where my highest hope abides? I had much to +ponder, for how could I lose her out of my life - though I knew +not at all whether she who had so much to make her happiness +would give me a single thought when I was gone.</p> + +<p>If all this seem the very uttermost of selfish vanity, forgive +a man who grasped in his hand a treasure so new, so wonderful +that he walked in fear and doubt lest it should slip away and +leave him in a world darkened for ever by the torment of the +knowledge that it might have been his and he had bartered it for +the mess of pottage that has bought so many birthrights since +Jacob bargained with his weary brother in the tents of Lahai-roi. +I thought I would come back later with my prize gained and +throwing it at her feet ask her wisdom in return, for whatever I +might not know I knew well she was wiser than I except in that +one shining of the light from Eleusis. I walked alone in the +woods thinking of these things and no answer satisfied me.</p> + +<p>I did not see her alone until the day I left, for I was +compelled by the arrangements I was making to go down to Simla +for a night. And now the last morning had come with golden sun - +shot mists rolling upward to disclose the far white billows of +the sea of eternity, the mountains awaking to their enormous +joys. The trees were dripping glory to the steaming earth; it +flowed like rivers into their most secret recesses, moss and +flower, fern and leaf floated upon the waves of light revealing +their inmost soul in triumphant gladness. Far off across the +valleys a cuckoo was calling - the very voice of spring, and in +the green world above my head a bird sang, a feathered joy, so +clear, so passionate that I thought the great summer morning +listened in silence to his rapture ringing through the woods. I +waited until the Jubilate was ended and then went in to bid +good-bye to my friends.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Ingmar bid me the kindest farewell and I left her serene +in the negation of all beauty, all hope save that of a world run +on the lines of a model municipality, disease a memory, sewerage, +light and air systems perfected, the charted brain sending its +costless messages to the outer parts of the habitable globe, and +at least a hundred years of life with a decent cremation at the +end of it assured to every eugenically born citizen. No more. But +I have long ceased to regret that others use their own eyes +whether clear or dim. Better the merest glimmer of light +perceived thus than the hearsay of the revelations of others. And +by the broken fragments of a bewildered hope a man shall +eventually reach the goal and rejoice in that dawn where the +morning stars sing together and the sons of God shout for joy. It +must come, for it is already here.</p> + +<p>Brynhild walked with me through the long glades in the fresh +thin air to the bridle road where my men and ponies waited, eager +to be off. We stood at last in the fringe of trees on a small +height which commanded the way; - a high uplifted path cut along +the shoulders of the hills and on the left the sheer drop of the +valleys. Perhaps seven or eight feet in width and dignified by +the name of the Great Hindustan and Tibet Road it ran winding far +away into Wonderland. Looking down into the valleys, so far +beneath that the solitudes seem to wall them in I thought of all +the strange caravans which have taken this way with tinkle of +bells and laughter now so long silenced, and as I looked I saw a +lost little monastery in a giant crevice, solitary as a planet on +the outermost ring of the system, and remembrance flashed into my +mind and I said;</p> + +<p>"I have marching orders that have countermanded my own plans. +I am to journey to the Buddhist Monastery of Tashigong, and there +meet a friend who will tell me what is necessary that I may +travel to Yarkhand and beyond. It will be long before I see +Kashmir."</p> + +<p>In those crystal clear eyes I saw a something new to me - a +faint smile, half pitying, half sad;</p> + +<p>"Who told you, and where?"</p> + +<p>"A girl in a strange place. A woman who has twice guided me +-"</p> + +<p>I broke off. Her smile perplexed me. I could not tell what to +say. She repeated in a soft undertone;</p> + +<p>"Great Lady, be pitiful to the blind eyes and give them +light."</p> + +<p>And instantly I knew. 0 blind - blind! Was the unhappy King of +the story duller of heart than I? And shame possessed me. Here +was the chrysoberyl that all day hides its secret in deeps of +lucid green but when the night comes flames with its fiery +ecstasy of crimson to the moon, and I - I had been complacently +considering whether I might not blunt my own spiritual instinct +by companionship with her, while she had been my guide, as +infinitely beyond me in insight as she was in all things +beautiful. I could have kissed her feet in my deep repentance. +True it is that the gateway of the high places is reverence and +he who cannot bow his head shall receive no crown. I saw that my +long travel in search of knowledge would have been utterly vain +if I had not learnt that lesson there and then. In those moments +of silence I learnt it once and for ever.</p> + +<p>She stood by me breathing the liquid morning air, her face +turned upon the eternal snows. I caught her hand in a recognition +that might have ended years of parting, and its warm youth +vibrated in mine, the foretaste of all understanding, all unions, +of love that asks nothing, that fears nothing, that has no +petition to make. She raised her eyes to mine and her tears were +a rainbow of hope. So we stood in silence that was more than any +words, and the golden moments went by. I knew her now for what +she was, one of whom it might have been written;</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>"I come from where night falls clearer</p> + +<p>Than your morning sun can rise;</p> + +<p>From an earth that to heaven draws nearer</p> + +<p>Than your visions of Paradise,-</p> + +<p>For the dreams that your dreamers dream</p> + +<p>We behold them with open eyes."</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>With open eyes! Later I asked the nature of the strange bond +that had called her to my side.</p> + +<p>"I do not understand that fully myself," she said - "That is +part of the knowledge we must wait for. But you have the eyes +that see, and that is a tie nothing can break. I had waited long +in the House of Beauty for you. I guided you there. But between +you and me there is also love."</p> + +<p>I stretched an eager hand but she repelled it gently, drawing +back a little. "Not love of each other though we are friends and +in the future may be infinitely more. But - have you ever seen a +drawing of Blake's - a young man stretching his arms to a white +swan which flies from him on wings he cannot stay? That is the +story of both our lives. We long to be joined in this life, here +and now, to an unspeakable beauty and power whose true believers +we are because we have seen and known. There is no love so +binding as the same purpose. Perhaps that is the only true love. +And so we shall never be apart though we may never in this world +be together again in what is called companionship."</p> + +<p>"We shall meet," I said confidently. She smiled and was +silent.</p> + +<p>"Do we follow a will-o'-the wisp in parting? Do we give up the +substance for the shadow? Shall I stay?"</p> + +<p>She laughed joyously;</p> + +<p>"We give a single rose for a rose-tree that bears seven times +seven. Daily I see more, and you are going where you will be +instructed. As you know my mother prefers for a time to have my +cousin with her to help her with the book she means to write. So +I shall have time to myself. What do you think I shall do?"</p> + +<p>"Blow away on a great wind. Ride on the crests of tossing +waves. Catch a star to light the fireflies!"</p> + +<p>She laughed like a bird's song.</p> + +<p>"Wrong - wrong! I shall be a student. All I know as yet has +come to me by intuition, but there is Law as well as Love and I +will learn. I have drifted like a happy cloud before the wind. +Now I will learn to be the wind that blows the clouds."</p> + +<p>I looked at her in astonishment. If a flower had desired the +same thing it could scarcely have seemed more incredible, for I +had thought her whole life and nature instinctive not +intellective. She smiled as one who has a beloved secret to +keep.</p> + +<p>"When you have gained what in this country they call The +Knowledge of Regeneration, come back and ask me what I have +learnt."</p> + +<p>She would say no more of that and turned to another matter, +speaking with earnestness;</p> + +<p>"Before you came here I had a message for you, and Stephen +Clifden will tell you the same thing when you meet. Believe it +for it is true. Remember always that the psychical is not the +mystical and that what we seek is not marvel but vision. These +two things are very far apart, so let the first with all its +dangers pass you by, for our way lies to the heights, and for us +there is only one danger - that of turning back and losing what +the whole world cannot give in exchange. I have never seen +Stephen Clifden but I know much of him. He is a safe guide - a +man who has had much and strange sorrow which has brought him joy +that cannot be told. He will take you to those who know the +things that you desire. I wish I might have gone too."</p> + +<p>Something in the sweetness of her voice, its high passion, the +strong beauty of her presence woke a poignant longing in my +heart. I said;</p> + +<p>"I cannot leave you. You are the only guide I can follow. Let +us search together - you always on before."</p> + +<p>"Your way lies there," she pointed to the high mountains. "And +mine to the plains, and if we chose our own we should wander. But +we shall meet again in the way and time that will be best and +with knowledge so enlarged that what we have seen already will be +like an empty dream compared to daylight truth. If you knew what +waits for you you would not delay one moment."</p> + +<p>She stood radiant beneath the deodars, a figure of Hope, +pointing steadily to the heights. I knew her words were true +though as yet I could not tell how. I knew that whereas we had +seen the Wonderful in beautiful though local forms there is a +plane where the Formless may be apprehended in clear dream and +solemn vision-the meeting of spirit with Spirit. What that +revelation would mean I could not guess - how should I? - but I +knew the illusion we call death and decay would wither before it. +There is a music above and beyond the Ninth Vibration though I +must love those words for ever for what their hidden meaning gave +me.</p> + +<p>I took her hand and held it. Strange - beyond all strangeness +that that story of an ancient sorrow should have made us what we +were to each other - should have opened to me the gates of that +Country where she wandered content. For the first time I had +realized in its fulness the loveliness of this crystal nature, +clear as flowing water to receive and transmit the light - itself +a prophecy and fulfilment of some higher race which will one day +inhabit our world when it has learnt the true values. She drew a +flower from her breast and gave it to me. It lies before me white +and living as I write these words.</p> + +<p>I sprang down the road and mounted, giving the word to march. +The men shouted and strode on - our faces to the Shipki Pass and +what lay beyond.</p> + +<p>We had parted.</p> + +<p>Once, twice, I looked back, and standing in full sunlight, she +waved her hand.</p> + +<p>We turned the angle of the rocks.</p> + +<p>What I found - what she found is a story strange and beautiful +which I may tell one day to those who care to hear. That for me +there were pauses, hesitancies, dreads, on the way I am not +concerned to deny, for so it must always be with the roots of the +old beliefs of fear and ignorance buried in the soil of our +hearts and ready to throw out their poisonous fibres. But there +was never doubt. For myself I have long forgotten the meaning of +that word in anything that is of real value.</p> + +<p>Do not let it be thought that the treasure is reserved for the +few or those of special gifts. And it is as free to the West as +to the East though I own it lies nearer to the surface in the +Orient where the spiritual genius of the people makes it possible +and the greater and more faithful teachers are found. It is not +without meaning that all the faiths of the world have dawned in +those sunrise skies. Yet it is within reach of all and asks only +recognition, for the universe has been the mine of its +jewels-</p> + +<p>"Median gold it holds, and silver from Atropatene, Ruby and +emerald from Hindustan, and Bactrian agate, Bright with beryl and +pearl, sardonyx and sapphire."-</p> + +<p>-and more that cannot be uttered - the Lights and +Perfections.</p> + +<p>So for all seekers I pray this prayer - beautiful in its +sonorous Latin, but noble in all the tongues;</p> + +<p>"Supplico tibi, Pater et Dux - I pray Thee, Guide of our +vision, that we may remember the nobleness with which Thou hast +endowed us, and that Thou wouldest be always on our right and on +our left in the motion of our wills, that we may be purged from +the contagion of the body and the affections of the brute and +overcome and rule them. And I pray also that Thou wouldest drive +away the blinding darkness from the eyes of our souls that we may +know well what is to be held for divine and what for mortal."</p> + +<p>"The nobleness with which Thou hast endowed us-" this, and not +the cry of the miserable sinner whose very repentance is no +virtue but the consequence of failure and weakness is the strong +music to which we must march.</p> + +<p>And the way is open to the mountains.</p> + +<p></p> + +<h2 align="center">THE INTERPRETER A ROMANCE OF THE EAST</h2> + +<p></p> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>There are strange things in this story, but, so far as I +understand them, I tell the truth. If you measure the East with a +Western foot-rule you will say, "Impossible." I should have said +it myself.</p> + +<p>Of myself I will say as little as I can, for this story is of +Vanna Loring. I am an incident only, though I did not know that +at first.</p> + +<p>My name is Stephen Clifden, and I was eight-and-thirty; plenty +of money, sound in wind and limb. I had been by way of being a +writer before the war, the hobby of a rich man; but if I picked +up anything in the welter in France, it was that real work is the +only salvation this mad world has to offer; so I meant to begin +at the beginning, and learn my trade like a journeyman labourer. +I had come to the right place. A very wonderful city is Peshawar +- rather let us say, two cities - the compounds, the +fortifications where Europeans dwell in such peace as their +strong right arms can secure them; and the native city and bazaar +humming and buzzing like a hive of angry bees with the rumours +that come up from Lower India or down the Khyber Pass with the +camel caravans loaded with merchandise from Afghanistan, Bokhara, +and farther. And it is because of this that Peshawar is the Key +of India, and a city of Romance that stands at every corner, and +cries aloud in the market - place. For at Peshawar every +able-bodied man sleeps with his revolver under his pillow, and +the old Fort is always ready in case it should be necessary at +brief and sharp notice to hurry the women and children into it, +and possibly, to die in their defense. So enlivening is the +neighbourhood of the frontier tribes that haunt the famous Khyber +Pass and the menacing hills where danger is always lurking.</p> + +<p>But there was society here, and I was swept into it - there +was chatter, and it galled me.</p> + +<p>I was beginning to feel that I had missed my mark, and must go +farther afield, perhaps up into Central Asia, when I met Vanna +Loring. If I say that her hair was soft and dark; that she had +the deepest hazel eyes I have ever seen, and a sensitive, tender +mouth; that she moved with a flowing grace like "a wave of the +sea - it sounds like the portrait of a beauty, and she was never +that. Also, incidentally, it gives none of her charm. I never +heard any one get any further than that she was "oddly +attractive" - let us leave it at that. She was certainly +attractive to me.</p> + +<p>She was the governess of little Winifred Meryon, whose father +held the august position of General Commanding the Frontier +Forces, and her mother the more commanding position of the +reigning beauty of Northern India, generally speaking. No one +disputed that. She was as pretty as a picture, and her charming +photograph had graced as many illustrated papers as there were +illustrated papers to grace.</p> + +<p>But Vanna - I gleaned her story by bits when I came across her +with the child in the gardens. I was beginning to piece it +together now.</p> + +<p>Her love of the strange and beautiful she had inherited from a +young Italian mother, daughter of a political refugee; her +childhood had been spent in a remote little village in the West +of England; half reluctantly she told me how she had brought +herself up after her mother's death and her father's second +marriage. Little was said of that, but I gathered that it had +been a grief to her, a factor in her flight to the East.</p> + +<p>We were walking in the Circular Road then with Winifred in +front leading her Pekingese by its blue ribbon, and we had it +almost to ourselves except for a few natives passing slow and +dignified on their own occasions, for fashionable Peshawar was +finishing its last rubber of bridge, before separating to dress +for dinner, and had no time to spare for trivialities and +sunsets.</p> + +<p>"So when I came to three-and-twenty," she said slowly, "I felt +I must break away from our narrow life. I had a call to India +stronger than anything on earth. You would not understand but +that was so, and I had spent every spare moment in teaching +myself India - its history, legends, religions, everything! And I +was not wanted at home, and I had grown afraid."</p> + +<p>I could divine years of patience and repression under this +plain tale, but also a power that would be dynamic when the +authentic voice called. That was her charm - gentleness in +strength - a sweet serenity.</p> + +<p>"What were you afraid of?"</p> + +<p>"Of growing old and missing what was waiting for me out here. +But I could not get away like other people. No money, you see. So +I thought I would come out here and teach. Dare I? Would they let +me? I knew I was fighting life and chances and risks if I did it; +but it was death if I stayed there. And then- Do you really care +to hear?"</p> + +<p>"Of course. Tell me how you broke your chain."</p> + +<p>"I spare you the family quarrels. I can never go back. But I +was spurred - spurred to take some wild leap; and I took it. Six +years ago I came out. First I went to a doctor and his wife at +Cawnpore. They had a wonderful knowledge of the Indian peoples, +and there I learned Hindustani and much else. Then he died. But +an aunt had left me two hundred pounds, and I could wait a little +and choose; and so I came here."</p> + +<p>It interested me. The courage that pale elastic type of woman +has!</p> + +<p>"Have you ever regretted it? Would they take you back if you +failed?"</p> + +<p>"Never, to both questions," she said, smiling. "Life is +glorious. I've drunk of a cup I never thought to taste; and if I +died tomorrow I should know I had done right. I rejoice in every +moment I live - even when Winifred and I are wrestling with +arithmetic."</p> + +<p>"I shouldn't have thought life was very easy with Lady +Meryon."</p> + +<p>"Oh, she is kind enough in an indifferent sort of way. I am +not the persecuted Jane Eyre sort of governess at all. But that +is all on the surface and does not matter. It is India I care for +-the people, the sun, the infinite beauty. It was coming home. +You would laugh if I told you I knew Peshawar long before I came +here. Knew it - walked here, lived. Before there were English in +India at all." She broke off. "You won't understand."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I have had that feeling, too," I said patronizingly. "If +one has read very much about a place-"</p> + +<p>"That was not quite what I meant. Never mind. The people, the +place - that is the real thing to me. All this is the dream." The +sweep of her hand took in not only Winifred and myself, but the +general's stately residence, which to blaspheme in Peshawar is +rank infidelity.</p> + +<p>"By George, I would give thousands to feel that! I can't get +out of Europe here. I want to write, Miss Loring," I found myself +saying. "I'd done a bit, and then the war came and blew my life +to pieces. Now I want to get inside the skin of the East, and I +can't do it. I see it from outside, with a pane of glass between. +No life in it. If you feel as you say, for God's sake be my +interpreter!"</p> + +<p>I really meant what I said. I knew she was a harp that any +breeze would sweep into music. I divined that temperament in her +and proposed to use it for my own ends. She had and I had not, +the power to be a part of all she saw, to feel kindred blood +running in her own veins. To the average European the native life +of India is scarcely interesting, so far is it removed from all +comprehension. To me it was interesting, but I could not tell +why. I stood outside and had not the fairy gold to pay for my +entrance. Here at all events she could buy her way where I could +not. Without cruelty, which honestly was not my besetting sin - +especially where women were concerned, the egoist in me felt I +would use her, would extract the last drop of the enchantment of +her knowledge before I went on my way. What more natural than +that Vanna or any other woman should minister to my thirst for +information? Men are like that. I pretend to be no better than +the rest. She pleased my fastidiousness - that fastidiousness +which is the only austerity in men not otherwise austere.</p> + +<p>"Interpret?" she said, looking at me with clear hazel eyes; +"how could I? You were in the native city yesterday. What did you +miss?"</p> + +<p>"Everything! I saw masses of colour, light, movement. +Brilliantly picturesque people. Children like Asiatic angels. +Magnificently scowling ruffians in sheepskin coats. In fact, a +movie staged for my benefit. I was afraid they would ring down +the curtain before I had had enough. It had no meaning. When I +got back to my diggings I tried to put down what I had just seen, +and I swear there's more inspiration in the guide-book."</p> + +<p>"Did you go alone?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I certainly would not go sight-seeing with the Meryon +crowd. Tell me what you felt when you saw it first."</p> + +<p>"I went with Sir John's uncle. He was a great traveler. The +colour struck me dumb. It flames - it sings. Think of the grey +pinched life in the West! I saw a grave dark potter turning his +wheel, while his little girl stood by, glad at our pleasure, her +head veiled like a miniature woman, tiny baggy trousers, and a +silver nose-stud, like a star, in one delicate nostril. In her +thin arms she held a heavy baby in a gilt cap, like a monkey. And +the wheel turned and whirled until it seemed to be spinning +dreams, thick as motes in the sun. The clay rose in smooth +spirals under his hand, and the wheel sang, 'Shall the vessel +reprove him who made one to honour and one to dishonour?' And I +saw the potter thumping his wet clay, and the clay, plastic as +dream-stuff, shaped swift as light, and the three Fates stood at +his shoul- der. Dreams, dreams, and all in the spinning of the +wheel, and the rich shadows of the old broken courtyard where he +sat. And the wheel stopped and the thread broke, and the little +new shapes he had made stood all about him, and he was only a +potter in Peshawar."</p> + +<p>Her voice was like a song. She had utterly forgotten my +existence. I did not dislike it at the moment, for I wanted to +hear more, and the impersonal is the rarest gift a woman can give +a man.</p> + +<p>"Did you buy anything?"</p> + +<p>"He gave me a gift - a flawed jar of turquoise blue, faint +turquoise green round the lip. He saw I understood. And then I +bought a little gold cap and a wooden box of jade-green Kabul +grapes. About a rupee, all told. But it was Eastern merchandise, +and I was trading from Balsora and Baghdad, and Eleazar's camels +were swaying down from Damascus along the Khyber Pass, and coming +in at the great Darwazah, and friends' eyes met me everywhere. I +am profoundly happy here."</p> + +<p>The sinking sun lit an almost ecstatic face.</p> + +<p>I envied her more deeply than I had ever envied any one. She +had the secret of immortal youth, and I felt old as I looked at +her. One might be eighty and share that passionate impersonal +joy. Age could not wither nor custom stale the infinite variety +of her world's joys. She had a child's dewy youth in her +eyes.</p> + +<p>There are great sunsets at Peshawar, flaming over the plain, +dying in melancholy splendour over the dangerous hills. They too +were hers, in a sense in which they could never be mine. But what +a companion! To my astonishment a wild thought of marriage +flashed across me, to be instantly rebuffed with a shrug. +Marriage - that one's wife might talk poetry to one about the +East! Absurd! But what was it these people felt and I could not +feel? Almost, shut up in the prison of self, I knew what Vanna +had felt in her village - a maddening desire to escape, to be a +part of the loveliness that lay beyond me. So might a man love a +king's daughter in her hopeless heights.</p> + +<p>"It may be very beautiful on the surface," I said morosely; +"but there's a lot of misery below - hateful, they tell me."</p> + +<p>"Of course. We shall get to work one day. But look at the +sunset. It opens like a mysterious flower. I must take Winifred +home now."</p> + +<p>"One moment," I pleaded; "I can only see it through your eyes. +I feel it while you speak, and then the good minute goes."</p> + +<p>She laughed.</p> + +<p>"And so must I. Come, Winifred. Look, there's an owl; not like +the owls in the summer dark in England-</p> + +<p>"Lovely are the curves of the white owl sweeping, Wavy in the +dark, lit by one low star."</p> + +<p>Suddenly she turned again and looked at me half wistfully.</p> + +<p>"It is good to talk to you. You want to know. You are so near +it all. I wish I could help you; I am so exquisitely happy +myself."</p> + +<p>My writing was at a standstill. It seemed the groping of a +blind man in a radiant world. Once perhaps I had felt that life +was good in itself - when the guns came thundering toward the +Vimy Ridge in a mad gallop of horses, and men shouting and +swearing and frantically urging them on. Then, riding for more +than life, I had tasted life for an instant. Not before or since. +But this woman had the secret.</p> + +<p>Lady Meryon, with her escort of girls and subalterns, came +daintily past the hotel compound, and startled me from my +brooding with her pretty silvery voice.</p> + +<p>"Dreaming, Mr. Clifden? It isn't at all wholesome to dream in +the East. Come and dine with us tomorrow. A tiny dance +afterwards, you know; or bridge for those who like it."</p> + +<p>I had not the faintest notion whether governesses dined with +the family or came in afterward with the coffee; but it was a +sporting chance, and I took it.</p> + +<p>Then Sir John came up and joined us.</p> + +<p>"You can't well dance tomorrow, Kitty," he said to his wife. +"There's been an outpost affair in the Swat Hills, and young +Fitzgerald has been shot. Come to dinner of course, Clifden. Glad +to see you. But no dancing, I think."</p> + +<p>Kitty Meryon's mouth drooped like a pouting child's. Was it +for the lost dance, or the lost soldier lying out on the hills in +the dying sunset. Who could tell? In either case it was pretty +enough for the illustrated papers.</p> + +<p>"How sad! Such a dear boy. We shall miss him at tennis." Then +brightly; "Well, we'll have to put the dance off for a week, but +come tomorrow anyhow."</p> + +<p></p> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>Next evening I went into Lady Meryon's flower-scented +drawing-room. The electric fans were fluttering and the evening +air was cool. Five or six pretty girls and as many men made up +the party - Kitty Meryon the prettiest of them all, fashionably +undressed in faint pink and crystal, with a charming smile in +readiness, all her gay little flags flying in the rich man's +honour. I am no vainer than other men, but I saw that. Whatever +her charm might be it was none for me. What could I say to +interest her who lived in her foolish little world as one shut in +a bright bubble? And she had said the wrong word about young +Fitzgerald - I wanted Vanna, with her deep seeing eyes, to say +the right one and adjust those cruel values.</p> + +<p>Governesses dine, it appeared, only to fill an unexpected +place, or make a decorous entry afterward, to play +accompaniments. Fortunately Kitty Meryon sang, in a pinched +little soprano, not nearly so pretty as her silver ripple of +talk.</p> + +<p>It was when the party had settled down to bridge and I was +standing out, that I ventured to go up to her as she sat knitting +by a window - not unwatched by the quick flash of Lady Meryon's +eyes as I did it.</p> + +<p>"I think you hypnotize me, Miss Loring. When I hear anything I +straightway want to know what you will say. Have you heard of +Fitzgerald's death?"</p> + +<p>"That is why we are not dancing tonight. Tomorrow the cable +will reach his home in England. He was an only child, and they +are the great people of the village where we are the little +people. I knew his mother as one knows a great lady who is kind +to all the village folk. It may kill her. It is travelling +tonight like a bullet to her heart, and she does not know."</p> + +<p>"His father?"</p> + +<p>"A brave man - a soldier himself. He will know it was a good +death and that Harry would not fail. He did not at Ypres. He +would not here. But all joy and hope will be dead in that house +tomorrow."</p> + +<p>"And what do you think?"</p> + +<p>"I am not sorry for Harry, if you mean that. He knew - we all +know - that he was on guard here holding the outposts against +blood and treachery and terrible things - playing the Great Game. +One never loses at that game if one plays it straight, and I am +sure that at the last it was joy he felt and not fear. He has not +lost. Did you notice in the church a niche before every soldier's +seat to hold his loaded gun? And the tablets on the walls; +"Killed at Kabul River, aged 22." - "Killed on outpost duty." - +"Murdered by an Afghan fanatic." This will be one memory more. +Why be sorry."</p> + +<p>Presently:-</p> + +<p>"I am going up to the hills tomorrow, to the Malakhand Fort, +with Mrs. Delany, Lady Meryon's aunt, and we shall see the +wonderful Tahkt-i-Bahi Monastery on the way. You should do that +run before you go. The fort is the last but one on the way to +Chitral, and beyond that the road is so beset that only soldiers +may go farther, and indeed the regiments escort each other up and +down. But it is an early start, for we must be back in Peshawar +at six for fear of raiding natives."</p> + +<p>"I know; they hauled me up in the dusk the other day, and told +me I should be swept off to the hills if I fooled about after +dusk. But I say - is it safe for you to go? You ought to have a +man. Could I go too?"</p> + +<p>I thought she did not look enthusiastic at the proposal.</p> + +<p>"Ask. You know I settle nothing. I go where I am sent." She +said it with the happiest smile. I knew they could send her +nowhere that she would not find joy. I thought her mere presence +must send the vibrations of happiness through the household. Yet +again - why? For where there is no receiver the current speaks in +vain; and for an instant I seemed to see the air full of messages +- of speech striving to utter its passionate truths to deaf ears +stopped for ever against the breaking waves of sound. But Vanna +heard.</p> + +<p>She left the room; and when the bridge was over, I made my +request. Lady Meryon shrugged her shoulders and declared it would +be a terribly dull run - the scenery nothing, "and only" (she +whispered) "Aunt Selina and poor Miss Loring?"</p> + +<p>Of course I saw at once that she did not like it; but Sir John +was all for my going, and that saved the situation.</p> + +<p>I certainly could have dispensed with Aunt Selina when the +automobile drew up in the golden river of the sunrise at the +hotel. There were only the driver, a personal servant, and the +two ladies; Mrs. Delany, comely, pleasant, talkative, and +Vanna-</p> + +<p>Her face in its dark motoring veil, fine and delicate as a +young moon in a cloud drift - the sensitive sweet mouth that had +quivered a little when she spoke of Fitzgerald - the pure glance +that radiated such kindness to all the world. She sat there with +the Key of Dreams pressed against her slight bosom - her eyes +dreaming above it. Already the strange airs of her unknown world +were breathing about me, and as yet I knew not the things that +belonged unto my peace.</p> + +<p>We glided along the straight military road from Peshawar to +Nowshera, the gold-bright sun dazzling in its whiteness - a +strange drive through the flat, burned country, with the ominous +Kabul River flowing through it. Military preparations everywhere, +and the hills looking watchfully down - alive, as it were, with +keen, hostile eyes. War was at present about us as behind the +lines in France; and when we crossed the Kabul River on a bridge +of boats, and I saw its haunted waters, I began to feel the +atmosphere of the place closing down upon me. It had a sinister +beauty; it breathed suspense; and I wished, as I was sure Vanna +did, for silence that was not at our command.</p> + +<p>For Mrs. Delany felt nothing of it. A bright shallow ripple of +talk was her contribution to the joys of the day; though it was, +fortunately, enough for her happiness if we listened and agreed. +I knew Vanna listened only in show. Her intent eyes were fixed on +the Tahkt-i-Bahi hills after we had swept out of Nowshera; and +when the car drew up at the rough track, she had a strange look +of suspense and pallor. I remember I wondered at the time if she +were nervous in the wild open country.</p> + +<p>"Now pray don't be shocked," said Mrs. Delany comfortably; +"but you two young people may go up to the monastery, and I shall +stay here. I am dreadfully ashamed of myself, but the sight of +that hill is enough for me. Don't hurry. I may have a little +doze, and be all the better company when you get back. No, don't +try to persuade me, Mr. Clifden. It isn't the part of a +friend."</p> + +<p>I cannot say I was sorry, though I had a moment of panic when +Vanna offered to stay with her - very much, too, as if she really +meant it. So we set out perforce, Vanna leading steadily, as if +she knew the way. She never looked up, and her wish for silence +was so evident, that I followed, lending my hand mutely when the +difficulties obliged it, she accepting absently, and as if her +thoughts were far away.</p> + +<p>Suddenly she quickened her pace. We had climbed about nine +hundred feet, and now the narrow track twisted through the rocks +- a track that looked as age-worn as no doubt it was. We threaded +it, and struggled over the ridge, and looked down victorious on +the other side.</p> + +<p>There she stopped. A very wonderful sight, of which I had +never seen the like, lay below us. Rock and waste and towering +crags, and the mighty ruin of the monastery set in the fangs of +the mountain like a robber baron's castle, looking far away to +the blue mountains of the Debatable Land - the land of mystery +and danger. It stood there - the great ruin of a vast habitation +of men. Building after building, mysterious and broken, +corridors, halls, refectories, cells; the dwelling of a faith so +alien that I could not reconstruct the life that gave it being. +And all sinking gently into ruin that in a century more would +confound it with the roots of the mountains.</p> + +<p>Grey and wonderful, it clung to the heights and looked with +eyeless windows at the past. Somehow I found it infinitely +pathetic; the very faith it expressed is dead in India, and none +left so poor to do it reverence.</p> + +<p>But Vanna knew her way. Unerringly she led me from point to +point, and she was visibly at home in the intricacies. Such +knowledge in a young woman bewildered me. Could she have studied +the plans in the Museum? How else should she know where the abbot +lived, or where the refractory brothers were punished?</p> + +<p>Once I missed her, while I stooped to examine some +scroll-work, and following, found her before one of the few +images of the Buddha that the rapacious Museum had spared - a +singularly beautiful bas-relief, the hand raised to enforce the +truth the calm lips were speaking, the drapery falling in stately +folds to the bare feet. As I came up, she had an air as if she +had just ceased from movement, and I had a distinct feeling that +she had knelt before it - I saw the look of worship! The thing +troubled me like a dream, haunting, impossible, but real.</p> + +<p>"How beautiful!" I said in spite of myself, as she pointed to +the image. "In this utter solitude it seems the very spirit of +the place."</p> + +<p>"He was. He is," said Vanna.</p> + +<p>"Explain to me. I don't understand. I know so little of him. +What is the subject?"</p> + +<p>She hesitated; then chose her words as if for a beginner;- "It +is the Blessed One preaching to the Tree-Spirits. See how eagerly +they lean from the boughs to listen. This other relief represents +him in the state of mystic vision. Here he is drowned in peace. +See how it overflows from the closed eyes; the closed lips. The +air is filled with his quiet."</p> + +<p>"What is he dreaming?"</p> + +<p>"Not dreaming - seeing. Peace. He sits at the point where time +and infinity meet. To attain that vision was the aim of the monks +who lived here."</p> + +<p>"Did they attain?" I found myself speaking as if she could +certainly answer.</p> + +<p>"A few. There was one, Vasettha, the Brahman, a young man who +had renounced all his possessions and riches, and seated here +before this image of the Blessed One, he fell often into the +mystic state. He had a strange vision at one time of the future +of India, which will surely be fulfilled. He did not forget it in +his rebirths. He remembers-"</p> + +<p>She broke off suddenly and said with forced indifference, - +"He would sit here often looking out over the mountains; the +monks sat at his feet to hear. He became abbot while still young. +But his story is a sad one."</p> + +<p>"I entreat you to tell me."</p> + +<p>She looked away over the mountains. "While he was abbot here,- +still a young man,- a famous Chinese Pilgrim came down through +Kashmir to visit the Holy Places in India. The abbot went forward +with him to Peshawar, that he might make him welcome. And there +came a dancer to Peshawar, named Lilavanti, most beautiful! I +dare not tell you her beauty. I tremble now to think-"</p> + +<p>Again she paused, and again the faint creeping sense of +mystery invaded me.</p> + +<p>She resumed;-</p> + +<p>"The abbot saw her and he loved her. He was young still, you +remember. She was a woman of the Hindu faith and hated Buddhism. +It swept him down into the lower worlds of storm and desire. He +fled with Lilavanti and never returned here. So in his rebirth he +fell-"</p> + +<p>She stopped dead; her face pale as death.</p> + +<p>"How do you know? Where have you read it? If I could only find +what you find and know what you know! The East is like an open +book to you. Tell me the rest."</p> + +<p>"How should I know any more?" she said hurriedly. "We must be +going back. You should study the plans of this place at Peshawar. +They were very learned monks who lived here. It is famous for +learning."</p> + +<p>The life had gone out of her words-out of the ruins. There was +no more to be said.</p> + +<p>We clambered down the hill in the hot sunshine, speaking only +of the view, the strange shrubs and flowers, and, once, the swift +gliding of a snake, and found Mrs. Delany blissfully asleep in +the most padded corner of the car. The spirit of the East +vanished in her comfortable presence, and luncheon seemed the +only matter of moment.</p> + +<p>"I wonder, my dears," she said, "if you would be very +disappointed and think me very dense if I proposed our giving up +the Malakhand Fort? The driver has been giving me in very poor +English such an account of the dangers of that awful road up the +hill that I feel no Fort would repay me for its terrors. Do say +what you feel, Miss Loring. Mr. Clifden can lunch with the +officers at Nowshera and come any time. I know I am an +atrocity."</p> + +<p>There could be only one answer, though Vanna and I knew +perfectly well the crafty design of the driver to spare himself +work. Mrs. Delany remained brightly awake for the run home, and +favored us with many remarkable views on India and its +shortcomings, Vanna, who had a sincere liking for her, laughing +with delight at her description of a visit of condolence with +Lady Meryon to the five widows of one of the hill Rajas.</p> + +<p>But I own I was pre-occupied. I knew those moments at the +monastery had given me a glimpse into the wonderland of her soul +that made me long for more. It was rapidly becoming clear to me +that unless my intentions developed on very different lines I +must flee Peshawar. For love is born of sympathy, and sympathy +was strengthening daily, but for love I had no courage yet.</p> + +<p>I feared it as men fear the unknown. I despised myself - but I +feared. I will confess my egregious folly and vanity - I had no +doubt as to her reception of my offer if I should make it, but +possessed by a colossal selfishness, I thought only of myself, +and from that point of view could not decide how I stood to lose +or gain. In my wildest accesses of vanity I did not suppose Vanna +loved me, but I felt she liked me, and I believe the advantages I +had to offer would be overwhelming to a woman in her position. +So, tossed on the waves of indecision, I inclined to flight.</p> + +<p>That night I resolutely began my packing, and wrote a note of +farewell to Lady Meryon. The next morning I furiously undid it, +and destroyed the note. And that afternoon I took the shortest +way to the sun-set road to lounge about and wait for Vanna and +Winifred. She never came, and I was as unreasonably angry as if I +had deserved the blessing of her presence.</p> + +<p>Next day I could see that she tried gently hut clearly to +discourage our meeting and for three days I never saw her at all. +Yet I knew that in her solitary life our talks counted for a +pleasure, and when we met again I thought I saw a new softness in +the lovely hazel deeps of her eyes.</p> + +<p></p> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>On the day when things became clear to me, I was walking +towards the Meryons' gates when I met her coming alone along the +sunset road, in the late gold of the afternoon. She looked pale +and a little wearied, and I remembered I wished I did not know +every change of her face as I did. It was a symptom that alarmed +my selfishness - it galled me with the sense that I was no longer +my own despot.</p> + +<p>"So you have been up the Khyber Pass," she said as I fell into +step at her side. "Tell me - was it as wonderful as you +expected?"</p> + +<p>"No, no, -you tell me! It will give me what I missed. Begin at +the beginning. Tell me what I saw."</p> + +<p>I could not miss the delight of her words, and she laughed, +knowing my whim.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that Pass! -the wonder of those old roads that have borne +the traffic and romance of the world for ages. Do you think there +is anything in the world so fascinating as they are? But did you +go on Tuesday or Friday?"</p> + +<p>For these are the only days in the week when the Khyber can be +safely entered. The British then turn out the Khyber Rifles and +man every crag, and the loaded caravans move like a tide, and go +up and down the narrow road on their occasions.</p> + +<p>Naturally mere sightseers are not welcomed, for much business +must be got through in that urgent forty eight hours in which +life is not risked in entering.</p> + +<p>"Tuesday. But make a picture for me."</p> + +<p>"Well, you gave your word not to photograph or sketch - as if +one wanted to when every bit of it is stamped on one's brain! And +you went up to Jumrood Fort at the entrance. Did they tell you it +is an old Sikh Fort and has been on duty in that turbulent place +for five hundred years And did you see the machine guns in the +court? And every one armed - even the boys with belts of +cartridges? Then you went up the narrow winding track between the +mountains, and you said to yourself, 'This is the road of pure +romance. It goes up to silken Samarkhand, and I can ride to +Bokhara of the beautiful women and to all the dreams. Am I alive +and is it real?' You felt that?"</p> + +<p>"All. Every bit. Go on!"</p> + +<p>She smiled with pleasure.</p> + +<p>"And you saw the little forts on the crags and the men on +guard all along the bills, rifles ready! You could hear the guns +rattle as they saluted. Do you know that up there men plough with +rifles loaded beside them? They have to be men indeed."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to imply that we are not men?"</p> + +<p>"Different men at least. This is life in a Border ballad. Such +a life as you knew in France but beautiful in a wild - hawk sort +of way. Don't the Khyber Rifles bewilder you? They are drawn from +these very Hill tribes, and will shoot their own fathers and +brothers in the way of duty as comfortably as if they were +jackals. Once there was a scrap here and one of the tribesmen +sniped our men unbearably. What do you suppose happened? A Khyber +Rifle came to the Colonel and said, 'Let me put an end to him, +Colonel Sahib. I know exactly where he sits. He is my +grandfather.' And he did it!"</p> + +<p>"The bond of bread and salt?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and discipline. I'm sometimes half frightened of +discipline. It moulds a man like wax. Even God doesn't do that. +Well - then you had the traders - wild shaggy men in sheepskin +and women in massive jewelry of silver and turquoise,-great +earrings, heavy bracelets loading their arms, wild, fierce, +handsome. And the camels - thousands of them, some going up, some +coming down, a mass of human and animal life. Above you, moving +figures against the keen blue sky, or deep below you in the +ravines.</p> + +<p>"The camels were swaying along with huge bales of goods, and +dark beautiful women in wicker cages perched on them. Silks and +carpets from Bokhara, and blue - eyed Persian cats, and bluer +Persian turquoises. Wonderful! And the dust, gilded by the +sunshine, makes a vaporous golden atmosphere for it all."</p> + +<p>"What was the most wonderful thing you saw there?"</p> + +<p>"The most beautiful, I think, was a man - a splendid dark +ruffian lounging along. He wanted to show off, and his swagger +was perfect. Long black onyx eyes and a tumble of black curls, +and teeth like almonds. But what do you think he carried on his +wrist - a hawk with fierce yellow eyes, ringed and chained. +Hawking is a favourite sport in the hills. Oh, why doesn't some +great painter come and paint it all before they take to trains +and cars? I long to see it all again, but I never shall."</p> + +<p>"Why not," said I. "Surely Sir John can get you up there any +day?"</p> + +<p>"Not now. The fighting makes it difficult. But it isn't that. +I am leaving."</p> + +<p>"Leaving?" My heart gave a leap. "Why? Where?"</p> + +<p>"Leaving Lady Meryon."</p> + +<p>"Why - for Heaven's sake?"</p> + +<p>"I had rather not tell you."</p> + +<p>"But I must know."</p> + +<p>"You cannot."</p> + +<p>"I shall ask Lady Meryon."</p> + +<p>"I forbid you."</p> + +<p>And then the unexpected happened, and an unbearable impulse +swept me into folly - or was it wisdom?</p> + +<p>"Listen to me. I would not have said it yet, but this settles +it. I want you to marry me. I want it atrociously!"</p> + +<p>It was a strange word. What I felt for her at that moment was +difficult to describe. I endured it like a pain that could only +be assuaged by her presence, but I endured it angrily. We were +walking on the sunset road - very deserted and quiet at the time. +The place was propitious if nothing else was.</p> + +<p>She looked at me in transparent astonishment;</p> + +<p>"Mr. Clifden, are you dreaming? You can't mean what you +say."</p> + +<p>"Why can't I? I do. I want you. You have the key of all I care +for. I think of the world without you and find it tasteless."</p> + +<p>"Surely you have all the world can give? What do you want +more?"</p> + +<p>"The power to enjoy it - to understand it. You have got that - +I haven't. I want you always with me to interpret, like a guide +to a blind fellow. I am no better."</p> + +<p>"Say like a dog, at once!" she interrupted. "At least you are +frank enough to put it on that ground. You have not said you love +me. You could not say it."</p> + +<p>"I don't know whether I do or not. I know nothing about love. +I want you. Indescribably. Perhaps that is love - is it? I never +wanted any one before. I have tried to get away and I can't."</p> + +<p>I was brutally frank, you see. She compelled my very +thoughts.</p> + +<p>"Why have you tried?"</p> + +<p>"Because every man likes freedom. But I like you better." "I +can tell you the reason," she said in her gentle unwavering +voice. "I am Lady Meryon's governess, and an undesirable. You +have felt that?"</p> + +<p>"Don't make me out such a snob. No - yes. You force me into +honesty. I did feel it at first like the miserable fool I am, but +I could kick myself when I think of that now. It is utterly +forgotten. Take me and make me what you will, and forgive me. +Only tell me your secret of joy. How is it you understand +everything alive or dead? I want to live - to see, to know."</p> + +<p>It was a rhapsody like a boy's. Yet at the moment I was not +even ashamed of it, so sharp was my need.</p> + +<p>"I think," she said, slowly, looking straight before her, +"that I had better be quite frank. I don't love you. I don't know +what love means in the Western sense. It has a very different +meaning for me. Your voice comes to me from an immense distance +when you speak in that way. You want me - but never with a +thought of what I might want. Is that love? I like you very +deeply as a friend, but we are of different races. There is a +gulf."</p> + +<p>"A gulf? You are English."</p> + +<p>"By birth, yes. In mind, no. And there are things that go +deeper, that you could not understand. So I refuse quite +definitely, and our ways part here, for in a few days I go. I +shall not see you again, but I wish to say good-bye."</p> + +<p>The bitterest chagrin was working in my soul. I felt as if all +were deserting me-a sickening feeling of loneliness. I did not +know the man who was in me, and was a stranger to myself.</p> + +<p>"I entreat you to tell me why, and where."</p> + +<p>"Since you have made me this offer, I will tell you why. Lady +Meryon objected to my friendship with you, and objected in a way +which-"</p> + +<p>She stopped, flushing palely. I caught her hand.</p> + +<p>"That settles it!-that she should have dared! I'll go up this +minute and tell her we are engaged. Vanna-Vanna !"</p> + +<p>For she disengaged her hand, quietly but firmly.</p> + +<p>"On no account. How can I make it more plain to you? I should +have gone soon in any case. My place is in the native city - that +is the life I want. I have work there, I knew it before I came +out. My sympathies are all with them. They know what life is - +why even the beggars, poorer than poor, are perfectly happy, +basking in the great generous sun. Oh, the splendour and riot of +life and colour! That's my life - I sicken of this."</p> + +<p>"But I'll give it to you. Marry me, and we will travel till +you're tired of it."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and look on as at a play - sitting in the stalls, and +applauding when we are pleased. No, I'm going to work there." +"For God's sake, how? Let me come too."</p> + +<p>"You can't. You're not in it. I am going to attach myself to +the medical mission at Lahore and learn nursing, and then I shall +go to my own people."</p> + +<p>"Missionaries? You've nothing in common with them?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing. But they teach what I want. Mr. Clifden, I shall not +come this way again. If I remember - I'll write to you, and tell +you what the real world is like."</p> + +<p>She smiled, the absorbed little smile I knew and feared. I saw +pleading was useless then. I would wait, and never lose sight of +her and of hope.</p> + +<p>"Vanna, before you go, give me your gift of sight. Interpret +for me. Stay with me a little and make me see."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean exactly?" she asked in her gentlest voice, +half turning to me.</p> + +<p>"Make one journey with me, as my sister, if you will do no +more. Though I warn you that all the time I shall be trying to +win my wife. But come with me once, and after that - if you will +go, you must. Say yes."</p> + +<p>Madness! But she hesitated - a hesitation full of hope, and +looked at me with intent eyes.</p> + +<p>"I will tell you frankly," she said at last, "that I know my +knowledge of the East and kinship with it goes far beyond mere +words. In my case the doors were not shut. I believe - I know +that long ago this was my life. If I spoke for ever I could not +make you understand how much I know and why. So I shall quite +certainly go back to it. Nothing - you least of all, can hold me. +But you are my friend - that is a true bond. And if you would +wish me to give you two months before I go, I might do that if it +would in any way help you. As your friend only - you clearly +understand. You would not reproach me afterwards when I left you, +as I should most certainly do?"</p> + +<p>"I swear I would not. I swear I would protect you even from +myself. I want you for ever, but if you will only give me two +months - come! But have you thought that people will talk. It may +injure you.</p> + +<p>I'm not worth that, God knows. And you will take nothing I +could give you in return."</p> + +<p>She spoke very quietly.</p> + +<p>"That does not trouble me. - It would only trouble me if you +asked what I have not to give. For two months I would travel with +you as a friend, if, like a friend, I paid my own expenses-"</p> + +<p>I would have interrupted, but she brushed that firmly aside. +"No, I must do as I say, and I am quite able to or I should not +suggest it. I would go on no other terms. It would be hard if +because we are man and woman I might not do one act of friendship +for you before we part. For though I refuse your offer utterly, I +appreciate it, and I would make what little return I can. It +would be a sharp pain to me to distress you."</p> + +<p>Her gentleness and calm, the magnitude of the offer she was +making stunned me so that I could scarcely speak. There was such +an extraordinary simplicity and generosity in her manner that it +appeared to me more enthralling and bewildering than the most +finished coquetry I had ever known. She gave me opportunities +that the most ardent lover could in his wildest dream desire, and +with the remoteness in her eyes and her still voice she deprived +them of all hope. It kindled in me a flame that made my throat +dry when I tried to speak.</p> + +<p>"Vanna, is it a promise? You mean it?"</p> + +<p>"If you wish it, yes. But I warn you I think it will not make +it easier for you when the time is over.</p> + +<p>"Why two months?"</p> + +<p>"Partly because I can afford no more. No! I know what you +would say. Partly because I can spare no more time. But I will +give you that, if you wish, though, honestly, I had very much +rather not. I think it unwise for you. I would protect you if I +could - indeed I would!"</p> + +<p>It was my turn to hesitate now. Every moment revealed to me +some new sweetness, some charm that I saw would weave itself into +the very fibre of my I had been! Was I not now a fool? Would it +not being if the opportunity were given. Oh, fool that be better +to let her go before she had become a part of my daily +experience? I began to fear I was courting my own shipwreck. She +read my thoughts clearly.</p> + +<p>"Indeed you would be wise to decide against it. Release me +from my promise. It was a mad scheme."</p> + +<p>The superiority - or so I felt it - of her gentleness maddened +me. It might have been I who needed protection, who was running +the risk of misjudgment - not she, a lonely woman. She looked at +me, waiting - trying to be wise for me, never for one instant +thinking of herself. I felt utterly exiled from the real purpose +of her life.</p> + +<p>"I will never release you. I claim your promise. I hold to +it."</p> + +<p>"Very well then - I will write, and tell you where I shall be. +Good-bye, and if you change your mind, as I hope you will, tell +me."</p> + +<p>She extended her hand cool as a snowflake, and was gone, +walking swiftly up the road. Ah, let a man beware when his wishes +fulfilled, rain down upon him!</p> + +<p>To what had I committed myself? She knew her strength and had +no fears. I could scarcely realize that she had liking enough for +me to make the offer. That it meant no shade more than she had +said I knew well. She was safe, but what was to be the result for +me? I knew nothing - she was a beloved mystery.</p> + +<p>"Strange she is and secret, Strange her eyes; her cheeks are +cold as cold sea-shells."</p> + +<p>Yet I would risk it, for I knew there was no hope if I let her +go now, and if I saw her again, some glimmer might fall upon my +dark.</p> + +<p>Next day this reached me:- Dear Mr. Clifden,-</p> + +<p>I am going to some Indian friends for a time. On the 15th of +June I shall he at Srinagar in Kashmir. A friend has allowed me +to take her little houseboat, the "Kedarnath." If you like this +plan we will share the cost for two months. I warn you it is not +luxurious, but I think you will like it. I shall do this whether +you come or no, for I want a quiet time before I take up my +nursing in Lahore. In thinking of all this will you remember that +I am not a girl but a woman. I shall he twenty-nine my next +birthday. Sincerely yours, VANNA LORING.</p> + +<p>P.S. But I still think you would be wiser not to come. I hope +to hear you will not.</p> + +<p>I replied only this :- Dear Miss Loring,- I think I understand +the position fully. I will be there. I thank you with all my +heart. Gratefully yours, STEPHEN CLIFDEN.</p> + +<p></p> + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>Three days later I met Lady Meryon, and was swept in to tea. +Her manner was distinctly more cordial as she mentioned casually +that Vanna had left - she understood to take up missionary work - +"which is odd," she added with a woman's acrimony, "for she had +no more in common with missionaries than I have, and that is +saying a good deal. Of course she speaks Hindustani perfectly, +and could be useful, but I haven't grasped the point of it yet" I +saw she counted on my knowing nothing of the real reason of +Vanna's going and left it, of course, at that. The talk drifted +away under my guidance. Vanna evidently puzzled her. She half +feared, and wholly misunderstood her.</p> + +<p>No message came to me, as time went by, and for the time she +had vanished completely, but I held fast to her promise and lived +on that only.</p> + +<p>I take up my life where it ceased to be a mere suspense and +became life once more.</p> + +<p>On the 15th of June, I found myself riding into Srinagar in +Kashmir, through the pure tremulous green of the mighty poplars +that hedge the road into the city. The beauty of the country had +half stunned me when I entered the mountain barrier of Baramula +and saw the snowy peaks that guard the Happy Valley, with the +Jhelum flowing through its tranquil loveliness. The flush of the +almond blossom was over, but the iris, like a blue sea of peace +had overflowed the world - the azure meadows smiled back at the +radiant sky. Such blossom! the blue shading into clear violet, +like a shoaling sea. The earth, like a cup held in the hand of a +god, brimmed with the draught of youth and summer and - love? But +no, for me the very word was sinister. Vanna's face, immutably +calm, confronted it.</p> + +<p>That night I slept in a boat at Sopor, and I remember that, +waking at midnight, I looked out and saw a mountain with a +gloriole of hazy silver about it, misty and faint as a cobweb +threaded with dew. The river, there spreading into a lake, was +dark under it, flowing in a deep smooth blackness of shadow, and +everything awaited - what? And even while I looked, the moon +floated serenely above the peak, and all was bathed in pure +light, the water rippling and shining in broken silver and pearl. +So had Vanna floated into my sky, luminous, sweet, remote. I did +not question my heart any more. I knew I loved her.</p> + +<p>Two days later I rode into Srinagar, and could scarcely see +the wild beauty of that strange Venice. of the East, my heart was +so beating in my eyes. I rode past the lovely wooden bridges +where the balconied houses totter to each other across the canals +in dim splendour of carving and age; where the many-coloured +native life crowds down to the river steps and cleanses its +flower-bright robes, its gold-bright brass vessels in the shining +stream, and my heart said only - Vanna, Vanna!</p> + +<p>One day, one thought, of her absence had taught me what she +was to me, and if humility and patient endeavor could raise me to +her feet, I was resolved that I would spend my life in labor and +think it well spent.</p> + +<p>My servant dismounted and led his horse, asking from every one +where the "Kedarnath" could be found, and eager black eyes +sparkled and two little bronze images detached themselves from +the crowd of boys, and ran, fleet as fauns, before us.</p> + +<p>Above the last bridge the Jhelum broadens out into a stately +river, controlled at one side by the banked walk known as the +Bund, with the Club House upon it and the line of houseboats +beneath. Here the visitors flutter up and down and exchange the +gossip, the bridge appointments, the little dinners that sit so +incongruously on the pure Orient that is Kashmir.</p> + +<p>She would not be here. My heart told me that, and sure enough +the boys were leading across the bridge and by a quiet shady way +to one of the many backwaters that the great river makes in the +enchanting city. There is one waterway stretching on afar to the +Dal Lake. It looks like a river - it is the very haunt of peace. +Under those mighty chenar, or plane trees, that are the glory of +Kashmir, clouding the water with deep green shadows, the sun can +scarcely pierce, save in a dipping sparkle here and there to +intensify the green gloom. The murmur of the city, the chatter of +the club, are hundreds of miles away. We rode downward under the +towering trees, and dismounting, saw a little houseboat tethered +to the bank. It was not of the richer sort that haunts the Bund, +where the native servants follow in a separate boat, and even the +electric light is turned on as part of the luxury. This was a +long low craft, very broad, thatched like a country cottage +afloat. In the forepart lived the native owner, and his family, +their crew, our cooks and servants; for they played many parts in +our service. And in the afterpart, room for a life, a dream, the +joy or curse & many days to be.</p> + +<p>But then, I saw only one thing - Vanna sat under the trees, +reading, or looking at the cool dim watery vista, with a single +boat, loaded to the river's edge with melons and scarlet +tomatoes, punting lazily down to Srinagar in the sleepy +afternoon.</p> + +<p>She was dressed in white with a shady hat, and her delicate +dark face seemed to glow in the shadow like the heart of a pale +rose. For the first time I knew she was beautiful. Beauty shone +in her like the flame in an alabaster lamp, serene, diffused in +the very air about her, so that to me she moved in a mild +radiance. She rose to meet me with both hands outstretched - the +kindest, most cordial welcome. Not an eyelash flickered, not a +trace of self- consciousness. If I could have seen her flush or +tremble - but no - her eyes were clear and calm as a forest pool. +So I remembered her. So I saw her once more.</p> + +<p>I tried, with a hopeless pretence, to follow her example and +hide what I felt, where she had nothing to hide.</p> + +<p>"What a place you have found. Why, it's like the deep heart of +a wood!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I saw it once when I was here with the Meryons. But we +lay at the Bund then - just under the Club. This is better. Did +you like the ride up?"</p> + +<p>I threw myself on the grass beside her with a feeling of +perfect rest.</p> + +<p>"It was like a new heaven and a new earth. What a +country!"</p> + +<p>The very spirit of Quiet seemed to be drowsing in those +branches towering up into the blue, dipping their green fingers +into the crystal of the water. What a heaven!</p> + +<p>"Now you shall have your tea and then I will show you your +rooms," she said, smiling at my delight. "We shall stay here a +few days more that you may see Srinagar, and then they tow us up +into the Dal Lake opposite the Gardens of the Mogul Emperors. And +if you think this beautiful what will you say then?"</p> + +<p>I shut my eyes and see still that first meal of my new life. +The little table that Pir Baksh, breathing full East in his +jade-green turban, set before her, with its cloth worked in a +pattern of the chenar leaves that are the symbol of Kashmir; the +brown cakes made by Ahmad Khan in a miraculous kitchen of his own +invention - a few holes burrowed in the river bank, a smoldering +fire beneath them, and a width of canvas for a roof. But it +served, and no more need be asked of luxury. And Vanna, making it +mysteriously the first home I ever had known, the central joy of +it all. Oh, wonderful days of life that breathe the spirit of +immortality and pass so quickly - surely they must be treasured +somewhere in Eternity that we may look upon their beloved light +once more.</p> + +<p>"Now you must see the boat. The Kedarnath is not a +Dreadnought, but she is broad and very comfortable. And we have +many chaperons. They all live in the bows, and exist simply to +protect the Sahiblog from all discomfort, and very well they do +it. That is Ahmad Khan by the kitchen. He cooks for us. Salama +owns the boat, and steers her and engages the men to tow us when +we move. And when I arrived he aired a little English and said +piously; The Lord help me to give you no trouble, and the Lord +help you!" That is his wife sitting on the bank. She speaks +little but Kashmiri, but I know a little of that. Look at the +hundred rat-tail plaits of her hair, lengthened with wool, and +see her silver and turquoise jewelry. She wears much of the +family fortune and is quite a walking bank. Salama, Ahmad Khan +and I talk by the hour. Ahmad comes from Fyzabad. Look at +Salama's boy - I call him the Orange Imp. Did you ever see +anything so beautiful?"</p> + +<p>I looked in sheer delight, and grasped my camera. Sitting near +us was a lovely little Kashmiri boy of about eight, in a faded +orange coat, and a turban exactly like his father's. His curled +black eyelashes were so long that they made a soft gloom over the +upper part of the little golden face. The perfect bow of the +scarlet lips, the long eyes, the shy smile, suggested an Indian +Eros. He sat dipping his feet in the water with little +pigeon-like cries of content.</p> + +<p>"He paddles at the bow of our little shikara boat with a +paddle exactly like a water-lily leaf. Do you like our friends? I +love them already, and know all their affairs. And now for the +boat."</p> + +<p>"One moment - If we are friends on a great adventure, I must +call you Vanna, and you me Stephen."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I suppose that is part of it," she said, smiling. "Come, +Stephen."</p> + +<p>It was like music, but a cold music that chilled me. She +should have hesitated, should have flushed - it was I who +trembled. So I followed her across the broad plank into our new +home.</p> + +<p>"This is our sitting-room. Look, how charming!"</p> + +<p>It was better than charming; it was home indeed. Windows at +each side opening down almost to the water, a little table for +meals that lived mostly on the bank, with a grey pot of iris in +the middle. Another table for writing, photography, and all the +little pursuits of travel. A bookshelf with some well - worn +friends. Two long cushioned chairs. Two for meals, and a Bokhara +rug, soft and pleasant for the feet. The interior was plain +unpainted wood, but set so that the grain showed like satin in +the rippling lights from the water.</p> + +<p>That is the inventory of the place I have loved best in the +world, but what eloquence can describe what it gave me, what its +memory gives me to this day? And I have no eloquence - what I +felt leaves me dumb.</p> + +<p>"It is perfect," was all I said as she waved her hand proudly. +"It is home."</p> + +<p>"And if you had come alone to Kashmir you would have had a +great rich boat with electric light and a butler. You would never +have seen the people except at meal - times. I think you will +like this better. Well, this is your tiny bedroom, and your +bathroom, and beyond the sitting - room are mine. Do you like it +all?"</p> + +<p>But I could say no more. The charm of her own personality had +touched everything and left its fragrance like a flower - breath +in the air. I was beggared of thanks, but my whole soul was +gratitude. We dined on the bank that evening, the lamp burning +steadily in the still air and throwing broken reflections in the +water, while the moon looked in upon them through the leaves. I +felt extraordinarily young and happy.</p> + +<p>The quiet of her voice was soft as the little lap of water +against the bows of the boat, and Kahdra, the Orange Imp, was +singing a little wordless song to himself as he washed the plates +beside us. It was a simple meal, and Vanna, abstemious as a +hermit never ate anything but rice and fruit, but I could +remember no meal in all my days of luxury where I had eaten with +such zest.</p> + +<p>"It looks very grand to have so many to wait upon us, doesn't +it? But this is one of the cheapest countries in the world though +the old timers mourn over present expenses. You will laugh when I +show you your share of the cost."</p> + +<p>"The wealth of the world could not buy this," I said, and was +silent.</p> + +<p>"But you must listen to my plans. We must do a little camping +the last three weeks before we part. Up in the mountains. Are +they not marvellous? They stand like a rampart round us, but not +cold and terrible, but "Like as the hills stand round about +Jerusalem" - they are guardian presences. And running up into +them, high -very high, are the valleys and hills where we shall +camp. Tomorrow we shall row through Srinagar, by the old +Maharaja's palace."</p> + +<p></p> + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p>And so began a life of sheer enchantment. We knew no one. The +visitors in Kashmir change nearly every season, and no one +cared-no one asked anything of us, and as for our shipmates, a +willing affectionate service was their gift, and no more. Looking +back, I know in what a wonder-world I was privileged to live. +Vanna could talk with them all. She did not move apart, a +condescending or indifferent foreigner. Kahdra would come to her +knee and prattle to her of the great snake that lived up on +Mahadeo to devour erring boys who omitted their prayers at proper +Moslem intervals. She would sit with the baby in her lap while +the mother busied herself in the sunny bows with the mysterious +dishes that smelt so savory to a hungry man. The cuts, the +bruises of the neighbourhood all came to Vanna for treatment.</p> + +<p>"I am graduating as a nurse," she would say laughing as she +bent over the lean arm of some weirdly wrinkled old lady, +bandaging and soothing at the same moment. Her reward would be +some bit of folk-lore, some quaintness of gratitude that I noted +down in the little book I kept for remembrance - that I do not +need, for every word is in my heart.</p> + +<p>We rowed down through the city next day - Salama rowing, and +little Kahdra lazily paddling at the bow - a wonderful city, with +its narrow ways begrimed with the dirt of ages, and its balconied +houses looking as if disease and sin had soaked into them and +given them a vicious tottering beauty, horrible and yet lovely +too. We saw the swarming life of the bazaar, the white turbans +coming and going, diversified by the rose and yellow Hindu +turbans, and the caste-marks, orange and red, on the dark +brows.</p> + +<p>I saw two women - girls - painted and tired like Jezebel, +looking out of one window carved and old, and the grey burnished +doves flying about it. They leaned indolently, like all the old, +old wickedness of the East that yet is ever young - "Flowers of +Delight," with smooth black hair braided with gold and blossoms, +and covered with pale rose veils, and gold embossed disks +swinging like lamps beside the olive cheeks, the great eyes +artificially lengthened and darkened with soorma, and the curves +of the full lips emphasized with vermilion. They looked down on +us with apathy, a dull weariness that held all the old evil of +the wicked humming city.</p> + +<p>It had taken shape in those indolent bodies and heavy eyes +that could flash into life as a snake wakes into fierce darting +energy when the time comes to spring - direct inheritrixes from +Lilith, in the fittest setting in the world - the almost +exhausted vice of an Oriental city as old as time.</p> + +<p>"And look-below here," said Vanna, pointing to one of the +ghauts - long rugged steps running down to the river.</p> + +<p>"When I came yesterday, a great broken crowd was collected +here, almost shouldering each other into the water where a boat +lay rocking. In it lay the body of a man brutally murdered for +the sake of a few rupees and flung into the river. I could see +the poor brown body stark in the boat with a friend weeping +beside it. On the lovely deodar bridge people leaned over, +watching with a grim open-mouthed curiosity, and business went on +gaily where the jewelers make the silver bangles for slender +wrists, and the rows of silver chains that make the necks like +'the Tower of Damascus builded for an armory.' It was all very +wild and cruel. I went down to them-"</p> + +<p>"Vanna - you went down? Horrible!"</p> + +<p>"No, you see I heard them say the wife was almost a child and +needs help. So I went. Once long ago at Peshawar I saw the same +thing happen, and they came and took the child for the service of +the gods, for she was most lovely, and she clung to the feet of a +man in terror, and the priest stabbed her to the heart. She died +in my arms.</p> + +<p>"Good God!" I said, shuddering; "what a sight for you! Did +they never hang him?"</p> + +<p>"He was not punished. I told you it was a very long time ago. +Her expression had a brooding quiet as she looked down into the +running river, almost it might be as if she saw the picture of +that past misery in the deep water. She said no more. But in her +words and the terrible crowding of its life, Srinagar seemed to +me more of a nightmare than anything I had seen, excepting only +Benares; for the holy Benares is a memory of horror, with a sense +of blood hidden under its frantic crazy devotion, and not far +hidden either.</p> + +<p>Our own green shade, when we pulled back to it in the evening +cool, was a refuge of unspeakable quiet. She read aloud to me +that evening by the small light of our lamp beneath the trees, +and, singularly, she read of joy.</p> + +<p>"I have drunk of the Cup of the Ineffable, I have found the +key of the Mystery, Travelling by no track I have come to the +Sorrowless Land; very easily has the mercy of the great Lord come +upon me. Wonderful is that Land of rest to which no merit can +win. There have I seen joy filled to the brim, perfection of joy. +He dances in rapture and waves of form arise from His dance. He +holds all within his bliss."</p> + +<p>"What is that?"</p> + +<p>"It is from the songs of the great Indian mystic - Kabir. Let +me read you more. It is like the singing of a lark, lost in the +infinite of light and heaven."</p> + +<p>So in the soft darkness I heard for the first time those +immortal words; and hearing, a faint glimmer of understanding +broke upon me as to the source of the peace that surrounded her. +I had accepted it as an emanation of her own heart when it was +the pulsing of the tide of the Divine. She read, choosing a verse +here and there, and I listened with absorption.</p> + +<p>Suppose I had been wrong in believing that sorrow is the +keynote of life; that pain is the road of ascent, if road there +be; that an implacable Nature and that only, presides over all +our pitiful struggles and seekings and writes a black "Finis" to +the holograph of our existence?</p> + +<p>What then? What was she teaching me? Was she the Interpreter +of a Beauty eternal in the heavens, and reflected like a broken +prism in the beauty that walked visible beside me? So I listened +like a child to an unknown language, yet ventured my protest.</p> + +<p>"In India, in this wonderful country where men have time and +will for speculation such thoughts may be natural. Can they be +found in the West?"</p> + +<p>"This is from the West - might not Kabir himself have said it? +Certainly he would have felt it. 'Happy is he who seeks not to +understand the Mystery of God, but who, merging his spirit into +Thine, sings to Thy face, 0 Lord, like a harp, understanding how +difficult it is to know - how easy to love Thee.' We debate and +argue and the Vision passes us by. We try to prove it, and kill +it in the laboratory of our minds, when on the altar of our souls +it will dwell for ever."</p> + +<p>Silence - and I pondered. Finally she laid the book aside, and +repeated from memory and in a tone of perfect music; "Kabir says, +'I shall go to the House of my Lord with my Love at my side; then +shall I sound the trumpet of triumph.'"</p> + +<p>And when she left me alone in the moonlight silence the old +doubts came back to me - the fear that I saw only through her +eyes, and began to believe in joy only because I loved her. I +remember I wrote in the little book I kept for my stray thoughts, +these words which are not mine but reflect my thought of her; +"Thine is the skill of the Fairy Woman, and the virtue of St. +Bride, and the faith of Mary the Mild, and the gracious way of +the Greek woman, and the beauty of lovely Emer, and the +tenderness of heart-sweet Deirdre, and the courage of Maev the +great Queen, and the charm of Mouth-of-Music."</p> + +<p>Yes, all that and more, but I feared lest I should see the +heaven of joy through her eyes only and find it mirage as I had +found so much else.</p> + +<p>SECOND PART Early in the pure dawn the men came and our boat +was towed up into the Dal Lake through crystal waterways and +flowery banks, the men on the path keeping step and straining at +the rope until the bronze muscles stood out on their legs and +backs, shouting strong rhythmic phrases to mark the pull.</p> + +<p>"They shout the Wondrous Names of God - as they are called," +said Vanna when I asked. "They always do that for a timid effort. +Bad shah! The Lord, the Compassionate, and so on. I don't think +there is any religion about it but it is as natural to them as +One, Two, Three, to us. It gives a tremendous lift. Watch and +see."</p> + +<p>It was part of the delightful strangeness that we should move +to that strong music. We sat on the upper deck and watched the +dream - like beauty drift slowly by until we emerged beneath a +little bridge into the fairy land of the lake which the Mogul +Emperors loved so well that they made their noble pleasance +gardens on the banks, and thought it little to travel up yearly +from far - off Delhi over the snowy Pir Panjal with their Queens +and courts for the perfect summer of Kashmir.</p> + +<p>We moored by a low bank under a great wood of chenar trees, +and saw the little table in the wilderness set in the greenest +shade with our chairs beside it, and my pipe laid reverently upon +it by Kahdra.</p> + +<p>Across the glittering water lay on one side the Shalimar +Garden known to all readers of "Lalla Ruhk" - a paradise of +roses; and beyond it again the lovelier gardens of Nour-Mahal, +the Light of the Palace, that imperial woman who ruled India +under the weak Emperor's name - she whose name he set thus upon +his coins:</p> + +<p>"By order of King Jehangir. Gold has a hundred splendours +added to it by receiving the name of Nour-Jahan the Queen."</p> + +<p>Has any woman ever had a more royal homage than this most +royal lady - known first as Mihr-u- nissa - Sun of Women, and +later, Nour-Mahal, Light of the Palace, and latest, Nour-Jahan- +Begam, Queen, Light of the World?</p> + +<p>Here in these gardens she had lived - had seen the snow +mountains change from the silver of dawn to the illimitable rose +of sunset. The life, the colour beat insistently upon my brain. +They built a world of magic where every moment was pure gold. +Surely - surely to Vanna it must be the same. I believed in my +very soul that she who gave and shared such joy could not be +utterly apart from me? Could I then feel certain that I had +gained any ground in these days we had been together? Could she +still define the cruel limits she had laid down, or were her eyes +kinder, her tones a more broken music? I did not know. Whenever I +could hazard a guess the next minute baffled me.</p> + +<p>Just then, in the sunset, she was sitting on deck, singing +under her breath and looking absently away to the Gardens across +the Lake. I could catch the words here and there, and knew +them.</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>"Pale hands I loved beside the Shalimar,</p> + +<p>Where are you now - who lies beneath your spell?</p> + +<p>Whom do you lead on Rapture's roadway far,</p> + +<p>Before you agonize them in farewell?"</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>"Don't!" I said abruptly. It stung me.</p> + +<p>"What?" she asked in surprise. "That is the song every one +remembers here. Poor Laurence Hope! How she knew and loved this +India! What are you grumbling at?"</p> + +<p>Her smile stung me.</p> + +<p>"Never mind," I said morosely. "You don't understand. You +never will."</p> + +<p>And yet I believed sometimes that she would - that time was on +my side.</p> + +<p>When Kahdra and I pulled her across to Nour-Mahal's garden +next day, how could I not believe it - her face was so full of +joy as she looked at me for sympathy?</p> + +<p>"I don't think so much beauty is crowded into any other few +miles in the world - beauty of association, history, nature, +everything!" she said with shining eyes. "The lotus flowers are +not out yet but when they come that is the last touch of +perfection. Do you remember Homer - 'But whoso ate of the +honey-sweet fruit of the lotus, was neither willing to bring me +word again, nor to depart. Nay, their desire was to remain there +for ever, feeding on the lotus with the Lotus Eaters, forgetful +of all return.' You know the people here eat the roots and seeds? +I ate them last year and perhaps that is why I cannot stay away. +But look at Nour- Mahal's garden!"</p> + +<p>We were pulling in among the reeds and the huge carven leaves +of the water plants, and the snake-headed buds lolling upon them +with the slippery half-sinister look that water-flowers have, as +though their cold secret life belonged to the hidden water world +and not to ours. But now the boat was touching the little wooden +steps.</p> + +<p>O beautiful - most beautiful the green lawns, shaded with huge +pyramids of the chenar trees, the terraced gardens where the +marble steps climbed from one to the other, and the mountain +streams flashed singing and shining down the carved marble slopes +that cunning hands had made to delight the Empress of Beauty, +between the wildernesses of roses. Her pavilion stands still +among the flowers, and the waters ripple through it to join the +lake - and she is - where? Even in the glory of sunshine the +passing of all fair things was present with me as I saw the empty +shell that had held the Pearl of Empire, and her roses that still +bloom, her waters that still sing for others.</p> + +<p>The spray of a hundred fountains was misty diamond dust in the +warm air laden with the scent of myriad flowers. Kahdra followed +us everywhere, singing his little tuneless happy song. The world +brimmed with beauty and joy. And we were together. Words broke +from me.</p> + +<p>"Vanna, let it be for ever! Let us live here. I'll give up all +the world for this and you."</p> + +<p>"But you see," she said delicately, "it would be 'giving up.' +You use the right word. It is not your life. It is a lovely +holiday, no more. You would weary of it. You would want the city +life and your own kind."</p> + +<p>I protested with all my soul.</p> + +<p>"No. Indeed I will say frankly that it would be lowering +yourself to live a lotus-eating life among my people. It is a +life with which you have no tie. A Westerner who lives like that +steps down; he loses his birthright just as an Oriental does who +Europeanizes himself. He cannot live your life nor you his. If +you had work here it would be different. No - six or eight weeks +more; then go away and forget it."</p> + +<p>I turned from her. The serpent was in Paradise. When is he +absent?</p> + +<p>On one of the terraces a man was beating a tom-tom, and veiled +women listened, grouped about him in brilliant colours.</p> + +<p>"Isn't that all India?" she said; "that dull reiterated sound? +It half stupefies, half maddens. Once at Darjiling I saw the +Lamas' Devil Dance - the soul, a white-faced child with eyes +unnaturally enlarged, fleeing among a rabble of devils - the evil +passions. It fled wildly here and there and every way was +blocked. The child fell on its knees, screaming dumbly - you +could see the despair in the staring eyes, but all was drowned in +the thunder of Tibetan drums. No mercy - no escape. +Horrible!"</p> + +<p>"Even in Europe the drum is awful," I said. "Do you remember +in the French Revolution how they Drowned the victims' voices in +a thunder roll of drums?"</p> + +<p>"I shall always see the face of the child, hunted down to +hell, falling on its knees, and screaming without a sound, when I +hear the drum. But listen - a flute! Now if that were the Flute +of Krishna you would have to follow. Let us come!"</p> + +<p>I could hear nothing of it, but she insisted and we followed +the music, inaudible to me, up the slopes of the garden that is +the foot-hill of the mighty mountain of Mahadeo, and still I +could hear nothing. And Vanna told me strange stories of the +Apollo of India whom all hearts must adore, even as the +herd-girls adored him in his golden youth by Jumna river and in +the pastures of Brindaban.</p> + +<p>Next day we were climbing the hill to the ruins where the evil +magician brought the King's daughter nightly to his will, flying +low under a golden moon. Vanna took my arm and I pulled her +laughing up the steepest flowery slopes until we reached the +height, and lo! the arched windows were eyeless and a lonely +breeze blowing through the cloisters, and the beautiful yellowish +stone arches supported nothing and were but frames for the blue +of far lake and mountain and the divine sky. We climbed the +broken stairs where the lizards went by like flashes, and had I +the tongue of men and angels I could not tell the wonder that lay +before us, - the whole wide valley of Kashmir in summer glory, +with its scented breeze singing, singing above it.</p> + +<p>We sat on the crushed aromatic herbs and among the wild roses +and looked down.</p> + +<p>"To think," she said, "that we might have died and never seen +it!"</p> + +<p>There followed a long silence. I thought she was tired, and +would not break it. Suddenly she spoke in a strange voice, low +and toneless;</p> + +<p>"The story of this place. She was the Princess Padmavati, and +her home was in Ayodhya. When she woke and found herself here by +the lake she was so terrified that she flung herself in and was +drowned. They held her back, but she died."</p> + +<p>"How do you know?"</p> + +<p>"Because a wandering monk came to the abbey of Tahkt-i-Bahi +near Peshawar and told Vasettha the Abbot."</p> + +<p>I had nearly spoilt all by an exclamation, but I held myself +back. I saw she was dreaming awake and was unconscious of what +she said.</p> + +<p>"The Abbot said, 'Do not describe her. What talk is this for +holy men? The young monks must not hear. Some of them have never +seen a woman. Should a monk speak of such toys?' But the wanderer +disobeyed and spoke, and there was a great tumult, and the monks +threw him out at the command of the young Abbot, and he wandered +down to Peshawar, and it was he later - the evil one! - that +brought his sister, Lilavanti the Dancer, to Peshawar, and the +Abbot fell into her snare. That was his revenge!"</p> + +<p>Her face was fixed and strange, for a moment her cheek looked +hollow, her eyes dim and grief- worn. What was she seeing? - what +remembering? Was it a story - a memory? What was it?</p> + +<p>"She was beautiful?" I prompted.</p> + +<p>"Men have said so, but for it he surrendered the Peace. Do not +speak of her accursed beauty."</p> + +<p>Her voice died away to a drowsy murmur; her head dropped on my +shoulder and for the mere de- light of contact I sat still and +scarcely breathed, praying that she might speak again, but the +good minute was gone. She drew one or two deep breaths, and sat +up with a bewildered look that quickly passed.</p> + +<p>"I was quite sleepy for a minute. The climb was so strenuous. +Hark - I hear the Flute of Krishna again."</p> + +<p>And again I could hear nothing, but she said it was sounding +from the trees at the base of the hill. Later when we climbed +down I found she was right - that a peasant lad, dark and +amazingly beautiful as these Kashmiris often are, was playing on +the flute to a girl at his feet - looking up at him with rapt +eyes. He flung Vanna a flower as we passed. She caught it and put +it in her bosom. A singular blossom, three petals of purest +white, set against three leaves of purest green, and lower down +the stem the three green leaves were repeated. It was still in +her bosom after dinner, and I looked at it more closely.</p> + +<p>"That is a curious flower," I said. "Three and three and +three. Nine. That makes the mystic number. I never saw a purer +white. What is it?"</p> + +<p>"Of course it is mystic," she said seriously. "It is the +Ninefold Flower. You saw who gave it?"</p> + +<p>"That peasant lad."</p> + +<p>She smiled.</p> + +<p>"You will see more some day. Some might not even have seen +that."</p> + +<p>"Does it grow here?"</p> + +<p>"This is the first I have seen. It is said to grow only where +the gods walk. Do you know that throughout all India Kashmir is +said to be holy ground? It was called long ago the land of the +gods, and of strange, but not evil, sorceries. Great marvels were +seen here."</p> + +<p>I felt the labyrinthine enchantments of that enchanted land +were closing about me - a slender web, grey, almost impalpable, +finer than fairy silk, was winding itself about my feet. My eyes +were opening to things I had not dreamed. She saw my thought.</p> + +<p>"Yes, you could not have seen even that much of him in +Peshawar. You did not know then."</p> + +<p>"He was not there," I answered, falling half unconsciously +into her tone.</p> + +<p>"He is always there - everywhere, and when he plays, all who +hear must follow. He was the Pied Piper in Hamelin, he was Pan in +Hellas. You will hear his wild fluting in many strange places +when you know how to listen. When one has seen him the rest comes +soon. And then you will follow."</p> + +<p>"Not away from you, Vanna."</p> + +<p>"From the marriage feast, from the Table of the Lord," she +said, smiling strangely. "The man who wrote that spoke of another +call, but it is the same - Krishna or Christ. When we hear the +music we follow. And we may lose or gain heaven."</p> + +<p>It might have been her compelling personality - it might have +been the marvels of beauty about me, but I knew well I had +entered at some mystic gate. A pass word had been spoken for me - +I was vouched for and might go in. Only a little way as yet. +Enchanted forests lay beyond, and perilous seas, but there were +hints, breaths like the wafting of the garments of unspeakable +Presences. My talk with Vanna grew less personal, and more +introspective. I felt the touch of her finger-tips leading me +along the ways of Quiet - my feet brushed a shining dew. Once, in +the twilight under the chenar trees, I saw a white gleaming and +thought it a swiftly passing Being, but when in haste I gained +the tree I found there only a Ninefold flower, white as a spirit +in the evening calm. I would not gather it but told Vanna what I +had seen.</p> + +<p>"You nearly saw;' she said. "She passed so quickly. It was the +Snowy One, Uma, Parvati, the Daughter of the Himalaya. That +mountain is the mountain of her lord - Shiva. It is natural she +should be here. I saw her last night lean over the height - her +face pillowed on her folded arms, with a low star in the mists of +her hair. Her eyes were like lakes of blue darkness. Vast and +wonderful. She is the Mystic Mother of India. You will see soon. +You could not have seen the flower until now."</p> + +<p>"Do you know," she added, "that in the mountains there are +poppies of clear blue - blue as turquoise. We will go up into the +heights and find them."</p> + +<p>And next moment she was planning the camping details, the men, +the ponies, with a practical zest that seemed to relegate the +occult to the absurd. Yet the very next day came a wonderful +moment.</p> + +<p>The sun was just setting and, as it were, suddenly the purple +glooms banked up heavy with thunder. The sky was black with fury, +the earth passive with dread. I never saw such lightning - it was +continuous and tore in zigzag flashes down the mountains like +rents in the substance of the world's fabric. And the thunder +roared up in the mountain gorges with shattering echoes. Then +fell the rain, and the whole lake seemed to rise to meet it, and +the noise was like the rattle of musketry. We were standing by +the cabin window and she suddenly caught my hand, and I saw in a +light of their own two dancing figures on the tormented water +before us. Wild in the tumult, embodied delight, with arms tossed +violently above their heads, and feet flung up behind them, +skimming the waves like seagulls, they passed. Their sex I could +not tell - I think they had none, but were bubble emanations of +the rejoicing rush of the rain and the wild retreating laughter +of the thunder. I saw the fierce aerial faces and their inhuman +glee as they fled by, and she dropped my hand and they were gone. +Slowly the storm lessened, and in the west the clouds tore +raggedly asunder and a flood of livid yellow light poured down +upon the lake - an awful light that struck it into an abyss of +fire. Then, as if at a word of command, two glorious rainbows +sprang across the water with the mountains for their piers, each +with its proper colours chorded. They made a Bridge of Dread that +stood out radiant against the background of storm - the Twilight +of the Gods, and the doomed gods marching forth to the last +fight. And the thunder growled sullenly away into the recesses of +the hill and the terrible rainbows faded until the stars came +quietly out and it was a still night.</p> + +<p>But I had seen that what is our dread is the joy of the +spirits of the Mighty Mother, and though the vision faded and I +doubted what I had seen, it prepared the way for what I was yet +to see. A few days later we started on what was to be the most +exquisite memory of my life. A train of ponies carried our tents +and camping necessaries and there was a pony for each of us. And +so, in the cool grey of a divine morning, with little rosy clouds +flecking the eastern sky, we set out from Islamabad for Vernag. +And this was the order of our going. She and I led the way, +attended by a sais (groom) and a coolie carrying the luncheon +basket. Half way we would stop in some green dell, or by some +rushing stream, and there rest and eat our little meal while the +rest of the cavalcade passed on to the appointed camping place, +and in the late afternoon we would follow, riding slowly, and +find the tents pitched and the kitchen department in full swing. +If the place pleased us we lingered for some days; - if not, the +camp was struck next morning, and again we wandered in search of +beauty.</p> + +<p>The people were no inconsiderable part of my joy. I cannot see +what they have to gain from such civilization as ours - a kindly +people and happy. Courtesy and friendliness met us everywhere, +and if their labor was hard, their harvest of beauty and laughter +seemed to be its reward. The little villages with their groves of +walnut and fruit trees spoke of no unfulfilled want, the +mulberries which fatten the sleek bears in their season fattened +the children too. I compared their lot with that of the toilers +in our cities and knew which I would choose. We rode by +shimmering fields of barley, with red poppies floating in the +clear transparent green as in deep sea water, through fields of +millet like the sky fallen on the earth, so innocently blue were +its blossoms, and the trees above us were trellised with the wild +roses, golden and crimson, and the ways tapestried with the +scented stars of the large white jasmine.</p> + +<p>It was strange that later much of what she said, escaped me. +Some I noted down at the time, but there were hints, shadows of +lovelier things beyond that eluded all but the fringes of memory +when I tried to piece them together and make a coherence of a +living wonder. For that reason, the best things cannot be told in +this history. It is only the cruder, grosser matters that words +will hold. The half-touchings -vanishing looks, breaths - O God, +I know them, but cannot tell.</p> + +<p>In the smaller villages, the head man came often to greet us +and make us welcome, bearing on a flat dish a little offering of +cakes and fruit, the produce of the place. One evening a man so +approached, stately in white robes and turban, attended by a +little lad who carried the patriarchal gift beside him. Our tents +were pitched under a glorious walnut tree with a run- ning stream +at our feet.</p> + +<p>Vanna of course, was the interpreter, and I called her from +her tent as the man stood salaaming before me. It was strange +that when she came, dressed in white, he stopped in his +salutation, and gazed at her in what, I thought, was silent +wonder.</p> + +<p>She spoke earnestly to him, standing before him with clasped +hands, almost, I could think, in the attitude of a suppliant. The +man listened gravely, with only an interjection, now and again, +and once he turned and looked curiously at me. Then he spoke, +evidently making some announcement which she received with bowed +head - and when he turned to go with a grave salute, she +performed a very singular ceremony, moving slowly round him three +times with clasped hands; keeping him always on the right. He +repaid it with the usual salaam and greeting of peace, which he +bestowed also on me, and then departed in deep meditation, his +eyes fixed on the ground. I ventured to ask what it all meant, +and she looked thoughtfully at me before replying.</p> + +<p>"It was a strange thing. I fear you will not altogether +understand, but I will tell you what I can. That man though +living here among Mahomedans, is a Brahman from Benares, and, +what is very rare in India, a Buddhist. And when he saw me he +believed he remembered me in a former birth. The ceremony you saw +me perform is one of honour in India. It was his due."</p> + +<p>"Did you remember him?" I knew my voice was incredulous.</p> + +<p>"Very well. He has changed little but is further on the upward +path. I saw him with dread for he holds the memory of a great +wrong I did. Yet he told me a thing that has filled my heart with +joy."</p> + +<p>"Vanna-what is it?"</p> + +<p>She had a clear uplifted look which startled me. There was +suddenly a chill air blowing between us.</p> + +<p>"I must not tell you yet but you will know soon. He was a good +man. I am glad we have met."</p> + +<p>She buried herself in writing in a small book I had noticed +and longed to look into, and no more was said.</p> + +<p>We struck camp next day and trekked on towards Vernag - a +rough march, but one of great beauty, beneath the shade of forest +trees, garlanded with pale roses that climbed from bough to bough +and tossed triumphant wreaths into the uppermost blue.</p> + +<p>In the afternoon thunder was flapping its wings far off in the +mountains and a little rain fell while we were lunching under a +big tree. I was considering anxiously how to shelter Vanna, when +a farmer invited us to his house - a scene of Biblical +hospitality that delighted us both. He led us up some break-neck +little stairs to a large bare room, open to the clean air all +round the roof, and with a kind of rough enclosure on the wooden +floor where the family slept at night. There he opened our +basket, and then, with anxious care, hung clothes and rough +draperies about us that our meal might be unwatched by one or two +friends who had followed us in with breathless interest. Still +further to entertain us a great rarity was brought out and laid +at Vanna's feet as something we might like to watch - a curious +bird in a cage, with brightly barred wings and a singular cry. +She fed it with fruit, and it fluttered to her hand. Just so +Abraham might have welcomed his guests, and when we left with +words of deepest gratitude, our host made the beautiful obeisance +of touching his forehead with joined hands as he bowed. To me the +whole incident had an extraordinary grace, and ennobled both host +and guest. But we met an ascending scale of loveliness so varied +in its aspects that I passed from one emotion to another and knew +no sameness.</p> + +<p>That afternoon the camp was pitched at the foot of a mighty +hill, under the waving pyramids of the chenars, sweeping their +green like the robes of a goddess. Near by was a half circle of +low arches falling into ruin, and as we went in among them I +beheld a wondrous sight - the huge octagonal tank or basin made +by the Mogul Emperor Jehangir to receive the waters of a mighty +Spring which wells from the hill and has been held sacred by +Hindu and Moslem. And if loveliness can sanctify surely it is +sacred indeed.</p> + +<p>The tank was more than a hundred feet in diameter and circled +by a roughly paved pathway where the little arched cells open +that the devotees may sit and contemplate the lustral waters. +There on a black stone, is sculptured the Imperial inscription +comparing this spring to the holier wells of Paradise, and I +thought no less of it, for it rushes straight from the rock with +no aiding stream, and its waters are fifty feet deep, and sweep +away from this great basin through beautiful low arches in a wild +foaming river - the crystal life-blood of the mountains for ever +welling away. The colour and perfect purity of this living jewel +were most marvellous -clear blue-green like a chalcedony, but +changing as the lights in an opal - a wonderful quivering +brilliance, flickering with the silver of shoals of sacred +fish.</p> + +<p>But the Mogul Empire is with the snows of yesteryear and the +wonder has passed from the Moslems into the keeping of the Hindus +once more, and the Lingam of Shiva, crowned with flowers, is the +symbol in the little shrine by the entrance. Surely in India, the +gods are one and have no jealousies among them - so swiftly do +their glories merge the one into the other.</p> + +<p>"How all the Mogul Emperors loved running water," said Vanna. +"I can see them leaning over it in their carved pavilions with +delicate dark faces and pensive eyes beneath their turbans, lost +in the endless reverie of the East while liquid melody passes +into their dream. It was the music they best loved."</p> + +<p>She was leading me into the royal garden below, where the +young river flows beneath the pavilion set above and across the +rush of the water.</p> + +<p>"I remember before I came to India," she went on, "there were +certain words and phrases that meant the whole East to me. It was +an enchantment. The. first flash picture I had was Milton's-</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>'Dark faces with white silken turbans wreathed.'</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>and it still is. I have thought ever since that every man +should wear a turban. It dignifies the un-comeliest and it is +quite curious to see how many inches a man descends in the scale +of beauty the moment he takes it off and you see only the +skull-cap about which they wind it. They wind it with wonderful +skill too. I have seen a man take eighteen yards of muslin and +throw it round his head with a few turns, and in five or six +minutes the beautiful folds were all in order and he looked like +a king. Some of the Gujars here wear black ones and they are very +effective and worth painting - the black folds and the sullen +tempestuous black brows underneath."</p> + +<p>We sat in the pavilion for awhile looking down on the rushing +water, and she spoke of Akbar, the greatest of the Moguls, and +spoke with a curious personal touch, as I thought.</p> + +<p>"I wish you would try to write a story of him - one on more +human lines than has been done yet. No one has accounted for the +passionate quest of truth that was the real secret of his life. +Strange in an Oriental despot if you think of it! It really can +only be understood from the Buddhist belief, which curiously +seems to have been the only one he neglected, that a mysterious +Karma influenced all his thoughts. If I tell you as a key-note +for your story, that in a past life he had been a Buddhist priest +- one who had fallen away, would that in any way account to you +for attempts to recover the lost way? Try to think that out, and +to write the story, not as a Western mind sees it, but pure +East."</p> + +<p>"That would be a great book to write if one could catch the +voices of the past. But how to do it?"</p> + +<p>"I will give you one day a little book that may help you. The +other story I wish you would write is the story of a Dancer of +Peshawar. There is a connection between the two - a story of ruin +and repentance."</p> + +<p>"Will you tell it to me?"</p> + +<p>"A part. In this same book you will find much more, hut not +all. All cannot be told. You must imagine much. But I think your +imagination will be true."</p> + +<p>"Why do you think so?"</p> + +<p>"Because in these few days you have learnt so much. You have +seen the Ninefold Flower, and the rain spirits. You will soon +hear the Flute of Krishna which none can hear who cannot dream +true."</p> + +<p>That night I heard it. I waked, suddenly, to music, and +standing in the door of my tent, in the dead silence of the +night, lit only by a few low stars, I heard the poignant notes of +a flute. If it had called my name it could not have summoned me +more clearly, and I followed without a thought of delay, +forgetting even Vanna in the strange urgency that filled me. The +music was elusive, seeming to come first from one side, then from +the other, but finally I tracked it as a bee does a flower by the +scent, to the gate of the royal garden - the pleasure place of +the dead Emperors.</p> + +<p>The gate stood ajar - strange! for I had seen the custodian +close it that evening. Now it stood wide and I went in, walking +noiselessly over the dewy grass. I knew and could not tell how, +that I must be noiseless. Passing as if I were guided, down the +course of the strong young river, I came to the pavilion that +spanned it - the place where we had stood that afternoon - and +there to my profound amazement, I saw Vanna, leaning against a +slight wooden pillar. As if she had expected me, she laid one +finger on her lip, and stretching out her hand, took mine and +drew me beside her as a mother might a child. And instantly I +saw!</p> + +<p>On the further bank a young man in a strange diadem or miter +of jewels, bare-breasted and beautiful, stood among the flowering +oleanders, one foot lightly crossed over the other as he stood. +He was like an image of pale radiant gold, and I could have sworn +that the light came from within rather than fell upon him, for +the night was very dark. He held the flute to his lips, and as I +looked, I became aware that the noise of the rushing water was +tapering off into a murmur scarcely louder than that of a summer +bee in the heart of a rose. Therefore the music rose like a +fountain of crystal drops, cold, clear, and of an entrancing +sweetness, and the face above it was such that I had no power to +turn my eyes away. How shall I say what it was? All I had ever +desired, dreamed, hoped, prayed, looked at me from the remote +beauty of the eyes and with the most persuasive gentleness +entreated me, rather than commanded to follow fearlessly and win. +But these are words, and words shaped in the rough mould of +thought cannot convey the deep desire that would have hurled me +to his feet if Vanna had not held me with a firm restraining +hand. Looking up in adoring love to the dark face was a ring of +woodland creatures. I thought I could distinguish the white +clouded robe of a snow- leopard, the soft clumsiness of a young +bear, and many more, but these shifted and blurred like dream +creatures - I could not be sure of them nor define their numbers. +The eyes of the Player looked down upon their passionate delight +with careless kindness.</p> + +<p>Dim images passed through my mind. Orpheus - No, this was no +Greek. Pan-yet again, No. Where were the pipes, the goat hoofs? +The young Dionysos - No, there were strange jewels instead of his +vines. And then Vanna's voice said as if from a great +distance;</p> + +<p>"Krishna - the Beloved." And I said aloud, "I see!" And even +as I said it the whole picture blurred together like a dream, and +I was alone in the pavilion and the water was foaming past me. +Had I walked in my sleep, I thought, as I made my way hack? As I +gained the garden gate, before me, like a snowflake, I saw the +Ninefold Flower.</p> + +<p>When I told her next day, speaking of it as a dream, she said +simply; "They have opened the door to you. You will not need me +soon.</p> + +<p>"I shall always need you. You have taught me everything. I +could see nothing last night until you took my hand."</p> + +<p>"I was not there," she said smiling. "It was only the thought +of me, and you can have that when I am very far away. I was +sleeping in my tent. What you called in me then you can always +call, even if I am - dead."</p> + +<p>"That is a word which is beginning to have no meaning for me. +You have said things to me - no, thought them, that have made me +doubt if there is room in the universe for the thing we have +called death."</p> + +<p>She smiled her sweet wise smile.</p> + +<p>"Where we are death is not. Where death is we are not. But you +will understand better soon."</p> + +<p>Our march curving took us by the Mogul gardens of Achibal, and +the glorious ruins of the great Temple at Martund, and so down to +Bawan with its crystal waters and that loveliest camping ground +beside them. A mighty grove of chenar trees, so huge that I felt +as if we were in a great sea cave where the air is dyed with the +deep shadowy green of the inmost ocean, and the murmuring of the +myriad leaves was like a sea at rest. I looked up into the noble +height and my memory of Westminster dwindled, for this led on and +up to the infinite blue, and at night the stars hung like fruit +upon the branches. The water ran with a great joyous rush of +release from the mountain behind, but was first received in a +broad basin full of sacred fish and reflecting a little temple of +Maheshwara and one of Surya the Sun. Here in this basin the water +lay pure and still as an ecstasy, and beside it was musing the +young Brahman priest who served the temple. Since I had joined +Vanna I had begun with her help to study a little Hindustani, and +with an aptitude for language could understand here and there. I +caught a word or two as she spoke with him that startled me, when +the high-bred ascetic face turned serenely upon her, and he +addressed her as "My sister," adding a sentence beyond my +learning, but which she willingly translated later. - "May He who +sits above the Mysteries, have mercy upon thy rebirth."</p> + +<p>She said afterwards;</p> + +<p>"How beautiful some of these men are. It seems a different +type of beauty from ours, nearer to nature and the old gods. Look +at that priest - the tall figure, the clear olive skin, the dark +level brows, the long lashes that make a soft gloom about the +eyes - eyes that have the fathomless depth of a deer's, the proud +arch of the lip. I think there is no country where aristocracy is +more clearly marked than in India. The Brahmans are aristocrats +of the world. You see it is a religious aristocracy as well. It +has everything that can foster pride and exclusiveness. They +spring from the Mouth of Deity. They are His word incarnate. Not +many kings are of the Brahman caste, and the Brahmans look down +upon them from Sovereign heights. I have known men who would not +eat with their own rulers who would have drunk the water that +washed the Brahmans' feet."</p> + +<p>She took me that day, the Brahman with us, to see a cave in +the mountain. We climbed up the face of the cliff to where a +little tree grew on a ledge, and the black mouth yawned. We went +in and often it was so low we had to stoop, leaving the sunlight +behind until it was like a dim eye glimmering in the velvet +blackness. The air was dank and cold and presently obscene with +the smell of bats, and alive with their wings, as they came +sweeping about us, gibbering and squeaking. I thought of the rush +of the ghosts, blown like dead leaves in the Odyssey. And then a +small rock chamber branched off, and in this, lit by a bit of +burning wood, we saw the bones of a holy man who lived and died +there four hundred years ago. Think of it! He lived there always, +with the slow dropping of water from the dead weight of the +mountain above his head, drop by drop tolling the minutes away: +the little groping feet through the cave that would bring him +food and drink, hurrying into the warmth and sunlight again, and +his only companion the sacred Lingam which means the Creative +Energy that sets the worlds dancing for joy round the sun - that, +and the black solitude to sit down beside him. Surely his bones +can hardly be dryer and colder now than they were then! There +must be strange ecstasies in such a life - wild visions in the +dark, or it could never be endured.</p> + +<p>And so, in marches of about ten miles a day, we came to +Pahlgam on the banks of the dancing Lidar. There was now only +three weeks left of the time she had promised. After a few days +at Pahlgam the march would turn and bend its way back to +Srinagar, and to - what? I could not believe it was to separation +- in her lovely kindness she had grown so close to me that, even +for the sake of friendship, I believed our paths must run +together to the end, and there were moments when I could still +half convince myself that I had grown as necessary to her as she +was to me. No - not as necessary, for she was life and soul to +me, but a part of her daily experience that she valued and would +not easily part with. That evening we were sitting outside the +tents, near the camp fire, of pine logs and cones, the leaping +flames making the night beautiful with gold and leaping sparks, +in an attempt to reach the mellow splendours of the moon. The +men, in various attitudes of rest, were lying about, and one had +been telling a story which had just ended in excitement and loud +applause.</p> + +<p>"These are Mahomedans," said Vanna, "and it is only a story of +love and fighting like the Arabian Nights. If they had been +Hindus, it might well have been of Krishna or of Rama and Sita. +Their faith comes from an earlier time and they still see +visions. The Moslem is a hard practical faith for men - men of +the world too. It is not visionary now, though it once had its +great mysteries."</p> + +<p>"I wish you would tell me what you think of the visions or +apparitions of the gods that are seen here. Is it all illusion? +Tell me your thought."</p> + +<p>"How difficult that is to answer. I suppose if love and faith +are strong enough they will always create the vibrations to which +the greater vibrations respond, and so make God in their own +image at any time or place. But that they call up what is the +truest reality I have never doubted. There is no shadow without a +substance. The substance is beyond us but under certain +conditions the shadow is projected and we see it.</p> + +<p>"Have I seen or has it been dream?"</p> + +<p>"I cannot tell. It may have been the impress of my mind on +yours, for I see such things always. You say I took your +hand?"</p> + +<p>"Take it now."</p> + +<p>She obeyed, and instantly, as I felt the firm cool clasp, I +heard the rain of music through the pines - the Flute Player was +passing. She dropped it smiling and the sweet sound ceased.</p> + +<p>"You see! How can I tell what you have seen? You will know +better when I am gone. You will stand alone then."</p> + +<p>"You will not go - you cannot. I have seen how you have loved +all this wonderful time. I believe it has been as dear to you as +to me. And every day I have loved you more. I depend upon you for +everything that makes life worth living. You could not - you who +are so gentle - you could not commit the senseless cruelty of +leaving me when you have taught me to love you with every beat of +my heart. I have been patient - I have held myself in, but I must +speak now. Marry me, and teach me. I know nothing. You know all I +need to know. For pity's sake be my wife."</p> + +<p>I had not meant to say it; it broke from me in the firelight +moonlight with a power that I could not stay. She looked at me +with a disarming gentleness.</p> + +<p>"Is this fair? Do you remember how at Peshawar I told you I +thought it was a dangerous experiment, and that it would make +things harder for you. But you took the risk like a brave man +because you felt there were things to be gained - knowledge, +insight, beauty. Have you not gained them?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. Absolutely."</p> + +<p>"Then, is it all loss if I go?"</p> + +<p>"Not all. But loss I dare not face."</p> + +<p>"I will tell you this. I could not stay if I would. Do you +remember the old man on the way to Vernag? He told me that I must +very soon take up an entirely new life. I have no choice, though +if I had I would still do it."</p> + +<p>There was silence and down a long arcade, without any touch of +her hand I heard the music, receding with exquisite modulations +to a very great distance, and between the pillared stems, I saw a +faint light.</p> + +<p>"Do you wish to go?"</p> + +<p>"Entirely. But I shall not forget you, Stephen. I will tell +you something. For me, since I came to India, the gate that shuts +us out at birth has opened. How shall I explain? Do you remember +Kipling's 'Finest Story in the World'?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. Fiction!"</p> + +<p>"Not fiction - true, whether he knew it or no. But for me the +door has opened wide. First, I remembered piecemeal, with wide +gaps, then more connectedly. Then, at the end of the first year, +I met one day at Cawnpore, an ascetic, an old man of great beauty +and wisdom, and he was able by his own knowledge to enlighten +mine. Not wholly - much has come since then. Has come, some of it +in ways you could not understand now, but much by direct sight +and hearing. Long, long ago I lived in Peshawar, and my story was +a sorrowful one. I will tell you a little before I go."</p> + +<p>"I hold you to your promise. What is there I cannot believe +when you tell me? But does that life put you altogether away from +me? Was there no place for me in any of your memories that has +drawn us together now? Give me a little hope that in the eternal +pilgrimage there is some bond between us and some rebirth where +we may met again."</p> + +<p>"I will tell you that also before we part. I have grown to +believe that you do love me - and therefore love something which +is infinitely above me."</p> + +<p>"And do you love me at all? Am I nothing, Vanna - Vanna?"</p> + +<p>"My friend," she said, and laid her hand on mine.</p> + +<p>A silence, and then she spoke, very low.</p> + +<p>"You must be prepared for very great change, Stephen, and yet +believe that it does not really change things at all. See how +even the gods pass and do not change! The early gods of India are +gone and Shiva, Vishnu, Krishna have taken their places and are +one and the same. The old Buddhist stories say that in heaven +"The flowers of the garland the God wore are withered, his robes +of majesty are waxed old and faded; he falls from his high +estate, and is re-born into a new life." But he lives still in +the young God who is born among men. The gods cannot die, nor can +we nor anything that has life. Now I must go in.</p> + +<p>I sat long in the moonlight thinking. The whole camp was sunk +in sleep and the young dawn was waking upon the peaks when I +turned in.</p> + +<p>The days that were left we spent in wandering up the Lidar +River to the hills that are the first ramp of the ascent to the +great heights. We found the damp corners where the mushrooms grow +like pearls - the mushrooms of which she said - "To me they have +always been fairy things. To see them in the silver-grey dew of +the early mornings - mysteriously there like the manna in the +desert - they are elfin plunder, and as a child I was half afraid +of them. No wonder they are the darlings of folklore, especially +in Celtic countries where the Little People move in the +starlight. Strange to think they are here too among strange +gods!"</p> + +<p>We climbed to where the wild peonies bloom in glory that few +eyes see, and the rosy beds of wild sweet strawberries ripen. +Every hour brought with it some new delight, some exquisiteness +of sight or of words that I shall remember for ever. She sat one +day on a rock, holding the sculptured leaves and massive +seed-vessels of some glorious plant that the Kashmiris believe +has magic virtues hidden in the seeds of pure rose embedded in +the white down.</p> + +<p>"If you fast for three days and eat nine of these in the Night +of No Moon, you can rise on the air light as thistledown and +stand on the peak of Haramoukh. And on Haramoukh, as you know it +is believed, the gods dwell. There was a man here who tried this +enchantment. He was a changed man for ever after, wandering and +muttering to himself and avoiding all human intercourse as far as +he could. He was no Kashmiri - A Jat from the Punjab, and they +showed him to me when I was here with the Meryons, and told me he +would speak to none. But I knew he would speak to me, and he +did."</p> + +<p>"Did he tell you anything of what he had seen in the high +world up yonder?"</p> + +<p>"He said he had seen the Dream of the God. I could not get +more than that. But there are many people here who believe that +the Universe as we know it is but an image in the dream of +Ishvara, the Universal Spirit - in whom are all the gods - and +that when He ceases to dream we pass again into the Night of +Brahm, and all is darkness until the Spirit of God moves again on +the face of the waters. There are few temples to Brahm. He is +above and beyond all direct worship."</p> + +<p>"Do you think he had seen anything?"</p> + +<p>"What do I know? Will you eat the seeds? The Night of No Moon +will soon be here."</p> + +<p>She held out the seed-vessels, laughing. I write that down but +how record the lovely light of kindliness in her eyes - the +almost submissive gentleness that yet was a defense stronger than +steel. I never knew - how should I? - whether she was sitting by +my side or heavens away from me in her own strange world. But +always she was a sweetness that I could not reach, a cup of +nectar that I might not drink, unalterably her own and never +mine, and yet - my friend.</p> + +<p>She showed me the wild track up into the mountains where the +Pilgrims go to pay their devotions at the Great God's shrine in +the awful heights, regretting that we were too early for that +most wonderful sight. Above where we were sitting the river fell +in a tormented white cascade, crashing arid feathering into +spray-dust of diamonds. An eagle was flying above it with a +mighty spread of wings that seemed almost double-jointed in the +middle - they curved and flapped so wide and free. The fierce +head was outstretched with the rake of a plundering galley as he +swept down the wind, seeking his meat from God, and passed +majestic from our sight. The valley beneath us was littered with +enormous boulders spilt from the ancient hollows of the hills. It +must have been a great sight when the giants set them trundling +down in work or play! - I said this to Vanna, who was looking +down upon it with meditative eyes. She roused herself.</p> + +<p>"Yes, this really is Giant-Land up here - everything is so +huge. And when they quarrel up in the heights - in Jotunheim - +and the black storms come down the valleys it is like colossal +laughter or clumsy boisterous anger. And the Frost giants are +still at work up there with their great axes of frost and rain. +They fling down the side of a mountain or make fresh ways for the +rivers. About sixty years ago - far above here - they tore down a +mountain side and damned up the mighty Indus, so that for months +he was a lake, shut back in the hills. But the river giants are +no less strong up here in the heights of the world, and lie lay +brooding and hiding his time. And then one awful day he tore the +barrier down and roared down the valley carrying death and ruin +with him, and swept away a whole Sikh army among other +unconsidered trifles. That must have been a soul-shaking +sight."</p> + +<p>She spoke on, and as she spoke I saw. What are her words as I +record them? Stray dead leaves pressed in a book - the life and +grace dead. Yet I record, for she taught me what I believe the +world should learn, that the Buddhist philosophers are right when +they teach that all forms of what we call matter are really but +aggregates of spiritual units, and that life itself is a curtain +hiding reality as the vast veil of day conceals from our sight +the countless orbs of space. So that the purified mind even while +prisoned in the body, may enter into union with the Real and, +according to attainment, see it as it is.</p> + +<p>She was an interpreter because she believed this truth +profoundly. She saw the spiritual essence beneath the lovely +illusion of matter, and the air about her was radiant with the +motion of strange forces for which the dull world has many names +aiming indeed at the truth, but falling - O how far short of her +calm perception! She was indeed of a Household higher than the +Household of Faith. She had received enlightenment. She beheld +with open eyes.</p> + +<p>Next day our camp was struck and we turned our faces again to +Srinagar and to the day of parting. I set down but one strange +incident of our journey, of which I did not speak even to +her.</p> + +<p>We were camping at Bijbehara, awaiting our house boat, and the +site was by the Maharaja's lodge above the little town. It was +midnight and I was sleepless - the shadow of the near future was +upon me. I wandered down to the lovely old wooded bridge across +the Jhelum, where the strong young trees grow up from the piles. +Beyond it the moon was shining on the ancient Hindu remains close +to the new temple, and as I stood on the bridge I could see the +figure of a man in deepest meditation by the ruins. He was no +European. I saw the straight dignified folds of the robes. But it +was not surprising he should be there and I should have thought +no more of it, had I not heard at that instant from the further +side of the river the music of the Flute. I cannot hope to +describe that music to any who have not heard it. Suffice it to +say that where it calls he who hears must follow whether in the +body or the spirit. Nor can I now tell in which I followed. One +day it will call me across the River of Death, and I shall ford +it or sink in the immeasurable depths and either will be +well.</p> + +<p>But immediately I was at the other side of the river, standing +by the stone Bull of Shiva where he kneels before the Symbol, and +looking steadfastly upon me a few paces away was a man in the +dress of a Buddhist monk. He wore the yellow robe that leaves one +shoulder bare; his head was bare also and he held in one hand a +small bowl like a stemless chalice. I knew I was seeing a very +strange inexplicable sight - one that in Kashmir should be +incredible, but I put wonder aside for I knew now that I was +moving in the sphere where the incredible may well be the actual. +His expression was of the most unbroken calm. If I compare it to +the passionless gaze of the Sphinx I misrepresent, for the Riddle +of the Sphinx still awaits solution, but in this face was a noble +acquiescence and a content that had it vibrated must have passed +into joy.</p> + +<p>Words or their equivalent passed between us. I felt his +voice.</p> + +<p>"You have heard the music of the Flute?"</p> + +<p>"I have heard."</p> + +<p>"What has it given?"</p> + +<p>"A consuming longing."</p> + +<p>"It is the music of the Eternal. The creeds and the faiths are +the words that men have set to that melody. Listening, it will +lead you to Wisdom. Day by day you will interpret more +surely."</p> + +<p>"I cannot stand alone."</p> + +<p>"You will not need. What has led you will lead you still. +Through many births it has led you. How should it fail?"</p> + +<p>"What should I do?"</p> + +<p>"Go forward."</p> + +<p>"What should I shun?"</p> + +<p>"Sorrow and fear."</p> + +<p>"What should I seek?"</p> + +<p>"Joy."</p> + +<p>"And the end?"</p> + +<p>"Joy. Wisdom. They are the Light and Dark of the Divine." A +cold breeze passed and touched my forehead. I was still standing +in the middle of the bridge above the water gliding to the Ocean, +and there was no figure by the Bull of Shiva. I was alone. I +passed back to the tents with the shudder that is not fear but +akin to death upon me. I knew I had been profoundly withdrawn +from what we call actual life, and the return is dread.</p> + +<p>The days passed as we floated down the river to Srinagar. On +board the Kedarnath, now lying in our first berth beneath the +chenars near and yet far from the city, the last night had come. +Next morning I should begin the long ride to Baramula and beyond +that barrier of the Happy Valley down to Murree and the Punjab. +Where afterwards? I neither knew nor cared. My lesson was before +me to be learned. I must try to detach myself from all I had +prized - to say to my heart it was but a loan and no gift, and to +cling only to the imperishable. And did I as yet certainly know +more than the A B C of the hard doctrine by which I must live? +"Que vivre est difficile, 0 mon cocur fatigue!" - an immense +weariness possessed me - a passive grief.</p> + +<p>Vanna would follow later with the wife of an Indian doctor. I +believed she was bound for Lahore but on that point she had not +spoken certainly and I felt we should not meet again.</p> + +<p>And now my packing was finished, and, as far as my possessions +went, the little cabin had the soulless emptiness that comes with +departure. I was enduring as best I could. If she had held +loyally to her pact, could I do less. Was she to blame for my +wild hope that in the end she would relent and step down to the +household levels of love?</p> + +<p>She sat by the window - the last time I should see the moonlit +banks and her clear face against them. I made and won my fight +for the courage of words.</p> + +<p>"And now I've finished everything - thank goodness! and we can +talk. Vanna - you will write to me?"</p> + +<p>"Once. I promise that."</p> + +<p>"Only once? Why? I counted on your words."</p> + +<p>"I want to speak to you of something else now. I want to tell +you a memory. But look first at the pale light behind the +Takht-i-Suliman."</p> + +<p>So I had seen it with her. So I should not see it again. We +watched until a line of silver sparkled on the black water, and +then she spoke again.</p> + +<p>"Stephen, do you remember in the ruined monastery near +Peshawar, how I told you of the young Abbot, who came down to +Peshawar with a Chinese pilgrim? And he never returned."</p> + +<p>"I remember. There was a Dancer."</p> + +<p>"There was a Dancer. She was Lilavanti, and she was brought +there to trap him but when she saw him she loved him, and that +was his ruin and hers. Trickery he would have known and escaped. +Love caught him in an unbreakable net, and they fled down the +Punjab and no one knew any more. But I know. For two years they +lived together and she saw the agony in his heart - the anguish +of his broken vows, the face of the Blessed One receding into an +infinite distance. She knew that every day added a link to the +heavy Karma that was bound about the feet she loved, and her soul +said "Set him free," and her heart refused the torture. But her +soul was the stronger. She set him free."</p> + +<p>"How?"</p> + +<p>"She took poison. He became an ascetic in the hills and died +in peace but with a long expiation upon him."</p> + +<p>"And she?"</p> + +<p>"I am she."</p> + +<p>"You!" I heard my voice as if it were another man's. Was it +possible that I - a man of the twentieth century, believed this +impossible thing? Impossible, and yet - what had I learnt if not +the unity of Time, the illusion of matter? What is the twentieth +century, what the first? Do they not lie before the Supreme as +one, and clean from our petty divisions? And I myself had seen +what, if I could trust it, asserted the marvels that are no +marvels to those who know.</p> + +<p>"You loved him?"</p> + +<p>"I love him."</p> + +<p>"Then there is nothing at all for me."</p> + +<p>She resumed as if she had heard nothing.</p> + +<p>"I have lost him for many lives. He stepped above me at once, +for he was clean gold though he fell, and though I have followed +I have not found. But that Buddhist beyond Islamabad - you shall +hear now what he said. It was this. 'The shut door opens, and +this time he awaits.' I cannot yet say all it means, but there is +no Lahore for me. I shall meet him soon."</p> + +<p>"Vanna, you would not harm yourself again?"</p> + +<p>"Never. I should not meet him. But you will see. Now I can +talk no more. I will be there tomorrow when you go, and I will +ride with you to the poplar road."</p> + +<p>She passed like a shadow into her little dark cabin, and I was +left alone. I will not dwell on that black loneliness of the +spirit, for it has passed - it was the darkness of hell, a +madness of jealousy, and could have no enduring life in any heart +that had known her. But it was death while it lasted. I had +moments of horrible belief, of horrible disbelief, but however it +might be I knew that she was out of reach for ever. Near me - +yes! but only as the silver image of the moon floated in the +water by the boat, with the moon herself cold myriads of miles +away. I will say no more of that last eclipse of what she had +wrought in me.</p> + +<p>The bright morning came, sunny as if my joys were beginning +instead of ending. Vanna mounted her horse and led the way from +the boat. I cast one long look at the little Kedarnath, the home +of those perfect weeks, of such joy and sorrow as would have +seemed impossible to me in the chrysalis of my former existence. +Little Kahdra stood crying bitterly on the bank - the kindly folk +who had served us were gathered saddened and quiet. I set my +teeth and followed her.</p> + +<p>How dear she looked, how kind, how gentle her appealing eyes, +as I drew up beside her. She knew what I felt. She knew that the +sight of little Kahdra crying as he said good - bye was the last +pull at my sore heart. Still she rode steadily on, and still I +followed. Once she spoke.</p> + +<p>"Stephen, there was a man in Peshawar, kind and true, who +loved that Lilavanti who had no heart for him. And when she died, +it was in his arms, as a sister might cling to a brother, for the +man she loved had left her. It seems that will not be in this +life, but do not think I have been so blind that I did not know +my friend."</p> + +<p>I could not answer - it was the realization of the utmost I +could hope and it came like healing to my spirit. Better that +bond between us, slight as most men might think it, than the +dearest and closest with a woman not Vanna. It was the first +thrill of a new joy in my heart - the first, I thank the +Infinite, of many and steadily growing joys and hopes that cannot +be uttered here.</p> + +<p>I bent to take the hand she stretched to me, but even as they +touched, I saw, passing behind the trees by the road, the young +man I had seen in the garden at Vernag - most beautiful, in the +strange miter of his jewelled diadem. His flute was at his lips +and the music rang out sudden and crystal clear as though a +woodland god were passing to awaken all the joys of the dawn.</p> + +<p>The horses heard too. In an instant hers had swerved wildly, +and she lay on the ground at my feet. The music had ceased.</p> + +<p>Days had gone before I could recall what had happened then. I +lifted her in my arms and carried her into the rest-house near at +hand, and the doctor came and looked grave, and a nurse was sent +from the Mission Hospital. No doubt all was done that was +possible, hut I knew from the first what it meant and how it +would be. She lay in a white stillness, and the room was quiet as +death. I remembered with unspeakable gratitude later that the +nurse had been merciful and had not sent me away.</p> + +<p>So Vanna lay all day and through the night, and when the dawn +came again she stirred and motioned with her hand, although her +eyes were closed. I understood, and kneeling, I put my hand under +her head, and rested it against my shoulder. Her faint voice +murmured at my ear.</p> + +<p>"I dreamed - I was in the pine wood at Pahlgam and it was the +Night of No Moon, and I was afraid for it was dark, but suddenly +all the trees were covered with little lights like stars, and the +greater light was beyond. Nothing to be afraid of."</p> + +<p>"Nothing, Beloved."</p> + +<p>"And I looked beyond Peshawar, further than eyes could see, +and in the ruins of the monastery where we stood, you and I - I +saw him, and he lay with his head at the feet of the Blessed One. +That is well, is it not?"</p> + +<p>"Well, Beloved."</p> + +<p>"And it is well I go? Is it not?"</p> + +<p>"It is well."</p> + +<p>A long silence. The first sun ray touched the floor. Again the +whisper.</p> + +<p>"Believe what I have told you. For we shall meet again." I +repeated-</p> + +<p>"We shall meet again."</p> + +<p>In my arms she died.</p> + +<p>Later, when all was over I asked myself if I believed this and +answered with full assurance - Yes.</p> + +<p>If the story thus told sounds incredible it was not incredible +to me. I had had a profound experience. What is a miracle? It is +simply the vision of the Divine behind nature. It will come in +different forms according to the eyes that see, but the soul will +know that its perception is authentic.</p> + +<p>I could not leave Kashmir, nor was there any need. On the +contrary I saw that there was work for me here among the people +she had loved, and my first aim was to fit myself for that and +for the writing I now felt was to be my career in life. After +much thought I bought the little Kedarnath and made it my home, +very greatly to the satisfaction of little Kahdra and all the +friendly people to whom I owed so much.</p> + +<p>Vanna's cabin I made my sleeping room, and it is the simple +truth that the first night I slept in the place that was a Temple +of Peace in my thoughts, I had a dream of wordless bliss, and +starting awake for sheer joy I saw her face in the night, human +and dear, looking down upon me with that poignant sweetness which +would seem to be the utmost revelation of love and pity. And as I +stretched my hands, another face dawned solemnly from the shadow +beside her with grave brows bent on mine - one I had known and +seen in the ruins at Bijbehara. Outside and very near I could +hear the silver weaving of the Flute that in India is the symbol +of the call of the Divine. A dream - yes, but it taught me to +live. At first, in my days of grief and loss, I did but dream - +the days were hard to endure. I will not dwell on that illusion +of sorrow, now long dead. I lived only for the night.</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>"When sleep comes to close each difficult day,</p> + +<p>When night gives pause to the long watch I keep,</p> + +<p>And all my bonds I needs must loose apart,</p> + +<p>Must doff my will as raiment laid away-</p> + +<p>With the first dream that comes with the first sleep,</p> + +<p>I run - I run! I am gathered to thy heart!"</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>To the heart of her pity. Thus for awhile I lived. Slowly I +became conscious of her abiding presence about me, day or night +It grew clearer, closer.</p> + +<p>Like the austere Hippolytus to his unseen Goddess, I could +say;</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>"Who am more to thee than other mortals are,</p> + +<p>Whose is the holy lot,</p> + +<p>As friend with friend to walk and talk with thee,</p> + +<p>Hearing thy sweet mouth's music in mine ear,</p> + +<p>But thee beholding not."</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>That was much, but later, the sunshine was no bar, the bond +strengthened and there have been days in the heights of the +hills, in the depths of the woods, when I saw her as in life, +passing at a distance, but real and lovely. Life? She had never +lived as she did now - a spirit, freed and rejoicing. For me the +door she had opened would never shut. The Presences were about +me, and I entered upon my heritage of joy, knowing that in +Kashmir, the holy land of Beauty, they walk very near, and lift +up the folds of the Dark that the initiate may see the light +behind.</p> + +<p>So I began my solitary life of gladness. I wrote, aided by the +little book she had left me, full of strangest stories, stranger +by far than my own brain could conceive. Some to be revealed - +some to be hidden. And thus the world will one day receive the +story of the Dancer of Peshawar in her upward lives, that it may +know, if it will, that death is nothing - for Life and Love are +all.</p> + +<p></p> + +<h2 align="center">THE INCOMPARABLE LADY</h2> + +<h3 align="center">A STORY OF CHINA WITH A MORAL</h3> + +<p></p> + +<p>It is recorded that when the Pearl Empress (his mother) asked +of the philosophic Yellow Emperor which he considered the most +beautiful of the Imperial concubines, he replied instantly: "The +Lady A-Kuei": and when the Royal Parent in profound astonishment +demanded bow this could be, having regard to the exquisite +beauties in question, the Emperor replied;</p> + +<p>"I have never seen her. It was dark when I entered the Dragon +Chamber and dusk of dawn when I rose and left her."</p> + +<p>Then said the Pearl Princess;</p> + +<p>"Possibly the harmony of her voice solaced the Son of +Heaven?"</p> + +<p>But he replied;</p> + +<p>"She spoke not."</p> + +<p>And the Pearl Empress rejoined:</p> + +<p>"Her limbs then are doubtless softer than the kingfisher's +plumage?"</p> + +<p>But the Yellow Emperor replied;</p> + +<p>"Doubtless. Yet I have not touched them. I was that night +immersed in speculations on the Yin and the Yang. How then should +I touch a woman?"</p> + +<p>And the Pearl Empress was silent from very great amazement, +not daring to question further but marveling how the thing might +be. And seeing this, the Yellow Emperor recited a poem to the +following effect:</p> + +<p>"It is said that Power rules the world And who shall gainsay +it? But Loveliness is the head-jewel upon the brow of Power."</p> + +<p>And when the Empress had listened with reverence to the +Imperial Poet, she quitted the August Presence.</p> + +<p>Immediately, having entered her own palace of the Tranquil +Motherly Virtues, she caused the Lady A-Kuei to be summoned to +her presence, who came, habited in a purple robe and with pins of +jade and coral in her hair. And the Pearl Empress considered her +attentively, recalling the perfect features of the White Jade +Concubine, the ambrosial smile of the Princess of Feminine +Propriety, and the willow-leaf eyebrows of the Lady of Chen, and +her astonishment was excessive, because the Lady A-Kuei could not +in beauty approach any one of these ladies. Reflecting further +she then placed her behind the screen, and summoned the court +artist, Lo Cheng, who had been formerly commissioned to paint the +heavenly features of the Emperor's Ladies, mirrored in still +water, though he had naturally not been permitted to view the +beauties themselves. Of him the Empress demanded:</p> + +<p>"Who is the most beautiful - which the most priceless jewel of +the dwellers in the Dragon Palace?"</p> + +<p>And, with humility, Lo Cheng replied:</p> + +<p>"What mortal man shall decide between the white Crane and the +Swan, or between the paeony flower and the lotus?" And having +thus said he remained silent, and in him was no help. Finally and +after exhortation the Pearl Empress condescended to threaten him +with the loss of a head so useless to himself and to her majesty. +Then, in great fear and haste he replied:</p> + +<p>"Of all the flowers that adorn the garden of the Sun of +Heaven, the Lady A-Kuei is the fittest to be gathered by the +Imperial Hand, and this is my deliberate opinion."</p> + +<p>Now, hearing this statement, the Pearl Empress was submerged +in bewilderment, knowing that the Lady A-Kuei had modestly +retired when the artist had depicted the reflection of the +assembled loveliness of the Inner Chambers, as not counting +herself worthy of portraiture, and her features were therefore +unknown to him. Nor could the Empress further question the +artist, for when she had done so, he replied only:</p> + +<p>"This is the secret of the Son of Heaven," and, having gained +permission, he swiftly departed.</p> + +<p>Nor could the Lady A-Kuei herself aid her Imperial Majesty, +for on being questioned she was overwhelmed with modesty and +confusion, and with stammering lips could only repeat:</p> + +<p>"This is the secret of his Divine Majesty," imploring with the +utmost humility, forgiveness from the Imperial Mother.</p> + +<p>The Pearl Empress was unable to eat her supper. In vain were +spread before her the delicacies of the Empire. She could but +trifle with a shark's fin and a "Silver Ear" fungus and a dish of +slugs entrapped upon roses, with the dew-like pearls upon them. +Her burning curiosity had wholly deprived her of appetite, nor +could the amusing exertions of the Palace mimes, or a lantern +fete upon the lake restore her to any composure. "This +circumstance will cause my flight on the Dragon (death)," she +said to herself, "unless I succeed in unveiling the mystery. What +therefore should be my next proceeding?"</p> + +<p>And so, deeply reflecting, she caused the Chief of the Eunuchs +to summon the Princess of Feminine Propriety, the White Jade +Concubine and all the other exalted beauties of the Heavenly +Palace.</p> + +<p>In due course of time these ladies arrived, paying suitable +respect and obeisance to the Mother of his Divine Majesty. They +were resplendent in king-fisher ornaments, in jewels of jade, +crystal and coral, in robes of silk and gauze, and still more +resplendent in charms that not the Celestial Empire itself could +equal, setting aside entirely all countries of the foreign +barbarians. And in grace and elegance of manners, in skill in the +arts of poetry and the lute, what could surpass them?</p> + +<p>Like a parterre of flowers they surrounded her Majesty, and +awaited her pleasure with perfect decorum, when, having saluted +them with affability she thus addressed them - "Lovely ones - +ladies distinguished by the particular attention of your +sovereign and mine, I have sent for you to resolve a doubt and a +difficulty. On questioning our sovereign as to whom he regarded +as the loveliest of his garden of beauty he benignantly replied: +"The Lady A-Kuei is incomparable," and though this may well be, +he further graciously added that he had never seen her. Nor, on +pursuing the subject, could I learn the Imperial reason. The +artist Lo Cheng follows in his Master's footsteps, he also never +having seen the favored lady, and he and she reply to me that +this is an Imperial secret. Declare to me therefore if your +perspicacity and the feminine interest which every lady property +takes in the other can unravel this mystery, for my liver is +tormented with anxiety beyond measure."</p> + +<p>As soon as the Pearl Empress had spoken she realized that she +had committed a great indiscretion. A babel of voices, of cries, +questions and contradictions instantly arose. Decorum was +abandoned. The Lady of Chen swooned, nor could she be revived for +an hour, and the Princess of Feminine Propriety and the White +Jade Concubine could be dragged apart only by the united efforts +of six of the Palace matrons, so great was their fury the one +with the other, each accusing each of encouragement to the Lady +A-Kuei's pretensions. So also with the remaining ladies. Shrieks +resounded through the Hall of Virtuous Tranquillity, and when the +Pearl Empress attempted to pour oil on the troubled waters by +speaking soothing and comfortable words, the august Voice was +entirely inaudible in the tumult.</p> + +<p>All sought at length in united indignation for the Lady +A-Kuei, but she had modestly withdrawn to the Pearl Pavilion in +the Imperial Garden and, foreseeing anxieties, had there secured +herself on hearing the opening of the Royal Speech.</p> + +<p>Finally the ladies were led away by their attendants, weeping, +lamenting, raging, according to their several dispositions, and +the Pearl Empress, left with her own maidens, beheld the floor +strewn with jade pins, kingfisher and coral jewels, and even with +fragments of silk and gauze. Nor was she any nearer the solution +of the desired secret.</p> + +<p>That night she tossed upon a bed sleepless though heaped with +down, and her mind raged like a fire up and down all possible +answers to the riddle, but none would serve. Then, at the dawn, +raising herself on one august elbow she called to her venerable +nurse and foster mother, the Lady Ma, wise and resourceful in the +affairs and difficulties of women, and, repeating the +circumstances, demanded her counsel.</p> + +<p>The Lady Ma considering the matter long and deeply, slowly +replied:</p> + +<p>"This is a great riddle and dangerous, for to intermeddle with +the divine secrets is the high road to the Yellow Springs +(death). But the child of my breasts and my exalted Mistress +shall never ask in vain, for a thwarted curiosity is dangerous as +a suppressed fever. I will conceal myself nightly in the Dragon +Bedchamber and this will certainly unveil the truth. And if I +perish I perish."</p> + +<p>It is impossible to describe how the Empress heaped Lady Ma +with costly jewels and silken brocades and taels of silver beyond +measuring - how she placed on her breast the amulet of jade that +had guarded herself from all evil influences, how she called the +ancestral spirits to witness that she would provide for the Lady +Ma's remotest descendants if she lost her life in this sublime +devotion to duty.</p> + +<p>That night Lady Ma concealed herself behind the Imperial couch +in the Dragon Chamber, to await the coming of the Son of Heaven. +Slowly dripped the water-clock as the minutes fled away; sorely +ached the venerable limbs of the Lady Ma as she crouched in the +shadows and saw the rising moon scattering silver through the +elegant traceries of carved ebony and ivory; wildly beat her +heart as delicately tripping footsteps approached the Dragon +Chamber, and the Princess of Feminine Propriety, attended by her +maidens, ascended the Imperial Couch and hastily dismissed them. +Yet no sweet repose awaited this favored lady. The Lady Ma could +hear her smothered sobs, her muttered exclamations - nay could +even feel the couch itself tremble as the Princess uttered the +hated name of the Lady A-Kuei, the poison of jealousy running in +every vein. It was impossible for Lady Ma to decide which was the +most virulent, this, or the poison of curiosity in the heart of +the Pearl Empress. Though she loved not the Princess she was +compelled to pity such suffering. But all thought was banished by +the approach of the Yellow Emperor, prepared for repose and +unattended, in simple but divine grandeur.</p> + +<p>It cannot indeed be supposed that a Celestial Emperor is +human, yet there was mortality in the start which his Augustness +gave when the Princess of Feminine Propriety flinging herself +from the Dragon couch, threw herself at his feet and with tears +that flowed like that river known as "The Sorrow of China," +demanded to know what she had done that another should be +preferred before her; reciting in frantic haste such +imperfections of the Lady A-Kuei's appearance as she could recall +(or invent) in the haste of that agitating moment.</p> + +<p>"That one of her eyes is larger than the other - no human +being can doubt" sobbed the lady -" and surely your Divine +Majesty cannot be aware that her hair reaches but to her waist, +and that there is a brown mole on the nape of her neck? When she +sings it resembles the croak of the crow. It is true that most of +the Palace ladies are chosen for anything but beauty, yet she is +the most ill-favored. And is it this - this bat-faced lady who is +preferred to me! Would I had never been born: Yet even your +Majesty's own lips have told me I am fair!"</p> + +<p>The Yellow Emperor supported the form of the Princess in his +arms. There are moments when even a Son of Heaven is but human. +"Fair as the rainbow," he murmured, and the Princess faintly +smiled; then gathering the resolution of the Philosopher he added +manfully - "But the Lady A-Kuei is incomparable. And the reason +is -"</p> + +<p>The Lady Ma eagerly stretched her head forward with a hand to +either ear. But the Princess of Feminine Propriety with one +shriek had swooned and in the hurry of summoning attendants and +causing her to be conveyed to her own apartments that precious +sentence was never completed.</p> + +<p>Still the Lady Ma groveled behind the Dragon Couch as the Son +of Heaven, left alone, approached the veranda and apostrophizing +the moon, murmured -</p> + +<p>"0 loveliest pale watcher of the destinies of men, illuminate +the beauty of the Lady A-Kuei, and grant that I who have never +seen that beauty may never see it, but remain its constant +admirer!" So saying, he sought his solitary couch and slept, +while the Lady Ma, in a torment of bewilderment, glided from the +room.</p> + +<p>The matter remained in suspense for several days. The White +Jade Concubine was the next lady commanded to the Dragon Chamber, +and again the Lady Ma was in her post of observation. Much she +heard, much she saw that was not to the point, but the scene +ended as before by the dismissal of the lady in tears, and the +departure of the Lady Ma in ignorance of the secret.</p> + +<p>The Emperor's peace was ended.</p> + +<p>The singular circumstance was that the Lady A-Kuei was never +summoned by the Yellow Emperor. Eagerly as the Empress watched, +no token of affection for her was ever visible. Nothing could be +detected. It was inexplicable. Finally, devoured by curiosity +that gave her no respite, she resolved on a stratagem that should +dispel the mystery, though it carried with it a risk on which she +trembled to reflect. It was the afternoon of a languid summer +day, and the Yellow Emperor, almost unattended, had come to pay a +visit of filial respect to the Pearl Empress. She received him +with the ceremony due to her sovereign in the porcelain pavilion +of the Eastern Gardens, with the lotos fish ponds before them, +and a faint breeze occasionally tinkling the crystal wind-bells +that decorated the shrubs on the cloud and dragon-wrought slopes +of the marble approach. A bird of brilliant plumage uttered a cry +of reverence from its gold cage as the Son of Heaven entered. As +was his occasional custom, and after suitable inquiries as to his +parent's health, the attendants were all dismissed out of earshot +and the Emperor leaned on his cushions and gazed reflectively +into the sunshine outside. So had the Court Artist represented +him as "The Incarnation of Philosophic Calm."</p> + +<p>"These gardens are fair," said the Empress after a respectful +silence, moving her fan illustrated with the emblem of +Immortality - the Ho Bird.</p> + +<p>"Fair indeed," returned the Emperor. - "It might be supposed +that all sorrow and disturbance would be shut without the +Forbidden Precincts. Yet it is not so. And though the figures of +my ladies moving among the flowers appear at this distance +instinct with joy, yet -"</p> + +<p>He was silent.</p> + +<p>"They know not," said the Empress with solemnity "that death +entered the Forbidden Precincts but last night. A disembodied +spirit has returned to its place and doubtless exists in bliss." +"Indeed?" returned the Yellow Emperor with indifference - "yet if +the spirit is absorbed into the Source whence it came, and the +bones have crumbled into nothingness, where does the Ego exist? +The dead are venerable, but no longer of interest."</p> + +<p>"Not even when they were loved in life?" said the Empress, +caressing the bird in the cage with one jewelled finger, but +attentively observing her son from the corner of her august eye. +"They were; they are not," he remarked sententiously and stifling +a yawn; it was a drowsy afternoon. "But who is it that has +abandoned us? Surely not the Lady Ma - your Majesty's faithful +foster-mother?"</p> + +<p>"A younger, a lovelier spirit has sought the Yellow Springs" +replied the trembling Empress. "I regret to inform your Majesty +that a sudden convulsion last night deprived the Lady A-Kuei of +life. I would not permit the news to reach you lest it should +break your august night's rest."</p> + +<p>There was a silence, then the Emperor turned his eyes serenely +upon his Imperial Mother. "That the statement of my august Parent +is merely - let us say - allegoric - does not detract from its +interest. But had the Lady A-Kuei in truth departed to the Yellow +Springs I should none the less have received the news without +uneasiness. What though the sun set - is not the memory of his +light all surpassing?"</p> + +<p>No longer could the Pearl Empress endure the excess of her +curiosity. Deeply kowtowing, imploring pardon, with raised hands +and tears which no son dare neglect, she besought the Emperor to +enlighten her as to this mystery, recounting his praises of the +lady and his admission that he had never beheld her, and all the +circumstances connected with this remark- able episode. She +omitted only, (from considerations of delicacy and others,) the +vigils of the Lady Ma in the Dragon Chamber. The Emperor, +sighing, looked upon the ground, and for a time was silent. Then +he replied as follows:</p> + +<p>"Willingly would I have kept silence, but what child dare +withstand the plea of a parent? Is it necessary to inform the +Heavenly Empress that beauty seen is beauty made familiar and +that familiarity is the foe of admiration? How is it possible +that I should see the Princess of Feminine Propriety, for +instance, by night and day without becoming aware of her +imperfections as well as her graces? How awake in the night +without hearing the snoring of the White Jade Concubine and +considering the mouth from which it issues as the less lovely. +How partake of the society of any woman without finding her +chattering as the crane, avid of admiration, jealous, destructive +of philosophy, fatal to composure, fevered with curiosity; a +creature, in short, a little above the gibbon, but infinitely +below the notice of the sage, save as a temporary measure of +amusement in itself unworthy the philosopher. The faces of all my +ladies are known to me. All are fair and all alike. But one +night, as I lay in the Dragon Couch, lost in speculation, +absorbed in contemplation of the Yin and the Yang, the night +passed for the solitary dreamer as a dream. In the darkness of +the dawn I rose still dreaming, and departed to the Pearl +Pavilion in the garden, and there remained an hour viewing the +sunrise and experiencing ineffable opinions on the destiny of +man. Returning then to a couch which I believed to have been that +of the solitary philosopher I observed a depression where another +form had lain, and in it a jade hairpin such as is worn by my +junior beauties. Petrified with amazement at the display of such +reserve, such continence, such august self-restraint, I perceived +that, lost in my thoughts, I had had an unimagined companion and +that this gentle reminder was from her gentle hand. But whom? I +knew not. I then observed Lo Cheng the Court Artist in attendance +and immediately despatched him to make secret enquiry and +ascertain the name and circumstances of that beauty who, unknown, +had shared my vigil. I learnt on his return that it was the Lady +A-Kuei. I had entered the Dragon Chamber in a low moonlight, and +guessed not her presence. She spoke no word. Finding her Imperial +Master thus absorbed, she invited no attention, nor in any way +obtruded her beauties upon my notice. Scarcely did she draw +breath. Yet reflect upon what she might have done! The night +passed and I remained entirely unconscious of her presence, and +out of respect she would not sleep but remained reverently and +modestly awake, assisting, if it may so be expressed, at a humble +distance, in the speculations which held me prisoner. What a +pearl was here! On learning these details by Lo Cheng from her +own roseate lips, and remembering the unexampled temptation she +had resisted (for well she knew that had she touched the Emperor +the Philosopher had vanished) I despatched an august rescript to +this favored Lady, conferring on her the degree of Incomparable +Beauty of the First Rank. On condition of secrecy."</p> + +<p>The Pearl Empress, still in deepest bewilderment, besought his +majesty to proceed. He did so, with his usual dignity.</p> + +<p>"Though my mind could not wholly restrain its admiration, yet +secrecy was necessary, for had the facts been known, every lady, +from the Princess of Feminine Propriety to the Junior Beauty of +the Bed Chamber would henceforward have observed only silence and +a frigid decorum in the Dragon Bed Chamber. And though the +Emperor be a philosopher, yet a philosopher is still a man, and +there are moments when decorum -"</p> + +<p>The Emperor paused discreetly; then resumed.</p> + +<p>"The world should not be composed entirely of A-Kueis, yet in +my mind I behold the Incomparable Lady fair beyond expression. +Like the moon she sails glorious in the heavens to be adored only +in vision as the one woman who could respect the absorption of +the Emperor, and of whose beauty as she lay beside him the +philosopher could remain unconscious and therefore untroubled in +body. To see her, to find her earthly, would be an experience for +which the Emperor might have courage, but the philosopher never. +And attached to all this is a moral:"</p> + +<p>The Pearl Empress urgently inquired its nature.</p> + +<p>"Let the wisdom of my august parent discern it," said the +Emperor sententiously.</p> + +<p>"And the future?" she inquired.</p> + +<p>"The - let us call it parable -" said the Emperor politely +-"with which your Majesty was good enough to entertain me, has +suggested a precaution to my mind. I see now a lovely form moving +among the flowers. It is possible that it may be the Incomparable +Lady, or that at any moment I may come upon her and my ideal be +shattered. This must be safeguarded. I might command her +retirement to her native province, but who shall insure me +against the weakness of my own heart demanding her return? No. +Let Your Majesty's words spoken - well - in parable, be fulfilled +in truth. I shall give orders to the Chief Eunuch that the +Incomparable Lady tonight shall drink the Draught of Crushed +Pearls, and be thus restored to the sphere that alone is worthy +of her. Thus are all anxieties soothed, and the honours offered +to her virtuous spirit shall be a glorious repayment of the ideal +that will ever illuminate my soul."</p> + +<p>The Empress was speechless. She had borne the Emperor in her +womb, but the philosopher outsoared her comprehension. She +retired, leaving his Majesty in a reverie, endeavoring herself to +grasp the moral of which he had spoken, for the guidance of +herself and the ladies concerned. But whether it inculcated +reserve or the reverse in the Dragon Chamber, and what the +Imperial ladies should follow as an example she was, to the end +of her life, totally unable to say. Philosophy indeed walks on +the heights. We cannot all expect to follow it.</p> + +<p>That night the Incomparable Lady drank the Draught of Crushed +Pearls.</p> + +<p>The Princess of Feminine Propriety and the White Jade +Concubine, learning these circumstances, redoubled their charms, +their coquetries and their efforts to occupy what may be +described as the inner sanctuary of the Emperor's esteem. Both +lived to a green old age, wealthy and honored, alike firm in the +conviction that if the Incomparable Lady had not shown herself so +superior to temptation the Emperor might have been on the whole +better pleased, whatever the sufferings of the philosopher. Both +lived to be the tyrants of many generations of beauties at the +Celestial Court. Both were assiduous in their devotions before +the spirit tablet of the departed lady, and in recommending her +example of reserve and humility to every damsel whom it might +concern.</p> + +<p>It will probably occur to the reader of this unique but +veracious story that there is more in it than meets the eye, and +more than the one moral alluded to by the Emperor according to +the point of view of the different actors.</p> + +<p>To the discernment of the reader it must accordingly be +left.</p> + +<p></p> + +<h2 align="center">THE HATRED OF THE QUEEN</h2> + +<h3 align="center">A Story of Burma</h3> + +<p></p> + +<p>Most wonderful is the Irawadi, the mighty river of Burma. In +all the world elsewhere is no such river, bearing the melted +snows from its mysterious sources in the high places of the +mountains. The dawn rises upon its league. wide flood; the moon +walks upon it with silver feet. It is the pulsing heart of the +land, living still though so many rules and rulers have risen and +fallen beside it, their pomps and glories drifting like flotsam +dawn the river to the eternal ocean that is the end of all - and +the beginning. Dead civilizations strew its banks, dreaming in +the torrid sunshine of glories that were - of blood-stained gold, +jewels wept from woeful crowns, nightmare dreams of murder and +terror; dreaming also of heavenly beauty, for the Lord Buddha +looks down in moonlight peace upon the land that leaped to kiss +His footprints, that has laid its heart in the hand of the +Blessed One, and shares therefore in His bliss and content. The +Land of the Lord Buddha, where the myriad pagodas lift their +golden flames of worship everywhere, and no idlest wind can pass +but it ruffles the bells below the htees until they send forth +their silver ripple of music to swell the hymn of praise!</p> + +<p>There is a little bay on the bank of the flooding river - a +silent, deserted place of sand- dunes and small bills. When a +ship is in sight, some poor folk come and spread out the red +lacquer that helps their scanty subsistence, and the people from +the passing ship land and barter and in a few minutes are gone on +their busy way and silence settles down once more. They neither +know nor care that, near by, a mighty city spread its splendour +for miles along the river bank, that the king known as Lord of +the Golden Palace, The Golden Foot, Lord of the White Elephant, +held his state there with balls of magnificence, obsequious +women, fawning courtiers and all the riot and colour of an +Eastern tyranny. How should they care? Now there are ruins - +ruins, and the cobras slip in and out through the deserted holy +places. They breed their writhing young in the sleeping-chambers +of queens, the tigers mew in the moonlight, and the giant spider, +more terrible than the cobra, strikes with its black poison- claw +and, paralyzing the life of the victim, sucks its brain with +slow, lascivious pleasure.</p> + +<p>Are these foul creatures more dreadful than some of the men, +the women, who dwelt in these palaces - the more evil because of +the human brain that plotted and foresaw? That is known only to +the mysterious Law that in silence watches and decrees.</p> + +<p>But this is a story of the dead days of Pagan, by the Irawadi, +and it will be shown that, as the Lotus of the Lord Buddha grows +up a white splendour from the black mud of the depths, so also +may the soul of a woman.</p> + +<p>In the days of the Lord of the White Elephant, the King Pagan +Men, was a boy named Mindon, son of second Queen and the King. +So, at least, it was said in the Golden Palace, but those who +knew the secrets of such matters whispered that, when the King +had taken her by the hand she came to him no maid, and that the +boy was the son of an Indian trader. Furthermore it was said that +she herself was woman of the Rajputs, knowledgeable in spells, +incantations and elemental spirits such as the Beloos that +terribly haunt waste places, and all Powers that move in the +dark, and that thus she had won the King. Certainly she had been +captured by the King's war-boats off the coast from a +trading-ship bound for Ceylon, and it was her story that, because +of her beauty, she was sent thither to serve as concubine to the +King, Tissa of Ceylon. Being captured, she was brought to the +Lord of the Golden Palace. The tongue she spoke was strange to +all the fighting men, but it was wondrous to see how swiftly she +learnt theirs and spoke it with a sweet ripple such as is in the +throat of a bird.</p> + +<p>She was beautiful exceedingly, with a colour of pale gold upon +her and lengths of silk-spun hair, and eyes like those of a +jungle-deer, and water might run beneath the arch of her foot +without wetting it, and her breasts were like the cloudy pillows +where the sun couches at setting. Now, at Pagan, the name they +called her was Dwaymenau, but her true name, known only to +herself, was Sundari, and she knew not the Law of the Blessed +Buddha but was a heathen accursed. In the strong hollow of her +hand she held the heart of the King, so that on the birth of her +son she had risen from a mere concubine to be the second Queen +and a power to whom all bowed. The First Queen, Maya, languished +in her palace, her pale beauty wasting daily, deserted and +lonely, for she had been the light of the King's eyes until the +coming of the Indian woman, and she loved her lord with a great +love and was a noble woman brought up in honour and all things +becoming a queen. But sigh as she would, the King came never. All +night he lay in the arms of Dwaymenau, all day he sat beside her, +whether at the great water pageants or at the festival when the +dancing-girls swayed and postured before him in her gilded +chambers. Even when be went forth to hunt the tiger, she went +with him as far as a woman may go, and then stood back only +because he would not risk his jewel, her life. So all that was +evil in the man she fostered and all that was good she cherished +not at all, fearing lest he should return to the Queen. At her +will he had consulted the Hlwot Daw, the Council of the +Woon-gyees or Ministers, concerning a divorce of the Queen, but +this they told him could not be since she had kept all the laws +of Manu, being faithful, noble and beautiful and having borne him +a son.</p> + +<p>For, before the Indian woman had come to the King, the Queen +had borne a son, Ananda, and he was pale and slender and the King +despised him because of the wiles of Dwaymenau, saying he was fit +only to sit among the women, having the soul of a slave, and he +laughed bitterly as the pale child crouched in the corner to see +him pass. If his eyes had been clear, he would have known that +here was no slave, but a heart as much greater than his own as +the spirit is stronger than the body. But this he did not know +and he strode past with Dwaymenau's boy on his shoulder, laughing +with cruel glee.</p> + +<p>And this boy, Mindon, was beautiful and strong as his mother, +pale olive of face, with the dark and crafty eyes of the cunning +Indian traders, with black hair and a body straight, strong and +long in the leg for his years - apt at the beginnings of bow, +sword and spear - full of promise, if the promise was only words +and looks.</p> + +<p>And so matters rested in the palace until Ananda had ten years +and Mindon nine.</p> + +<p>It was the warm and sunny winter and the days were pleasant, +and on a certain day the Queen, Maya, went with her ladies to +worship the Blessed One at the Thapinyu Temple, looking down upon +the swiftly flowing river. The temple was exceedingly rich and +magnificent, so gilded with pure gold-leaf that it appeared of +solid gold. And about the upper part were golden bells beneath +the jewelled htee, which wafted very sweetly in the wind and gave +forth a crystal-clear music. The ladies bore in their hands more +gold-leaf, that they might acquire merit by offering this for the +service of the Master of the Law, and indeed this temple was the +offering of the Queen herself, who, because she bore the name of +the Mother of the Lord, excelled in good works and was the Moon +of this lower world in charity and piety.</p> + +<p>Though wan with grief and anxiety, this Queen was beautiful. +Her eyes, like mournful lakes of darkness, were lovely in the +pale ivory of her face. Her lips were nobly cut and calm, and by +the favour of the Guardian Nats, she was shaped with grace and +health, a worthy mother of kings. Also she wore her jewels like a +mighty princess, a magnificence to which all the people shikoed +as she passed, folding their hands and touching the forehead +while they bowed down, kneeling.</p> + +<p>Before the colossal image of the Holy One she made her +offering and, attended by her women, she sat in meditation, +drawing consolation from the Tranquillity above her and the +silence of the shrine. This ended, the Queen rose and did +obeisance to the Lord and, retiring, paced back beneath the White +Canopy and entered the courtyard where the palace stood - a +palace of noble teakwood, brown and golden and carved like lace +into strange fantasies of spires and pinnacles and branches where +Nats and Tree Spirits and Beloos and swaying river maidens +mingled and met amid fruits and leaves and flowers in a wild and +joyous confusion. The faces, the blowing garments, whirled into +points with the swiftness of the dance, were touched with gold, +and so glad was the building that it seemed as if a very light +wind might whirl it to the sky, and even the sad Queen stopped to +rejoice in its beauty as it blossomed in the sunlight.</p> + +<p>And even as she paused, her little son Ananda rushed to meet +her, pale and panting, and flung himself into her arms with dry +sobs like those of an overrun man. She soothed him until he could +speak, and then the grief made way in a rain of tears.</p> + +<p>"Mindon has killed my deer. He bared his knife, slit his +throat and cast him in the ditch and there he lies."</p> + +<p>"There will he not lie long!" shouted Mindon, breaking from +the palace to the group where all were silent now. "For the worms +will eat him and the dogs pick clean his bones, and he will show +his horns at his lords no more. If you loved him, White-liver, +you should have taught him better manners to his betters.</p> + +<p>With a stifled shriek Ananda caught the slender knife from his +girdle and flew at Mindon like a cat of the woods. Such things +were done daily by young and old, and this was a long sorrow come +to a head between the boys.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, lifting the hangings of the palace gateway, before +them stood the mother of Mindon, the Lady Dwaymenau, pale as +wool, having heard the shout of her boy, so that the two Queens +faced each other, each holding the shoulders of her son, and the +ladies watched, mute as fishes, for it was years since these two +had met.</p> + +<p>"What have you done to my son?" breathed Maya the Queen, dry +in the throat and all but speechless with passion. For indeed his +face, for a child, was ghastly.</p> + +<p>"Look at his knife! What would he do to my son?" Dwaymenau was +stiff with hate and spoke as to a slave.</p> + +<p>"He has killed my deer and mocks me because I loved him, He is +the devil in this place. Look at the devils in his eyes. Look +quick before he smiles, my mother."</p> + +<p>And indeed, young as the boy was, an evil thing sat in either +eye and glittered upon them. Dwaymenau passed her hand across his +brow, and he smiled and they were gone.</p> + +<p>"The beast ran at me and would have flung me with his horns," +he said, looking up brightly at his mother. "He had the madness +upon him. I struck once and he was dead. My father would have +done the same.</p> + +<p>"That would he not!" said Queen Maya bitterly. "Your father +would have crept up, fawning on the deer, and offered him the +fruits he loved, stroking him the while. And in trust the beast +would have eaten, and the poison in the fruit would have slain +him. For the people of your father meet neither man nor beast in +fair fight. With a kiss they stab!"</p> + +<p>Horror kept the women staring and silent. No one had dreamed +that the scandal had reached the Queen. Never had she spoken or +looked her knowledge but endured all in patience. Now it sprang +out like a sword among them, and they feared for Maya, whom all +loved.</p> + +<p>Mindon did not understand. It was beyond him, but he saw he +was scorned. Dwaymenau, her face rigid as a mask, looked +pitilessly at the shaking Queen, and each word dropped from her +mouth, hard and cold as the falling of diamonds. She refused the +insult.</p> + +<p>"If it is thus you speak of our lord and my love, what wonder +he forsakes you? Mother of a craven milk runs in your veins and +his for blood. Take your slinking brat away and weep together! My +son and I go forth to meet the King as he comes from hunting, and +to welcome him kingly!" She caught her boy to her with a +magnificent gesture; he flung his little arm about her, and +laughing loudly they went off together.</p> + +<p>The tension relaxed a little when they were out of sight. The +women knew that, since Dwaymenau had refused to take the Queen's +meaning, she would certainly not carry her complaint to the King. +They guessed at her reason for this forbearance, but, be that as +it might, it was Certain that no other person would dare to tell +him and risk the fate that waits the messenger of evil.</p> + +<p>The eldest lady led away the Queen, now almost tottering in +the reaction of fear and pain. Oh, that she had controlled her +speech! Not for her own sake - for she had lost all and the +beggar can lose no more - but for the boy's sake, the unloved +child that stood between the stranger and her hopes. For him she +had made a terrible enemy. Weeping, the boy followed her.</p> + +<p>"Take comfort, little son," she said, drawing him to her +tenderly. "The deer can suffer no more. For the tigers, he does +not fear them. He runs in green woods now where there is none to +hunt. He is up and away. The Blessed One was once a deer as +gentle as yours."</p> + +<p>But still the child wept, and the Queen broke down utterly. +"Oh, if life be a dream, let us wake, let us wake!" she sobbed. +"For evil things walk in it that cannot live in the light. Or let +us dream deeper and forget. Go, little son, yet stay - for who +can tell what waits us when the King comes. Let us meet him +here."</p> + +<p>For she believed that Dwaymenau would certainly carry the tale +of her speech to the King, and, if so, what hope but death +together?</p> + +<p>That night, after the feasting, when the girls were dancing +the dance of the fairies and spirits, in gold dresses, winged on +the legs and shoulders, and high, gold-spired and pinnacled caps, +the King missed the little Prince, Ananda, and asked why he was +absent.</p> + +<p>No one answered, the women looking upon each other, until +Dwaymenau, sitting beside him, glimmering with rough pearls and +rubies, spoke smoothly: "Lord, worshipped and beloved, the two +boys quarreled this day, and Ananda's deer attacked our Mindon. +He had a madness upon him and thrust with his horns. But, Mindon, +your true son, flew in upon him and in a great fight he slit the +beast's throat with the knife you gave him. Did he not well?"</p> + +<p>"Well," said the King briefly. "But is there no hurt? Have +searched? For he is mine."</p> + +<p>There was arrogance in the last sentence and her proud soul +rebelled, but smoothly as ever she spoke: "I have searched and +there is not the littlest scratch. But Ananda is weeping because +the deer is dead, and his mother is angry. What should I do?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing. Ananda is worthless and worthless let him be! And +for that pale shadow that was once a woman, let her be forgotten. +And now, drink, my Queen!"</p> + +<p>And Dwaymenau drank but the drink was bitter to her, for a +ghost had risen upon her that day. She had never dreamed that +such a scandal had been spoken, and it stunned her very soul with +fear, that the Queen should know her vileness and the cheat she +had put upon the King. As pure maid he had received her, and she +knew, none better, what the doom would be if his trust were +broken and he knew the child not his. She herself had seen this +thing done to a concubine who had a little offended. She was +thrust living in a sack and this hung between two earthen jars +pierced with small holes, and thus she was set afloat on the +terrible river. And not till the slow filling and sinking of the +jars was the agony over and the cries for mercy stilled. No, the +Queen's speech was safe with her, but was it safe with the Queen? +For her silence, Dwaymenau must take measures.</p> + +<p>Then she put it all aside and laughed and jested with the King +and did indeed for a time forget, for she loved him for his +black-browed beauty and his courage and royalty and the childlike +trust and the man's passion that mingled in him for her. Daily +and nightly such prayers as she made to strange gods were that +she might bear a son, true son of his.</p> + +<p>Next day, in the noonday stillness when all slept, she led her +young son by the hand to her secret chamber, and, holding him +upon her knees in that rich and golden place, she lifted his face +to hers and stared into his eyes. And so unwavering was her gaze, +so mighty the hard, unblinking stare that his own was held +against it, and he stared back as the earth stares breathless at +the moon. Gradually the terror faded out of his eyes; they glazed +as if in a trance; his head fell stupidly against her bosom; his +spirit stood on the borderland of being and waited.</p> + +<p>Seeing this, she took his palm and, molding it like wax, into +the cup of it she dropped clear fluid from a small vessel of +pottery with the fylfot upon its side and the disks of the god +Shiva. And strange it was to see that lore of India in the palace +where the Blessed Law reigned in peace. Then, fixing her eyes +with power upon Mindon, she bade him, a pure child, see for her +in its clearness.</p> + +<p>"Only virgin-pure can see!" she muttered, staring into his +eyes. "See! See!"</p> + +<p>The eyes of Mindon were closing. He half opened them and +looked dully at his palm. His face was pinched and yellow.</p> + +<p>"A woman - a child, on a long couch. Dead! I see!"</p> + +<p>"See her face. Is her head crowned with the Queen's jewels? +See!"</p> + +<p>"Jewels. I cannot see her face. It is hidden."</p> + +<p>"Why is it hidden?"</p> + +<p>"A robe across her face. Oh, let me go!"</p> + +<p>"And the child? See!"</p> + +<p>"Let me go. Stop - my head - my head! I cannot see. The child +is hidden. Her arm holds it. A woman stoops above them."</p> + +<p>"A woman? Who? Is it like me? Speak! See!"</p> + +<p>"A woman. It is like you, mother - it is like you. I fear very +greatly. A knife - a knife! Blood! I cannot see - I cannot speak! +I - I sleep."</p> + +<p>His face was ghastly white now, his body cold and collapsed. +Terrified, she caught him to her breast and relaxed the power of +her will upon him. For that moment, she was only the passionate +mother and quaked to think she might have hurt him. An hour +passed and he slept heavily in her arms, and in agony she watched +to see the colour steal back into the olive cheek and white lips. +In the second hour he waked and stretched himself indolently, +yawning like a cat. Her tears dropped like rain upon him as she +clasped him violently to her.</p> + +<p>He writhed himself free, petulant and spoilt. "Let me be. I +hate kisses and women's tricks. I want to go forth and play. I +have had a devil's dream.</p> + +<p>"What did you see in your dream, prince of my heart?" She +caught frantically at the last chance.</p> + +<p>"A deer - a tiger. I have forgotten. Let me go." He ran off +and she sat alone with her doubts and fears. Yet triumph coloured +them too. She saw a dead woman, a dead child, and herself bending +above them. She hid the vessel in her bosom and went out among +her women.</p> + +<p>Weeks passed, and never a word that she dreaded from Maya the +Queen. The women of Dwaymenau, questioning the Queen's women, +heard that she seemed to have heavy sorrow upon her. Her eyes +were like dying lamps and she faded as they. The King never +entered her palace. Drowned in Dwaymenau's wiles and beauty, her +slave, her thrall, he forgot all else but his fighting, his +hunting and his long war-boats, and whether the Queen lived or +died, he cared nothing. Better indeed she should die and her +place be emptied for the beloved, without offence to her powerful +kindred.</p> + +<p>And now he was to sail upon a raid against the Shan Tsaubwa, +who had denied him tribute of gold and jewels and slaves. +Glorious were the boats prepared for war, of brown teak and +gilded until they shone like gold. Seventy men rowed them, sword +and lance beside each. Warriors crowded them, flags and banners +fluttered about them; the shining water reflected the pomp like a +mirror and the air rang with song. Dwaymenau stood beside the +water with her women, bidding the King farewell, and so he saw +her, radiant in the dawn, with her boy beside her, and waved his +hand to the last.</p> + +<p>The ships were gone and the days languished a little at Pagan. +They missed the laughter and royalty of the King, and few men, +and those old and weak, were left in the city. The pulse of life +beat slower.</p> + +<p>And Dwaymenau took rule in the Golden Palace. Queen Maya sat +like one in a dream and questioned nothing, and Dwaymenau ruled +with wisdom but none loved her. To all she was the interloper, +the witch-woman, the out-land upstart. Only the fear of the King +guarded her and her boy, but that was strong. The boys played +together sometimes, Mindon tyrannizing and cruel, Ananda fearing +and complying, broken in spirit.</p> + +<p>Maya the Queen walked daily in the long and empty Golden Hall +of Audience, where none came now that the King was gone, pacing +up and down, gazing wearily at the carved screens and all their +woodland beauty of gods that did not hear, of happy spirits that +had no pity. Like a spirit herself she passed between the red +pillars, appearing and reappearing with steps that made no sound, +consumed with hate of the evil woman that had stolen her joy. +Like a slow fire it burned in her soul, and the face of the +Blessed One was hidden from her, and she had forgotten His peace. +In that atmosphere of hate her life dwindled. Her son's dwindled +also, and there was talk among the women of some potion that +Dwaymenau had been seen to drop into his noontide drink as she +went swiftly by. That might he the gossip of malice, but he +pined. His eyes were large like a young bird's; his hands like +little claws. They thought the departing year would take him with +it. What harm? Very certainly the King would shed no tear.</p> + +<p>It was a sweet and silent afternoon and she wandered in the +great and lonely hall, sickened with the hate in her soul and her +fear for her boy. Suddenly she heard flying footsteps - a boy's, +running in mad haste in the outer hall, and, following them, bare +feet, soft, thudding.</p> + +<p>She stopped dead and every pulse cried - Danger! No time to +think or breathe when Mindon burst into sight, wild with terror +and following close beside him a man - a madman, a short bright +dah in his grasp, his jaws grinding foam, his wild eyes starting +- one passion to murder. So sometimes from the Nats comes +pitiless fury, and men run mad and kill and none knows why.</p> + +<p>Maya the Queen stiffened to meet the danger. Joy swept through +her soul; her weariness was gone. A fierce smile showed her teeth +- a smile of hate, as she stood there and drew her dagger for +defense. For defense - the man would rend the boy and turn on her +and she would not die. She would live to triumph that the mongrel +was dead, and her son, the Prince again and his father's joy - +for his heart would turn to the child most surely. Justice was +rushing on its victim. She would see it and live content, the +long years of agony wiped out in blood, as was fitting. She would +not flee; she would see it and rejoice. And as she stood in +gladness - these broken thoughts rushing through her like flashes +of lightning - Mindon saw her by the pillar and, screaming in +anguish for the first time, fled to her for refuge.</p> + +<p>She raised her knife to meet the staring eyes, the chalk white +face, and drive him back on the murderer. If the man failed, she +would not! And even as she did this a strange thing befell. +Something stronger than hate swept her away like a leaf on the +river; something primeval that lives in the lonely pangs of +childbirth, that hides in the womb and breasts of the mother. It +was stronger than she. It was not the hated Mindoin - she saw him +no more. Suddenly it was the eternal Child, lifting dying, +appealing eyes to the Woman, as he clung to her knees. She did +not think this - she felt it, and it dominated her utterly. The +Woman answered. As if it had been her own flesh and blood, she +swept the panting body behind her and faced the man with uplifted +dagger and knew her victory assured, whether in life or death. On +came the horrible rush, the flaming eyes, and, if it was chance +that set the dagger against his throat, it was cool strength that +drove it home and never wavered until the blood welling from the +throat quenched the flame in the wild eyes, and she stood +triumphing like a war-goddess, with the man at her feet. Then, +strong and flushed, Maya the Queen gathered the half-dead boy in +her arms, and, both drenched with blood, they moved slowly down +the hall and outside met the hurrying crowd, with Dwaymenau, whom +the scream had brought to find her son.</p> + +<p>"You have killed him! She has killed him!" Scarcely could the +Rajput woman speak. She was kneeling beside him - he hideous with +blood. "She hated him always. She has murdered him. Seize +her!"</p> + +<p>"Woman, what matter your hates and mine?" the Queen said +slowly. "The boy is stark with fear. Carry him in and send for +old Meh Shway Gon. Woman, be silent!"</p> + +<p>When a Queen commands, men and women obey, and a Queen +commanded then. A huddled group lifted the child and carried him +away, Dwaymenau with them, still uttering wild threats, and the +Queen was left alone.</p> + +<p>She could not realize what she had done and left undone. She +could not understand it. She had hated, sickened with loathing, +as it seemed for ages, and now, in a moment it had blown away +like a whirlwind that is gone. Hate was washed out of her soul +and had left it cool and white as the Lotus of the Blessed One. +What power had Dwaymenau to hurt her when that other Power walked +beside her? She seemed to float above her in high air and look +down upon her with compassion. Strength, virtue flowed in her +veins; weakness, fear were fantasies. She could not understand, +but knew that here was perfect enlightenment. About her echoed +the words of the Blessed One: "Never in this world doth hatred +cease by hatred, but only by love. This is an old rule."</p> + +<p>"Whereas I was blind, now I see," said Maya the Queen slowly +to her own heart. She had grasped the hems of the Mighty.</p> + +<p>Words cannot speak the still passion of strength and joy that +possessed her. Her step was light. As she walked, her soul sang +within her, for thus it is with those that have received the Law. +About them is the Peace.</p> + +<p>In the dawn she was told that the Queen, Dwaymenau, would +speak with her, and without a tremor she who had shaken like a +leaf at that name commanded that she should enter. It was +Dwaymenau that trembled as she came into that unknown place.</p> + +<p>With cloudy brows and eyes that would reveal no secret, she +stood before the high seat where the Queen sat pale and +majestic.</p> + +<p>"Is it well with the boy?" the Queen asked earnestly.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Dwaymenau, fingering the silver bosses of her +girdle.</p> + +<p>"Then - is there more to say?" The tone was that of the great +lady who courteously ends an audience. "There is more. The men +brought in the body and in its throat your dagger was sticking. +And my son has told me that your body was a shield to him. You +offered your life for his. I did not think to thank you - but I +thank you." She ended abruptly and still her eyes had never met +the Queen's.</p> + +<p>"I accept your thanks. Yet a mother could do no less."</p> + +<p>The tone was one of dismissal but still Dwaymenau +lingered.</p> + +<p>"The dagger," she said and drew it from her bosom. On the +clear, pointed blade the blood had curdled and dried. "I never +thought to ask a gift of you, but this dagger is a memorial of my +son's danger. May I keep it?"</p> + +<p>"As you will. Here is the sheath." From her girdle she drew it +- rough silver, encrusted with rubies from the mountains.</p> + +<p>The hand rejected it.</p> + +<p>"Jewels I cannot take, but bare steel is a fitting gift +between us two."</p> + +<p>"As you will."</p> + +<p>The Queen spoke compassionately, and Dwaymenau, still with +veiled eyes, was gone without fare well. The empty sheath lay on +the seat - a symbol of the sharp-edged hate that had passed out +of her life. She touched the sheath to her lips and, smiling, +laid it away.</p> + +<p>And the days went by and Dwaymenau came no more before her, +and her days were fulfilled with peace. And now again the Queen +ruled in the palace wisely and like a Queen, and this Dwaymenau +did not dispute, but what her thoughts were no man could +tell.</p> + +<p>Then came the end.</p> + +<p>One night the city awakened to a wild alarm. A terrible fleet +of war-boats came sweeping along the river thick as locusts - the +war fleet of the Lord of Prome. Battle shouts broke tile peace of +the night to horror; axes battered on the outer doors; the roofs +of the outer buildings were all aflame. It was no wonderful +incident, but a common one enough of those turbulent days - +reprisal by a powerful ruler with raids and hates to avenge on +the Lord of the Golden Palace. It was indeed a right to be +gainsaid only by the strong arm, and the strong arm was absent; +as for the men of Pagan, if the guard failed and the women's +courage sank, they would return to blackened walls, empty +chambers and desolation.</p> + +<p>At Pagan the guard was small, indeed, for the King's greed of +plunder had taken almost every able man with him. Still, those +who were left did what they could, and the women, alert and +brave, with but few exceptions, gathered the children and handed +such weapons as they could muster to the men, and themselves, +taking knives and daggers, helped to defend the inner rooms.</p> + +<p>In the farthest, the Queen, having given her commands and +encouraged all with brave words, like a wise, prudent princess, +sat with her son beside her. Her duty was now to him. Loved or +unloved, he was still the heir, the root of the House tree. If +all failed, she must make ransom and terms for him, and, if they +died, it must be together. He, with sparkling eyes, gay in the +danger, stood by her. Thus Dwaymenau found them.</p> + +<p>She entered quietly and without any display of emotion and +stood before the high seat.</p> + +<p>"Great Queen" - she used that title for the first time - "the +leader is Meng Kyinyo of Prome. There is no mercy. The end is +near. Our men fall fast, the women are fleeing. I have come to +say this thing: Save the Prince."</p> + +<p>"And how?" asked the Queen, still seated. "I have no +power."</p> + +<p>"I have sent to Maung Tin, abbot of the Golden Monastery, and +he has said this thing. In the Kyoung across the river he can +hide one child among the novices. Cut his hair swiftly and put +upon him this yellow robe. The time is measured in minutes."</p> + +<p>Then the Queen perceived, standing by the pillar, a monk of a +stern, dark presence, the creature of Dwaymenau. For an instant +she pondered. Was the woman selling the child to death? Dwaymenau +spoke no word. Her face was a mask. A minute that seemed an hour +drifted by, and the yelling and shrieks for mercy drew +nearer.</p> + +<p>"There will be pursuit," said the Queen. "They will slay him +on the river. Better here with me."</p> + +<p>"There will be no pursuit." Dwaymenau fixed her strange eyes +on the Queen for the first time.</p> + +<p>What moved in those eyes? The Queen could not tell. But +despairing, she rose and went to the silent monk, leading the +Prince by the hand. Swiftly he stripped the child of the silk +pasoh of royalty, swiftly he cut the long black tresses knotted +on the little head, and upon the slender golden body he set the +yellow robe worn by the Lord Himself on earth, and in the small +hand he placed the begging-bowl of the Lord. And now, remote and +holy, in the dress that is of all most sacred, the Prince, +standing by the monk, turned to his mother and looked with grave +eyes upon her, as the child Buddha looked upon his Mother - also +a Queen. But Dwaymenau stood by silent and lent no help as the +Queen folded the Prince in her arms and laid his hand in the hand +of the monk and saw them pass away among the pillars, she +standing still and white.</p> + +<p>She turned to her rival. "If you have meant truly, I thank +you."</p> + +<p>"I have meant truly."</p> + +<p>She turned to go, but the Queen caught her by the hand.</p> + +<p>"Why have you done this?" she asked, looking into the strange +eyes of the strange woman.</p> + +<p>Something like tears gathered in them for a moment, but she +brushed them away as she said hurriedly:</p> + +<p>"I was grateful. You saved my son. Is it not enough?"</p> + +<p>"No, not enough!" cried the Queen. "There is more. Tell me, +for death is upon us."</p> + +<p>"His footsteps are near," said the Indian. "I will speak. I +love my lord. In death I will not cheat him. What you have known +is true. My child is no child of his. I will not go down to death +with a lie upon my lips. Come and see."</p> + +<p>Dwaymenau was no more. Sundari, the Indian woman, awful and +calm, led the Queen down the long ball and into her own chamber, +where Mindon, the child, slept a drugged sleep. The Queen felt +that she had never known her; she herself seemed diminished in +stature as she followed the stately figure, with its still, dark +face. Into this room the enemy were breaking, shouldering their +way at the door - a rabble of terrible faces. Their fury was +partly checked when only a sleeping child and two women +confronted them, but their leader, a grim and evil- looking man, +strode from the huddle.</p> + +<p>"Where is the son of the King?" be shouted. "Speak, women! +Whose is this boy?"</p> + +<p>Sundari laid her hand upon her son's shoulder. Not a muscle of +her face flickered.</p> + +<p>"This is his son."</p> + +<p>"His true son - the son of Maya the Queen?"</p> + +<p>"His true son, the son of Maya the Queen."</p> + +<p>"Not the younger - the mongrel?"</p> + +<p>"The younger - the mongrel died last week of a fever."</p> + +<p>Every moment of delay was precious. Her eyes saw only a monk +and a boy fleeing across the wide river.</p> + +<p>"Which is Maya the Queen?"</p> + +<p>"This," said Sundari. "She cannot speak. It is her son - the +Prince."</p> + +<p>Maya had veiled her face with her hands. Her brain swam, but +she understood the noble lie. This woman could love. Their lord +would not be left childless. Thought beat like pulses in her - +raced along her veins. She held her breath and was dumb.</p> + +<p>His doubt was assuaged and the lust of vengeance was on him - +a madness seized the man. But even his own wild men shrank back a +moment, for to slay a sleeping child in cold blood is no man's +work.</p> + +<p>"You swear it is the Prince. But why? Why do you not lie to +save him if you are the King's woman?"</p> + +<p>"Because his mother has trampled me to the earth. I am the +Indian woman - the mother of the younger, who is dead and safe. +She jeered at me - she mocked me. It is time I should see her +suffer. Suffer now as I have suffered, Maya the Queen!"</p> + +<p>This was reasonable - this was like the women he bad known. +His doubt was gone - he laughed aloud.</p> + +<p>"Then feed full of vengeance!" he cried, and drove his knife +through the child's heart.</p> + +<p>For a moment Sundari wavered where she stood, but she held +herself and was rigid as the dead.</p> + +<p>"Tha-du! Well done!" she said with an awful smile. "The tree +is broken, the roots cut. And now for us women - our fate, 0 +master?"</p> + +<p>"Wait here," he answered. "Let not a hair of their heads be +touched. Both are fair. The two for me. For the rest draw lots +when all is done."</p> + +<p>The uproar surged away. The two stood by the dead boy. So +swift had been his death that he lay as though he still slept - +the black lashes pressed upon his cheek.</p> + +<p>With the heredity of their different races upon them, neither +wept. But silently the Queen opened her arms; wide as a woman +that entreats she opened them to the Indian Queen, and +speechlessly the two clung together. For a while neither +spoke.</p> + +<p>"My sister!" said Maya the Queen. And again, "0 great of +heart!"</p> + +<p>She laid her cheek against Sundari's, and a wave of solemn joy +seemed to break in her soul and flood it with life and light.</p> + +<p>"Had I known sooner!" she said. "For now the night draws +on."</p> + +<p>"What is time?" answered the Rajput woman. "We stand before +the Lords of Life and Death. The life you gave was yours, and I +am unworthy to kiss the feet of the Queen. Our lord will return +and his son is saved. The House can be rebuilt. My son and I were +waifs washed up from the sea. Another wave washes us back to +nothingness. Tell him my story and he will loathe me."</p> + +<p>"My lips are shut," said the Queen. "Should I betray my +sister's honour? When he speaks of the noble women of old, your +name will be among them. What matters which of us he loves and +remembers? Your soul and mine have seen the same thing, and we +are one. But I - what have I to do with life? The ship and the +bed of the conqueror await us. Should we await them, my +sister?"</p> + +<p>The bright tears glittered in the eyes of Sundari at the +tender name and the love in the face of the Queen. At last she +accepted it.</p> + +<p>"My sister, no," she said, and drew from her bosom the dagger +of Maya, with the man's blood rusted upon it. "Here is the way. I +have kept this dagger in token of my debt. Nightly have I kissed +it, swearing that, when the time came, I would repay my debt to +the great Queen. Shall I go first or follow, my sister?"</p> + +<p>Her voice lingered on the word. It was precious to her. It was +like clear water, laying away the stain of the shameful +years.</p> + +<p>"Your arm is strong," answered the Queen. "I go first. Because +the King's son is safe, I bless you. For your love of the King, I +love you. And here, standing on the verge of life, I testify that +the words of the Blessed One are truth - that love is All; that +hatred is Nothing."</p> + +<p>She bared the breast that this woman had made desolate - that, +with the love of this woman, was desolate ho longer, and, +stooping, laid her hand on the brow of Mindon. Once more they +embraced, and then, strong and true, and with the Rajput passion +behind the blow, the stroke fell and Sundari had given her sister +the crowning mercy of deliverance. She laid the body beside her +own son, composing the stately limbs, the quiet eyelids, the +black lengths of hair into majesty. So, she thought, in the great +temple of the Rajput race, the Mother Goddess shed silence and +awe upon her worshippers. The two lay like mother and son - one +slight hand of the Queen she laid across the little body as if to +guard it.</p> + +<p>Her work done, she turned to the entrance and watched the dawn +coming glorious over the river. The men shouted and quarreled in +the distance, but she heeded them no more than the chattering of +apes. Her heart was away over the distance to the King, but with +no passion now: so might a mother have thought of her son. He was +sleeping, forgetful of even her in his dreams. What matter? She +was glad at heart. The Queen was dearer to her than the King - so +strange is life; so healing is death. She remembered without +surprise that she had asked no forgiveness of the Queen for all +the cruel wrongs, for the deadly intent - had made no confession. +Again what matter? What is forgiveness when love is all?</p> + +<p>She turned from the dawn-light to the light in the face of the +Queen. It was well. Led by such a hand, she could present herself +without fear before the Lords of Life and Death - she and the +child. She smiled. Life is good, but death, which is more life, +is better. The son of the King was safe, but her own son +safer.</p> + +<p>When the conqueror reentered the chamber, he found the dead +Queen guarding the dead child, and across her feet, as not worthy +to lie beside her, was the body of the Indian woman, most +beautiful in death.</p> + +<p></p> + +<h2 align="center">FIRE OF BEAUTY</h2> + +<p align="center"><i>(Salutation to Ganesa the Lord of Wisdom, +and to Saraswate the Lady of Sweet Speech!)</i></p> + +<p></p> + +<p>This story was composed by the Brahmin Visravas, that dweller +on the banks of holy Kashi; and though the events it records are +long past, yet it is absolutely and immutably true because, by +the power of his yoga, he summoned up every scene before him, and +beheld the persons moving and speaking as in life. Thus he had +naught to do but to set down what befell.</p> + +<p>What follows, that hath he seen.</p> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Wide was the plain, the morning sun shining full upon it, +drinking up the dew as the Divine drinks up the spirit of man. +Far it stretched, resembling the ocean, and riding upon it like a +stately ship was the league-long Rock of Chitor. It is certainly +by the favour of the Gods that this great fortress of the Rajput +Kings thus rises from the plain, leagues in length, noble in +height; and very strange it is to see the flat earth fall away +from it like waters from the bows of a boat, as it soars into the +sky with its burden of palaces and towers.</p> + +<p>Here dwelt the Queen Padmini and her husband Bhimsi, the Rana +of the Rajputs.</p> + +<p>The sight of the holy ascetic Visravas pierced even the +secrets of the Rani's bower, where, in the inmost chamber of +marble, carved until it appeared like lace of the foam of the +sea, she was seated upon cushions of blue Bokhariot silk, like +the lotus whose name she bore floating upon the blue depths of +the lake. She had just risen from the shallow bath of marble at +her feet.</p> + +<p>Most beautiful was this Queen, a haughty beauty such as should +be a Rajput lady; for the name "Rajput" signifies Son of a King, +and this lady was assuredly the daughter of Kings and of no +lesser persons. And since that beauty is long since ashes (all +things being transitory), it is permitted to describe the +mellowed ivory of her body, the smooth curves of her hips, and +the defiance of her glimmering bosom, half veiled by the long +silken tresses of sandal- scented hair which a maiden on either +side, bowing toward her, knotted upon her head. But even he who +with his eyes has seen it can scarce tell the beauty of her face +- the slender arched nose, the great eyes like lakes of darkness +in the reeds of her curled lashes, the mouth of roses, the +glance, deer-like but proud, that courted and repelled +admiration. This cannot be told, nor could the hand of man paint +it. Scarcely could that fair wife of the Pandava Prince, Draupadi +the Beautiful (who bore upon her perfect form every auspicious +mark) excel this lady.</p> + +<p>(Ashes - ashes! May Maheshwara have mercy upon her +rebirths!)</p> + +<p>Throughout India had run the fame of this beauty. In the +bazaar of Kashmir they told of it. It was recorded in the palaces +of Travancore, and all the lands that lay between; and in an evil +hour - may the Gods curse the mother that bore him! - it reached +the ears of Allah-u- Din, the Moslem dog, a very great fighting +man who sat in Middle India, looting and spoiling.</p> + +<p>(Ahi! for the beauty that is as a burning flame!)</p> + +<p>In the gardens beneath the windows of the Queen, the peacocks, +those maharajas of the birds, were spreading the bronze and +emerald of their tails. The sun shone on them as on heaps of +jewels, so that they dazzled the eyes. They stood about the feet +of the ancient Brahmin sage, he who had tutored the Queen in her +childhood and given her wisdom as the crest-jeweled of her +loveliness. He, the Twice-born sat under the shade of a neem +tree, hearing the gurgle of the sacred waters from the Cow's +Mouth, where the great tank shone under the custard-apple boughs; +and, at peace with all the world, he read in the Scripture which +affirms the transience of all things drifting across the thought +of the Supreme like clouds upon the surface of the Ocean.</p> + +<p>(Ahi! that loveliness is also illusion!)</p> + +<p>Her women placed about the Queen - that Lotus of Women - a +robe of silk of which none could say that it was green or blue, +the noble colours so mingled into each other under the latticed +gold work of Kashi. They set the jewels on her head, and wide +thin rings of gold heavy with great pearls in her ears. Upon the +swell of her bosom they clasped the necklace of table emeralds, +large, deep, and full of green lights, which is the token of the +Chitor queens. Upon her slender ankles they placed the chooris of +pure soft gold, set also with grass-green emeralds, and the +delicate souls of her feet they reddened with lac. Nor were her +arms forgotten, but loaded with bangles so free from alloy that +they could be bent between the hands of a child. Then with fine +paste they painted the Symbol between her dark brows, and, +rising, she shone divine as a nymph of heaven who should cause +the righteous to stumble in his austerities and arrest even the +glances of Gods.</p> + +<p>(Ahi! that the Transient should be so fair!)</p> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>Now it was the hour that the Rana should visit her; for since +the coming of the Lotus Lady, be had forgotten his other women, +and in her was all his heart. He came from the Hall of Audience +where petitions were heard, and justice done to rich and poor; +and as he came, the Queen, hearing his step on the stone, +dismissed her women, and smiling to know her loveliness, bowed +before him, even as the Goddess Uma bows before Him who is her +other half.</p> + +<p>Now he was a tall man, with the falcon look of the Hill +Rajputs, and moustaches that curled up to his eyes, lion-waisted +and lean in the flanks like Arjoon himself, a very ruler of men; +and as he came, his hand was on the hilt of the sword that showed +beneath his gold coat of khincob. On the high cushions he sat, +and the Rani a step beneath him; and she said, raising her lotus +eyes:</p> + +<p>"Speak, Aryaputra, (son of a noble father)-what hath +befallen?"</p> + +<p>And he, looking upon her beauty with fear, replied,-</p> + +<p>"It is thy beauty, 0 wife, that brings disaster."</p> + +<p>"And how is this?" she asked very earnestly.</p> + +<p>For a moment he paused, regarding her as might a stranger, as +one who considers a beauty in which he hath no part; and, drawn +by this strangeness, she rose and knelt beside him, pillowing her +head upon his heart.</p> + +<p>"Say on," she said in her voice of music.</p> + +<p>He unfurled a scroll that he had crushed in his strong right +hand, and read aloud:-</p> + +<p>"`Thus says Allah-u-Din, Shadow of God, Wonder of the Age, +Viceregent of Kings. We have heard that in the Treasury of Chitor +is a jewel, the like of which is not in the Four Seas - the work +of the hand of the Only God, to whom be praise! This jewel is thy +Queen, the Lady Padmini. Now, since the sons of the Prophet are +righteous, I desire but to look upon this jewel, and ascribing +glory to the Creator, to depart in peace. Granted requests are +the bonds of friendship; therefore lay the head of acquiescence +in the dust of opportunity and name an auspicious day.'"</p> + +<p>He crushed it again and flung it furiously from him on the +marble.</p> + +<p>"The insult is deadly. The soor! son of a debased mother! Well +he knows that to the meanest Rajput his women are sacred, and how +much more the daughters and wives of the Kings! The jackals feast +on the tongue that speaks this shame! But it is a threat, Beloved +- a threat! Give me thy counsel that never failed me yet."</p> + +<p>For the Rajputs take counsel with their women who are +wise.</p> + +<p>They were silent, each weighing the force of resistance that +could be made; and this the Rani knew even as he.</p> + +<p>"It cannot be," she said; "the very ashes of the dead would +shudder to hear. Shall the Queens of India be made the sport of +the barbarians?"</p> + +<p>Her husband looked upon her fair face. She could feel his +heart labor beneath her ear.</p> + +<p>"True, wife; but the barbarians are strong. Our men are +tigers, each one, but the red dogs of the Dekkan can pull down +the tiger, for they are many, and he alone."</p> + +<p>Then that great Lady, accepting his words, and conscious of +the danger, murmured this, clinging to her husband:-</p> + +<p>"There was a Princess of our line whose beauty made all other +women seem as waning moons in the sun's splendour. And many great +Kings sought her, and there was contention and war. And, she, +fearing that the Rajputs would be crushed to powder between the +warring Kings, sent unto each this message: `Come on such and +such a day, and thou shalt see my face and hear my choice.' And +they, coming, rejoiced exceedingly, thinking each one that he was +the Chosen. So they came into the great Hall, and there was a +table, and somewhat upon it covered with a gold cloth; and an old +veiled woman lifted the gold, and the head of the Princess lay +there with the lashes like night upon her cheek, and between her +lips was a little scroll, saying this: `I have chosen my Lover +and my Lord, and he is mightiest, for he is Death.' - So the +Kings went silently away. And there was Peace."</p> + +<p>The music of her voice ceased, and the Rana clasped her +closer.</p> + +<p>"This I cannot do. Better die together. Let us take counsel +with the ancient Brahman, thy guru [teacher], for he is very +wise."</p> + +<p>She clapped her hands, and the maidens returned, and, bowing, +brought the venerable Prabhu Narayan into the Presence, and again +those roses retired.</p> + +<p>Respectful salutation was then offered by the King and the +Queen to that saint, hoary with wisdom - he who had seen her grow +into the loveliness of the sea-born Shri, yet had never seen that +loveliness; for he had never raised his eyes above the chooris +about her ankles. To him the King related his anxieties; and he +sat rapt in musing, and the two waited in dutiful silence until +long minutes had fallen away; and at the last he lifted his head, +weighted with wisdom, and spoke.</p> + +<p>"0 King, Descendant of Rama! this outrage cannot be. Yet, +knowing the strength and desire of this obscene one and the +weakness of our power, it is plain that only with cunning can +cunning be met. Hear, therefore, the history of the Fox and the +Drum.</p> + +<p>"A certain Fox searched for food in the jungle, and so doing +beheld a tree on which hung a drum; and when the boughs knocked +upon the parchment, it sounded aloud. Considering, he believed +that so round a form and so great a voice must portend much good +feeding. Neglecting on this account a fowl that fed near by, he +ascended to the drum. The drum being rent was but air and +parchment, and meanwhile the fowl fled away. And from the eye of +folly he shed the tear of disappointment, having bartered the +substance for the shadow. So must we act with this budmash +[scoundrel]. First, receiving his oath that he will depart +without violence, hid him hither to a great feast, and say that +he shall behold the face of the Queen in a mirror. Provide that +some fair woman of the city show her face, and then let him +depart in peace, showing him friendship. He shall not know he +hath not seen the beauty he would befoul."</p> + +<p>After consultation, no better way could be found; but the +heart of the great Lady was heavy with foreboding.</p> + +<p>(A hi! that Beauty should wander a pilgrim in the ways of +sorrow!)</p> + +<p>To Allah-u-Din therefore did the King dispatch this letter by +swift riders on mares of Mewar.</p> + +<p>After salutations - "Now whereas thou hast said thou wouldest +look upon the beauty of the Treasure of Chitor, know it is not +the custom of the Rajputs that any eye should light upon their +treasure. Yet assuredly, when requests arise between friends, +there cannot fail to follow distress of mind and division of soul +if these are ungranted. So, under promises that follow, I bid +thee to a feast at my poor house of Chitor, and thou shalt see +that beauty reflected in a mirror, and so seeing, depart in peace +from the house of a friend."</p> + +<p>This being writ by the Twice-Born, the Brahman, did the Rana +sign with bitter rage in his heart. And the days passed.</p> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p>On a certain day found fortunate by the astrologers - a day of +early winter, when the dawns were pure gold and the nights +radiant with a cool moon - did a mighty troop of Moslems set +their camp on the plain of Chitor. It was as if a city had +blossomed in an hour. Those who looked from the walls muttered +prayers to the Lord of the Trident; for these men seemed like the +swarms of the locust - people, warriors all, fierce fighting-men. +And in the ways of Chitor, and up the steep and winding causeway +from the plains, were warriors also, the chosen of the Rajputs, +thick as blades of corn hedging the path.</p> + +<p>(Ahi! that the blossom of beauty should have swords for +thorns!)</p> + +<p>Then, leaving his camp, attended by many Chiefs, - may the +mothers and sires that begot them be accursed! - came +Allah-u-Din, riding toward the Lower Gate, and so upward along +the causeway, between the two rows of men who neither looked nor +spoke, standing like the carvings of war in the Caves of Ajunta. +And the moon was rising through the sunset as he came beneath the +last and seventh gate. Through the towers and palaces he rode +with his following, but no woman, veiled or unveiled, - no, not +even an outcast of the city, - was there to see him come; only +the men, armed and silent. So he turned to Munim Khan that rode +at his bridle, saying,-</p> + +<p>"Let not the eye of watchfulness close this night on the +pillow of forgetfulness!"</p> + +<p>And thus he entered the palace.</p> + +<p>Very great was the feast in Chitor, and the wines that those +accursed should not drink (since the Outcast whom they call their +Prophet forbade them) ran like water, and at the right hand of +Allah-u-Din was set the great crystal Cup inlaid with gold by a +craft that is now perished; and he filled and refilled it - may +his own Prophet curse the swine!</p> + +<p>But because the sons of Kings eat not with the outcasts, the +Rana entered after, clothed in chain armor of blue steel, and +having greeted him, bid him to the sight of that Treasure. And +Allah-u-Din, his eyes swimming with wine, and yet not drunken, +followed, and the two went alone.</p> + +<p>Purdahs [curtains] of great splendour were hung in the great +Hall that is called the Raja's Hall, exceeding rich with gold, +and in front of the opening was a kneeling-cushion, and an a gold +stool before it a polished mirror.</p> + +<p>(Ahi! for gold and beauty, the scourges of the world!)</p> + +<p>And the Rana was pale to the lips.</p> + +<p>Now as the Princes stood by the purdah, a veiled woman, +shrouded in white so that no shape could he seen in her, came +forth from within, and kneeling upon the cushion, she unveiled +her face bending until the mirror, like a pool of water, held it, +and that only. And the King motioned his guest to look, and he +looked over her veiled shoulder and saw. Very great was the bowed +beauty that the mirror held, but Allah-u-Din turned to the +Rana.</p> + +<p>"By the Bread and the Salt, by the Guest-Right, by the Honour +of thy House, I ask - is this the Treasure of Chitor?"</p> + +<p>And since the Sun-Descended cannot lie, no, not though they +perish, the Rana answered, flushing darkly, - "This is not the +Treasure. Wilt thou spare?"</p> + +<p>But he would not, and the woman slipped like a shadow behind +the purdah and no word said.</p> + +<p>Then was heard the tinkling of chooris, and the little noise +fell upon the silence like a fear, and, parting the curtains, +came a woman veiled like the other. She did not kneel, but took +the mirror in her hand, and Allah-u-Din drew up behind her back. +From her face she raised the veil of gold Dakka webs, and gazed +into the mirror, holding it high, and that Accursed stumbled +back, blinded with beauty, saying this only,- "I have seen the +Treasure of Chitor."</p> + +<p>So the purdah fell about her.</p> + +<p>The next day, after the Imaum of the Accursed had called them +to prayer, they departed, and Allah-u-Din, paying thanks to the +Rana for honours given and taken, and swearing friendship, +besought him to ride to his camp, to see the marvels of gold and +steel armor brought down from the passes, swearing also +safe-conduct. And because the Rajputs trust the word even of a +foe, he went.</p> + +<p>(A hi! that honour should strike hands with traitors!)</p> + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p>The hours went by, heavy-footed like mourners. Padmini the +Rani knelt by the window in her tower that overlooks the plains. +Motionless she knelt there, as the Goddess Uma lost in her +penances, and she saw her Lord ride forth, and the sparkle of +steel where the sun shone on them, and the Standard of the Cold +Disk on its black ground. So the camp of the Moslem swallowed +them up, and they returned no more. Still she knelt and none +dared speak with her; and as the first shade of evening fell +across the hills of Rajasthan, she saw a horseman spurting over +the flat; and he rode like the wind, and, seeing, she implored +the Gods.</p> + +<p>Then entered the Twice-Born, that saint of clear eyes, and he +bore a scroll; and she rose and seated herself, and he stood by +her, as her ladies cowered like frightened doves before the woe +in his face as he read.</p> + +<p>"To the Rose of Beauty, The Pearl among Women, the Chosen of +the Palace. Who, having seen thy loveliness, can look on another? +Who, having tasted the wine of the Houris, but thirsts forever? +Behold, I have thy King as hostage. Come thou and deliver him. I +have sworn that he shall return in thy place."</p> + +<p>And from a smaller scroll, the Brahman read this:-</p> + +<p>"I am fallen in the snare. Act thou as becomes a +Rajputni."</p> + +<p>Then that Daughter of the Sun lifted her head, for the +thronging of armed feet was heard in the Council Hall below. From +the floor she caught her veil and veiled herself in haste, and +the Brahman with bowed head followed, while her women mourned +aloud. And, descending, between the folds of the purdah she +appeared white and veiled, and the Brahman beside her, and the +eyes of all the Princes were lowered to her shrouded feet, while +the voice they had not heard fell silvery upon the air, and the +echoes of the high roof repeated it.</p> + +<p>"Chief of the Rajputs, what is your counsel?" And he of Marwar +stepped forward, and not rais- ing his eyes above her feet, +answered,-</p> + +<p>"Queen, what is thine?"</p> + +<p>For the Rajputs have ever heard the voice of their women.</p> + +<p>And she said,-</p> + +<p>"I counsel that I die and my head be sent to him, that my +blood may quench his desire."</p> + +<p>And each talked eagerly with the other, but amid the tumult +the Twice-Born said,-</p> + +<p>"This is not good talk. In his rage he will slay the King. By +my yoga, I have seen it. Seek another way."</p> + +<p>So they sought, but could determine nothing, and they feared +to ride against the dog, for he held the life of the King; and +the tumult was great, but all were for the King's safety.</p> + +<p>Then once more she spoke.</p> + +<p>"Seeing it is determined that the King's life is more than my +honour, I go this night. In your hand I leave my little son, the +Prince Ajeysi. Prepare my litters, seven hundred of the best, for +all my women go with me. Depart now, for I have a thought from +the Gods."</p> + +<p>Then, returning to her bower, she spoke this letter to the +saint, and he wrote it, and it was sent to the camp.</p> + +<p>After salutations - "Wisdom and strength have attained their +end. Have ready for release the Rana of Chitor, for this night I +come with my ladies, the prize of the conqueror."</p> + +<p>When the sun sank, a great procession with torches descended +the steep way of Chitor - seven hundred litters, and in the first +was borne the Queen, and all her women followed.</p> + +<p>All the streets were thronged with women, weeping and beating +their breasts. Very greatly they wept, and no men were seen, for +their livers were black within them for shame as the Treasure of +Chitor departed, nor would they look upon the sight. And across +the plains went that procession; as if the stars had fallen upon +the earth, so glittered the sorrowful lights of the Queen.</p> + +<p>But in the camp was great rejoicing, for the Barbarians knew +that many fair women attended on her.</p> + +<p>Now, before the entrance to the camp they had made a great +shamiana [tent] ready, hung with shawls of Kashmir and the +plunder of Delhi; and there was set a silk divan for the Rani, +and beside it stood the Loser and the Gainer, Allah-u-Din and the +King, awaiting the Treasure.</p> + +<p>Veiled she entered, stepping proudly, and taking no heed of +the Moslem, she stood before her husband, and even through the +veil he could feel the eyes he knew.</p> + +<p>And that Accursed spoke, laughing.</p> + +<p>"I have won-I have won, 0 King! Bid farewell to the Chosen of +the Palace - the Beloved of the Viceregent of Kings!"</p> + +<p>Then she spoke softly, delicately, in her own tongue, that the +outcast should not guess the matter of her speech.</p> + +<p>"Stand by me. Stir not. And when I raise my arm, cry the cry +of the Rajputs. NOW!"</p> + +<p>And she flung her arm above her head, and instantly, like a +lion roaring, he shouted, drawing his sword, and from every +litter sprang an armed man, glittering in steel, and the bearers, +humble of mien, were Rajput knights, every one.</p> + +<p>And Allah-u-Din thrust at the breast of the Queen; but around +them surged the war, and she was hedged with swords like a rose +in the thickets.</p> + +<p>Very full of wine, dull with feasting and lust and surprised, +the Moslems fled across the plains, streaming in a broken rabble, +cursing and shouting like low-caste women; and the Rajputs, +wiping their swords, returned from the pursuit and laughed upon +each other.</p> + +<p>But what shall be said of the joy of the King and of her who +had imagined this thing, in- structed of the Goddess who is the +other half of her Lord?</p> + +<p>So the procession returned, singing, to Chitor with those Two +in the midst; but among the dogs that fled was Allah-u-Din, his +face blackened with shame and wrath, the curses choking in his +foul throat.</p> + +<p>(Aid! that the evil still walk the ways of the world!)</p> + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p>So the time went by and the beauty of the Queen grew, and her +King could see none but hers. Like the moon she obscured the +stars, and every day he remembered her wisdom, her valour, and +his soul did homage at her feet, and there was great content in +Chitor.</p> + +<p>It chanced one day that the Queen, looking from her high +window that like an eagle's nest overhung the precipice, saw, on +the plain beneath, a train of men, walking like ants, and each +carried a basket on his back, and behind them was a cloud of dust +like a great army. Already the city was astir because of this +thing, and the rumours came thick and the spies were sent +out.</p> + +<p>In the dark they returned, and the Rana entered the bower of +Padmini, his eyes burning like coal with hate and wrath, and he +flung his arm round his wife like a shield.</p> + +<p>"He is returned, and in power. Counsel me again, 0 wife, for +great is thy wisdom!"</p> + +<p>But she answered only this,-</p> + +<p>"Fight, for this time it is to the death."</p> + +<p>Then each day she watched bow the baskets of earth, emptied +upon the plain at first, made nothing, an ant heap whereat fools +might laugh. But each day as the trains of men came, spilling +their baskets, the great earthworks grew and their height +mounted. Day after day the Rajputs rode forth and slew; and as +they slew it seemed that all the teeming millions of the earth +came forth to take the places of the slain. And the Rajputs fell +also, and under the pennons the thundering forces returned daily, +thinned of their best.</p> + +<p>(A hi! that Evil rules the world as God!)</p> + +<p>And still the earth grew up to the heights, and the protection +of the hills was slowly withdrawn from Chitor, for on the heights +they made they set their engines of war.</p> + +<p>Then in a red dawn that great saint Narayan came to the Queen, +where she watched by her window, and spoke.</p> + +<p>"0 great lady, I have dreamed a fearful dream. Nay, rather +have I seen a vision."</p> + +<p>With her face set like a sword, the Queen said,-</p> + +<p>"Say on."</p> + +<p>"In a light red like blood, I waked, and beside me stood the +Mother, - Durga, - awful to see, with a girdle of heads about her +middle; and the drops fell thick and slow from That which she +held in her hand, and in the other was her sickle of Doom. Nor +did she speak, but my soul heard her words."</p> + +<p>"Narrate them."</p> + +<p>"She commanded: `Say this to the Rana: "In Chitor is My altar; +in Chitor is thy throne. If thou wouldest save either, send forth +twelve crowned Kings of Chitor to die.'"</p> + +<p>As he said this, the Rana, fore-spent with fighting, entered +and heard the Divine word.</p> + +<p>Now there were twelve princes of the Rajput blood, and the +youngest was the son of Padmini. What choice had these most +miserable but to appease the dreadful anger of the Goddess? So on +each fourth day a King of Chitor was crowned, and for three days +sat upon the throne, and on the fourth day, set in the front, +went forth and died fighting. So perished eleven Kings of Chitor, +and now there was left but the little Ajeysi, the son of the +Queen.</p> + +<p>And that day was a great Council called.</p> + +<p>Few were there. On the plains many lay dead; holding the gates +many watched; but the blood was red in their hearts and flowed +like Indus in the melting of the snows. And to them spoke the +Rana, his hand clenched on his sword, and the other laid on the +small dark head of the Prince Ajeysi, who stood between his +knees. And as he spoke his voice gathered strength till it rang +through the hall like the voice of Indra when he thunders in the +heavens.</p> + +<p>"Men of the Rajputs, this child shall not die. Are we become +jackals that we fall upon the weak and tear them? When have we +put our women and children in the forefront of the war? I - I +only am King of Chitor. Narayan shall save this child for the +time that will surely come. And for us - what shall we do? I die +for Chitor!"</p> + +<p>And like the hollow waves of a great sea they answered +him,-</p> + +<p>"We will die for Chitor."</p> + +<p>There was silence and Marwar spoke.</p> + +<p>"The women?"</p> + +<p>"Do they not know the duty of a Rajputni?" said the King. "My +household has demanded that the caves be prepared."</p> + +<p>And the men clashed stew joy with their swords, and the +council dispersed.</p> + +<p>Then that very great saint, the Twice-Born, put off the sacred +thread that is the very soul of the Brahman. In his turban he +wound it secretly, and he stained his noble Aryan body until it +resembled the Pariahs, foul for the pure to see, loathsome for +the pure to touch, and he put on him the rags of the lowest of +the earth, and taking the Prince, he removed from the body of the +child every trace of royal and Rajput birth, and he appeared like +a child of the Bhils - the vile forest wanderers that shame not +to defile their lips with carrion. And in this guise they stood +before the Queen; and when she looked on the saint, the tears +fell from her eyes like rain, not for grief for her son, nor for +death, but that for their sake the pure should be made impure and +the glory of the Brahman-hood be defiled. And she fell at the old +man's feet and laid her head on the ground before him.</p> + +<p>"Rise, daughter!" he said, "and take comfort! Are not the eyes +of the Gods clear that they should distinguish? - and this day we +stand before the God of Gods. Have not the Great Ones said, `That +which causes life causes also decay and death'? Therefore we who +go and you who stay are alike a part of the Divine. Embrace now +your child and bless him, for we depart. And it is on account of +the sacrifice of the Twelve that he is saved alive."</p> + +<p>So, controlling her tears, she rose, and clasping the child to +her bosom, she bade him be of good cheer since he went with the +Gods. And that great saint took his hand from hers, and for the +first time in the life of the Queen he raised his aged eyes to +her face, and she gazed at him; but what she read, even the +ascetic Visravas, who saw all by the power of his yoga, could not +tell, for it was beyond speech. Very certainly the peace +thereafter possessed her.</p> + +<p>So those two went out by the secret ways of the rocks, and +wandering far, were saved by the favour of Durga.</p> + +<h3>VI</h3> + +<p>And the nights went by and the days, and the time came that no +longer could they hold Chitor, and all hope was dead.</p> + +<p>On a certain day the Rana and the Rani stood for the last time +in her bower, and looked down into the city; and in the streets +were gathered in a very wonderful procession the women of Chitor; +and not one was veiled. Flowers that had bloomed in the inner +chambers, great ladies jewelled for a festival, young brides, +aged mothers, and girl children clinging to the robes of their +mothers who held their babes, crowded the ways. Even the +low-caste women walked with measured steps and proudly, decked in +what they had of best, their eyes lengthened with soorma, and +flowers in the darkness of their hair.</p> + +<p>The Queen was clothed in a gold robe of rejoicing, her bodice +latticed with diamonds and great gems, and upon her bosom the +necklace of table emeralds, alight with green fire, which is the +jewel of the Queens of Chitor. So she stood radiant as a vision +of Shri, and it appeared that rays encircled her person.</p> + +<p>And the Rana, unarmed save for his sword, had the saffron +dress of a bridegroom and the jeweled cap of the Rajput Kings, +and below in the hall were the Princes and Chiefs, clad even as +he.</p> + +<p>Then, raising her lotus eyes to her lord, the Princess +said,-</p> + +<p>"Beloved, the time is come, and we have chosen rightly, for +this is the way of honour, and it is but another link forged in +the chain of existence; for until existence itself is ended and +rebirth destroyed, still shall we meet in lives to come and still +be husband and wife. What room then for despair?"</p> + +<p>And he answered,-</p> + +<p>"This is true. Go first, wife, and I follow. Let not the door +swing to behind thee. But oh, to see thy beauty once more that is +the very speech of Gods with men! Wilt thou surely come again to +me and again be fair?"</p> + +<p>And for all answer she smiled upon him, and at his feet +performed the obeisance of the Rajput wife when she departs upon +a journey; and they went out together, the Queen unveiled.</p> + +<p>As she passed through the Princes, they lowered their eyes so +that none saw her; but when she stood on the steps of the palace, +the women all turned eagerly toward her like stars about the +moon, and lifting their arms, they began to sing the dirge of the +Rajput women.</p> + +<p>So they marched, and in great companies they marched, company +behind company, young and old, past the Queen, saluting her and +drawing courage from the loveliness and kindness of her unveiled +face.</p> + +<p>In the rocks beneath the palaces of Chitor are very great +caves - league long and terrible, with ways of darkness no eyes +have seen; and it is believed that in times past spirits have +haunted them with strange wailings. In these was prepared great +store of wood and oils and fragrant matters for burning. So to +these caves they marched and, company by company, disappeared +into the darkness; and the voice of their singing grew faint and +hollow, and died away, as the men stood watching their women +go.</p> + +<p>Now, when this was done and the last had gone, the Rani +descended the steps, and the Rana, taking a torch dipped in +fragrant oils, followed her, and the Princes walked after, clad +like bridegrooms but with no faces of bridal joy. At the entrance +of the caves, having lit the torch, he gave it into her hand, and +she, receiving it and smiling, turned once upon the threshold, +and for the first time those Princes beheld the face of the +Queen, but they hid their eyes with their hands when they had +seen. So she departed within, and the Rana shut to the door and +barred and bolted it, and the men with him flung down great rocks +before it so that none should know the way, nor indeed is it +known to this day; and with their hands on their swords they +waited there, not speaking, until a great smoke rose between the +crevices of the rocks, but no sound at all.</p> + +<p>(Ashes of roses - ashes of roses! . . Ahi! for beauty that is +but touched and remitted!)</p> + +<p>The sun was high when those men with their horses and on foot +marched down the winding causeway beneath the seven gates, and so +forth into the plains, and charging unarmed upon the Moslems, +they perished every man. After, it was asked of one who had seen +the great slaughter,-</p> + +<p>"Say how my King bore himself."</p> + +<p>And he who had seen told this:-</p> + +<p>"Reaper of the harvest of battle, on the bed of honour he has +spread a carpet of the slain! He sleeps ringed about by his +enemies. How can the world tell of his deeds? The tongue is +silent."</p> + +<p>When that Accursed, Allah-u-Din, came up the winding height of +the hills, he found only a dead city, and his heart was sick +within him.</p> + +<p>Now this is the Sack of Chitor, and by the Oath of the Sack of +Chitor do the Rajputs swear when they bind their honour.</p> + +<p>But it is only the ascetic Visravas who by the power of his +yoga has heard every word, and with his eyes beheld that Flame of +Beauty, who, for a brief space illuminating the world as a Queen, +returns to birth in many a shape of sorrowful loveliness until +the Blue-throated God shall in his favour destroy her +rebirths.</p> + +<p>Salutation to Ganesa the Elephant-Headed One, and to Shri the +Lady of Beauty!</p> + +<p></p> + +<p></p> + +<h2 align="center">THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL</h2> + +<p></p> + +<p>In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful- the +Smiting! A day when the soul shall know what it has sent on or +kept back. A day when no soul shall control aught for another. +And the bidding belongs to God.</p> + +<h3 align="center">THE KORAN.</h3> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p>Now the Shah-in-Shah, Shah Jahan, Emperor in India, loved his +wife with a great love. And of all the wives of the Mogul +Emperors surely this Lady Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal - the Chosen +of the Palace - was the most worthy of love. In the tresses of +her silk-soft hair his heart was bound, and for none other had he +so much as a passing thought since his soul had been submerged in +her sweetness. Of her he said, using the words of the poet Faisi, +-</p> + +<p>"How shall I understand the magic of Love the Juggler? For he +made thy beauty enter at that small gate the pupil of my eye, And +now - and now my heart cannot contain it!"</p> + +<p>But who should marvel? For those who have seen this Arjemand +crowned with the crown the Padishah set upon her sweet low brows, +with the lamps of great jewels lighting the dimples of her cheeks +as they swung beside them, have most surely seen perfection. lie +who sat upon the Peacock Throne, where the outspread tail of +massed gems is centred by that great ruby, "The Eye of the +Peacock, the Tribute of the World," valued it not so much as one +Jock of the dark and perfumed tresses that rolled to her feet. +Less to him the twelve throne columns set close with pearls than +the little pearls she showed in her sweet laughter. For if this +lady was all beauty, so too she was all goodness; and from the +Shah-in-Shah to the poorest, all hearts of the world knelt in +adoration, before the Chosen of the Palace. She was, indeed, an +extraor- dinary beauty, in that she had the soul of a child, and +she alone remained unconscious of her power; and so she walked, +crowned and clothed with humility.</p> + +<p>Cold, haughty, and silent was the Shah-in-Shah before she +blessed his arms - flattered, envied, but loved by none. But the +gift this Lady brought with her was love; and this, shining like +the sun upon ice, melted his coldness, and he became indeed the +kingly centre of a kingly court May the Peace be upon her!</p> + +<p>Now it was the dawn of a sorrowful day when the pains of the +Lady Arjemand came strong and terrible, and she travailed in +agony. The hakims (physicians) stroked their beards and reasoned +one with another; the wise women surrounded her, and remedies +many and great were tried; and still her anguish grew, and in the +hall without sat the Shah-in-Shah upon his divan, in anguish of +spirit yet greater. The sweat ran on his brows, the knotted veins +were thick on his temples, and his eyes, sunk in their caves, +showed as those of a maddened man. He crouched on his cushions +and stared at the purdah that divided him from the Lady; and all +day the people came and went about him, and there was silence +from the voice he longed to hear; for she would not moan, lest +the sound should slay the Emperor. Her women besought her, +fearing that her strong silence would break her heart; but still +she lay, her hands clenched in one another, enduring; and the +Emperor endured without. The Day of the Smiting!</p> + +<p>So, as the time of the evening prayer drew nigh, a child was +born, and the Empress, having done with pain, began to sink +slowly into that profound sleep that is the shadow cast by the +Last. May Allah the Upholder have mercy on our weakness! And the +women, white with fear and watching, looked upon her, and +whispered one to another, "It is the end."</p> + +<p>And the aged mother of Abdul Mirza, standing at her head, +said, "She heeds not the cry of the child. She cannot stay." And +the newly wed wife of Saif Khan, standing at her feet, said, "The +voice of the beloved husband is as the Call of the Angel. Let the +Padishah be summoned."</p> + +<p>So, the evening prayer being over (but the Emperor had not +prayed), the wisest of the hakims, Kazim Sharif, went before him +and spoke:-</p> + +<p>"Inhallah! May the will of the Issuer of Decrees in all things +be done! Ascribe unto the Creator glory, bowing before his +Throne."</p> + +<p>And he remained silent; but the Padishah, haggard in his +jewels, with his face hidden, answered thickly, "The truth! For +Allah has forgotten his slave."</p> + +<p>And Kazim Sharif, bowing at his feet and veiling his face with +his hands, replied:</p> + +<p>"The voice of the child cannot reach her, and the Lady of +Delight departs. He who would speak with her must speak +quickly."</p> + +<p>Then the Emperor rose to his feet unsteadily, like a man drunk +with the forbidden juice; and when Kazim Sharif would have +supported him, be flung aside his hands, and he stumbled, a man +wounded to death, as it were, to the marble chamber where she +lay.</p> + +<p>In that white chamber it was dusk, and they had lit the little +cressets so that a very faint light fell upon her face. A slender +fountain a little cooled the hot, still air with its thin music +and its sprinkled diamonds, and outside, the summer lightnings +were playing wide and blue on the river; but so still was it that +the dragging footsteps of the Emperor raised the hair on the +flesh of those who heard, So the women who should, veiled +themselves, and the others remained like pillars of stone.</p> + +<p>Now, when those steps were heard, a faint colour rose in the +cheek of the Lady Arjemand; but she did not raise the heavy +lashes, or move her hand. And he came up beside her, and the +Shadow of God, who should kneel to none, knelt, and his head fell +forward upon her breast; and in the hush the women glided out +like ghosts, leaving the husband with the wife excepting only +that her foster-nurse stood far off, with eyes averted.</p> + +<p>So the minutes drifted by, falling audibly one by one into +eternity, and at the long last she slowly opened her eyes and, as +from the depths of a dream, beheld the Emperor; and in a voice +faint as the fall of a rose-leaf she said the one word, +"Beloved!"</p> + +<p>And he from between his clenched teeth, answered, "Speak, +wife."</p> + +<p>So she, who in all things had loved and served him, - she, +Light of all hearts, dispeller of all gloom, - gathered her dying +breath for consolation, and raised one hand slowly; and it fell +across his, and so remained.</p> + +<p>Now, her beauty had been broken in the anguish like a rose in +storm; but it returned to her, doubtless that the Padishah might +take comfort in its memory; and she looked like a houri of +Paradise who, kneeling beside the Zemzem Well, beholds the Waters +of Peace. Not Fatmeh herself, the daughter of the Prophet of God, +shone more sweetly. She repeated the word, "Beloved"; and after a +pause she whispered on with lips that scarcely stirred, "King of +the Age, this is the end."</p> + +<p>But still he was like a dead man, nor lifted his face.</p> + +<p>"Surely all things pass. And though I go, in your heart I +abide, and nothing can sever us. Take comfort."</p> + +<p>But there was no answer.</p> + +<p>"Nothing but Love's own hand can slay Love. Therefore, +remember me, and I shall live."</p> + +<p>And he answered from the darkness of her bosom, "The whole +world shall remember. But when shall I be united to thee? 0 +Allah, how long wilt thou leave me to waste in this +separation?"</p> + +<p>And she: "Beloved, what is time? We sleep and the night is +gone. Now put your arms about me, for I sink into rest. What +words are needed between us? Love is enough."</p> + +<p>So, making not the Profession of Faith, - and what need, since +all her life was worship, - the Lady Arjemand turned into his +arms like a child. And the night deepened.</p> + +<p>Morning, with its arrows of golden light that struck the river +to splendour! Morning, with its pure breath, its sunshine of joy, +and the koels fluting in the Palace gardens! Morning, divine and +new from the hand of the Maker! And in the innermost chamber of +marble a white silence; and the Lady, the Mirror of Goodness, +lying in the Compassion of Allah, and a broken man stretched on +the ground beside her. For all flesh, from the camel-driver to +the Shah-in- Shah, is as one in the Day of the Smiting.</p> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p>For weeks the Emperor lay before the door of death; and had it +opened to him, he had been blessed. So the months went by, and +very slowly the strength returned to him; but his eyes were +withered and the bones stood out in his cheeks. But he resumed +his throne, and sat upon it kingly, black-bearded, eagle-eyed, +terribly apart in his grief and his royalty; and so seated among +his Usbegs, he declared his will.</p> + +<p>"For this Lady (upon whom be peace), departed to the mercy of +the Giver and Taker, shall a tomb-palace be made, the Like of +which is not found in the four corners of the world. Send forth +therefore for craftsmen like the builders of the Temple of +Solomon the Wise; for I will build."</p> + +<p>So, taking counsel, they sent in haste into Agra for Ustad +Isa, the Master-Builder, a man of Shiraz; and he, being presented +before the Padishah, received his instructions in these +words:-</p> + +<p>"I will that all the world shall remember the Flower of the +World, that all hearts shall give thanks for her beauty, which +was indeed the perfect Mirror of the Creator. And since it is +abhorrent of Islam that any image be made in the likeness of +anything that has life, make for me a palace-tomb, gracious as +she was gracious, lovely as she was lovely. Not such as the tombs +of the Kings and the Conquerors, but of a divine sweetness. Make +me a garden on the banks of Jumna, and build it there, where, +sitting in my Pavilion of Marble, I may see it rise."</p> + +<p>And Ustad Isa, having heard, said, "Upon my head and eyes!" +and went out from the Presence.</p> + +<p>So, musing upon the words of the Padishah, he went to his +house in Agra, and there pondered the matter long and deeply; and +for a whole day and night he refused all food and secluded +himself from the society of all men; for he said:-</p> + +<p>"This is a weighty thing, for this Lady (upon whom be peace) +must visibly dwell in her tomb- palace on the shore of the river; +and how shall I, who have never seen her, imagine the grace that +was in her, and restore it to the world? Oh, had I but the memory +of her face! Could I but see it as the Shah-in-Shah sees it, +remembering the past! Prophet of God, intercede for me, that I +may look through his eyes, if but for a moment!"</p> + +<p>That night he slept, wearied and weakened with fasting; and +whether it were that the body guarded no longer the gates of the +soul, I cannot say; for, when the body ails, the soul soars free +above its weakness. But a strange marvel happened.</p> + +<p>For, as it seemed to him, he awoke at the mid-noon of the +night, and he was sitting, not in his own house, but upon the +roof of the royal palace, looking down on the gliding Jumna, +where the low moon slept in silver, and the light was alone upon +the water; and there were no boats, but sleep and dream, hovering +hand-in-hand, moved upon the air, and his heart was dilated in +the great silence.</p> + +<p>Yet he knew well that he waked in some supernatural sphere: +for his eyes could see across the river as if the opposite shore +lay at his feet; and he could distinguish every leaf on every +tree, and the flowers moon-blanched and ghost-like. And there, in +the blackest shade of the pippala boughs, he beheld a faint light +like a pearl; and looking with unspeakable anxiety, he saw within +the light, slowly growing, the figure of a lady exceedingly +glorious in majesty and crowned with a rayed crown of mighty +jewels of white and golden splendour. Her gold robe fell to her +feet, and - very strange to tell - her feet touched not the +ground, but hung a span's length above it, so that she floated in +the air.</p> + +<p>But the marvel of marvels was her face - not, indeed, for its +beauty, though that transcended all, but for its singular and +compassionate sweetness, wherewith she looked toward the Palace +beyond the river as if it held the heart of her heart, while +death and its river lay between.</p> + +<p>And Ustad Isa said:- "0 dream, if this sweetness be but a +dream, let me never wake! Let me see forever this exquisite work +of Allah the Maker, before whom all the craftsmen are as +children! For my knowledge is as nothing, and I am ashamed in its +presence."</p> + +<p>And as he spoke, she turned those brimming eyes on him, and he +saw her slowly absorbed into the glory of the moonlight; but as +she faded into dream, he beheld, slowly rising, where her feet +had hung in the blessed air, a palace of whiteness, warm as +ivory, cold as chastity, domes and cupolas, slender minars, +arches of marble fretted into sea-foam, screen within screen of +purest marble, to hide the sleeping beauty of a great Queen - +silence in the heart of it, and in every line a harmony beyond +all music. Grace was about it - the grace of a Queen who prays +and does not command; who, seated in her royalty yet inclines all +hearts to love. Arid he saw that its grace was her grace, and its +soul her soul, and that she gave it for the consolation of the +Emperor.</p> + +<p>And he fell on his face and worshipped the Master-Builder of +the Universe, saying,- "Praise cannot express thy Perfection. +Thine Essence confounds thought. Surely I am but the tool in the +hand of the Builder."</p> + +<p>And when he awoke, he was lying in his own secret chamber, but +beside him was a drawing such as the craftsmen make of the work +they have imagined in their hearts. And it was the Palace of the +Tomb.</p> + +<p>Henceforward, how should he waver? He was as a slave who obeys +his master, and with haste he summoned to Agra his Army of +Beauty.</p> + +<p>Then were assembled all the master craftsmen of India and of +the outer world. From Delhi, from Shiraz, even from Baghdad and +Syria, they came. Muhammad Hanif, the wise mason, came from +Kandahar, Muhammad Sayyid from Mooltan. Amanat Khan, and other +great writers of the holy Koran, who should make the scripts of +the Book upon fine marble. Inlayers from Kanauj, with fingers +like those of the Spirits that bowed before Solomon the King, who +should make beautiful the pure stone with inlay of jewels, as did +their forefathers for the Rajah of Mewar; mighty dealers with +agate, cornelian, and lapis lazuli. Came also, from Bokhara, Ata +Muhammad and Shakri Muhammad, that they might carve the lilies of +the field, very glorious, about that Flower of the World. Men of +India, men of Persia, men of the outer lands, they came at the +bidding of Ustad Isa, that the spirit of his vision might be made +manifest.</p> + +<p>And a great council was held among these servants of beauty. +so they made a model in little of the glory that was to be, and +laid it at the feet of the Shah-in-Shah; and he allowed it, +though not as yet fully discerning their intent. And when it was +approved, Ustad Isa called to him a man of Kashmir; and the very +hand of the Creator was upon this man, for he could make gardens +second only to the Gardens of Paradise, having been born by that +Dal Lake where are those roses of the earth, the Shalimar and the +Nishat Bagh; and to him said Ustad Isa,-</p> + +<p>"Behold, Rain Lal Kashmiri, consider this design! Thus and +thus shall a white palace, exquisite in perfection, arise on the +banks of Jumna. Here, in little, in this model of sandalwood, see +what shall be. Consider these domes, rounded as the Bosom of +Beauty, recalling the mystic fruit of the lotus flower. Consider +these four minars that stand about them like Spirits about the +Throne. And remembering that all this shall stand upon a great +dais of purest marble, and that the river shall be its mirror, +repeating to everlasting its loveliness, make me a garden that +shall be the throne room to this Queen."</p> + +<p>And Ram Lal Kashmiri salaamed and said, "Obedience!" and went +forth and pondered night and day, journeying even over the snows +of the Pir Panjal to Kashmir, that he might bathe his eyes in +beauty where she walks, naked and divine, upon the earth. and he +it was who imagined the black marble and white that made the way +of approach.</p> + +<p>So grew the palace that should murmur, like a seashell, in the +ear of the world the secret of love.</p> + +<p>Veiled had that loveliness been in the shadow of the palace; +but now the sun should rise upon it and turn its ivory to gold, +should set upon it and flush its snow with rose. The moon should +lie upon it like the pearls upon her bosom, the visible grace of +her presence breathe about it, the music of her voice hover in +the birds and trees of the garden. Times there were when Ustad +Isa despaired lest even these mighty servants of beauty should +miss perfection. Yet it grew and grew, rising like the growth of +a flower.</p> + +<p>So on a certain day it stood completed, and beneath the small +tomb in the sanctuary, veiled with screens of wrought marble so +fine that they might lift in the breeze, - the veils of a Queen, +- slept the Lady Arjemand; and above her a narrow coffer of white +marble, enriched in a great script with the Ninety-Nine Wondrous +Names of God. And the Shah-in-Shah, now grey and worn, entered +and, standing by her, cried in a loud voice, - "I ascribe to the +Unity, the only Creator, the perfection of his handiwork made +visible here by the hand of mortal man. For the beauty that was +secret in my Palace is here revealed; and the Crowned Lady shall +sit forever upon the banks of the Jumna River. It was love that +commanded this Tomb."</p> + +<p>And the golden echo carried his voice up into the high dome, +and it died away in whispers of music.</p> + +<p>But Ustad Isa standing far off in the throng (for what are +craftsmen in the presence of the mighty?), said softly in his +beard, "It was Love also that built, and therefore it shall +endure."</p> + +<p>Now it is told that, on a certain night in summer, when the +moon is full, a man who lingers by the straight water, where the +cypresses stand over their own image, may see a strange marvel - +may see the Palace of the Taj dissolve like a pearl, and so rise +in a mist into the moonlight; and in its place, on her dais of +white marble, he shall see the Lady Arjemand, Mumtaz-i-Mahal, the +Chosen of the Palace, stand there in the white perfection of +beauty, smiling as one who hath attained unto the Peace. For she +is its soul.</p> + +<p>And kneeling before the dais, he shall see Ustad Isa, who made +this body of her beauty; and his face is hidden in his hands.</p> + +<p></p> + +<p></p> + +<h2 align="center">"HOW GREAT IS THE GLORY OF KWANNON!"</h2> + +<h3 align="center">A JAPANESE STORY</h3> + +<h3 align="center"></h3> + +<p>(0 Lovely One-O thou Flower! With Thy beautiful face, with Thy +beautiful eyes, pour light upon the world! Adoration to +Kwannon.)</p> + +<p>In Japan in the days of the remote Ancestors, near the little +village of Shiobara, the river ran through rocks of a very +strange blue colour, and the bed of the river was also composed +of these rocks, so that the clear water ran blue as turquoise +gems to the sea.</p> + +<p>The great forests murmured beside it, and through their +swaying boughs was breathed the song of Eternity. Those who +listen may hear if their ears are open. To others it is but the +idle sighing of the wind.</p> + +<p>Now because of all this beauty there stood in these forests a +roughly built palace of unbarked wood, and here the great Emperor +would come from City-Royal to seek rest for his doubtful thoughts +and the cares of state, turning aside often to see the moonlight +in Shiobara. He sought also the free air and the sound of falling +water, yet dearer to him than the plucked strings of sho and +biwa. For he said;</p> + +<p>"Where and how shall We find peace even for a moment, and +afford Our heart refreshment even for a single second?"</p> + +<p>And it seemed to him that he found such moments at +Shiobara.</p> + +<p>Only one of his great nobles would His Majesty bring with him +- the Dainagon, and him be chose because he was a worthy and +honorable person and very simple of heart.</p> + +<p>There was yet another reason why the Son of Heaven inclined to +the little Shiobara. It had reached the Emperor that a Recluse of +the utmost sanctity dwelt in that forest. His name was Semimaru. +He had made himself a small hut in the deep woods, much as a +decrepit silkworm might spin his last Cocoon and there had the +Peace found him.</p> + +<p>It had also reached His Majesty that, although blind, be was +exceedingly skilled in the art of playing the biwa, both in the +Flowing Fount manner and the Woodpecker manner, and that, +especially on nights when the moon was full, this aged man made +such music as transported the soul. This music His Majesty +desired very greatly to hear.</p> + +<p>Never had Semimaru left his hut save to gather wood or seek +food until the Divine Emperor commanded his attendance that he +might soothe his august heart with music.</p> + +<p>Now on this night of nights the moon was full and the snow +heavy on the pines, and the earth was white also, and when the +moon shone through the boughs it made a cold light like dawn, and +the shadows of the trees were black upon it.</p> + +<p>The attendants of His Majesty long since slept for sheer +weariness, for the night was far spent, but the Emperor and the +Dainagon still sat with their eyes fixed on the venerable +Semimaru. For many hours he had played, drawing strange music +from his biwa. Sometimes it had been like rain blowing over the +plains of Adzuma, sometimes like the winds roaring down the +passes of the Yoshino Mountains, and yet again like the voice of +far cities. For many hours they listened without weariness, and +thought that all the stories of the ancients might flow past them +in the weird music that seemed to have neither beginning nor +end.</p> + +<p>"It is as the river that changes and changes not, and is ever +and ever the same," said the Emperor in his own soul.</p> + +<p>And certainly had a voice announced to His Augustness that +centuries were drifting by as he listened, he could have felt no +surprise.</p> + +<p>Before them, as they sat upon the silken floor cushions, was a +small shrine with a Buddha shelf, and a hanging picture of the +Amida Buddha within it - the expression one of rapt peace. +Figures of Fugen and Fudo were placed before the curtain doors of +the shrine, looking up in adoration to the Blessed One. A small +and aged pine tree was in a pot of grey porcelain from Chosen - +the only ornament in the chamber.</p> + +<p>Suddenly His Majesty became aware that the Dainagon also had +fallen asleep from weariness, and that the recluse was no longer +playing, but was speaking in a still voice like a deeply flowing +stream. The Emperor had observed no change from music to speech, +nor could he recall when the music had ceased, so that it +altogether resembled a dream.</p> + +<p>"When I first came here - "the Venerable one continued-" it +was not my intention to stay long in the forest. As each day +dawned, I said; `In seven days I go.' And again - 'In seven.' Yet +have I not gone. The days glided by and here have I attained to +look on the beginnings of peace. Then wherefore should I go? - +for all life is within the soul. Shall the fish weary of his +pool? And I, who through my blind eyes feel the moon illuming my +forest by night and the sun by day, abide in peace, so that even +the wild beasts press round to hear my music. I have come by a +path overblown by autumn leaves. But I have come."</p> + +<p>Then said the Divine Emperor as if unconsciously;</p> + +<p>"Would that I also might come! But the august duties cannot +easily be laid aside. And I have no wife - no son."</p> + +<p>And Semimaru, playing very softly on the strings of his biwa +made no other answer, and His Majesty, collecting his thoughts, +which had become, as it were, frozen with the cold and the quiet +and the strange music, spoke thus, as if in a waking dream;</p> + +<p>"Why have I not wedded? Because I have desired a bride beyond +the women of earth, and of none such as I desire has the rumor +reached me. Consider that Ancestor who wedded Her Shining +Majesty! Evil and lovely was she, and the passions were loud +about her. And so it is with women. Trouble and vexation of +spirit, or instead a great weariness. But if the Blessed One +would vouchsafe to my prayers a maiden of blossom and dew, with a +heart calm as moonlight, her would I wed. 0, honorable One, whose +wisdom surveys the world, is there in any place near or far - in +heaven or in earth, such a one that I may seek and find?"</p> + +<p>And Semimaru, still making a very low music on his biwa, said +this;</p> + +<p>"Supreme Master, where the Shiobara River breaks away through +the gorges to the sea, dwelt a poor couple - the husband a +wood-cutter. They had no children to aid in their toil, and daily +the woman addressed her prayers for a son to the Bodhisattwa +Kwannon, the Lady of Pity who looketh down for ever upon the +sound of prayer. Very fervently she prayed, with such offerings +as her poverty allowed, and on a certain night she dreamed this +dream. At the shrine of the Senju Kwannon she knelt as was her +custom, and that Great Lady, sitting enthroned upon the Lotos of +Purity, opened Her eyes slowly from Her divine contemplation and +heard the prayer of the wood-cutter's wife. Then stooping like a +blown willow branch, she gathered a bud from the golden lotos +plant that stood upon her altar, and breathing upon it it became +pure white and living, and it exhaled a perfume like the flowers +of Paradise, This flower the Lady of Pity flung into the bosom of +her petitioner, and closing Her eyes returned into Her divine +dream, whilst the woman awoke, weeping for joy.</p> + +<p>But when she sought in her bosom for the Lotos it was gone. Of +all this she boasted loudly to her folk and kin, and the more so, +when in due time she perceived herself to be with child, for, +from that august favour she looked for nothing less than a son, +radiant with the Five Ornaments of riches, health, longevity, +beauty, and success. Yet, when her hour was come, a girl was +born, and blind."</p> + +<p>"Was she welcomed?" asked the dreaming voice of the +Emperor.</p> + +<p>"Augustness, but as a household drudge. For her food was +cruelty and her drink tears. And the shrine of the Senju Kwannon +was neglected by her parents because of the disappointment and +shame of the unwanted gift. And they believed that, lost in Her +divine contemplation, the Great Lady would not perceive this +neglect. The Gods however are known by their great memories."</p> + +<p>"Her name?"</p> + +<p>"Majesty, Tsuyu-Morning Dew. And like the morning dew she +shines in stillness. She has repaid good for evil to her evil +parents, serving them with unwearied service."</p> + +<p>"What distinguishes her from others?"</p> + +<p>"Augustness, a very great peace. Doubtless the shadow of the +dream of the Holy Kwannon. She works, she moves, she smiles as +one who has tasted of content."</p> + +<p>"Has she beauty?"</p> + +<p>"Supreme Master, am I not blind? But it is said that she has +no beauty that men should desire her. Her face is flat and round, +and her eyes blind."</p> + +<p>"And yet content?"</p> + +<p>"Philosophers might envy her calm. And her blindness is +without doubt a grace from the excelling Pity, for could she see +her own exceeding ugliness she must weep for shame. But she sees +not. Her sight is inward, and she is well content."</p> + +<p>"Where does she dwell?"</p> + +<p>"Supreme Majesty, far from here - where in the heart of the +woods the river breaks through the rocks."</p> + +<p>"Venerable One, why have you told me this? I asked for a royal +maiden wise and beautiful, calm as the dawn, and you have told me +of a wood-cutter's drudge, blind and ugly."</p> + +<p>And now Semimaru did not answer, but the tones of the biwa +grew louder and clearer, and they rang like a song of triumph, +and the Emperor could hear these words in the voice of the +strings.</p> + +<p>"She is beautiful as the night, crowned with moon and stars +for him who has eyes to see. Princess Splendour was dim beside +her; Prince Fireshine, gloom! Her Shining Majesty was but a +darkened glory before this maid. All beauty shines within her +hidden eyes."</p> + +<p>And having uttered this the music became wordless once more, +but it still flowed on more and more softly like a river that +flows into the far distance.</p> + +<p>The Emperor stared at the mats, musing - the light of the lamp +was burning low. His heart said within him;</p> + +<p>"This maiden, cast like a flower from the hand of Kwannon +Sama, will I see."</p> + +<p>And as he said this the music had faded away into a +thread-like smallness, and when after long thought he raised his +august head, he was alone save for the Dainagon, sleeping on the +mats behind him, and the chamber was in darkness. Semimaru had +departed in silence, and His Majesty, looking forth into the +broad moonlight, could see the track of his feet upon the shining +snow, and the music came back very thinly like spring rain in the +trees. Once more he looked at the whiteness of the night, and +then, stretching his august person on the mats, he slept amid +dreams of sweet sound.</p> + +<p>The next day, forbidding any to follow save the Dainagon, His +Majesty went forth upon the frozen snow where the sun shone in a +blinding whiteness. They followed the track of Semimaru's feet +far under the pine trees so heavy with their load of snow that +they were bowed as if with fruit. And the track led on and the +air was so still that the cracking of a bough was like the blow +of a hammer, and the sliding of a load of snow from a branch like +the fall of an avalanche. Nor did they speak as they went. They +listened, nor could they say for what.</p> + +<p>Then, when they had gone a very great way, the track ceased +suddenly, as if cut off, and at this spot, under the pines furred +with snow, His Majesty became aware of a perfume so sweet that it +was as though all the flowers of the earth haunted the place with +their presence, and a music like the biwa of Semimaru was heard +in the tree tops. This sounded far off like the whispering of +rain when it falls in very small leaves, and presently it died +away, and a voice followed after, singing, alone in the woods, so +that the silence appeared to have been created that such a music +might possess the world. So the Emperor stopped instantly, and +the Dainagon behind him and he heard these words.</p> + +<p>"In me the Heavenly Lotos grew, The fibres ran from head to +feet, And my heart was the august Blossom. Therefore the +sweetness flowed through the veins of my flesh, And I breathed +peace upon all the world, And about me was my fragrance shed That +the souls of men should desire me."</p> + +<p>Now, as he listened, there came through the wood a maiden, +bare - footed, save for grass sandals, and clad in coarse +clothing, and she came up and passed them, still singing.</p> + +<p>And when she was past, His Majesty put up his hand to his +eyes, like one dreaming, and said;</p> + +<p>"What have you seen?"</p> + +<p>And the Dainagon answered;</p> + +<p>"Augustness, a country wench, flat - faced, ugly and blind, +and with a voice like a crow. Has not your Majesty seen +this?"</p> + +<p>The Emperor, still shading his eyes, replied;</p> + +<p>"I saw a maiden so beautiful that her Shining Majesty would be +a black blot beside her. As she went, the Spring and all its +sweetness blew from her garments. Her robe was green with small +gold flowers. Her eyes were closed, but she resembled a cherry +tree, snowy with bloom and dew. Her voice was like the singing +flowers of Paradise."</p> + +<p>The Dainagon looked at him with fear and compassion;</p> + +<p>"Augustness, how should such a lady carry in her arms a bundle +of firewood?"</p> + +<p>"She bore in her hands three lotos flowers, and where each +foot fell I saw a lotos bloom and vanish."</p> + +<p>They retraced their steps through the wood; His Majesty +radiant as Prince Fireshine with the joy that filled his soul; +the Dainagon darkened as Prince Firefade with fear, believing +that the strange music of Semimaru had bewitched His Majesty, or +that the maiden herself might possibly have the power of the fox +in shape-changing and bewildering the senses.</p> + +<p>Very sorrowful and careful was his heart for he loved his +Master.</p> + +<p>That night His Majesty dreamed that he stood before the +kakemono of the Amida Buddha, and that as he raised his eyes in +adoration to the Blessed Face, he beheld the images of Fugen and +Fudo, rise up and bow down before that One Who Is. Then, gliding +in, before these Holinesses stood a figure, and it was the +wood-cutter's daughter homely and blinded. She stretched her +hands upward as though invoking the supreme Buddha, and then +turning to His Majesty she smiled upon him, her eyes closed as in +bliss unutterable. And he said aloud.</p> + +<p>"Would that I might see her eyes!" and so saying awoke in a +great stillness of snow and moonlight.</p> + +<p>Having waked, he said within himself</p> + +<p>"This marvel will I wed and she shall be my Empress were she +lower than the Eta, and whether her face be lovely or homely. For +she is certainly a flower dropped from the hand of the +Divine."</p> + +<p>So when the sun was high His Majesty, again followed by the +Dainagon, went through the forest swiftly, and like a man that +sees his goal, and when they reached the place where the maiden +went by, His Majesty straitly commanded the Dainagon that he +should draw apart, and leave him to speak with the maiden; yet +that he should watch what befell.</p> + +<p>So the Dainagon watched, and again he saw her come, very +poorly clad, and with bare feet that shrank from the snow in her +grass sandals, bowed beneath a heavy load of wood upon her +shoulders, and her face flat and homely like a girl of the +people, and her eyes blind and shut.</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>And as she came she sang this.</p> + +<p>"The Eternal way lies before him,</p> + +<p>The way that is made manifest in the Wise.</p> + +<p>The Heart that loves reveals itself to man.</p> + +<p>For now he draws nigh to the Source.</p> + +<p>The night advances fast,</p> + +<p>And lo! the moon shines bright."</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>And to the Dainagon it seemed a harsh crying nor could he +distinguish any words at all.</p> + +<p>But what His Majesty beheld was this. The evening had come on +and the moon was rising. The snow had gone. It was the full glory +of spring, and the flowers sprang thick as stars upon the grass, +and among them lotos flowers, great as the wheel of a chariot, +white and shining with the luminance of the pearl, and upon each +one of these was seated an incarnate Holiness, looking upward +with joined hands. In the trees were the voices of the mystic +Birds that are the utterance of the Blessed One, proclaiming in +harmony the Five Virtues, The Five Powers, the Seven Steps +ascending to perfect Illumination, the Noble Eightfold Path, and +all the Law. And, bearing, in the heart of the Son of Heaven +awoke the Three Remembrances - the Remembrance of Him who is +Blessed, Remembrance of the Law, and Remembrance of the Communion +of the Assembly.</p> + +<p>So, looking upward to the heavens, he beheld the Infinite +Buddha, high and lifted up in a great raying glory. About Him +were the exalted Bodhisattwas, the mighty Disciples, great Arhats +all, and all the countless Angelhood. And these rose high into +the infinite until they could be seen but as a point of fire +against the moon. With this golden multitude beyond all numbering +was He.</p> + +<p>Then, as His Majesty had seen in the dream of the night, the +wood-cutter's daughter, moving through the flowers like one blind +that gropes his way, advanced before the Blessed Feet, and +uplifting her hands, did adoration, and her face he could not +see, but his heart went with her, adoring also the infinite +Buddha seated in the calms of boundless Light.</p> + +<p>Then enlightenment entered at his eyes, as a man that wakes +from sleep, and suddenly he beheld the Maiden crowned and robed +and terrible in beauty, and her feet were stayed upon an open +lotos, and his soul knew the Senju Kwannon Herself, myriad-armed +for the helping of mankind.</p> + +<p>And turning, she smiled as in the vision, but his eyes being +now clear her blinded eyes were opened, and that glory who shall +tell as those living founts of Wisdom rayed upon him their +ineffable light? In that ocean was his being drowned, and so, +bowed before the Infinite Buddha, he received the Greater +Illumination.</p> + +<p>How great is the Glory of Kwannon!</p> + +<p>When the radiance and the vision were withdrawn and only the +moon looked over the trees, His Majesty rose upon his feet, and +standing on the snow, surrounded with calm, he called to the +Dainagon, and asked this;</p> + +<p>"What have you seen?"</p> + +<p>"Augustness, nothing but the country wench and moon and +snow."</p> + +<p>"And heard?"</p> + +<p>"Augustness, nothing but the harsh voice of the wood-cutter's +daughter."</p> + +<p>"And felt?"</p> + +<p>"Augustness, nothing but the bone-piercing cold." So His +Majesty adored that which cannot be uttered, saying;</p> + +<p>"So Wisdom, so Glory encompass us about, and we see them not +for we are blinded with illusion. Yet every stone is a jewel and +every clod is spirit and to the hems of the Infinite Buddha all +cling. Through the compassion of the Supernal Mercy that walks +the earth as the Bodhisattwa Kwannon, am I admitted to wisdom and +given sight and hearing. And what is all the world to that happy +one who has beheld Her eyes!"</p> + +<p>And His Majesty returned through the forest.</p> + +<p>When, the next day, he sent for the venerable Semimaru that +holy recluse had departed and none knew where. But still when the +moon is full a strange music moves in the tree tops of +Shiobara.</p> + +<p>Then His sacred Majesty returned to City-Royal, having +determined to retire into the quiet life, and there, abandoning +the throne to a kinsman wise in greatness, he became a dweller in +the deserted hut of Semimaru.</p> + +<p>His life, like a descending moon approaching the hill that +should hide it, was passed in meditation on that Incarnate Love +and Compassion whose glory had augustly been made known to him, +and having cast aside all save the image of the Divine from his +soul, His Majesty became even as that man who desired +enlightenment of the Blessed One.</p> + +<p>For he, desiring instruction, gathered precious flowers, and +journeyed to present them as an offering to the Guatama Buddha. +Standing before Him, he stretched forth both his hands holding +the flowers.</p> + +<p>Then said the Holy One, looking upon his petitioner's right +hand;</p> + +<p>"Loose your hold of these."</p> + +<p>And the man dropped the flowers from his right hand. And the +Holy One looking upon his left hand, said;</p> + +<p>"Loose your hold of these."</p> + +<p>And, sorrowing, he dropped the flowers from his left hand. And +again the Master said;</p> + +<p>"Loose your hold of that which is neither in the right nor in +the left"</p> + +<p>And the disciple said very pitifully;</p> + +<p>"Lord, of what should I loose my hold for I have nothing +left?"</p> + +<p>And He looked upon him steadfastly.</p> + +<p>Therefore at last understanding he emptied his soul of all +desire, and of fear that is the shadow of desire, and being +enlightened relinquished all burdens.</p> + +<p>So was it also with His Majesty. In peace he dwelt, and +becoming a great Arhat, in peace he departed to that Uttermost +Joy where is the Blessed One made manifest in Pure Light.</p> + +<p>As for the parents of the maiden, they entered after sore +troubles into peace, having been remembered by the Infinite. For +it is certain that the enemies also of the Supreme Buddha go to +salvation by thinking on Him, even though it be against Him.</p> + +<p>And he who tells this truth makes this prayer to the Lady of +Pity;</p> + +<p>"Grant me, I pray, One dewdrop from Thy willow spray, And in +the double Lotos keep My hidden heart asleep."</p> + +<p>How great is the Glory of Kwannon!</p> + +<p></p> + +<p></p> + +<h2 align="center">THE ROUND-FACED BEAUTY</h2> + +<h3 align="center">A STORY OF THE CHINESE COURT</h3> + +<h3 align="center"></h3> + +<p>In the city of Chang-an music filled the palaces, and the +festivities of the Emperor were measured by its beat. Night, and +the full moon swimming like a gold-fish in the garden lakes, gave +the signal for the Feather Jacket and Rainbow Skirt dances. +Morning, with the rising sun, summoned the court again to the +feast and wine-cup in the floating gardens.</p> + +<p>The Emperor Chung Tsu favored this city before all others. The +Yen Tower soaring heavenward, the Drum Towers, the Pearl Pagoda, +were the only fit surroundings of his magnificence; and in the +Pavilion of Tranquil Learning were held those discussions which +enlightened the world and spread the fame of the Jade Emperor far +and wide. In all respects he adorned the Dragon Throne - in all +but one; for Nature, bestowing so much, withheld one gift, and +the Imperial heart, as precious as jade, was also as hard, and he +eschewed utterly the company of the Hidden Palace Flowers.</p> + +<p>Yet the Inner Chambers were filled with ladies chosen from all +parts of the Celestial Empire - ladies of the most exquisite and +torturing beauty, moons of loveliness, moving coquettishly on +little feet, with all the grace of willow branches in a light +breeze. They were sprinkled with perfumes, adorned with jewels, +robed in silks woven with gold and embroidered with designs of +flowers and birds. Their faces were painted and their eyebrows +formed into slender and perfect arches whence the soul of man +might well slip to perdition, and a breath of sweet odor followed +each wherever she moved. Every one might have been the Empress of +some lesser kingdom; but though rumours reached the Son of Heaven +from time to time of their charms, - especially when some new +blossom was added to the Imperial bouquet,- he had dismissed them +from his august thoughts, and they languished in a neglect so +complete that the Great Cold Palaces of the Moon were not more +empty than their hearts. They remained under the supervision of +the Princess of Han, August Aunt of the Emperor, knowing that +their Lord considered the company of sleeve-dogs and macaws more +pleasant than their own. Nor had he as yet chosen an Empress, and +it was evident that without some miracle, such as the +intervention of the Municipal God, no heir to the throne could be +hoped for.</p> + +<p>Yet the Emperor one day remembered his imprisoned beauties, +and it crossed the Imperial thoughts that even these inferior +creatures might afford such interest as may be found in the +gambols of trained fleas or other insects of no natural +attainments.</p> + +<p>Accordingly, he commanded that the subject last discussed in +his presence should be transferred to the Inner Chambers, and it +was his Order that the ladies should also discuss it, and their +opinions be engraved on ivory, bound together with red silk and +tassels and thus presented at the Dragon feet. The subject chosen +was the following:-</p> + +<p>Describe the Qualities of the Ideal Man</p> + +<p>Now when this command was laid before the August Aunt, the +guardian of the Inner Chambers, she was much perturbed in mind, +for such a thing was unheard of in all the annals of the Empire. +Recovering herself, she ventured to say that the discussion of +such a question might raise very disquieting thoughts in the +minds of the ladies, who could not be supposed to have any +opinions at all on such a subject. Nor was it desirable that they +should have. To every woman her husband and no other is and must +be the Ideal Man. So it was always in the past; so it must ever +be. There are certain things which it is dangerous to question or +discuss, and how can ladies who have never spoken with any other +man than a parent or a brother judge such matters?</p> + +<p>"How, indeed," asked this lady of exalted merit, "can the bat +form an idea of the sunlight, or the carp of the motion of wings? +If his Celestial Majesty had commanded a discussion on the +Superior Woman and the virtues which should adorn her, some +sentiments not wholly unworthy might have been offered. But this +is a calamity. They come unexpectedly, springing up like +mushrooms, and this one is probably due to the lack of virtue of +the inelegant and unintellectual person who is now speaking."</p> + +<p>This she uttered in the presence of the principal beauties of +the Inner Chambers. They sat or reclined about her in attitudes +of perfect loveliness. Two, embroidering silver pheasants, paused +with their needles suspended above the stretched silk, to hear +the August Aunt. One, threading beads of jewel jade, permitted +them to slip from the string and so distended the rose of her +mouth in surprise that the small pearl-shells were visible +within. The Lady Tortoise, caressing a scarlet and azure macaw, +in her agitation so twitched the feathers that the bird, +shrieking, bit her finger. The Lady Golden Bells blushed deeply +at the thought of what was required of them; and the little Lady +Summer Dress, youngest of all the assembled beauties, was so +alarmed at the prospect that she began to sob aloud, until she +met the eye of the August Aunt and abruptly ceased.</p> + +<p>"It is not, however, to be supposed," said the August Aunt, +opening her snuff-bottle of painted crystal, "that the minds of +our deplorable and unattractive sex are wholly incapable of +forming opinions. But speech is a grave matter for women, +naturally slow-witted and feeble-minded as they are. This +unenlightened person recalls the Odes as saying:-</p> + +<blockquote> +<p>`A flaw in a piece of white jade</p> + +<p>May be ground away,</p> + +<p>But when a woman has spoken foolishly</p> + +<p>Nothing can be done-'</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>a consideration which should make every lady here and +throughout the world think anxiously before speech." So anxiously +did the assembled beauties think, that all remained mute as fish +in a pool, and the August Aunt continued:-</p> + +<p>"Let Tsu-ssu be summoned. It is my intention to suggest to the +Dragon Emperor that the virtues of women be the subject of our +discourse, and I will myself open and conclude the +discussion."</p> + +<p>Tsu-ssu was not long in kotowing before the August Aunt, who +despatched her message with the proper ceremonial due to its +Imperial destination; and meanwhile, in much agitation, the +beauties could but twitter and whisper in each other's ears, and +await the response like condemned prisoners who yet hope for +reprieve.</p> + +<p>Scarce an hour had dripped away on the water-clock when an +Imperial Missive bound with yellow silk arrived, and the August +Aunt, rising, kotowed nine times before she received it in her +jewelled hand with its delicate and lengthy nails ensheathed in +pure gold and set with gems of the first water. She then read it +aloud, the ladies prostrating themselves.</p> + +<p>To the Princess of Han, the August Aunt, the Lady of the Nine +Superior Virtues:-</p> + +<p>"Having deeply reflected on the wisdom submitted, We thus +reply. Women should not be the judges of their own virtues, since +these exist only in relation to men. Let Our Command therefore be +executed, and tablets presented before us seven days hence, with +the name of each lady appended to her tablet."</p> + +<p>It was indeed pitiable to see the anxiety of the ladies! A +sacrifice to Kwan-Yin, the Goddess of Mercy, of a jewel from +each, with intercession for aid, was proposed by the Lustrous +Lady; but the majority shook their heads sadly. The August Aunt, +tossing her head, declared that, as the Son of Heaven had made no +comment on her proposal of opening and closing the discussion, +she should take no part other than safeguarding the interests of +propriety. This much increased the alarm, and, kneeling at her +feet, the swan-like beauties, Deep-Snow and Winter Moon implored +her aid and compassion. But, rising indignantly, the August Aunt +sought her own apartments, and for the first time the inmates of +the Pepper Chamber saw with regret the golden dragons embroidered +on her back.</p> + +<p>It was then that the Round-Faced Beauty ventured a remark. +This maiden, having been born in the far-off province of +Ssuch-uan, was considered a rustic by the distinguished elegance +of the Palace and, therefore, had never spoken unless decorum +required. Still, even her detractors were compelled to admit the +charms that had gained her her name. Her face had the flawless +outline of the pearl, and like the blossom of the plum was the +purity of her complexion, upon which the darkness of her eyebrows +resembled two silk-moths alighted to flutter above the brilliance +of her eyes - eyes which even the August Aunt had commended after +a banquet of unsurpassed variety. Her hair had been compared to +the crow's plumage; her waist was like a roll of silk, and her +discretion in habiting herself was such that even the Lustrous +Lady and the Lady Tortoise drew instruction from the splendours +of her robes. It created, however, a general astonishment when +she spoke.</p> + +<p>"Paragons of beauty, what is this dull and opaque. witted +person that she should speak?"</p> + +<p>"What, indeed!" said the Celestial Sister. "This entirely +undistinguished person cannot even imagine."</p> + +<p>A distressing pause followed, during which many whispered +anxiously. The Lustrous Lady broke it.</p> + +<p>"It is true that the highly ornamental Round-Faced Beauty is +but lately come, yet even the intelligent Ant may assist the +Dragon; and in the presence of alarm, what is decorum? With a +tiger behind one, who can recall the Book of Rites and act with +befitting elegance?"</p> + +<p>"The high-born will at all times remember the Rites!" retorted +the Celestial Sister. "Have we not heard the August Aunt observe: +`Those who understand do not speak. Those who speak do not +understand'?"</p> + +<p>The Round-Faced Beauty collected her courage.</p> + +<p>"Doubtless this is wisdom; yet if the wise do not speak, who +should instruct us? The August Aunt herself would be silent."</p> + +<p>All were confounded by this dilemma, and the little Lady +Summer-Dress, still weeping, entreated that the Round-Faced +Beauty might be heard. The Heavenly Blossoms then prepared to +listen and assumed attitudes of attention, which so disconcerted +the Round-Faced Beauty that she blushed like a spring tulip in +speaking.</p> + +<p>"Beautiful ladies, our Lord, who is unknown to us all, has +issued an august command. It cannot be disputed, for the whisper +of disobedience is heard as thunder in the Imperial Presence. +Should we not aid each other? If any lady has formed a dream in +her soul of the Ideal Man, might not such a picture aid us all? +Let us not be `say-nothing-do-nothing,' but act!"</p> + +<p>They hung their heads and smiled, but none would allow that +she had formed such an image. The little Lady Tortoise, laughing +behind her fan of sandalwood, said roguishly: "The Ideal Man +should be handsome, liberal in giving, and assuredly he should +appreciate the beauty of his wives. But this we cannot say to the +Divine Emperor."</p> + +<p>A sigh rustled through the Pepper Chamber. The Celestial +Sister looked angrily at the speaker.</p> + +<p>"This is the talk of children," she said. "Does no one +remember Kung-fu-tse's [Confucius] description of the Superior +Man?"</p> + +<p>Unfortunately none did - not even the Celestial Sister +herself.</p> + +<p>"Is it not probable," said the Round-Faced Beauty, "that the +Divine Emperor remembers it him- self and wishes-"</p> + +<p>But the Celestial Sister, yawning audibly, summoned the +attendants to bring rose-leaves in honey, and would hear no +more.</p> + +<p>The Round-Faced Beauty therefore wandered forth among the +mossy rocks and drooping willows of the Imperial Garden, deeply +considering the matter. She ascended the bow-curved bridge of +marble which crossed the Pool of Clear Weather, and from the top +idly observed the reflection of her rose-and-gold coat in the +water while, with her taper fingers, she crumbled cake for the +fortunate gold-fish that dwelt in it. And, so doing, she remarked +one fish, four-tailed among the six-tailed, and in no way +distinguished by elegance, which secured by far the largest share +of the crumbs dropped into the pool. Bending lower, she observed +this singular fish and its methods.</p> + +<p>The others crowded about the spot where the crumbs fell, all +herded together. In their eagerness and stupidity they remained +like a cloud of gold in one spot, slowly waving their tails. But +this fish, concealing itself behind a miniature rock, waited, +looking upward, until the crumbs were falling, and then, rushing +forth with the speed of an arrow, scattered the stupid mass of +fish, and bore off the crumbs to its shelter, where it instantly +devoured them.</p> + +<p>"This is notable," said the Round-Faced Beauty. "Observation +enlightens the mind. To be apart - to be distinguished - secures +notice!" And she plunged into thought again, wandering, herself a +flower, among the gorgeous tree peonies.</p> + +<p>On the following day the August Aunt commanded that a writer +among the palace attendants should, with brush and ink, be +summoned to transcribe the wisdom of the ladies. She requested +that each would give three days to thought, relating the +following anecdote. "There was a man who, taking a piece of +ivory, carved it into a mulberry leaf, spending three years on +the task. When finished it could not be told from the original, +and was a gift suitable for the Brother of the Sun and Moon. Do +likewise!"</p> + +<p>"But yet, 0 Augustness!" said the Celestial Sister, "if the +Lord of Heaven took as long with each leaf, there would be few +leaves on the trees, and if-"</p> + +<p>The August Aunt immediately commanded silence and retired. On +the third day she seated herself in her chair of carved ebony, +while the attendant placed himself by her feet and prepared to +record her words.</p> + +<p>"This insignificant person has decided," began her Augustness, +looking round and unscrewing the amber top of her snuff-bottle, +"to take an unintelligent part in these proceedings. An example +should be set. Attendant, write!"</p> + +<p>She then dictated as follows: "The Ideal Man is he who now +decorates the Imperial Throne, or he who in all humility ventures +to resemble the incomparable Emperor. Though he may not hope to +attain, his endeavor is his merit. No further description it +needed."</p> + +<p>With complacence she inhaled the perfumed snuff, as the writer +appended the elegant characters of her Imperial name.</p> + +<p>If it is permissible to say that the faces of the beauties +lengthened visibly, it should now be said. For it had been the +intention of every lady to make an illusion to the Celestial +Emperor and depict him as the Ideal Man. Nor had they expected +that the August Aunt would take any part in the matter.</p> + +<p>"Oh, but it was the intention of this commonplace and +undignified person to say this very thing!" cried the Lustrous +Lady, with tears in the jewels of her eyes. "I thought no other +high-minded and distinguished lady would for a moment think of +it"</p> + +<p>"And it was my intention also!" fluttered the little Lady +Tortoise, wringing her hands! "What now shall this most unlucky +and unendurable person do? For three nights has sleep forsaken my +unattractive eyelids, and, tossing and turning on a couch +deprived of all comfort, I could only repeat, `The Ideal Man is +the Divine Dragon Emperor!'"</p> + +<p>"May one of entirely contemptible attainments make a +suggestion in this assemblage of scintillating wit and beauty?" +inquired the Celestial Sister. "My superficial opinion is that it +would be well to prepare a single paper to which all names should +be appended, stating that His Majesty in his Dragon Divinity +comprises all ideals in his sacred Person."</p> + +<p>"Let those words be recorded," said the August Aunt. "What +else should any lady of discretion and propriety say? In this +Palace of Virtuous Peace, where all is consecrated to the Son of +Heaven, though he deigns not to enter it, what other thought dare +be breathed? Has any lady ventured to step outside such a limit? +If so, let her declare herself!"</p> + +<p>All shook their heads, and the August Aunt proceeded: "Let the +writer record this as the opinion of every lady of the Imperial +Household, and let each name be separately appended."</p> + +<p>Had any desired to object, none dared to confront the August +Aunt; but apparently no beauty so desired, for after three +nights' sleepless meditation, no other thought than this had +occurred to any.</p> + +<p>Accordingly, the writer moved from lady to lady and, under the +supervision of the August Aunt, transcribed the following: "The +Ideal Man is the earthly likeness of the Divine Emperor. How +should it be otherwise?" And under this sentence wrote the name +of each lovely one in succession. The papers were then placed in +the hanging sleeves of the August Aunt for safety.</p> + +<p>By the decree of Fate, the father of the Round-Faced Beauty +had, before he became an ancestral spirit, been a scholar of +distinction, having graduated at the age of seventy-two with a +composition commended by the Grand Examiner. Having no gold and +silver to give his daughter, he had formed her mind, and had +presented her with the sole jewel of his family-a pearl as large +as a bean. Such was her sole dower, but the accomplished Aunt may +excel the indolent Prince.</p> + +<p>Yet, before the thought in her mind, she hesitated and +trembled, recalling the lesson of the gold-fish; and it was with +anxiety that paled her roseate lips that, on a certain day, she +had sought the Willow Bridge Pavilion. There had awaited her a +palace attendant skilled with the brush, and there in secrecy and +dire affright, hearing the footsteps of the August Aunt in every +rustle of leafage, and her voice in the call of every crow, did +the Round-Faced Beauty dictate the following composition:-</p> + +<p>"Though the sky rain pearls, it cannot equal the beneficence +of the Son of Heaven. Though the sky rain jade it cannot equal +his magnificence. He has commanded his slave to describe the +qualities of the Ideal Man. How should I, a mere woman, do this? +I, who have not seen the Divine Emperor, how should I know what +is virtue? I, who have not seen the glory of his countenance, how +should I know what is beauty? Report speaks of his excellencies, +but I who live in the dark know not. But to the Ideal Woman, the +very vices of her husband are virtues. Should he exalt another, +this is a mark of his superior taste. Should he dismiss his +slave, this is justice. To the Ideal Woman there is but one Ideal +Man - and that is her lord. From the day she crosses his +threshold, to the day when they clothe her in the garments of +Immortality, this is her sole opinion. Yet would that she might +receive instruction of what only are beauty and virtue in his +adorable presence."</p> + +<p>This being written, she presented her one pearl to the +attendant and fled, not looking behind her, as quickly as her +delicate feet would permit.</p> + +<p>On the seventh day the compositions, engraved on ivory and +bound with red silk and tassels, were presented to the Emperor, +and for seven days more he forgot their existence. On the eighth +the High Chamberlain ventured to recall them to the Imperial +memory, and the Emperor glancing slightly at one after another, +threw them aside, yawning as he did so. Finally, one arrested his +eyes, and reading it more than once he laid it before him and +meditated. An hour passed in this way while the forgotten Lord +Chamberlain continued to kneel. The Son of Heaven, then raising +his head, pronounced these words: "In the society of the Ideal +Woman, she to whom jealousy is unknown, tranquillity might +possibly be obtained. Let prayer be made before the Ancestors +with the customary offerings, for this is a matter deserving +attention."</p> + +<p>A few days passed, and an Imperial attendant, escorted by two +mandarins of the peacock- feather and crystal-button rank, +desired an audience of the August Aunt, and, speaking before the +curtain, informed her that his Imperial Majesty would pay a visit +that evening to the Hall of Tranquil Longevity. Such was her +agitation at this honour that she immediately swooned; but, +reviving, summoned all the attendants and gave orders for a +banquet and musicians.</p> + +<p>Lanterns painted with pheasants and exquisite landscapes were +hung on all the pavilions. Tap- estries of rose, decorated with +the Five-Clawed Dragons, adorned the chambers; and upon the High +Seat was placed a robe of yellow satin embroidered with pearls. +All was hurry and excitement. The Blossoms of the Palace were so +exquisitely decked that one grain more of powder would have made +them too lily-like, and one touch more of rouge, too rosecheeked. +It was indeed perfection, and, like lotuses upon a lake, or Asian +birds, gorgeous of plumage, they stood ranged in the outer +chamber while the Celestial Emperor took his seat.</p> + +<p>The Round-Faced Beauty wore no jewels, having bartered her +pearl for her opportunity; but her long coat of jade-green, +embroidered with golden willows, and her trousers of palest rose +left nothing to be desired. In her hair two golden peonies were +fastened with pins of kingfisher work. The Son of Heaven was +seated upon the throne as the ladies approached, marshaled by the +August Aunt. He was attired in the Yellow Robe with the Flying +Dragons, and upon the Imperial Head was the Cap, ornamented with +one hundred and forty-four priceless gems. From it hung the +twelve pendants of strings of pearls, partly concealing the +august eyes of the Jade Emperor. No greater splendour can strike +awe into the soul of man.</p> + +<p>At his command the August Aunt took her seat upon a lesser +chair at the Celestial Feet. Her mien was majestic, and struck +awe into the assembled beauties, whose names she spoke aloud as +each approached and prostrated herself. She then pronounced these +words:</p> + +<p>"Beautiful ones, the Emperor, having considered the opinions +submitted by you on the subject of the Superior Man, is pleased +to express his august commendation. Dismiss, therefore, anxiety +from your minds, and prepare to assist at the humble concert of +music we have prepared for his Divine pleasure."</p> + +<p>Slightly raising himself in his chair, the Son of Heaven +looked down upon that Garden of Beauty, holding in his hand an +ivory tablet bound with red silk.</p> + +<p>"Lovely ladies," he began, in a voice that assuaged fear, "who +among you was it that laid before our feet a composition +beginning thus - 'Though the sky rain pearls'?"</p> + +<p>The August Aunt immediately rose.</p> + +<p>"Imperial Majesty, none! These eyes supervised every +composition. No impropriety was permitted."</p> + +<p>The Son of Heaven resumed: "Let that lady stand forth."</p> + +<p>The words were few, but sufficient. Trembling in every limb, +the Round-Faced Beauty separated herself from her companions and +prostrated herself, amid the breathless amazement of the Blossoms +of the Palace. He looked down upon her as she knelt, pale as a +lady carved in ivory, but lovely as the lotus of Chang-Su. He +turned to the August Aunt. "Princess of Han, my Imperial Aunt, I +would speak with this lady alone."</p> + +<p>Decorum itself and the custom of Palaces could not conceal the +indignation of the August Aunt as she rose and retired, driving +the ladies before her as a shepherd drives his sheep.</p> + +<p>The Hall of Tranquil Longevity being now empty, the Jade +Emperor extended his hand and beckoned the Round-Faced Beauty to +approach. This she did, hanging her head like a flower surcharged +with dew and swaying gracefully as a wind-bell, and knelt on the +lowest step of the Seat of State.</p> + +<p>"Loveliest One," said the Emperor, "I have read your +composition. I would know the truth. Did any aid you as you spoke +it? Was it the thought of your own heart?"</p> + +<p>"None aided, Divine," said she, almost fainting with fear. "It +was indeed the thought of this illiterate slave, consumed with an +unwarranted but uncontrollable passion."</p> + +<p>"And have you in truth desired to see your Lord?"</p> + +<p>"As a prisoner in a dungeon desires the light, so was it with +this low person."</p> + +<p>"And having seen?"</p> + +<p>"Augustness, the dull eyes of this slave are blinded with +beauty."</p> + +<p>She laid her head before his feet.</p> + +<p>"Yet you have depicted, not the Ideal Man, but the Ideal +Woman. This was not the Celestial command. How was this?"</p> + +<p>"Because, 0 versatile and auspicious Emperor, the blind cannot +behold the sunlight, and it is only the Ideal Woman who is worthy +to comprehend and worship the Ideal Man. For this alone is she +created."</p> + +<p>A smile began to illuminate the Imperial Countenance. "And +how, 0 Round-Faced Beauty, did you evade the vigilance of the +August Aunt?"</p> + +<p>She hung her head lower, speaking almost in a whisper. "With +her one pearl did this person buy the secrecy of the writer; and +when the August Aunt slept, did I conceal the paper in her sleeve +with the rest, and her own Imperial hand gave it to the engraver +of ivory."</p> + +<p>She veiled her face with two jade-white hands that trembled +excessively. On hearing this statement the Celestial Emperor +broke at once into a very great laughter, and he laughed loud and +long as a tiller of wheat. The Round-Faced Beauty heard it +demurely until, catching the Imperial eye, decorum was forgotten +and she too laughed uncontrollably. So they continued, and +finally the Emperor leaned back, drying the tears in his eyes +with his august sleeve, and the lady, resuming her gravity, hid +her face in her hands, yet regarded him through her fingers.</p> + +<p>When the August Aunt returned at the end of an hour with the +ladies, surrounded by the attendants with their instruments of +music, the Round-Faced Beauty was seated in the chair that she +herself had occupied, and on the whiteness of her brow was hung +the chain of pearls, which had formed the frontal of the Cap of +the Emperor.</p> + +<p>It is recorded that, advancing from honour to honour, the +Round-Faced Beauty was eventually chosen Empress and became the +mother of the Imperial Prince. The celestial purity of her mind +and the absence of all flaws of jealousy and anger warranted this +distinction. But it is also recorded that, after her elevation, +no other lady was ever exalted in the Imperial favour or received +the slightest notice from the Emperor. For the Empress, now well +acquainted with the Ideal Man, judged it better that his +experiences of the Ideal Woman should be drawn from herself +alone. And as she decreed, so it was done. Doubtless Her Majesty +did well.</p> + +<p>It is known that the Emperor departed to the Ancestral Spirits +at an early age, seeking, as the August Aunt observed, that +repose which on earth could never more be his. But no one has +asserted that this lady's disposition was free from the ordinary +blemishes of humanity.</p> + +<p>As for the Celestial Empress (who survives in history as one +of the most astute rulers who ever adorned the Dragon Throne), +she continued to rule her son and the Empire, surrounded by the +respectful admiration of all.</p> + +<p></p> + +<p></p> + +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<pre> +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE NINTH VIBRATION, ET. 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