though made of stone, and
possesses four hands; it is guarded by a dog, and you can buy little
imitation dogs made of sugar anywhere near. There is even an image of
the goddess of smallpox, and if you ask why the Hindu chooses such
repulsive and revolting things to worship, the answer is, because he is
afraid. He says, "If the gods are good they will not injure me, but if
they are evil I must propitiate them!"

Everywhere we go we have copper bowls or even the half of coco-nut
shells thrust at us for offerings; the priests tolerate the strangers
entering their temples only because they hope to get something out of
them.

* * * * *

We are now far from Benares; we have left behind the narrow crowded
alleys, the violent smells, and the gay colours, and are in the train
speeding toward Calcutta, whence we will take a steamer to Burma. The
train has just stopped at a wayside station and there is a chance to
stretch our legs. Ramaswamy appears and tells us they are going to stop
here for a time. He doesn't seem to know why,--something about a sahib
is all we can gather,--so we get out and wander along the village
street. We have only gone a short way when we see a kind of litter
coming along slung on bearers' shoulders. It is screened by curtains,
and beside it rides a white man in a helmet, followed by natives. Why,
that is the very man who came up in the train from Delhi with us! I
wonder what he is doing here. That must be a sick woman in the litter.
This is evidently what the train was waiting for, so we might as well go
back.

We get to the station just in time to see the curtains pushed aside by
the sahib, who very tenderly and skilfully raises in his arms the sick
person inside, and supports him into the station. It is a gaunt
scarecrow of a man, a skeleton of a creature, whose big pathetic eyes
look dark in his hollow face. He is evidently very ill. He is
half-carried across to a carriage next to ours that has been prepared
for him, and is laid down on a couch on the seat, and it is not long
before we get under way again. Going out a little later on to the
platform between the two compartments we find our friend, the tall
Englishman, standing there smoking. He recognises us at once and asks us
about our experiences; it is not difficult to find out about the
invalid.

"One of the best chaps going," he says shortly. "Simply broken up by the
work he's been doing in the plague-camp u