oli, the Durgapuga, the feast
of lanterns, and watching the processions when the idols and their
custodians visit each other's shrines or go to the river for the
blessing of the waters. But wander where I may, priest or Ganapati have
I never seen again.

"Thus have passed fifty long years, during which I have lived for one
thing alone, and that----revenge!"

* * * * *

Pausing before the last word, then uttering it in a scream that pierced
the night air, the fakir sprang to his feet, and, swept by a sudden gust
of overmastering passion, raised his hands high to heaven--a weird and
eerie figure in the silver sheen of the moon.

"Deen! deen! deen!" he cried, dancing around as he shrilly voiced the
fanatic call to massacre--the dread call which through the centuries has
drenched with human blood a thousand shrines, both Moslem mosques and
Hindu temples.

"Subah!" shouted the Afghan general, half rising, his hand on his sword
hilt. "Stop that, you son of a dog, or I will make you meat for jackals.
Subah!" At the reiterated stern command the dancing figure became
instantly rigid. Then, just as suddenly as he had leaped from his
crouching attitude, the fakir sank to the ground in a huddled heap, his
face buried in the dust.

"You would be happier to-day, O man of many sorrows, had you followed
the philosophy of 'kooch perwani'--had you said to yourself: 'What is
done is done, and cannot be undone. Let it pass. Kooch perwani--no
matter.'"

It was the Rajput who was speaking, in rebuke yet in commiseration.

"Even when all seemed lost" continued the Hindu soldier, "you should
have forgotten the blue diamonds, the abiding greed for which was the
real cause of your undoing; you should have forgotten your lost wealth
and honourable position, your dear ones gone to the abode of bliss, the
enemies who had despitefully used you but who, as your own religion
teaches, were in truth only God's emissaries sent to punish you for your
sins. It is the philosophy of 'kooch perwani' that teaches us to forget
the dead past, do the work of the vital present, and by doing it aright
build for the future an edifice of happiness and contentment. Had you
followed that philosophy, O fakir, you might have been again to-day rich
in the good things of the world."

The mendicant raised his face from the dust. "To which I reply, O
prince,--kooch perwani. By the ordeals through which I have passed I
have come to l