a pleased smile upon his
mahogany face, "still, there's no saying how things may come out. What
d'ye think of him, Mr. West?"

"Why," said I, "I am very much interested in him. What a magnificent
head and bearing he has for a young man. I suppose he cannot be more
than thirty."

"Forty," said the mate.

"Sixty, if he is a day," remarked Captain Meadows. "Why, I have heard
him talk quite familiarly of the first Afghan war. He was a man then,
and that is close on forty years ago."

"Wonderful!" I ejaculated. "His skin is as smooth and his eyes are as
clear as mine are. He is the superior priest of the three, no doubt."

"The inferior," said the captain confidently. "That is why he does all
the talking for them. Their minds are too elevated to descend to mere
worldly chatter."

"They are the strangest pieces of flotsam and jetsam that were ever
thrown upon this coast," I remarked. "My father will be mightily
interested in them."

"Indeed, I think the less you have to do with them the better for you,"
said the mate. "If I do command my own ship I'll promise you that I
never carry live stock of that sort on board of her. But here we are all
aboard and the anchor tripped, so we must bid you good-bye."

The wagonette had just finished loading up when we arrived, and the
chief places, on either side of the driver, had been reserved for my two
companions, who speedily sprang into them. With a chorus of cheers the
good fellows whirled away down the road, while my father, Esther, and I
stood upon the lawn and waved our hands to them until they disappeared
behind the Cloomber woods, _en route_ for the Wigtown railway station.
Barque and crew had both vanished now from our little world, the only
relic of either being the heaps of _debris_ upon the beach, which were
to lie there until the arrival of an agent from Lloyd's.

CHAPTER XIII. IN WHICH I SEE THAT WHICH HAS BEEN SEEN BY FEW

At dinner that evening I mentioned to my father the episode of the three
Buddhist priests, and found, as I had expected, that he was very much
interested by my account of them.

When, however, he heard of the high manner in which Ram Singh had spoken
of him, and the distinguished position which he had assigned him among
philologists, he became so excited that it was all we could do to
prevent him from setting off then and there to make his acquaintance.

Esther and I were relieved and glad when we at last succeeded in
abstracting his