United States and let them melt opinions there!
Let them answer to us for the Mahatma's life, and to us for the work
they do yonder!

"And lest they feel that they have been imposed upon--that they are
beggars sent to beg in behalf of beggars--let us pay them royally! Lo,
there sits one of these men beside the Gray Mahatma. I invite you, royal
women, to provide him with the wherewithal for that campaign to which we
have appointed him and his friend!"

She herself set the example by throwing a purse at me--a leather wallet
stuffed full of English banknotes, and the others had all evidently come
prepared, for the room rained money for about two minutes! Purses fell
on the Mahatma and on me in such profusion that surely Midas never felt
more opulent--although the Mahatma took no notice of them even when one
hit him in the face.

There were all kinds of purses, stuffed with all kinds of money, but
mostly paper money; some, however, had gold in them, for I heard the
gold jingle, and the darned things hurt you when they landed like a rock
on some part of your defenseless anatomy. Take them on the whole, those
women made straight shooting, but not even curiosity was strong enough
to make me pick up one purse and count its contents.

I rose and bowed acknowledgment without intending to commit myself, and
without touching any of the purses, which would have been instantly
interpreted as signifying acceptance. But I sat down again pretty
promptly, for I had no sooner got to my feet than the woman in black got
up too, and throwing aside the embroidered _sari_ disclosed none other
than Athelstan King looking sore-eyed from lack of sleep and rather weak
from all he had gone through, but humorously determined, nevertheless.

Yasmini laughed aloud. Evidently she was in the secret. But nobody else
had known, as the flutter of excitement proved. I think most of the
women were rather deliciously scandalized, although some of them were so
imbued with ancient prejudices that they drew their own veils all the
closer and seemed to be trying to hide behind one another. In fact, any
one interested in discovering which were the progressives and which the
reactionaries in that assembly could have made a good guess in that
minute, although it might not have done him much good unless he had a
good memory for the colors and patterns of _saris_. A woman veiled in
the Indian fashion is not easy to identify.

But before they could make up their