e
wild beasts, not men. Burn up the wasps' nest, maggots and all!' They
did it; faggots were piled round the building and set on fire, and those
who attempted to escape were received on the English spears and tossed
back into the flames. The eldest son was away with a detachment at the
time, and so escaped the fate which would otherwise have annihilated our
race. But his estates were stolen from him and conferred on the
murderers, whose descendants hold them to the present day. Have the
Burkes best reason to love the English or to hate them?"

Harry Forsyth was a practical youth, who took things as he found them,
and he could not even understand how anybody's feelings, much less their
actions, should be affected by anything which happened in the days of
Oliver Cromwell. He might just as well refuse a penny to an Italian
organ-grinder, because Julius Caesar ill-treated the ancient Britons.
Besides, he was half a Forsyth, and the Forsyths were probably all
English. For all he knew, some old Forsyth might have had a hand in
burning up the Burkes. He did not offer any such suggestion, however,
but sat somewhat awe-stricken, wondering what this strange uncle would
say or do next.

He relapsed into thought, and for some time the silence was only broken
by the bubbling of the water in the narghile. When at last he spoke
again, it was in a calmer tone of voice, and with eyes withdrawn from
his nephew's face.

"Serve not the English Government, civil or military," he said. "Or, if
you do, confine yourself to your allotted task. That which is exactly
due for the pay you receive, do for honour and honesty's sake. But do
no more; show no zeal: above all, trust not to any sense of justice for
reward of any work done in excess of the bargain. Incur no
responsibility, or you will be made a cat's-paw of.

"Listen. At the time of the Crimean War a young man in the Indian
service had a severe illness which obliged him to return to England on
furlough. At one of the stations where his ship touched a number of
women and children and invalids belonging to a regiment which had gone
on to the seat of war were taken on board, and he, according to previous
arrangement, was placed in charge of them.

"It came on to blow hard in the Gulf of Lyons, and the old transport
strained so that she sprang a leak, which put her fires out. Later on
her masts went, and after beating about for several wretched days, she
went ashore on a