. With them was an army of servants
and attendants, soldiers, muleteers, camel-drivers, merchants with
grain and stores for man and beast, singers to make entertainment by
the way and musicians to accompany them, besides elephants, camels,
horses, mules, ponies, donkeys, goats, and carts and wagons of every
kind and description, so that it seemed more like a large town on the
march than anything else.

Thus they travelled for several days, till they entered a country that
was like a sea of sand, where the swirling dust floated in clouds, and
men and beasts were half choked by it. Towards the close of that day
they came to a village, and when the headmen hurried out to salute the
rajah and to pay him their respects, they began, with very long and
serious faces, to explain that, whilst they and all that they had were
of course at the disposal of the rajah, the coming of so large a
company had nevertheless put them into a dreadful difficulty because
they had never a well nor spring of water in their country; and they
had no water to give drink to such an army of men and beasts!

Great fear fell upon the host at the words of the headmen, but the
rajah merely told the wazir that he must get water somehow, and that
settled the matter so far as _he_ was concerned. The wazir sent off in
haste for all the oldest men in the place, and began to question them
as to whether there were no wells near by.

They all looked helplessly at each other, and said nothing; but at
length one old grey-beard replied:

'Truly, Sir Wazir, there is, within a mile or two of this village, a
well which some former king made hundreds of years ago. It is, they
say, great and inexhaustible, covered in by heavy stone-work and with
a flight of steps leading down to the water in the very bowels of the
earth; but no man ever goes near it because it is haunted by evil
spirits, and it is known that whoso disappears down the well shall
never be seen again.'

The wazir stroked his beard and considered a moment. Then he turned to
Ram Singh who stood behind his chair.

'There is a proverb,' said he, 'that no man can be trusted until he
has been tried. Go you and get the rajah and his people water from
this well.'

Then there flashed into Ram Singh's mind the first counsel of the old
guru--'_Always obey without question the orders of him whose service
you enter._' So he replied at once that he was ready, and left to
prepare for his adventure. Two great braz