and the rock-stuff of strength.
Then men are old. It is not so with her. Bitter waters of grief have
drenched her, they have covered her as the deep covers the lands below;
but her ascending flames of life consume them all. She rises like a
creature made of jewels, to enlighten men against the snares of that same
deep from which she has come up--wearing splendours of loveliness for
garmenture.

"The people weep their tears for her pain; but she heals their hurts with
a look. She restores their dead memories of youth to old men--their
memories of dead loves. She restores the eyes of girlhood to the elder
women, who have long been weary with yearning after dead little
ones--after dead men. She has taught the little people who cannot
think--the child-hearted people--that Love-the-transcendent can never die!

"Dhoop Ki Dhil? She is youth, eternal! She is motherhood--the divine
lotus of the world!"

Turning to face Cadman and Skag, the man said gently:

"The way lies before you. Go swiftly now. Peace."

And rising softly in the dead hush, he moved away.

Cadman sat long meditating, before he spoke at all; then it was like
thinking aloud:

"A mystic brother of the Vindhas--one with the old man outside; not
leaving these little semi-primitives alone--identifies himself with
them--that's good business!"

"Let's get on!" breathed Skag.

They made the utmost speed possible, till they came to the village that
startled them. The childlike care-freedom was gone. Light-heartedness
was quenched. Apprehension took its place; low tones, no laughter--a
look of helpless suffering like the large-eyed wonder in the face of a
grieved child.

They asked about the next village.

"Fear lives there," they were told.

"What fear?" Cadman asked.

"Do you know the king of all serpents--he who comes over any wall, he who
goes through any thatch? He dwells there. He feeds upon the children of
men and upon their creatures. He comes only to the edge, but he eats!"

The boy who told them this was so different from other boys they had
seen, that Cadman asked him direct:

"Who are you?"

"I am here under a master, doing a certain work in my novitiate," the boy
said simply.

"Will you take us there in the morning?" Cadman asked.

The boy looked at them intently, before he answered:

"It is just inside the nesting-place of all the serpents in the world;
but Fear is their king. We who are here to serve, have no weapo