d the colonel in my
ear, "whether these reports are mere gossip, or the truth?"

Sadhu-Nanaka must not be confounded with Guru-Nanaka, a leader of the
Sikhs. The former are Adwaitas, the latter monotheists. The Adwaitas
believe only in an impersonal deity named Parabrahm.

In the chief hall of the vihara was a life-sized statue of Bhavani, the
feminine aspect of Shiva. From the bosom of this devaki streams forth
the pure cold water of a mountain spring, which falls into a reservoir
at her feet. Around it lay heaps of sacrificial flowers, rice, betel
leaves and incense. This hall was, in consequence, so damp that we
preferred to spend the night on the verandah in the open air, hanging,
as it were, between sky and earth, and lit from below by numerous fires
kept burning all the night by Gulab-Sing's servants, to scare away wild
beasts, and, from above, by the light of the full moon. A supper was
arranged after the Eastern fashion, on carpets spread upon the floor,
and with thick banana leaves for plates and dishes. The noiselessly
gliding steps of the servants, more silent than ghosts, their white
muslins and red turbans, the limitless depths of space, lost in waves of
moonlight, before us, and behind, the dark vaults of ancient caves,
dug out by unknown races, in unknown times, in honor of an unknown,
prehistoric religion--all these, our surroundings, transported us into a
strange world, and into distant epochs far different from our own.

We had before us representatives of five different peoples, five
different types of costume, each quite unlike the others. All five are
known to us in ethnography under the generic name of Hindus. Similarly
eagles, condors, hawks, vultures, and owls are known to ornithology as
"birds of prey," but the analogous differences are as great. Each of
these five companions, a Rajput, a Bengali, a Madrasi, a Sinhalese and
a Mahratti, is a descendant of a race, the origin of which European
scientists have discussed for over half a century without coming to any
agreement.

Rajputs are called Hindus and are said to belong to the Aryan race; but
they call themselves Suryavansa, that is to say, descendants of Surya or
the sun.

The Brahmans derive their origin from Indu, the moon, and are called
Induvansa; Indu, Soma, or Chandra, meaning moon in Sanskrit. If the
first Aryans, appearing in the prologue of universal history, are
Brahmans, that is to say, the people who, according to Max Muller,