hip as
the other engines he knew--mere captive devils of the British Solomon--had
been, but a machine enthroned. Those two smaller dynamos Azuma-zi by force
of contrast despised; the large one he privately christened the Lord of
the Dynamos. They were fretful and irregular, but the big dynamo was
steady. How great it was! How serene and easy in its working! Greater and
calmer even than the Buddhas he had seen at Rangoon, and yet not
motionless, but living! The great black coils spun, spun, spun, the rings
ran round under the brushes, and the deep note of its coil steadied the
whole. It affected Azuma-zi queerly.

Azuma-zi was not fond of labour. He would sit about and watch the Lord of
the Dynamos while Holroyd went away to persuade the yard porter to get
whisky, although his proper place was not in the dynamo shed but behind
the engines, and, moreover, if Holroyd caught him skulking he got hit for
it with a rod of stout copper wire. He would go and stand close to the
colossus, and look up at the great leather band running overhead. There
was a black patch on the band that came round, and it pleased him somehow
among all the clatter to watch this return again and again. Odd thoughts
spun with the whirl of it. Scientific people tell us that savages give
souls to rocks and trees,--and a machine is a thousand times more alive
than a rock or a tree. And Azuma-zi was practically a savage still; the
veneer of civilisation lay no deeper than his slop suit, his bruises, and
the coal grime on his face and hands. His father before him had worshipped
a meteoric stone, kindred blood, it may be, had splashed the broad wheels
of Juggernaut.

He took every opportunity Holroyd gave him of touching and handling the
great dynamo that was fascinating him. He polished and cleaned it until
the metal parts were blinding in the sun. He felt a mysterious sense of
service in doing this. He would go up to it and touch its spinning coils
gently. The gods he had worshipped were all far away. The people in London
hid their gods.

At last his dim feelings grew more distinct, and took shape in thoughts,
and at last in acts. When he came into the roaring shed one morning he
salaamed to the Lord of the Dynamos, and then, when Holroyd was away, he
went and whispered to the thundering machine that he was its servant, and
prayed it to have pity on him and save him from Holroyd. As he did so a
rare gleam of light came in through the open archway of the t