lung to thy Way, rendering fidelity when it was hard to give, in
that Black Year of which I now remember other tales. Enter now upon
the Middle Way which is the path to Freedom. Hear the Most Excellent
Law, and do not follow dreams.'

'Speak, then, old man,' the soldier smiled, half saluting. 'We be all
babblers at our age.'

The lama squatted under the shade of a mango, whose shadow played
checkerwise over his face; the soldier sat stiffly on the pony; and
Kim, making sure that there were no snakes, lay down in the crotch of
the twisted roots.

There was a drowsy buzz of small life in hot sunshine, a cooing of
doves, and a sleepy drone of well-wheels across the fields. Slowly and
impressively the lama began. At the end of ten minutes the old soldier
slid from his pony, to hear better as he said, and sat with the reins
round his wrist. The lama's voice faltered, the periods lengthened.
Kim was busy watching a grey squirrel. When the little scolding bunch
of fur, close pressed to the branch, disappeared, preacher and audience
were fast asleep, the old officer's strong-cut head pillowed on his
arm, the lama's thrown back against the tree-bole, where it showed like
yellow ivory. A naked child toddled up, stared, and, moved by some
quick impulse of reverence, made a solemn little obeisance before the
lama--only the child was so short and fat that it toppled over
sideways, and Kim laughed at the sprawling, chubby legs. The child,
scared and indignant, yelled aloud.

'Hai! Hai!' said the soldier, leaping to his feet. 'What is it? What
orders? ... It is ... a child! I dreamed it was an alarm. Little
one--little one--do not cry. Have I slept? That was discourteous
indeed!'

'I fear! I am afraid!' roared the child.

'What is it to fear? Two old men and a boy? How wilt thou ever make a
soldier, Princeling?'

The lama had waked too, but, taking no direct notice of the child,
clicked his rosary.

'What is that?' said the child, stopping a yell midway. 'I have never
seen such things. Give them me.'

'Aha.' said the lama, smiling, and trailing a loop of it on the grass:

This is a handful of cardamoms, This is a lump of ghi: This is millet
and chillies and rice, A supper for thee and me!

The child shrieked with joy, and snatched at the dark, glancing beads.

'Oho!' said the old soldier. 'Whence hadst thou that song, despiser
of this world?'

'I learned it in Pathankot--sitting on a doorstep