old light for a few minutes; but to
Kim it was the crown of the Umballa Brahmin's prophecy.

'Hark!' said the lama. 'One beats a drum--far off!'

At first the sound, carrying diluted through the still air, resembled
the beating of an artery in the head. Soon a sharpness was added.

'Ah! The music,' Kim explained. He knew the sound of a regimental
band, but it amazed the lama.

At the far end of the plain a heavy, dusty column crawled in sight.
Then the wind brought the tune:

We crave your condescension
To tell you what we know
Of marching in the Mulligan Guards
To Sligo Port below!

Here broke in the shrill-tongued fifes:

We shouldered arms,
We marched--we marched away.
From Phoenix Park
We marched to Dublin Bay.
The drums and the fifes,
Oh, sweetly they did play,
As we marched--marched--marched--with the
Mulligan Guards!

It was the band of the Mavericks playing the regiment to camp; for the
men were route-marching with their baggage. The rippling column swung
into the level--carts behind it divided left and right, ran about like
an ant-hill, and ...

'But this is sorcery!' said the lama.

The plain dotted itself with tents that seemed to rise, all spread,
from the carts. Another rush of men invaded the grove, pitched a huge
tent in silence, ran up yet eight or nine more by the side of it,
unearthed cooking-pots, pans, and bundles, which were taken possession
of by a crowd of native servants; and behold the mango-tope turned into
an orderly town as they watched!

'Let us go,' said the lama, sinking back afraid, as the fires twinkled
and white officers with jingling swords stalked into the Mess-tent.

'Stand back in the shadow. No one can see beyond the light of a fire,'
said Kim, his eyes still on the flag. He had never before watched the
routine of a seasoned regiment pitching camp in thirty minutes.

'Look! look! look!' clucked the lama. 'Yonder comes a priest.' It
was Bennett, the Church of England Chaplain of the regiment, limping in
dusty black. One of his flock had made some rude remarks about the
Chaplain's mettle; and to abash him Bennett had marched step by step
with the men that day. The black dress, gold cross on the watch-chain,
the hairless face, and the soft, black wideawake hat would have marked
him as a holy man anywhere in all India. He dropped into a camp-chair
by the door of the Mess-tent and slid off his boots. Three or four
officers