r with thee. Therefore I am here. Who begs
for thee, these days?' he went on quickly. The ice was thin.

'Very often I beg myself; but, as thou knowest, I am seldom here,
except when I come to look again at my disciple. From one end to
another of Hind have I travelled afoot and in the te-rain. A great and
a wonderful land! But here, when I put in, is as though I were in my
own Bhotiyal.'

He looked round the little clean cell complacently. A low cushion gave
him a seat, on which he had disposed himself in the cross-legged
attitude of the Bodhisat emerging from meditation; a black teak-wood
table, not twenty inches high, set with copper tea-cups, was before
him. In one corner stood a tiny altar, also of heavily carved teak,
bearing a copper-gilt image of the seated Buddha and fronted by a lamp,
an incense-holder, and a pair of copper flower-pots.

'The Keeper of the Images in the Wonder House acquired merit by giving
me these a year since,' he said, following Kim's eye. 'When one is far
from one's own land such things carry remembrance; and we must
reverence the Lord for that He showed the Way. See!' He pointed to a
curiously-built mound of coloured rice crowned with a fantastic metal
ornament. 'When I was Abbot in my own place--before I came to better
knowledge I made that offering daily. It is the Sacrifice of the
Universe to the Lord. Thus do we of Bhotiyal offer all the world daily
to the Excellent Law. And I do it even now, though I know that the
Excellent One is beyond all pinchings and pattings.' He snuffed from
his gourd.

'It is well done, Holy One,' Kim murmured, sinking at ease on the
cushions, very happy and rather tired.

'And also,' the old man chuckled, 'I write pictures of the Wheel of
Life. Three days to a picture. I was busied on it--or it may be I
shut my eyes a little--when they brought word of thee. It is good to
have thee here: I will show thee my art--not for pride's sake, but
because thou must learn. The Sahibs have not all this world's wisdom.'

He drew from under the table a sheet of strangely scented yellow
Chinese paper, the brushes, and slab of Indian ink. In cleanest,
severest outline he had traced the Great Wheel with its six spokes,
whose centre is the conjoined Hog, Snake, and Dove (Ignorance, Anger,
and Lust), and whose compartments are all the Heavens and Hells, and
all the chances of human life. Men say that the Bodhisat Himself first
drew it with grains