ead of the
night and knock at your door. Then I will call loudly that you may wake
and open the door to me. With great delight you will open the door and
fold me to your breast, my Mother. Then I will sit down beside you and
tell you what has happened to me--good and evil. Then having rested the
night in comfort I will go out after the day has come and I will salute
all my brethren at the mosque and in the village. Then I will return
and eat my bread in pleasure and happiness. You, Mother, will say to
me: "Shall I give you some _ghi_?" [native butter]. I will say at first
proudly, like one who has travelled:--"No, I want none." You will press
me, and I will softly push my plate over to you and you will fill it
with _ghi_, and I shall dip my cake in it with delight. Believe me,
Mother, this homecoming will take place just as I have described it. I
see you before me always. It seems to me only yesterday that I bent to
your feet when I made salutation and you put your hand upon my head.

Mother, put your trust in God to guard my head. If my grave lies in
France it can never be in the Punjab, though we try for a thousand
years. If it be in the Punjab then I shall certainly return to it to
that very place. Meantime, Mother, consider what I have to eat. This is
the true list. I eat daily sugar and ghi and flour, salt, meat, red
peppers, some almonds and dates, sweets of various kinds as well as
raisins and cardamoms. In the morning I eat tea and white biscuits. An
hour after, halwa and puri [native dishes]. At noon, tea and bread; at
seven o'clock of the evening, vegetable curry. At bedtime I drink milk.
There is abundance of milk in this country. I am more comfortable here,
I swear it to you, Mother, than any high officer in India. As for our
clothing, there is no account kept of it. You would cry out, Mother, to
see the thick cloth expended. So I beg you, Mother, to take comfort
concerning your son. Do not tear my heart by telling me your years.
Though we both lived to be as old as elephants I am your son who will
come asking for you as I said, at your door.

As to the risk of death, who is free from it anywhere? Certainly not in
the Punjab. I hear that all those religious mendicants at Zilabad have
proclaimed a holy fair this summer in order that pious people may feed
them, and now, having collected in thousands beside the river in hot
weather, they have spread cholera all over the district. There is
trouble raging throug