The eye turns instinctively to the faintest glimmer of light. So the light reflected from the calm face of the mysteriously beautiful dreamer as she lay beside her father, her head resting on his arm, and her face turned mutely up to the dark sky, staggered the captain, who started back as if he had received a sudden blow, or as if some unexpected event had forced him into the presence of a supernatural being, while the brazen image of Indra gleamed with a lurid brightness that reddened the pale atmosphere around, as if in the vicinity of some conflagration.
Buddhist as he was, he had a sort of ancestral reverence for the gods of the Hindoos. He also believed in the ancient tradition that no one could injure the innocent. The shadow of the shade grew darker, and he thought the eyes of the god were fixed intently upon him. All his unrighteous desires quelled, he stood transfixed reverently to the spot. A serious smile, almost stern in its expression, passed over the girl's face, as he stood contemplating her. That seemingly slumbering statue was conscious of an intruder, and she quietly opened her eyes on him.
The captain's lantern lighted up his face, and, stout-hearted, fearless man that he was, he trembled as he met that calm, inquiring look. But before he could retire or bring himself to speak, the girl uttered a sudden cry of terror, so pathetic and terrible that the old man sprang to his feet, and the guards, who heard it in the distance, felt their blood run cold with horror and dismay.
There was a moment of hesitation as the old Rajpoot confronted the guardsman face to face. The next instant the lantern was dashed from his trembling hand, and he lay prostrate on the ground, while his enemy grappled at his throat with the fury of a wild beast. The remainder of the guards rushed to the scene of conflict, but even they stood confounded for a second or two at the sight of the strange, terrified girl. They soon recovered from their astonishment, however, and proceeded to capture the old man, when Smâyâtee sprang to her feet at once, like some spectre rising from the ground, and, pushing back the soldiers with all her might, clasped her father round the neck. Thus clinging to him, she turned a face of defiance on the guardsmen of the king. The aspect of the girl, who thought to restrain by an electric glance an armed force, excited such derision in the breasts of the soldiers, that they rudely tore her from her father, bound her with the silken bridle-reins that had served for her pony, and carried them both off to separate cells, while a party of them remained behind to restore their fallen chief.
AMONG THE HILLS OF ORISSA.
Before proceeding further, it will not be amiss to give the reader some account of this Rajpoot and his daughter. And that he may better understand the personal anecdotes of bravery, honest zeal, and devotedness that distinguished him in life, I must turn to the still broader and deeper historical incidents which are the marked characteristics of the race to which he belonged. I do not undertake to treat of this portion of India at large, but only to look at the small corner of it in which Rama the Rajpoot was born.
In the district of Orissa stands on a cluster of hills, in the midst of an arid and undulating plateau, the city of Megara, composed for the most part of houses of mean aspect, with only a few handsome mansions and stately edifices to relieve their monotonous insignificance, possessing few fine trees large enough to afford shade, with the exception of the sacred groves dedicated to the earth-goddess Dâvee and the sun-god Dhupyâ; and with water barely sufficient to quench the excessive thirst of its parched inhabitants, alternately swept by piercing blasts and scorched by intense heats, Megara would certainly present but few attractions to the traveller but for the mysterious reverence which has rested ever since the time of Alexander over the illimitable plains of Hindostan. Tragic and terrible are the memories that poetry has woven about this land of undefined distances and nearly fabulous magnificence, where men adopt, from father to son, the professions of murderers, highwaymen, robbers, soldiers, warriors, and priests, where each man lives as if surrounded by internal and external enemies, and expects from every circling point of the horizon a foeman instead of a friend.