"'Think! I am Sukya!' went on the high-pitched voice. 'Would Sukya come between his brethren and the Shining Ones? I, chosen for the oblation by reason of virtue and learning; I, Sukya, journeying to holy Amar-nâth not for my own sake,--for I fear no judgment,--but for the sake of the disciple, yonder boy Amra, betrothed to the daughter of my daughter, and vowed to the pilgrimage from birth.'
"A yell of crackling laughter came from the jogi as he leapt to the bastion of the bathing-place, and so, raised within sight of all, struck an attitude of indignant appeal. 'When was an outcast vowed to pilgrimage? And by my jogi's vow I swear the boy Amra, disciple of Sukya, to be an outcast. A Sudra of Sudras! seeing that his mother, being twice-born, defiled her race with scum from beyond the seas.'
"'By George!' muttered Taylor again, 'this is getting lively--for the scum.'
"'Perhaps the Presence is becoming tired of this vulgar scene,' suggested an obsequious chuprassi, who had been devoted to our service by order of the Cashmere officials; but the Presences were deeply interested. For all that, I should not care to witness such a sight again. The attention of the crowd, centred a moment before on the jogi, was turned now on the boy, who stood absolutely alone; the girl, moved by the unreasoning habit of race, having dropped his hand at the first word and crept to her grandfather's side. I can see that young face still, awful in its terror, piteous in its entreaty.
"'Thou liest, Gopi!' cried the Brahman, gasping with passion; and at the words a gleam of hope crept to those hunted eyes. 'Prove it, I say; for I appeal to the Shining Ones whom I have served.'
"'I accept the challenge,' yelled the jogi with frantic gestures, while a perfect roar of assent, cries of devotion, and prayers for guidance, rose from the crowd.
"Taylor looked round at me quickly. 'You are in luck. There is going to be a miracle. I saw that Gopi at Hurdwâr once; he is a rare hand at them.' He must have understood my resentment at being thus recalled to the nineteenth century, for he added half to himself, ''Tis tragedy for all that,--to the boy.'
"An appeal for silence enabled us to hear that both parties had agreed to refer the question of birth to the sacred cord, with which every male of the three twice-born castes is invested. If the strands were of the pure cotton ordained by ritual to the Brahman, the boy should be held of pure blood; but the admixture of anything pointing to the despised Sudra would make him anathema maranatha, and render his master impure, and therefore unfit to lead the devotions of others.
"I cannot attempt to describe the scene which followed; for even now, the confusion inseparable from finding yourself in surroundings which require explanation before they can fall into their appointed place in the picture, prevents me from remembering anything in detail--anything but a surging sea of saffron and white, a babel of wild cries, 'Hurri! Gunga-ji! Dhurm! Dhurm!' (Hurri![[2]] Ganges! the Faith! the Faith!) Then suddenly a roar--'Gopi! a miracle! a miracle! Praise be to the Shining Ones!'
"It seemed but a moment ere the enthusiastic crowd had swept the jogi from his pedestal, and, crowned with jasmin chaplets, he was being borne high on men's shoulders to make a round of the various temples; while the keepers of the shrine swelled the tumult judiciously by cries of 'Oblations! offerings! The Shining Ones are present to-day!'