When he reached his own country, he summoned together all his kindred and told them all that had happened. They were very sad when they heard that the book was lost, and bewildered because they had no means of enlightenment. They resolved to call a Durbar of all the Khasis to consider how they could carry on their worship in a becoming way and with some uniformity, so as to secure for themselves the three great blessings of humanity—health, wealth, and families.
Since that day the Khasis have depended for their knowledge of sacred worship on the traditions that have come down from one generation to the other from their ancestors who sat in the great Durbar after the sacred book was lost, while the foreigners learn how to worship from books.
XXXII
The Blessing of the Mendicant
Part I
Once there lived a very poor family, consisting of a father, mother, an only son, and his wife. They were poorer than any of their neighbours, and were never free from want; they seldom got a full meal, and sometimes they had to go without food for a whole day, while their clothes but barely covered their bodies. No matter how hard they worked, or where they went to cultivate, their crops never succeeded like the crops of their fellow-cultivators in the same locality. But they were good people, and never grumbled or blamed the gods, neither did they ask alms of any one, but continued to work season after season, contented with their poor fare and their half-empty cooking-pots.
One day an aged mendicant belonging to a foreign tribe wandered into their village, begging for food at every house and for a night’s shelter. But nobody pitied him or gave him food. Last of all, he came to the dwelling of the poor family, where, as usual, they had not enough food to satisfy their own need, yet when they saw the aged beggar standing outside in the cold, their hearts were filled with pity. They invited him to enter, and they shared their scanty meal with him. “Come,” they said, “we have but little to give you, it is true, but it is not right to leave a fellow-man outside to starve to death.” So he lodged with them that night.
It happened that the daughter-in-law was absent that night, so that the stranger saw only the parents and their son.