"Shabash! shabash!" he cried, again and yet again.
"And your story?" asked the Rajput, with a nod of inquiry and
encouragement.
"Is one that shows how a man may keep on running all his life yet never
reach the goal he has in sight," replied the ascetic. And with the
sturdy independence of his calling he beat a peremptory tattoo with
finger-tips on wooden begging-bowl to command attention to his tale.
* * * * *
"Behold in me a man who possesses nothing in this world excepting a
begging-bowl and a loin cloth. Yet was I at one time the owner of lands
and of cattle, of a home bountifully stored for comfort and for
sustenance, of wives who wore rich jewels, necklets of pearls, armlets
of gold, and bangles of silver, with maid-servants to minister to their
needs and children to play around them. All gone! by my own doing, or
undoing, call it which you will.
"And know, too, that in those days I also was a soldier"--this with a
defiant glance first at the Rajput chief and then at the Afghan general.
"At my side rattled the steel scabbard, and in my belt was the sharp
poinard, swift messenger of death when it came to hand-to-hand fighting,
and the horse I rode had its rich trappings of gold and silver.
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