His fears were,
however, unnecessary, for the stranger signified by a shake of the head
that it was impossible for him to accept it.
"My friends and I are very much obliged to you," he said, "but we have
our own reasons for remaining where we are. The hut which we occupy is
deserted and partly ruined, but we Easterns have trained ourselves
to do without most of those things which are looked upon as necessaries
in Europe, believing firmly in that wise axiom that a man is rich, not
in proportion to what he has, but in proportion to what he can dispense
with. A good fisherman supplies us with bread and with herbs, we have
clean, dry straw for our couches; what could man wish for more?"
"But you must feel the cold at night, coming straight from the tropics,"
remarked the captain. "Perhaps our bodies are cold sometimes. We have
not noticed it. We have all three spent many years in the
Upper Himalayas on the border of the region of eternal snow, so we are
not very sensitive to inconveniences of the sort."
"At least," said I, "you must allow me to send you over some fish and
some meat from our larder."
"We are not Christians," he answered, "but Buddhists of the higher
school. We do not recognise that man has a moral right to slay
an ox or a fish for the gross use of his body. He has not put life into
them, and has assuredly no mandate from the Almighty to take life from
them save under most pressing need. We could not, therefore, use your
gift if you were to send it.
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