He was, I could see, uneasy lest in the eagerness of
debate he had overstepped the bounds of hospitality.
"They do not mix with the world," Ram Singh answered, rising to his
feet. "They are of a higher grade than I, and more sensitive to
contaminating influences. They are immersed in a six months' meditation
upon the mystery of the third incarnation, which has lasted with few
intermissions from the time that we left the Himalayas. I shall not
see you again, Mr. Hunter West, and I therefore bid you farewell. Your
old age will be a happy one, as it deserves to be, and your Eastern
studies will have a lasting effect upon the knowledge and literature of
your own country. Farewell!"
"And am I also to see no more of you?" I asked.
"Unless you will walk with me along the sea-shore," he answered. "But
you have already been out this morning, and may be tired. I ask too
much of you."
"Nay, I should be delighted to come," I responded from my heart, and we
set off together, accompanied for some little distance by my father, who
would gladly, I could see, have reopened the Sanscrit controversy, had
not his stock of breath been too limited to allow of his talking and
walking at the same time.
"He is a learned man," Ram Singh remarked, after we had left him behind,
"but, like many another, he is intolerant towards opinions which differ
from his own. He will know better some day."
I made no answer to this observation, and we trudged along for a time in
silence, keeping well down to the water's edge, where the sands afforded
a good foothold.
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