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A yogi, his hair matted with filth till it stood twisted and writhed on his head like the serpent tresses of Medusa, his lean skeleton ash-daubed body clothed in yellow, on his forehead the crescent of Eklinga, in his hand a pair of clanking iron tongs, crawled wearily to the tents where were the decoits, and bleared out of blood-shot blobs of faded brown at Ajeet Singh.

While Daedalus, who is force, measured; while Orpheus, who is intelligence, sang; the pillar, which is a letter; the arcade, which is a syllable; the pyramid, which is a word, all set in movement at once by a law of geometry and by a law of poetry, grouped themselves, combined, amalgamated, descended, ascended, placed themselves side by side on the soil, ranged themselves in stories in the sky, until they had written under the dictation of the general idea of an epoch, those marvellous books which were also marvellous edifices: the Pagoda of Eklinga, the Rhamseion of Egypt, the Temple of Solomon.

I will not tell you, poor old man, to go and visit the sepulchral chambers of the pyramids, of which ancient Herodotus speaks, nor the brick tower of Babylon, nor the immense white marble sanctuary of the Indian temple of Eklinga.

In their hands were either iron-tongs, with loose clattering ring, or a yak's tail, or the three-ribbed horn of a black-buck. Some of the yogis, perhaps Goswamies that had come from the country where Eklinga was the tutelary deity, had their hair braided and woven around their foreheads, holding in its fold lotus seeds; beneath the tiara of hair a crescent of white on their foreheads.

It was one of my own name who swore on the shrine of Eklinga at Udaipur friendship for a Prince of Marwar, and changed turbans with him, which is more binding than eating opium together, then slew him like a dog. Of my faith, an oath, 'by the Beard of the Prophet, is more binding, I think. Too many gods, such as the men of Hind have, produce a wavering.