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Updated: June 5, 2025
I would be main sorry to see you mixed up with one of these young devils for I know you are a straight-living gentleman." "There is not the smallest chance of my being what you call 'mixed up' with any young devil," said Shafto in a sulky voice. "As for Ma Chit she is not the sort you suppose." "Oh, may be not," rejoined the pongye in a dubious tone.
As soon as Shafto had discovered and restored his patta, the pongye arose, gave himself a shake and, without another word, stalked away, a tall, erect, unspeakably majestic figure. When Shafto met Roscoe he lost no time in recounting his extraordinary adventure, and added triumphantly: "So you see, Joe Roscoe, you are not the only man here who makes a strange acquaintance."
"Yes," assented his host; "I suppose this," pointing to his yellow gown with his stick, "is a fancy dress, for, of course, you are not a real pongye?" "Troth, I am so," he rejoined with indignant emphasis; "I've been properly initiated I know Burmese and the Pali language, and can intone a chant with anyone." "All the same, you're an Irishman and your speech bewrayeth you.
"Looks is deceitful, and so is many a fine fellow," observed the pongye in a dreamy voice. After this pronouncement he relapsed into a reflective silence a silence which conveyed the subtle suggestion that the visitor was charged with some weighty mission.
"No harm of any sort can come next or nigh ye," continued the pongye, "as long as that stone's in your possession and that's as shure as me name's Mung Baw." And hastily collecting his umbrella and bowl, before Shafto could realise the intended move the stranger was gone. Nothing remained of his visit but the curious aromatic odour and the so-called "talisman."
Once a stone, to which was attached a paper, was thrown into his room. On it was inscribed in a babu's clerkly hand: "Do come and talk to Ma Chit." Returning one evening from a lively dinner at the "Barn," Shafto was surprised to see a light in his room, and still more surprised to find the pongye once again seated on his bed.
"No, saar, he refused; he would not." Shafto flung open the door of his apartment with a gesture of annoyance and, to his profound amazement, discovered the pongye seated in easy comfort upon his bed. He was surrounded by an odd medicinal aromatic atmosphere, his sandals, begging-bowl and umbrella were carefully disposed beside him and he appeared to be thoroughly at home.
By degrees, thanks to great charity and kindness, I come round, I remembered everything only too well, and then I buried Mick Ryan in the jungle and became a pongye. The peace and quiet ate into me very bones, and I took on the yellow robe.
Several men ran to the struggling ponies; Shafto and another to the overturned gharry and hauled out two privates; number one, helplessly intoxicated; number two, not quite so helpless; the third person to emerge was, to Shafto's speechless amazement, no less a personage than a shaven priest a full-grown pongye in his yellow robe!
The pongye and Shafto had many long talks together; they discussed life among the Burmese, the prospects of war, the changes that might awake and shake the world, and, appropriate supplement to the topic of war, more than once they spoke of death.
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