Atmâ

  CHAPTER XII.

  There was fear of Evil Influence, pestilence and death in the country,and as the time of new moon drew near, propitiatory sacrifices wereprepared. A number of the courtiers of Golab Singh declared theirintention of visiting sacred places and offering gifts. Many who abjuredthese rites went also as to a festival. On such an errand many supposedLal Singh to be gone, although his prolonged absence led to unspokensurmisings among those who looked on him as the emissary of a politicalparty, but at the close of a fierce contest men are chary of speech, andnone spoke his suspicions. At all events he had disappeared the dayafter the events of our last chapter.

  Atma resolved to take this opportunity of attempting to communicate withthe Maharanee, and intimated his purpose of resorting to the Welldesignated by Nama. It was of course on the southern border of Kashmir,and entailed a long pilgrimage. Bertram, tired of splendour, wouldaccompany him. Together they set out on horseback, followed byattendants who bore gifts for the Shrine. They rode forward, leavingtheir retinue, and conversed as was their wont.

  Atma fain would know why his friend so devoutly went on pilgrimage.

  "I suppose," said Bertram laughing, "that the Nawab would tell you,though the ass goes to Mecca he becomes not a pilgrim thereby. But AtmaSingh, if I mistake not, your own creed does not recognize the rites weare to witness; I ask, then, in my turn, why, since our mission ismeaningless, does your choice of a destination lead us to the mostdistant of the sacred places?"

  "I do not say that the Shrine is without sanctity to me," replied Atmaevasively, "and the place is one of great attractiveness, while thejourney thither, though longer, is more agreeable than other routes. Butyour jesting challenge reminds me of what once befel the holy Nanuk, thefounder of the Sikh religion. He slept in the heat of the day on agrassy bank with his feet turned westward. A Mohammedan priest findinghim, struck him and demanded how he dared direct his feet towards thesacred city of Mecca. 'How dare you, infidel dog, to turn your feettowards God?' he demanded. The wise one responded:

  'Though past the highest heaven of heavens I rise, Though cowering in the deep I hide mine eyes, I roam but through the Mosque his hands have wrought, Show me, O Moulvie, where thy God is not!'"

  "Your wise man spoke a great truth," said Bertram. "The earth is aTemple, it was designed for a House of Prayer, and in it God has placednot a sect nor a nation, but all mankind. Many a Holy of Holies has manraised within this temple, and vainly have the builders sought by everydevice of loveliness, sensuous or shadowy, to achieve for theirinventions the Beauty of Holiness. Your Nanuk was divinely taught, forleaving alike the Material and the Ideal, he grasped the True."

  Now they paused where sat a mendicant who besought charity. Atmabestowed a gift, saying,

  "Our great teacher said:

  'The beggar's face a mirror is, in it We best learn how our zeal in heaven appears. Pause then and look--nor pious alms omit, Lest on its brightness fall an angel's tears.'"

  Then Bertram, pleased with this, asked more regarding the founder of theSikh faith, and Atma related what things the teacher had accounted holy."This," he said, "did he instruct:

  'The hearts that justice and soft pity shrine Are the true Mecca, loved of the Divine.

  Who doth in good deeds duteous hours engage, Performs for God an holy pilgrimage.

  Who to his own hurt speaks the truth, he tells The Mystic Speech that pious rite excels.

  Rude orisons of alien He will bless If they are offered but in faithfulness.'"

  "It is good," said Bertram, "modes of worship are many, faiths arenearly as various as the temperaments of mankind, but virtue is one. Nouniversal intuition prompts to a form of ritual as acceptable to God,but the moral sense of all the race points unswervingly to the pole-starof the soul--Truth, another name for Purity.

  "Many," he continued, "have been the self-ordained guides of the humanconscience, blind leaders of the blind, would-be saviours of the world!Why should a mazed wandering soul be so eager to summon followers, soready to point the way? What strange prompting of love or daring ishere? It surely is not from desire of applause that men seek theleadership on the road to heaven, for what man so decried in the historyof the world as he who arrogates to himself the place and name ofPriest? And yet priest and poet are akin. The man who seeks the place ofmediator and interpreter betwixt his fellows and the Unknowable mustneeds be an idealist, and if he deal with illusion who so unfortunate ashe?"

  They halted that night where two streams met. Bathed in moonlight it wasa scene of great beauty and repose, a confluence of the beatitudes ofearth and air. Peace filled their souls so that they perceived theunexpressive adoration of the river, and the trees, and the solemnmoonlight. It was such an hour as makes poets of men, and Atma raisedhis head and spoke:

  "At tranquil eve is proper time for prayer, When winds are fair, And gracious shadows 'mong the myrtles move. The list'ning eve it was ordained for prayer.

  By the soft murmur of thy cooing dove Teach me to love; Grant that thy starry front fill my death's night With joyful light; And hushed as on this bank the violet's close Be my repose.

  Abide Love, Happiness, and Peace till shining morn From the same birth that gave the past be borne."

  Bertram:

  "Fair are these hillside haunts at even calm, And sweet the fragrance of each flowery spray. Dew of the Spirit, fall in heavenly balm Upon my slumbers; bounteous Lord, I pray, Like one who sang thy praise in other way, Bless Thou the wicked, for the Good, I know, Are blessed already, blessed they come and go."