For fifty years united in the bonds
  Of wedded love, no harsh, unloving word
  For all those happy years, their only fear
  That death would break the bonds that bound their souls;
  And next their eldest born, who sought his son,
  And drank deep wisdom from the Buddha’s lips,
  And by his side that mother we have seen
  Outwatch the night, whose sweet and earnest face
  By five and twenty years of wedded love,
  By five and twenty years of busy cares—­
  The cares of home, with all its daily joys—­
  Had gained that look of holy motherhood[7]
  That millions worship on their bended knees
  As highest emblem of eternal love;
  And last that sister whose untiring love
  Watched by her mother through the weary hours,
  Her fair young face all trust and happiness,
  Before her, rainbow-tinted hopes and joys,
  Life’s dark and cold and cruel side concealed,
  And by her side a noble Brahman youth,
  Who saw in her his every hope fulfilled.

  But where is now that erring, wandering son,
  The pride of all these loyal, loving hearts,
  Heir to this wealth and hope of this proud house?

  Seven clothed in coarsest yellow robes draw near
  With heads close shorn and bare, unsandaled feet,
  Alms-bowl on shoulder slung and staff in hand,
  But moving with that gentle stateliness
  That birth and blood, not wealth and effort, give,
  All in the strength of manhood’s early prime,
  All heirs to wealth rejected, cast aside,
  But all united in the holy cause
  Of giving light and hope and help to all,
  While earnest greetings from the evening’s hosts
  Show they are welcome and expected guests.

  Startled, the stately Brahmans turn aside. 
  “The heir has lost his reason,” whispered they,
  “And joined that wandering prince who late appeared
  Among the yogis in the sacred grove,
  Who thinks he sees the truth by inner sight,
  Who fain would teach the wise, and claims to know
  More than the fathers and the Vedas teach.” 
  But as he nearer came, his stately form,
  His noble presence and his earnest face,
  Beaming with gentleness and holy love,
  Hushed into silence every rising sneer.

  One of their number, wise in sacred lore,
  Profoundly learned, in all the Vedas versed,
  With courtly grace saluting Buddha, said: 
  “Our Brahman masters teach that many ways
  Lead up to Brahma Loca, Brahma’s rest,
  As many roads from many distant lands
  All meet before Benares’ sacred shrines. 
  They say that he who learns the Vedas’ hymns,
  Performs the rites and prays the many prayers
  That all the sages of the past have taught,
  In Brahma’s self shall be absorbed at last—­
  As all the streams from mountain, hill and plain,
  That swell proud Gunga’s broad and sacred stream,
  At last shall mingle with the ocean’s