’They did not hang medals in those days on all who by accident had heard a gun fired.  No!  In nineteen pitched battles was I; in six-and-forty skirmishes of horse; and in small affairs without number.  Nine wounds I bear; a medal and four clasps and the medal of an Order, for my captains, who are now generals, remembered me when the Kaisar-i-Hind had accomplished fifty years of her reign, and all the land rejoiced.  They said:  “Give him the Order of Berittish India.”  I carry it upon my neck now.  I have also my jaghir [holding] from the hands of the State — a free gift to me and mine.  The men of the old days -they are now Commissioners — come riding to me through the crops — high upon horses so that all the village sees — and we talk out the old skirmishes, one dead man’s name leading to another.’

‘And after?’ said the lama.

‘Oh, afterwards they go away, but not before my village has seen.’

‘And at the last what wilt thou do?’

‘At the last I shall die.’

‘And after?’

’Let the Gods order it.  I have never pestered Them with prayers.  I do not think They will pester me.  Look you, I have noticed in my long life that those who eternally break in upon Those Above with complaints and reports and bellowings and weepings are presently sent for in haste, as our Colonel used to send for slack-jawed down-country men who talked too much.  No, I have never wearied the Gods.  They will remember this, and give me a quiet place where I can drive my lance in the shade, and wait to welcome my sons:  I have no less than three Rissaldar — majors all — in the regiments.’

’And they likewise, bound upon the Wheel, go forth from life to life — from despair to despair,’ said the lama below his breath, ‘hot, uneasy, snatching.’

‘Ay,’ the old soldier chuckled.  ’Three Rissaldar -majors in three regiments.  Gamblers a little, but so am I. They must be well mounted; and one cannot take the horses as in the old days one took women.  Well, well, my holding can pay for all.  How thinkest thou?  It is a well-watered strip, but my men cheat me.  I do not know how to ask save at the lance’s point.  Ugh!  I grow angry and I curse them, and they feign penitence, but behind my back I know they call me a toothless old ape.’

‘Hast thou never desired any other thing?’

’Yes — yes — a thousand times!  A straight back and a close-clinging knee once more; a quick wrist and a keen eye; and the marrow that makes a man.  Oh, the old days — the good days of my strength!’

‘That strength is weakness.’

’It has turned so; but fifty years since I could have proved it otherwise,’ the old soldier retorted, driving his stirrup-edge into the pony’s lean flank.

‘But I know a River of great healing.’

’I have drank Gunga-water to the edge of dropsy.  All she gave me was a flux, and no sort of strength.’