The buildings rear immense, horizons fade
And thought forgets old gages in the ecstasy of view. 
The standards go by which the steps were made. 
On which we trod from former levels to the new. 
No time for backward glance, no pause for breath,
Since impulse like a bowstring loosed us in full flight
And in delirium of speed none aim considereth
Nor in the blaze of burning codes can think of night. 
The whirring of sped wheels and horn remind
That speed, more speed is best and peace is waste! 
They rank unfortunate who tag behind
And only they seem wise who urge, and haste and haste. 
New comforts multiply (for there is need!)
Each ballot adds assent to law that crowds the days. 
None pause.  None clamor but for speed—­more speed! 
And yet—­there was a sweetness in the olden ways.

“And since, my Lords, in olden days—­”

Trotters, fed on chopped raw meat by advice of Tess, and brushed by Bimbu for an hour to get the stiffness out of him, was sent off in the noon heat with a double message for his master, one addressed to Samson, one to Dick Blaine, and both wrapped in the same chewed leather cover, that the dog might understand.  The mongrel in him made him more immune to heat than a thoroughbred would have been.  In any case, he showed nothing but eagerness to get back to Tom Tripe, and, settling the package comfortably in his jaws, was off without ceremony at a steady canter.

“If all my friends were like that one,” said Yasmini, “I would be empress of the earth, not queen of a little part of Rajputana!  However, one thing at a time!”

It was hardly more than a village that Tess could see through the jalousies of her bedroom windows.  The room was at a corner, so that she had a wide view in two directions from either deep window-seat.  There were all the signs of Indian village life about her—­low, thatched houses in compounds fenced with thorn and prickly pear,—­temples in between them,—­trades and handicrafts plied in the shade of ancient trees,—­squalor and beauty, leisure, wealth, poverty and lordliness all hand in hand.  She could see the backs of elephants standing in a compound under trees, and there were peacocks swaggering everywhere, eating the same offal, though, as the unpretentious chickens in the streets.  Over in the distance, beyond the elephants, was the tiled roof of a great house glinting in strong sunlight between the green of enormous pipal trees; and there were other houses, strong to look at but not so great, jumbled together in one quarter where a stream passed through the village.

Yasmini came and sat beside her in the window-seat, as simply dressed in white as on the night before, with her gold hair braided up loosely and an air of reveling in the luxury of peace and rest.

“That great house,” she said, peering through the jalousies, “is where the ceremony is to be tonight.  My father’s father built it.  This is not our state, but he owned the land.”