’So the mendicant returned to the money-lender, and would not sell.  Then that wicked man sat all day before him offering more and more for those three days’ earnings.  First, ten, fifty, and a hundred rupees; and then, for he did not know when the Gods would pour down their gifts, rupees by the thousand, till he had offered half a lakh of rupees.  Upon this sum the mendicant’s wife shifted her counsel, and the mendicant signed the bond, and the money was paid in silver; great white bullocks bringing it by the cartload.  But saving only all that money, the mendicant received nothing from the Gods at all, and the heart of the money-lender was uneasy on account of expectation.  Therefore at noon of the third day the money-lender went into the temple to spy upon the councils of the Gods, and to learn in what manner that gift might arrive.  Even as he was making his prayers, a crack between the stones of the floor gaped, and, closing, caught him by the heel.  Then he heard the Gods walking in the temple in the darkness of the columns, and Shiv called to his son Ganesh, saying, “Son, what hast thou done in regard to the lakh of rupees for the mendicant?” And Ganesh woke, for the money-lender heard the dry rustle of his trunk uncoiling, and he answered, “Father, one half of the money has been paid, and the debtor for the other half I hold here fast by the heel."’

The child bubbled with laughter.  ’And the moneylender paid the mendicant?’ it said.

’Surely, for he whom the Gods hold by the heel must pay to the uttermost.  The money was paid at evening, all silver, in great carts, and thus Ganesh did his work.’

‘Nathu!  Ohe Nathu!’

A woman was calling in the dusk by the door of the courtyard.

The child began to wriggle.  ‘That is my mother,’ it said.

‘Go then, littlest,’ answered Gobind; ‘but stay a moment.’

He ripped a generous yard from his patchwork-quilt, put it over the child’s shoulders, and the child ran away.

THE AMIR’S HOMILY [Footnote:  Copyright, 1891, by MacMillan & Co.]

His Royal Highness Abdur Rahman, Amir of Afghanistan, G.C.S.I., and trusted ally of Her Imperial Majesty the Queen of England and Empress of India, is a gentleman for whom all right-thinking people should have a profound regard.  Like most other rulers, he governs not as he would but as he can, and the mantle of his authority covers the most turbulent race under the stars.  To the Afghan neither life, property, law, nor kingship are sacred when his own lusts prompt him to rebel.  He is a thief by instinct, a murderer by heredity and training, and frankly and bestially immoral by all three.  None the less he has his own crooked notions of honour, and his character is fascinating to study.  On occasion he will fight without reason given till he is hacked in pieces; on other occasions he will refuse to show fight till he is driven into a corner.  Herein he is as unaccountable as the gray wolf, who is his blood-brother.