two."

Then another took up the parable.

"Aye! and four hands to boot, wherewith to root out weeds."

"The hundredfold wheat hath more stems than one," quoth a third.

"And a toddling child can drive bullocks," put in a fourth.

So in solemn adage ran the talk, with many a weighty pause, and many a self-complacent wag of the head when the ball of ancient wit had been successfully passed to the next neighbour.

Accustomed as he was to this style of reasoning, each remark was a fresh tap driving the nail of conviction into Gunesh Chund's slow brain. As he stood on the roof that night, whence he could see the horizon strike the sky in one unbroken circle, a keen desire to live as his fathers had lived excluded all other thoughts. Here was his world; here lay his duty.

"Thou canst choose a wife for me if thou wiliest," he said sheepishly to his mother, when, in the early dawn, he found her already at work, while Veru lay abed with some ache or pain.

"O my son! O Guneshwa!" cried the old woman, flinging her arms around his neck with unwonted tenderness, and with tears of joy in her bright old eyes. "I will find thee a pearl and paragon. With a skin wheat-coloured, and--"

"Nay, mother," interrupted the big man, still more sheepishly, "an' she please thee, and have a soft tongue, that is all I care for. And, mother, say no word to Veru yet. There is time; and mayhap thou wilt not find a wife soon."

His mother laughed scornfully.

"Not find one to marry the lumberdar! such a fine, straight man as thou art, Guneshwa. Why, they will come in crowds! Nay, be not so modest; that is the girl's part, not the man's. Nevertheless, as thou sayst, 'tis time enough to tell Veru when all things are settled. There is but one woman needed in a marriage."

If some rankling doubt as to the honesty of his silence lingered in Gunesh Chund's mind, it vanished quickly before the personal peace which his decision brought to the household.

Perhaps Veru might have 

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