their horses, an odd noise floated over the sham domes of the mosque.

"Tis a donkey with the strangles, Khan Sahib," remarked Rahmat Ali. "Yea, mine is a lucky one--five curls and--" He paused.

No, it was not a donkey. What was it? A camel snoring? A cow dying? The women servants baking bread in the corner stood up to listen. The two boys, heads down, arms interlaced, wrestling stark naked in the sun, paused also. Then, suddenly, as if by mistake, an inconceivable gamut, beginning with an earthquake, passing on to a foghorn, and ending with a pennywhistle, let itself loose.

"God and his Prophet," yelled Azmutoollah, "it is a conch!"

As they stood petrified by the audacity, the low grunting recommenced, and then once more something let go, lost control over itself, and went skirling up like a burst bagpipe.

"My sword!" gasped the ex-rissaldar. "The idolatrous defiler of the faith--the desecrator of my fathers' graves! A conch in Jehâdpore! By the Lord who made me, 'tis the last!"

If the opponents had been better matched, there would have been bloodshedding in the village on that calm evening; but what could a dozen sowars with drawn swords, headed by Azmutoollah, joined by half the populace of the village, do against Hunumân Sing, who, with a trembling in his knees but the courage of martyrs in his mind, stood on the steps of the temple, nearly bursting himself in his efforts to play the unwonted instrument?

A roar of laughter went up from the crowd, as, alarmed but determined, he backed from the onslaught to the temple door, stumbled on the step, sat down violently, and the concussion sent a perfectly supernatural "Ker--whoo--oo--oo--oo--ph!" through the conch.

Even Azmutoollah's indignation could not withstand it.

"Go, Rahmat Ali, and take it from him ere he do himself an injury, and seek Mool Raj, Kutb-u-din. 'Tis his blame, not the boy's."

But Hunumân was on his feet again, full of outraged importance. The affair to him was deadly earnest.

"I am no boy, Khan Azmutoollah, but of legal age, with B.A. pass. I am a loyal citizen of Victoria Kaiser-i-hind. Religious liberty enjoins me to play conch if I choose, and I do choose."

The spirit was willing, but the flesh, in the hustling hands of half a 

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