Note 2 — Chapter XII · Assassination.

Then Gurupada, the hermit, left his dwelling, to enjoy the fresh air laden with fragrance. He seated himself beneath his verandah, overgrown with roses and jasmine. He sat there enjoying the peace of nature and the new life which the refreshing rain had called forth; while he thought of the ancient epic of the clouds, with Indra the slayer of Vritra2 as its hero, which floated before his mind, as if it had been a poem of yesterday. Then sombre and disquieting thoughts forced themselves upon him. The accounts that Kulluka had lately brought from Kashmir and Agra filled him with anxiety respecting the future of his dearly-loved country. “And so,” said he to himself, “it must in the end come to what I have so long feared, and hoped to have averted by many years of self-inflicted banishment. A strange ruler is on the point of seizing on our unhappy country, and the road is smoothed to him by our own fatal disunion. He is right from his point of view: he must restore order in a neighbouring State when the anarchy continually causes disturbances in his own empire; and if this cannot be accomplished while the independence of that country is respected, then must it be forced to subjection. But is there in truth nothing that can be done? No, no,” continued he. “Kulluka’s proposal that I should return, and, perhaps supported by Akbar, take the government from the hands of my weak brother—no, that would not do. My return would only be a temporary remedy, even if it were that. And I have become too old and unpractised in the art of ruling again to reign, and, above all, there, where youth and energy are required. Life cannot last much longer; I am weary and long for rest; I have long sighed for union with the immortal Brahma, whence we take our short independent existence, and to which we shall return again.” And Gurupada slowly closed his eyes as he stretched himself upon a soft bed of fresh moss. A flash of lightning, that for a moment lit up the valley and all around, awoke and called him back for a few moments to his reflections.