"Om Mani Padme Hum." The words were muttered into the hair which hungfrom the neck of a huge Yak. P'ao's lips were cut and stiff with the cold, and on the muffler that he wore as a respirator, tiny icicles formed, as his breath condensed on his knitted wool.

Clinging close to the animal, who was friend as well as carrier to the man, he was waiting, muttering incessantly the mystic phrase, "Om Mani Padme Hum," until the blinding snow stopped whirling, and the raging hurricane should cease. Half an hour ago, they had been trudging along comfortably enough over crunching snow, through an atmosphere clear as space, and blazing with sunlight. P'ao, shuddering in the depths of his superstitious soul, wondered which of the Noi-jin, malignant spirits of the mountain, he had offended, that all the warriors of the elements should be arrayed against him now.

He knew when he left Ta-tsien-lu so late in the year, that he was tempting fate, but his impatience to get on drove him to risk anything, even his life. Hence, the winter having closed in, he had been struggling for weeks against every obstacle that malicious demons could oppose to him.

P'ao was tired, as in addition to the load of tsamba which he carried, to ease a little the second yak, who had gone lame, his clothes were weighted with silver. In his strong stiff robe, and in the cloth of the "Old Noble," his faithful beast, silver was sewn, each piece separate from the other, lest by an inadvertent jingle, its presence should be disclosed to a lurking robber. The man knew that as soon as he left Chinese soil, and commenced the entrauce into his own inhospitable country, the danger of thieves would be increased a hundred-fold, and he had taken these precautions accordingly. P'ao's trip into China, across to Peking, had been eminently successful, and he was coming home now, rich beyond the wildest dreams of the most avaricious of P'ug-nakians, and able at last to claim his heart's desire.

P'ao was a carver. The eldest of three brothers, he remained in the native village of P'ug-nak, in one of the valleys near the Lhasa district, and employed himself in fashioning ornaments and jewellery of jade. He enjoyed some considerable local fame, and was really one of the most skilful workers in Tibet. His natural gifts, first displayed in butter carving at the annual Feast of Flowers, when he, with the other artists, had made wonderful representations of everything in nature, all done in frozen butter, had been fortunately developed by a kindly old Chinese, formerly in the suite of the Chinese Amban, or Resident, at Lhasa.

P'ao had been in the habit of going there, in his boy hood, with his father, who, assisted by the "Old Noble," had made his living as a carrier. Hitherto, P'ao's works had been sent out to the great market of China through his brothers, the younger one of whom having been employed in the annual caravan travelling between Lhasa and Ta-tsien-lu, while the second one kept an inn in the latter town, which was a headquarters for merchants trading between China and Tibet. Hitherto, also, P'ao had had occasion to regret the esteem in which highly-wrought jade was held, and the disproportionately small prices it brought in the market. Work as faithfully as he might, he could gain merely a subsistence and nothing more.

Of course, he could have married T'ukmar, whose name, "Turquoise" seemed to him perfectly to express her, as "dots" and establishments were modest matters in P'ug-nak, but though it was the custom of the country and in no way ethically shocking, somehow P'ao did not relish the idea of sharing her as wife with his two brothers, who had also remained unmarried.

Early in the Water-Tiger year, however, smallpox raged with greater violence than usual in Ta-tsien-lu, and P'ao's second brother fell a victim. The youngest one, with commendable enterprise, hurrying to secure the belongings of the dead man before P'ao should appear, himself contracted the disease, and succumbed, and so P'ao was left the sole representative of his family. The immediate result of this double bereavemeut was the discovery that all these years, his lamented brethren had been appropriating the lion's share of the proceeds of his work, leaving him but the barest margin with which to buy materials, and for his subsistence.

"That is what comes of not seeing the world", P'ao reflected. "They were both men who had travelled, and certainly, they knew business. I, too, must go forth and see more than the mountains opposite P'ug-nak. Certainly, it is necessary! If my own brothers have robbed me like this all these years, what have I to look for from strangers, who cannot be expected to have any mercy for me?" he thought, naively. Thus was the venturesome step decided upon. He would go to Peking himself. He would discover the true state of the jade market, and henceforth have no middlemen between him and his customers. Accordingly, having by good luck, recovered the more valuable of his brothers' effects, he took them back to P'ug-nak, and hid them securely in his hut, away from the rapacity of his neighbours, and one day set forth. The villagers, with stirrup-cups of barley-beer, escorted him to the confines of the little hamlet, and watched him depart gaily, riding his big black yak, on his way down the hill and then returned to their avocations, and forgot all about him. In Ta-tsien-lu, after depositing the yak in the care of an acquaintance, to be looked after until his return, he secured employment in the Dalai Lama's annual trade caravan, and started on his long journey across China.

Arriving outside Peking, he, with the rest of the caravan, installed himself at the Yellow Temple, feeling himself an experienced traveller, as he hobnobbed with Lamas and traders, from all over Thibet and Mongolia. Every day, leaving the temple, he trudged across the yellow plain to the Anting Gate, and entered into the city, to confer with the jewel merchants. He was amazed at his success, and also at the esteem in which he was held by the jewellers of both the Chinese and the Tartar city, and caught himself wondering whether he was more angry at his brothers for the money robbery, or for the loss of the sweets of fame, for which they were responsible. He was quite dazzled by his financial success, too, when at last the objects he had brought with him had been xchanged for silver. His already great admiration for the Chinese dealers' acumen would probably have been trebly increased, besides, if he could have known how thoroughly these amiable persons had cheated him.

His business transacted, he arranged for an early departure for Ta-tsien-lu with another caravan on the point of returning, in spite of the sensible advice of his Lama hosts. These, nearly all Thibetans, could not understand why he preferred to exchange the comfortable conditions of life in China, not to speak of his financial success, for the struggle for existence in their own bleak country.

All these recollections drifted through his mind, now, as he stood with his face buried in the mane of the motionless wise old yak, who knew that a single step might lose them the path, and their lives. He muttered quickly, over and over, the "Om Mani Padme Hum." He hadn't the slightest idea of the significance of the phrase. He knew that the words spoke, "Oh, the jewel in the lotus, amen!" but wherein lay their mystic power, he was quite unaware. Only he knew that he must be saved - he must live through this storm - he must win his way to P'ug-nak, to his home and to her. And the Lama who dwelt up the hillside, in the black cavern which gave the village its name, had always told him that the way to "win merit" was to repeat these words on all occasions. P'ao translated "to win merit " freely, to suit the exigencies of the situation. Just now it meant to be helped, and to be granted his desire.

The sky was cold, the air stung with whips of ice, and P'ao's face, such part of it as was exposed to the air, was raw and bleeding from the combined effects of sun-blistering and snow-freezing. Behind his gauze goggles, of black yak-hair, his blood-shot eyes glowed lurid and hideous, like the eyes of an ogre, and, altogether, bundled up as he was into shapelessness with his sheep-skin clothes, his Chinese hood covering all his head save the front of his face with his nose-pads, temple-pads (extra precautions borrowed from Chinese travellers), his goggles and muffler, he looked like some fearful monster of delirium, rather than like a man.

Man he was, however, and thoughtful lover, for carefully hidden in his armpit, sewn up in his innermost garment, (which he had been particular not to take off since his departure from Peking), lay a jewel, an exquisite tribute he was carrying to T'uk-mar. It was a brooch of gold filigree. Cunning Canton goldsmiths wove golden threads into flowery shapes, in which they set daintily, the tiny lovely feather of the king-fisher. It was all finer than a wisp of tangled camel's-hair, and the minute feathers gleamed with the colors Thibetans love - the sapphire of their own high sky, the green of jade, the blue of lapis-lazuli, and the bright blue of their vivid turquoise. P'ao had parted with much of his lately acquired wealth to secure this gem, but even now, in the cold and desolation of the raging storm, he glowed warmly, as he thought how beautiful T'ukmar would look with it pinned in the band of cloth she wore bound round her head. It would be a princess's dowry, grander than a whole herd of yaks.

The "Old Noble" stirred, and lifting his heavy horns and shaggy head, surveyed the landscape and sniffed the air. He knew that it was possible to proceed in the teeth of the now lessening wind, and without waiting for his dreaming master's word of command, he ambled forward. P'ao was accompanied by one man, a servant (and a new dignity it was for P'ao to have a servant at all!) who followed in charge of the lame yak. The servant had protested volubly against this choice of routes, a short cut to Lhasa, which P'ao knew of only from the descriptions of the travelling brother. He was aware of its danger, but urged on by his frantic desire to return quickly, had insisted upon risking it.

Up to the present, the lameness of the yak was the only serious misfortune that had befallen them; but now, as the little procession wound its way around a sharp corner, the limping beast fell, coming down heavily, carrying with it the servant. On attempting to rise, the coolie fell back with his left leg doubled under him, broken and helpless. P'ao rushed to his assistance, and lifted him on to the lame yak's back. The coolie, in his pain, begged for the easier choice of riding the "Old Noble", and P'ao was about to grant the request, when he reflected that the precious burden of wealth the " Old Noble" carried would have to be shifted to the lame yak - less secure, less sure-footed. No, it could not be, no such risk could be run, and so the groaning servant was settled on the back of the almost disabled animal.

Night fell upon them, clear and cold. The youth chose a shelter behind some rocks, and pitched their tent, hanging it only from the center pole. He, nearly dead himself from fatigue, half carried, half dragged the coolie off the suffering animal's back, and placed him close to the fire which he had kindled in the tent. It was a dreadful night. The injured man, groaning in agony, kept sleep away from P'ao's eyes, and morning found them quite unfit for further progress.

Remorselessly, goaded by his eager desire, however, P'ao loaded the animals, taking far more of the lame yak's burden this day, and again adjusted the coolie on top of the packs. High up there, on the roof of the world, the sun beat mercilessly upon them while, as the yak stumbled along over the frost-splintered rocks of the path, every shadow thrown across it meant a chill as of the tomb to be crossed, before they passed into the sun again. At noon, the coolie was delirious, and the yak hardly able to move, yet P'ao would not stop. At sunset, the yak, which had been stumbling at every step, finally fell, heavily and awkwardly, and lay helpless with a broken shoulder.

P'ao was in despair. The injured animal, which he was obliged to despatch at once, had carried the larger part of the food for both man and beasts. What was to be done now? Either the treasure must be abandoned, or coolie and food must be left.

Another dreadful night followed, but morning found P'ao decided. He made a bundle of as much of the tsamba as he could carry, and cut choice portions of the slain yak's meat, which he tied to the cords of the "Old Noble's" pack, leaving them hanging to freeze. The coolie, whose staring eyes and black split lips told their own story, he disposed behind the carcass of the slain yak, that the man might not roll over the cliff in his delirium. In his hand he put a knife, by his side a store of the tsamba, and over all he spread the yak-hair tent. Then, shouldering his burden, he strode resolutely away with the "Old Noble", and never once looked behind him.

Day after fearful day succeeded. Alone be trudged on over the unknown path, eating as little of the tsamba and meat as would sustain life. He had lost energy to make camp, and whittled the raw meat to eat as he walked, sucking snow for drink, and at night lay in a hollow of the snow close to the warm sides of the "Old Noble," whose long hair and thick bushy tail served as coverlet for both of them.

At length, after seeming ages, he began to recognize the country through which he was passing - recognized too, that it was within a few days march - even his weary marches - of his own very. They were getting down below the line of everlasting snow, and the "Old Noble" could find a little pasturage on the tender herbage tentatively put forth by a timid spring, and he could be less sparing of his own diet. His faint heart revived again, and he saw the eyes of her he loved guiding him forward. There was but one more difficulty, and all the rest would be fairly easy.

Above, on the precipice he was climbing, the path ended at a projecting ledge, which hung over an abyss spanned by a suspension bridge. A thousand feet below, a river seethed its foaming way over rocks and precipices down to the fair valley in the south. The bridge was supposed to be kept in repair by travellers who used this route, but they were few and he was doubtful of its condition. There were not many who, like him, merited sufficiently the name of P'ao, or "Dare-devil," to attempt the road he had traversed.

In one hand he thumbed his prayer-beads, as with the other he led the "Old Noble" carefully along the overhanging path. With breathless interest he watched every step of the careful beast, a dread too awful to be put into words gripping his soul. At last, they stood, man and beast, on the fairly wide spur which projected out towards the opposite bank of the precipice. From a little rocky projection above the platform they stood on, a bamboo cable as thick as a man's arm, was slung to the opposite cliff. Over this cable a loose slip-loop of tough bamboo rope was adjusted on a sort of wooden pulley, which ran more or less easily along the cable. This loop hung down about four feet, and was spliced into a single rope which bore a cross-beam of bamboo a yard long and quite three inches in diameter. From this transverse bar or seat, fastened to either side of the cliff, long loose cords hung, by which to pull the slip-loop back and forth.

P'ao tried the cable. It seemed firm and the slip-loop was also quite secure. He breathed a sigh of relief, and divesting himself of his silver-weighted gown, he put on again only his sheepskin coat, and unloaded the treasure from the yak. He made it into a bundle which he fastened to his back by slipping his arms into loops of cord left for the purpose, and it was further steadied by a strap which passed around his forehead. He thrust his rosary and knife into the bosom of his coat, and then secreted his robe behind a rock. His purpose was to carry the bulk of the treasure across first, hide it, then return for his garment and the remains of the tsamba, leaving the "Old Noble" to find his way down to the valleys as best he could.

He seated hiniself on the transverse bar, gathered up the loose cord, and notched firmly the notch of the slip-loop. For a moment, he hesitated - just for a moment, as he inadvertently glanced over the edge of the cliff and realised how fearful was the distance beneath him. Then, with an exclamation that was almost a shout of triumph, he kicked the side of the rocky projection, as a child kicks the ground to start a swing, and slid down into space. His weight and the heavy load he carried caused the bamboo cable to sag so far that he received a splendid impetus, and with a feeling of glorious exhilaration, as though he were flying to his love through the air, he had slipped, almost before he knew it, more than half the distance of the cable.

It was perfect travelling, the way he had been travelling in his heart the whole distance, but his progress was stopped now by the steep dip of the cable from the opposite bank. What had been an advantage in his descent was a double disadvantage in his ascent.

However, swaying there in space, carefully fixing his eyes on the opposite cliff, he began steadily to haul on the slack of the loose rope by which he was to pull himself along the cable up to the cliff. He gathered the cord all up until it was taut, letting superfluous length dance beneath him, where it looked like a gossamer blown idly in the wind. Then he began steadily to pull. This part was difficult because he could no longer cling to the crotch of the loop above him, but required both hands to haul himself up the incline. Slowly, with all his strength, he pulled. The slip-loop, on account of the weight dependent on it, moved reluctantly along the cable, and his progress upwards was almost imperceptible. Ascend he did, however, and breathless and perspiring he realised that nearly half of the remaining distance had been covered.

He was getting fearfully fatigued, as he could not let the rope become slack for a single moment while he rested, otherwise he would slide back again, so he was compelled to cling with all his strength, to maintain the position won. A giddiness he did not like assailed him, too, for a sickening moment. The dreaded Poison of the Pass! Was it to attack him now? If so, his fate was too hideous to contemplate. Startled by the thought, he exerted himself for a mighty effort, and put forth all his force in a tremendous pull. He felt the loop slide grudgingly upward. and then.

A shock! Something snapped, and he was clutching madly at a loose and flying rope that offered no resistance. He felt himself sliding down, down, with fearful rapidity, as he whirled wildly round and round, and swayed from side to side. Almost insensible, hugging the pendant loop, which he had been lucky enough to grasp in his first frantic clutch, from sheer instinct, gripping with all the power of his muscular legs the rope that passed up between his thighs, he hung there, quite at the mercy, in his dizzy helplessness, of the whirling swaying thing that threatened every moment to fling him, hurtling down to a frightful death.

At length, and it seemed to him hours, the force of the momentum acquired by the sudden slide dissipated itself, and the man and the swing hung almost still, only swaying a little as shudder after shudder shook the man's body. At last his nerve centers had been disturbed, and he was racked with dulls that chattered his teeth, and threatened to fairly dismember him. He had been too dull, too dod-like, too undeveloped to ever know physical fear before, and now he threatened to collapse utterly in the extremity of this peril.

His first conscious realisation of himself, after he had clung there some time, was that he was repeating over and over, with quivering lips, the lilystic words, "Om Mani Padme Hum", in the intervals of violent shaking. His situation was so appalling, and his sickness was so acute, that he began to cry, miserably and feebly, like a sick child. The truth was that P'ao's reason was then hung on the verge, and if his had been a finer nervous organization, he must have gone quite mad and have hurled him self down the two or three thousand feet beneath him.

Finally, the sickness ceased, and he began to struggle to get himseif in hand. His first thought was to return to the side he had left, but after some feeble fruitless gropings with his feet for the hauling rope from that side, the fear assailed him that perhaps that rope might also break. He knew he could not live through another experience of that sort, so he gave up the idea, and tried to concentrate his energies on evolving some way of escaping his present predicament.

The weight of his body and his load caused the bamboo cable to sag alarmingly in a way that added to his panic, and he hastened to rid himself of the precious treasure he had risked so much to save. He asked now, of the gods, only his life!

Cautiously loosening his clasp of the loop, and scarcely daring to breathe, he felt with one trembling hand inside his bosom for his knife. It was there, the god of luck be praised! He withdrew it carefully, and severed first the strap that held the pack to his forehead, and then slowly and gently cut the loop through which his right arm was passed.

Every movement made his dangling seat sway sickeningly, and he was drenched with sweat. He finally succeeded in slipping his left arm out of the loop, and the bundle of wealth which was to realise all his hopes and dreams dropped like a stone beneath him. The elastic cable, relieved of half the strain on it, tightened itself, and once more the hapless creature was nearly shaken off his precarious perch. A long rest was necessary after this effort, and then P'ao prepared himself for his last final attempt to cross. A grunt from the forsaken yak, his trusted old friend, roused him again to life and effort.

He had unconsciously clung to the broken hauling rope, and had tucked it in his girdle - while he was relieving himself of the pack. Now, he cautiously withdrew it, and cutting off a length of it, he made a loop which he passed around his body under his arms. Holding the end of it in his teeth, he slowly raised himself until he stood upright on the seat of the swing. Clinging to the cable with his left hand, with his right he tied himself as securely as he could to the slip-loop. Again he had to rest, and it was a face ashen gray with fear and hopelessness, from which red eyes bulged horridly, that he turned lip in supplication to the serene Thibetan sky.

Gathering courage for the effort that was to decide his fate, muttering with dry mouth and stiff lips, the constant prayer, he proceeded to work his way, hand over hand along the cable, resting every third movement or so, on the bar, clinging in the last agony of desperation with hands, with knees, vith teeth, to anything that would give him hold, to prevent himself from sliding back again. At times, he was obliged to lift himself off the bar with one hand, and hang suspended, while with the other he moved the pulley over a rough place in the rope which impeded it's advance.

How many times it seemed that he must give up, he never knew. How many times the rope which bound him to the slip-loop was really all that held him there, he could not tell. But at last, success was his. He reached the end of that seemingly interminable cable, and with a joy that was almost madness, he knew that a few inches beneath his feet, was earth, solid earth, and not that awful depth of empty sunlit space.

He could not, however, bring himself to let go the cable, until he had worked himself quite up to the point from which it was suspended. This was a great log driven into the earth some distance from the edge of the cliff, and buried beneath a heap of rocks; so that when he finally slipped his feet off the bar and cut the rope which tied him to the slip-loop, he was quite safe.

Without stopping, without looking back at the faithful waiting yak and the rest of his treasure, he rushed, he stumbled, he fell along the path until a huge boulder shut off from his sight all possible view of the awful abyss he had crossed. Then, at last, weak, trembling, with arms almost torn from their sockets, and crying again like a child, he flung himself flat down upon the earth, clinging to the ground desperately, digging into it madly, with fingers bleeding, fleshless, and nailless, and seeking to hide his straining eyeballs in the bosom of the earth.

II.

The Lama sat on the earthen floor of the Black Cavern. His fine keen face was bent over a manuscript which was spread out on the low table before him. He had been poring over it for mouths and had succeeded in deciphering nearly all of the curious old characters. Many years ago the Lama had come to the cave from Lhasa to take advantage of the year's retirement in the forest allowed each Buddhist priest. He was young then, the scars of the burning pastilles scarcely healed on his shaven scalp. He belonged to the Ge-Iuk-pa sect, as evidenced by his yellow cap, but his philosophy was more transcendental and his theology purer, while his ardour of devotion was far greater than that of his companions, so he was hardly genuine Lamaist so much as Buddhist of an exceptionally pure type. Absorbed in study, struggling with Karma, he led for many long years a life of peace in this cavern, which, half way up a hill-side, looked across a valley to the mountains towering opposite. He had chosen his dwelling well, "back to the hill," a lake in the prospect, and opposite, the grand procession of mountains shouldering their way with regal ice-crowned heads, up into the blue of the Thibetan sky. Slowly and shyly on the little plateau below the holy man's cave, the tiny vage of Pungnak had grown up, and in the many years the priest had sat above them, the inhabitants had worn a path up to his dwelling, carrying their humble offerings. Tea, tsamba, churraa, anything except flesh food was welcome to the gentle priest, and the humble donor always went away with a comforting blessing or words of good counsel. He had watched the children grow up, marry, and beget children of their own.

He had assisted at all their rites and ceremonies; had married them; and had prepared their dead for "burial" in the bodies of the snow vultures which came obediently to their grim work. So great was his continual holiness, that all malignant demons were exorcised, and only kindly spirits hovered in the neighbourhood of the protected village. It was the boast of the men of P'ug-nak to their neighbours in the adjacent valleys, that never a Shrimpo had devoured one of their number when they went down to the valley to attend their herds, though there were many great boulders at the foot of the hill, which, as every one knew, were eminently fitted for the dwellings of these bloodthirsty demons. And the Lha-min, those evil spirits continually at war with all things spiritual, had long since retired in disgust, weary of waging a hopeless war against perfect virtue.

Yet the priest knew that his virtue was not perfect. Still in his heart he held desire, desire of life, desire of love - the lusts of the eye. And mortify the flesh to the utmost as he did, these would not die; and he mourned to know that these desires, smothered in his soul though they were, were begetting Karma for him, and that other incarnations must be reserved for his endurance. He mourned as he saw himself bound to the wheel of change through countless ages, and he marvelled as he realized in himself and in the wretched villagers at his feet, the force of this desire for life.

To him, no thought was so beautiful, no gift to be so wooed as the idea of the ceasing of all things - the absolute rest in deliverence from existence. This was his one absorbing thought, his one hope. Each day saw him glad, at its close, that it had slipped into the past, like a bead dropped on the rosary string, to mark a prayer that is said. Each day, done, led him so much nearer the end, so much nearer to the time of deliverence, when this phase should be finished, and he would rest awhile in the spiritual night, before his Devachan, and before taking up again the next link he was carrying in the chain of existence. He prayed, he hoped, and he lived, to make those links few - to bring the time of entering in to the Nirvana close to him.

Yet must he realise that in the heart of his heart, there lurked still the germ that he could not eradicate - the love of living; and why it endured, he could not understand. His soul craved rest, extinction, but his body cried, "Live!" - in spite of the narrow colorless existence which was all it had ever known of life. No existence could hold less of joy or less of hope than his and his people's. True, his poverty, his austerity, his asceticism were his first choice, while their poverty, squalor, and misery were perforce of cruel circumstance.

He wondered, as he watched, year after year, their unresting struggle for mere daily subsistence, wrung by suffering and heartbreaking toil from the icy bosom of their cruel land, why, demon-tormented as they were in their superstition, they did not, as soon as they reached an age of comprehension, put an end to it all, in some simple method of suicide.

That solution was not possible for him, in the light of his knowledge of the after fate of suicides, and in the face of his conviction of the inexorability of Karma. He knew he had debts to pay, phases to work out, if not in this existence, then in the next, or the next. And yet he confessed that it was not this knowledge that made him continue to live. It was the same mere instinctive clinging to life that forced these human vermin to exist.

Sitting opposite the figure of the next Redeemer, Maitreya, the coming Buddha, turning his prayer-barrel, the while he unconsciously listened to the fluttering of the strips of paper within, all marked "Om Mani Padme Hum", the Lama often reviewed the events of his little world. And many times he wondered as to the result of Pao's undertaking. He saw him go gaily forth on his long journey to Peking, and knowing the youth's real skill at his work, he did not doubt but that he would receive proper recognition. He smiled indulgently as he thought of T'uk-mar's pleasure, should the youth return, but he wondered rather sadly whether she would be able to withstand much longer the pressure brought to bear upon her to marry a wealthy farmer in a neighboring valley.

The farmer was already worrying T'uk-mar's father to send the girl to him for the customary months of trial before the actual marriage ceremony should take place. She, with surprising obstinacy, refused to go, and the indolent old Thibetan, her father, had so far let the girl have her own way. But he was ambitious. It was even whispered the he would be the next headman of the village, and a prosperous marriage for his daughter would assist in his advancement. So it was that the Lama knew right well which of the gods were to be propitiated when T'uk-mar brought to him her "Torma "a poor little cone of tsamba, butter, treacle and sugar, made by herself, and humbly offered to appease the Tsen and Gek, demons that she knew were lurking on mountain paths and valley roads to bring disaster on her traveller. As for the villagers, if they ever thought of P'ao at all, they had long since decided that, having found a good chance in China, he probably had too much good sense to return to the snows and labor of P'ug-nak. Only T'uk-mar knew that he would come back.

When the return actually occured, it was at sunset one evening, as T'uk-mar was squattting on the ground outside her father's hut, manipulating a little heap of yak-dung, to prepare it for fuel. Suddenly she saw a bent and tattered figure climbing up the slope to the little plateau. Ragged, dirty beyond even her dreams of dirt; haggard, with swollen cracked lips and elf-locks almost white hanging over his face, it needed all her love to tell her that this was P'ao, returned - he who had set forth not two years ago, stalwart and jaunty, to get a fortune for them both.

She ran to him, driving off the big mastiffs, who with deep bell-tones, proclaimed him strange and therefore hostile, and threw her arm around him to support him to his own hut. The poor room, so long untenanted, was cold and cheerless, and after she had settled him on the k'ang, T'uk-mar ran across to her own house, to tell the news and to fetch tea and a jar of glowing coals.

Very soon the whole village had gathered around the hut, as many as possible crowding inside, and Pao had to tell them all his story, from the arrival at Peking (and many incredulous "wa's" greeted his statement of the price his wares brought!) to the fearful recital of the suspension bridge, and his subsequent wanderings half demented, until he almost stumbled on the village. His return was an event to celebrate, so children were despatched to the different huts for tea, dried meat, twisted biscuit, or whatever else they might find for food. "Chang" was freely dispensed, drink-horns loaned and exchanged, tsamba bowls produced froni the breasts of robes, and so great was the excitement, that even the Lama was coaxed down from his cell and seated, on someone's saddle-bags, by P'ao's side on the k'ang. The wonderful tale had to be repeated over and over again and the marvelling increased, until finally one inquisitive youth was felt to have voiced the general sentiment, when he asked: "But why, then, did you return at all, from Peking?"

P'ao's eyes had been constantly following T'uk-mar, as she flitted about, ladling tea into the pot from the big bowl on the fire, or adding generous lumps of butter to cups already served. He watched her silently a moment, then answered quietly, "T'uk-mar was here."

A shout of laughter greeted this, and much coarse jesting followed. T'uk-mar, trying to avoid observation as much as possible, followed her father out of the hut, The old man cast the remains of his tea in the slop-bowl by the door, to indicate that his visit was ended, and stalked away, not sparing of his scorn at P'ao's presumption. The Lama was the last to leave, and as he watched P'ao trying to make himself comfortable on the unwarmed k'ang, he contemplated him thoughtfully, and asked, too, as he left the room: "Why, indeed did you return?"

The next day, provided with a white silk scarf of ceremony, P'ao called formally on T'uk-mar's father, and asked for his daughter's hand. The old man's disdain was dissipated by a sight of the kingfisher-feather ornament. Its beauty and value caused him to regard P'ao as a son-in-law to be considered seriously. No girl outside of Lhasa had such an ornament, and its worth seemed to corroborate P'ao's story of what he could sell his work for, now that he had established direct relations with Peking.

"I rebuke my soul that I seemed not to believe your story last night", he said, politely offering P'ao some thick tsamba porridge out of his own venerable fingers. P'ao knew that this was equal to the most solemn of paternal blessings, and his heart leaped at the thought that in a few days, she, dowered with clothes and cattle, would be given to him, forever his cherished "Turquoise!"

III.

The Lama, after his months of labor, had at length deciphered and made a fair copy in Thibetan of the ancient manuscript. His pale face shone white against the background of the Black Cavern like an ivory carving against black lacquer, as he bent his head to read:

"In the early morning of the world, Brahma, in his idleness caught up a handful of cosmic dust, and kneaded it. It slipped from his grasp, rolled over the edge of heaven, and plunged on an endless way into the abysses of space. For a second, the great God regretted his misadventure, and wished his toy back in his hand again. Obedient to the thought the now incandescent ball rolled back heaven-wards; but, a moment later, indifferent, he let it go from his mind.

A moment's thought of the gods, however, is but an aeon of time - and in the dropping, the momentary recalling, and the subsequent dismissal from his mind, Brahma fixed forever the orbit of that seething ball of dust.

Brahma looked at Saraswati, to receive her smile of gentle chiding for his habitual clumsiness. The glory of her beauty smote him, as always, afresh. He gathered up more dust, and with experimental fingers, tried to mould a counterpart of her in miniature. Trial after trial was put down in despair. Her beauty, her glory, could not be caught or counterfeited. In petulence, he formed a clumsy caricature of himself and found it good. So, quite eagerly, he set about making many. Finally the were nearly surrounded as they sat by the little mannikins which lay rigid and inanimate on the floor of Heaven.

Brahma yawned, and leaned over to put his head in Saraswati's lap; but, bending too near the mannikins, his breath warmed them into life, and blinded and dazed by the glory of heaven, they staggered to their feet, living creatures.

Aghast at the result of his trifling, Brahma gathered them up in his lap, and looked at Saraswati. She shrugged her shoulders, as disclaiming any responsibility. He pondered for an instant, and there was silence in heaven. The roar of whirling worlds hummed unheeded in their accustomed ears, while Brahma pondered.

Suddenly, at the thithermost edge of space, appeared a new, bright object, and Brahma remembered the globe he had lately fashioned, During the aeons of his moments, the glowing mass had cooled, slowly changes had occurred, and now, as it approached, following unfailingingly the orbit fixed by his fleeting thought, he saw that it was a green and smiling world.

A solution of his difficulty occurred to Brahma. Leaning out from heaven, he gently deposited the mannikins on the orb as it rolled by, and watched with pleasure, the little world, with its little moon, go whirling off into the void.

That disposed of, Brahma yawned again, and lolling at ease, put his head in Saraswati's lap.

Brahma slept.

When the gods sleep, then is the time of cataclysms, Much was happening on the little earth. Formed in a caprice, peopled in a perplexity, things went not well with it. At first, with the memory of the glory of heaven fresh in their minds, the mannikins waited, expectantly, until they should be restored to their place on the lap of Brahma. Time ticked its centuries away in Saraswati's inattentive ear, but on earth, they counted days. That day. had many hours, and each hour had 60 dragging minutes to be lived through.

While Brahma slept, the people waited. It was a long time before they accepted it, but fina1ly the realisation came that they were forgotten, that nothing was to change for them.

Years passed, decades passed, centuries passed, and with nothing to hope for, nothing to look forward to, desperation at the weary monotony of their existence took possession of them. At first, before the beautiful memory of their origin had quite faded from their minds in a fever of effort, they wearied themselves in building lofty towers, by means of which tbey strove to climb again to the high place they had been cast out of; but the earth held them inexorably. Finally, after a long time, the beatific memory lost forever, deep despair settled upon these hapless victims of a god's caprice.

The endless days ground on, and time was a wearisome succession of light and darkness, revealing nothing, hiding nothing. Ever and anon, one man or woman, more oppressed than the others by the meaningless burden of life, would run mad and by violence and bloodshed, vainly seek an escape from this slavery which they cou1d neither endure nor understand. Or another, forsaking his fellows, would hide in some cell alone, and, subsisting upon the fruits which the earth in her first flush of motherhood, provided so lavishly, would wait-and wait for what?

Brahma slept on, and Saraswati sat, fondling his resting head. Joy was theirs. In shifting her position slightly, Saraswati could see the earth more plainly, as once again it rolled along the line of the god's recalling thought. The aura was bad. A dull mist encompassed the sphere, there was an air of despair, of hopelessness, of violence and hatred. Remembering that it had pleased Brahma in the fashioning, she felt concern. It was only justice that help be given.

Gently kissing Brahma's forehead, she awoke him and showed him his toy. Perplexity wrinkled his brow. Inquiringly he looked at her, and spread out his hands, to show his helpless indecision.

With a wise little nod of her head Saraswati plucked a gleaming jewel from the heart of a lotus, which in perpetual offering to their gods, grew before her. It was like a rose in color, and glittered with so wonderful a fire, that it blazed dazzlingly even in the rainbow radiance of the Hall of Heaven. Crushing the jewel in her hand, she reduced it to a sparkling dust, which she was about to scatter over the earth, when for an instant, she paused and remembering fleeting time, and facing immutable eternity, her compassion grew greater. Into the glittering mass she crushed the blood-like sap out of a petal from the lotus, having care that each sparkling atom got its tiny drop of dew.

Leaning over the edge of the Universe, she threw the manikins into a deep sleep, and while they slept, she gathered them up into her lap, and gently anointed their eyes - and smiled as she dropped them back to earth, thinking of their awakening.

Awake they eventually did, as from oblivion, and remembering nothing of their sleep, took up again the heavy burdon of life. But, strangely, they realized at once that it was no longer a burden. Gladly and gaily they went about their tasks, working light-heartedly, rejoicing in effort, and planning new achievements. And looking into each other's eyes, man and woman, they found what they had lost so long, the light of the glory of heaven.

Brahma watched amazed. These creatures actually rejoiced in work, and could be happy in the face of suffering. If they held festivals, they danced with garlands about them, and vine-leaves in their hair. They married, they fondled little children, they sang praises to him and worshipped him! He heard them, in amazement, calling him "Creator," and thanking him for the inestimable boon of life. They made images of themselves, bigger and more magnificent, which they called "God," and "Brahma," even as he had made them as small images of himself.

And he saw that finally, when, one by one, they tired and lay down to a long rest, they went peacefully, even gladly, because they carried in their hearts the hope that they would enter again the Hall of Heaven, and abide forever on the bosom of God.

In utter bewilderment, Brahma turned to Saraswati. "What is it?" he asked. "What did you do?"

Saraswati just smiled inscrutably, and remembering how he hung upon her appreciation and approval of his smallest action, how every moment he needed her, and the perfect happy confidence in which he slept at her side, answered: "I gave them love."

And, again looking out across the fathomless void of space, with eyes wearied, facing immutable eternity, she added: "I gave them death!"

The priest dropped the manuscript, aud looked across the valley to the eternal snow-clad hills. A song like the murmuring of Dri-sa's to their gossamer guitars, floated up to him. It was P'ao, singing in the sunset to his bride.

Rare, art thou, as costly coral tree, O, my love!
With leaf of lucent jade, and fruit of pearls,
And tender bud of gleaming turquoise blue,
A Jewel, thou, to wear above my heart.

Fluttering like a turquoise butterfly,
O, my love I follow thee, or loiter in thy path.
Thou little lose, whose fragrance Dri-sa's sup,
I fain would creep within thy golden heart.

The hum of the busy village, the bleating of sheep, the grunting of yaks, the cry of a child; all the myriad noises made by its sordid struggling life, were carried up to him with the odor of yak-dung smoke. The priest pictured the inside of their huts, the filth, the poverty. He thought of T'uk-mar of her greasy hair, in its four or five dozen tiny plaits pinned up in a cloth bag between her shoulders - plaits that were nests of vermin! He saw her face with the high cheek-bones, narrow eyes, brown skin smeared over with darker brown paint; her slovenly single garment, belted about her thick waist with a strtp, and all the other unlovely details of the wretched little creature's being. He reflected upon her daily life; the slip-shod house-keeping -a tsamba bowl licked out to save washing; the preparation of yak-dung - for fuel; the cleansing of the entrails of slain sheep; the kneading of tsamba-dough and tea with hands never washed between one occupation aud the next; the grinding of parched barley for tsamba meal, in the same vessel used for her rare ablutions. His sensitive, ascetic soul shrank in horror. He thought of her life as maid, and what it would be as matron. She might be the wife of two or three husbands at once, the slave of P'ao, and the others, who would brutally beat her; spending her time between grinding toil for them and pandering to their lusts finding her pleasure in stupefied intoxication from "Chang", and gorging her appetite on heavy and disgusting morsels of the corpses of slain beasts; bearing children in disease and dirt, to grow up to live a life like hers and finding her greater honor in the greater number of the wretched little creatures she could propogate.

That was she, to whom P'ao had come back.

P'ao, lazy brute, slovenly drunkard animal revelling in filth, stupid clod, too primitive even to fear, had been transformed into a hero, a demi-god! He had trampled remorselessly upon the humanities, he had suffered and starved, he had faced, grandly, perils so dreadful that one could scarcely live and hear them told to climb mountains esteemed impassable, and to lay his last treasure and his life at the naked unwashed feet of filthy little T'uk-mar.

These things the priest had gropingly felt before, and had wondered what the magic was, before he read; but now as he discovered that P'ao could look at T'uk-mar, and see her only as: Thou little rose, whose fragrance Dri-sa's sup

He bent his head in comprehension.

As the song was wafted up to him with the fragrant juniper smoke burning below in the evening sacrifice, the priest felt again the gnawing yearning, which he knew in his heart to be the desire of life and love.

"They saw in each other's eyes, what they had lost so long ago, the light of the glory of heaven!"

Turning the prayer-wheel quickly, his starved heart whispered, "I understand, O Perfect One! The jewel in the Lotus! It is love - I understand!"