Page:Doughty--Mirrikh or A woman from Mars.djvu/132

 scale extended to distances bounded only by the mighty barriers of the Himalayas. All was bold and colossal; deep mountain gorges, towering peaks, awful precipices and  beetling crags all rounded off and changed into a thousand  fantastic shapes by the whirl of the drifting snow.

It was a sight to make a man think of his own insignificance and God’s greatness, if, happily, by education or conviction he is able to comprehend what I do in some measure now, but did not then, the mighty mystery of the infinite; the loving Father who doeth all things and doeth all things  well.

We stood on a rocky eminence about a hundred feet above the guard house, Dr. Philpot and I. Looking off we  could see to an interminable distance on all sides, for we  were at the very summit of the ridge, and our way lay down  to the whitened plains below, where far, far in the distance,  on the beginning of the next rise, we could faintly discern a  cluster of low, square-built structures, with a gilded dome  above them. This, our adept had informed us, was our destination—the lamasery of Psam-dagong.

“What a frightful country,” growled the Rev. Philpot as he and I were returning from our point of observation,  shortly after daylight that morning. “Do you know, Wylde, it’s my humble opinion that we shall never succeed  in reaching the lamasery. By Jove! I’d give something if we had Mirrikh’s levitating powers and could with one  jump throw ourselves back into the big courtyard of the  Nagkon Wat. Summer is what I’m sighing for now.”

“You don’t wish it any more than I do then,” I replied gloomily.

“I suppose nothing that either you or I could say would move Maurice in the least.”

“Nothing. He is completely under that man’s influence.”

“Wholly so. His individuality seems submerged in Mirrikh. Each day only adds to it. Why, he hasn’t even got eyes for that delightful creature you picked out of  the snow storm, when a child could see that she is dead  gone on him.”

“How absurd!” I replied tartly. “The girl is all sorrow over the loss of her father. Maurice is sympathetic by nature which attracts her toward him—that is all.”

He gave me a curious look—a look which set me to