Page:Karl Gjellerup - The Pilgrim Kamanita - 1911.djvu/87

 Satagira? Could it bring Vasitthi to my arms? I saw myself in the midst of a forest, fighting Satagira, whose skull I split with a powerful stroke of my sword; and again I saw myself as I bore the fainting Vasitthi out of the burning palace, which rang with the voices of robbers.

For the first time since that woeful sight of my lost Vasitthi met my eyes, my heart beat with courage and hope, and I began to think of the future; for the first time, I wished for myself, not death, but life.

Full of such pictures, I had scarcely gone a thousand paces when I saw before me a caravan which, evidently coming from the opposite direction, had halted while its leader, to all appearance, offered up a sacrifice beside a little hillock close to the highway.

I went up to him with a polite greeting, and asked what deity he was here worshipping.

"In this grave," he replied, "rests the holy Vajaçravas, to whose protection I owe it that, passing through a dangerous neighbourhood, I am yet able to reach home safe and without damage to life or property. And I counsel thee earnestly not to neglect to offer up a fitting sacrifice here. For if, when thou enterest the wooded region, thou wert to hire a hundred forest warders, their help would be as nothing to thee compared with the protection of this holy man."

"My dear friend," I replied, "this mound seems to be only a few months of, and if a Vajaçravas lies buried beneath, it certainly will not be any saint, but the robber of that name."

The merchant quietly nodded assent.

"The same … certainly … I saw him impaled at this spot. And his head is still up over the city gate. But