Page:The Downfall of the Gods (1911).pdf/210

 CHAPTER XIII

ANARCHY

dawn-wind stirred among the palm-fronds with a harsh, rattling sound, and in the ears of old Baguan Dass—as he stood shuddering a little, and drawing his cloak more closely about his shoulders-it was as though the bones of a hanging skeleton were set in motion.

The long panic and agony of the night were ending: the cold despair of morning had come.

Beyond the high wall which enclosed the palace-buildings, where yesterday portions of the town had been visible, nothing was now to be seen save mounds of charred débris, from which smoke-clouds ascended to mingle with the mists arising from the dew-drenched ground.

Not a living thing moved, except a lean cur or two, nosing and questing among the ruins ; and a great silence reigned, for to-day—for the first time for centuries—no pulse of drum nor scream of conch sounded from the temples to speed the vanishing shadows and herald the rising sun.