The Gardener (Tagore)/79

I OFTEN wonder where lie hidden the boundaries of recognition between man and the beast whose heart knows no spoken language. Through what primal paradise in a remote morning of creation ran the simple path by which their hearts visited each other. Those marks of their constant tread have not been effaced though their kinship has been long forgotten. Yet suddenly in some wordless music the dim memory wakes up and the beast gazes into the man′s face with a tender trust, and the man looks down its eyes with amused affection. It seems that the two friends meet masked and vaguely know each other through the disguise.