then pending. One of the men was hinting at the necessity of getting some fresh documents prepared and some additional witnesses suborned: another was loudly applauding his successful devices, as he unfastened rupees from his waistcloth. Bahulya himself seemed somewhat absent-minded and kept looking about him in all directions: now and again, he gave some trivial orders to his cultivators. "Ho there! lift that pumpkin on to the machan" "Spread those bundles of straw in the sun." Then again he would gaze all about him, evidently restless and agitated. One of the company remarked: "Moulvi Saheb! I have just heard some bad news about Thakchacha. Is there not likely to be some trouble?" Bahulya had no wish to tell any of his secrets, so shaking his head from side to side he replied in a light sententious manner: "Man is encompassed about with every danger; why should you be in any fear?" Another man remarked: "That is all very true, but Thakchacha is a very clever man: he will escape from the danger by the mere force of his intelligence. But be that as it may, we shall be very glad if no calamity befalls you: we have no allies, no resources save you, in this Bhowanipore. Talk of our strength, of our wisdom; why, you are all in your own person: if you were not here we should have to remove our abode hence. It was most fortunate for me that you fabricated those papers for me, for I managed to give that idiot of a zemindar a good lesson by their means: he has done me no injury since: he knows very well that all the weight of your influence has been thrown into the scales on my behalf against him." Bahulya, contentedly puffing away at his hooka, with its pedestal of Bidri ware, and letting the smoke out of his eyes and mouth, laughed gently to himself. Another man remarked: "When a man has to take land into his own hands in the Mofussil there are two ways of keeping
