to wall of the small enclosure, concealing all the dirt of the common earth, and all that was impure or unsightly round the foot of the temple. The flowering bushes rested their blossoms on the water, and the shrubs showed only their green crowns. The squalor and clamor of an Indian temple were all gone, and in their stead was the cleansing, mock-reverent water and the silence of Dreamland. The glamour of the place was strange beyond words. For sound there was only the plash of the water-bird’s wing, and the rhythmic lapping of the flood against the balconades. For the view, it was hemmed in by the tree-tops that overlooked the enclosure on all four sides. But within the small area was all that enchantment needed. It was Fairyland, with only a bright summer’s sun shining upon every thing to remind us of the e very-day earth. But suddenly the bell rang again. Fairyland or not, the hours were passing. So we floated out of the doorway again into the exquisite water-road, and sailed away. Look where we would, water, water, water, margined and broken by groves of trees, with here and there a suspicion of ruined houses from which now and again came wailing along the water the cry of some deserted dog. But nothing of every-day life! Where were the villages, with their cracked mud walls? the loitering natives, the roads and their dusty traffic? the creeping, creaking bullock-carts, and the jingling ekkas, baboo-laden? There were no parrot-ravaged crops, no muddy buff’aloes, no limping, sneaking pariah dogs to remind us of India. Even the kites, sailing in great circles above the broad sunlit water, did not seem the same birds that a few days before wheeled in hopes of offal round the village. The vulture on the palm-top was a very Jatayus among vultures. Where
