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Algy and I slept soundly for the remainder of that eventful night; but it is my opinion that the villagers never went to rest at all. The moment we set foot in the street the next morning, a vast crowd surged round my cousin; every one of them carried a string of flowers or—highest compliment—a gilded lime. Women brought their children, from the youngest upwards, and Algy was soon the centre of the village nursery. All these little people were solemnly requested “to look well upon that honoured lord, and to remember when they were old, and to tell it to their children, that their own eyes had rested on the great sahib who had killed the shaitan of Karwassa.”

Algy was loaded with honours and flowers; I must confess that he bore them modestly, and he, on his side, paid high tribute to Sassi the Marathi. He commanded that she should have a splendid funeral. The most costly pyre that was ever seen in those parts was erected, the memory of the oldest inhabitant was vainly racked to recall anything approaching its magnificence. The village resources, and the resources of three other hamlets, were strained to the utmost tension to provide sandal-wood, oil, jewels, and dress. If Algy’s London “pals” could hear of him spending fifty pounds on the burning of a native woman, how they would laugh and chaff him! I hinted as much, and got a distinctly nasty reply. He was quite right; roughing it had a bad effect upon his temper. At sundown the whole population assembled by the river bank to witness the obsequies of Sassi the widow of Gitan; they marvelled much (and so did I) to behold my cousin standing by, bare-headed, during the entire ceremony.