"And what of Ganesha?
Is this mountain of bones and thews a person to be trusted, or shall we show him how much stronger than him is a horsehair in a clever woman's fingers ?" "This man Ramsden is my friend," King said.
"Are you _his_ friend ?" she retorted.
He nodded.
"You are going to see the naked heart of India!" she said.

"Better to have your eyes burned out now than see that and be false to it afterward!" Then, since we failed to order red-hot needles for our eyes, she cried out once--one clear note that sounded almost exactly as if she had struck a silver gong.

A woman entered like the living echo to it.
Yasmini spoke, and the woman disappeared again.
Below us the river swallowed and gurgled along the palace wall, and we caught the occasional thumping of a boat-pole.

The thumping ceased exactly underneath us, and a man began singing in the time-hallowed language of Rajasthan.

I think he was looking upward as he sang, for each word reached its goal.
"Oh warm and broad the plow land lies, The idle oxen wait! We pray thee, holy river, rise, Nor glut thy fields too late! The year awakes! The slumbering seed Swells to its birth! Oh river, heed!" "Strange time of year for that song, Princess! Is that one of your spies ?" asked King, not too politely.
"One of my friends," she answered.