concerning his death, he rolled on the ground, lamenting in the bitterest terms his untimely departure from the world, and the subsequent wretchedness of his dear wife, whom he must leave a helpless widow. His lamentations grew so loud that they drew his better half to the scene. She, who had been apprised of the palmist's calculation, was beyond herself with grief, and fell by her husband's side, railing against the gods for this unjust and cruel visitation that they were inflicting upon them. Her shrieks quickly brought the neighbours to her side. They also were weavers, and not a whit more sensible than the afflicted couple, and when they saw Padmalochan in that unhappy state, they could not forbear shedding tears of sympathy. The man himself was naturally of an imaginative turn of mind, and in fancy he went through all the agonies of death, omitting not even the last gasp. Then when he seemed motionless, his wife and friends supposed that the soul had taken flight, and they at once engaged themselves in making preparations for the obsequies. Bundles of wood with a very sparse quantity of ghee to be rubbed on the supposed corpse before placing it on the funeral pile, and incense to be thrown into the fire to make a sweet odour, were prepared, and the sympathetic neighbours set out for the place of cremation in a deserted locality, many miles distant from their village. They carried on their shoulders their friend's body, wrapped in a mat and tied to a bamboo, and leaving the city behind them they reached the middle of a field, when it was near midnight. There were several footpaths marked in the field, and the benighted men did not know which to take. They were at their wits' ends, and commenced arguing on the point. The disagreement took the form of a quarrel, until at last Padma, so long silent in fancied death, could no longer hold his tongue. He cried out, "Friends, I know well the way to the burning ghat; and I would gladly tell you in which direction to go, if my tongue were not tied by Yama."
Hearing him speak, his friends were greatly frightened,
