LETTERS FROM ABROAD
that keeps open the traffic between this shore and the shore of Paradise—this is our King’s mail-boat for the communication of messages, and not for carrying cargo to the markets,"
I say to him: "Yes, I fully agree with you ; but, at the same time, take my warning, that your mail-boat may have to be commandeered for other urgent purposes, wholly unconnected with the Celestial Postal Department." His cheeks grow pale; his eyes become bemisted; his frail body shivers like a cypress at the first breath of winter, and he says to me: "Do I deserve to be treated like this? Have you lost all your love for me, that you can talk of putting me under martial law? Did you not drink your first cup of Amrita from my hand, and has not the Citizenship of the Sphere of Music been conferred upon you through my persuasion?"
I sit dumb, and muse and sigh, when sheaves of newspaper-cuttings are poured upon my table, and a leer is spread upon the face of the Practical man; he winks at the Patriotic man sitting solemnly by his side; and the man who is Good, thinks it his painful duty to oppose the Poet, whom he is ready to treat with some indulgence within proper limits. As for me, who am the President of this Panchayat, I have my deepest sentiment of tenderness for this Poet, possibly because he is so utterly good-for-nothing and always the first to be ignored in the time of emergency
