tained that day that in spite of the innocent little note she had left behind, the women of the town took her to be a party to a scandalous amour. Her virtuous instincts were outraged, and from the depths of her woman's resources she at once evolved a plan by which her reputation should be saved. She got up at the dead of night, locked the old woman, who was asleep, in the room, locked all doors save one from inside, and coolly set fire to the house in various parts. When she saw no human efforts could save the house, she dressed herself as a jogini,[1] getting her astonished lover to do likewise. And locking the remaining door from outside, this daughter of Gujarát left the town. A few hours later the house was found to be on fire. Efforts were made to save it; but before daylight it was all a wreck. In the morning they found the sowcár's old dási burnt to death, but easy of recognition. Then it was that the wise women of the town proclaimed that Huliká the virtuous had committed suttee, and that the immortal gods had taken her up from the grasp of the cruel but baffled seducer. Huliká henceforward came to be recognised as one of the saints; and there was no one, not even the old
- ↑ A female ascetic.
