282 BOMBAY DUCKS 



names, nor do I remember the why and the wherefore 

 of the punishment inflicted upon them by Siva. But 

 what matters this ? Are not dates and facts but the 

 dry bones of history ? Let us have the flesh and blood 

 of myth and tradition and leave the dry bones to 

 others. 



We are told that the Conjeeveram vultures are very 

 aged ; to be, for once, exact, they are twenty or thirty 

 hundred thousand years old — more or less ; but their 

 eyes are not dim, and they have the invaluable gift of 

 feeling the presence of a sinner. When a sin-stained 

 human being approaches the portals of the temple, 

 they refuse to show themselves. This, taken in con- 

 nexion with the fact that thousands of men have seen 

 these sacred birds, says much for the moral condition of 

 the Madras Presidency. 



