148 THE TRIBES ON MY FRONTIER. 



visits, but where there is one all the country knows it. And, 

 indeed, what would the country do without it ? Where would 

 the dusty wayfarer stop to eat his midday cJinppaltce and 

 drink a draught of cold water, or where would the collector 

 pitch his tent ? Into the dark penetralia of that pleasant 

 resthouse the sun has not for ages forced his way, and 

 a perennial coolness broods there. No one can tell you now 

 who built the small chapel and planted the tope, nor what 

 wickedness it was that he thought thus to expiate ; but his 

 was a misguided penitence, I fear, for he has taught future 

 generations to be grateful that he sinned. However, I would 

 judge him in no illiberal spirit. Whatever his motives may 

 have been, estimate him by his deeds, and he ranks, I say, 

 with those other two great men who have been through the 

 mango-tree lasting benefactors of their race. I mean that 

 Pires and that Alphonso, whose names seem to have come 

 down to us in the luscious peiric and the delicate afoos. I 

 yield to none in reverence for these names. I would not 

 lend a book to the man who refuses a Bombay mango. At 

 the same time I think it is a question whether the stunted 

 timberless tree which produces the luxury of Bombay has 

 gained or lost in its descent from the veteran of the tope, 

 with its trunk, ten feet in girth, towering towards heaven 



