320 TKAVEL, ADVENTUKE, AND SPORT. 



vain ; and yet a quiet, unknown individual deviously 

 wandered into it, without any noise or disturbance, as 

 if Parashvanatha were his bosom friend, and this long- 

 defended excavation his congenial abode. I don't 

 wonder they were puzzled, and let me go on my way 

 in peace. 



But, in the afternoon, another element began to 

 assert itself. There was an uneasy feeling that they 

 had not done what they ought to have done, and that 

 a curious stranger had walked through their advanced- 

 guards and careful lines, after a fashion which, if it 

 did not make them entirely ridiculous, at least re- 

 flected seriously upon them. The result of this was 

 that a good deal of excitement arose. The Arab 

 guard had a station on the other roof of the Khengar 

 Mehel, where they, at certain hours, invoked Allah, 

 and expressed their opinion that Muhammad Avas his 

 only prophet ; but it had, before, been found only 

 necessary for one or two of these heroes to appear 

 there. After my visit to the Amijhara there were 

 half-a-dozen of them up there, and they amused them- 

 selves by handling their matchlocks. The Jain pil- 

 grims, too, had got into a state of great excitement, 

 and were buzzing about like bees in a disturbed nest. 

 I did not much mind this, however, imtil I heard 

 that a report had spread among them to the effect 

 that I had polluted the Amijhara by taking down a 

 fowl and eating it before the sacred image. Of course 

 nothing of the kind had occurred ; I had even taken 



