"Think, in this batter'd Caravanserai
Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day,
How Sultan after Sultan with his Pomp.
Abode his destined Hour and went his way."




V.

THE STORY OF IMTIAZAN.


The scene of her earliest memories was a small room with spotless
floor-cloth, the windows whereof looked out upon the foliage of "ber" and
tamarind. During the day a black-bearded man would recline upon the
cushions, idly fondling her and calling her "Piyari" ( dearest); and at
night a pretty young woman would place her in a brightly-painted "jhula"
(swinging-cot) and sing her to sleep. Then the scene changes. He of the
black beard is away, and the form of the beloved lies stark beneath a white
sheet while mysterious women folk go to and fro within the house. A
kindly-faced old man, who in earlier days had helped her build little
dust-heaps beneath the trees, takes her from the warm cot and hands her
over to a woman of stern face and rasping tongue, with whom she dwells
disconsolate until one fateful day she finds herself alone in a
market-place, weeping the passionate tears of the waif and orphan. But
deliverance is at hand.

The sight of the weeping child touches a chord in the heart of Gowhar Jan,