tortoise in the sunlight. 'Is it true that there are many images
in the Wonder House of Lahore?' He repeated the last words as one
making sure of an address.

'That is true,' said Abdullah. 'It is full of heathen busts. Thou
also art an idolater.'

'Never mind him,' said. Kim. 'That is the Government's house and
there is no idolatry in it, but only a Sahib with a white beard.
Come with me and I will show.'

'Strange priests eat boys,' whispered Chota Lal.

'And he is a stranger and a but-parast [idolater],' said
Abdullah, the Mohammedan.

Kim laughed. 'He is new. Run to your mothers' laps, and be safe.
Come!'

Kim clicked round the self-registering turnstile; the old man
followed and halted amazed. In the entrance-hall stood the larger
figures of the Greco-Buddhist sculptures done, savants know how
long since, by forgotten workmen whose hands were feeling, and
not unskilfully, for the mysteriously transmitted Grecian touch.
There were hundreds of pieces, friezes of figures in relief,
fragments of statues and slabs crowded with figures that had
encrusted the brick walls of the Buddhist stupas and viharas of
the North Country and now, dug up and labelled, made the pride of
the Museum. In open-mouthed wonder the lama turned to this and
that, and finally checked in rapt attention before a large alto-