thou flower of the desert, swept away by the blood-stained dazzling
ocean of grandeur, with its foam of jealousy, its rocks and shoals of
intrigue, on what shore of cruel death wast thou cast, or in what other
land more splendid and more cruel?

Suddenly at this moment that crazy Meher Ali screamed out: "Stand back!
Stand back!! All is false! All is false!!" I opened my eyes and saw
that it was already light. My chaprasi came and handed me my letters,
and the cook waited with a salam for my orders.

I said; "No, I can stay here no longer." That very day I packed up, and
moved to my office. Old Karim Khan smiled a little as he saw me. I
felt nettled, but said nothing, and fell to my work.

As evening approached I grew absent-minded; I felt as if I had an
appointment to keep; and the work of examining the cotton accounts
seemed wholly useless; even the Nizamat of the Nizam did not appear to
be of much worth. Whatever belonged to the present, whatever was moving
and acting and working for bread seemed trivial, meaningless, and
contemptible.

I threw my pen down, closed my ledgers, got into my dog-cart, and drove
away. I noticed that it stopped of itself at the gate of the marble
palace just at the hour of twilight. With quick steps I climbed the
stairs, and entered the room.

A heavy silence was reigning within. The dark rooms were looking
sullen as if they had taken offence. My heart was full of contrition,
but there was no one to whom I could lay it bare, or of whom I could ask
forgiveness. I wandered about the dark rooms with a vacant mind. I