1 1 I'll .ll, ll I '1 
 
 THE DOWNFALL 
 OF THE GODS 
 
 HUGH dJFFORD 
 
 
CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924023396132 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PR 6005.L72D7 
 
 The downfall of the gods / 
 
 3 1924 023 396 132 
 
N 
 
 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
By the same Author 
 
 IN DAYS THAT ARE DEAD. 
 A Volume of Stories. 
 
 MALAYAN MONOCHROMES. 
 A Volume of Stories. 
 
 THE GOLD COAST REGIMENT 
 IN THE EAST AFRICAN 
 CAMPAIGN. 
 
 HEROES OF EXILE. 
 
 Being Certain Rescued Fragments 
 of Submerged Romance. 
 
THE DOWNFALL 
 OF THE GODS 
 
 By HUGH CLIFFORD, G.C.M.G., G.B.E. 
 
 Malayan Civil Service 
 
 LONDON 
 JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W. 
 
First Printed April, 19 ii 
 
 Reprinted May, 191 1 
 
 Reprinted March, 1928 
 
TO 
 
 BETTY 
 
 THIS, THE FIRST BOOK THAT I HAVE WRITTEtt, 
 IS INSCRIBED, 
 
 This is my Lady's praise i 
 God, after many days, 
 Wrought her in imknown ways 
 
 In sunset lands ; 
 This was my Lady's birth ; 
 God gave her mig^t and mirth, 
 And laid His whole sweet earth 
 
 Between her hands. 
 
 SwmBUSNS. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 I. The Revelation 
 II. The Proof 
 
 III. The Spirit of Destruction 
 
 IV. Slat 
 V. The Behest 
 
 VI. An Appeal to the Gods 
 VII. In the Ba Yon . 
 VIII. The Sword_of Indra . 
 
 IX, In the Hands of a Woman 
 X. The Feast of the City 
 
 XI. The Procession of the Sword 
 XII. Defeat that Crowns a Victory 
 
 XIII. Anarchy .... 
 
 XIV. The Secret of Slat . 
 XV. The Inner Shrine 
 
 XVI. Seeds .... 
 
 XVII. The Throne of the Snake . 
 
 XVIII. The Heart of the Multitude 
 
 XIX. The Heart of the Ruler . 
 
 XX. The Incarnate Spirit 
 
 XXI. The Setting Sun 
 XXII. The Triumph of the Snake. 
 
 XXIII. THE Snake's Decree . 
 
 XXIV. The Hut in the Forest 
 Notes .... 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 / was at Phnom Penh, the capital of modem 
 Kambodia, the which is a Protectorate of France, 
 ruled by a French Resident, in the name of its 
 aged king. I had just quitted Angkor, after 
 many days passed among its temples, and the 
 spell of its magic was still upon me. Yonder, 
 up the dismal river which flows from the Great 
 Lake, behind the thick curtain of almost deserted 
 forest, 1 had dwelt in a solitude, hardly broken, 
 amid things ancient and wonderful. Here, in 
 a place one half of which is a modern French 
 town, I was jarred by the incongruity which 
 results from grafting on to the gnarled trUnk of 
 Asia, the rank products of latter-day Europe. 
 I sought loneliness and peace. I wanted to 
 think, to meditate upon all that I had seen 
 at Angkor, and upon all that I had learned 
 of its tragic history. I wanted to get once 
 more into tune with the Asia of olden days, 
 away from the noise inseparable from its 
 
xii FOREWORD 
 
 invasion by the West ; and thus I came, at the 
 close of day, to the foot of the stairway that 
 leads up the face of the Phnom, to the pagoda 
 which crowns it. 
 
 To the north, south and west, and east, across 
 the waters of the Mekong, the country lay spread 
 out in an endless flat, clothed by the dingy greens 
 and blues and blacks of its vegetation; but 
 immediately around the Phnom were the lawns 
 and shrubberies of the trim public gardens, set 
 with iron cages, in which were pent a few 
 leopards and many woebegone wildfowl. 
 
 And to me, these things — the pagoda, the wild 
 creatures of the forest, the aged king yonder 
 in his palace, the neat gardens, the cages, the 
 sentry-guarded French Residency on the river's 
 brink — were symbols — symbols of the Great 
 Captivity. 
 
 Immediately before me, a long flight of brick 
 steps ran upward between twin balustrades, 
 fashioned in the likeness of the seven-headed 
 cobra of the Brahmans. The rounded bodies 
 of these monsters formed the balustrades them.- 
 selves ; the seven up-reared heads, fanning out 
 into a single menacing cobra-hood, rose one on 
 each side of the stairway s base; the pointed tails 
 writhed into the air, against the sky, high 
 above me. 
 
FOREWORD xiii 
 
 At the top of the stairway, plots of smooth 
 grass surrounded the sacred places, and tipped 
 abruptly down steep banks into masses of cluster- 
 ing' bushes. By these the detestable, immaculate 
 gardens were mercifully hidden. 
 
 Here, in awful, veiled seclusion, dwelt the 
 most ancient of the gods of the East. 
 
 In the foreground rose the pagoda, brilliant 
 with gold-leaf and many coloured tiles, its roof 
 ornamented by long, branching, outward-curving 
 horns, touched by the rays of the sunset and 
 striking a note- of gaiety, blithe and joyous. 
 Behind it — the immense, solid base almost in 
 contact with its threshold — stood the great dagoba, 
 a ponderous mass of grey stone and rust- 
 coloured lichen, tapering to a tall and delicate 
 spire, that led the eye up and up, and the heart 
 heavenward. It, too, struck its individual note 
 sombre, awful, and austere. 
 
 It was as though the pagoda and dagoba in 
 combination were designed to offer to the Gods all 
 the joys and all the sorrows that fill or oppress 
 the heart of man. 
 
 The head of the stairway, the plinth of the 
 dagoba, and each angle of its base were guarded 
 by alternate giants and lions, carved massively in 
 stone, those about the obelisk rising one above the 
 other in outstanding tiers. The giants iSere 
 
xiv FOREWORD 
 
 monsters with sinister faces, stout of trunk and 
 limb, reposing big, folded hands on the grips of 
 grounded pollard-clubs. The lions were the 
 heraldic lions of Asia, posturing in ungainly 
 fashion, with out-thrust buttocks, bodies wonder- 
 fully foreshortened, the legs of a jibbing horse, 
 and uplifted, ferocious heads- Yet, in some 
 subtle way, the very groiesqueness of these dis- 
 torted effigies of man and beast^grim, motionless, 
 impassive — enhanced the dignity and the solemnity 
 of this refuge of the ancient gods. 
 
 In the west, over the flat, half-submerged 
 country, visible above the dense shrubberies, the 
 day was dying in a wonderful blaze of colour ; 
 the heavens above — invaded in many directions by 
 great zvaves of crimson — displaying a purity of 
 azure, in startling contrast to the vivid green 
 streaks, inset about the furnace-mouth of the 
 horizon. In the east, across the dull red flood 
 of the river, a moon near the full was rising 
 from a bed of rosy cloud-fleece, its orb delicately 
 tinted by the reflected glow of sunset. 
 
 Between sun and moon was uplifted the dark 
 and shadowy pyramid of the dagoba, with its 
 grim wardens dimly seen. 
 
 A big, black lizard thrust its diamond-shaped 
 head forth from a cranny betiveen two huge 
 stones, and scarred the stillness with its loud. 
 
FOREWORD XV 
 
 discordant outcry. Then again a great hush 
 fell. 
 
 I hadjound that for which I had been seeking. 
 This was the East — the real East,, mysterious 
 and very ancient — waiting with her immense and 
 measureless patience to catch the awful whisper 
 that shall reveal the secrets of life and birth and 
 death. For she is ever expectant — the East; 
 never weary, never faithless, waiting — waiting 
 always — for the whisper that does not come. 
 
 The sadness of the last hour of day — perhaps 
 the saddest thing in all the immeasurable sadness 
 of the East — brooded over the darkening land 
 like some vast, menacing shadow. 
 
 The earth, faint with spent energies, drowsed 
 and dreamed amid the soft glamour of the 
 twilight, wrapped about by airs heavy and %varm, 
 velvet-soft and fragrant. 
 
 Yet the stillness of that quiet place was like an 
 anxious heart-beat. 
 
 And here, alone in this ancient sanctuary, 
 watching the dying day, I pieced together from, 
 the fragmentary knoivledge, which the research 
 of others had furnished to me, this story of the 
 Downfall of the Gods. 
 
 My gropings and searc kings amottgthe scattered 
 wreckage of a once mighty civilisation, my sojourn 
 amid the deserted temples of a once great people s 
 
xvi FOREWORD- 
 
 worship, had set me dreaming of the Past ; forced 
 my imagination to fearful probings of the Future-; 
 for these things told, in silent, grim mockery, of 
 the changing, unchanging fate of gods and 
 empires. 
 
 Hugh Clifford. 
 
THE DOWNFALL OF THE 
 GODS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE REVELATION 
 
 Over Angkor, the capital of the mighty Khmer 
 Empire, the hush of afternoon had fallen. All 
 nature, spent by the long hours of heat, lay 
 prostrate, awaiting breathlessly the first touch 
 of coolness that would come with the setting of 
 the sun. Only man — the tireless fashioner of 
 beautiful, useless things. — stared through the 
 glare under burdened eyelids and, at the ruthless 
 behest of man, still toiled and sweated in the 
 dust. 
 
 Beneath the drenching flood of sunlight 
 pouring down out of the colourless sky, Angkor 
 Wat stood forth in all its majesty, dominating 
 the featureless landscape. 
 
 From the margin of the Great Lake an 
 immense expanse of alluvial flat spread inshore 
 as far as the eye could carry. The turbid waters 
 and the jungle-smothered land merged imper- 
 
2 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 ceptibly the one into the other ; little creeks and 
 inlets cling-ing to the ragged skirts of the vegeta- 
 tion, and mud-stained amphibious trees wading 
 out into the shallows, or standing ankle-deep in 
 the slime and ooze. 
 
 The forest — an endless sea of tree-tops — inun- 
 dated the plain, the sombre waves of colour 
 fading as they receded to melt at last into a 
 misty blur of delicate, elusive tints low down 
 about the fretted skyline. Here and there the 
 sombre monotony of the jungle was relieved by 
 wide washes of vivid green, where the rice stood 
 ripening in the irrigated fields ; and in places the 
 surface of the earth was stained, as by some 
 parasitic growth, by the dusty greys and browns 
 of thatch, and the raw reds of tiled roofs visible 
 beneath their canopies of palm-fronds. For the 
 rest the forest — forest indescribably dingy, 
 squalid, and melancholy — draped itself like a 
 death-cloth over the face of the plain. 
 
 Nowhere else in all the wondrous fairyland 
 of tropical Asia could a landscape be found more 
 dreary to the eye, more depressing to the spirit, 
 than this spot on the shores of Tonle-Sap in 
 the lower valley of the Mekong. The sparse 
 hillocks served but to emphasise its flatness. 
 The very trees of the jungle had the air of 
 having slunk out of the muddy waters and of 
 huddling together shamefully, like a host of 
 woebegone waifs, on the parched and thirsty 
 soil. In their colouring there was no richness ; 
 and the thin heat-haze that shimmered so rest- 
 
THE REVELATION 3 
 
 lessly above them seemed an emanation from 
 the dust with which they were powdered. Even 
 the brilliant green of the rice-fields failed to 
 strike a -note of gaiety amid the dull blues and 
 blacks that enveloped and swamped it. Though 
 Nature had worked unnumbered miracles, 
 clothing the earth with vegetation and filling 
 with teeming life the water and the land, she 
 seemed, in some obscure fashion, to suffer here 
 an eternal defeat. The featureless aspect of the 
 plain and the monotony of sad colouring com- 
 bined to belittle its immensity. They made of 
 it a thing paltry and mean — a mere background 
 fitted only to throw into added prominence the 
 Titanic works of man. 
 
 Of these the most stupendous was the great 
 Wat. 
 
 From the day, more than five hundred years 
 earlier, when the Brahman conquerors had 
 stayed at last their wandering feet, and here, in 
 this wilderness of Kambodia, had elected to 
 consolidate their empire, they had wrought 
 strenuously for their own honour and aggrandise- 
 ment, but more strenuously still for the glory 
 and the propitiation of the gods of their 
 worship. 
 
 Quitting the banks of the sacred Ganges in 
 about the fifth century of our era, and striking 
 out recklessly into the Unknown, they had 
 driven irresistibly forward across the great 
 peninsula of Further India, fiery and impetuous 
 as some tremendous conflagration that licks 
 
4 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 up in its passage all with which it meets. 
 They had poured down through Assam and 
 Manipur ; had invaded, ravaged, and abandoned 
 the gracious garden-lands of Asia, which to-day 
 are Burma and northern Siam ; had subdued, 
 spoiled, and enslaved its peoples, and had lashed 
 whole populations to their victorious chariot- 
 wheels. Nor, while the force of the inexplicable 
 impulse that goaded them to wander remained 
 unexpended, had any wealth or charm or 
 natural beauty of the lands they traversed and 
 ruined prevailed to turn or stay them; yet, in 
 the end, like some mighty river that loses itself 
 ingloriously amid stagnant marshes, they had 
 found a final resting-place among the dreary 
 forests of Kambodia, and on the shores of its 
 mud-stained lake. 
 
 But the genius and the energy which had 
 borne them triumphantly across half a continent, 
 still demanded outlets ; and the men who had 
 conquered and destroyed upon so gigantic a 
 scale set themselves now, no less greatly, to 
 fashion and to create. 
 
 From the comfortless forest-lands they carved 
 out for themselves an immense empire, and 
 peopled it with the hosts they had reduced to 
 bondage. They exacted tribute and allegiance 
 from more than half the princes who ruled the 
 petty kingdoms of south-eastern Asia. They 
 converted the jungles about the margin of their 
 lake into irrigated fields, whence annually they 
 might draw enormous supplies of grain. They 
 
THE REVELATION 6 
 
 gfutted the earth of its mineral wealth as far 
 south as the Golden Chersonese. They made 
 Angkor Thom — their capital city — the centre of 
 a world. Thither many a crestfallen embassy 
 made humiliating pilgrimage. To its loud mart 
 flocked the merchants of India and of China, 
 and the spice-bearers from the rich islands of the 
 southern seas. A place dedicated beyond all 
 others to the service of the ancient gods, it 
 attracted the saintly and the learned of many 
 Hindu lands. It became the chosen resort of the 
 scholarly and the skilful, of the pandit and the 
 artisan, of the cunning carver of wood and stone. 
 In its crowded treasuries the Brahmans had 
 accumulated all the wealth that greed and 
 tyranny could clutch, that ingenuity could make 
 accessible, that the patient toil of thousands could 
 be forced to produce, until Angkor had become 
 like the unnaturally inflated limb of one sick of 
 elephantiasis, into which had drained all the 
 strength and all the nutriment that should have 
 maintained the whole shrunken body. 
 
 Always, too, the Brahmans — the twice-born 
 demigods— had achieved their successes at the 
 expense of the folk they ruled. They had been 
 the brain — the guiding, inspiring, subduing 
 influence. The thews and sinews had been 
 supplied by the low-caste peoples who served 
 and worshipped them, to whose lot had fallen 
 ever the heat and the burden of the day, the 
 unending travail, the labour unto death. 
 
 For in the universal belief in their divinity, 
 
6 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 abode the power of the Brahmans — a power 
 that enslaved the souls of low-caste men. 
 These latter, descendants of the conquered 
 peoples, raised awed eyes from the dust in 
 adoration of the priest-princes, at whose bidding 
 they toiled, and who ordered for them their lives. 
 They existed only in the shadow cast upon the 
 earth by these demigods who, to them, were a 
 divine mystery made manifest to human sight. 
 By serving, obeying, and honouring them, thus, 
 and thus only, might they do distant and vicar- 
 ious reverence to the Shining Ones and so, 
 acquiring merit, might win at last, in some yet 
 far-off incarnation, to more honourable estate. 
 The supreme patience, which is the very soul 
 of Asia — the patience which so unwearyingly 
 awaits the fulfilment of a promise vain and 
 remote — steeled them to endure. Wherefore, 
 like cattle, they bowed unresisting necks to the 
 Brahman's yoke, and their backs to ever- 
 increasing burdens. 
 
 And the burdens increased apace. 
 
 The people prostrated themselves in adoration 
 before the demigods who ruled them ; what time 
 the demigods themselves rested not from their 
 frantic efforts to propitiate the Deities from 
 whom their divinity was derived. 
 
 Ere ever the straggling mass of wooden build- 
 ings with roofs of thatch and tiles — which was 
 their capital city — had taken form, already they 
 had begun to construct, in honour of the High 
 Gods, temples of enduring stone. One by one 
 
THE REVELATION 7 
 
 the thirty shrines of Tha Phrom had come into 
 being, with their domes and columns and laby- 
 rinthine cloisters, decked with delicate sculpture. 
 Every hillock in the plain had been crowned by 
 its sacred edifice ; and from these little, perfect 
 4juildingrs^ the Brahmans had passed on to 
 greater and greater achievements. The Ba 
 Phun and the Ba Yon — the two splendid sanctu- 
 aries OT Angkor Thom — had in turn been 
 designed and executed; and each successive 
 effort of the Brahmans' genius had displayed ever 
 widening conceptions, a more scornful contempt 
 of difficulty, a more complete obsession by the 
 spell of the magnificent and the grandiose, and a 
 more lavish and wanton prodigality of human 
 toil. Drunken with power, indifferent to the 
 needs or the sufferings of their people, goaded 
 onward by a tremendous and augmenting 
 ambition, and urged, moreover, to still greater 
 efforts by their awful fear of the Gods, the 
 Brahmans, through the centuries, had piled 
 monolith on monolith, carving and fashioning 
 them wonderfully, and still had found their fierce 
 lust for architectural achievement unappeased; 
 till, in the fulness of time, the vast scheme of 
 Angkor Wat had burst, in all the splendour of 
 its inspiration, upon the imaginations of these 
 dreamers in stone. 
 
 Now, during three hundred years, men had 
 laboured ceaselessly in bitter travail, under the 
 pitiless sun-glare, to give that idea form; but 
 the end of their toiling was not yet. 
 
8 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 The Wat, cruel and inexorable as Fate, had 
 bounded and dominated the lives of thousands. 
 To the men of Angkor — the casteless ones 
 dedicated to its service — it had a monstrous 
 personality of its own. It was eternal. It had 
 always been there, claiming the strength and 
 vigour of their manhood, grinding them slowly 
 and mercilessly back into the dust whence they 
 had emerged. Men, whose fathers and grand- 
 fathers had grown grey in its slavery, had been 
 born beneath the shadow that it cast ; had 
 attained to maturity and had decayed with age, 
 still spending themselves in labour upon it ; and 
 had been carried to the burning-ghat under a 
 shadow imperceptibly lengthened. It brooded 
 over their imaginations, menacing and insatiable. 
 It paralysed their thought. They were blind to 
 the beauty of the marvel at which they wrought. 
 They knew only the measure of the toil and pain 
 which were the heavy price of it. They looked 
 at it with eyes sad and hopeless, spoke of it 
 furtively in fearful whispers. 
 
 Now, in the hush of afternoon, the Wat stood 
 forth in all the glory of its symmetry, dwarfing 
 the landscape. 
 
 Though much remained to be done, the labour 
 of three centuries had sufificed to give full shape 
 to the vision of the dreamer who designed it. 
 The immense outer cloister, some three miles in 
 girth, was completed only on two flanks. Of the 
 four flagged and raised causeways, destined to 
 lead to the threshold of the Wat from each of 
 
THE REVELATION 9 
 
 the cardinal points of the compass, only one, 
 that from the west, had been constructed in its 
 entirety ; and in the temple itself, many stones 
 still awaited the chisel of the sculptor. But 
 the five immense conical domes, rugged with 
 external carving and ornamentation, soared 
 triumphantly into the pale sky ; and the eye 
 was led up to them, from the basic platform 
 with its noble stairways, by the sculptured roofs 
 of two tiers of cloisters grouped around the 
 great, cliff- like mass of solid masonry that 
 supported the portals and courts and shrines 
 of the upper temple. And the colour of it was 
 wonderful. Grey for the most part — every tint 
 and shade of grey— g<ilden greys where the 
 sunlight smote the stones ; silver greys in the 
 lighter shadows ; deeper greys, merging into 
 blues and purples and blacks, where the shadows 
 were heavy ; and ruddy browns with violet tints 
 in them where the lichen had rusted the stones. 
 
 The sheer vastness of it, in design and exe- 
 cution, reduced all that surrounded it to utter 
 insignificance ; and the ant-like men who 
 swarmed, toiling about it, were lost in its 
 immensity, just as the faint clash and tinkle of 
 their tools was swallowed up by the heavy 
 stillness of the afternoon. 
 
 On the brink of the great moat at the spot 
 where, on the east, it skirted the limits of the 
 sacred precincts, a small, nearly naked boy was 
 seated, shaken by sobs. 
 
10 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 Behind him the forest crept up almost to the 
 edge of the water, and before him rose the Wat, 
 outlined sharply against the sky, and casting a 
 shadow that, enveloping him, traced a huddle 
 of grotesque shapes against the serried ranks of 
 trunks and branches. Between the child and 
 the threshold of the temple lay the moat, placid 
 and shining as a shield of bronze, reflecting with 
 startling vividness the inverted cones and 
 curiously wrought gables of the topmost shrines ; 
 and beyond it again was an open space, grown 
 upon sparsely by grass and weed and under- 
 wood, and littered with big fragments of grey 
 sandstone. No work was going forward on this 
 side of the building, and the boy was utterly 
 alone, with the mysterious, still forest, lapped in 
 slumber, behind him, and the immense, silent 
 bulk of the Wat rising in front to face and over- 
 shadow him. 
 
 He was a daintily fashioned little creature, 
 and the skin of his body was an even, pale 
 brown, without spot or blemish. His head, 
 small and shapely, set erect upon the slender 
 column of his throat, was covered by a shock of 
 fine, black hair, that hung curtain-wise across 
 his brows, about his ears, and to the nape of his 
 neck. His forehead was high and cleanly cut, 
 his nose straight with slightly drooping nostrils, 
 his cheek-bones rather prominent, his chin firm 
 and beautifully modelled, and the thin lips 
 pouted prettily. His hands and feet were at 
 once strong and delicate, though the palms of 
 
THE REVELATION 11 
 
 the former were thick with callosities, and the 
 soles of the latter horny with use. 
 
 But the most arresting feature of the child 
 were his eyes. They were large and very dark, 
 full of dreams and shadows, and they looked out 
 from Under heavily marked eyebrows, black as 
 his hair. They gave to him, at all times, an air 
 of solemn, unchildlike wisdom, and at this 
 moment they were full of trouble and swimming 
 in tears. 
 
 The actual cause of his grief was felt rather 
 than realised. He had come hither, seeking 
 solitude and refuge, from his parents' hut, and 
 shaken to the very depths of his being by the 
 storm of elemental passions which of a sudden 
 had burst above his head. Dimly he under- 
 stood that he, in some inexplicable fashion, had 
 been used as a missile in the fray, from the din 
 of which he had escaped. 
 
 There had been shrill word-battle between his 
 mother and a neighbour, over a matter of a 
 broken cooking-pot — warfare that dredged up 
 from the slime of two angry women's souls vile 
 thoughts, and viler words in which to clothe 
 them. Without warning, the panic-stricken 
 little boy had found himself in the heart of an 
 emotional cataclysm whose fury tortured his 
 nerves, while the very intensity of his distress 
 numbed and paralysed his understanding. 
 
 He had fled — pursued by he knew not what, 
 phantoms of horror and suggestion— and follow- 
 ing some obscure primordial instinct, had headed 
 
12 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 for the forest ; and now, by the edge of the moat, 
 he had thrown himself down in the shade, to 
 recover his breath, and still the frantic beating 
 of his heart. 
 
 His mother had always been to him a creature 
 vaguely mysterious. Sometimes, when he and 
 she were alone together, she would suddenly 
 fling soft arms around him and draw his head 
 down against her breasts — bruising him with her 
 violence, it might be — while she crooned over him 
 with words of extravagant affection. But when 
 the man, his father, was at hand — home from the 
 quarries or the rice-fields — her spasmodic love 
 seemed instantly to evaporate, leaving her the 
 cold, silent, passionless drudge of every day. 
 
 Childlike, he had never spoken to her or to 
 others of these strange outbursts of a love 
 that seemed to have in it something at once 
 fierce, hungry, and ashamed ; but often as he 
 sat watching her, busied over household tasks, 
 or emitting monosyllabic replies to the dis- 
 contented grumblings of her man, their master, 
 he would fall to wondering whether his memory 
 and his imagination were not playing the cheat, 
 whether, in truth, this immobile woman was one 
 with the raving, passion-torn creature who on 
 occasion usurped her place. 
 
 And as he had grown older, and his features 
 had begun to emerge from the rounded shape- 
 lessness of childhood into their present clean-cut 
 beauty, his mother's carefully concealed love 
 and adoration of him had become more intense, 
 
THE REVELATION X3 
 
 their manifestations more frequent ; what time, 
 the open distaste for him, which his father had 
 always evinced, had grown more and more 
 marked. Little by little, and so gradually that 
 he knew not when the understanding of these 
 things first dawned upon him, it had been borne 
 in upon his mind that he occupied in the house- 
 hold a place apart, an alien place ; that his two 
 small, snub-nosed, broad-faced brethren, who 
 followed him like dogs, were as unlike him in 
 mind as in body; that his mother loved him 
 above all things, but with an affection which she 
 dared not show in the presence of others ; that his 
 father hated him. He gave back hate for hate. 
 Vaguely all these memories were present with 
 him now, as he sat, sobbing and shaken, on the 
 grass by the moat's brink; and nebulous as a 
 mist, the conviction that they had some intimate 
 connection with the tumult from which he had 
 fled, stole up and enveloped him. Certain words 
 and phrases which had poured through the lips of 
 the woman while she abused his mother — words 
 which had lost themselves amid the excitement 
 and the terrors with which the quarrel had 
 smitten him — recurred now to his mind. Many 
 of them still were meaningless to the child ; but 
 through the foul murk of them an idea seemed 
 to loom. The mother who had borne him, and 
 whom for all her waywardness he loved, was a 
 wanton, and he a bastard. More. She was 
 mocked for pride — pride in her sin — pride in 
 him, who was the flaming badge of it. 
 
14 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 The horror of this thought, and of the 
 recollection of his mother's face distorted by a 
 passionate despair, as of some wild beast 
 brougfht to bay, shook him with a fresh tremor ; 
 and seizing- his head between his hands, and 
 resting his elbows on his knees, he broke into a 
 renewed burst of sobs. 
 
 The moat was at his feet, and his face was 
 bent above it ; and as he stared downward at 
 his reflection mirrored there, by the still water, a 
 fateful secret was revealed. 
 
 The afternoon was waning, and the jungle 
 was beginning to stir in the heavy sleep in 
 which, during all the long, hot hours of the day 
 it had been lapped. It was as though, with 
 faint rustlings, the warm earth was stretching 
 its limbs, very languidly, ere it awoke. Some- 
 where, far off, a woodpecker was tapping. 
 From homing bees, their hives high in the tree- 
 tops, there came a droning hum that was like a 
 delicate background to the forest silence. A 
 flock of paroquets burst out of the woodland, 
 circled, flashing like a kaleidoscope above the 
 moat, and instantly was gone. A big blue king- 
 fisher flew headlong down the bank, sounding 
 his discordant note. In the forest close at hand 
 arose for a moment a little flirt of feathers, and a 
 cicada overhead broke abruptly into his strident 
 love-song. Then once more the hush fell heavily ; 
 and through the silence, the water, lapping 
 about the feet of the sacred places, whispered 
 to the gazing boy its tremendous revelation. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THE PROOF 
 
 The moon, surrounded by fleecy clouds, was 
 climbing the eastern sky, as a man drew his 
 body slowly out of the water of the tank that 
 lay over against the main portals of Angkor 
 Wat. 
 
 He clambered to the summit of the causeway. 
 
 Before him, the temple rose a huge, shapeless 
 bulk of shadows, Out of which its gigantic cones 
 sprang heavenward, with outlines sharply de- 
 fined. Behind him, emerging from the obscurity, 
 the causeway, its flags white in the moonlight, 
 lay like an immense prostrate column. 
 
 Stepping deftly, one foot at a time, into the 
 loop of a cotton waist-skirt, he pulled the dry 
 garment upward to shield his nakedness, and let 
 slip his dripping loin-clout. Next, by means of 
 a few practised turns and twists, he converted 
 the cloth into the likeness of a pair of short, 
 baggy pants; and standing erect, stretched 
 himself luxuriously, and brushed the drops of 
 moisture from his eyes and hair. 
 
 The years which had passed since that fateful 
 
 16 
 
16 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 afternoon, upon which chance had revealed to 
 him the secret of his birth, had changed him 
 from boy to man, and by them the early promise 
 of beauty had been splendidly fulfilled. His 
 features, while retaining their distinctively 
 Hindu character, were now more strongly 
 marked. The nose was straighter, the chin 
 more firm, but the thin lips conveyed a sugges- 
 tion of sensuality, in spite of the rigid asceticism 
 of their lines. His head, under its close covering 
 of fine, black hair, was small and shapely, lending 
 to him a delusive air of stature. His hands and 
 feet, too, were small, bearing testimony, as did 
 every part of him, to the high-caste blood that 
 ran in his veins. He moved as move the wild 
 things of the forest — every motion graceful, 
 clean, and sure, eloquent of the immense reserve 
 of force that freed it from all trace of effort. 
 
 Almost nude, bronze-tinted, statuesque, 
 magnificently developed by the unremitting 
 toil which, as yet, was making, not breaking, 
 his manhood, he stood there in the transparent 
 darkness of the moonlight as perfectly fashioned 
 a young animal as ever humanity had bred. 
 Nature herself had stamped him with the seal of 
 the great ruling caste ; yet no Brahman's wafer 
 was on his forehead, his body was clothed in a 
 single coarse garment, the palms of his hands 
 were roughened by constant labour, and he 
 himself, an unconsidered unit in a host of toilers, 
 had been until that night a serf and a hewer of 
 stone. 
 
THE PROOF 17 
 
 Fate had decreed that his days should be spent 
 among the casteless folk, who were as driven 
 cattle before their Brahman lords ; but from 
 that day, long ago, when the water had 
 whispered its secret to his childish ears, he had 
 hugged to his heart a dear, inspiring conviction. 
 In that hour he had been aware of something 
 that stirred within him and matched that which 
 the reflection of his features had revealed — the 
 soul of the Dominant Race moving, like a babe 
 in the womb, in the heart and brain of this its 
 unacknowledged son. An excitement of pride 
 and of delight, a sudden, new, strange sense of 
 power — of latent fot*ce, of potential greatness — 
 had shaken the boy with long-drawn passionate 
 throbs ; and thereafter the knowledge that he 
 was not as other toilers in the dust had sus- 
 tained and uplifted him. To his fellows life was 
 bereft of hope. It stretched away before them, 
 an endless vista of monotony and labour, till it 
 lost itself at last in the smoke of the burning- 
 ghats. But to Chun it was full of promise. 
 The days through which he was living were 
 merely a peripd of trial, of probation. Fortified 
 by the conviction, which he cherished with so 
 triumphant a certainty, and hid from his fellows 
 with so jealous a care, he could make terms with 
 the unendurable. The pains and troubles of the 
 moment were powerless to oppress the spirit of 
 one who lived, not for the present, but for 
 the future. When the appointed hour should 
 strike, he would slough his pretended inferiority. 
 
18 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 as a snake sheds its worn-out skin, and would 
 suddenly blaze forth, before the eyes of those 
 who had known him for one casteless like them- 
 selves, a demig-od confessed. 
 
 In anticipation of that hour he prepared him- 
 self with a diligrence and resolution that never 
 slackened. With the aid of old Slat, the wise 
 man, he acquired a knowledge of the sacred 
 script, such as was rarely possessed by men of 
 his supposed estate ; and he had even made a 
 little acquaintance with the holy, forbidden books. 
 And the ease wherewith he had gotten this lore 
 had itself been full of wonderful surprises. It had 
 been as though he remembered, rather than 
 learned — remembered things half forgotten and 
 now recalled to memory. Once more it was the 
 Brahman blood astir in his brain, bringing with 
 it that pulsing sense of power. 
 
 Secretly, too, he had performed a thousand acts 
 of purification, the better to fit himself for the 
 moment, when, as he surely believed, he should 
 be received back into caste by the demigods, his 
 brethren. While he awaited the dawning of that 
 day, he herded with the dull masses of his fellows, 
 and with them prostrated himself before the 
 priest-princes, the offspring of those who, in the 
 beginning, sprang from the mouth of Purusha, 
 the Fount of the Universe, the eternal Soul of 
 Things. But always he felt that he, m truth, 
 belonged to the number of the adored, not to the 
 adorers ; and already, almost unconsciously, he 
 lorded it over the latter, less by virtue of his 
 
THE PROOF 19 
 
 thews and sinews, than by the magic force of 
 mind. 
 
 Thus, through childhood on into early man- 
 hood, the secret of his divinity had been to 
 Chun a wondrous spinner of dreams. How 
 good life was — to taste, to smell, to touch — 
 while these great visions made of it a fairy tale 
 that yet was true ! 
 
 Breathlessly he had awaited the time when, 
 having come to man's estate, he should put the 
 faith that was in him to its final, supreme test — 
 the test that lay ever ready to his hand. But 
 when at last he knew himself free to act, he was 
 long restrained by fears and hesitations. The 
 dream was in itself so beautiful that he feared to 
 shatter it. Morever, the awful punishment of 
 failure terrorised his imagination. 
 
 In the angle formed by the causeway and the 
 western extremity of the great basic platform of 
 the Wat, a tank held its clear waters within 
 massive walls of stone, wonderfully carved. 
 This was the bathing-place sacred to the use of 
 those demigods who performed the offices of their 
 religion within the temple. Only a Brahman 
 might lave himself here, and for one of the low- 
 caste folk to dip in it so much as a finger-tip was 
 untold pollution and defilement. Also it was 
 known to all men that, save for the twice-born, 
 these waters were a flaming death — that they 
 would peel and strip the flesh from off the bones 
 of the impious one who dared to let his unclean 
 hand so much as brush their surface. Folk 
 
20 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 drew away from them shuddering, as from a 
 boiling caldron, and there were living even then 
 in Angkor one or two wrecked and mangled 
 wretches who, in a moment of folly, had set at 
 defiance the universal belief. 
 
 For months Chun had been haunted and 
 obsessed by the thought of that placid pool, in 
 which there lurked, perhaps, a dreadful death. 
 Again and again those calm waters, so tranquil 
 in their massive confinement beneath the star- 
 set sky, had drawn him to themselves with a 
 compelling, magnetic attraction : again and 
 again, his young blood rebelling against the 
 peril in its fierce love of life, he had recoiled, 
 terror-stricken and ashamed. Death, fearful, 
 unspeakably agonising — death in this life and in 
 all future lives — glared at him from those still 
 depths. Though his faith in his godhead was so 
 firmly rooted in him as to have become an 
 integral part of his being, yet was the risk 
 appalling. He clung to the dream, longed 
 hungrily for the reality, but still was held a 
 prisoner by his fears. 
 
 And now to-night, at last, desire had won the 
 mastery ; and with bursting heart and throbbing 
 veins, he had nerved himself for the worst that 
 might befall, had drawn his muscles taut to 
 resist the threatened agony, had closed his eyes, 
 and with a great outcry to the Gods, had leaped. 
 
 The surprise, that yet was no surprise; the 
 sudden release from the tense, agonising sus- 
 pense ; the wild triumph that flared up in him like 
 
THE PROOF 21 
 
 a roaring flame; the glad, intoxicating relief that 
 had possessed him, as the waters broke cool and 
 refreshing about his fevered body — had almost 
 shocked him into insensibility ; but instantly he 
 had recovered, and had drunk his fill of the most 
 magical of all elixirs — success snatched glor- 
 iously from the very teeth of death. 
 
 Later, lying on his back and gazing upward 
 through the shadows of the night at the 
 immense, brooding mass of the Wat, darker 
 than the enveloping darkness, gradually there 
 had stolen upon him, with a force never hitherto 
 experienced, the tremendous conviction of his 
 godhead. Like some celestial, healing balm it 
 descended upon the soul of him, dowering him 
 suddenly with a sense of ineffable peace ; so 
 calm was it, so certain, so strengthening and all- 
 pervading. He glowed with a triumph which 
 steadied and uplifted, while it filled and thrilled 
 him. All his childlike faith awoke to add force 
 and glory to the impression. It was as though 
 the sacred waters, which were powerless to do 
 him hurt, were breathing new virtue and vigour 
 into him through every gaping pore. Almost 
 could he hear the footfalls of the Deva, the 
 Shining Ones — of Indra, Lord of the Air 
 and of the Thunders — of Brahma, the universal, 
 self-existing soul — of Atharvan, the Proto- Priest 
 — passing out from the holy places, builded for 
 their worship, to administer this unique baptism 
 to him, the offspring of the Gods. 
 
 Long that vision held him ; but in the end he 
 
22 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 drew his body out of the water, and donned the 
 coarse garment that was his daily wear. Then, 
 a gfod confessed, he stood, godlike, on the flags 
 of the big causeway, delighting in the strength 
 and beauty of his young manhood, and in the 
 glorious, strange world into which he had been 
 new-born — the world which the god in him 
 should presently shape to his will. 
 
 Slowly the moon was freeing itself from its 
 escort of clouds. Before Chun, at the cause- 
 way's end, the wide stairway that leads upward 
 to the main entrance of the cloisters lay 
 heaped in shadow. On either side of it, dimly 
 seen, great cobras, seven-headed, fashioned 
 monstrously in stone, writhed into the darkness. 
 Lions in strange postures, and hideous giants, 
 resting immense, folded hands on grounded 
 clubs, flanked them, vague and ghostly in the 
 uncertain light. Above them, the long, uneven 
 line of the cloisters' roof-ridge ran away and lost 
 itself in the obscurity to right and left ; and over 
 it again uprose the solid bulk of the temple and 
 the huge cones in which it culminated. Every 
 moment the strength of the moonlight increased, 
 touching tenderly the carved edges of the 
 towers, silvering the fretted stone-work, reveal- 
 ing hidden tints in moss and lichen, suggesting 
 more than it disclosed, plunging great masses of 
 the Wat into mystery and gloom. But the 
 causeway, raised above the surrounding en- 
 closure to a height of a dozen feet, was white, all 
 white, with every rigid line of it clearly defined ; 
 
THE PROOF 23 
 
 and the man, standing there alone upon it, with 
 a long, black shadow extending over the flags 
 behind him, became suddenly conspicuous. 
 
 He had forgotten prudence, forgotten the 
 necessity for caution, for concealment. The 
 intoxication that flooded his brain was of such 
 overpowering potency that it left no space for 
 the thoughts of every day. He, in his new- 
 found divinity, forgot to fear mankind, or even 
 his fellows, the demigods. 
 
 With a bell-like clink of bangles, a girl stepped 
 suddenly from the shadows huddled about the 
 stairway of the temple, placed soft fingers upon 
 his arm and drew him into concealment. As 
 she emerged from the darkness, and ere she 
 again vanished into it, dragging him after her, 
 Chun saw her, as in a flash, and took in the 
 vision of her with a wonderful complete- 
 ness. 
 
 She was very small and slender and beauti- 
 fully formed, as though the Gods who fashioned 
 her had taken joy in the exquisite perfection of 
 their handiwork ; and the slim symmetry of her 
 figure was delicately revealed by the soft silk 
 cloth which, draped across her breasts, and 
 leaving the right shoulder nude, fell from waist 
 to ankles. Her arms, bare, shapely, something 
 over thin — little virginal arms — showed against 
 that vesture like foam upon a wave. Chun 
 was struck breathless by the extreme whiteness 
 of her — the whiteness and the divine frailty. 
 
 The small, oval face, under its low, wise fore- 
 
24 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 head, was of an even transparent pallor. Her 
 deep brown eyes looked out, with steady gaze, 
 from beneath brows tenderly curved. Her lips, 
 full and parted, lent to her face its single note of 
 rich colour ; but for all their fulness, they were 
 firm, and from behind them peeped two tiny 
 sharp teeth, shaped like the poison-fangs of a 
 snake, which broke the evenness of their fellows. 
 But her chiefest glory was her hair. It was 
 very dark, with a marvellous deep shadow in it, 
 such as falls at dusk in the secret places of the 
 woods. Dry and soft, it waved back in two 
 rounded billows from a natural parting on her 
 forehead. The pallor of her face enhanced its 
 beauty ; its darkness etherialised the extreme 
 whiteness of her ; and the deep, grave eyes, 
 glancing from beneath it, borrowed therefrom 
 an added mystery. 
 
 Those eyes were bent upon Chun as she 
 stepped toward him, scanning him closely, and 
 as she touched his arm, they were of a sudden 
 clouded, till their brown was almost black. For 
 an instant the little pale face became fixed and 
 rigid ; and across it there swept a gust of some 
 strange magic of the emotions, or, it might be, 
 a subtle exhalation from the well-nigh obliterated 
 memories of lives long passed. In that instant 
 her face — the face of a child just budding into 
 the maturity of girlhood — became the face of a 
 Seer, infinitely old, wise beyond the limits of 
 human wisdom, filled with unearthly knowledge 
 of the mysteries of life and death, of the past 
 
THE PROOF 25 
 
 and of the future ; fateful, seeing in a single flash 
 all the manifold mischance of sad humanity. 
 
 Chun marked the change with wonder but 
 without surprise ; for to him this was no woman, 
 though the touch of her fingers was soft and 
 warm upon his flesh. Through the glamour of 
 her loveliness and the air of mystery that, like a 
 vapour, seemed to cast a veil around her, she 
 shone forth for him an Incarnation of some 
 Deva who, in this supreme moment of his 
 emotional experience, had stepped down from 
 her heaven to hallow his baptism. So deep- 
 seated in the soul of him was this conviction 
 that, forgetful of the pride and triumph of his 
 own godhead, he sank at her feet in the shadows, 
 prostrating himself, murmuring in the ancient 
 tongue broken words of praise, of supplication, 
 of gratitude. 
 
 Thus, from the first moment of their meeting, 
 Chun knelt to her, his divinity — was on his knees 
 before her in worship of her beauty, of her 
 mystery, of the compelling magic that was hers. 
 There were times through which he was yet to 
 live, when he was to rise up to leave her, curbing 
 his wrath lest he should lay violent hands upon 
 her, and drag her in the dust into which she 
 had stamped him. But ever the real Chun, as 
 now in the beginning, was on his knees at her 
 feet in an eternal agony of adoration. 
 
 A musical ripple of laughter sounded above 
 him in the darkness ; and squatting on the flags, 
 Chun raised his head and looked at her. She 
 
26 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 was convulsed with merriment, the slim figure 
 shaking- till all her bangles were chiming to her 
 laugh. For a moment she could not find breath 
 for speech. 
 
 "A Deva! I !" she gasped. "An Incarna- 
 tion of the Shining Ones ! " 
 
 There was bitter derision in her tones ; and 
 then, of a sudden, she was grave, and to her 
 eyes and face that strange look of age returned. 
 
 "And yet . . . " she said presentlyj as-though 
 she were speaking, not to Chun, but to herself. 
 " And yet . . . who knows ? Which of us can 
 guess what we are, or whence we come, or why ? 
 I am that which I am ; but even to me — to me, 
 perhaps beyond the common lot — at times far-off 
 voices have whispered. They make themselves 
 heard in the stillness, in the hush of the night. 
 They murmur of ... I know not what — 
 shadowy memories of lives long passed. Or are 
 they only dreams — dear, impossible dreams ? " 
 
 Chun rose quickly to his feet, towering above 
 her in the half light. He knew now that his 
 imagination had betrayed him, and that the girl 
 at his side was no Deva, but a woman fashioned 
 of warm flesh and blood. The reaction from the 
 pitch of intensity to which a moment before his 
 emotions had been tuned was abrupt and 
 stunning as a blow ; yet he was still exalted by 
 the consciousness that at last his godhead had 
 been proved. That knowledge warmed his 
 heart, soothed and stimulated his soul, satisfied 
 his every ambition, fulfilled his wildest hopes. 
 
THE PROOF 27 
 
 But the perfection of his triumph, he dimly felt, 
 was somehow marred by the presence of this 
 girl. She aroused the man in him, appealing 
 strongly to his passions, and in that hour he 
 would fain have been only a god. 
 
 Yet somewhere, deep down in him, there was 
 set stirring a secret, intimate joy that she was 
 no Deva, but a woman, and that he, though a 
 demigod, was still a man. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 
 
 She lifted critical eyes to gaze upon him, 
 apprising his physical beauty with calm ap- 
 preciation. Then she spoke again. 
 
 "Are you mad?" she whispered. "Are you 
 mad, or have you a wager with death ? Do you 
 know that it is a sin past all forgiveness for 
 a Sudra — a man of servile caste — thus to pollute 
 the waters of the sacred places ? " 
 
 " But I am no Sudra, I ! " said Chun proudly. 
 " I am of the number of the demigods! Mark 
 me well. Is not my body fashioned in their like- 
 ness ? For a very long time the secret of my 
 birth has been known to me, and to-night 
 at last my divinity has been proved — proved ! " 
 
 The triumphant music of his own words 
 thrilled him. The tremendous truth seemed to 
 take to itself a new might and majesty, now 
 that he had dared to translate it into speech. 
 
 "Blasphemer! Blasphemer of the most holy 
 demigods ! " she exclaimed in mock horror, and 
 a light laugh tripped at the heels of her cry. 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 29 
 
 " You are overbold to whisper such vain things, 
 even here, alone with the night and me ! " 
 
 " But I uttered no blasphemy," protested 
 Chun. " I spoke only the truth." 
 
 Again she scanned him critically. 
 
 "Yes. It is at least true that you are comely 
 and that you are made something after the 
 model of these demigods of yours ; but blas- 
 phemer and defiler of the holy places though 
 you be, cannot you be content to be a man? 
 Your limbs have toiled and wrought and broken 
 and hewn, and your labours have dowered you 
 with strength. Your hands have not been 
 folded eternally in mawkish prayer, as are those 
 of the twice-born. They are not velvet-soft and 
 weak and vicious ; they are firm and strong 
 and rough. They might be cruel if the will 
 were there — not with the apish cruelty of the 
 torturers, but with the brutal force of the man 
 whom passion kindles. You are no demigod — 
 be sure of that — and thank the High Gods that, 
 in this incarnation, at least, they have moulded 
 you in the likeness, not of a mannikin, but of 
 a man ! " 
 
 " You lie," said Chun simply. " Not an hour 
 ago the sacred waters proved beyond all question 
 that I am one of the living gods ! " 
 
 Again she laughed derisively. 
 
 "How have they proved it ? " she asked. 
 
 Chun drew her deeper4nto the shadows, and 
 at the touch of her every pulse in him beat 
 a quickened measure. At the foot of the great 
 
30 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 stairway, in an angle of the balustrade, they 
 squatted on the flags facing one another. Chun 
 could feel her warm breath upon his cheek. It 
 was fragrant as a flower. 
 
 "Thus I have proved it," he whispered, his 
 voice vibrating with excitement. "A little 
 before you came, I plunged headlong into the 
 waters of the forbidden place. To a Sudra, as 
 all men know, that were destruction, yet / took 
 no hurt! The High Gods have accepted me, 
 who long have known the secret of my birthright, 
 and to-morrow I will go to my brethren, the 
 demigods, and proclaim to them my kinship 
 with them." 
 
 An inarticulate sound came from her as he 
 ceased speaking, and peering through the gloom, 
 he saw that she was once more shaken by un- 
 controllable laughter. ' 
 
 " Fool ! " she gasped presently, through stifled 
 sobs of merriment. "Fool, fool, fool! Are 
 there stillliving in our midst folk so simple as to 
 believe the old wives' tales which the Brahmans, 
 for their own purposes, have made current? 
 How cunningly hath Prajdpati, the maker of all 
 things, fashioned folly in the hearts of men! 
 Do you really fancy that in those so-called 
 sacred waters Death lies in wait for casteless 
 men and Sudras? Is it possible that, though 
 this world of ours is old and grey with age, 
 those who live in it remain always credulous as 
 little children ? " 
 
 " But these waters are not as other waters," 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 31 
 
 said Chun with intense conviction. "That is 
 no legend, but the truth." 
 
 "Truth ! " she echoed with a bitter sneer, and 
 spat upon the ground in token of her disgust. 
 "Truth! What is truth? Brahman lies that 
 masquerade in stately trappings. Lies, all lies 
 — lies invented by the weaklings you call demi- 
 gods, who lie that they may live in ease and 
 luxury, and dare not cease from lying lest they 
 perish ! " 
 
 " Be still !" cried Chun. "I will not listen to 
 such blasphemies ! " 
 
 The Brahman in him awoke, outraged and 
 wrathful, at her denunciation of the caste which 
 that evening had claimed him. The superstitious 
 awe and reverence with which a lifetime passed 
 among a subject people had taught him to 
 regard the demigods, cried out in horror against 
 this fearless defamer of holy things ; but more 
 than all he was gripped by a cold personal terror. 
 This girl was striking at the very foundation- 
 stones upon which the dream of his life had 
 been reared, and already doubt assailed him. 
 
 " Blasphemies !" she repeated in unutterable 
 scorn. "To blaspheme is to decry that which 
 is sacred; but here is nought save a little dust, 
 built heaven-high on dust, for the worship of the 
 lean brains, that by these weavers of nothing out 
 of nothing are for ever ruled and cowed. They 
 are lies, I say, all lies — a lie their godhead, a lie 
 their divinity, a lie their purifications where no 
 purity abides, a lie even, it may be, the High 
 
32 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 Gods in whose name they gfrind men's lives to 
 powder! Which of us has seen them, those 
 dumb, invisible Beings for whose glory you 
 miserable Sudras labour all your days, piling 
 stone on stone the better to knock at the gates 
 of their brazen heaven ? Mayhap even they are 
 lies — black lies of the Brahmans' fashioning — 
 but this at least is certain : all the rest are fairy- 
 tales set up like boggarts to scare fools, that the 
 crops you sow in pain and tears may be reaped 
 by the demigods alone ! " 
 
 She paused breathless, shaken by the passion 
 of her scorn ; and Chun was silent too. 
 Dismayed and bewildered by her appalling 
 blasphemies, he waited expectant of some 
 thunderbolt that surely must punish them, and 
 when nothing happened his terror was increased. 
 Were the High Gods powerless as he to defend 
 themselves from this ruthless shatterer of his 
 dreams ? 
 
 " Listen," she resumed more calmly. " I, 
 who am what I am — who am what these same 
 demigods of yours have made me — I speak 
 because I know. This world in which we live is 
 based upon a lie ; is reared up, tottering and 
 perilous, with only lies to stay it ; is ruled and 
 held together by lies. If once the truth be 
 understood, the whole vast edifice will topple 
 inward, crumble, and collapse. Sometimes I 
 dream that the hour of its fall is near at hand, 
 and that through me, even me, the Brahmans 
 will be brought to ruin." 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 33 
 
 " Who are you ? What are you ? " whispered 
 Chun. 
 
 Again the idea flashed across his mind that 
 this was no mere mortal who, in his supreme 
 hour of triumph, had risen out of the darkness 
 and the shadows to rob him of its perfection. 
 
 "A moment ago you worshipped me as a 
 Deva," she said softly. "For a little longer 
 let me be, to you at least, a daughter of the 
 Gods. You would have me believe in your 
 godhead. I make no such demand on your 
 credulity, though this much of divinity is mine 
 — that I have emerged from the mists by 
 which you still are blinded, and that now, 
 like the Gods, I see clearly, knowing good 
 and evil." 
 
 "But your name?" asked Chun. " How do 
 men call you?" 
 
 "What matters the name of my body? It is 
 my soul that to-night speaks with your soul. 
 For a very long time it has been held in a 
 bondage of silence : now it begins to snuff the 
 air of freedom." 
 
 She tilted her chin and inhaled the fragrance 
 of the night. 
 
 " If you would know what manner of goddess 
 I am, think of me as the Spirit of Destruction," 
 she said. 
 
 As she spoke, her face became fixed and 
 rigid, and even in the uncertain light the 
 shadows deepened in her eyes. Again there 
 swept- across her features the fateful look which 
 
34 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 Chun had marked when first her hand was laid 
 upon his arm. 
 
 " So am I well named," she continued. " The 
 Spirit of Destruction! For this, perhaps, the 
 voices of the night have whispered in my ears 
 time out of mind, for this — that through me this 
 monstrous edifice of lies should at last be 
 brought to nought, wrecking all that is builded 
 upon it, and crushing in its fall the foul beings 
 who have fashioned it. And now listen and 
 mark well that which I have to tell, for out of 
 the depths of suffering have I drawn forth my 
 knowledge. Nay," she cried, touching his bare 
 breast with the palm of her hand, when he made 
 as though he would have stayed her speech. 
 " Nay, for you shall listen 1 Too long I have 
 pondered these secrets in my heart, and never 
 till now have I found one to whom with safety I 
 could utter even a word of them." 
 
 "And I?" whispered Chun. "How do you 
 know that it is safe to speak such blasphemies 
 in my hearing? I have told you that I am of 
 the number of the demigods. How if I betray 
 you to my brethren ? " 
 
 She answered with a derisive laugh. 
 
 "How do I know that it is safe to speak 
 to you ? Think ! Did I not see you bathing in 
 the forbidden waters? Do not the Brahman 
 wardens keep their vigil even now in the temple 
 guard-house, yonder ? Have I not only to raise 
 my voice, and will you not on the instant be 
 taken? And after . . . ? What think you is. 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 35 
 
 the measure of retribution meted out to those 
 who sin against the Lie? Again I speak 
 because j I know. I have but to cry aloud, and 
 in a little space you will be stretched upon a bed 
 of torment, from which you shall not be lifted till 
 your brain has snapped, or your body is still in 
 death. You have committed the unpardonable 
 sin — the sin past all redemption — for you have 
 disproved a lie. Are you not afraid to find 
 yourself thus held, soul and body, in the hollow 
 of a woman's hand ? Accuse me as you will, the 
 Brahmans will not hearken ; but to me they will 
 listen readily. Say, shall I cry to them ? Shall 
 we put my words to the test } " 
 
 Chun clutched her arm with the eagerness 
 of terror. 
 
 " Be still ! " he gasped. 
 
 He drew in his breath sharply, for of a sudden 
 he knew that she spoke the truth. In spite of 
 his still unshaken faith in his own divinity, 
 the fact that the Rulers, his brethren, would be 
 less easily convinced, flashed upon him with 
 a shocking certainty. The godhead of the 
 Brahmans, he knew, carried with it no immunity 
 from physical suffering or from death. He had 
 thought boldly to proclaim his right to be taken 
 into caste, pointing for confirmation to the test 
 which he had braved ; he had dreamed that he 
 would be accepted, welcomed as a brother who, 
 by some mischance, had strayed from out the 
 fold. Now, in an instant, this girl's scornful 
 words convicted him of presumptuous folly. The 
 
36 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 waters had set the seal of truth upon the belief 
 in his godhead which so long had been his 
 cherished secret, but the high hopes that had 
 sustained him during all his days of toil and 
 servitude were as distant as ever. Ah, she was 
 indeed well named — the Spirit of Destruction ! 
 
 " Have you heard tell of Phun, the mad- 
 man ? " her quiet voice was asking. " Like 
 you, he dreamed that he was a Brahman. Like 
 you, he put his belief to the proof." 
 
 "Yes. I know him. But he, he was no 
 demigod, as the event made manifest," said 
 Chun. "Slat, the wise man, Slat, his brother, 
 found him at the dawn, writhing in the dust 
 without the big gateway. He was sightless ; 
 the tongue of him was consumed, as it were, 
 by fire ; all his flesh was flayed and bleeding. 
 Even his reason had gone from him, and ever 
 since that day he has been dumb and pitiful to 
 see, and helpless as a maimed brute. He braved 
 the forbidden waters, it is true, but he was no 
 Brahman, and they destroyed him utterly. 
 Often I have seen our folk point at him and 
 tell the tale of his presumption and its punish- 
 ment." 
 
 " I saw that punishment," said the girl, with a 
 little, hard laugh, "The waters did him no 
 ,harm, but that night your demigods were more 
 watchful. They captured him as he came up out 
 of the tank, gagged him and bore him into the 
 guard-house. I was only a child then, but the 
 sound of the scuffle awoke me. I followed and 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 37 
 
 hid without, and peeping through the embrasure, 
 watched all they did to him. His -tongue they 
 wrested out with red-hot pincers, and even then 
 he screamed and screamed, while the blood 
 gushed from his mouth. Red-hot irons drilled 
 his eyes. With little sharp knives, working very 
 busily and in silence, they flayed him. They 
 were hurried, for the night was far advanced, 
 but I marked their apish pleasure in their task. 
 From time to time one or another laughed, 
 sucking at his lips. Some trembled with excite- 
 ment, and Baguan Das, the old High Priest, 
 sobbed and uttered little cries of ecstasy. 
 Before the dawn they carried him to the 
 threshold of the big gateway, and threw him 
 out to writhe in the dust — a lie to shore a 
 lie. I know, I know, for I saw it all — and I, 
 too, a little, I licked my lips. It was a new 
 emotion — that ; and a devil of pleasure, some- 
 where deep down in the dregs of me, was set 
 stirring by it." 
 
 She paused, and he shuddered. He was 
 possessed by a frantic, hot desire to crush her in 
 his arms, and to stifle on her lips the words that 
 so blighted his dreams of gods .and men, aye, 
 and of women too. 
 
 As though conscious of his thought, she drew 
 a little apart from him, and for a moment her 
 breath came hurriedly. Then she spoke again. 
 
 " Listen," she said. " Listen, since it is my 
 will that you should hear that which no mortal 
 in this terror-stricken place has yet dared t(j 
 
38 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 whisper ; which few havei had the courage even 
 to harbour as a suspicion amid the shuddering 
 secrecies of their hearts. Listen while I speak 
 of these lies that sway our world. 
 
 " Let the High Gods be, since of them we can 
 only guess : but the divinity of the Brahmans, 
 that at least is a lie confessed. In what do they 
 differ from the rest of mankind ? Are they not 
 mortal even as we? Are they not born of 
 women ? Are they not in the beginning helpless 
 babies, all dull, grey eyes and gaping, sucking 
 mouths ? Do they not grow into children, who 
 play in the dust, even as other children? Do 
 they ' not become men, full of lusts and low 
 desires, as it is the manner of men to be ? Do 
 they not take unto themselves wives, and there- 
 after beget children in their turn? Have they 
 not every frailty common to their fellow-men? 
 Are they not passion-swept, greedy, torn by 
 anger, excited by cruelty, slaves to the eye, 
 bondsmen to the flesh, jealous, miserly, false, 
 mean? Are not idiots born among them, aye, 
 and in greater numbers than among the Sudras ? 
 In a word, are they not men — just men — as 
 vulnerable of body, as limited of soul as others 
 of their kind ? I tell you that they are less than 
 that, for ease and luxury have weakened them. 
 I know them for what they ate — futile servants 
 of their passions, unfettered, uncontrolled, save 
 when a woman has the whim and the wit to 
 torture them, to make of them her thralls, to 
 stamp them into the mire which is less foul than 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 39 
 
 they. A hi. Indra! Lord of the Thunders! 
 Demigods, forsooth, these sorry rags of human- 
 ity that Prajdpati in bitter irony has created! 
 Before our eyes they are rotting to decay, yet 
 you foolish Sudras hold them in awe ! Perhaps 
 the Brahmans of cJd time, who conquered all the 
 world, possessed miraculous powers such as are 
 claimed in our day by their degenerate offspring : 
 but the age of miracles has passed away, for the 
 earth is spent, and the race of heroes has left no 
 trace behind it. Now only their name survives, 
 and in its mighty shadow the Brahmans lurk, 
 like beasts of prey, and you cowed Sudras are 
 the witless cattle upon which they batten. How 
 long shall this monstrous wrong endure? Ah, 
 that a man might arise to tear this myth to 
 shreds — a man with force enough in the soul of 
 him" to rouse our people, and with the skill and 
 daring to make himself their leader ! Ah, that / 
 were a man! Ye gods of sky and air and 
 earth! If I were a man, how should these 
 Brahmans tremble ! " 
 
 She threw her slender arms aloft in a passion- 
 ate gesture. Her whole body, quivering with 
 the excitement that shook her, seemed to be 
 possessed by a very demon of rage at her own 
 impotence, at the intolerable vanity of the fate 
 that sheathed so militant and virile a soul in a 
 scabbard so delicate and frail. 
 
 "It is fortunate for you that you are 
 not a man," said Chun, scornful in his turn. 
 " Wickedly you have miscalled the Gods and the 
 
40 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 demigrods, of whom I, too, am one ; yet the 
 Heavens have taken no heed ; the night silences 
 are still unbroken. It is because you are only a 
 woman. Earth and sky regard not the vain 
 outcry of one so feeble and so burdened with all 
 unwisdom. The Gods will not even stir them- 
 selves to blast you ! " 
 
 She turned upon him slowly, and looked at 
 him through the shadows out of calmly con- 
 temptuous eyes. 
 
 " So it is always. So it has ever been. They 
 are impotent folk, these High Gods of yours. 
 Only by men is their sanctity defended. It is 
 not they, but the men who prate of them, who 
 punish what you call blasphemy or sacrilege — 
 and why? Is it not because the Brahmans 
 claim to be the shadow cast on earth by the 
 Gods we cannot see, the Gods we cannot hear, 
 the dumb ones who cannot speak to us ? And 
 if there be no substance, how then should the 
 shadow have being ? Are not they, perhaps, the 
 most monstrous lie of all, moulded from nothing- 
 ness — vain imaginings glorified by their creators 
 for their own selfish ends ? If I spit in the face 
 of the meanest of our kind, forthwith he strikes 
 to avenge the insult. Now spit I — thus — -upon 
 these same High Gods, and behold ... I am 
 unscathed ! " 
 
 "Be still! Be still!" cried Chun, beside 
 himself with superstitious terrors. "The Gods 
 scorn to wreak vengeance upon the unclean. In 
 their heavens they abide, magnificent and aloof. 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 41 
 
 They pay no heed to the ravings of an angry 
 woman." 
 
 " That is easy to say, but who; shall prove or 
 yet disprove it? If they exist, then must their 
 dwelling-place be very far away, and they 
 themselves too busy with their loves and their 
 revels to regard the prayers we raise to them, 
 since even our revilings they cannot hear. Who 
 has heard their voices? Which of us has 
 touched their robes? When have they made 
 answer to our supplications ? When have they 
 punished the reproaches of man with the thunder- 
 bolt or with the earthquake ? We pray always, 
 and whether we pray v-r no, in its appointed 
 season comes the full harvest or the dearth, the 
 parching drought or the rain that gives life to 
 the fields. If they be not dead, then certainly 
 are they drugged or slumbering, regarding not 
 at all those who on earth worship or blaspheme 
 them," 
 
 "They bide their time," said Chun. "It is 
 true that no word spoken by us can move them ^ 
 yet we pray on, humbly, as befits the servants of 
 the Gods. Thus seek we a little to raise our 
 souls nearer to them, so that in the end they, 
 perchance, may hear us. But you, though they 
 disdain to strike you dead, will in some future 
 life pay the full price of your impious thoughts 
 and utterances." 
 
 " What care I for future lives ? " the girl cried 
 passionately. " Of past existences, if such there 
 be, I can remember nought, save now and again 
 
42 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 when, out of the eternal silences, an elusive 
 whisper seems to murmur of vague memories. 
 But this incarnation is real, I am here in the 
 world — I, I, I ! They are actual, my miseries 
 and griefs, the little shreds of happiness, the 
 dreams that alone make endurable the burden of 
 my days. What matters the Past, what matters 
 the Future ? Of them we know nothing ; but 
 the Present — ah, that is everything! And for 
 us — for you, for me, for tens of thousands — the 
 Present is poisoned by the Lie to which men 
 cling in cringing abjectness." 
 
 "The Gods confide to their worshippers the 
 task of avenging insults hurled at them," said 
 Chun in a hoarse whisper. " And of the number 
 of their chosen servants am I, who from them 
 derive my godhead ! " 
 
 He spoke more to himself than to her ; and to 
 him it was as though the Shining Ones, claim- 
 ing him as their champion, had made his 
 thought articulate. They had not visited this 
 girl's wild blasphemies with instant annihilation 
 because they reposed their trust in the loyalty of 
 him, their minister. They communed silently 
 with his heart, as from the beginning the Gods 
 have communed with the children of men, laying 
 upon him a charge and awaiting its fulfilment. 
 Their message was distinct, imperative. No 
 merciful doubt rose mistlike to blind his eyes to 
 his plain duty, to the nature of the demand they 
 made upon him. Yet every fibre of him quivered 
 with revolt at the thought of laying violent 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 43 
 
 hands upon the beautiful, frail creature at his 
 side. He buried his face in his hands, and 
 rocked his body to and fro in an agony of 
 hesitation. 
 
 Once more the sound of her laughter broke 
 upon his ear, and he raised his head and looked 
 at her with eyes in which wonder fought with a 
 great despair. Tragedy was very near to him, 
 yet she, she could laugh 1 
 
 "Avenger of the Gods!" she mocked him. 
 " Defender of the Impotent ! You, most 
 mighty demigod, would slay me, the . . . the 
 Spirit of Destruction, in obedience to the dumb 
 pleadings of the Voiceless Ones who are power- 
 less to slay in their own behoof! Yet am I 
 unafraid ! Slay me ! Behold, I am very small 
 and frail. One twist of those strong hands of 
 yours, and the deed is done ! Then will the 
 poor, feeble gods be avenged, and thy secret 
 which is mine will the more easily be kept! 
 You, who call yourself a Brahman, act after the 
 custom of your brethren, and by serving the 
 Shining Ones, serve your own divine self! " 
 
 Chun's hands had been clenched in the dark- 
 ness vyhile he strove to gather resolution to grasp 
 that slender throat. Now they fell nerveless to 
 his sides. A moment later, he again buried his 
 face in his hands. 
 
 " Ye Gods," he sobbed. " I cannot do it ! I 
 cannot do it ! " 
 
 He knew that he was turning his back upon 
 all that he held to be sacred : that for her he was 
 
44 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 killing his soul. But the music of her voice 
 subdued him : her presence compelled him. 
 The very delicacy and defencelessness of her, 
 exercised over him a power that was above and 
 beyond all strength. The conviction was upon 
 him that he was earning an eternity of damna- 
 tion — that in a moment he was undoing the 
 work of countless incarnations which, at the 
 last, had made of him on earth a Brahman and 
 a demigod : yet his arms hung slackly at his 
 sides, and his will was set. Defiantly he dis- 
 regarded the mandate of the Gods. Now, he 
 thought, now surely, their thunderbolt must fall. 
 
 "You long to slay me, the blasphemer; but 
 me, the woman, you cannot endure to slay," 
 the girl whispered. 
 
 To Chun it seemed that his soul, naked and 
 ashamed, lay there stripped and bleeding for 
 her merciless inspection. 
 
 " But, since I have greatly sinned," she 
 continued, "and since you have been the witness 
 of my sinning, it is fitting that death in horrible 
 guise should punish my misdeed. Yonder lie 
 the dark waters of the forbidden place. I, who 
 am no demigod, will cast myself into them, and 
 so court the destruction which my wickedness 
 has merited, and which you dare not deal to 
 me." , 
 
 She rose at the word, and ran lightly from 
 him in the direction of the Brahmans' bathing- 
 tank. With terror in his heart, Chun leaped up 
 in pursuit. He knew now that he could not 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 45 
 
 endure that death should rob him of her. 
 Quickly as he followed, he failed to overtake 
 her, for this child of the night stepped so surely 
 amid the shadows that she was standing- poised 
 on the brink of the tank ere he could do more 
 than lay an outstretched hand upon the flutter- 
 ing hem of her garment. His voice, hoarse in 
 entreaty, praying her with passionate, strained 
 intensity to forbear, sounded strangely in 
 his ears. 
 
 With a quick, wriggling movement, she freed 
 herself of the silken cloth that covered her, and 
 for an infinite, wonderful moment the white- 
 ness of her body blinded him. The soft vesture 
 remained in his grasp. He clutched wildly at 
 her, but she eluded him. A splash sounded, and 
 he covered his eyes with his hands. 
 
 A mocking laugh recalled him to himself. He 
 dared to look. She lay at ease, floating on the 
 water, her shapely white limbs almost motion- 
 less, her hair, unbound, adrift upon the surface, 
 making a dark background for the small oval 
 face which showed very pale in the moonlight. 
 Her lips were parted in laughter, and her 
 mischief-freighted eyes shone alluringly. 
 
 " So I too, it seems, am of the number of the 
 divinities!" she cried up to him, her voice 
 cautiously subdued. "The water is cool and 
 sweet. Come. Come here and swim with me ! " 
 
 In a moment, Chun had let slip his waist- 
 clothf and his bronze body seemed to flash in 
 the moonlight as he leaped at her bidding. 
 
46 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 His whole being was in turmoil; his world 
 upheaved. He knew no longer what to believe, 
 what to disbelieve. Only he was aware that a 
 passionate, wild desire inspired him — a desire 
 to echo this girl's blasphemies, to out-do her 
 sinning, to drag the very Gods from their 
 thrones, if that would pleasure her. It was a 
 delirium of triumphant surrender of the god and 
 the man in him to this strange incarnation of 
 Womanhood. It intoxicated him like some 
 sweet and magical elixir. 
 
 For a space, light-heartedly as two children, 
 they swam and raced and played together in the 
 still, cool waters, with the solemn, moonlit 
 night around them, and looming through it and 
 above them the immense shadow of the great 
 temple. Then, before he was aware of her 
 intention, she regained the land, draped her 
 cloth about her, and vanished into the darkness. 
 
 He sprang after her, hot in pursuit, straining 
 his eyes to catch a glimpse of her flitting figure. 
 To the very portals of the Wat he followed, but 
 no trace of her could he find ; and at last, slowly 
 and sorrowfully, he turned away. Then, through 
 the stillness, a whisper seemed to vibrate. 
 
 " Thus does the Spirit of Destruction breathe 
 upon the Lie, and her breath is death ! " 
 
 He wheeled sharply about, peering and 
 listening. Was he cheating himself, or did the 
 sudden gust of dawn-wind, which that instant 
 awoke to rustle in the trees, bear him yet 
 another message ? 
 
THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION 47 
 
 " To-morrow night at the rising of the moon ! " 
 
 Chun turned away, bearing in his breast the 
 
 grey ashes of many a hope which all his days 
 
 he had cherished : but nestling close against his 
 
 heart was one new-born. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 SLAT 
 
 Slat, the old wise man, sat in the doorway of 
 his hut, preparing a quid of betel- nut. His 
 withered body was bare to the waist, its skin a 
 network of intricate, fine wrinkles. The folds of 
 his som-pot covered him from waist to knee ; his 
 thin, bony legs were crossed compactly in front 
 of him ; his feet were unshod. The worn, frayed 
 soles of them resembled rotting leather. Above 
 the bulging protuberances of his brow, to which 
 his emaciation lent an added prominence, his 
 white hair rose in an erect shock, stiff, straight, 
 and close. His features were craggy — the fore- 
 head, heavy with thought, was massive and 
 rough-hewn as a boulder ; the line of the nose 
 irregular and strong ; the chin firm and thrust- 
 ing. Even the empty gums, and the hollows 
 into which the lower part of the face had sunken 
 above them, could not rob the mouth of its 
 calm strength. Shaggy eyebrows sprouted in 
 thick, white clusters above eyes set in innumer- 
 able radiating wrinkles. The chisels of time 
 had scored deep furrows across his brow, and 
 
 48 
 
SLAT 49 
 
 had gfouged out straight channels from nose 
 to mouth. His rugged face might have 
 been carved out of mahogany by some keen 
 implement. 
 
 He held in his left hand a thin bamboo, its 
 surface worn black and shiny with use. The 
 hollow of it served him as a mortar in which to 
 crush to paste the ingredients of the quid which 
 his jaws could no longer chew unaided. His 
 right hand, grasping a short stick of dark, hard 
 wood which he used as a pestle, rose and fell 
 with the regularity of a machine. An appreci- 
 able portion of his life was spent in this task of 
 preparing betel-quids ; and the effortless action 
 and the soft beat, beat of the pestle on the 
 dissolving mass beneath it, had become for him 
 inseparable accompaniments and stimuli to the 
 working of his mind. 
 
 For years now he had been judged too feeble 
 to toil in the quarries, or even to sit upon the 
 scaffoldings, with chisel and hammer, carving 
 the great stones which the labour of his fellows 
 had set in place. Early in life his intelligence 
 had forced him through the ranks of the dull, 
 heavy-eyed, brutalised workers, and had relieved 
 him of the grosser tasks of a purely mechanical 
 sort; and the Brahmans had taken full toll of 
 his ingenuity, his skill, and his art. They had 
 detected in him, also, a peculiar mechanical 
 genius ; and so long as his hand Was steady and 
 his eye sure, they had used him body and brain 
 much as, in our day, men use a machine upon 
 
50 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 which they can depend. Then, when they 
 believed that he could serve them no longer, 
 they had cast him aside, like any other blunted 
 and discarded tool, to rot or rust, to starve or 
 die, on to the great human scrap-heap where lay 
 decaying the worn-out manhood of Angkor. 
 
 But old Slat had neither starved nor died. 
 His reputation for wisdom attracted to him 
 many who stood in need of counsel, and many 
 more who believed him to be a wizard ; for in 
 the East men and women alike have ever been 
 eager traffickers in the intangible. Moreover, 
 Slat had three stalwart sons — heavy, bovine 
 creatures, slow to reason and apt to labour — 
 and such make useful and docile offspring for a 
 man of many wiles. They sweated and toiled 
 because their lords, the Brahmans, had need of 
 them, but incidentally they helped to support 
 their father and his brother Phun. 
 
 Neither did he rust ; for though his body was 
 old, his mind became increasingly active now that 
 at length he had full leisure in which to ponder 
 and meditate. Always he was busy reasoning, 
 speculating, planning : and goaded by a fierce 
 itch of the spirit, he sought restlessly for 
 solutions of problems abstract or mechanical. 
 
 He was deep in thought now, as he sat there 
 at the head of the rickety ladder-way that led 
 from the ground to the pile-raised threshold of 
 his hut. His hand rose and fell with a regular 
 motion above the betel-tube of worn bamboo, 
 and his old eyes, wise and weary, gazed out. 
 
SLAT 51 
 
 through the aching sun-glare, over the low, dark 
 masses of the forest, out over the mighty domes 
 of the Wat, up into the distant heavens and 
 beyond. 
 
 A profound stillness wrapped the earth about, 
 as though it were part of the heavy atmosphere 
 of the noontide ; but from the direction of 
 the temple there came, faint but incessant, the 
 eternal sound of metal smiting stone. So gentle 
 was it that it seemed but another phase of 
 silence. 
 
 A sudden bestial babbling, inarticulate and 
 shrill, broke rudely upon the universal peace, 
 and upon Slat's meditations. It burst forth, 
 abrupt and startling, from the dim shadows of 
 the hut's interior, where some half-seen creature 
 grovelled on the torn mats. 
 
 Slat, flinging his chin sideways and scowling 
 viciously, spoke as men speak to dogs. 
 
 " Be still, there ! " he ejaculated, and the 
 babbling dwindled immediately to an awed, 
 broken mumbling, pathetic in its impotence. 
 
 "A king and a god, forsooth!" Slat growled 
 under his breath. "A god begotten of the 
 living gods! A fool always, and now the 
 begetter of nought save folly! 'A prey to 
 the forbidden waters,' say the witless people. 
 A fool, say I, who suffered himself to be 
 broken body and brain in the vain attempt to 
 prove things which by reason were already 
 proven ! " 
 
 He turned to snarl savagely at the grovelling 
 
62 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 creature in the shadows behind him. It 
 whimpered, seemed to tremble, and was still. 
 
 Slat chuckled, and then, as he caught sight of 
 an advancing figure, he muttered with a sneer : 
 
 "Here is yet another offspring of the gods ; 
 ripe for folly and filled with yearnings to share 
 with us our godhead of the dust — as was Phun, 
 my brother, in his time ! " 
 
 As he spoke, Chun crossed the rubbish-strewn 
 space before the hut, and ascended the stair- 
 ladder. Without a word, he seated himself 
 cross-legged upon the mat within the door, and 
 mechanically Slat pushed a clumsy wooden betel- 
 box across the floor to him. In silence Chun 
 prepared a quid ; then he looked up and spoke. 
 
 "My father," he said, "I am troubled by 
 many thoughts." 
 
 "You too!" exclaimed Slat, still chuckling 
 mirthlessly above his betel-tube. 
 
 Before he^poke again, he pressed the tip of 
 his pestle against the false bottom of the 
 bamboo, till the brick-red paste which he had 
 been pounding emerged from the other end in a 
 damp, cylindrical mass, nearly an inch long. 
 He broke it off neatly against his gums, and as 
 the pungent concoction of betel-nut, pepper-vine 
 leaf, gambir, and quicklime bit his palate, for 
 a moment he closed his eyes the better to enjoy 
 its flavour. 
 
 " You too, O son of the living gods ! " he said, 
 and bent upon the young man a sudden, pene- 
 trating scrutiny. 
 
SLAT 53 
 
 Chun, stiffening- in every limb, feturned the 
 gaze with a look of half-terrified surprise. 
 
 " What do you know ? " he asked in an awed 
 whisper. 
 
 " Many things,"«aid Slart. " I know something 
 of the pride, the folly, and the naughtiness of 
 youth, since once long ago I, even I, was young. 
 I know the potency of the dream. I know the 
 magic lure of the promise that only in dreams 
 may find fulfilment. Above all I know the itch 
 of the blood that is shared by you and by me, 
 aye, and by the beast-thing yonder who writhes 
 and whines upon the mat. It was the ambition 
 that was his — that ts yours — which uplifted him, 
 cast him down, and in the end left him what now 
 you see him." 
 
 " Tell me, tell me! " cried Chun hoarsely. 
 
 "What shall I tell you that your knowledge 
 of yourself has not already revealed ? You are 
 one of the demigods — so am 1 1 You are of 
 the blood royal, and divine — so am I ! You have 
 the brain and the desires with which all who are 
 of that strain are endowed or cursed — I also! 
 These things we share gloriously — you and I — 
 with our masters, the Brahmans, and with our 
 fellow the beast, who grovels yonder maimed 
 and moping in the shadows ! How splendid is 
 our heritage ! Let us, in awe and wonder, bow 
 down and worship . . . our own godhead ! " 
 • He shook with cackling laughter. 
 
 "Father," said Chun earnestly, "I come 
 here to lay my very life between your hands. 
 
54 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 I need help, counsel, aid. Doubts and strange 
 thoughts oppress me. May I speak boldly ? " 
 
 "Aye, speak without fear," said Slat, gravely 
 now. "Though the devourer feasts upon its 
 own spawn, and men prey upon their fellows, we 
 be a close brotherhood, we others, we demigods 
 of the dust. Be not afraid!" And here he 
 laughed again mockingly. " But, I crave pardon ! 
 How should a god know fear ? " 
 
 "I am a demigod, and I am not," faltered 
 Chun. " I know not rightly what I am ! My 
 kinship with the Brahmans has long been known 
 to me. All things proclaimed it — my face, as 
 I have seen it, gazing back at me out of still 
 waters ; the manner in which my limbs, my 
 hands, my feet are fashioned ; the way in which, 
 at your call, the ancient tongue came to me, an 
 awakened memory. But more than all these, 
 some secret stir in my blood convinced me of the 
 truth. It was like a voice, hushed but full of 
 music, that whispered to me, deep down in the 
 crannies and subways of my being : and last 
 night • . . last night I put my godhead to the 
 proof!" 
 
 " Even as once did Phun," snarled Slat. 
 
 "Aye, but look at him ! " cried Chun. "And 
 see me ! I am unscathed while he is . . . what 
 he is!" 
 
 "True," chuckled Slat. "My son, very 
 certainly, then, you are one of the living 
 gods ! " 
 
 " Mock me not, father," Chun implored him. 
 
SLAT 55 
 
 " I come here seeking knowledge. I am tortured 
 by doubt. Think ! What if, after all, it is only 
 a dream and I am not a god ! " 
 
 His voice dropped to a hushed whisper. 
 
 "That were indeed grievous," sneered Slat. 
 "But, even so, you are still a man — not a 
 writhing beast-thing like Phun, the madman. 
 In that, at least, you are to be accounted 
 happy." 
 
 "But I, who so long have dreamed of my 
 divinity, can find little to comfort me in mere 
 manhood," said Chun. 
 
 " Better a whole man than a mutilated god," 
 said Slat bitterly. "Look at Phun, and take 
 warning from him. And listen. To me, too, 
 there once came a season of madness when, like 
 you, I dreamed dreams; for in my veins also 
 runs the blood of our Brahman lords, upon 
 whom may the High Gods smile ! If they smile 
 not at them, and at the vain pride of them, then 
 there is no merriment in heaven. 
 
 "Between me and Phun, my brother, there 
 was this difierence — Phun by his dreams was 
 ruled, and to-day he may not govern the aimless 
 motions of his limbs : / swayed my dreams, and 
 so I am what I am — a son of the Gods, indeed, 
 though you know it not. I tell you that I, Slat, 
 the old wise man (aye, name me a man, for in the 
 man in me I have found the god) have set foot 
 where no demigod of them all has ever attained. 
 I tell you more — that my dream is real; that 
 it is no vapour of the brain, no self-deluding 
 
56 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 mirage such as the Brahmans conjure up to 
 charm them to security, but a victory wrested 
 by thought from the secret forces that dominate 
 all created things. Thus am I content; but 
 you, my son, blinded by your pride, following 
 the beckonings of elusive hopes, have already 
 drawn lots with death; and are still, it would 
 seem, in the mood to woo again the spirit of 
 destruction." 
 
 " Do you know her too, the Spirit of Destruc- 
 tion ? " cried Chun astonished. 
 
 "This I know," replied Slat. "There are 
 in this world of ours two spirits that never 
 rest — one that creates, one that destroys. She, 
 the Creator, has inspired all the marvels that 
 the toil and the blood and the tears of our 
 people, from generation to generation, have 
 fashioned. She is insatiable. She craves 
 eternally for the bodies and the souls of men. 
 She grinds us to dust in her unending service. 
 No travail of our torn and bleeding hands can 
 glut her. She devours our days, enslaves us 
 from the cradle to the burning-ghat, drinks to 
 the dregs the last drop of our vitality, mono- 
 polises our thought. But though of our every 
 energy she takes so heavy a toll, our souls she 
 stimulates and uplifts, wafting us ever to 
 increasing heights, urging us onward to more 
 daring flights, till in her bondage the mind of 
 man attains to undreamed-of emancipation. It 
 is she that plants in our brains the seed of 
 desire — the passionate longing to achieve the 
 
SLAT 57 
 
 impossible ; for she harries us with dreams, 
 lures us with visions, points beyond the horizon 
 to the hidden things that might be, will be, 
 shall be ! 
 
 " It was she who of old whispered in the ears 
 of the Brahman lords, bidding them cease 
 from their blood-stained conquests, entreating 
 them to turn away from the seductions of her 
 sister Spirit, demanding of them that they 
 should make, not break. And thus it was that 
 our Khmer world, which is the head and crown 
 of things, had in this wilderness its obscure 
 beginnings. 
 
 " My son, consider and mark well the miracles 
 which under the guidance of this spirit have 
 been wrought! To me they are as a vast and 
 noble stairway of the intellect, which the soul of 
 our people has scaled, step by step, in the 
 eternal pursuit of beauty. See how the vapours 
 of men's thoughts have materialised in the grey, 
 enduring stone ! First the Tha Phrom, with its 
 thirty perfect shrines : then the temples which 
 crown our hills, such as the Ba-Kheng yonder. 
 Next, from out the misty depths of the mind 
 emerged those tremendous conceptions, the Ba- 
 Yon and the Ba-Phun, which flank the forum of 
 the Great City ; and in the sweat and toil of 
 thousands, at the cost of countless lives and 
 pain piled on pain, even those wild visions were 
 made actual. Spent with their long labours, 
 after that, for a space, our people lay prostrate, 
 panting in the dust ; yet still did the spirit slaver 
 
58 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 for fresh victims, still was the gluttony of her 
 desire unassuaged. No longer did she speak in 
 whispers. Now she raised her voice in.a scream, 
 imperative, irresistible, and those who heard 
 and understood cowered before her, their finite 
 brains reeling under the shock of an infinite 
 idea. It seemed to them — it must have seemed 
 to them — that the task laid upon them was 
 beyond the power of man; but the spirit 
 breathed upon one master-mind among^ them 
 all, driving out fear. Thus was the plan con- 
 ceived, which in our day is taking final shape in 
 the great Wat, that rises heavenward before 
 our eyes. Even though inspired by the spirit, 
 how did the fettered mind of man dare to dream 
 so greatly ? You know nought, my son, of the 
 immutable laws of strain and thrust, of the 
 mysterious forces that dominate inanimate 
 things, of the bewildering, warring problems 
 which assail the master-builder. You have 
 been born under the shadow of that stupendous 
 monument of imagination, execution, and 
 endeavour; and unwondering you have looked 
 upon it because, to you, it has been as familiar 
 a marvel as the daily rising and setting of the 
 sun. You and your fellows have laboured 
 blindly at the bidding of that godlike man, who, 
 long since, has been gathered to the Gods ; and 
 like those who for generations have ■ preceded 
 you, you have wrought more mightily than you 
 dreamed. But he, be sure, he knew! Though 
 the pyre devoured him ere ever his thought was 
 
SLAT 59 
 
 realised, he beheld with the clear vision of the 
 uplifted soul of him that which to-day we see. 
 He foreknew it all, to its last, least detail, before 
 a pick was set to the quarry — all, all, all ! And 
 the supreme difificulty of it, that too was by him 
 anticipated, grappled with, laughed at, over- 
 come! And yet . . . and yet . . . One secret 
 eluded him — even him! That was left for me, 
 in this later, meaner age — left as a legacy of the 
 mind to make to me divine amends for my filched 
 godhead — for upon me too, though the Brahman 
 dotards know it not, the Spirit of Creation has 
 breathed, and shunning the Spirit of Destruc- 
 tion, which has consumed Phun, my brother, I 
 have found an answer to a question which 
 baffled even him, the man my master, my god, 
 my only deity, the conceiver of Angkor Wat ! " 
 
 He paused, breathless, his whole frame pulsing 
 and trembling with emotion and excitement ; 
 and for a moment there was silence. 
 
 " But what know you of the Spirit of Destruc- 
 tion "i " asked Chun presently. 
 
 "She, too," responded Slat, in a subdued 
 tone, " is restless and very busy, and in the end, 
 mayhap, she will prevail. Sometimes, indeed, I 
 wonder whether, in truth, there be two Spirits — 
 whether there be not one only that works in 
 divers ways — ^for without the Spirit of Destruc- 
 tion the Spirit of Creation cannot live. Through 
 the ruin of many kingdoms was the Khmer 
 empire evolved. We shatter the eternal hills, 
 that we with their rocks may build our temples. 
 
60 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 We are ground to dust, generation after genera- 
 tion, that the thought bred in the brain of one 
 man may live for all time. Nought arises save 
 out of wrack ; by destruction is creation fed ; 
 there is no making, save by much breaking. It 
 is the Law, awful and unrelenting; the Law 
 that rules our world. 
 
 " But here at Angkor, the greatest city of the 
 greatest empire that the audacity and ruthless- 
 ness of man have fashioned, the Spirit of 
 Destruction never rests. She feasts cruelly 
 upon human lives in the quarries, at the pulleys 
 and the levers. She crushes them under the 
 wheels of her huge, stone-freighted cars. Every 
 block that has been laid in our temples is 
 cemented with blood of her shedding, has been 
 watered by the tears wrung -from helpless men 
 by her merciless hand. But also she works in 
 many hidden ways, for she is subtle even as 
 she is pitiless. When she is in jesting mood, she 
 lures to death some madman — such as you or 
 the fool, Phun, yonder — with lying promises 
 and treacherous dreams ; but most of all she 
 delights to fill the souls of men with doubt. 
 That is an insidious poison that invades the 
 veins — inflames the brain. ' Who hath seen the 
 Gods?' she asks, 'Who hath heard their 
 voices ? ' Mockingly, she demands a sign, and 
 from the heavens that are as brass no answer 
 comes. She pours scorn upon the B rah mans 
 and their divinity, and beneath the lash of her 
 derision our lords are as impotent, as defence- 
 
SLAT 61 
 
 less as the silent Gods. Yet these are the plinth 
 upon which our world is set ; if it be shaken, 
 then is the entire scheme of our life a-tremble. 
 If the Gods are not, we very surely are mad and 
 smitten with folly, since aeon after aeon we toil 
 and strive and break and slay ourselves, rearing, 
 in their honour and for our own security, 
 these endless prayers in stone! And if the 
 Brahmans be not demigods, are we not worse 
 than mad, we, an abject, slavish generation who 
 suffer them so mightily to outrage and oppress 
 us — we who are many, they who are few — we 
 whom toil has endowed with strength, they 
 whom ease and luxury have enervated? If 
 there be no Gods — if the divinity of the 
 Brahmans be nought save a lying myth — what 
 answer can there be to question such as these ? 
 For only by their faith in these mysteries are 
 our people enslaved. They, the poor, dull clods, 
 they cannot see what I see. To me — to me 
 perhaps alone — the fruit of all our labour is its 
 own tremendous end ; but the others, the mob 
 of soulless toilers, how should their slow brains 
 respond to the imperious call of art ? What do 
 they know of Beauty, of her wonder, her magic, 
 her glamour- weaving spell? How should the 
 glory of supreme achievement solace them for 
 the stunted life, the lost freedom, the days of 
 ceaseless travail, the aching limbs, the wrenched 
 muscles, the lacerated flesh, the breaking hearts? 
 How should their dwarfed minds perceive the 
 wonder of the work to which their weary hands 
 
62 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 are set? They labour blindly, knowing only 
 that the monoliths are heavy, the toil unending. 
 They bend sweating over each day's sordid task, 
 with heavy eyes fixed upon the earth, driven by 
 fears of the Unknown — slavish brutes whom 
 fear alone can drive. 
 
 " My son, if the Spirit of Destruction cast 
 down the ancient gods from their high places, 
 and reveal to our people the feeble humanity of 
 the men whom they so long have deemed divine, 
 I fear greatly that on that day the work would 
 cease. 'Tis to me an ever-present dread. 
 Better than that the bondage which* binds them 
 to toil for the Brahmans, and for the fulfilment of 
 my Master's dream. And yet. . . . The secret 
 that my eager brain has found amid the striving 
 laws of strain and thrust, I cannot let it vanish 
 from the earth with me. It has eluded all men, 
 till in the appointed hour to me it was revealed. 
 It is a special gift to me — utterly mine! It, at 
 least, shall not be made the spoil of these dogs 
 of Brahmans, who have used me body aivi brain, 
 and who have denied to me and to Phun, 
 yonder, as they deny also to you, that to which 
 our blood makes us co-heirs with them ! Think 
 you that I should have won to the secret know- 
 ledge which to-day is mine, were it not for my 
 kinship with the great ones who, in times out 
 of mind, planned and foreordained what the 
 degenerate folk who now. rule us have only 
 enough of wit to execute? A despised and 
 broken branch of the mighty Brahman tree am 
 
SLAT 63 
 
 I ; but in darkness where I He neglected, I have 
 borne fruit no less glorious than that which of 
 old came from the parent stem ; and that I will 
 yeild up to no false demigod of them all ! " 
 
 Again Slat fell silent. His old eyes flashed, 
 his body quivered with rage, and Chun watched 
 him with uncomprehending wonder. 
 
 " And yet," the former murmured after a brief 
 pause. "And yet, if the Spirit of Destruction 
 hold her hand, and hasten not to shatter and 
 destroy, only by the grace of the Brahmans can 
 my thought quicken. I had rather that it should 
 perish with this brain of mine which gave it 
 birth. 
 
 " Remains only, then, the hope ! Who knows ? 
 If the ancient tyranny were broken, perhaps our 
 people would still submit to labour — some of 
 them. Is this also a dream ? I ponder over it 
 long and long, for if it have but one slender 
 chance of life, I would not willingly suffer my 
 idea to die. Surely among some of our toilers 
 there must abide a little love of their handiwork, 
 and habit too is a compelling force. Moreover, 
 should not I, a master-builder in my generation, 
 be at hand to inspire and guide them ? As I sit 
 thinking anxious thoughts, more surely does the 
 h(^e burst into the flame of certainty ! " 
 
 He had forgotten Chun, who sat mazed and 
 wondering at his side. Almost mechanically he 
 was emptying his mind of its burdens through 
 the outlet of spoken words, while his eyes gazed, 
 unseeing but intent, out through the sunshine at 
 
64 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the massive cones which crowned the temple of 
 his adoration. The longing to see his own 
 visions realised no less gloriously, warred within 
 him against the fear lest any act of his might 
 jeopardise the fulfilment of his Master's tran- 
 scendent dream. Desire kindled hope and 
 derided his timidity ; yet doubt tore at his heart. 
 
 " Much of your talk I cannot understand," 
 said Chun. "But the Spirit of Destruction 
 spoke with me in the night-time, decrying gods 
 and demigods, even as you say. Have you 
 also chanced upon her, seen her beauty, heard 
 her voice, listened to her blasphemies ? Have 
 you too been lured by her to abet her 
 sacrileges ? " 
 
 "Aye," said old Slat slowly, while he still 
 gazed out at the hazy distances. "Aye! I 
 have known her long; passionately have I 
 desired her; breathlessly have I awaited her 
 coming ; but also I have feared her greatly. I 
 fear her now ! " 
 
 Then the old man plunged into silence, and 
 that day Chun could win no further word from 
 him. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE BEHEST 
 
 Behind and over Angkor Wat a moon, a little 
 past the full, was rising. On earth the night 
 was intensely still; the air — hot, moist, scent- 
 laden — seeming to float in suspension above the 
 ground, like a dense vapour, invisible but 
 stifling. But, high aloft in the heavens, 
 atmospheric currents were raging, and vast 
 masses of black cloud, ragged and fantastic, 
 rushed storm-driven across the sky, rapidly 
 changing their formation as they scudded, like 
 some vanquished host in panic-stricken flight. 
 Almost incessantly the horizon toward the south 
 was illumined by wide flares of summer lightning 
 that, with the irregular regularity of a helio- 
 graph, were blazoned for an instant above the 
 jagged line of forest tree-tops — shimmered and 
 went out. Pale stars glimmered mistily in little 
 patches of open sky, till the storm-wrack over- 
 whelmed them and they seemed to soar upward 
 into infinite, smoky depths of air. Amid this 
 noiseless violence of inaudible storm, the moon 
 
 66 
 
66 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 sailed toward the zenith in serene, impassive 
 splendour. 
 
 As she rose, the outline of the temple emerged 
 gradually from the vast shadows of the night. 
 The moonlight touched and fretted the edges of 
 the domes ; washed in a pale background 
 against which the dim bulk of roofs and walls 
 and portals stood forth in sudden prominence ; 
 flooded courtyard and cloister through unsus- 
 pected apertures ; threw with seeming caprice 
 huge fragments of the building into calm, 
 majestic light ; and plunged the rest, by 
 contrast, into impenetrable gloom. 
 
 Chun, creeping cautiously along the narrow 
 strip of darkness, cast upon the ground by the 
 abrupt wall of the causeway, watched this evolu- 
 tion of shadow out of shadow with a beating 
 heart. 
 
 " To-morrow night at the rising of the moon ! " 
 
 Had fancy cheated him, or had those words 
 really been spoken by the strange musical voice 
 through which there thrilled for him elusive 
 echoes that seemed to awaken twilit memories 
 of earlier incarnations? Those were the 
 questions which, all day long, had revolved 
 in the heart and in the brain of him — an 
 endless torturing procession. They were grind- 
 ing his soul now with the pitiless monotony 
 of their insistence — with their vanity, with the 
 knowledge that the event alone could answer 
 them. 
 
 Of a sudden, as he crept through the shadows, 
 
THE BEHEST 67 
 
 they were revealed to him in the likeness of 
 vital, personified spirits — haunting, malevolent, 
 and relentless. They resembled, he thought, 
 the ruthless dragon of tradition which, from 
 time to time, flings itself with wide slavering 
 jaws upon the moon, and is only foiled because 
 those who on earth love her raise so great a 
 tumult that its craven spirit is daunted. 
 Monstrous as this incarnation of evil, the 
 questions that were persecuting him seemed to 
 Chun to have devoured all that till now had 
 been to him momentous or beautiful — the dream 
 of his divinity, the pride of his birthright, the 
 lure of his ambition, the hopes which, since. his 
 boyhood, had gilded for him this grey world of 
 toil and travail. These things had been for him 
 the glorious interpreters of the meaning and the 
 mystery of existence ; but in the space of a few 
 hours they had vanished into the jaws of these 
 insatiable invaders of his thoughts. Beside his 
 overwhelming desire to know that he would see 
 Her again, all else had faded into pale, sad 
 nothingness. The world in which he lived had 
 been blotted out ; and he saw himself of a sudden 
 reduced to a single fierce craving — a cry, a hope, 
 a fear. 
 
 He was trembling in every limb — shaken by 
 that intense violence of tremor which, in 
 moments of deep emotion, smites the very 
 strong — ^when he came at last to the foot of the 
 great stairway, and stood there peering eagerly 
 into the darkness. His breath was coming 
 
68 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 through his locked teeth in short, painful gfusts. 
 His heart was leaping savagely, like a wild 
 thing caged and pent. There was so irresistible 
 a sinking within him th^t he was stricken with 
 nausea. His whole body seemed to be strung 
 like a bow by the tense agony of expectation. 
 
 For a space he stood thus, searching the 
 shadows, his senses torturing him with tiny 
 shreds of sound, and lovely misty shapes that 
 had no existence save in his imagination. Then, 
 with a sob, he collapsed in a sitting posture on 
 the temple-steps. 
 
 Hour after hour he sat there motionless, while 
 the moon soared higher and higher into the 
 clear heavens, whence the flying storm-scud had 
 departed — sat there numbed by the terrible 
 force of the reaction, gazing miserably at the 
 wreckage of his hopes and at the ruined soul of 
 him. For he realised now that she had done 
 this — that she had killed his soul. Obedient 
 to her spell, he had betrayed the Gods, had 
 rejected, in thought at least, the doctrine of the 
 divinity of the Brahmans, and with her had 
 made a mock of his own godly heritage. In 
 answer to her reckless call, he had plunged 
 into the sacred waters, not reverently, as a 
 Brahman should, but filled with sacrilegous 
 delight, responding to the outcry of the flesh 
 which craved for proximity to the beautiful, 
 shameless body whose whiteness had shone so 
 alluringly up through the troubled waves. 
 
 Now he was oppressed by the most intolerable 
 
THE BEHEST 69 
 
 of burdens — a sense of unforgivable sin : but 
 most sorely was he borne down by the know- 
 ledge that he had sinned against himself. 
 Nothing in life, he felt, could ever be the 
 same again. Never more could the marvellous 
 scheme of things be to him that which it had 
 been so short a while before. Swayed by the 
 casual touch of a woman's hand upon his arm, 
 hypnotised by the music of her voice, lured by 
 the magic of her beauty, he had bartered the 
 god in him, and with it all his wealth of godlike 
 dreams, for . . . what ? For this raging hunger 
 of the heart and of the flesh, for this craving of 
 the soul, for this agony of baulked desire that 
 made all the world a measureless, aching 
 emptiness, for the humiliation of vain waiting, 
 for the merciless dragging in the mire of his 
 manhood and his pride. She had not robbed 
 him only of his dream of godhead : she had 
 filched from him also all that made of him a 
 man. In that instant he had a vision of hipiself 
 as the thing to which she had reduced him — a 
 being of shadowlike futility, without force, or 
 strength, or power of achievement, without aim 
 or meaning — an impotent fleck of foam, passion- 
 tossed on a wave of supreme, unsatisfied desire. 
 He bent his head above the folded arms that 
 rested on his knees, and his frame was shaken 
 by hard sobs that brought with them no relief of 
 tears. He had ceased to listen to the elusive 
 noises of the night that conjured stealthy foot- 
 falls out of the great silences. He had ceased 
 
70 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 to hope — almost to think. He was a mere clot 
 of desire, of shame, of suffering. 
 
 Of a sudden he was aware that a miracle had 
 befallen — that she was there, before him, close 
 to him in the darkness. Something within him 
 — something tense and strained — seemed to 
 snap with an appalling shock, and in a momen t 
 he was prostrate at her feet, caressing them 
 with lips and cheek, touching them with 
 adoring hands, crooning over them with broken, 
 passionate words — worshipping this girl with an 
 extravagant intensity such as he had not 
 lavished upon her, even when, at her first 
 coming, he had believed her to be an incarna- 
 tion of the Gods. 
 
 She stood quite still, looking down at him 
 with grave eyes, outwardly unmoved, but 
 warmed a little, mayhap, by the sincerity of his 
 adoration. Then she bent over him, laid a hand 
 on either cheek, and so drew him upward till, 
 with lifted face, he half knelt, half squatted 
 before her. 
 
 He sat back upon his heels, looking up at her, 
 his breath caught, his eyes dazed by the sudden 
 wonder of her beauty. Absent, he had thought 
 her present, so perfectly had his imagination 
 seemed to visualise her. Even at noonday, 
 when he had let his eyelids fall, it had seemed to 
 him that the small, pale face, the eyes of depth 
 and mystery, the shadowy hair, the slender, 
 girlish form had leaped instantly into vivid life 
 
THE BEHEST 71 
 
 against a rosy backgfround. Now that she 
 stood before him in the flesh, these visions of 
 her were revealed to him as inadequate, faded 
 things. Dazzled by the wonder of her, he knelt at 
 her feet, and his soul too was prostrate before 
 her. 
 
 To others, perhaps, this girl might have 
 seemed no more than a dainty, pretty slip of 
 womanhood, a creature of moods and shadows, 
 less brilliant than many of her sisters ; but over 
 Chun, from the first, her beauty worked an 
 imperative, magical spell. To this one man 
 she stood for Womanhood itself. In her he 
 recognised, unconsciously, the antithesis to his 
 own virility. In her he was aware of the strength 
 which is combined with physical frailty, and 
 exerts over mere brute force a tyrannical 
 ascendancy — the weakness which makes to a 
 strong man's nature an insistent, irresistible 
 appeal — the subtle qualities of soul and intellect 
 which are complementary to those of the male 
 animal, not comparable nor competitive, differing 
 from them in kind rather than in degree. Out 
 of the night she had come to him, at a moment 
 of supreme emotion, in the likeness of a daughter 
 of the Gods. Out of the immense, impenetrable 
 darkness of the past, the soul of her seemed to 
 cry to his soul, stirring his being to its depths, 
 awaking slumbering memories that arose, ghost- 
 like, to pass and repass, veiled and mysterious, 
 in some dim shadowland of fantasyv 
 
 " You have come ! " Chun panted at last. 
 
72 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 So elusive did she seem to him, that he needed 
 spoken words to set a seal upon the actuality of 
 her presence, 
 
 "Why are you here?" she asked. Her 
 passionless tone was cold and unwelcoming. 
 He, who had been rent by such longings and 
 despairs because her coming had been delayed, 
 who had been filled with a joy so tumultuous 
 by her mere proximity, winced under her 
 question as though a whip-lash had been laid 
 across his face. 
 
 " I came at your bidding," he blurted out. 
 
 She stepped away from him. 
 
 "At my bidding \" she echoed. "What care 
 have I for your comings in and your goings out 
 — casteless one ? Why should /bid you come or 
 go or stay or depart ? What are you to me ? " 
 
 "I thought ... I fancied ... I hoped 
 . . ." he faltered, mightily abashed. 
 
 "What know I of your thoughts, your fancies, 
 or your hopes ? " she flung back at him. " You 
 weary me with meaningless words, and already 
 I am over- weary." 
 
 At the word, she sank down in a squatting 
 attitude upon the flags, a little figure, pitiful and 
 forlorn — the incarnation of flesh distressed and 
 spirit over-taxed — and all the tenderness of 
 Chun's nature awoke instantly in answer to her 
 mute appeal. Like a dog he crept nearer to her, 
 longing to express the sympathy that inspired 
 him ; but he did not dare even to touch the hem 
 of her garment. 
 
THE BEHEST 73 
 
 "Ye Gods of earth and air!" he ejaculated 
 in a hoarse whisper. "That I might comfort 
 you, ease your pains, bear your burdens." 
 
 She cut him short with an impatient shrug. 
 
 " Be still!" she said curtly. " I desire peace, 
 not words. Be still ! " 
 
 At once his speech was hushed : and he sat 
 there in the shadows, afraid almost to draw 
 breath, motionless in spite of the cramp that 
 presently began to assail his limbs which chance 
 had drawn into unnatural attitudes. 
 
 For a long time she too was motionless, while 
 her eyes stared gloomily into the darkness. She 
 made no sign that betrayed consciousness of his 
 proximity, and he felt himself to be thrust away 
 from all communion with her — from her thought 
 and from her memory — beyond the limits of 
 distant horizons. 
 
 She seemed to have power to bruise the very 
 soiH of him. 
 
 At last she spoke, but without turning her 
 head or looking at him. 
 
 "Are you dumb?" she asked. "Are you 
 dumb and dead ? Can you neither Speak nor 
 move? Have you not enough of wit to know 
 how horrible to me are these silences of the 
 night?" 
 
 Anger flared up in him at her perverse 
 injustice, but he suppressed it instantly. A 
 great fear was upon him lest a jarring word 
 should send her back into the darkness out of 
 which she had come. 
 
74 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 "All the night I have waited here for you," 
 he whispered humbly. "I have longed for 
 your coming as a man stricken with thirst 
 craves for the cool waters." 
 
 "Why?" she asked. Her tone was as hard 
 and as unyielding as ever. 
 
 " Because ..." said Chun in a passionate 
 whisper, and now his words came from him in 
 a rush. " Because since you came out of the 
 shadows and into the shadows passed, I have 
 thought only of you, dreamed only of you, seen 
 nothing but the vision of your beauty, heard no 
 sound save the music of your voice. All the 
 world is vocal of you. Every shadow hints the 
 shadows in your hair. All solitudes are fragrant 
 of you, and to me are no longer lonely, for you 
 in them are close to me. Every sunbeam holds 
 a promise of your coming, and the twilight 
 whispers to me of you. You inspire all created 
 things, so that for me they have no meaning 
 save through you. You are Life itself — the 
 soul of its beauty and its mystery." 
 
 She bent a calm gaze upon him, then slowly 
 smiled. 
 
 "Am I not well named?" she asked, "I, the 
 Spirit of Destruction ? " 
 
 " No ! " he cried in passionate protest. " No ! 
 You are the Spirit of Creation, for since last 
 night you have made for me a new heaven and 
 a new earth, aye, and a new hell therewith. To 
 be near you is my heaven, to long vainly for you 
 is my hell, and the earth itself exists now for me 
 
THE BEHEST 75 
 
 only, that,^ moving on it, I may love and serve 
 you." 
 
 " The madness ! " she ejaculated softly. J,t is 
 by this name that " in the East the supreme 
 insanity of love is known. "The madness! It 
 seems, my friend, that the virus has set fire to 
 your blood," and she laughed as one well content. 
 
 "Yes," said Chun. "It is in very truth the 
 madness— bred of the senses, it may be, but ask- 
 ing no satisfaction of the sense. It has infected 
 me, mounting to my brain, I think, filling my heart 
 and my soul. It is a great evil — the madness 
 — when it grips a man as I by it am gripped." 
 
 " No," she whispered softly. " It is the only 
 sanity. Without it there is no faith, no hope, 
 no colour in the world, no joy nor inspiration in 
 the work of man, no end nor meaning in the 
 unsought, tyrannical power of woman. It is the 
 invisible motive force that uplifts and casts 
 down, that fashions and destroys, that creates 
 something out of nothing or brings high hopes 
 to nought, that turns defeat into victory and 
 makes victory more bitter than defeat. Lacking 
 it, mankind would be levelled with the beasts, 
 and the earth itself become a wilderness." 
 
 " But in me already it has worked destruction," 
 said Chun. " Ere you came, I was a demigod. 
 By the Gods' very selves, by the baptism of the 
 sacred waters, my godhead had been accepted 
 and approved. And now . . . And now I am 
 less even than a man, only a cry ! a cry for you ; 
 only a desire, a desire for your presence ; only a 
 
76 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 shadow, a shadow cast by you. What care I 
 for the High Gods in their heavens, since you 
 for me fill earth and sky ? What worth is there 
 in the divinity of the living gods, or what does 
 it matter whether by them or by others our 
 world is ruled, seeing that you are my only 
 demigod, your will my only law? Already at 
 your bidding I have committed sacrilege, slaying 
 perchance my soul, as to serve you I willingly 
 would give my body to be burned. That surely 
 is a madness and a great evil, for it has stolen 
 from ttie my very self; casting down, not up- 
 lifting ; robbing all things of their values ; 
 paralysing, not inspiring, my mind." 
 
 "That shall not be," she whispered earnestly, 
 laying a hand upon Chun's bare shoulder. 
 " Listen, and bid that trembling cease." For at 
 her touch he had been shaken anew by that 
 strange, uncontrollable palsy of the limbs. " Be 
 still, and listen. Last night you were obsessed 
 by dreams — dreams of your fabled divinity, 
 dreams of the power over men that your godhead 
 might win for you, dreams of I know not what 
 futility. I breathed upon them, and like mists 
 they melted away. Now they are dispelled, and 
 you sit here mourning over them like a child 
 who weeps because the footfall of a passer-by 
 has ground back into the mire the mud castles 
 he had builded. Yet they were only castles 
 fashioned from the dust, those poor dreams of 
 yours. Waste no tears on them. Do not 
 our architects clear of all things the spaces 
 
THE BEHEST 77 
 
 upon which presendy their temples are to be 
 reared ? Even so have I done to you. Destruc- 
 tion must precede all creation. I have taken 
 from you nothing that was of any Worth, nought 
 save false hopes and vain ambitions, a belief in 
 a divinity that was not yours, a paltry longing 
 for recognition by the Brahmans, who begot you 
 in shame, of a godhead no more real than that 
 to which they lay claim. You thought, mayhap, 
 that these things would bring with them a life 
 of ease, such as the Brahmans lead, that you 
 would share with them the adoration of the 
 Sudras, and the power to oppress your fellows^ 
 Are those such high and noble desires that you 
 should be mightily cast down because you now 
 know that they can never be satisfied ? Say, 
 my friend — ^have I filched from you much that it 
 profited you to keep } " 
 
 "How can I judge?" said Chun. "This 
 only I know — that since your coming you have 
 changed for me the face of life." 
 
 "And that is well," she insisted earnestly, 
 leaning a little toward him. "That is well, 
 for, ere I came, you were not looking on the face 
 of life, but on its lying counterfeit. Look up- 
 yonder at the great Wat that towers above our 
 heads. Have you ever asked yourself why the 
 Brahmans have builded it ; why to fashion it our 
 people labour out their lives, like cattle yoked to 
 a plough in an endless furrow.?" 
 
 " It is built in honour of the High Gods," said 
 Chun simply. 
 
78 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 " And why, think you, do the Brahmans so 
 greatly desire to do homage to the High Gods ? " 
 
 " Because they are the Gods of their worship," 
 responded Chun, 
 
 "Fool!" cried the girl. "It is because the 
 Brahmans are afraid ! I tell you that these self- 
 styled demigods are oppressed by eternal fears. 
 They know that they are few and weak, and 
 that the men over whom they tyrannise are 
 numerous and strong. They know that they 
 and their forbears, from generation to genera- 
 tion, have sinned past all redemption, enslaving 
 those whom they name Sudras and casteless 
 ones, making a mock of their humanity, dealing 
 with them as beasts of burden, working them to 
 the bone, robbing their bodies of health and 
 strength, killing the live souls of them, casting 
 them aside to rot and die ; when age and much 
 toil have broken them, holding them to be no 
 better than the dust in which they travail, back 
 into which, after many days, in the end they 
 grind them. They know the measureless 
 immensity of their crime, done in the sight of 
 the Gods, against their fellow-men, and franti- 
 cally they strive to propitiate, to placate, to 
 bribe. They build these temples that the Gods 
 themselves may, in sojne sort, be made with 
 them sharers in their sinning. Thus, they 
 hope to escape retribution ; and they dare not 
 desist, lest the Gods should wax wrathful, and 
 the men they so long have outraged find leisure 
 at last for thought and questionings. Look at 
 
THE BEHEST 79 
 
 the works which they have built by the toil of 
 other men, how, in the beginning, they were 
 small and humble; how each generation has 
 seen them become more grandiose, more 
 monstrous ; until now, in our own time, this 
 cruel and tremendous edifice of Angkor Wat 
 draws near completion. Always greater and 
 greater bribes to heaven, and heavier burdens 
 aid upon our people — and so it will be for ever, 
 while we, like dumb beasts, endure their rule 
 and their oppressions. Do you fancy that the 
 labours of the Sudras will have an ending when 
 the great Wat is carved to its last stone ? I tell 
 you that the Brahmans dare not hold their hands. 
 Fear of the Gods, fear of the men whom they 
 have wronged, alike goad them onward. They 
 have become the thralls of their own tyranny. 
 These colossal prayers in stone may not cease, 
 lest the Gods,, being angry, wreak at last the 
 lortg-merited vengeance. The slavery of toil 
 which is brutalising our people may not be 
 relaxed even a little, lest freedom breed revolt. 
 I tell you these Brahmans are pursued by furies 
 of fear lest the Gods should strike, or lest the 
 people, learning their own strength, should rise 
 up and destroy them." 
 
 For a space, after she had ceased speaking, 
 Chun sat motionless, sunken deep in thought. 
 To this man, born and bred among the 
 Sudras the idea that the demigods could feel 
 fear was new and astounding. Their divinity 
 was, in his eyes, an impregnable rampart reared 
 
80 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 around them. That they should hold the Gods 
 in awe was part of the appointed order of things, 
 but that they should be afraid of men ! Ah, that 
 were almost unbelievable — a notion not easy of 
 assimilation. Stated by other lips, it would have 
 seemed to him the merest froth of folly; but 
 coming from her, and wedded to the voice that 
 set tingling within him such deep, responsive 
 vibrations, it assumed a new force and reality. 
 The energy emanating from her, the intense 
 earnestness and conviction which inspired her 
 frailty, had also their hypnotic effect. Though 
 once more she was shaking the foundations of 
 his world, he had nothing with which to oppose 
 her fierce iconoclasm. 
 
 " How do you know? How do you know 
 these things?" he demanded feebly. Alrea<iy 
 all the beliefs that had been his were staggered 
 by doubt. Presently, perhaps out of the wrack 
 of them, a new faith would arise. 
 
 "How do I know ? " she echoed, and 
 suddenly was torn by passion. "Ye gods of 
 earth and air, how do I know? How do I 
 know that these Brahmans are no demigods, 
 but vile, weak men ? How do I know that their 
 gods are myths, their service a foul excuse for 
 the satisfaction of bestial appetites? Hush! 
 Do not ask me how I know these things: but 
 be sure, very sure, that beyond all doubt I 
 know ! " 
 
 She ceased abruptly, but even through the 
 great stillness that wrapped them around it 
 
THE BEHEST 81 
 
 seemed to Chun that the fury of her passion 
 still vibrated. 
 
 She had spoken with head thrown slightly 
 back, with eyes that flashed, with tumultuous, 
 torrential speech. Now, suddenly, she seemed 
 to collapse, to shrink into herself, to be trans- 
 formed from a creature of furious, storm-driven 
 energy into a little, pitiful girl, frail and spent. 
 Her face assumed once more that strange look 
 of infinite age, of weary, superhuman knowledge. 
 
 For the second time that evening ^11 the 
 tenderness, all the instinctive chivalry of his 
 manhood, flared up in Chun's heart, like a 
 mighty sacrificial fire alight before the altar of 
 her divinity. His whole, nature responded 
 unreasoningly to he knew not what subtly 
 expressed need of hers. He crept toward her, 
 and very gently laid his arms about her slender 
 shoulders. As he buried his face in the fragrant 
 masses of her hair, he caught the sound of 
 a little sob. 
 
 For a moment or two they sat thus, motion- 
 less in the darkness ; the passion within him 
 abashed by a measureless compassion which 
 had been awakened he knew not how. Then 
 the palm of one of her hands was laid upon 
 his breast, and softly he was thrust from her. 
 He drew away at once, unresistingly ; his mind 
 and body alike obedient to her wish : but the 
 miracle of that instant of physical contact with 
 her was thrilling him with a glowing wonder 
 and surprise. It intoxicated him, lent a new 
 
82 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 glamour to the still, moonlit world, made life a 
 triumphant, glorious thing. 
 
 He sat very still, fearful lest by word or 
 movement he should break the spell of this 
 perfect moment; but his heart beat wildly. 
 What now to him were gods or demigods? 
 What cared he for his wrecked dreams of 
 divinity? The man in him, leaping up in 
 fiery response to the pathos of a woman's 
 mute appeal, fulfilled his every desire. As 
 a man, he loved her, longed to serve her, 
 saw in the hope that he a little might help 
 and comfort her, an all-satisfying ambition 
 and the sole reason of his existence upon 
 earth. Already, it seemed to him, he by her 
 was so utterly absorbed that he had, apart 
 from this being so compact of force and frailty, 
 no separate existence. 
 
 she sat before him on the flags, her knees 
 drawn up, her arms embracing them, her chin 
 resting upon them, looking at him through 
 calm, searching eyes. 
 
 " Do you love me ? " she asked suddenly. 
 " Love me with your soul ; not only, manlike, 
 with your body ? " 
 
 He broke into eager protestations; but 
 with a gesture she stayed the torrent of his 
 words. 
 
 "And in proof you would do any deed — any 
 deed— that I might demand of you? Think 
 well before you reply. Any deed ? " 
 
 "Aye," he cried, "Have I not already told 
 
THE BEHEST 83 
 
 you ? I would give my soul to be slain and my 
 body to be burned for you." 
 
 Again she scrutinised him closely and then 
 abruptly spoke. 
 
 " Bring here to me — here where we now sit — 
 the Sacred Sword of Indra ! " ^ she said. 
 
 He smiled at her, thinking that she spoke in 
 hyperbole ; but her face was set and grave, 
 and upon it once more that unearthly expression 
 was fixed. 
 
 "You are silent," she said presently, in cold, 
 hard tones. " Are your protestations all vain — 
 mere empty words, spoken as men speak such 
 things to delude the folly and the feith which 
 they dream abide in women.? Shame upon 
 you and upon me! Almost for a moment 
 I believed you." 
 
 "You can believe," cried Chun in desperation. 
 "But, think, . . . The Sacred Sword! The 
 blade forged by Indra's self, and by him given 
 into the hands of the Brahman king who, first 
 of all his house, ruled over our world ! Men say 
 that the very soul of this land of ours abides in 
 that weapon of the Gods, and that if aught of 
 ill befall it, the kingdom itself shall perish. 
 Already I have done sacrilege at your bidding, 
 but that were nothing by the side of this. To 
 seize the Sword of Indra! That were to smite 
 with open palm the faces of the most High 
 Gods. It would bring plague and pestilence and 
 calamity and death to ravage this land. There- 
 
 1 Vide note i. 
 
84 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 after no crops would grow. Famine would 
 devour our people. To its uttermost founda- 
 tions would our world be shaken. Think, 
 heart of my heart. Think well, I entreat you, 
 ere you demand this thing of me." 
 
 Slowly, with weary grace, she rose to her 
 feet, and he rose too, so that for a moment 
 they stood facing one another' — he towering 
 above her, troubled and distressed, she looking 
 up at him, inexorable and commanding. 
 
 " Enough of words," she said. " I have 
 claimed a deed from you who would give your 
 soul to be slain and your body to be burned for 
 me." She mimicked his words with a cruel 
 sneer. "If you desire to see my face again — 
 ever more to hear my voice — again — who 
 knows? — to hold me in your arms, to feel the 
 softness of my hair upon your cheek and brow 
 — to taste, it may be, joys more intimate than 
 these — gifts of my giving — then do my bidding. 
 Bring to me the Sacred Sword. Bring it here 
 and lay it at my feet. Then, not otherwise, 
 shall I believe in your love. Fail me in this, 
 and I, who came from out the shadows, shall 
 be swallowed up by them once more. I shall 
 leave you, but " — (here she laughed mirthlessly) 
 — " not altogether as I found you. Then " — (she 
 laughed again) — "then you were a demigod, 
 convinced of your own divinity. I shall leave 
 you shorn of your godhead, bereft of hope, 
 robbed of ambition, and even the miserable 
 manhood that belongs to you denied its chief 
 
THE BEHEST 85 
 
 desire, and clothed with the shame of shames, 
 because for the fulfilment of that desire it did 
 not dare enough." 
 
 Her words, her laugh, her derisive tones 
 maddened him. A great wave of anger swept 
 over him — of anger and desire — impelling him 
 to seize this little, delicate girl, who so mocked 
 and tantalised him, and crush her in his brawny 
 arms — to have his will of her, avenging thus the 
 injuries she had wrought upon his soul, and 
 slaking thus the fierce thirsts of his body. 
 
 It was only for an instant that he was 
 shaken by this up- welling of the brute within 
 him ; but the paroxysm left him exhausted and 
 ashamed. He had thrown his arms aloft, his 
 face straining upward, as with conscious, 
 physical effort he battled with the devils who 
 assailed him. Now his hands fell limply to 
 his sides. He bent his eyes to the spot where 
 the girl had been standing — but she had dis- 
 appeared as silently as she had come. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 AN APPEAL TO THE GODS 
 
 By the half-built southern portal of the outer 
 cloister of Angkor Wat, a gang- of perhaps five 
 hundred men was toiling in the blazing heat of 
 noon. The moving shadows which they cast 
 were circular, squat patches of blackness, stain- 
 ing the white dust ; those thrown by the sheer 
 wails of the cloisters were incredibly narrow, 
 clean-cut and hard. The sparse cocoanut palms 
 — their fronds lifting and stiffening in the heat — 
 had little sun-striped circles drawn about their 
 boles. For the rest, the rank growth of grass 
 and the blinding earth, where the passage of 
 innumerable unshod feet had worn the vegetation 
 to powder, lay exposed to the vertical sun rays, 
 and the refraction from them struck upward with 
 an intolerable intensity. 
 
 High noon poised above Angkor Wat — 
 tropical noontide, fierce and pitiless ; yet within 
 the half-finished gateway, where old Slat was 
 sitting, a dim dusk prevailed. Above him 
 roughly-hewn stones, the successive strata 
 inclining more and more to meet at last in the 
 
AN APPEAL TO THE GODS 87 
 
 acute angle of the roof, supported far overhead 
 an immense conical tower. On either hand of 
 him a long, straight cloister stretched away in 
 narrowing perspective, the rigid lines broken 
 here and there by deep embrasures, by the 
 square bulk of pillars, and by jutting masonry of 
 occasional shrines in which, dimly seen, stood 
 gigantic images of Hindu gods. 
 
 Closer at hand were grouped big, four-sided 
 columns, with capitals and bases delicately 
 carved or awaiting the chisel of the sculptor ; 
 and about him, and around him and before, stood 
 the massive, time-defying structures of the gate. 
 Through windows whose embrasures, formed 
 in the thickness of the walls, were shrouded from 
 without by clusters of shrubs and vines and 
 creepers, there crept a veiled light which served 
 to suggest, rather than to revea,!, the wealth of 
 sculpture decorating so many of the stones — 
 carved figures of bearded Brahmans rapt in 
 perpetual adoration ; dancing-girls with rounded 
 breasts and triple pyramidal head-dresses ; 
 curtains of fine drapery exquisitely imitated; 
 intricate designs of flowers, of leaves, of birds, of 
 imaginative scroll-work in endless variety. 
 
 A dank atmosphere pervaded the place, and 
 the air fell chill, as with the chill of a tomb. 
 The semi-darkness lent to it a haunting sense of 
 mystery and gloom. Yet immediately in front 
 of Slat, cut sharply out of those grim and 
 sombre stones, was the blazing oblong of day- 
 light framed by the gateway. 
 
88 THE DOWNFALL OF TTHE GODS 
 
 The contrast between the dim, shadowy 
 interior and the tense, white heat without was 
 abrupt, sudden, stunning as a blow ; and Slat's 
 old eyes, dazed and reeling under the shock of it, 
 were led along the line of the great causeway 
 which — ^like an immense prostrate column, of 
 the colourless colour of flame in the heart of a 
 furnace — stretched straight to the threshold of 
 the Wat, beneath thin ghosts of heat-haze that 
 danced and danced. 
 
 Then, gradually; as his sight became inured 
 to the blinding glare, the mighty pile of the 
 great temple emerged, as from behind veils — the 
 magnificent, inevitable culmination of that giant 
 causeway. Framed by the dark monoliths of 
 the gate, set against a background of white-hot 
 sunlight, it stood forth revealed in all the 
 splendour of its design, in all the triumph of its 
 beauty and its symmetry. The stairway break- 
 ing the line of the base, and leading upward to 
 outer portals, the long roofs of the exterior 
 cloisters, the massed bulk of the cliff of masonry 
 which supported the shrines and courts of the 
 upper temple, the abrupt flights of steps which 
 scaled its face and vanished into three dark, 
 oblong entrances, and the piles of sculptured 
 stones above them, each in its turn fulfilled its 
 purpose, carrying the eye higher and higher till 
 at last it rested upon the huge, conical domes 
 whereof the rugged outlines were set in sharp 
 silhouette against a sky pale with heat. 
 
 This was Slat's chosen view of the temple 
 
AN APPEAL TO THE GODS 89 
 
 whose beauty was his idol, for none other 
 seemed to him to convey in equal measure so 
 complete an understanding of the perfection of 
 its design. Sitting thus, gazing from out the 
 dusk of the distant cloister at the Wat, standing 
 solitary and immense in the heart of this sun- 
 steeped landscape, ever there seemed to come to 
 him as a new and wonderful surprise a full 
 appreciation of its grandeur as a single, vast 
 idea, tremendously conceived, triumphantly 
 realised. Then he would draw in his breath 
 with a sort of passionate delight. The 
 splendour of it filled and thrilled him, satisfying 
 every longing and aspiration of his soul ; and 
 somewhere deep hidden within him there lurked 
 a secret joy and pride borne of the conviction 
 that he alone really understood, that his mind 
 only was attuned to the mind of that dead 
 genius upon whose imagination there had 
 dawned, long ago, this transcendent dream of 
 beauty. 
 
 "Yet, even from his eyes was hidden the 
 secret which / have wrested from amid the 
 jarring strife of thrust and strain ! " he would 
 often murmur. "That, from the beginning of 
 things, was reserved for me — for me alone ! " 
 
 This was his triumphant thought. It bore 
 him, by ever so little, nearer to the Master whom 
 he worshipped. 
 
 He turned himself about, and looking through 
 the opposite portal of the gate, fell to preparing 
 a quid of betel-nut. 
 
90 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 There came to his ears the noises made by the 
 labour of many toilers — the choraic song of men 
 working in unison, the clinking of metal against 
 stone, the whine of coir ropes winding through 
 clumsy sheaves, the groaning of green-wood 
 skids, the rumble of heavy carts on worn and 
 rutted tracks, the low rumour of human speech, 
 and the occasional abrupt sound of a voice raised 
 in counsel or command — noises that seemed to be 
 rough-hewn out of the midday stillness. 
 
 Down the rude track which led from a 
 distant quarry to the works, unwieldy drays, with 
 solid, wooden wheels, were crawling, jolt by jolt, 
 surrounded by ant-like clusters of men who 
 pushed and hauled them. Nearer at hand, 
 labourers were making ready to discharge a 
 huge monolith from the cart which bore it. 
 Skids lay ready on the ground for its reception. 
 Long poles of specially selected hard wood were 
 lashed across it, at short intervals, and under 
 these a crowd of men, with crooked knees, 
 gripping hands, and anxious faces, were thrust- 
 ing their sun-tanned shoulders. Most of them 
 used some clot of worn-out garment as a pad, to 
 prevent the pole from eating into skin and flesh ; 
 but in spite of this precaution, many of them 
 showed swollen and bruised contusions between 
 neck and shoulder-tip. Such abrasions — often 
 purposely self-inflicted — were a frequent and 
 popular pretext upon which to base a plea 
 for temporary release from labour; and the 
 
 Brahmans, knowing this, had learned to think 
 
AN APPEAL TO THE GODS 91 
 
 lightly of bleeding shoulders. A man's flesh 
 needed now to be very severely lacerated ere it 
 could earn the boon of rest for its owner; yet 
 time and again, rare holidays came to most of 
 the toilers from this cause. 
 
 Slat, pondering moodily, sat watching the 
 men who were busying themselves about the 
 cart and block. The task of lifting and shift- 
 ing a heavy piece of stone was one which he 
 had seen pei"formed thousands of times, and 
 ordinarily the labourers and their sufferings 
 were, to him, matters of scant moment. All his 
 life he had been accustomed to see his fellows 
 toiling, doggedly and stupidly, at a task in the 
 results of which they took no delight, and 
 whereof the infinity was like a dark shadow cast 
 across their days. Collectively they had not 
 interested him. Individually they had been to 
 him little more than cogs in the machine which 
 disrupted the eternal hills to give the Idea form. 
 As each in turn became worn out and useless, 
 he was replaced by another. Only the work 
 was enduring and immortal, of infinite import- 
 ance compared with the ephemeral beings who 
 themselves upon it. 
 
 But of late, since he had felt old age creeping 
 upon him, and had fallen to the weaving of 
 dreams which could only be realised through 
 the co-operation of the multitude, he had begun 
 a little to regard and estimate his fellaws as 
 sentient human souls. What they were became 
 to him of a sudden a question of greater 
 
92 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 moment than what they could do. He still 
 held them in unfathomable contempt, appris- 
 ing and perhaps even exaggerating their 
 stupidity ; but he speculated much concerning 
 their thoughts and feelings and passions, trying 
 to calculate whither these things, under his 
 guidance, might lead them. They were still to 
 hinT the component parts of an engine whose 
 united force might be directed to the perform- 
 ance of an allotted task ; but it was as though 
 upon these inanimate things there had been laid 
 the curse of souls — as though, beneath his hand, 
 they had rotted unexpectedly into unclean life. 
 This conception of the toiling mob was so new 
 to him that even now he was repelled and a 
 little bewildered by it. 
 
 The men around the big monolith were 
 engrossed by their task. The huge grey stone 
 lay inert upon its dray, incongruously swathed 
 in a tangle of coir lashings, like some fettered 
 monster, and the men who swarmed about it 
 were dwarfed into insignificance by its bulk. 
 
 The war-chariots of the Brahmans ran on 
 high wheels, graceful things with sixteen slender 
 spokes wrought wonderfully in metal — the most 
 perfect contrivances of their kind that the East 
 has ever devised — but these were too delicate 
 for the rough work of the quarries. The heavy 
 cart upon which the block now reposed was 
 supported upon two solid, circular pieces of hard 
 wood, each fashioned from a single slab, and the 
 rims of these were worn and frayed by the 
 
AN APPEAL TO THE GODS 93 
 
 tremendous pressure from above, and contact 
 with rough ruts below. The body of the dray, 
 as it stood at rest, was kept ift a horizontal 
 position by means of upright props. 
 
 Practice and inherited aptitude had given to 
 the Khmers much skill in the handling of 
 unwieldy masses of stone, but the inadequacy of 
 their appliances caused their labours to be beset 
 by constant risk of mischance. The immense 
 ashlars with which they wrought were ordinarily 
 possessed by a tremendous, stubborn inertia ; but 
 this (as all men knew) was capable upon occasion 
 of being transmuted by some trifling mishap 
 into an unaccountable, blundering impulse to 
 charge and crush and maim. It needed so 
 little of heedlessness, of momentary inattention, 
 of chance unhandiness on the part of any of the 
 men, to cause a big block to break away from 
 governance ; yet the safety of all concerned was 
 dependent upon the maintenance over it of an 
 uninterrupted control. Experience had taught 
 the workers these elementary facts, and had 
 driven into their slow perceptions an under- 
 standing of the precarious uncertainty which 
 attended all their toil ; but, none the less, 
 familiarity with danger had bred in them an 
 incurable, indolent indifference. Angkor at this 
 time was filled with maimed wretches whose 
 injuries the rude surgery of the place had 
 done pitifully little to repair; but their fellows 
 learned no prudence from these ugly object- 
 lessons. Even now, as Slat sat watching, man 
 
94 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 after man, engrossed by the work in hand, 
 placed himself directly in front of the monolith 
 which any sudden disturbance of equilibrium 
 might precipitate upon him, or craned over the 
 tail of the dray which a similar mishap might 
 drive upward like a bolt from a catapult. 
 
 Chun, nude save for a loin-clout twisted about 
 his middle, was toiling savagely with the rest. 
 
 Terribly awake, yet hungering for the sleep 
 which was denied to him, his eyeballs smarted in 
 the sun-glare. A fiery sap seemed to pulse 
 through his veins, mounting to his brain in a 
 fevered excitement, secret, repressed} but rest- 
 less. He was intensely alive, quivering with an 
 abnormal keenness of vitality that goaded and 
 maddened him. Though his body laboured, and 
 a portion of his mind was set firmly upon the 
 details of the task under his hand, some hidden, 
 inner part of him was absorbed and intoxicated 
 by the memory of recent events, and yet was a 
 prey to a fierce struggle between duty and 
 desire. It was to him as though lie were held 
 by the woman, who had named herself the Spirit 
 of Destruction, in a grip resembling that of a 
 demoniacal possession ; he was obsessed by the 
 thought of her ; haunted by her face, her lips, her 
 hair, her eyes. Through all the tumult of 
 labour he heard the music of her voice. Even 
 when released, as now, from the thraldom of her 
 presence, he was conscious of a strange, hypnotic 
 force that radiated from her, dominating his soul, 
 penetrating all distances, pursuing without haste, 
 
AN APPEAL TO THE GODS 95 
 
 subduing without effort. In deep, wrathful 
 humiliation he knew himself for what he had 
 become — her thing, her chattel. 
 
 From the nethermost depths of his being, a 
 rebel of pride raised a bruised and bleeding head 
 to mock at her, and at him with bitter jibe and 
 sneer. It pointed a scornful finger at the fool 
 who had suffered himself to be robbed alike of 
 his godhead and his manhood. It showed him 
 a merciless picture of himself, ground into 
 the deepest degradation by the tyranny of 
 uncontrollable desire. It shouldered aside all 
 sophistical, extenuating pleas, and dug down to 
 crude, basic causes. It spat upon him and upon 
 his shame with passionate disgust, with venom, 
 with spite. Brutally it analysed her magic. 
 
 Yet all the while, some othier force within 
 him — a force at once abject and noble — 
 — fought hard for mastery. It kissed the 
 fetters that bound him, gloried in his slavery, 
 flooded his whole being with an infinite tender- 
 ness, set him longing for some supreme oppor- 
 tunity for self-immolation whereby he might 
 render homage to this wayward goddess of his 
 worship. 
 
 But here he caught his breath, remembering 
 that the occasion lay ready to his hand, recall- 
 ing too the awful nature of it. 
 
 A third voice within him was clamorous now, 
 and not all his hungry craving to see her again 
 could quite still it. The accumulated traditions 
 of a lifetime, and the superstitions inherited from 
 
96 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 unnumbered generations of men and women 
 who had greatly feared the Gods, conspired 
 together to paralyse his will. Already the sacri- 
 lege done by him at her bidding oppressed him 
 with an intolerable conviction of unforgivable 
 sin ; but that faded into nothingness beside the 
 deed which she now demanded of him. Even to 
 touch the golden sheath of the Sacred Sword of 
 Indra was, for all save the initiated Brahman 
 wardens, an act of unthinkable wickedness. 
 To seize it, bear it away, and lay it at the feet 
 of a woman, was comparable to an attempt to 
 drag the High Gods from their very thrones. 
 The mystic Spirit of the Land, as all men knew, 
 had in this blade his chosen dwelling-place. 
 Chun trembled to think of the vials of terror 
 and calamity that would surely be poured out 
 upon his people if that spirit were to suffer 
 outrage at his hands. And the deed must be 
 deliberately done, planned with forethought, 
 skill, and caution. It was not to be performed 
 while a momentary, intoxicating impulse nerved 
 him to the commission of an almost unpre- 
 meditated act. Not only his body and a part 
 of his mind, but the whol^ of his being must 
 combine to flout the Gods. That the oppor- 
 tunity and the necessity for thought were thrust 
 upon him, inspired him with an overwhelming 
 sense of guilt. 
 
 He knew himself to be standing at a parting 
 of the ways. If he obeyed her behest, then was 
 he damned as never since the beginning of 
 
AN APPEAL TO THE GODS 97 
 
 thing's had man been damned before. If he 
 subscribed to the dictates of the conscience 
 that was in him, and which now awoke with 
 such passionate entreaties to be heard, then 
 would he never see her again. It was the old, 
 old choice beween a distant, dull security and a 
 present, dear delight; between eternity and 
 time; between the infinite — vagfue, shadowy, 
 but terrible — and the finite — a near, warm, 
 intimate joy. If he obeyed her. . . . The bare 
 thought of his reward set him quivering. If he 
 turned away from this horrifying, yet alluring 
 temptation. ... His heart sank as he beheld 
 life spreading away before his young eyes in a 
 dreary, loveless vista — without hope, without 
 promise, without delight to redeem its cruelty, 
 without dreams to soften its harshness, without 
 her to assuage its fierce hungers. 
 
 There remained, then, for him only death. 
 
 Suddenly the big block, balanced so nicely 
 above the clumsy wheels, drew his thought with 
 magnetic force. It assumed on the instant a 
 new and tremendous meaning. It was no longer 
 only a huge ashlar of cold, grey stone : it was a 
 thunderbolt of the Gods. His breast was bared 
 to the missile of their vengeance. Let them 
 strike, and in vindicating their offended majesty 
 — end his bitter pain. 
 
 Acting on a sudden impulse, he leaned his 
 weight against one of the uprights by means of 
 which the dray was propped. Two men were 
 stooping low above the skids on to which the 
 
98 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 monolith would presently be slipped. These he 
 thrust aside, leaping into their place. He was 
 in a direct line now with the blunt end of the 
 long stone, and he felt the prop yield as again 
 he pressed it outward. Then, bracing himself 
 to await the catastrophe, he closed his eyes and 
 drew his muscles taut. 
 
 " Not yet ! Not yet ! " yelled many voices, 
 and then " Leap clear ! Leap clear ! " they cried. 
 
 The world went out for Chun in the crash of 
 splintered timber, the dull thud of a mighty 
 impact, and shrill cries of pain and terror. 
 
 He opened his eyes to find himself standing in 
 the heart of a great cloud of dust. With a 
 shock, the violence of which caused every thew 
 in his body to fall limp in reaction, he realised 
 that he had suffered no hurt ; but in his ears 
 there was a hubbub of excited voices, punctuated 
 by abrupt, discordant shrieks. 
 
 Presently through the veil obscuring his vision 
 — dust of earth and fog of brain — he saw 
 clearly. 
 
 The monolith, instead of shooting forward to 
 the skids, had toppled sideways from its carriage, 
 shattering the dray and precipitating itself upon 
 the working-party. The men had been stand- 
 ing all along its length, two and three deep, 
 with their shoulders under the wooden yokes 
 by means of which the block was to have been 
 lifted, and guided in its descent. Most of them 
 had had time in which to leap free, and these 
 were standing now, shaken and dazed by the 
 
AN APPEAL TO THE GODS 99 
 
 appalling' narrowness of their escape from death ; 
 but about a dozen of them had been borne to the 
 ground, and lay there, crushed beneath the 
 monstrous stone. The more fortunate of these 
 had been smashed, as an egg is smashed, with 
 an atrocious completeness ; but one or two were 
 writhing and screaming in the dust, tethered 
 awfully to the block by limbs which now bore no 
 likeness to any member of the human body. 
 They were doomed to die, for it would take near 
 an hour to lift the stone sufficiently to effect 
 their release ; and knowing this, their fellows 
 stood around them, bewildered and impotent, 
 crowding together like scared cattle. A dull, 
 sullen murmur arose from them, making a dark 
 background of sound against which the agonised 
 shrieks of the tortured men were like red flames 
 made vocal; and old Slat, listening unmoved, 
 heard in that growing rumour the voice of a 
 people demanding blood for blood. 
 
 But Chun was conscious only of the silence of 
 the defenceless Gods. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 IN THE BA YON 
 
 Night had fallen once more, and of a sudden 
 all Angkor Thorn was clamorous with a wild, 
 insistent outcry to the Gods, that they might 
 hear. 
 
 From the temples grouped around the central 
 forum of the city, screaming conchs broke out, 
 as the last of the daylight died — in prolonged, 
 passionate appeal. Drums boomed and sobbed 
 a restless accompaniment. 
 
 In the echoing courtyards of the sanctuaries, 
 bearded Brahmans, grown old in the service of 
 the Gods, paced to and fro, their faces rapt, 
 their eyes half closed in transports of ecstatic 
 excitement. They moved rhythmically, their 
 bodies swinging from the hips, both hands 
 clutching the great shells which they held to 
 their lips, whence fiery spears of sound seemed 
 to thrust upward to clash against the very gates 
 of Heaven. 
 
 Surely the Gods would hearken ! Surely this 
 clamour, arousing them for an instant from their 
 luxurious self-absorption, would cause them to 
 
 100 
 
IN THE BA YON 101 
 
 cast earthward one casual glance upon the 
 mighty works which their servants, the twice- 
 born demigods, had wrought in their honour ! 
 
 The still air vibrated, the dull earth throbbed 
 to this quivering, and agitated music. It was a 
 pitiful, vain cry raised by the finite to the 
 infinite, pathetically hopeful, eternally hopeless. 
 Men wrought for the Gods, slaved for them, 
 besieged them with supplication, toiled and 
 strove and ground their fellows to the dust in 
 frantic efforts to appease them, raised entreating 
 hands in worship to them, and set up in endur- 
 ing stone imperishable prayers to propitiate and 
 invoke them : but always the Gods were dumb. 
 
 Their unyielding silence was fraught with 
 terror. By the superstitious awe which their 
 divinity inspired the Brahmans, generation after 
 generation had held a mighty multitude in 
 thraldom ; but they too endured a like bondage. 
 The High Gods whom they worshipped were 
 stupendous beings, strong, rapacious, cruel, 
 suspicious too, and swayed by caprice and 
 jealousy. They were insatiable. No sacrifice 
 could satisfy their greed ; no toil done in their 
 service could allay their ravening desire for 
 lordship over the bodies and the souls of men ; 
 no extravagance of homage could turn aside 
 their insensate wrath. Wanton and vindictive, 
 they smote with pitiless stripes the men who 
 spent themselves in their service, speaking only 
 in the roar of storm, in the sullen fury of deluge, 
 in the indiscriminate slaughter of pestilence. 
 
102 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 Cowering before them, the Khmer Brahmans, 
 who ruled a world, crept upon the earth, fearful 
 and abject. ! 
 
 The very palace of their king, behind the 
 great wall so curiously carved, was built only of 
 timber. Dwellings wrought of stone were the 
 peculiar perquisite of the Gods. Every cere- 
 monial observance of the Brahmans' lives was a 
 symbol of perpetual worship. Their godhead 
 itself was but a shred let fall from the divinities 
 on high. Proudly and cruelly they ruled, as 
 viceroys of the proud and cruel ; but they bent 
 men to labour, less in their own service than 
 in that of their inexorable task-masters. A 
 passionate love of artistic achievement inspired 
 them ; but in their eyes beauty, at best, was but 
 a bribe paid by them into the heavenly treasure- 
 house. Also they dared not desist, or even 
 slacken their efforts, lest the anger of the 
 Shining Ones should overtake them. 
 
 Four times daily were their terrors and their 
 desperate, vain expectancy made vocal in the 
 wailing clamour of conch and drum — a little 
 before the dawn, at the coming of the first heats, 
 at the fall of dusk, and as now at the beginning 
 of night. It was as though the agony of man, 
 becoming suddenly articulate, raised this outcry 
 from the dust in which he grovelled. 
 
 Then, abruptly, in the middle of a wild, 
 beseeching note, each conch was stilled, as if at 
 last it were convinced of the futility of its appeal ; 
 and a heavy silence fell. 
 
IN THE BA YON 103 
 
 Gradually a rumour of sound made itself 
 heard, arising from the hive of human dwellings 
 which, under a huddle of thatched and tiled 
 roofs, spread away and away to the margin of 
 the Great Lake — the tinkling, faltering jangle 
 of a three-stringed lute, the throbbing of distant 
 drums, the hum of speech, the wailings of little 
 children, the occasional yelping of curs. But as 
 the night advanced, all these were hushed, till 
 the peace of slumber, after the long day of heat 
 and toil, brooded over Angkor Thom. 
 
 This was the hour for which Chun had been 
 waiting. With a beating heart, he crept from 
 his sleeping-mat to the barred door, let slip its 
 fastenings, and began to lower himself to the 
 ground down the rickety ladder-way. The 
 rungs, creaking under his weight, seemed to 
 shout aloud the nature of his errand. Every 
 faint sound magnified itself in his ears and 
 increased his apprehensions. Intense relief 
 came to his wire-drawn nerves with the sound- 
 less fall of his bare feet upon the beaten path he 
 presently was treading. 
 
 He passed in the darkness along a narrow 
 alley, flanked by two uneven rows of hovels and 
 fences ; and at last emerged into a big, open 
 space, exchanging a slender ribbon of star- 
 spangled sky for the wide splendour of the 
 heavens. Before him lay the empty oblong of 
 the forum. 
 
 On his right, the cluster of tiled roofs, which 
 covered the palace of the king and its groups of 
 
104 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 connected buildings, showed above the wall 
 encircling them. Chun could see the long, 
 upward twisted horns spreading away from their 
 ridges, and could catch the tinkling of the little 
 bells with which they were adorned; but the 
 obscurity hid from his sight the riot of gilding 
 and many colours which by day made them 
 wonderful to behold. The long roof of the hall 
 of state, thrusting prominently forth from the 
 shapeless pile of dwelling-houses, was visible 
 outlined against the sky, supported upon 
 quadruple rows of columns, each hewn from a 
 single balk and fantastic in the extravagance of 
 its ornamentation. 
 
 Further to the right, an immense, shapeless 
 mass rose into the night, squatting ponderously 
 on the brink of a moat, and Chun knew it for 
 the Ba Phun, the great temple which, till the 
 Ba Yon and Angkor Wat successively took 
 form and overshadowed it, marked in its day 
 the culmination of one of those vast waves of 
 adoration, of which each ripple was a shrine 
 wrought wonderfully in stone. Others had 
 preceded, others again had followed it, each in 
 turn foaming itself away at the feet of the 
 unmoved Gods. 
 
 Some such reflection, vaguely formulated, 
 was in Chun's mind as the shadowy bulk of the 
 Ba Phun caught his eye ; for to-night he looked 
 about him on old and familiar things, and 
 beheld them in a new aspect. It seemed to 
 him that he had been that day the recipient 
 
IN THE BA YON 105 
 
 of a special revelation. The Gods had always 
 been silent, giving back to man no ans'VJ^ering 
 sign ; but now he knew them to be defenceless. 
 
 He shuddered a little as the sight of those 
 tortured innocents, and their heart-rending 
 cries recurred to his memory. They had done 
 no sacrilege, yet they had been taken — he 
 spared. Were the Gods blind, as well as deaf 
 and dumb and impotent? In what then did 
 they differ from the stocks and stones of 
 inanimate nature? The reply came readily. 
 In this, that the latter were visible — tangible — 
 while the Gods. ... He gave vent to a sound 
 that was half laugh, half scoff. The Gods! 
 And he laughed again. 
 
 In that moment they, to him, were dead — 
 self-slain; and with them died awe and fear, 
 and the reverence and„ restraint which are 
 born of fear. 
 
 And suddenly there flashed upon his per- 
 ception a vision of what life on earth might 
 mean if it were rid of these things, and of the 
 abundance of delight that a man might wring 
 from it who was untrammelled by the fetters 
 that bound his fellows. 
 
 He had not realised it before, but now he 
 saw that all his days he had been hedged about 
 by fear — fear of the Gods, fear of the divinity 
 that hallowed the Brahmans, fear of the 
 unknown and of the hereafter. Released 
 from these paralysing terrors, it seemed to 
 him that he had attained the godhead which 
 
106 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 had been denied to him when he bathed in 
 the sacred waters. His was a divinity trans.- 
 cending that of the Brahmans, who prostrated 
 themselves before the Gods. To him now all 
 things were possible ; the Sword of Indra itself 
 was nought save a bauble ; and sacrilege was 
 shorn of all its horror. 
 
 Chun stepped out through the darkness with 
 a bolder stride, his heart uplifted and confident, 
 as though his spirit had cast aside a lifelong 
 burden. It had seemed to him that he had 
 lost his soul when, servile to the charm of 
 a woman, he had surrendered his claim to be 
 numbered among the demigods ; and then he 
 had been ashamed. But now, now he was 
 glad, since through her also there had come 
 to him this undreamed-of emancipation. 
 
 The moon, late rising, was beginning to force 
 its way upward through great billows of cotton- 
 soft cloud, massed low down on the eastern 
 horizon. Already the palace-buildings and the 
 Ba Phun were bulking through the gloom with 
 faint, silver-edged outlines, and were casting 
 long, hard shadows across the forum. Presently 
 all the secrets which night had shrouded would 
 be revealed. In Chun the fear of the Gods was 
 stilled ; but the fear of men, and of the hate and 
 cruelty of men, remained. He hugged the wall 
 of the forum, and though he went quickly, he 
 moved with caution. 
 
 At last he reached the fooi of the broad stair- 
 way which led upward to the outer courts of the 
 
IN THE BA YON 107 
 
 Ba Yon. Even in the uncertain light, he could 
 see the upreared hoods of the twin seven- 
 headed cobras, whose rounded bodies formed 
 the balustrades, spreading above him, and their 
 tapering tails writhing high aloft, half lost in 
 the darkness. 
 
 Flattening his body against the flank of one 
 of these monsters, Chun climbed the stairs, 
 step by step, crept beneath the base of one 
 of those waving tails, and ensconced himself 
 in an angle of the parapet. Here he squatted, 
 holding his breath, and sought to quell the 
 strong tremor of excitement by which he was 
 shaken. Inaction fretted his nerves; yet until 
 he could see more clearly, he dared not pene- 
 trate further into the forbidden sanctuary. 
 
 He was seated in deep shadow cast upon 
 the flags of the courtyard by the half-wall, 
 against the rough stones of which his shoulders 
 rested. His heels were drawn compactly 
 under him. In this position he faced due west, 
 so that the moon, as it soared into the sky 
 behind him, threw slanting rays which passed 
 above his head, and lighted up the masses of 
 sacred buildings on the fringes of whose 
 precincts he was trespassing. 
 
 As his eyes became accustomed to the 
 gloom, and as the moonlight strengthened, 
 first one and then another of these shrines 
 rose slowly out of the darkness, great frag- 
 ments of them made luminous, while others 
 were still plunged in shade. Each was 
 
108 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 a temple, square in form, its sides, penetrated 
 by arched portals, rising abruptly from the flags 
 to terminate in a dozen huge stones, nicely 
 dovetailed together, from whose united surfaces, 
 on each facet, a gigantic head of Brahma had 
 been hewn. The delicately carved head-dresses 
 with which these were crowned, combined to 
 form the dome of each sanctuary. As Chun 
 knew, there were fifty-two of these tower-like 
 edifices grouped around the central shrine, 
 which now was his objective; so that in this 
 temple the effigy of the impassive countenance 
 of the divinity was repeated one hundred and 
 twelve times. 
 
 From the spot where he was seated a score 
 or more of them was visible ; and as these, one 
 by one, emerged from the enveloping darkness, 
 his new-found atheism was for a moment 
 shaken. In spite of himself, he was impressed 
 by the sublimity of these unmoved faces which, 
 symbolising the spirit of prayer, awaited with 
 such secure certainty, such tireless patience, 
 the coming of ... he knew not what : for some 
 world-shaking catastrophe, it might be, or 
 perhaps for the answer so long denied to 
 man's eternal invocation. 
 
 It was only for an instant, for mockery awoke 
 within him once more when he recalled the fact 
 that these immense, impassive faces were man- 
 fashioned like the rest ; that they symbolised a 
 human, not a divine idea ; that they and their 
 awful expectancy were, in truth, only one more 
 
IN THE BA YON 109 
 
 appeal of the finite to the unheeding infinite, of 
 the despairingfly articulate to the dumb, blind, 
 deaf, powerless beings who, like their effigies, 
 owed their very existence to the imagination of 
 their worshippers. 
 
 Yet, even as this thought flashed through his 
 mind and set a sneer upon his lips, he was 
 obscurely conscious that with the passing of a 
 faith which had inspired his race for centuries, 
 much else that had sustained and ennobled 
 humanity must also pass away. Though he 
 ^till exulted in the freedom of his soul, which 
 that day had come to him, he of a sudden was 
 depressed by a vague sense of loss. 
 
 But Chun's thought was not long held by 
 these groping speculations, for presently he 
 became aware that the darkness about him was 
 peopled by invisible, flitting forms. Once more 
 superstitious terrors stirred within him. What 
 if the High Gods, now that he had penetrated 
 into their sanctuaries, should at last elect to 
 wreak on him their wrath ? Here, in the gloom 
 of the temple, with those mysterious heads of 
 Brahma dominating the night, the non-existence 
 of the deities seemed less certain than it had 
 appeared out yonder, under the open sky. 
 Though he sought to scoff at it, fear still 
 pursued him. 
 
 A moment later, and his ear caught a familiar 
 sound — the chink and clink of bangles and 
 anklets. His heart, upon which the cold hand 
 of terror had been laid, leaped suddenly within 
 
110 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 hirrii Had she — already, in his thought she was 
 nameless— had she, by some occul-t intuition, 
 divined the hour of his errand, and come hither 
 from Angkor Wat to watch or aid him ? 
 
 Straining- his ears, he found that the peopled 
 obscurity was sibilant with whisperings, and it 
 seemed to him that he caught the sound of bare 
 feet falling upon the smooth flags. 
 
 An instant later, the figure of a girl came 
 forth suddenly from the banked shadows on his 
 right, into a patch of moonlight ; her ornaments 
 making music as she went. Chun leaped up, 
 almost to his feet, then crouched anew. For a 
 second the illusion had been complete, so like in 
 costume, in gait, in outline was this maiden to 
 the lady of his worship ; hut in a flash he saw 
 that it was not she. 
 
 The girl stood for a little space, her small 
 head tilted over her shoulder, her eyes fixed on 
 the darkness behind her, a smile of mockery and 
 invitation on her parted lips. A second figi^re 
 stepped swiftly after her, threw its arms around 
 her, tilted back her head roughly with a big 
 hand thrust beneath her chin, and buried its 
 face on hers. Chun could hear the man's hard 
 breathing and see his blazing eyes ; and knew 
 him for a young Brahman of about his own age, 
 Chandra Dass by name, whom the quarry hands 
 called "the Arrogant One," and who had often 
 set Chun's blood boiling by his caustic speech 
 and scornful gestures. 
 Chun set his teeth in the darkness, and his 
 
IN THE BA YON 111 
 
 hand felt for his heavy wood-knife, for there was 
 hate in his heart, and the male animal within 
 him was goaded by primitive instincts. A sense 
 of the importance of his mission alone restrained 
 him from the insanity of action. He sat still, 
 holding himself in leash by a mighty effort that 
 set him quivering. 
 
 "Thus in pleasant fashion do we serve the 
 Gods," Chandra Dass was saying, as he kissed 
 the full lips upturned toward him. " I, the 
 fructifier, you the fructified ; that the earth may 
 bring forth an abundance of good things upon 
 which lowly ones, such as you, may feedl^ 
 It is a duty well devised and much to my liking. 
 Come ! That I may serve the Gods according 
 to their so wise ordinance ; and that you, pretty 
 one, may serve alike the Gods and me ! " 
 
 He laughed evilly, and began to draw her 
 after him into the shadows. She went, still 
 smiling, but with. feet that made believe to lag. 
 Her attitude was one of complete surrender. 
 
 A third figure emerged from the darkness, and 
 stayed them with a gesture. 
 
 It was Baguan Dass, the old high priest : and 
 at the sight of him the girl squatted on the flags, 
 bowing her head above her folded hands. 
 
 He was a man far advanced in years, with a 
 shock of thick white hair upon his head, and a 
 bushy beard of the same hue falling in a great 
 cascade to his waist over his hairy breast. He 
 wore a huddle of white cloths about his middle, 
 
 ■ Notes. 
 
112 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 beneath which were visible long frilled trousers, 
 but his body was bare, and his skin was 
 shrivelled like that of a withered pippin. His 
 face, too, where it was not hidden by hair, was 
 scored by deep furrows set in a maze of infinite, 
 fine wrinkles ; and his eyes, beneath shaggy 
 white eyebrows, glared from their deep sockets 
 with the savage fire of the fanatic. 
 
 He turned fiercely upon Chandra Dass, and 
 spoke to him, using such vocatives as a man 
 may address to a dog. 
 
 "What make you here?" he asked. "Do 
 you not know that this is the night of the 
 Cleansing? In that fool head of yours is there 
 no understanding of propriety ? " 
 
 " I did but seek to serve the Shining Ones, 
 according to their ordinance," pleaded Chandra 
 Dass meekly. " That the earth may be 
 fruitful, I. . . ." 
 
 But with a snarl, the old man cut him short. 
 
 "Serve the Gods, forsooth! Your beast- 
 passions are the only deities served by you and 
 such as you. It is ordained that on the night of 
 the Cleansing none save those appointed to the 
 King's service shall enter the sanctuaries." 
 
 "I had forgotten. Father," Chandra Dass 
 began falteringly. 
 
 "Forgotten!" the other flung back at him. 
 "Well I know the wickedness in your heart. 
 You thought to creep in here, secretly, the 
 better to take your pick of the temple women, 
 on a night when you would find no rivals. 
 
IN THE BA YON 113 
 
 Shame upon you! Begone, casteless son of a 
 foul woman! To-morrow fitting punishment 
 shall be meted out to you. Well are you named 
 'the Arrogant One,' dog and son of a dog. 
 Begone ! " 
 
 Chandra Dass made a low obeisance, and 
 slunk away without a word. He passed so close 
 to Chun that the latter could have touched him 
 with his outstretched hand, and Chun licked 
 his lips with satisfaction as the moonlight, 
 falling full upon the young Brahman's face, 
 revealed a chapfallen and scowling countenance. 
 
 Baguan Dass stood where the other had left 
 him. He was alone, for the girl had melted into 
 the shadows. Chun could see his long beard 
 waggling below his restless lips, but no sound 
 came from him. 
 
 The old priest was presently joined by others 
 of his cult, who came in twos and threes from 
 various parts of the temple, and massed them- 
 selves silently at his back. One or two of those 
 of higher rank spoke a word to the high priest 
 ere they fell into their places behind him; but 
 to them he made no reply, acknowledging their 
 whispered communications only by a slight 
 inclination of his head. 
 
 From the shadows, beyond the group of 
 hierophants, came the jingle of bangles, and 
 the soft rustle of silk garments. Once in a 
 while the sound was heard as of a tambourine 
 accidentally struck or shaken. The women of 
 the temple were also mustering. 
 
114 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 Chun next became aware of a noise without, 
 which stealthily approached ; and peeping round 
 the angle of the balustrade, at imminent risk of 
 detection, he saw a long and narrow oblong of 
 blackness moving slowing across the forum 
 from the direction of the palace enclosure. 
 Peering at it intently, he presently made it out 
 to be a body of men, advancing with rhythmical 
 tread, bearing in their midst something which 
 looked like a closed palanquin. 
 
 Chun withdrew his head, and flattened him- 
 self, with beating heart, against the wall. 
 
 The sound of footsteps grew momentarily 
 more and more distinct. They began to ascend 
 the main stairway, and Chun heard a whispered 
 word or two, apparently addressed in caution to 
 the bearers of the palanquin. 
 
 Then the head of the procession came into 
 view within a few feet of him, the men who 
 composed it fanning out to right and left, so 
 that he had much ado to avoid being trodden 
 under their feet. 
 
 Next the palanquin reached the head of the 
 stairs, and at its coming all the priests 
 except Baguan Dass, squatted suddenly on 
 the flags, and even the patriarch bent his 
 old head nearly to the ground in humble 
 obeisance. 
 
 The bearers set the closed palanquin down in 
 the moonlight, and as they drew back, old 
 Baguan Dass, approaching, squatted beside it, 
 and seemed to hold a whispered duologue with 
 
IN THE BA YON 115 
 
 the occupant, who still remained hidden behind 
 its embroidered curtains. 
 
 Chun's mind was working with lightning 
 speed. He was determined to probe these 
 mysteries; for since his entry into the temple, 
 merciless revelations had been made to him. 
 Life held for him now a. pain so keen and savage 
 that he had ceased to fear death. He was brim- 
 ful of a hatred so intense that it calmed, rather 
 than excited, his faculties. Every secret that 
 chance might enable him to filch from the 
 Brahmans would be, he felt, a weapon forged 
 for their undoing and laid in his willing hands ; 
 it would be, too, in some sort, an act of 
 vengeance wreaked by him upon the perse- 
 cutors of the girl he loved. 
 
 Very cautiously, but without hesitation 6r 
 faltering, he began to creep, inch by inch, along 
 the wall, and to penetrate deeper and deeper 
 into the mysterious depths of the temple. He 
 had to pass almost under the feet of the men 
 grouped around; and once a member of the 
 processional party kicked back at him blindly, 
 evidently mistaking him for a prowling cur. 
 Edging his way along as silently as he could, 
 he won at last to the flank of one of the nearer 
 towers, and stood erect in its shadow. Here 
 he paused for a moment to look back ; and as 
 he did so, he saw four young priests approach 
 the palanquin, and set their shoulders beneath 
 its yokes. 
 
 He turned about swiftly, and tiptoed off in 
 
116 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the direction in which he knew the central 
 shrine to lie. At first he was bewildered by 
 the labyrinthian passages, open spaces, and 
 stairways of the ancient place; but he held 
 resolutely upon his way, and presently caught 
 the gleam of lamps and torches a hundred feet 
 distant. Towards this he crept, leaping quickly 
 across little patches and runnels of moonlight, 
 and seeking to bury himself in the shadows, till 
 at last he found himself lying flat upon his 
 stomach, on the floor of the cloister at the very 
 edge of the portal. 
 
 Raising his head with the utmost stealth, he 
 peeped into the interior of the shrine. A wide, 
 low altar, heaped with floral ofierings, filled the 
 whole space at the end of the sanctuary. Rich 
 hangings depended from and hid the walls 
 behind it ; and before them, with gold and 
 silver vessels laid at their feet, and illumined by 
 lamps marvellously fashioned of the same 
 materials, stood bronze figures of Indra, God 
 of the Thunders ; Brahma, the Spirit of Prayer, 
 whose sublime calm looks upon us to-day from 
 the face of the sedent Buddha ; and Siva, Lord 
 of the Dance, the most joyous efiigy that ever 
 has kindled the glad worship of mankind. 
 
 Around the walls long torches, steeped in 
 (iamar-tes'm, flared and smoked ; and the air 
 was heavy with the scent of decaying flowers 
 and the heavy fumes of incense. 
 
 Two aged priests squatted silent before 
 the shrine, and as Chun peeped at them, one 
 
IN THE BA YON 117 
 
 aros^, and passing from torch to torch, stirred 
 each into brighter flame with a long silver 
 instrument. 
 
 Already the sound of approaching feet was 
 making itself heard, accompanied by a low 
 rumble of incantation, which boomed through 
 the lilting chorus of female voices raised in 
 song, the occasional clash of cymbals, and the 
 thrumming and jingling of tambourines. 
 
 Chun, quickly realising that his present 
 position was untenable, drew back into the 
 cloister, rose to his feet, and keeping close to 
 the wall, slipped round a corner of the building. 
 A great window, its embrasure fashioned in 
 the thickness of the huge ashlars of which the 
 shrine was built, was visible some feet from the 
 ground, and through it a mist of smoky light 
 straggled forth to lose itself in the surrounding 
 darkness. It was barred by a row of big 
 uprights, made of stone elaborately carved ; 
 but these were set well within the sill, which 
 was broad enough to accommodate Chun, 
 who swung himself up, and lay flat upon it. 
 He now had an uninterrupted view of the 
 interior of the sanctuary ; and lying without 
 in the darkness, ran little risk of being seen by 
 those who stood within, in the glare of the 
 torch-light. 
 
 The indistinct, bass murmur of the priests, 
 the subdued song and music of the women, 
 and underlying all the shuffling of bare feet 
 upon the flags, grew momentarily more loud ; 
 
118 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 and soon the portals of the shrine were blocked 
 by a troop of white-clad Brahmans. These 
 crushed and pushed their way into the sanctuary, 
 in unceremonious fashion, and drew off to right 
 and left, lining the walls. Next, the big door- 
 space was filled by a kaleidoscopic group of 
 women. Their trim, black heads, with oiled 
 hair accurately parted in the middle, shone in 
 the torch-light ; their right shoulders were nude ; 
 their arms and wrists and ankles were loaded 
 with ornaments of gold and silver; gorgeous, 
 many-coloured silks draped their graceful 
 figures. They held small tambourines in their 
 uplifted hands. The faces of some were rapt, 
 their eyes fixed in a deeming ecstasy. The 
 expression of others was unmoved, indifferent ; 
 while one or two smiled and tittered as they 
 nudged and edged their way into their appointed 
 places in the confined space. 
 
 In obedience to some secret, preconcerted 
 signal, all these women sank suddenly to one 
 knee, and then advanced up the centre of the 
 sanctuary, in perfect unison and with incredible 
 rapidity, with one leg always in a kneeling 
 posture, while the other, in its turn, was flung 
 forward, the sole of the foot resting on the 
 ground, the knee crooked. The ease and grace 
 with which this difficult feat was performed 
 bore testimony to the lifelong training to which 
 these girls had been subjected. 
 
 Arrived at the foot of the altar, the leading 
 row leaped lightly into an erect attitude, their 
 
IN THE BA YON 119 
 
 tambourines poised above their heads ; and 
 those behind them followed their example. A 
 chorus of shrill song burst from them, and the 
 tambourines clashed and throbbed in time to the 
 music. Simultaneously every woman began to 
 dance with an abandon only equalled by the 
 bronze effigy of Siva, above them on the altar, 
 with his brandished arms and legs.^ 
 
 As abruptly as it had begun, the dancing 
 ceased ; the crowd of women sank again to one 
 knee, and retreated down the sanctuary, as they 
 had advanced. The portals reached, they melted 
 away into the darkness without, to the accom- 
 paniment of a faint jingling of metal ornaments. 
 Chun, where he lay, could hear their whisperings, 
 the clinking of their bangles, the rustle of their 
 garments, and their light footfalls, as they 
 dispersed. 
 
 Again the doorway was blocked, but this time 
 by the palanquin, borne high on the shoulders of 
 four young priests, surrounded by a mob of 
 hierophants, and followed closely by old Baguan 
 Dass and a dozen of his leading assistants. 
 Then the great metal doors clanged to, after all 
 the younger priests had withdrawn. 
 
 The gilded palanquin, with its heavy 
 embroidered curtains closely veiling its occupant, 
 stood in the centre of the shrine before the altar 
 of the Gods. The two priests who awaited its 
 coming, Baguan Dass and perhaps a score of 
 aged servants of the temple, ysrere grouped 
 
 * Note 3. 
 
120 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 around it, and from them ascended a wailing, 
 sonorous chant. 
 
 The holy songf, pitched in a heart-broken 
 minor key, sobbed and cried and moaned; the 
 torches flared and smoked ; the incense thrown 
 in handfuls into the braziers on the altar sent up 
 thick, curling wreaths, which hung low in the still 
 air, and eddied in slow, fragrant, luminous billows, 
 over Chun's prostrate body, through the great 
 embrasure. The atmosphere within became 
 intolerable, and old Baguan Dass's body shone 
 with perspiration as, the chorus of the priests 
 abruptly ceasing, he took up his place before the 
 altar. 
 
 Three times he prostrated himself, then stood 
 erect, and with uplifted arms began to intone a 
 passionate invocation in the ancient tongue. 
 
 His body quivering, his eyes blazing with 
 religious excitement, his beard agitated, he 
 mouthed out the rolling syllables with their 
 majestic cadences; but Chun, for all Slat's 
 teaching, could catch little of the meaning of his 
 words, save the oft-repeated names of the deities, 
 a reference to the Sacred Sword, and the reiter- 
 ated entreaty that through its agency some 
 miracle of mercy might be wrought in favour of 
 the Son of Heaven, the Lord of Lords, the Ruler 
 of the World, the Prince of Demigods, the 
 immortal and all-puissant King of the Khmer 
 Empire. 
 
 Then Chun's heart stood still within him, for 
 suddenly he understood that the Lord of the 
 
IN THE BA YON 121 
 
 World — upon whom it was death for any of his 
 subjects to set eyes— was seated within that 
 palanquin, not twenty feet away from him. He 
 was unable wholly to free himself from super- 
 stitious terrors; but curiosity conquered fear. 
 He lay still and watched. 
 
 Long old Baguan Dass besoug^ht the Gods, 
 working himself up to a pitch of frenzy that 
 communicated itself to those who surrounded 
 him, so that many rocked their bodies wildly 
 from side to side ; and when, from time to time, 
 the other priests in chorus echoed his prayer, 
 sobs and grroans and cries mingled with their 
 responses. 
 
 With one long, torrential appeal to heaven, 
 the old high priest abruptly ceased his invoca- 
 tion ; and turning with a commanding gesture 
 to the palanquin, bade its occupant come forth 
 to experience the mercy of the Gods. 
 
 The curtains of the palanquin were agitated 
 for a moment, and Chun held his breath in 
 expectation. Then, from under them there 
 slipped a figure, covered from head to heel in an 
 ample cloak of cotton dyed yellow with turmeric, 
 the which in Angkor was the exclusive wear of 
 royalty. 
 
 For an instant the figure stood before the 
 altar; and then, at a sign from Baguan Dass, 
 let fall the garment in billows about his 
 feet. 
 
 He was naked now, save for a ydlow 
 clout twisted tightly about his loins : and his 
 
122 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 face and parts of his body were studded closely 
 with gnarled bosses, prominent and shiny. The 
 nose and more than one finger and toe were 
 lacking : for this man^ — the Chief of Demigods, 
 the Lord of Lords, the Ruler of the World — 
 was a leper. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE SWORD OF INDRA 
 
 He Stood there before them all, in his nakedness 
 and his shame, his body, with its incomplete 
 extremities and its discoloured and nodulous 
 surfaces, palsied a little by feebleness or emotion. 
 His weak eyes, from the red rims of which the 
 lashes had moulted, peered and blinked at the 
 lights blazing upon the altar. His knees vacil- 
 lated, as though they with difificulty sustained 
 his weight. His unsightly hands groped at the 
 air, with motions wavering and aimless. Then, 
 giving vent to an inarticulate sound, he collapsed 
 suddenly in a heap, which writhed itself into an 
 extended prostration — his face againsLthe flags, 
 his arms flung out before him, his hands.palm 
 downward, upon the worn and slippery stones. 
 
 There he lay, the ruler of thousands, the 
 head and front of a proud and priestly caste, 
 bearing upon his misshapen shoulders the 
 burden of an immense tradition, and reduced 
 pitifully to this — a man, cursed beyond the 
 common lot of men, craving abjectly from the 
 Gods an impossible boon.^ 
 
 > Note 4. 
 
 128 
 
124 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 The two old priests, who from the first had 
 occupied the shrine, arose now from their places, 
 prostrated themselves, and then crawled slowly 
 to the back of the altar. A moment later they 
 reappeared, bearing between them, with fearful 
 reverence, a long, narrow box wrapped in silk 
 coverings. 
 
 Halting at the left of the still prostrate king, 
 they began, with infinite care and slowness, to 
 unwind these swathings, till a case of ancient 
 red lacquer was exposed. This was made in 
 two parts, bound together by rings of rattan, 
 and from it presently was drawn a long object 
 enveloped in more silk cloths. One by one these 
 in turn were removed, till from between the 
 hands of the two Brahmans there rose aloft a 
 huge sheathed sword, its hilt upon the flags, its 
 point high above the heads of the grovelling 
 men. 
 
 With a slight indrawing of the breath all 
 present bowed themselves to the ground ; then 
 squatting on their heels, lifted expectant faces to 
 gaze and watch. 
 
 The glare of the torches shimmered on the 
 sheath, and threw crude lights and shadows on 
 the chignons and nude shoulders of the two old 
 priests, who, head to head, with their legs folded 
 under them, and with their arms, from elbow to 
 wrist, lying flat upon the flags, supported in their 
 clasped hands the sword upreared between 
 them. 
 
 The sheath, over five feet in length and some 
 
THE SWORD OF INDRA 125 
 
 fouf inches wide, was wrought of gold, lavishly 
 embossed and carved, as though the craftsman 
 who fashioned it had rioted in unstinted use of 
 the precious stuff. It blazed in a great flame, 
 with purple shadows in the deep crannies of the 
 carving, and tiny tongues of orange and scarlet 
 licking along its length — for this was not the 
 pale gold of Europe, but the rich, red gold of 
 south-eastern Asia, almost virgin in its purity, 
 which, when treated with certain herbs of the 
 jungle, takes to itself a splendid ruddy tint, like 
 that seen in the heart of a fire. 
 
 With an indescribable slowness and reverence, 
 the elder of the 'two servants of the Sword drew 
 the sheath upward from the hilt, exposing to the 
 sight of the worshippers about six inches of the 
 blade. 
 
 Again all present bowed themselves to the 
 ground, and from many of them little sighs of 
 emotion escaped: for this was the Sword of 
 Indra, the gift of the God of Thunders himself 
 to the first of the Khmer kings, and in it was 
 known to abide the mystic Spirit of the Land. 
 Even Chun, the sceptic, gazing at it from his 
 hidinsf-place, was impressed against his will. 
 For this blade, he knew, many men had died, 
 throwing away life as a thing of nothing worth, 
 that thereby they might save it from capture. 
 Even to him it was no mere weapon upon which 
 his eyes were bent. It was the incarnation of 
 an Idea — an idea for which men had spent and 
 slain themselves. 
 
126 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 Then, of a su4den, he recalled the reason of 
 his presence in that forbidden place, and sought 
 to still an involuntary, inward shuddering. The 
 night had brought to him so many revelations, 
 each one of which had seemed to set the seal of 
 certainty upon his new-found disbelief, that even 
 the innate superstition within him stirred now 
 with slack vitality. Soon, with an air of con- 
 scious truculence and yet subconscious fear, he 
 raised reluctant eyes to gaze irreverently upon 
 this tremendous relic of his race. 
 
 The short length of metal which the priests 
 so grudgingly exposed to sight was- black and 
 encrusted with age, roughly triangular in shape, 
 and the torch-light revealed a network of fine 
 gold-watering above its massive carvings. Near 
 the hilt a sedent figure was visible, embowered 
 in delicate scrollwork. The scabbard hid the 
 rest of the blade. 
 
 All this while the king had maintjiined his 
 prostrate attitude, his body shaken now and 
 again by a ripple of tremor, while sighs and 
 moans and inarticulate sounds occasionally 
 broke from his lips. Now, at a sign from 
 Baguan Dass, who half lay, half knelt beside 
 him, he crept across the intervening space of 
 floor, touched the Sacred Sword with his leprous 
 hands, and for an instant rested the crown of his 
 head against it near the feet of the carven god. 
 
 Led by Baguan Dass, the assembled priests 
 set up, on the instant, a wailing chorus. It was 
 at once a lamentation and an appeal ; and little 
 
THE SWORD OF INDRA 127 
 
 by little it sobbed itself into silence, while the 
 incense thrown upon the altar filled the confined 
 space with thick wreaths of fragrant smoke, and 
 the heavy stones of the walls and roofs seemed to 
 imprison and multiply the sound. 
 
 Then the king shuffled back across the floor, 
 and again fell prone and motionless along 
 the flags. 
 
 The servants of the Sword, with many 
 observances, restored the sacred weapon to 
 its niche behind the altar. 
 
 Again Baguan Dass uplifted his voice in 
 prayer, and his assistants chimed in at intervals 
 in resonant chorus. Then the king rose totter- 
 ing to his feet ; the yellow garment was draped 
 about his shoulders, and he clambered pain- 
 fully and awkwardly back into the palanquin. 
 
 The great doors were flung wide. The 
 priests lifted up their burden. The procession 
 re-formed, and trooped out of the sanctuary 
 into the still air of the night. The two old 
 servants of the Sword, blinking sleepy eyes, 
 fell to extinguishing the torches and the lights 
 on the altar. Chun slid from off the sill of the 
 embrasure, and squatted in the cloister with 
 his back against the wall. 
 
 For perhaps an hour he sat there, fighting off 
 the sleep which now began to oppress his eye- 
 lids, and turning over in his mind the meaning 
 of the secrets which had been that night 
 revealed to him. But there was one scrap of 
 knowledge, from a full comprehension of which 
 
128 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 his whole being drew back in an agony of 
 repulsion and distress ; yet it was this, morfe 
 than all else, that now nerved him to the act 
 upon which his will was set. 
 
 Creeping round the angle of the cloister, he 
 was able presently to peer, as he had peered 
 before, over the threshold-stone, into the 
 interior of the shrine; for the doors, though 
 drawn together, were still ajar. Two lights 
 flickered from the low altar, but beyond their 
 range the shadows were heavily banked. From 
 a corner of the sanctuary came the sound of 
 regular breathing. After their long vigil, the 
 servants of the Sword slept beside their sacred 
 charge. 
 
 Chun rose to his feet, pushed the big doors 
 slightly apart, slipped swiftly through the 
 aperture, and dropped once more to his knees. 
 Crawling on all fours, he made his way, inch 
 by inch, across the floor of the sanctuary, while 
 the three defenceless gods upon the altar, their 
 bronze figures shimmering in the flicker of the 
 lights, seemed to watch him through impassive 
 eyes. Once one of the sleepers — Chun could 
 make out their forms dimly, as they lay against 
 the wall, wrapped to the nose in the long 
 cloths which they had arawn about them — 
 moved in his slumber, flinging out and with- 
 drawing an arm, and muttering brokenly. 
 Then Chun clamped himself to the flags, and 
 hushed his breathing till his heart seemed like 
 to burst. 
 
THE SWORD OF INDRA 129 
 
 Again he crept onward. He wormed his way 
 to the left-hand corner of the altar, and into 
 the darkness beyond. He had now to feel with 
 furtive, outstretched fingers every inch of his 
 path, lest he should come into collision with 
 some unseen object whose fall might arouse the 
 sleepers. He moved more slowly than a 
 shadow at midday ; but at last his hand touched 
 silk, and passing it cautiously to the right, he 
 realised with a thrill that the Sword of Indra 
 lay at last within his grasp. 
 
 Its great weight, when he began to lift it from 
 its place, came upon him with a shock of 
 surprise ; but his were the muscles of the hewer 
 of stone, and without difficulty he leaned it 
 over his shoulder, and with redoubled caution 
 began his backward course. 
 
 Once more, feeling his way with his left hand, 
 he crept from behind the shrine, helped now by 
 the faint light cast ahead of him by the altar- 
 lamps. The servants of the Sword still slept. 
 Again he traversed the flags, and at last 
 reached the doorway, rose erect, slipped into 
 the cloister without, and drew the portals to 
 behind him. As, gazing through the acute 
 angles of the arches, he saw once more the stars 
 in heaven and the soft light of moon, he could 
 hardly believe, in spite of the load across his 
 shoulder, that the task his love had set him had 
 indeed been accomplished. It had seemed an 
 impossibility: it had proved so easy. He had 
 meditated upon it with such terror, such 
 
180 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 writhin&s and agonies of the soul ; and behold 
 it was, in the event, as prosaic as any common 
 robbery. He remembered that, throughout his 
 adventure, his fears had been directed solely 
 towards men, as are those of any thief of human 
 property. The servants of the Sword had 
 slept : but what of the slumbering Gods ? 
 There was in his heart a veritable ferocity of 
 contempt and derision. 
 
 The Ba Yon also slept. Its cloisters, lighted 
 faintly by the moon, were silent solitudes. 
 Chun passed through them cautiously but with 
 confidence, and reached at last the great outer 
 stairway up which he had crawled a few hours 
 before. Descending this, he was absorbed into 
 the shadows of the night. 
 
 A little before the dawning of the day, he hid 
 a long object, wrapped throughout its length in 
 the sheath of the cocoanut, and securely bound 
 at intervals with pieces of rattan, in the thatch 
 of his hut. Then, making fast the door behind 
 him, he crept to his sleeping-mat, and fell into 
 the slumber which waits upon utter exhaustion. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 IN THE HANDS OF A WOMAN 
 
 "Behold! I have done your behest! I have 
 it here — have brought it with me — to lay at 
 your feet ! " 
 
 Chun spoke breathlessly, his face uplifted to 
 the little, shadowy figure which stood before 
 and above him in the darkness. It was the 
 moment of triumph that all day he had been 
 promising himself, of which the thought had 
 been like a warm and glowing joy, close hidden 
 in his heart. 
 
 Once again he had kept a long and solitary 
 vigil; but though the suspense of expectancy 
 had been hard to endure, he had not experienced 
 the paroxysms of despair whicn formerly had 
 visited him. He had known that she would 
 come to him. And now she was here — very 
 near him — so that, as she stood looking down at 
 him, he fancied that he could catch the faint 
 fragrance of her breath: no mocking shadow, 
 this, but the creature of delicious flesh and 
 blood who was his love. 
 
 The words that should tell her of his deed 
 
 181 
 
132 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 accomplished, and done through loyalty to 
 her whim, burst from him in a tumultuous 
 whisper. His voice was shaking with excite- 
 ment. Eagerly he peered upward through the 
 gloom, seeking to read the smile of glad surprise 
 which should reward him for all the perils he 
 had braved. 
 
 The girl stood, not a yard away from him, 
 with one small foot caressing with its sole the 
 ankle-joint of its fellow. Her silk garment, 
 draped over her right shpulder and about her 
 waist, fell downward in graceful lines and 
 curves. Both hands were raised, holding in 
 their fingers a single blossom of frangipani, 
 which men call "temple flowers," since they 
 have a spiecial use as floral offerings to the 
 Gods ; and the thick petals were a spot of white- 
 ness against the even pallor of her face. 
 
 She made no sign nor movement while Chun 
 was speaking, and even when his eager words 
 had died away into the stillness, she remained 
 immobile and silent. Then, after a long pause, 
 in a voice as cold and passionless as crystal, she 
 ejaculated one syllable — 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 His disappointment, in the violence of re- 
 action, had for Chun the force of a blow. He 
 saw in an instant of time, as men see a land- 
 scape, with its outline and its colour revealed 
 by the sudden vividness of a lightning-flash, all 
 that had befallen him, all that he had endured, 
 since last this girl had stood beside him. He 
 
IN THE HANDS OF A WOMAN 133 
 
 recalled the mental strugrgle £ind atigruish which 
 had preceded his appeal to the Gods ; again he 
 braced himself for death ; once more he looted 
 in horror upon the shrieking wretches pinned 
 beneath the monolith ; he beheld himself 
 standing vainglorious and contemptuous above 
 the grave, which held the dead faith that had 
 inspired and uplifted his fathers; saw himself 
 wresting their secrets from the Brahmans in the 
 temple of the Ba Yon, filled to overflowing by 
 a fierce hate, which had its root in his love for 
 this girl ; gazed with loathing and repulsion 
 upon the leprous king ; held the Sword of Indra 
 — a trophy won to win her — between his hands : 
 and all for . . . What ? 
 
 In an instant, by a single spoken word, she 
 had brought to the dust all his soaring hopes, 
 all his pride in that which he had attempted, and 
 suffered, and achieved in the vain expectation 
 that she, too, would share a little in his pride 
 and triumph. 
 
 "Well?" she repeated irritably, as he still 
 was silent. "Why do you not speak? Why 
 do you sit there, like a dumb thing, whimpering 
 on the ground." 
 
 "I did not whimper," he replied in a surly 
 growl. 
 
 " Well, snuffling," she said. " Why don't you 
 speak ? " 
 
 " I have spoken. I tell you that I have 
 brought it here — the Sword of Indra. No 
 matter how I wrested it from its wardens; no 
 
134 THE DOWNFALI. OF THE GODS 
 
 matter what risks I have run, that your will 
 might be accomplished; no matter what 
 dangers I have faced, in peril from the hate 
 of man and from the dire hatred of the Gods. 
 Let it suffice that it is here — here beneath 
 my " 
 
 With an impatient gesture she cut him short. 
 
 " Peace ! Peace ! Peace ! " she cried implor- 
 ingly. "My head spins with your so many 
 words. I ask only silence. Peace ! " 
 
 Bewildered as a dog in the hands of a 
 capricious master, Chun stemmed the current 
 of his complaining speech, and watched the girl 
 as, with a little shudder of fatigue, she cast 
 herself down in a heap on the flags by his side. 
 Her knees were drawn up, and her hands clasped 
 about them. Her face was buried between 
 them, so that only her little ears and the white 
 nape of her neck were visible below the dark 
 masses of her hair. She remained so still that 
 she seemed hardly to respire ; and Chun, afraid 
 to stir, sat beside her in a hypnotic immobility. 
 
 After a long, long time, she raised her eyes 
 and looked at him. The small, beautiful face 
 was almost haggard. There was upon it no 
 expression of curiosity nor interest; only a 
 great weariness. 
 
 "Now tell me," she said. 
 
 Shyly at first— almost shamefacedly — Chun 
 began to recount the story of his emotional and 
 bodily experiences ; but as her attention became 
 more and more visibly arrested, his own self- 
 
IN THE HANDS OF A WOMAN 135 
 
 confidence, in a measure, returned. Soon he 
 was speaking and describing with force and 
 vivacity, and more than once she interrupted 
 him to ask some eager question, and once at 
 least she smiled, as one well pleased. She, who 
 had seemed so dead, was keenly alive now — 
 living with him, in imagination, through every 
 moment of the history he related. Her eyes 
 were fixed upon his face, her lips were parted, 
 and behind them the little snake's fangs showed 
 among her white teeth. Her whole figure 
 seemed to be vitalised ; the lassitude and inertia 
 of a few moments before transformed into 
 excitement and vivid energy : and Chun, watch- 
 ing her through hungry and adoring eyes, 
 marked the change, and felt that this, his 
 reward, was doubled in value because it had 
 been wrested from her, not freely given. 
 
 When he came to the moment in his narrative 
 when the king, emerging from the palanquin, 
 had stood naked before the altar — a leper far 
 gone in the disease — she gave vent to a little 
 cry, and clutched Chun's arm with a grip that 
 hurt him. 
 
 "Ah! Ha! my friend!" she exclaimed. 
 "That, then, is the mystery. You have done 
 well. You have stolen from the Brahmans 
 something more precious than the Sword of 
 Indra. But, go on. Tell me more, still more." 
 
 And Chun continued his narrative. One 
 thing only he omitted. He made no mention of 
 the scene which he had witnessed between 
 
136 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 Chandra Dass and the girl of the temple — the 
 woman whom, for a moment, he had mistaken 
 for the girl at his side. Yet this, and the secret 
 meaning which it held for him, were the most 
 portentous discoveries in his eyes that that 
 night of adventure had brought in its train. 
 His love, and a very chivalrous tenderness 
 which that love inspired, caused him to shrink 
 from revealing to her that he, by chance, had 
 resolved the mystery with which, as with a 
 garment, she had sought to shroud herself. 
 
 He recalled the words which she had used to 
 him at their first meeting — words which now to 
 him were a cry more pathetic than surely ever 
 yet had woman raised to man : 
 
 " For a little longer let me be, to you at least, a 
 Daughter of the Gods." 
 
 Chun could have wept for very pity of her, as 
 they recurred to his memory : but well he knew 
 that this girl must be for him, not " for a little 
 longer," but for always, that which from the 
 first she had been — his queen, his dear 
 divinity. Also, the frenzy of rage and hate 
 which an understanding of her lot had kindled in 
 him, flared up anew; and while his very soul 
 boiled with it, seething above the fire of an 
 emotion that was stronger than his pain, he 
 seemed to grasp the reason of his existence, the 
 nature of his mission upon earth. He was here 
 to serve and to avenge her, the Spirit of Destruc- 
 tion ; for her lo labour and to fight ; for her to 
 destroy and overcome. This great passion of 
 
IN THE HANDS OF A WOMAN 137 
 
 hatred that so shoak him, was implanted in his 
 heart of set purpose. It must be slaked, or he 
 would die; and only by slaking it could his 
 love be served and saved. 
 
 The girl sat scanning him closely through the 
 shadows, which were beginning to yield to the 
 strengthening moonlight. 
 
 " And did you see no women in the Ba Yon ?" 
 she asked presently. 
 
 "No," said Chun. He lied bravely, but his 
 eyes fell. 
 
 She emitted a short, mirthless laugh. 
 
 "No man can lie to a woman," she said 
 quietly. And then, after a pause, " So now you 
 know." 
 
 Chun looked at her in hangdog fashion, as 
 though he had been detected in the commission 
 of some disgraceful crime. Then, in silence and 
 grief, he bowed his head with a nod of assent. 
 He kept his eyes fixed upon the flags before 
 him, upon one of which with the forefinger of his 
 right hand he was nervously tracing a meaning- 
 less figure. 
 
 The silence that followed was like a scourge 
 laid across his naked soul. 
 
 " So even this dream is taken from me," she 
 said at last, "that a man should think of me 
 with reverence ! " 
 
 There was a sob mingled with the music of 
 her voice. 
 
 At the word, Chun, with tears gathering to 
 his eyes, flung himself prostrate at her feet, 
 
138 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 covering them with caresses. His own words 
 came brokenly, torn by the passion of his desire 
 to convince and comfort her. 
 
 " Reverence ! " he cried. " Could you but look 
 into my heart! Could you but read my 
 thought 1 Ah, but then you — even you — would 
 be satisfied. Reverence! It is too slight 
 a word. There is worship, adoration, pity 
 too " 
 
 "I want none oi your pity ! " she interjected 
 sharply. 
 
 " I worship you, I adore you, I long only to 
 serve you," he continued unchecked. "For me 
 there are no longer gods in heaven ; but on 
 earth, you are my goddess, my queen, my 
 love " 
 
 She withdrew her feet sharply from his touch, 
 and moved a little away from him.- 
 
 "I knew it!" she said. And her tone was 
 scornful. "I had been waiting for it. Ah, ye 
 Gods ! But a man is ever a man ! His thought 
 makes believe to cradle with his service the 
 woman whom he desires ; but always it is him- 
 self, his own vile passions, to which he first 
 would minister. You think, because I am 
 what I am, that I am within your reach ! " She 
 spat savagely into the darkness. " But it is not 
 so. I am no rejected meat, let fall from the 
 Brahmans' table, for Sudras to devour. Though 
 I be allotted to the service of these dogs in the 
 name of gods who are not, I have not yet 
 declined to the last degradation of our slavery. 
 
IN THE HANDS OF A WOMAN 139 
 
 No waif of the city am I, of whom even caste- 
 less ones njiay have their will." 
 
 Chun, no longer prostrate, was beset by the 
 old bewilderment. 
 
 " You know no justice 1 " he cried, goaded into 
 anger. " I ask nothing " 
 
 "That is well," she flashed back at him, 
 " Since you would ask in vain." 
 
 " I ask nothing from you," he repeated 
 doggedly, as though she had not spoken. " I 
 desire nothing. Least of all do I want aught 
 that you cannot give freely and with gladness. 
 But this, truly, I do seek^ — that I may a little 
 serve, and aid, and comfort you ; that, if the 
 Fates be willing, to me may fall the task of 
 avenging you upon those who have abused you ; 
 that the great hate which is within me may be 
 poured out in devastation upon those at whose 
 hands you have suffered- " 
 
 "How do you know that I have suffered?" 
 she asked innocently, but with evil meaning. 
 She heard him draw in bis breath with the quick, 
 abrupt inhalation of a man stabbed by a sudden 
 twinge of pain ; and she continued, smiling a 
 little to herself, like one revolving pleasant 
 memories. 
 
 " It is a drab thing, the lot of a woman who' 
 has no lovers. From that Fate has saved me. 
 Why, then, should I quarrel with Fate?" 
 
 "They must be lovers of her own choosing," 
 said Chun grimly. "A woman may delight in 
 giving, but " 
 
140 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 " But she loves also mastery," she insinuated 
 softly. " Think of the princesses in the ancient 
 tales ; were they not always captured, and were 
 they, think you, quite unhappy ? " 
 
 Chun writhed where he sat listening. 
 
 " Ye gods of earth and air ! " he blurted out. 
 " Take the Sword of Indra, since it is your whim 
 to make of it a plaything, and let me be gone. 
 If you be happy in your degradation, there is 
 nought for me to avenge. But, listen, woman 
 of the temple ! The ignoble pleasures by which 
 you set such store are viler far than any passion 
 that, harbouring in the heart of a man, craves 
 the satisfaction upon which you so cry shame. 
 This is the end ! Take the Sword and let me 
 go! 
 
 She moved nearer to him, and her little 
 fingers clasped his arm with a grip at once 
 soft and firm. Her touch stilled instantly 
 the storm of anger in him. She looked at 
 him intently out of those great, mysterious 
 eyes. 
 
 "And would you, at a word, desert me?" 
 she whispered. "Would you leave me, and 
 my little body, and my tortured soul, at the 
 mercy of men who are strong, and cruel, and 
 ravenous ? And you prate of your love! " 
 
 She gave vent to a laugh bitterly derisive. 
 
 "Is it your will that I should be eaten by 
 worms; when you, perhaps (who knows?), 
 by a little labour and self-sacrifice might save 
 me?" 
 
IN THE HANDS OF A WOMAN 141 
 
 Chun listened, with indignation against him- 
 self augmenting within him. Almost was he 
 persuaded that he had been guilty of some 
 monstrous treason against her. 
 
 " Pardon," he whispered hoarsely. " I crave 
 your pardon. But you know — always you 
 know — that I am yours, yours to you, to do 
 with what you will. Indeed I ask no guerdon. 
 I cherish no hope, save that a little I may 
 serve you ; my being is without reason, unless 
 through me some added happiness, or some 
 surcease of pain may visit you. Believe me, 
 my love for you is a holy thing — no vile passion 
 of the blood : and always, always, it goes hand 
 in hand with reverence." 
 
 Again her arms were clasped about her 
 updrawn knees, and her face sank down 
 between them. She rocked her body to and 
 fro. Her shoulders heaved a little. 
 
 " Mahadeo ! " she exclaimed in a muffled 
 voice. "How I have suffered! You, who 
 are but a man, with the coarse fibres of your 
 kind, you do not know what suffering is — 
 you do not dream how acute is the pain, how 
 bitter the humiliation, that women must endure. 
 But / know, for those agonies have been to me 
 my daily fare." 
 
 Chun longed to throw his great arms around 
 her, to draw this little sobbing child to him, 
 that, resting against his breast, she might 
 feel his big, unselfish love enveloping her, and 
 borrow therefrom a moment's consolation. 
 
142 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 But, in his uncertainty of her shiftinsr moods, 
 he did not dare even to touch her. 
 
 " Yet, I too know a little," he said, hushing 
 his voice to a soothing tenderness. "I have 
 thought — I have imagined. Ever since an 
 understanding, of the truth came to me out of the 
 shadows, yonder in the Ba Yon, it seems to me 
 that this alone has obsessed my mind. It has 
 been filled with harrowing pictures — your 
 beauty, so degraded and abused; your pride, 
 dragged in the mire; you, youy my queen, my 
 divinity, thrust down from the throne in the 
 heavens, which should be yours, to be made 
 a victim of the Lie by the lying dogs who shore 
 and serve it ! " 
 
 In spite of himself, his voice rose with his 
 rising passion. He did not realise how slavishly 
 he was echoing thoughts which had their origin 
 with her. 
 
 She raised her head and turned her face 
 toward him. Out of its pale purity of tint 
 and line, her eyes scrutinised him with 
 amusement and curiosity. 
 
 "You have learned your lesson well," she 
 said slightingly. " But there are still other 
 lessons for you to learn. You have thought, 
 you have imagined. . . . But you have not 
 known. Now listen : it is well that a full under- 
 standing should be yours." 
 
 For nearly an hour she spoke, aimost 
 uninterruptedly, while Chun writhed and 
 shuddered at her side. She spoke with a 
 
IN THE HANDS OF A WOMAN 143 
 
 studied and brutal frankness of her experi- 
 ences, dwelling with a morbid insistency, 
 that seemingly to her was almost pleasurable, 
 upon every detail of her ill-treatment and 
 humiliation. She forced Chun to share in 
 every insult to her body, every affront to her 
 soul, to which life had subjected her. She 
 spared him nothing that could torture or 
 wound a lover, or that could outrage and 
 inflame the fury of a man. It was as though 
 she, who had suffered greatly, took a savage 
 delight in making him a participator in every 
 pang that she had endured. And all the while, 
 she watched him narrowly, as if the soul that 
 she was torturing were some delicate instrument 
 upon which she played with infinite skill, and 
 that its instant response afforded her a keen 
 satisfaction. 
 
 Chun had not dreamed till that moment what 
 passions of sympathy and of ungovernable 
 rage, .what an insanity of hatred and of 
 jealousy, had their abode within him. She 
 left little upon which his imagination might 
 feed : yet was his imagination busy, exaggerat- 
 ing and elaborating the intolerable. He was 
 pale and shaking, and sweating at every pore, 
 when at last she ceased her monologue. 
 
 The crown was set upon his suffering by 
 the conviction — ^firm within him, though firmly 
 and loyally he sought to uproot it — that he, 
 vicariously, felt a shrewder pain than any 
 with which she, in living through the happen- 
 
144 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 ingfs of which she told, had ever become 
 acquainted. 
 
 "And now," she concluded. "Now that you 
 know all, would you leave me, abandoning me 
 to this — to this ? " 
 
 He bent his head to the ground before her, 
 and laid it against her feet. 
 
 " I love you," he murmured, with a shudder- 
 ing sob. "I love you. Every pain that has 
 been yours is my most bitter pain. I long to 
 comfort you for all you have endured ; to protect, 
 and aid, and serve you. But, most of all " — and 
 here he sat erect and threw back his head with 
 a passionate gesture — " Most of all, I seek to 
 avenge you ! " 
 
 "That is well," she said calmly. " Now show 
 me the Sword." 
 
 A little before the dawn, he left her. She had 
 been gentle, even tender to him; and he, 
 warned by his slowly growing knowledge of 
 her, and unmindful of self, had sought to be 
 to her what she would have him be. 
 
 Also, together they had explored the paths 
 through which an ambushed vengeance might 
 be led to precipitate itself upon the demigods ; 
 and he, before he passed to his sleeping-mat, 
 burned in a wayside bonfire the long lacquer- 
 box and the silk wrappings which had protected 
 the sacred weapon. He went about this task 
 with quiet confidence, stepping lightly, holding 
 his head erect ; for great pride and joy that 
 
IN THE HANDS OF A WOMAN 145 
 
 night were his. Yet was he in chains; and 
 upon his shoulders had been laid heavier 
 burdens than he ever before had striven to 
 sustain. 
 
 . And the Sword of Indra lay at rest at the 
 bottom of the Brahqians' bathing-pool, with 
 the still waters above it guarding it from the 
 sight of man. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 THE FEAST OF THE CITY 
 
 The day of full moon, which synchronised most 
 nearly with the summer solstice, had come, and 
 throughout the Khmer Empire all the world 
 made holiday. 
 
 It was the day, tradition related, which had 
 seen the foundation of Angkor Thorn, the first 
 and greatest of cities; the day upon which 
 Indra, Lord of the Thunders, incarnated in the 
 likeness of a youthful warrior, had appeared 
 suddenly before the Brahman king, and had 
 placed in his hands the Sacred Sword. 
 
 Every Khmer peasant could repeat by heart 
 the mystic dialogue which had then ensued 
 between the aged monarch — worn and white- 
 bearded, after a lifetime of battle, seated gravely 
 among his councillors— and the god, resplendent 
 with supernatural light, and in all the pride and 
 glory of immortal youth. 
 
 "Guard well this Sword," Indra had con- 
 cluded, "for within its blade, not made with 
 hands, shall the Spirit of the Land abide. 
 While it is in thy grasp, thy house shall 
 
 146 
 
THE J-EAST OF THE CITY 147 
 
 endure ; thy sons shall rule ; thy kingdom shall 
 be a mighty kingdom. Plenty shall lavish its 
 gifts on thee and on thy people. Here, in thy 
 city, peace shall tarry, and in distant lands thine 
 arm shall prevail, and the nations shall cower 
 before thee. But suffer the Sword to be wrested 
 from thee, and all calamity shall be thine. 
 Famine and pestilence and disastrous war shall 
 stalk abroad to devastate the land. Thy people 
 shall rise against thee. The trees of thy fruit- 
 groves shall be barren, and the crops rot in the 
 fields. Thine enemies from without shall harry 
 thee, and in thine own house shall strife and 
 dissension be found. Health and wealth and 
 power shall alike desert thee, and in that hour 
 shall all thy works be brought to nought. 
 Wherefore^ guard well this Sword ! " 
 
 In awe and reverence and fear the king and 
 his councillors had bowed themselves to the 
 ground. When they raised their heads, the 
 god had vanished; but the sunlight flamed 
 along the scabbard of red gold in which the gift 
 of the Divinity was sheathed. 
 
 For days past, troops of men, women, and 
 children, drawn from the neighbouring districts, 
 had been gathering in the vicinity of the capital. 
 Clad in spotless white garments, as befitted folk 
 on pilgrimage, they came mostly on foot; but 
 small carts, pulled by little, vicious bulls, were 
 numerous; and now and again the throng 
 parted, the people squatting reverently in the 
 
148 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 dust, to admit of the passage of one of the 
 demigods, seated, rocking, high above them, in 
 the howdah of a gaily caparisoned elephant, or 
 lolling in an ancient war-chariot, drawn by a 
 horse upon whose rough back a slovenly 
 postilion sat astride. 
 
 Every house and hut in and about Angkor 
 was crowded to overflowing. Little family 
 groups camped in the outer cloisters of the 
 temples ; and in every open space, and along the 
 shores of Tonle-Sap, lean-to sheds had been 
 improvised to serve as temporary dwellings. 
 
 The good people of Angkor spoiled the 
 strangers with a more than Mosaic complete- 
 ness. Extravagant prices were asked and given 
 for accommodation, which on any other occasion 
 would have compelled a pariah to protest. 
 When the small stocks of rice which the 
 pilgrims had brought with them were exhausted, 
 the visitors found that fresh supplies could only 
 be obtained at famine-rates. The men of the 
 town saw in the necessity and the simplicity of 
 the men from the country a golden opportunity, 
 and they turned it to gold ; practising upon 
 them every imposture, every extortion, every 
 cynical deception, that the subtle ingenuity of 
 the East could devise, and the wit of a money- 
 loving population could contrive. In the forum 
 and the market-places men, with laughter and 
 the slapping of thighs, related to appreciative 
 groups strange tales of their successful trickeries. 
 There was little enough to suggest any 
 
THE FEAST OF THE CITY 149 
 
 religious or sacramental objective. Men, 
 
 women, and children, it is true, crowded into, 
 
 and shouldered and pushed their way out of, 
 
 the wide portals of the temples, and within laid 
 
 floral offerings at the feet of the Gods and 
 
 prostrated themselves before them ; but the city 
 
 and its precincts were given over to feasting 
 
 and revelry. Under rough booths, open to the 
 
 view on all four sides, strolling' players enacted 
 
 ancient dramas and fairy tales, interspersing the 
 
 songs and slow-moving, posturing dances, with 
 
 improvised dialogue, coarse and topical. At 
 
 night-time, behind cotton transparencies, the 
 
 story of the Ramayana was told and retold» 
 
 with the aid of rude puppets, held on long sticks, 
 
 whose shadows moved grotesquely across the 
 
 white and shimmering oblongs. By day and by 
 
 night, conjurors, jugglers, and snake-charmers 
 
 moved through the crowd, or squatted in the 
 
 heart of a circle of spectators, making display 
 
 of their skill. Contortionists — the elasticity of 
 
 whose bodies was capable of astonishing a 
 
 people, every one of whom in childhood can 
 
 pick up a coin with his lips from a spot on 
 
 the floor behind him — wove themselves into 
 
 knots and horror-inspiring convolutions to the 
 
 exciting music of flutes and drums. Prostitutes, 
 
 bedizened and bedecked, with hair oiled to a 
 
 mirror-like lustre, sat on verandahsr drawing 
 
 from lutes attenuated melodies, and raising 
 
 above the murmur of the crowd, thin jets of 
 
 song, while their hard eyes, unnaturally large 
 
150 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 agfainst great smudges of bistre, invited with 
 leer and ogle the attention of the passers-by. 
 Panders moved hither and thither through 
 the throng, accosting indiscriminately bearded 
 fathers of families, dull countrymen, grey-headed 
 elders, and callow boys, with infamous smirks and 
 nudges. Hawkers, crying their wares in shrill, 
 inarticulate falsetto, offered toys and sweet- 
 meats and baubles to the pilgrims. Around 
 the eating-shops, where rice and steaming-hot 
 curries were for sale, a clamorous mob struggled 
 to secure a meal. The halt, the blind, and the 
 maimed — many of them the victims of accidents 
 in the quarries, or at the works — sat by the 
 roadside, filling the air with lamentations, and 
 exhibiting in merciless fashion abominable 
 deformities. Fakirs, with long hair grown solid 
 with dirt and with neglect, displayed self-inflicted 
 mutilations, or held atrophied arms aloft, gnarled 
 and rigid as the dead boughs of trees. The 
 eyes of these holy men were closed ; or opened 
 to their fullest extent, glared with the wild light 
 of insanity. From the gnashing jaws of one 
 and all of them, there issued streams of chant or 
 invocation. Attendants, expectant and alert, 
 gathered up the tin coins cast to them, and 
 haggled over the prices they demanded for relics 
 of these saints. Occasionally, the people were 
 pushed roughly aside by obsequious and officious 
 Sudras, to make way for one of the demigods 
 who, unmindful of the salutations of the throng 
 — whose members at his approach sank to the 
 
THE FEAST OF THE CITY 181 
 
 ground in sitting postures, with folded hands up- 
 lifted to their foreheads — stalked through the 
 multitude, as through an empty street. 
 
 Everywhere, in spite of the white garments 
 worn by most of the pilgrims, there was colour 
 — colour, intensely vivid and of infinite variety, 
 that shifted and changed and combined and 
 dispersed with a constant, capricious mutability. 
 From above, the sun, set high in the heart of a 
 cloudless sky, poured upon the scene floods of 
 its crude and glaring light. Behind, the grey 
 bulk of the temples, refracting the heat, rose 
 mountainous and sombre. 
 
 A great tumult, made up of many noises, set 
 the heavy air quivering — a dull rumour of voices, 
 like the humming of a myriad swarming bees ; 
 the yells of hawkers, the lamentation of beggars, 
 the frenzied invocations of religious mendicants, 
 the songs of players, the throb and pulse of 
 drums, the screaming of temple-conchs, the 
 faint, thin music of stringed instruments. 
 
 The heat was intense ; the atmosphere stifling. 
 Th6 acrid scent of a massed and perspiring 
 multitude was blent with the pungent, nerve- 
 exciting odours of a bazaar of south-eastern 
 Asia. 
 
 Ordinarily, the spirit of the people was as gay 
 and as light-hearted as the scene was brilliant 
 and tawdry ; but this year, on the Feast of the 
 City, there was discernible throughout Angkor 
 a strange feeling of unrest. Its causation was 
 
152 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 obscure; yet the town was a- buzz with vague 
 rumours — was like a whispering gallery in which 
 sounded hushed voices, foretelling calamity, that 
 came no man knew whence. A brooding, 
 indefinable fear hung like some intangible mist 
 over the people. It pervaded the very atmo- 
 sphere ; and men, inhaling and exhaling it, blew 
 upon the sullen embers of a universal, unreason- 
 ing anxiety. 
 
 The quidnuncs were busy plying all men with 
 eager questions, distorting replies, magnifying 
 report. In the eating-booths and in the market- 
 places, in the temporary camps of the pilgrims, 
 and in the houses and huts of the city-dwellers, 
 folk asked one another, What is it? and drew 
 apart with grave faces and unformulated pre- 
 sentiments of evil. The women of the town 
 whispered strange tidings in the ears of their 
 paramours ; and the peasants, bewildered by a 
 multitude of conflicting rumours, discussed 
 impossible happenings with the wearisome 
 reiteration of stupidity. 
 
 Some, speaking under their breath, told how 
 the army sent forth from Angkor to chastise the 
 presumptuous Thai,^ had met with crushing 
 defeat : but this was scouted by the multitude. 
 Never since the beginning of things had the 
 Khmer Empire tasted of aught save victory. 
 That that record could ever be reversed was an 
 idea to which the public mind was not easily 
 attuned. 
 
 » Note 5. 
 
THE FEAST OF THE CITY 153 
 
 Others contended that a great king — the 
 grandson of one Kublai Kaan — had arisen in 
 the far north, and that his envoy who, with his 
 pig-tailed retinue, had recently visited and quitted 
 Angkor, had come to demand submission from 
 the Chief of the Demigods. This story, however, 
 was laughed to scorn by the citizens of Angkor 
 Thorn. The envoy had come, it was true ; but 
 his mission was to offer, not to demand, tribute. 
 This view was popular, since it accorded more 
 nearly with all past experience, and was grateful 
 to the national pride.^ 
 
 But, as is usual when rumour runs riot among 
 an Oriental populace, these vague and unsup- 
 ported prognostications of calamity were not 
 confined to purely mundane events. In Asia, 
 the line which divides the supernatural from the 
 natural is not held to be drawn with the rigidity 
 ascribed to it by Europeans. To an Eastern 
 people the impossible is always possible, the 
 incredible is ever worthy of credence. The 
 voices that echo through the vast, mysterious 
 corridors of the Beyond are audible; the 
 unearthly beings who have there their habita- 
 tion, are, on occasion, visible to the eyes of man. 
 Gods and demons alike are for ever busy about 
 human affairs. They watch over, protecting or 
 disturbing, the slumbers of infancy. They 
 attend mankind upon their way through life, 
 blessing or cursing their labours, bringing the 
 increase, sending the dearth. They smile 
 
 ' Vide note 6. ^' 
 
154 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 throug-h sunshine, mix the mercy of their good- 
 will with the fructifying rains, proclaim their 
 wrath in storm and earthquake and pestilence. 
 They soothe or haunt the dying, and mark 
 with jealous eyes the observances performed by 
 mourners around the burial-places or the burn- 
 ing shat. When unrest is in the air, men 
 instinctively cast furtive glances upward and 
 around; for at such seasons the Spirits of 
 Good and of 111 are felt to be near at hand. 
 
 So now in Angkor strange whispers circulated. 
 The figure of Indra, God of the Thunders, 
 become incarnate in the likeness of a comely 
 youth, and burning like a flame, had been seen 
 by many, during a recent night of darkness and 
 storm, standing on the summit of the Ba Yon. 
 Slat, the old wise man, who had come to 
 Angkor Thom that night from his hut near the 
 great Wat, to harbour with some friends who 
 had need of his counsel, had himself witnessed 
 the prodigy, and had called others forth to see. 
 
 The portent was variously interpreted. Some 
 maintained that the god had descended upon 
 his favourite city to renew with it his covenant ; 
 others that the vision was an evil omen, herald- 
 ing destruction. A rumour — sprung whence no 
 man knew — spread like wildfire, that Indra had 
 come in wrath to take back the Sword that, in 
 the beginning, he had given as a talisman to the 
 demigods who ruled the land. This was denied, 
 with rage and indignation, by the sanguine and 
 the patriotic; but though men might seek to 
 
THE FEAST OF THE CITY 155 
 
 stamp out the smouldering- flame of doubt and 
 of suspicion, ever it burst forth anew, to sear and 
 blacken the thought of the populace. 
 
 Fear and unrest were stimulated by the 
 manner in which the Brahmans of the Ba Yon 
 were known to have comported themselves 
 upon that night of visitation. They had not 
 approached the god with greeting and praise 
 and offering, as aforetime their fathers had 
 hailed such incarnations of the Divine. Instead, 
 there had been a mighty running to and fro 
 within the clofisters and corridors of the temple — 
 a search — a chase I i 
 
 "They hounded the Shining One," a waggish 
 sceptic of the bazaar had declared, "as though 
 he had been a swift-running fowl whom the 
 cooking-pot awaited. Running in blind, haste 
 and falling over one another, they hunted him ! 
 They be a rapacious breed, these demigods of 
 ours, and for a very long time they have preyed 
 upon us; but surely 'tis a new practice, even for 
 them, to seek to make a meal off the very Gods 
 of heaven." 
 
 And the incarnation of Indra had vanished. 
 That much was certain ; for after he had been 
 seen to blaze forth for an instant from the 
 summit of the Ba Yon, no living soul again had 
 set eyes upon him. All that night the Ba Yon 
 had hummed like a disturbed hive; and the 
 storm had risen ere the dawn to a wild pitch of 
 atmospheric fury, and had only died down with 
 the breaking of the day. Thus was the wrath of 
 
156 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the outraged god made manifest to all the 
 people. 
 
 Had he carried off the Sword? The dread of 
 this made the hearts of all stand still, and men 
 recalled and repeated to one another the 
 prophecy of Indra with which tradition had 
 familiarised even the youngest. They could 
 not, they would not, believe ; but the fear 
 and doubt, once kindled, were not easily 
 quenched. 
 
 And blent with this was yet another rumour. 
 The god whom the Brahmans had insulted had 
 smitten the Chief of the Brahmans. He had 
 cursed the king, whom his people had not been 
 permitted to see for more than a decade, trans- 
 forming him into a toad — a snake, yellow, inert, 
 and blind — a dragon, without teeth or claws : 
 the report took many forms. The king, it was 
 said, had put up a prayer that his life might be 
 taken rather than that he should be deprived of 
 his natural shape ; but his entreaty had been in 
 vain. He lay hidden yonder in the palace, 
 reduced to the likeness of a beast — he, the Chief 
 of the Demigods, the Ruler of the World ! 
 
 The sheer horror of the idea fascinated the 
 imagination of the populace. 
 
 And to-day a suppressed but strong excite- 
 ment animated the people. At noon the great 
 procession would form at the portals of the Ba 
 Yon, and the Sacred Sword, followed by the 
 king and all his court, would be borne through 
 the heart of the multitude to the steps of the 
 
THE FEAST OF THE CITY 167 
 
 Ba Phun, there to be exhibited to the people, 
 that the land might be blessed. 
 
 Presently it was felt all these vaguely formu- 
 lated fears would be set at rest or — confirmed. 
 
 The latter was unthinkable — and yet 
 
 Men awaited the event with curiosity, with 
 eagerness, but with an involuntary, inner dread. 
 
 Inspired by the Spirit of Destruction ; guided 
 and aided by the cunning and wisdom of Slat ; 
 braving, with a reckless courage that was his 
 own, imminent risk of capture, of torture, of 
 death, Chun had made ready the faggots for the 
 conflagration that perhaps would set all Angkor 
 in a blaze. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 THE PROCESSION OF THE SWORD 
 
 The forum, packed with people, was a sea of 
 shifting, kaleidoscopic colour, with a surface of 
 black heads and brown upturned faces. The 
 outer courts and cloisters of the Ba Yon were 
 thronged by a struggling, perspiring multitude. 
 The crowd, filling every available spot of 
 standing-room, overflowed in broken waves on 
 to the crests of walls, on to the temple-steps, 
 into the branches of trees, and clung in clusters 
 to the steep sides of tile and thatched roofs. 
 
 At the foot of the great stairway leading 
 upward into the Ba Yon, elephants, their big 
 bodies covered with rich but tawdry caparisons, 
 and with tall howdahs on their backs, were 
 massed. They stood there, with the people 
 pressing fearfessly about them, almost touching 
 their flanks, with their mahouts, goad in hand, 
 standing at their shoulders, and with three or 
 four disreputable-looking ruffians — such as in 
 Asia are always to be found in the train of an 
 elephant-driver — astride upon them. Their 
 little, wise eyes looked forth from the immense 
 
THE PROCESSION OF THE SWORD 159 
 
 bulk of their wrinkled, slate-coloured bodies 
 with an incredibly evil cunning; they rocked 
 slowly, leaning their weight, first on one huge 
 foot, then on its fellow; their heads and ears 
 and trunks and tails were in constant motion. 
 One of their number, a gigantic albino, his skin 
 a patchy, unsightly pink, clumsily scaled the 
 steps of the temple, and rolled into the gloom 
 of the courtyard at its head. He was a sacred 
 animal, and he was supposed (except by the 
 anxious folk who had the hereditary charge of 
 him) to be immortal. Four generations of his 
 mahouts had come and gone, while he survived 
 them, and now the men of a fifth tended him by 
 day and by night. Of late they had detected in 
 him signs of failing strength, and their appre- 
 hensions were becoming acute. If death over- 
 took him, they knew that the blame would be 
 imputed to them, and that those ai^ong them 
 who had him in their immediate care would 
 suffer terrible things ere they were permitted to 
 share with him the peace of the grave. To-day, 
 as painfully he climbed the stairs of the teniple, 
 they glanced fearfully at one another and 
 marked his every movement with a keen 
 anxiety. They knew by a hundred subtle signs 
 how great was the strain that was being im- 
 posed upon that labouring, time-worn heart. 
 
 With difficulty the big brute was forced to 
 flounder down into a comfortless kneeling 
 posture, while a knot of Brahmans, with much 
 irreverent noise, bore a howdah of beaten gold 
 
160 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 from the interior of the temple, and lifted it on 
 to his back. Suffered once more to stand erect, 
 he rocked restlessly in the heart of a little 
 swarm of men, who with busy hands and feet 
 lashed his burden securely to its resting-place 
 by means of long, soiled cords of crimson and 
 gold. They clambered over and about him, as 
 though he iiad been some inanimate object, 
 making the curves of his long, gold-bound tusks 
 serve them as rungs for their feet, swinging 
 themselves this way and that, with one hand 
 upon his neck and the other grasping his trunk, 
 fitting their knees into the hollows behind his 
 big ears. 
 
 At last all was ready; the portals guarding 
 the Shrine of the Sword flew wide ; a long pro- 
 cession of priests began to debouch from them 
 and to make its way down the wide cloisters ; a 
 solemn chant echoed through the temple, rising 
 strident and penetrating above the murmur and 
 clamour of the crowd without ; and suddenly, 
 from every sanctuary in Angkor Thom, conchs 
 screamed and brayed wildly, accompanied by 
 the vibrating tumult of drums. 
 
 The gates of the palace-enclosure were thrust 
 open, and the royal palanquin appeared, its 
 yellow curtains closely drawn ; long sunshades 
 of the same colour, with heavy fringes maide of 
 little, lozenge-shaped pieces of gold, were held 
 reverently above it. 
 
 A tremor of movement swept, wavelike, over, 
 the crowd, which seemed to quake, then 
 
THE PROCESSION OF THE SWORD 161 
 
 suddenly to subside earthward. The people 
 were squatting, with hands laid palm to palm 
 and uplifted to their foreheads, in homage to 
 their invisible king. 
 
 The palanquin, with its guard of young 
 Brahmans, passed across the forum, the people 
 shuffling back upon one another at its approach, 
 and making way for it; and one man in that 
 multitude recalled the last occasion upon which 
 he had seen it cross that open space in the 
 direction of the Ba Yon, 
 
 The procession of priests from within the 
 temple, and the troop of courtiers surrounding 
 the palanquin of their king, arrived simultane- 
 ously, the one at the foot of the stairway, the 
 other at the side of the elephant, which had 
 again been made to assume a kneeling posture. 
 The royal party paused expectant ; the wardens 
 of the Sword, aided by old Baguan Dass, 
 ascended into the howdah. Crouching there, 
 head to head, and not a foot apart, they held 
 erect between them — its hilt upon the floor of 
 the howdah, its point aloft, swathed throughout 
 its length in wrappings of cloth-of-gold — the 
 sacred weapon of the Thunder God. 
 
 The elephant, with a floundering motion, 
 regained its feet, and began, with infinite 
 caution and slowness, to descend the wide 
 stairway. 
 
 The mahouts noted, with superstitious awe, the 
 palsy by which the wardens of the Sword were 
 of a sudden smitten. Their own anxieties were 
 
162 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 centred in their elephant and his ebbing vitality. 
 They drew a woeful omen from the strange 
 emotion of the priests. 
 
 As the huge pink monster rolled into view, his 
 hunched legs making ungainly movements, 
 every line of him eloquent of his discomfort 
 and apprehension, a murmur ran through the 
 crowd. At first the sound was like a mighty 
 whispering, hushed and sibilant. Quickly it 
 swelled to a savage muttering — gathered volume, 
 till it grew to a roar ; from a roar, burst into a 
 wild and clamorous outcry; then sank away 
 into a silence which, after that moment of 
 tumult, even the insistent scream of the conchs 
 seemed powerless to break. Then the noise of 
 many voices reasserted itself: tongues were 
 busy throughout that multitude. Everyone 
 was imparting his opinions to his neighbours, 
 with reiteration and emphasis. The mob was 
 swayed by a common indignation, a sullen wrath, 
 ready to burst into the red flame of action. A 
 spirit of suspicion had entered into possession of 
 it. It was filled alike with fury and with fear. 
 Here and there a man more fiery than his 
 fellows had leaped to his feet, and was haran- 
 guing all who could hear him with frantic 
 words and gestures. 
 
 " For years past," cried one, " they have veiled 
 from us the face of the king ! Now they seek 
 also to dpprive us of the sight of Indra's Sword 1 
 Nay, not of the Sword only, but of the very 
 scabbard that is its casket ! " 
 
THE PROCESSION OF THE SWORD 163 
 
 "Listen, O my brothers!" another was 
 yelling. " The demigods who rule and so abuse 
 us, who bind us to toil, while they live at ease, 
 who feast on our labour, casting to us others 
 only the leavings they discard, they never weary 
 of heaping insults upon us. We are not worthy 
 to look upon otir king, lest the sight of folk such 
 as us defile his sacred countenance. That we 
 have endured ! Now we are held too mean and 
 unworthy to look upon the Sword which holds 
 within it the mystic Spirit of the Land. Must 
 we endure that also, O my brothers? Are we 
 men or dogs that we should suffer this thing? 
 Have we not hands to strike, aye, and knives in 
 our hands? Shall we ..." 
 
 The tumult drowned his words. 
 
 " The God hath taken back the Sword that he 
 gave!" was a cry that arose on every side. 
 "The Sword! The Sword! Let us see the 
 Sword, if indeed it hath not been reft from 
 us!" 
 
 A man of the goldsmith caste, with open 
 mouth and wild gesticulations, was trying to tell 
 those within hearing that he and some of his 
 caste-mates had been bidden fashion a gigantic 
 scabbard by the priests of the temple, and had 
 pleaded the impossibility of making it in the 
 time allotted to | them. 
 
 The belief that the shrouded and wavering 
 object, held aloft on the howdah of the white 
 elephant, wa^ not in truth the Sword of Indra, 
 was spreading throughout the multitude, blent. 
 
164 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 illogrically, with the conviction that in swath- 
 ing it in wrappings a studied insult had been 
 flung in their faces by the men of the ruling 
 caste. The temper of the crowd was ugly and 
 threatening. 
 
 Old Baguan Dass, descending the steps of the 
 temple with a large body of heirophants grouped 
 behind him, looked out with scorn and anger 
 upon the swaying, clamorous people. It was to 
 him as though a pack of curs had dared to yap 
 and show their teeth in the face of their master ; 
 yet from among his followers, priestly deserters 
 were slinking off, one by one, to vanish amid a 
 flutter of white draperies into the dark interior 
 of the temple. 
 
 Long years of security and ease, of sensuality 
 and self-indulgence, had softened many of the 
 Brahmans, sapping their courage and their 
 energy, unfitting them for emergency, and so 
 enhancing the value of life that they did not dare 
 look into the hard eyes of death. 
 
 It was no large band, even of the courtiers, 
 that rallied about the palanquin of their king. 
 An uneasy feeling was abroad among them that 
 something was wrong ; that their fortunes were 
 on the wane. 
 
 For a moment those in charge of the procession 
 seemed in doubt how to proceed ; but Baguan 
 Dass — his long white beard falling to his waist 
 and blowing backward over his shoulders in the 
 excitement of his wrath — commanded and com- 
 pelled the mahouts, marshalled the procession of 
 
THE PROCESSION OF THE SWORD 165 
 
 elephants, two by two, with the Sword and the 
 palanquin in their midst, and bade them force 
 their way through the mob in the direction of 
 the Ba Phun. 
 
 But movement was no longer easy, for the 
 multitude gave way grudgingly, and more than 
 once men in the foremost rank were thrust by 
 those behind them almost under the feet of the 
 slowly marching elephants. When this hap- 
 pened the great beasts, who in cold blood would 
 not willingly injure a human being, halted and 
 backed, with wise heads shaking and small eyes 
 aglare; and their mahouts had some difficulty 
 in urging them forward again. 
 
 Very slowly the procession, wriggling through- 
 out its length, like an injured snake, pushed out 
 into the forum, heading for the Ba Phun, the 
 people surrounding it and crowding in upon it 
 from every side. They were on their feet now to 
 a man, not keeping their distance and crouching 
 in the dust in accordance with ancient custom, 
 , and this alone was menacing ; but the aspect and 
 attitude of the multitude were more threatening 
 still. Once again that grim muttering sound 
 broke out, swelling to a roar, sinking almost to 
 silence, then rising anew with augmenting force 
 and volume. The very ground under foot 
 seemed to vibrate in response to it ; it was like 
 a fretsaw working busily upon the nerves of all 
 who heard it ; the very elephants became restive ; 
 but still the procession crept onward. 
 
 The centre of the forum was nearly reached. 
 
166 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 and the leading elephants had almost passed the 
 spot where a large group of quarrymen from 
 Angkor Wat was assembled, when of a sudden 
 the mob began to surge back and forth with a 
 strange rhythmical motion. *At once the 
 procession, elephants with the rest, was tossed 
 to and fro in the heart of the multitude, much as 
 a boat rocks in the wash of a ^teamer that 
 passes it in a confined space. The movement 
 was irresistible ; the men in the front ranks were 
 powerless to stay it ; at every upjbeaval it gained 
 velocity and momentum. The mahouts, high 
 above the tumult, could be seen y^h raised arms 
 and blood-stained goads, striving to steady their 
 elephants, against whose flanks the mob was 
 breaking in waves and sprays. Men were 
 trampled under foot, and screams of pain arose 
 above the roar of the people. Then came a rush 
 and for a moment all was confusion. 
 
 Chun, waving a long wood-knife, sharp and 
 heavy as a cutlaSs, and followed by perhaps a 
 hundred of his fellow-quarrymen similarly armed, 
 broke into the heart of the procession. A young 
 Brahman of the Court tried to stay him, pushing 
 him from him with his left hand, while with the 
 other he sought to draw his sword. His face, up- 
 turned toward Chun, was eloquent of surprise, of 
 contempt, of excitement Th6n the heavy wood- 
 knife crushed into it, aj»d the man dropped, to be 
 trodden instantly undernjftany scuttering feet. On 
 every side Brahmaas ware falling. To tkc kst 
 they had not foua^ tt pMsible to believe that the 
 
THE PROCESSION OF THE SWORD 167 
 
 Sudras would dare to raise sacrilegious hands 
 against them. The procession had lost all 
 coherency : it was broken in a dozen places, each 
 component part becoming a separate centre of 
 battle. ChuHj closely guarded by his two 
 clownish brothers, Sud and Muth, flung himself 
 at the flank of the white elephant. The mahout 
 jabbed at him with his goad, but Sud parried 
 the blow, and slashed back at the hand that 
 held it. The wardens of the Sword, letting 
 their charge fall into the howdah, slipped dis- 
 creetly down the opposite side of the elephant, 
 and were immediately stamped underfoot in 
 the fray. 
 
 Chun clambered into the place which they 
 had quitted, ishouted to the mahout to mind his 
 manners as he valued his life, seized the Sword 
 and held it aloft. 
 
 At the sight of it, brandished above his head, 
 the tumult of the multitude was for a moment 
 stilled. All eyes were fixed upon the fluttering 
 draperies of cloth-of-gold. The desire for this 
 unveiling had been universal, but the actual 
 deed revived superstitious terrors in the 
 beholders. Save where men still fought for 
 their lives, all now were stricken motionless, 
 holding their breath in awful anticipation. 
 
 Chun, his bare feet gripping the sides of the 
 howdah — the frail canopy had been wrenched 
 off in his struggle to ascend — stood swaying 
 above the throng, every line of his strong, 
 young body visible to those who gazed. One 
 
168 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 by one the cloths swathing the Sword were 
 unwound and flung aside, to flutter slowly 
 downward ; till at last he waved above his head 
 a long piece of painted wood. 
 
 " Behold 1 " he cried. " This is not the Sword 
 of Indra, but a painted lie, forged by these arch- 
 forgers of lies ! A lie like their godhead ! A lie 
 like their shrouded king ! A lie ! A lie ! " 
 
 With a passionate gesture, he bent the dummy 
 sword across his knee, and snapped it with a 
 loud noise of splintering wood. 
 
 For a moment he held the broken pieces aloft, 
 then flung them from him. 
 
 There arose, on the instant, a bestial roar of 
 rage — ^resonant, menacing, and ferocious. 
 
 The mob, released from the paralysis of fear, 
 which for a moment had held them in leash, 
 broke free, in the violence of the reaction, from 
 all control. These men, so long kept in complete 
 subjection, had felt themselves aggrieved, and 
 their anger had goaded them to the brink of 
 rebellion ; but until now the majority had been 
 timorous and afraid. They had watched the 
 sacrilegious acts of Chun and his companions 
 with wonder and a secret sympathy ; but their 
 audacity had shocked and affrighted them. 
 For an instant, they had been sobered and 
 cowed by a great dread, as they beheld the 
 sacred emblem between his hands ; but now, 
 when the deception practised upon them was 
 made manifest, and they saw the sham sword 
 broken and cast aside, a change was wrought in 
 
THE PROCESSION OF THE SWORD 169 
 
 them. The conviction was strong upon them 
 that the fetters of their bondage were loosened ; 
 that they were immune from retribution ; that 
 their numbers made them powerful ; that they 
 were strong ; that the Brahmans were few and 
 weak. They were inspired by a collective 
 courage. For the first time in the memory of 
 man, they crept forth from beneath that lowering 
 shadow of fear, under which each one of them 
 had been born and bred. 
 
 There were many among them — owners of 
 property, traders, shopkeepers, landowners on a 
 small scale — who stood to lose much by an 
 outbreak of anarchy ; buc these had no time for 
 thought, and infected by the prevailing rage and 
 enthusiasm, they roared with their fellows, 
 loudly demanding a victim, with all a mob's 
 slavering lust for blood. 
 
 "Thus deal I with this shrouded lie!" Chun 
 was' shouting. "Now shall ye behold your 
 king, upon whose face you outcasts are not 
 worthy to look ! " 
 
 He vanished from his eminence upon the 
 howdah, and dived into the thickest of the 
 fight. 
 
 The Brahmans, smitten with panic and utterly 
 outnumbered, were struggling back to the Ba 
 Yon, old Baguan Dass raving and cursing in 
 their midst. The royal palanquin was protected 
 only by a few faithful courtiers. 
 
 Chun, striving to make his voice heard above 
 the tumult, and calling to his quarrymen to let 
 
170 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the crowd deal with the retreating demigods, 
 flung himself at the band of devoted men who 
 still sought to save their king. He felled the 
 leader with a mighty blow of his wood-knife, and 
 his companions aiding him, the little knot of 
 warriors was speedily overpowered. 
 
 Forcing their way through the vociferous 
 crowd, and dragging the palanquin with them, 
 paying no heed to the outcry of its squealing 
 occupant, they won at last to the flank of the 
 white elephant. Muth and Sud had been 
 standing guard over the mahout during the 
 absence of their brother, and at a sign from him 
 the driver forced the huge brute to kneel. The 
 palanquin was with difficulty fixed across the 
 floor of the howdah, Sud and Muth mounting 
 on to the elephant's back, and holding the 
 swaying thing in place, while Chun once more 
 assumed an erect attitude by its side. 
 
 Slowly the elephant rose, heaving and rock- 
 ing, until its driver, the three men upon its 
 back, and the palanquin, with its curtains still 
 drawn, were visible above the heads of the 
 crowd. 
 
 "The King! The King! They have the 
 King. Bring him forth! Let us see him! 
 The King! The King!" 
 
 The whole forum was clamorous. 
 
 Chun held his right hand aloft, and silence 
 fell in obedience to his gesture. 
 
 He was panting with his exertions ; his cloth 
 was torn and blood-stained; and he had upon 
 
THE PROCESSION OF THE SWORD 171 
 
 his forehead a ragged cut, which had bled 
 profusely. As he spoke, he jerked his head 
 back repeatedly, as though he sought to rid 
 himself of the trickle that invaded his eyes. 
 His bronze figure was alive with excitement, 
 alert, triumphant. 
 
 " I have here your king! " he shouted. " The 
 Son of Heaven ! The Lord of Lords ! The Ruler 
 of the World ! The Prince of Demigods ! The 
 immortal and all-puissant Monarch of the Khmer 
 Empire!" With blasphemous irony he recited 
 the style and titles of the king. "Behold in 
 him yet another shrouded lie." 
 
 He turned to the palanquin, thrust a hand 
 through the curtains, and with an air of uncon- 
 trollable disgust, dragged forth its occupant. 
 Sud and Muth, at a word from their brother, 
 flung the palanquin to the ground, and in an 
 instant the crowd had torn it to shreds. 
 
 The king, wrapped from head to heel in 
 a long silk cloth of the royal yellow, squatted 
 in the howdah, every inch of his body as com- 
 pletely hidden from sight as that of a veiled 
 woman. Handling him with brutal roughness, 
 Chun pulled him on to his feet, tore the big 
 cloth away, rent the silk jacket from his back 
 and the full waist-skirt from about his loins, 
 and then stood aside, attempting to cleanse his 
 hands, as from some unspeakable pollution. 
 
 Naked, the leper stood before his people, his 
 body of unclean flesh bent forward a little from 
 the hips, his maimed hands hanging limply from 
 
172 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 his feeble wrists, his weak eyes peering and 
 blinking. 
 
 A heavy silence had fallen, and through it 
 was heard a thin wail. The Prince of Demigods, 
 naked and ashamed, was weeping abject, human 
 tears over the departed divinity of his House, 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 DEFEAT THAT CROWNS A VICTORY 
 
 "Now, tell me aU." 
 
 She issued her command to the man who, in 
 an hour, had sprung from obscurity to become 
 the leader of the people, with the same calm 
 assurance, the same air of unquestioned superior- 
 ity, that she had used to Chun, the unknown 
 Sudra. For a moment, surprise and disappoint- 
 ment, and a dull, resentful pain, more bitter than 
 disappointment, held him dumb. 
 
 They were not hiding in the shadows, as of 
 old, but instead were sitting in the moonlight 
 outside the central portals of the upper temple of 
 Angkor Wat. 
 
 At their feet, the abrupt mass of masonry, 
 which is the immense plinth whereon the temple 
 stands, fell in a precipitous descent, sheer to the 
 courtyard eighty feet below them, scaled in three 
 places by perilous stairways. The courtyard, 
 blocked in one spot by the guard-houses, no 
 longer tenanted by Brahmans, was plunged deep 
 in shadow; but beyond it rose the walls and 
 arched roofs of the inner cloisters, which almost 
 
 178 
 
174 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 hid from sight the outer precincts built on 
 terraces, each lower than the last. Beyond and 
 below these, the moonlight glinted upon the 
 bathing-tank, and showed the great causeway, 
 a broad white shaft cleaving the darkness of the 
 earth, leading to the domed portals of the 
 encircling cloisters, a quarter of a mile away. 
 The moonlight, falling full upon the old grey 
 stones, revealed those close at hand with an 
 infinite wealth of detail, and caused those at a 
 distance to stand forth with an elusive, ghostly 
 beauty. 
 
 Beyond the outer precincts of the temple, the 
 forest, spreading away to the silvered waters of 
 the Great Lake, lay like a heavy shadow over 
 the land; but in the direction of Angkor Thom, 
 the sky was red and lurid, and below it mighty 
 tongues of flame rose and fell. That sprawling 
 ■ city of wood and thatch was burning in many 
 places. 
 
 The girl of the temple sat in her favourite 
 attitude — her bare feet set upon the flags and 
 peeping from below the hem of her garment; 
 her arms clasped about her updrawn knees, 
 her chin resting upon them. Her face, very 
 pale in the moonlight, showed no trace of excite- 
 ment or interest, but her eyes were fixed intently 
 upon the leaping fires and the glowing sky, 
 yonder, over Angkor Thom. Except that she 
 issued her command to him, she betrayed no 
 sign of being conscious that Chun was beside 
 her. 
 
DEFEAT THAT CROWNS A VICTORY 175 
 
 In her presence, and chilled by her indiffer- 
 ence, he felt himself slipping downward from the 
 pre-eminence to which he had that day attained, 
 back into the serf and the Sudra. A sort of 
 still rage awoke in him, bred of the knowledge 
 that, though he could dominate and lead his 
 fellow-men, the Spirit of Destruction had but to 
 breathe upon him to reduce him forthwith to 
 a mortifying, ineffective impotence. It was as 
 though the spell she cast over him wrought 
 a paralysis in his brain — hypnotised his 
 souL 
 
 Always he had chafed under the sense of 
 humiliation with which she, without a look, 
 almost without a word, had power to imbue 
 him; but this evening^ — when he had come to 
 her uplifted and triumphant, intoxicated a 
 little by his first draught of success, by the 
 incense of applause and the acclamation of his 
 fellows, feeling himself to be a hero who had 
 wrought heroically — secretly he had counted 
 upon a different reception. He had even 
 dreamed, perhaps, that she, at last, would hail 
 him as her master ; that she, too, would join in 
 the clamorous, half-wondering flattery which 
 had greeted him on every side after the scene 
 in the forum. At the least, he had thought, 
 she would treat him as a being on an equality 
 with herself — he who had planned and schemed 
 with her, and later with old Slat, and who, 
 while she sat still and awaited the event, had 
 toiled and wrought, risking life and limb, and 
 
176 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 braving the chance of torture, which is worse 
 than death. But now, sitting here beside 
 her, watching her pale, unmoved face, he knew 
 how vain were all these hopes ; and the crown 
 of victory that had been his was turned to 
 withered leaves. 
 
 "Has a dumbness smitten you? Or are 
 your ears deaf, that you do not hear me?" 
 she asked, still speaking without turning her 
 eyes toward him. Then, enunciating every 
 word very slowly and distinctly, as though 
 thereby she trusted to make their meaning 
 plain to his dull intelligence: "Tell — me 
 — all — that — has — befallen," she added. 
 
 Chun, feeling that, by some strange magic 
 of hers, all his great deeds had of a sudden been 
 assimilated with the commonplace, grudgingly 
 took up his tale. 
 
 He told how he had sought ou Slat, who, 
 for reasons which Chun could not fathom, 
 greatly desired the overthrow of the Brahmans, 
 as a stepping-stone to the attainment of certain 
 ambitions of his own, connected with some 
 architectural secret, at which he was constantly 
 hinting. How the old man had inspired him 
 with an idea, and had provided him with 
 a "medicine that causes the body to which 
 it is applied to shine in the night-time, more 
 especially if the skin be wet." How he, Chun, 
 risking detection and capture once more, had 
 made his way to the summit of the Ba Yon, 
 during a night of storm, and standing there, 
 
DEFEAT THAT CROWNS A VICTORY 177 
 
 smeared with the aforesaid medicine, had been 
 seen, for a moment, by a score of curious folk, 
 whom old Slat, without attracting attention to 
 himself, had contrived to assemble for the 
 purpose. 
 
 "Old Slat did well," was the girl's only 
 comment at this juncture. "He is wise and 
 cunning and brave." 
 
 Chun's share in the adventure she completely 
 ignored, and her injustice made him wince. 
 
 Sullenly he continued his narrative — describ- 
 ing how the rumour of the incarnation of Indra 
 spread like wildfire throughout Angkor, and 
 among the assembling pilgrims; how Slat, 
 dropping here a hint, and there some cryptic 
 utterance, fermented the spirit of unrest ; how 
 he, Chun, fanned the uneasiness and the 
 smouldering discontent of the quarrymen ; how, 
 little by little, playing upon the superstitions of 
 the people, doubts concerning the integrity of 
 the Sacred Sword, doubts about what had 
 befallen the veiled king, had been planted in 
 many minds ; how the public anxiety, once 
 kindled, spread like a raging flame; and then, 
 his own enthusiasm leaping up within him, 
 telling in dramatic fashion of the events which, 
 that afternoon, had been enacted in the forum. 
 
 " He wept, the unclean one," Chun concluded. 
 " Like a weak woman, he wept, making a little 
 outcry, feeble and pitiful, and the people roared 
 and laughed, mocking him. He stood there, 
 naked before them all, palsied and almost blind 
 
178 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 — he, the Prince of Demigods, upon whose 
 august countenance we, forsooth, were not 
 deemed worthy to look! The sight of him, 
 sore smitten by the evil sickness, gave a lie to 
 the godhead of the Brahmans ; and for a little I 
 suffered the multitude to glut their eyes with the 
 sight of him. Then, with the point of my knee 
 thrust beneath his buttocks, I heaved him down 
 among the people. They drew apart, avoiding 
 his uncleanness, so that he tumbled sprawling ; 
 then rising, tottered hither and thither, groping 
 with his hands, while they fell back before him. 
 Then a man smote him on the face with his 
 open palm, and he staggered and cried, burying 
 his head in his hands. I saw his shoulders 
 heave. Forthwith the fury of the crowd was 
 kindled. For a space they baited him ; but all 
 were too eager to strike. Very soon he was a 
 shapeless thing, motionless in the dust, which 
 men still spurned and smote. 
 
 "Then I lifted up my voice, and sent my 
 words ringing over the heads and dinning in the 
 ears of the multitude. 
 
 "'Thus,' I cried, 'do we, who now are a free 
 people, proclaim our freedom! They are no 
 demigods, these dogs whose king you have 
 mangled and killed, fouling your hands with the 
 touch of his uncleanness : they are not demigods, 
 but men, fashioned as we are fashioned. Also, 
 they are few, and we are numerous ; they are 
 feeble, while we, we are strong. Our muscles 
 are of iron, by reason of the labour to which we 
 
DEFEAT -tHAT CROWNS A VICTORY 179 
 
 and our fathers before us have been bound by 
 them and by their sires ; theirs, from long 
 disuse, have become weak as those of a woman. 
 Our bonds are broken, our slavery is at an 
 end! No longer shall we be as driven cattle 
 before these Brahman swine ; no longer will we 
 suffer their oppressions and their tyrannies. 
 Indra has taken back the Sword that was his 
 gift, and the prophecy of old time shall be 
 fulfilled!" 
 
 " Then, even as I spoke, a voice was uplifted 
 from the fringe of the crowd, near to the 
 entrance of the forum. 
 
 " ' Aye, it shall be fulfilled ! ' it cried. ' Famine 
 and pestilence and disastrous war shall stalk 
 abroad to devastate the land. The people shall 
 rise against their rulers. The trees of the fruit- 
 groves shall be barren, and the crops rot in the 
 fields. Our enemies from without shall harry 
 us, and in our own house shall strife and dis- 
 sension be found ! * 
 
 "All heads were turned toward the speaker, 
 men standing a-tiptoe, and craning their heads 
 to see; and I, still standing on the elephant, 
 beheld a little knot of war-worn men leaning 
 on their spears. It was their leader who spoke. 
 
 "Quickly the intelligence spread that these 
 were messengers from the army that recently 
 went forth to chastise the presumptuous Thai, 
 and ill were the tidings they brought. Our 
 people have sustained a crushing defeat, and 
 many of them are slain or captured. A greai-t 
 
180 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 lamentation arose, as the news became known, 
 for all had friends or kinsmen with the army. 
 The messengers were well-nigh torn to pieces 
 by the eager, questioning people. I and the 
 Brahmans were alike forgotten. 
 
 " I saw that, for that day, I could do no more 
 in Angkor Thom. 
 
 "I slid from off the elephant, and gathered 
 together my comrades of the quarry and the 
 workyard. Their thought still was centred 
 upon what we had done. They were not fickle 
 and without continuous purpose, like the rest of 
 the mob. 
 
 " Hastily we marched hither to Angkor Wat 
 — and you know the rest. The Brahmans, for 
 the most part, had gone to Angkor Thom to 
 attend the feast — and a ripe bellyful of feasting 
 was theirs — and few remained to keep watch and 
 ward. Also, like their fellows yonder, they did 
 not dream that the men they name Sudras 
 would dare to raise their hands against them. 
 They fell an easy prey to us, and you also, I 
 think, saw something of that slaying ? 
 
 " Now here, upon this rock-like mass of 
 stones, with the temple-buildings, which are set 
 thereon, to afford us house-room, we will make 
 our citadel, until the power of the self-styled 
 demigods be utterly destroyed. I have brought 
 hither stores of rice; I have planned; I have 
 made ready against attack ; I " 
 
 "I, I, I," she echoed, sneeringly. "You, 
 always you! It is the sole thought that fills 
 
DEFEAT THAT CROWNS- A VICTORY 181 
 
 that narrow head of yours. Peace, peace, I pray 
 you ! Give me a moment of silence in which to 
 think. You are full of vain boasts of that which 
 you have done, of that which you can do : but 
 now it is thought, not mere action, that is 
 needed, and in that you, for all your prating, 
 cannot aid." 
 
 During the whole course of his narrative, she 
 had not changed her pose, nor glanced toward 
 him, save when, he told of the baiting of the 
 leprous king. Then, for an instant, her eyes 
 had flashed, and her lips, parting in a smile, had 
 disclosed the two sharp fangs and the small, 
 white teeth, cruel and set. Later, while she 
 spoke to him, her face had been turned in his 
 direction, her eyes fault-finding and contemptu- 
 ous, her forehead frowning. Then she had 
 relapsed into her former immobility. 
 
 Chun sat still and silent, afraid to move, 
 hardly daring to look at her. She always had 
 the power utterly to subdue him. He knew 
 himself to be a slave to her will. Many fetters 
 had he broken, and that very day he had had a 
 leading share in bringing his fellows out of a 
 bondage which had endured for centuries : yet, 
 in this girl's presence, he felt himself to be bound 
 hand and foot with bonds that he could not sever 
 — to be held in an appalling and degrading 
 thraldom, brain and heart and soul. 
 
 After a long while, during which Chun had 
 watched the moon climbing up the curve of the 
 sky, and the shadows huddling and contracting. 
 
182 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 she spoke aloud. Her chin still rested on her 
 crooked knees ; her eyes still gazed at the patch 
 of ruddy cloud that hovered over Angkor Thorn. 
 
 " And that ? " she nodded at the conflagration. 
 •' That. What is the good of that ? " 
 
 "There is no good in it," said Chun, humbly. 
 " It is only ruin and loss and folly. The thatch 
 is dry ; the fire has been set in many places ; 
 and before the dawn all the town will be in 
 ashes." 
 
 " While you, who have kindled the flame, sit 
 here and boast to a woman of your prowess," she 
 sneered. 
 
 " But I cannot stay that burning," Chun 
 pleaded. 
 
 She laughed a hard, dry laugh. 
 
 " That is true and over-true," she said. " You 
 can light a blaze, but you cannot quench it. 
 You can set a storm raging, but you cannot 
 control its fury. You can lay a world in ruin, 
 and take pride in the easy task ; but you have 
 not the wit to guide the forces you have brought 
 into being, so that out of destruction there may 
 arise something more perfect than that which 
 you have demolished. Said I not sooth when I 
 declared just now that, though you can act y^ith 
 your big body and your strong, rough hands, 
 you have no brain with which to think ? " 
 
 " But what can I do ? " asked Chun, miserably. 
 
 She laughed in his face. ■ 
 
 ' ' Do ! Always do !" she cried. " That is ever 
 the limit of your imagination ! Well, since you 
 
DEFEAT THAT CROWNS A VICTORY 183 
 
 are bent on action, and indeed are unfitted for 
 aught else, go down yonder and fetch me the 
 Sword from the hiding-place in which we laid it." 
 
 Chun rose without a word; descended the 
 abrupt flight of steps that fell away from the 
 portal in which she was seated, to the courtyard 
 bdow ; passed the guard-houses, now occupied 
 by his own friends ; and entered the cloisters 
 beyond. The place was dark, and the moon- 
 light, struggling through the deep embrasures, 
 cut sharp angular patches out of the gloom, and 
 intensified the blackness of the shadows. 
 
 Chun groped his way through the central 
 chamber ; descended the steps which led down 
 into the second tier of cloisters ; and at last 
 found himself at the head of the wide, stone stair 
 which gave upon the giant causeway. Down 
 these he passed, recalling the hours he had spent 
 within their shadow in the company of the girl 
 who above awaited his return. It seemed to 
 him that now hope was a fainter thing than 
 then it had been. 
 
 Once more he stood, as once long ago he had 
 poised himself, on the brink of the bathing-tank ; 
 then lowered himself into the water ; took a deep 
 breath and dived. He just failed to reach the 
 bottom, and came to the surface, after a severe 
 struggle, panting hard. The cut on his forehead 
 smarted; and suddenly he was conscious that 
 the strain to which the events of the last few 
 days had subjected him, body and mind, had 
 left him more exhausted than he had realised. 
 
184 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 His eyes swam, and his head whirled giddily. 
 There was a strange rushing noise in his ears. 
 
 He drew himself out of the water, and for a 
 space sat resting, and gathering his strength for a 
 second attempt. He was haunted by the fear 
 that he might fail; and already he winced and 
 flinched as, in imagination, he saw the scorn in 
 the girl's eyes and heard her merciless comment. 
 "I thought, at least, that you could do 
 things ! " 
 
 At last, setting his teeth, he stood erect ; poised 
 himself for an instant ; took a long breath ; and 
 leaped headlong into the water. With strong, 
 eager strokes he swam downward, every muscle 
 extended to the utmost tension of its energy; 
 his breath hard held; his heart leaping and 
 racketing ; his blood roaring in his ears. Down 
 and down he swam, nailing himself to his 
 endeavour, as to a cross, feeling that his very 
 veins would burst if this appalling pressure were 
 prolonged; and at last his hand touched the 
 flags of the tank's bottom. Lying prone, in an 
 agony of endurance and suspense, he groped 
 blindly for the Sword ; touched it with his finger- 
 tips ; missed it ; groping, touched it again ; 
 grasped it at the last; and then, clutching it 
 tightly, drew his feet under him, and prizing 
 them against the smooth and slippery stones, 
 sprang upward. Weighted by the great Sword, 
 he rose slowly, his neck extended, his face yearn- 
 ing upward, strained and agonising, his heart in 
 tumult, his lungs fluttering like a wild thing held 
 
DEFEAT THAT CROWNS A VICTORY 185 
 
 in his bosom. With his legs contracting and 
 straightening themselves in a series of violent, 
 spasmodic efforts, he fought his way upward I 
 felt the water like a monstrous burden press 
 upon his head ; saw a pale light grow momen- 
 tarily more distinct above him ; till at last he tore 
 through the surface, and his imprisoned breath 
 burst from him in a mighty exhalation. 
 
 Barely enough of strength remained to him to 
 make it possible to struggle to the side of the 
 tank, and inch by inch to draw his body out of 
 the water. 
 
 His eyes smarted ; in his mouth there was a 
 curious salt flavour; and a little blood was 
 trickling from his ears. The gash on his fore- 
 head had broken open and was bleeding 
 profusely; but the Sword of Indra, in its 
 scabbard of wrought- gold, lay across his knees. 
 
 Long he sat there, feeling too sick and giddy 
 to move ; then, with the lagging steps of a man 
 broken by years, he crept back into the temple. 
 Painfully, he dragged the weight of his weary 
 limbs up the stairways, from terrace to terrace ; 
 and in ascending the last steep flight, he had to 
 halt and steady himself more than once, lest he. 
 should miss his footing and fall into the court- 
 yard beneath. 
 
 At length he stood before the girl, panting and 
 trembling, and laid the Sword at her feet, without 
 a word. 
 
 She sat where he had left her, and her pose 
 was unchanged. She did not glance at him, nor 
 
186 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 at the weapon which, at the cost of so much 
 pain and endurance, he had brought to her. 
 
 " You have been very long," she said. 
 
 "The water was deep," he replied apologeti- 
 cally, and sat down, spent and gasping. 
 
 " Don't make that noise, opening and shutting 
 your mouth like a newly landed fish," she 
 snapped at him. "It irks me." 
 
 He tried to still the frantic pumping of his 
 lungs. 
 
 "Well?" she queried, after a pause. "Why 
 do you wait ? I only want the Sword. You can 
 leave it here and go." 
 
 " Why should I leave it here ? It is mine, not 
 yours," said Chun, moved to sudden anger. 
 "And why should I go? I and my comrades — 
 not you and the hussies who are your play- 
 mates — wrested the Wat from the Brahmans." 
 
 He pointed downward to a spot in the court, 
 yard where a white-robed figure still lay as it 
 had fallen, stricken down in the fight. 
 
 " We, not you, killed that carrion ; and to- 
 night Angkor Wat and all that it holds are ours, 
 to use as we will. How, think you, are the 
 other women, your sisters of the temple, at this 
 hour engaged? They are making unto them- 
 selves friends of my brethren of the pulley and 
 the lever. Caste fell dead yonder, in the forum, 
 where fell the body of the stricken king. I have 
 released you from a sorry slavery. Try me 
 not too highly, lest perchance I abandon you 
 to 
 
DEFEAT THAT CROWNS A VICTORY 187 
 
 She had turned, and was lookingf at him out of 
 grave, sad eyes; and his own fell before her. 
 His angry words sank abashed into a shamed 
 silence. 
 
 " Chun 1 " she said ; and the rich, low tones of 
 her voice seemed to vibrate through him. 
 "Chun! Is it you who speak thus, and — to 
 me?" 
 
 She said no more, only bent the gaze of her 
 great eyes in a sort of sorrowful pity upon his 
 distressed face : but it was enough. 
 
 In a moment, filled with passionate self- 
 reproach, he was lying prostrate before her, 
 caressing her feet, seeking to conciliate her just 
 anger by faltering assurances of his love — of his 
 fidelity; mingled with fierce condemnations of 
 the brute which, for an instant, had stirred 
 within him and had lifted its head to snarl at her. 
 
 He had forgotten all her cruelty, all the little 
 barb^ which she had planted in him, the more 
 surely to goad him to rebellion. He had forgotten 
 her ingratitude; the ungraciousness with which 
 she had avoided all acknowledgment of aught 
 done by him in her service ; even her refusal to 
 recognise that he had wrought bravely and skil- 
 fully for the downfall of the Brahmans, and his 
 own bitter disappointment, were forgotten. He 
 remembered only that he had used harsh and 
 angry words to her; that, mad with pain and 
 wrath, he had threatened her. 
 
 He was no longer, even to himself, the man 
 who, that day, had swayed and led and dominated 
 
188 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 his fellows. He felt himself to be the meanest 
 thing that moved — a proven traitor to his love. 
 Appalled by the revelation which had been made 
 to him of the brutality and the force of the 
 passions dormant within him, filled with self- 
 distrust and a bitter self-contempt, he did 
 penance before her in the dust. 
 
 "That you, even you, should fail me!" she 
 exclaimed. 
 
 There was a pained surprise in her voice, as 
 though the last and surest of all her poor defences 
 had been snatched from her by some ruthless 
 hand. 
 
 Chun redoubled his protestations ; and after a 
 long while, a little hand stole downward and 
 rested upon his head. 
 
 " Say no more," she said. " And I will try to 
 forgive, even if I may not wholly forget. I will 
 take the Sword, since I have need of it, as you 
 shall presently see. Also, I have a mind to use 
 the inner sanctuary for mine own, and there I 
 would be alone. If you, in truth, desire my 
 forgiveness, see that I am unmolested ; that 
 women, even, are not suffered to penetrate 
 thither to disturb me. Let food — the best that 
 you can procure — the woman Zin, who is among 
 the captives, hath much skill in cooking — be 
 brought to the doors of the shrine twice daily ; 
 but do not seek to enter, unless I summon you. 
 Set over the place guards whom you can trust. 
 That, for the present, is all. Now, give me the 
 Sword." 
 
DEFEAT THAT CROWNS A VICTORY 189 
 
 She rose to her feet, lifted, not without diffi- 
 culty, the great sheathed weapon from the flags, 
 and rested it over her little shoulder. Then 
 bending upon Chun one more look out of her 
 grave and passionless eyes, she passed through 
 the portals, and was lost in the darkness within. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 ANARCHY 
 
 The dawn-wind stirred among the palm-fronds 
 with a harsh, rattling sound, and in the ears of 
 old Baguan Dass — as he stood shuddering a 
 little, and drawing his cloak more closely about 
 his shoulders — it was as though the bones of a 
 hanging skeleton were set in motion. 
 
 The long panic and agony of the night were 
 ending : the cold despair of morning had come. 
 
 Beyond the high wall which enclosed the 
 palace-buildings, where yesterday portions of 
 the town had been visible, nothing was now to 
 be seen save mounds of charred ddbris, from 
 which smoke-clouds ascended to mingle with 
 the mists arising from the dew-drenched 
 ground. 
 
 Not a living thing moved, except a lean cur 
 or two, nosing and questing among the ruins ; 
 and a great silence reigned, for to-day — for the 
 first time for centuries — no pulse of drum nor 
 scream of conch sounded from the temples to 
 speed the vanishing shadows and herald the 
 rising sun. 
 
 190 
 
ANARCHY 191 
 
 Forgotten of the Shining Ones, to whom the 
 Brahmans of Angkor had put up such passion- 
 ate prayer — with folded hands and lifted voice, 
 with conch, with drum, with sacrifice, with 
 enduring stone piled in mountainous, eternal 
 monuments — the city lay in ashes ; and the 
 men who had ruled it were penned like sheep 
 within the royal enclosure, with fear and despair 
 laying cold hands about their hearts. 
 
 But it was by neither of these emotions that 
 old Baguan Dass was chiefly swayed as, stand- 
 ing alone in the grey light of the dawn, he 
 looked around upon the desolation and wreck- 
 age which a few short hours had wrought. He 
 was filled with indignant rage, with wonder, 
 with savage disgust. Proud son of the proudest 
 caste on earth, it was to him incredible that the 
 Sudras should dare to lift sacrilegious hands 
 from the mire to strike at the deputies of the 
 Gods. From infancy he had looked upon the 
 people as hardly distinguishable from the rest 
 of the brute creation. By his aristocratic spirit, 
 the very gods in heaven had always been 
 visualised as another higher aristocracy. That 
 they could fight on the side of the casteless 
 ones would have been to him but yesterday a 
 notion frankly blasphemous. He had thought 
 too well of their discrimination, of their sense 
 of propriety, of their appreciation of the eternal 
 fitnesses, for such an infamous accusation easily 
 to frame itself in his mind against them. And 
 yet— — 
 
192 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 He looked out at the huge, grey temples, as 
 one by one they bulked forth from the misty 
 shadows, in the growing light of dawn — at the 
 heaps of blackened cinders — at the palm-trees, 
 whose fronds, discoloured and wilted by the 
 flames, hung rattling in the breeze. 
 
 Turning, he gazed into the palace-precincts — 
 at the open spaces, strewn with stones cast by 
 the hands of a hate-maddened populace — at the 
 hall of state, open to the air on three sides, in 
 which, stretched upon the floor, lay huddled 
 crowds of sleeping refugees — at the roofs, with 
 their fantastic, upward-branching horns, and 
 their tiles, bright with gilding and gay with 
 many colours — at the groups of woebegone, 
 draggled wretches (Brahmans every one of 
 them) who squatted around the few clumsy 
 mortars, exchanging fearful whispers — at the 
 unmistakable signs of siege and hastily im- 
 provised defence which everywhere were visible. 
 
 Yes : this thing was not an evil dream that 
 had haunted the watches of the night. The 
 impossible had come to pass. And suddenly 
 old. Baguan Dass — throwing his arms aloft, his 
 face straining upward, his beard disordered, 
 flowing back over his shoulders — stormed at 
 high heaven, blaspheming the Gods of his 
 worship. 
 
 The outburst left him spent and exhausted ; 
 and drawing his cloak around him, he leaned 
 upon the coping of the wall. 
 
 His mind, over which he had relaxed control. 
 
ANARCHY 193 
 
 wandered back through the years of his long 
 life, obedient to a subconscious conviction 
 which whispered that the end was near. 
 
 With a pride more paternal than personal, he 
 conjured up the vision of the youth he once had 
 been — light-hearted, swaggering, vainglorious, 
 eager for battle, hungry for adventure, ripe for 
 mischief, greedy of emotion ; and it seemed to 
 him that the blood ran thin by comparison in 
 the veins of the youngsters of this later day. 
 
 He recalled with an extraordinary wealth of 
 detail, every circumstance of the campaign 
 against the rebel King of Champa, in which as 
 a lad he had taken part — the days and nights in 
 the forest and on the waters of the Mekong — 
 the stockades and the camp-fires — the struggle 
 through the swamps and the labyrinthian water- 
 ways of the estuary — the first sight of the sea, 
 so like, and yet so unlike, the mud-stained 
 expanse of Tonl6-Sap — the sacking of the 
 rebel city, and the ill-things done joyously 
 during that night of tumult and license. 
 
 He thought of his many loves — girls of the 
 temple, girls of the town, women whom he had 
 had to wife, publicly and with ceremony, women 
 wedded to Sudras, whom he had used for his 
 pleasure : and of the latter, one stood forth, in 
 his memory, from all the rest. She, if she still 
 lived, was a withered hag by now, the worn-out 
 drudge of some low-caste household ; but he saw 
 her only as she once had been a score of years 
 ago, when, through her, for a season, and late in 
 
194 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 life, "the madness" had smitten him. The 
 world, now so old and drab and sad, had been a 
 good world then, and life a glorious thing. 
 Colour and beauty had held for him, on a 
 sudden, a new, glad surprise. The sunshine 
 had put on an added splendour ; the moonlight 
 had fallen upon the sleeping earth with a soft- 
 ness of glamour and mystery never seen before. 
 Every sound was melody: every scent had 
 borrowed an unsuspected fragrance. Upon all 
 things there had come a marvellous gift of 
 tongues, endowing the inarticulate universe 
 with an undreamed-of eloquence. 
 
 It had been short-lived — the madness. Caste 
 and pride of race had been its enemies. The 
 woman was already the wife of a Sudra. There 
 had been degradation in the connection, even 
 in its moments of most supreme intoxication. 
 His people, discovering it, had dragged him, 
 defiled and polluted, from the slough in which 
 he had been sinking; but somehow life for 
 him had never been quite the same again. 
 
 He had had many loves since then; and as 
 his vitality slackened, till only an occasFonal 
 flicker leaped in flame above the grey embers 
 of burned-out desire, women had been replaced 
 by other idols. He had thirsted for power, and 
 of that too he had had his fill. Turning sated 
 from this, yet still holding it fast in his time- 
 worn hand, he had sought in asceticism and 
 in the religious exaltation of the fanatic, fresh 
 outlets for his mental energy. It had seemed 
 
ANARCHY 195 
 
 to him that life and earth were too narrow for 
 his needs. He had hungered for future incarna- 
 tions that would afford him, perhaps, more 
 spacious opportunities, that would crown him 
 at the last, it might be, with unimagined 
 victory. 
 
 And now, now, even this paltry world, which 
 he had learned so to despise, was passing 
 beyond his control ; the Gods, in whom he had 
 trusted, were betraying him ; the Stidras, who 
 had been as the dirt beneath his feet, were 
 leag^eds with them for his undoing ; the men 
 of his own caste — who, in spite of the withering 
 contempt which they individually excited in him, 
 were not to him as other men — were displaying 
 a degenerate cowardice, and all through the 
 night had given tokens of their panic, their 
 futility, their inability to combine, or to defend 
 their rights. 
 
 The world, it seemed to him, had waxed 
 very old, ripening to decay. 
 
 With his own eyes he had seen the king, his 
 kinsman, stricken with foul disease ; the Sword 
 of Indra filched from its sleeping wardens by 
 some sacrilegious thief; the deception which 
 he had devised exposed by the rebellious 
 multitude; himself and his priests attacked 
 in their own forum, under the walls of their 
 own temples, by a populace from whose limbs 
 the trammels of superstitious awe and worship 
 had miraculously fallen; and the prince, and 
 head of his House, stripped naked, mocked, 
 
196 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 abused, and done to death by sweepers and 
 outcasts. 
 
 The ingratitude of the Gods kindled a raging 
 anger within him — a passion embittered and 
 made virulent by a sense of his utter impotence. 
 He thought of the adoration, the prayers, the 
 countless sacrifices which had been offered to 
 them here, in Angkor ; of the temples builded 
 in their honour in the sweat and the blood of 
 thousands ; of the unwavering fidelity which, 
 from generation to generation, the men of his 
 caste had shown to them ; and behold this, 
 after the long, long silence, was the answer 
 they vouchsafed 1 
 
 Again, with features distorted, with uplifted 
 arms, with all his body quivering and vibrating 
 in the fury of his emotion, with loud and awful 
 outcry, he blasphemed the heedless Gods. 
 
 A babel of noise echoed through the shrines 
 and cloisters of the Ba Phun — the murmur and 
 mutter of a big crowd, the sound of voices 
 striving to make themselves heard above the 
 tumult, the shuffle and patter of many feet, 
 the cries of little children, the shrill tones of 
 women, the occasional clashing of metal against 
 stone. 
 
 Chun, and perhaps five hundred of the quarry- 
 men from Angkor Wat, had come in ; and the 
 mob, without discipline or organisation, was 
 marshalling itself for a renewal of hostilities 
 with the Brahmans, who still lurked in hiding 
 
ANARCHY 197 
 
 behind the big stone walls of the palace 
 enclosure. 
 
 Men, women, and children, rendered homeless 
 by the conflagrations which had laid all Angkor 
 Thom in ashes, had crowded into the temples, 
 seeking protection from the tropical sun. 
 Wherever a shadow was cast, little groups were 
 gathered together, busying themselves around 
 fires and cooking-pots. Mothers sought security 
 in corners from the press of trampling feet, 
 giving suck to their babies, trying with scant 
 success to save their little ones from the dangers 
 besetting them on every side. Yesterday, in 
 the forum, and all night long, while the fires 
 raged, many people had been crushed to death 
 in the surging of the crowd, and the mad rushes 
 of panic-stricken fugitives. 
 
 From time to time, great clouds of smoke, 
 hot and suffocating, and pungent with the 
 penetrating reek of burning wood, came 
 billowing through the temple, borne from 
 the smouldering ruins on the breeze of 
 morning. 
 
 Chun shouldered his way through the 
 clamorous, vociferating mob, and won at 
 last to the inner shrine of the Ba Phun, 
 wherev among broken images of the gods, 
 old Slat was seated with his eternal betel- 
 tube in| his hands. 
 
 "The Spirit of Destruction is abroad," 
 croakefa the old man. "The city, which 
 centuries have been needed to fashion, in 
 
198 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 a single night has gone up to heaven in 
 smoke! They are brutes and mad, these 
 low-caste folk — possessed by devils of hate 
 and wrath — they are no longer men, but apes 
 drunk with wine and with success. They can 
 only tear and rend and break and burn. Look 
 at these efifigies of the Gods! Thus will they 
 serve all things of beauty, as these already 
 they have served. It repents me that I had 
 a hand in this upheaval. It will bring into 
 the world no new thing, but it will take much 
 out of it that, being here, lent something of 
 beauty to life : and my dream, behold it is 
 only a dream. I know it, and am sad." 
 
 "Yet now there is no turning back," said 
 Chun. 
 
 To him, also, the fruit of victory was already 
 turning to dust and ashes in his mouth ; but the 
 scene which he had witnessed between Chandra 
 Dass and the woman of the temple recurred to 
 his memory, and his hatred of the Brahmans, 
 and his lust for vengeance upon them flared 
 up anew. 
 
 " 'Tis vain to look back," he repeated. " To- 
 day we must make an end — to-day while the 
 fury of the people is still fiery hot, and ere the 
 men of the army come hither from the place 
 where they have met defeat. If the Brahmans 
 recover that which yesterday saw shorn from 
 them, it will go hard with me and with many. 
 Have you any counsel to give me, O my 
 Father?" 
 
ANARCHY 199 
 
 Slat shook his head. 
 
 " Nay," he said. " I am old, and my limbs 
 have turned traitor. I cannot aid you in the 
 fight ; and for the rest, these people are mad. 
 They will not listen to words, and words now are 
 the only weapons I can wield. Act, my son, 
 since the strength to dare and do still abides 
 with you." 
 
 Chun left him without a word, and gathering 
 half a dozen of his friends around him, bade 
 them bring drums from the shrines, and climb 
 with him to one of the domes of the temple. 
 
 The heads of the crowd were raised, when 
 the rumble and thrumming from aloft sounded 
 in their ears ; and Chun, standing erect among 
 his squatting retinue, motioned to the people, 
 entreating silepce. A fresh clamour burst forth 
 for a moment and was with difficulty stilled, but 
 curiosity to hear what he had to say presently 
 occasioned a lull. From within the temple and 
 from places where Chun was not visible, there 
 still came a muffled tumult of many voices ; but 
 above this, his clear, young tones were distinctly 
 heard. 
 
 Until the day before, he had never addressed 
 an audience ; but he, who was of the people, 
 knew the temper of his fellows. Hate lent to 
 him a rude eloquence. The passion within him 
 was infectious, and the growing excitement of the 
 mob reacted upon his own enthusiasm. He put 
 into rough, plain words thoughts and suspicions 
 which, half-formulated, had found a secret 
 
200 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 lurking-place in many minds. He lashed the 
 multitude to anger, to rage, to a slavering lust for 
 blood. Men, with clenched hands, and working, 
 upturned faces, danced upon the ground in 
 their impatience, smiting their breasts with cries 
 and curses. With one voice they yelled to him 
 to come down, to make an end of speaking, to 
 exchange words for action, to lead them forth- 
 with against the men who had so monstrously 
 oppressed them. 
 
 When, followed by the quarrymen of Angkor 
 Wat, he at last descended, way was made for 
 him ; and the multitude — grasping weapons in 
 their hands, making a mighty tumult, and drunk 
 with excitement — surged after him into the 
 forum. 
 
 The palace buildings, perched upon a slight 
 eminence, were distant some two hundred yards 
 from the point at which the noisy crowd de- 
 bouched into the open space; and above the 
 stone wall, upon which at regular interval, 
 efifigies of elephants, the size of bullocks, were 
 carved, could be seen the brilliant roofs — a 
 jumble of lines and slopes and angles — their 
 colours vivid in the sunshine. 
 
 As the mob, roaring like the sea, rushed into 
 the forum, with faces distorted by passion and 
 excitement, upturned beneath arms that waved, 
 that gesticulated wildly, that brandished weapons 
 that shook clenched fists, the mortars in the 
 enclosure were fired. For a moment the wall 
 
ANARCHY 201 
 
 of the palace was hidden in clouds of smoke 
 that leaped out horizontally with furious speed ; 
 stopped suddenly ; to hang suspended in the 
 still air. 
 
 It was the chance for which the Brahmans had 
 been waiting, and they had trained their clumsy 
 pieces so as to sweep the forum ; but, now that 
 the supreme moment had come, they touched 
 them off with reckless haste, not exercising 
 the patience, which alone could secure the best 
 results, and forgetting in their agitation that, by 
 emptying at a single discharge their entire 
 battery, they would temporarily disarm them- 
 selves. 
 
 Two or three of the great, round, stone balls 
 crashed into the crowd, leaving- thin lines of 
 casualties in their wake ; but others flew high ; 
 some swept portions of the forum, into which 
 the people had not yet spread ; and a few, 
 falling short, ricochetted harmlessly overhead, 
 to plunge into the surrounding fruit-groves. 
 
 For a moment the multitude was checked in 
 its impetuous rush by this thunderous volley, 
 and cries of pain and rage and dismay arose, 
 blended with the wailing of women ; but the fury 
 which animated and inspired them was un- 
 quenchable. The smoke, hanging like a curtain 
 before the defences of the Brahmans, concealing 
 them from sight, became, in an instant, no mere 
 cloud of vapour, but a tangible enemy. The 
 multitude, so maddened now that fear was 
 forgotten, charged at it in a transport of ferocity ; 
 
202 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the leaders, compelled by those behind them, 
 swept up to and over the wall, as though it had 
 no existence; and leaped down headlong into 
 the lines of its defenders. 
 
 They were aware of rows of anxious, fearful 
 faces, peering in uncertainty through the dense 
 veil of smoke — faces which forthwith contracted 
 into the frowning, set expression of hate and 
 concentrated effort, as naked swords rose and 
 fell above them — faces that went down, borne to 
 the earth by the violence of the onset, to be 
 trodden under foot — terrified faces whose owners 
 turned and fled. 
 
 The sheer brute-weight of the mob carried all 
 before it. Here, in the heart of the mUde, the 
 head of a dead man lolled limply, with distorted 
 features, the body prized up by the struggling 
 masses which surrounded it ; there, one of the 
 Sudras, missing his footing, would collapse, to 
 be stamped to death by the throng of his 
 fellows. Women^ who had become entangled in 
 the crowd, wailed and shrieked, their agonised 
 faces seeming to float on the surface of the 
 multitude. 
 
 The swaying, surging rabble drove forward, 
 like a solid body, across the open space, which 
 divided the wall from the long hall of state ; 
 burst into it, crushing many of its members to 
 death against the four rows of immense wooden 
 columns supporting the roof; and sprayed out, 
 at last, to overwhelm the mass of palace-buildings 
 grouped behind it. The terrified cries of women 
 
ANARCHY 203 
 
 and children rent the air ; savage-hand-to-hand 
 fights took place in every doorway ; fire-stands 
 were overturned, and flames burst forth in a 
 dozen quarters.; but still the eager throng behind 
 drove the foremost ranks on and on, making 
 shields of the bodies of their dead, till the flood 
 of maddened human beings inundated every 
 cranny of the royal precincts, and many were 
 forced, bruised and breathless, against the high 
 wall which guarded the rear of the enclosure. 
 
 The Brahmans fought with the dumb 
 savagery of wild-cats; but they were over- 
 powered by the multitude of their assailants. 
 Kill as they would, " they could deal death 
 only to a few. Then they were borne down 
 crushed under foot, stamped into the dust, over- 
 whelmed, obliterated. In many of the houses 
 the flooring, built upon piles, gave way under 
 the weight of the rabble, and the Sudras and 
 their enemies, and the women and children 
 hiding in the dark interiors, were precipitated in 
 struggling, cursing masses on to the ground 
 beneath. 
 
 Presently, their thirst for bloodshed still 
 unslaked, men looked about savagely for fresh 
 victims ; and in that moment many a defenceless 
 creature^— hag and maiden, child and babe — 
 became the prey of the mob's insanity. 
 
 Little by little the pressure from behind re- 
 laxed. The fight was over. Men, freeing them- 
 selves from the throng, had time to draw breath 
 and to look about them. Everywhere, as the 
 
204 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 crowd parted, the ground was seen to be littered 
 with the dead. The Sudras, in exterminating' 
 the demigods, had stamped the life out of full as 
 many of their fellows. Men stood, in awe- 
 stricken groups, about the mangled corpses of 
 friends ; and women, springing from nowhere, 
 filled the place with their lamentations. Gradu- 
 ally a sort of hush fell upon the multitude, broken 
 only by a sound of weeping. 
 
 Then, above the lull, arose the solemn music 
 of chanting priests, and all eyes were turned 
 toward a little stone temple — the only building 
 in the enclosure not made of wood — whence it 
 seemed to issue. 
 
 Its walls and portals had withstood the rush of 
 the rabble, which had opened out and swarmed 
 round it, leaving a little heap of dead to mark 
 the place of its impact with the unyielding 
 stone. 
 
 Chun, with the gash on his forehead reopened 
 — bruised and breathless, and bleeding in many 
 places — swung round on his heel when the 
 chanting fell upon his ear. The crowd, re-form- 
 ing, pushed toward the temple ; but the pressure 
 was not as irresistible as before. 
 
 Chun, whom all now recognised as, in some 
 sort, their leader, was able to restrain the men 
 immediately behind him, and to keep clear a 
 little space before the closed portals of the 
 shrine. 
 
 These — while men craned their necks, stand- 
 ing a-tiptoe, and clambering on to buildings, in 
 
ANARCHY 205 
 
 their efforts to see — were slowly agitated, and 
 then flung wide. 
 
 Old Baguan Dass, with half a dozen of the 
 more aged of his hierophants grouped behind 
 him, stood in the entrance. 
 
 His white beard fell to his waist ; his long, 
 thin hands were folded palm to palm, thumbs to 
 breast, finger-tips to lips, in the craditional 
 posture of prayer ; his eyes, fixed high above the 
 head of the mob, blazed with fanatical fire. In 
 a strong, musical voice he intoned the sacred 
 chant, mouthing the rolling and sonorous 
 syllables. 
 
 Thus, with laudations of the treacherous Gods 
 upon his lips — fearlessly contemptuous of his 
 enemies to the last, faithful too to his ideals as a 
 priest and a son of the twice-born demigods — 
 he came forth to his death, impassive and 
 unfaltering. 
 
 As he advanced, a great silence fell upon the 
 multitude, and only the chanting of the priests 
 was heard above the roaring of the flames, 
 which every instant were gaining ground in the 
 blazing palace-buildings. 
 
 A hand clutched Chun's naked arm with a 
 grip that pained him ; and turning he looked 
 into his mother's face. How she had come 
 there he knew not, nor stayed to ask. He had 
 not seen her since before the riot in the forum. 
 There was a look in her withered face that was 
 new to him, though he had seen many expres- 
 sions imprinted upon it which had been hidden 
 
206 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 from all the world. Demons of horror and 
 dismay peeped from her eyes. Her features 
 were drawn and haggard in the stress of an 
 intense emotion. Her voice trembled, and her 
 words were hoarse and tremulous. 
 
 " Save him ! " she whispered. " Save him ! 
 The Twice-born ! The High Priest ! He . . . 
 he is your father ! " 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 THE SECRET OF SLAT 
 
 Seven days and nights had come and gone 
 since the morning which had seen the palace- 
 buildings invaded and sacked and burnt by the 
 Sudras ; and to old Slat, sitting alone in one of the 
 courts of the upper temple of Angkor Wat, it 
 had seemed to be the mission of each passing 
 hour to make manifest the vanity of his hopes. 
 
 He had withdrawn now to this secluded spot 
 that he might avoid sights and sounds sympto- 
 matic of the prevailing anarchy, each one of 
 which moved him to contempt, to indignation, 
 or to disgust. 
 
 He had his seat on the floor of one of the 
 cloisters which, raised to a height of some five 
 feet above the flags of the square court, ran 
 round all four sides of it. Looking across the 
 open space, he could see the shady interior of 
 the opposite cloister, and the steep pitch of the 
 heavily sculptured roof above it, sloping upward 
 to the ridge, along which the effigy of a huge 
 snake writhed against the sky-line. 
 
 With the loving eye of the artist, he took in 
 
 20T 
 
208 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 every detail of its beauty ; with the technical 
 appreciation of a craftsman, he noted how each 
 stone, put to its special purpose, aided in the 
 evolution of the perfect whole. Yet was he not 
 entirely satisfied. The acute angle at which 
 the slopes of the roof met, robbed the archi- 
 tectural scheme of something of dignity and 
 grandeur in Slat's sight ; and this, repeated in 
 every temple, in every cloister, in every dome 
 which his people had constructed, was a flaw so 
 obvious that he could never quite escape from it. 
 It was, to him, a perpetual chagrin that by it 
 should be marred even this supreme masterpiece 
 of the dead dreamer whom he worshipped. 
 
 One of the causes of the immense solidity of the 
 Khmer temples — which have survived, almost 
 unharmed, centuries of time and of neglect — is 
 to be found in the method whereby their builders 
 evaded the difficulty of the arch. To effect the 
 convergence of their walls, they laid stones, in 
 successive strata, upon the summits in such a 
 way that each was held in place by the weight of 
 the portion of it which did not overlap. When 
 all was completed, and before the task of 
 trimming had been taken in hand, a Khmer 
 "arch" must have resembled a rough double- 
 staircase, culminating in a single, narrow block ; 
 but so carefully were projections cut down to 
 the limit of safety, and so elaborately were the 
 surfaces ornamented with carving and sculpture, 
 that, in the end, the rule-of-thumb method 
 employed was only to be detected by reason of 
 
THE SECRET OF SLAT 209 
 
 the acute angle at which the walls met, and the 
 stiff and ungraceful form of the roof which 
 resulted. 
 
 For years, old Slat — unaided by any save in- 
 stinctive mathematical knowledge — had sought 
 a remedy for that which an artistic sense within 
 him proclaimed to be a defect tarnishing the 
 perfection of his idol. Long had he pondered, 
 meditated, groped ; seeking the solution of his 
 problem, as he had once said to Chun, " among 
 the mysterious forces which dominate inani- 
 mate things — the immutable laws of strain and 
 thrust." 
 
 Obsessed by his idea, undaunted by repeated 
 failure, bringing to his task the tireless patience 
 of the East, he had reasoned, calculated, argued, 
 experimented; had fashioned little stones of 
 fantastic shapes, which he hoped would develop 
 the cohesion that he sought ; had worked always 
 in secret, lest the Brahmans should surprise his 
 notion ; and throughout had been stimulated 
 and inspired by the thought that he was treading 
 in the footsteps of the master who had designed 
 Angkor Wat, from whose eyes, in spite of all his 
 genius, this priceless conception had been veiled. 
 
 And at last, when old age had come upon him, 
 when his eyes were dim and his hands smitten 
 with palsy, suddenly — like a whisper from the 
 Gods — the solution had flashed upon him and 
 his mind had grasped and mastered the formula 
 of the arch. 
 
 The little model, with its nicely dovetailed 
 
210 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 stones, had stood before him in the flicker of the 
 damar-torches — for old Slat had been puzzling 
 at his problem far into the night — and as he saw 
 the noble curve of the arch which he had 
 fashioned, almost he adored it — no, not it, but 
 the inspiring genius of his race which, deigning 
 to use his heart and hand and brain, had brought 
 into being this thing of wonder and beauty. 
 
 Always he had known himself to be a descend- 
 ant of the demigods — though the knowledge had 
 not spurred him to acts of madness, such as that 
 which had led his brother, Phun, to the destruc- 
 tion of his manhood ; but now he had felt, for 
 the first time in life, that the divine in him had 
 found a fitting outlet. 
 
 And forthwith all that was most human in 
 this man had leaped up to assert his right of 
 ownership in his discovery. That, at least, 
 should not become the spoil of the Brahmans 
 who, in their pride, had denied to him all that, 
 by right of blood, was his. They had withheld 
 from him everything over which they wielded 
 power ; but he, from them, would withhold his 
 precious secret. That should be his vengeance 
 upon them for a lifetime of oppression and neglect 
 — the vengeance of the man whose body had worn 
 itself out in their service, whose intelligence they 
 had used unscrupulously, giving in return no 
 guerdon of thanks or recognition. 
 
 For a season this thought had been his delight, 
 and he had hugged it to his heart, gloating in 
 triumph over the double achievement of his 
 
THE SECRET OF SLAT 211 
 
 discovery and of its concealment ; but as time 
 passed and the fires of the hurmng-^Aai began 
 to hold for him an imminent threat, the desire 
 to see his dream realised in all the majesty of 
 enduring stone became more and more insistent. 
 It was like the pain of a raging tooth. It would 
 not suffer itself to be forgotten ; it broke eternally 
 upon his peace ; it devoured all other hopes and 
 aspirations ; it monopolised, his thought. Yet, 
 never once did he feel tempted to surrender his 
 knowledge to the Brahmans : too deep for that 
 was his hatred of the demigods. Only, he fell to 
 dreaming anew, to plotting, planning, scheming ; 
 and then Chun had come to him — an unacknow- 
 ledged Brahman, like himself — and almost in- 
 sensibly the old man had been sucked into the 
 whirlpool of a great conspiracy. 
 
 From the first, his reason and his judgment 
 had told him that he was staking all his hopes 
 upon a desperate chance ; but obstinately he 
 had shunned the truth. Now, looking back upon 
 recent events, he saw clearly that which, sub- 
 consciously, he had always known — that the 
 revolution, which he had aided, could result 
 only in anarchy, and must make the realisation 
 of his dream more visionary than it had ever 
 been. 
 
 This conviction had been branded on his brain 
 when, after the scenes of riot and savagery 
 enacted in the forum, the mob had given itself 
 up to a night of pillage and license, setting fire 
 to the capital, reducing to ashes huge stores of 
 
212 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 food and merchandise, rendering thousands 
 homeless, and thereafter, in their wantonness, 
 wreaking an iconoclastic wrath upon the images 
 of the Gods, and upon the mighty monuments 
 which had been builded by the labour of them 
 and of their fathers. 
 
 To Slat, the massacre of the demigods had 
 been an incident of little moment — for them he 
 felt no pity : but the stupid love of destruction 
 for destruction's sake, which had throughout 
 been evinced by the maddened populace, aroused 
 in him a sullen rage. 
 
 As he sat now, alone with the silent stones — 
 which, embodying a vast idea, had for him a 
 meaning that humanity could never have — he 
 thought of the happenings of which he, during 
 the past few days, had been a disgusted 
 witness. 
 
 The Sudras, released from a bondage that 
 had endured for centuries, were intoxicated by 
 the suddenness and the completeness of their 
 emancipation. Fear and awe and reverence — 
 the fetters which so long had shackled them — 
 had fallen from them in an hour. The demigods, 
 who had enslaved them, they had utterly routed 
 and vanquished. The Deities, of whom the 
 Brahmans were the vicars upon earth, had 
 shared in the defeat of their servants. Hatred 
 of the demigods, and of the Gods in whose name 
 their endless labours had been exacted, had been 
 a smouldering passion in many a Sudras breast, 
 while superstitious dreads still prevented it from 
 
THE SECRET OF SLAT 213 
 
 bursting into flame. Now, in an instant, it had 
 flared up into a fierce and vindictive atheism. 
 The very Gods were felt to be defenceless, even 
 as the Brahmans had proved to be defenceless. 
 Divinities and demigods stood and fell together. 
 Of a sudden the superhumanity of both was 
 revealed to the popular understanding as a cruel 
 and tremendous myth — a myth which, time out 
 of mind, had enslaved the souls of men, and had 
 harnessed their bodies to an eternity of toil — a 
 myth which was now for ever shattered. 
 
 The abrupt revulsion of feeling had displayed 
 itself in a thousand brutish manifestations. 
 Everything that before had claimed the 
 reverence, the devotion, or the obedience of the 
 multitude, had now become an object of its 
 abhorrence and its spite. The Brahmans who 
 had escaped from the attack upon the procession 
 of the false sword, and from the massacre in the 
 palace, had been tracked and hunted down ; 
 had been dragged from the huts of peasants and 
 their hiding-places in the forests, to be done to 
 death by a hate-maddened people. Every insult 
 that a perverse imagination could devise, every 
 atrocity that the vile ingenuity of man could 
 invent, and the Asiatic's special aptitude for the 
 infliction of exquisite pain could perfect, had 
 been practised upon the captives ; till even the 
 fury of the multitude and its love of spectacular 
 horrors grew languid through satiety. With 
 stupid uproar and laughter, the images of the 
 Gods were broken and ground to powder ; and 
 
214 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 though the solidity of the temples defied the 
 mob's efforts at demolition, an aimless rage was 
 wreaked upon some of the more accessible of the 
 sculptures. 
 
 The Spirit of Destruction reigned supreme. 
 The people could only mangle and kill and 
 break and wreck. Work, which had been the 
 inspiration of the demigods' rule, ha-d earned a 
 special hatred from the multitude of whom it 
 had been required. In the quarries, the half- 
 lifted block was suffered to lie where it had fallen. 
 The tracks leading to Angkor Wat were barred 
 by abandoned drays, each freighted with a 
 gigantic monolith, and to many of them were 
 still tethered starving cattle, which no man had 
 taken the trouble to release. Even the crops in 
 the fields were neglected, for the prevailing sense 
 of insecurity had robbed property of its value, 
 and the masterless people were inspired by no 
 collective foresight. The men whose lives had, 
 from generation to generation, been ordered for 
 them by a higher intelligence, in which all power 
 of initiative, organisation, and command had 
 been centred, had not yet learned to think or 
 plan for themselves. Slat and a few others, as 
 they watched Angkor Thom and its granaries 
 go up to the heavens in flame, and as each 
 succeeding day made the indolence and the folly 
 of the people more clearly manifest, had looked 
 deep enough into the shadows of the future to 
 see therein the grinning phantom of famine ; 
 but, for the most part, men took no thought for 
 
THE SECRET OF SLAT 215 
 
 the morrow, ate, drank, and made merry, 
 squandering lavishly all that, by looting and 
 pillage, they had wrested for themselves out of 
 the general wreck. 
 
 Old Slat smiled sardonically, licking his lips 
 with an evil satisfaction, as he thought of the 
 retribution which presently would descend upon 
 those heedless, brainless revellers ; but not even 
 his prevision of the miseries which awaited them 
 could afford him lasting consolation. Work, 
 which is the common lot of man, would reclaim 
 them in the end, he knew ; but using necessity as 
 its goad, it would drive them into the fields and 
 the forests, seeking food — not into the unfinished 
 temple, to make his dream come true. 
 
 His secret of the keystone had been discovered 
 only to be lost ; and realising this, he was over- 
 come with grief. It seemed to him that he had 
 lived too long in a world of apes and fools. 
 
 Chun, followed by a little band of youngsters, 
 who had attached themselves to him, entered 
 the cloister in which old Slat was seated. He 
 and his companions were dressed in bright, 
 new silks ; and magnificent weapons, mounted 
 in silver and gold, were thrust into their 
 girdles and carried in their hands. During 
 the past few days, the young and the energetic 
 had found many chances of looting the objects 
 most to their taste. 
 
 Chun came from the direction of the western 
 courtyard, having scaled the perpendicular steps 
 
216 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 which lead to the central portals of the upper 
 temple, and was now making- his way toward 
 the inner shrine by the southern cloisters. 
 
 When he caught sight of Slat, he bade his 
 fellows leave him, and squatted in silence by the 
 side of the old man. 
 
 "Whither away?" asked the latter, in 
 mechanical greeting. 
 
 Chun pointed with outstretched chin — 
 peasant-fashion — in the direction of the interior 
 of the upper temple. 
 
 "Yonder," he said. 
 
 " I might have known," said Slat bitterly, 
 "that all this turmoil had its beginning, aye and 
 its end, in a woman. Who is she, and what is 
 her style and name ? " 
 
 "She — but, in truth, I know not her 
 name. She — she calls herself the Spirit of 
 Destruction," 
 
 "Then she has broken loose, my son," said 
 Slat. 
 
 Chun was on his feet in an instant, a prey to 
 anxiety and dismay. 
 
 " When ? Whither ? Where has she gone ? " 
 he cried. 
 
 " Is she not abroad throughout the land — the 
 Spirit of Destruction?" asked Slat sardoni- 
 cally. 
 
 " Yes : but I speak of this woman — this girl! 
 Has she gone forth ? Have you seen her ? " 
 
 "Nay, I have not seen her," replied Skt. 
 "In common with all men, I know that 
 
THE SECRET OF SLAT 217 
 
 someone abides in the inner shrine; and I, 
 being mindful of your youth, my son, and of 
 the insensate folly of youth, needed no man to 
 tell me that, very surely, it is a woman. Yet 
 even I did not know that she was an incarnation 
 of the Spirit of Destruction. Indeed, it is very 
 fitting and right and appropriate that such a 
 one should in this hour usurp the innermost 
 shrine of the Gods." 
 
 His mocking words were without merriment. 
 Through them there breathed a spirit of disgust 
 and indignation. 
 
 "For seven days and seven nights she has 
 been there — ^alone," said Chun. "Even I 
 have not been suffered to see her." 
 
 "Are you sure that she has been alone?" 
 asked Slat. 
 
 Chun looked up at the old man, with the 
 horror of an appalling suspicion dawning in his 
 face. 
 
 "Yes," he said, in a voice which he vainly 
 tried to make full of confidence. " My brethren, 
 Sud and Muth, have kept watch and ward 
 without the portals of the shrine since the 
 moment that she entered them. 
 
 " Without the portals," echoed Slat. 
 
 " What know you ? " asked Chun breathlessly. 
 
 "Only the treachery and the naughtiness of 
 woman," said Slat. "Is she your leman ? " 
 
 " No," said Chun, bowing low his head. 
 
 "Hath she other lovers — or a lover?" 
 asked Slat pitilessly. 
 
218 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 <( ' 
 
 No. At least, I In truth, I know 
 
 not," faltered Chun. 
 
 " Whence comes she? Who are her parents ? 
 What is her caste ? Is she a virgin ? " asked 
 Slat. 
 
 Chun was seated cross-legged, his forearms 
 resting on his thighs, his clasped hands in his 
 lap, his head bent low above them. 
 
 "Of her parentage I know nothing," he 
 mumbled. "And she is no virgin. She is — 
 she is— a — a woman of the tendple." 
 
 Slat turned upon him at the word, with a 
 snarl like that of some savage animal. 
 
 "And it is for this — for a woman born in 
 harlotry and bred in whoredom — that you have 
 brought our world crumbling in ruins about 
 our ears ! For this, for this ! " 
 
 His words tripped and stumbled over one 
 another in the intensity of his anger and 
 indignation. 
 
 "And I, fool and dotard that I am, /, for this, 
 have helped you! For this have suffered the 
 shattering of my dream! Arrrgh! It lacked 
 but this to put the crown of shame upon my 
 grief!" 
 
 "Be still!" said Chun, sullenly, raising his 
 head and looking wrathfully at the old man. 
 "You speak of things of which you know 
 nothing. She is not as other women." 
 
 Slat spat upon the flags in token of his 
 disgust. 
 
 "When, since the world began, was a fool's 
 
THE SECRET OF SLAT 219 
 
 love like unto other women?" he exclaimed. 
 "You have said enough. She is — of the 
 temple; yet hath she denied herself to you. 
 And — for seven days and nights, she has 
 been — so she would have you believe — alone 1 " 
 
 He was shaken by uncontrollable laughter, 
 mirthless, mocking, and vibrating with spite. 
 There was, to him, keen Satisfaction in the 
 knowledge that, amid the general wreckage, it 
 was not his dream alone that had been 
 dispersed. 
 
 For a moment Chun's hands went out, as 
 though with them he would have gripped the 
 throat of the old man, and wrung the life from 
 out of him. Then he drew them back, and 
 leaped to his feet. 
 
 " It is a lie!" he cried. "You know her not. 
 Now go I to prove how black is the lie you have 
 uttered against her ! " 
 
 He turned away, and with hurried steps, 
 passed out of sight in the direction of the inner 
 shrine. 
 
 His words were confident ; but in his heart 
 there was a secret, ra^ng dread. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE INNER SHRINE 
 
 On palm-leaf mats, spread before the big 
 bronze portals of the inner shrine, Chun found 
 his two loutish, peasant brothers sitting, chew- 
 ing betel-quids, and talking listlessly. They 
 had been camped there, day and night, for 
 a week, and they had been enjoying themselves 
 immensely. Their slack curiosity concerning 
 the world-shaking events, which were taking 
 place outside the temple, was satisfied by the 
 news that from time to time filtered through 
 to them ; and, for the rest, they had attained 
 suddenly to the realisation of an impossible 
 ideal. To eat and sleep only — that, to these 
 drudges of the house, and toilers in the quarry 
 and the workyard, had been a phrase which 
 from childhood, had seemed to enshrine for 
 them the perfect existence; and, behold, here, 
 seated or lying upon mats of luxurious softness, 
 nothing was expected of them save eating and 
 sleeping. It was incredible, no less. Also, to 
 complete their well-being, an ill-favoured damsel 
 of the temple — who had thought to grasp a 
 golden opportunity by making to herself friends 
 
 220 
 
THE INNER SHRINE 221 
 
 of the brothers of the man of the hour — had 
 taken up her abode with them ; and they shared 
 her favours — as they shared everything — with 
 a placid, animal content. 
 
 Chun, without casting them a word or a look, 
 as they pushed and sidled their sitting bodies 
 across the mat, to make way for him, walked 
 swiftly to the closed doors ; withdrew the bolts 
 noiselessly, with firm hands ; pulled one of the 
 portals wide ; stepped into the dim interior of 
 the shrine; and clanged the heavy sheet of 
 bronze to behind him. 
 
 He heard a man's startled exclamation, and 
 a girl's laugh. 
 
 He had an instant vision of two seated 
 figures, with the low, stone altar rising behind 
 them, surmounted by vessels and lamps of gold 
 and silver, grouped about the feet of posturing, 
 fantastic images. He saw both leap erect, and 
 one — the taller — feel for and draw a sword ; 
 but Chun was too quick for him. In a transport 
 of murderous rage, which had in it all the super- 
 human strength and violence of insanity, he 
 flung himself upon the man, and bore him to 
 the ground, crashing down upon him with 
 fingers buried to the knuckles in his throat. 
 The drawn sword fell clattering on the flags. 
 
 Chun was conscious of arms that strove to 
 throw him off"; of fists that smote at him with 
 blows that he did not feel ; of a body that 
 writhed and floundered beneath him, in 
 impotent efforts to win free. Through the 
 
222 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 flogging of his heart- beats, and his own 
 laboured breathing, he heard the agonised 
 pumping of his enemy's bursting lungs. 
 
 Again and again, he lifted the man's head 
 from the ground, to bring it down upon the 
 flags with a dull, stunning impact ; and as his 
 own set teeth ground against one another 
 audibly, in the intense concentration of all his 
 physical forces, he was aware that each pang 
 which he inflicted upon his adversary found 
 an answer within him in a throb of passionate 
 satisfaction. 
 
 Quickly the strength of his writhing victim 
 ebbed. To Chun it seemed, as resistance 
 slackened, and only the convulsive heaving of the 
 man's lungs maintained its violence, that he could 
 feel the vitality oozing from his opponent, like 
 fluid expressed from a sponge ; and elated by 
 the knowledge that the end of the fight was 
 near, he lifted the limp head, and brought it 
 smashing down upon the flags again, more 
 remorselessly than before. 
 
 At last, tlae frantic efforts to draw breath — 
 which mechanically the man's body had been 
 making, independently of his will — l>ecame more 
 infrequent, more feeble, till in a sob they ended ; 
 and with one more shattering blow of the head 
 against the stones, Chun cast his enemy aside, 
 and rose stiffly from above him. 
 
 In a silence, broken only by the panting and 
 floundering of the combatants, he had killed 
 this man with his hands. 
 
THE INNER SHRINE 223 
 
 He stood still, for a moment, gazing down 
 at the dead body. He was spent, not only 
 by the tremendous physical exertion, but by 
 the insanity of anger, blent with many emo- 
 tions, which for a space had endowed him with 
 invincible force ; and standing thus, gasping 
 loudly, dazed and giddy, he was conscious of 
 a sensation of utter exhaustion of body and 
 mind ; and also that his hands were paining 
 him acutely. 
 
 Then something seemed to snap inside him, 
 and he rolled over, fainting, and collapsed on 
 the flags above the body of the man whom he 
 had slain. 
 
 It was her voice that, from an infinite 
 distance, hailed him from the heart of a shadowy 
 world. Feebly he groped his way through the 
 darkness in the direction of the sound. 
 
 Presently he became aware that he was lying 
 on the ground with his head softly pillowed,, 
 and that her voice hovered above him. 
 
 It was distant still, but momentarily it drew 
 nearer. It was showering upon him all manner 
 of endearing epithets; and with closed eyes, 
 he lay motionless. Consciously to enjoy his 
 dream. 
 
 It had visited him before, many times — this 
 dream; and he had learned to dread waking 
 from it : but now it seemed to possess a reality 
 never equaired in the past. 
 
 Yet, he was afraid to open his eyes. 
 
224 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 There was a taste, as of blood, in his mouth, 
 and his limbs seemed weighted with lead; but 
 all around him there was suffused a fragrance 
 which he had learned to associate with her. 
 
 The soft object upon which his head was 
 pillowed, moved slightly, and the sweat was 
 wiped from his brow, gently, with a silk handker- 
 chief. A hand caressed his hair. The low, 
 deep, musical voice wooed him with tender 
 phrases. 
 
 Very slowly, and still expecting that the 
 illusion would be immediately dispelled, he 
 opened his eyes and looked upward. 
 
 She was bending above him, her face half 
 averted and dimly seen beneath the soft masses of 
 her hair. Anxiety, curiosity, and a mockery that 
 was half-doubtful, half-alluring, peeped from her 
 eyes. Her lips whispered his name. 
 
 He closed his eyes and lay still, too spent to 
 move ; but feebly, he pressed, with his swollen 
 and wrenched fingers, the little hand which she 
 slipped between them. 
 
 His rage against her had ceased to move him. 
 He was conscious only of a great content. 
 
 Too exhausted and inert for thought, he passed 
 again into oblivion ; but, even in sleep, he 
 maintained his grip upon her hand. To the 
 last he was haunted by the fear that he would 
 wake to find her gone ; yet his exhausted body 
 demanded rest, and would not be denied. 
 
 When he, at last, recovered consciousness, it 
 
THE INNER SHRINE 225 
 
 was only by an effort that he was able to recall 
 what had befallen him, and where he was. 
 
 The night had crept up, and the shrine was 
 lighted only by a smoking oil-lamp, set upon the 
 low altar-stone. It threw a faint garish glare, 
 flickering and uncertain, upon the lower limbs of 
 images, whereof the bodies were plunged in 
 shadow, and upon the figure of the girl, seated 
 placidly upon a mat at his feet. 
 
 She was looking at him, steadily and calmly, 
 as she had often looked at him ; and at the sight 
 of her, Chun struggled up into a sitting posture. 
 
 She rose, without a word ; vanished into the 
 gloom, and instantly returned, bearing rice and 
 a curry-bowl or two, which she set before him. 
 She produced a brass vessel, with a funnel- 
 shaped mouth, and a little silver cup, fashioned 
 in the likeness of half a cocoanut-shell and filled 
 with water. This she poured over the hand 
 which Chun mechanically extended. He 
 noticed that his fingers were swollen and 
 discoloured, and that they were stiff and sore. 
 Beneath his nails, the quicks showed black with 
 suffused blood. 
 
 "Eat! "said the girl. 
 
 She spoke with her accustomed accent of 
 command, and mechanically Chun obeyed her. 
 He had not realised how badly he stood in need 
 of food. Ravenously he devoured the rice and 
 the savoury mess of curry; and then drank 
 deeply of the water she handed him in the little 
 silver bowl. Still in silence, he suffered her to 
 
226 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 pour the ablution for his fingers, and to remove 
 the plates and eating-vessels. 
 
 She opened the bronze doors a little, to thrust 
 them out into the vestibule ; then reseated her- 
 self near him. She bent grave, questioning eyes 
 upon his face, and before her gaze his own fell. 
 
 The recollection that, during all these days, 
 she had duped and fooled him, welled up 
 suddenly within him, filling him with pain and 
 keen distress. The emotions that tore at him 
 were more akin to shame, than to anger. It was 
 to him — in some illogical sort — as though, not 
 she, but something outside her — something 
 unconnected with her personality — had wronged 
 and outraged him — betraying his trust, mocking 
 his love, and torturing him with an insanity of 
 jealousy. 
 
 "You — ^you harboured him! AH these 
 days and nights, while I did loyally your bid- 
 ding, you gave him refuge here — you " 
 
 She silenced his stuttering speech with a 
 gesture full of weariness. 
 
 " Must you speak of him ? " she asked 
 plaintively. "Now that you are rested, now 
 that you have eaten and drunk your fill, will you 
 not a little think of me — who so tenderly have 
 cared for you — and remove, that carrion ? " 
 
 With a little shudder of dislike, real or affected, 
 she indicated something that was only a patch of 
 blackness, more black than the surrounding 
 shadows. 
 
 Chun, checked and abashed, as this woman 
 
THE INNER SHRINE 227 
 
 alone had ever the power to abash and check 
 him, rose at once, and dragged into the feeble 
 lamp-light the body of the man whom he had 
 killed. It was already stiff, and the face with its 
 swollen and discoloured features, the protruding, 
 purple tongue, and starting eyes, fixed and 
 glazed, looked up at him with an air of horrible, 
 waggfish mockery.. 
 
 In spite of its disfigurement, Chun recognised 
 Chandra Dass, the young Brahman whom he 
 and the other quarrymen had been wont to 
 name "the Arrogant One"; and he was 
 conscious of a distinct feeling of relief — he who 
 had lost his faith in the Gods, and had led the 
 onslaught upon their twice-born servants — 
 because his rival had not been a Sttdra. 
 
 Calling to Sud and Muth to aid him, he drew 
 the body out into the darkness of the vestibule. 
 
 " Take this thing, and cast it over the parapet 
 into the court below," he said to them. 
 
 Baguan Dass and three or four of the aged 
 priests who had been captured with him — Chun 
 had saved them from the mob, claiming them 
 for his own, on the plea that they might yet be 
 needed to guard the Sacred Sword if Indra 
 should return it into human keeping — came out 
 of the shadows and gazed silently at the dead 
 body of their kinsman. 
 
 Baguan Dass, seizing a torch and stooping low, 
 examined closely the face and neck. Then, 
 drawing himself erect, he looked at Chun with 
 something resembling pride in his eyes. 
 
228 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 " I gave you sound muscles, son of mine!" he 
 said. 
 
 They were the first words that had passed his 
 lips since he had been made captive ; and involun- 
 tarily, Chun bowed himself before his father. 
 
 He turned back, and re-entered the shrine, 
 closing the heavy doors behind him. 
 
 "Come!" whispered a voice from the 
 shadows. The light had been extinguished 
 during his absence. 
 
 He groped blindly, till a little hand found his, 
 and drew him forward. A soft laugh, musical 
 and hushed, sounded close to him ; and in an 
 instant, the girl was in his arms, her cheek 
 against his cheek. 
 
 "Ah," she whispered softly. "Now I know 
 that you love me ; and you, too — perhaps 
 — a little — I love; for you are cruel and brave 
 and very strong. For a moment, almost, I 
 feared you." 
 
 And again a happy laugh came from her lips. 
 
 Chun, straining her to his heart, could find no 
 voice in which to answer. All her maltreatment 
 of him, all her tyrannies, all her deception were 
 forgotten ; and with a little shudder of self- 
 loathing, he realised that the fire of his passion 
 was inflamed, rather than quenched, by the 
 knowledge that other men had greatly desired 
 her beauty. 
 
 But he had no time for thought. He knew, 
 at last, the supreme ecstasy of a dream come 
 true. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 SEEDS 
 
 One afternoon, a little before the last of the 
 daylight died, Chun was seated alone at a spot 
 just without the niain portals of the upper 
 temple. To the right and left of him, the 
 narrow abutting platform flanked the massive 
 walls, and spread away to the angles of the 
 building, where other porches projected, crowned 
 high overhead by their tremendous domes. 
 At his feet, far below, and already plunged in 
 shadow, lay the courtyard, with its twin guard- 
 houses indistinctly seen. Beyond the huddle of 
 roofs on its further side, which formed Chun's 
 immediate foreground, and the long, distant line 
 of the exterior cloisters, the forest — pitch-black 
 in the diisk — rose in sombre, broken wave-crests 
 against the sullen reds and purples of the sunset. 
 On the horizon to the north-west, the waters of 
 the Great Lake were visible, glinting with a dull 
 and ruddy sheen as they faintly reflected the glow 
 in the sky. 
 
 Chun was deep in thought; but remotely he 
 was conscious of an insistent, half-heard com- 
 motion within the dark recesses of the Wat. 
 
 229 
 
230 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 With a tumultuous, shrill shriekingr, and a hurried 
 beat and flutter of innumerable wings, the bats 
 were assembling for their nightly exodus.^ 
 
 In their myriads they came, from every dark 
 cranny of the temple, flocking to the porches, 
 there to hang in dense, ragged festoons and 
 fringes, till the carved wooden ceilings were 
 black, as though grown upon by some foul, 
 fungoid lichen. 
 
 Presently half ^ dozen adventurous pioneers 
 flitted out, described wide circles on noiseless 
 wings, and flung themselves back into shelter. 
 Looking over his shoulder, Chun could see the 
 interior of the porch alive with bats — thousands 
 depending limply, like sodden leaves in some 
 enchanted forest; others in motion so swift 
 that his eyes could not follow them in the 
 uncertain light; while the ceiling, in patches, 
 was alternately covered by them, as by a sudden 
 black eruption, and as suddenly and mysteriously 
 cleansed. 
 
 And all the while, the sound of the creatures' 
 frenzied twitterings and squeakings, and the stir 
 and flutter of their wings, increased in volume, 
 disturbing the solemn silence of the sunset 
 hour. 
 
 Then, abruptly — as though each unit com- 
 posing it acted in obedience to some inaudible 
 command — the bat-army started forth upon its 
 nightly foray to the fly- and mosquito-infested 
 borders of Tonl6-Sap. 
 
 ' Note?. 
 
SEEDS 231 
 
 From the main entrance, before which Chun 
 had his seat, and simultaneously from every 
 other portal of the Wat, bats poured in columns, 
 in continuous streams, in jets, in bunches — their 
 numbers past all counting. Over Chun's head 
 they came in great clusters and gushes, that 
 broke up magically, each individual swinging 
 and veering in its panic-driven flight, each troop 
 fanning out rapidly, till the whole sky, in the 
 direction of the lake, was dotted with their 
 hurrying battalions. 
 
 Theirs was the speed of terror, for enemies 
 awaited them — big, tawny, white-headed fish- 
 kites, little grey eagles, sparrow-hawks, owls, 
 and birds of prey of many varieties. Some 
 hovered above the huge domes of the temple ; 
 some floated, in wide sweeps and circles, poised 
 on outstretched, motionless wings; others sat 
 perched here and there on roof-ridge or 
 carving, in calm, secure anticipation. Then, 
 when the moment of exodus arrived, all became 
 instantly animated by an extraordinary vital 
 energy. The fish-kites and the owls flapped 
 and floundered through the scattering throngs 
 of bats, with difficulty securing a single victim ; 
 but the hawks and the eagles never failed. 
 Like plummets they dropped into those nimble 
 multitudes, plunging to strike, and a soft crunch- 
 ing sound and the snick of frail bones was 
 heard; then they soared swiftly upward, to 
 plunge and strike again. All was enacted with 
 amazing quickness, and in silence, for the bats 
 
232 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 had ceased their squeakings when their flight 
 began; and almost in the flick of an eyelid 
 they had vanished into the shadows, and their 
 persecutors flew hither and thither, slowly, with 
 full talons. 
 
 A moment more, and the darkness had 
 descended. The nightly toll had been paid ; 
 and the bats, released from fear, were free, till 
 the dawn, to feast joyously upon a yet mightier 
 host of tiny winged creatures, around the 
 swampy borders of the lake.^ 
 
 The sight was one which Chun had watched 
 many scores of times, and always with a certain 
 amused appreciation ; but now — so much had 
 the range of his ideas been expanded by his 
 connection with recent events — even things old 
 and familiar wore for him a new aspect. They 
 set in motion trains of thought which they had 
 never formerly suggested to his mind. 
 
 Thus, as he now sat gazing out into the dark- 
 ness and following, in imagination, the hosts 
 of bats upon their predatory way, he was 
 struck suddenly by the grotesque resemblance 
 between human and natural history ; and fell to 
 arraigning the appalling cruelty of the scheme 
 which suffers the individual life to subsist only 
 so long as it pays a ransom by inflicting 
 numberless deaths. An arresting conception of 
 the universe, new to him, flashed upon his 
 mental vision. He saw it as one vast slaughter- 
 house in which — -without breathing-space or 
 
 * Vide note 7. 
 
SEEDS 233 
 
 intermission — blood-guilty survivors, after a 
 lifetime of bloodshed, came, each in his 
 appointed hour, to a bloody end. It seemed 
 to him that, even as he sat there, earth and air 
 and water quivered and vibrated with the 
 horrible turmoil of that eternal, selfish carnage 
 — the struggle for life, prolific of death; that 
 the stillness of the night was like a mighty 
 door, closed before him, to shut out from 
 hearing the wails of the death-dealers who, at 
 last, by death were stricken. He beheld all 
 animate creatures — great and small, weak and 
 strong, ferocious and timid, old and young — 
 inspired by a detestable, insatiable egoism; 
 forced to kill that they might live; forced, 
 too, in the end, to yield up in agony the life 
 which they had fed with the mortal pangs of 
 others. 
 
 Chun hid his face in his hands, as though he 
 sought to hide from sight the pictures his sudden 
 conception had evoked. It was, to him, as 
 though the whole universe had been smitten, 
 before his very eyes, by some monstrous malady, 
 and had dissolved about him into a struggling 
 mass of putrescence. 
 
 In that moment the relative proportion of 
 things, as he had always seen them, became 
 strangely transformed. That which, for him, 
 had filled all the world — the tyranny of the 
 Brahmans, the revolt of the Sudras — lost its 
 magnitude. What were the long slavery, the 
 bloody and triumphant revolution but mere 
 
234 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 casual manifestations of the same inexorable law 
 — passing phases in the fierce fight for existence, 
 in which, by blood and suffering, a tranisient 
 victory was secured, ere the final defeat of 
 annihilation inevitably befell ? 
 
 Other thoughts came hurrying in the train 
 of these. 
 
 What were the weapons which the accumulated 
 experience of their kind had taught men to use, 
 in order a little to postpone the sure, ultimate 
 destruction ? Faith, hope, the charity that works 
 and schemes for others, forethought, combin- 
 ation, discipline. But how should these find 
 place in a land where fear and reverence lay 
 dead? 
 
 Chun recalled the elation which had been his 
 when, intoxicated by the sense of freedom 
 inspired in him by his new-found atheism, he 
 had felt himself to be emancipated from the 
 thraldom of superstition by which his fellows 
 were enslaved. Yet, even then, he had been 
 conscious that, with the passing away of the 
 faith of his fathers, something very precious 
 was vanishing from the earth. Now, with vision 
 made more clear by a riper knowledge of men 
 and things, he realised that that which had been 
 lost was not only precious, but essential. Every- 
 where the images of the Gods were broken on 
 the altar-stones. Save for Baguan Dass and 
 the few aged priests who had been saved with 
 him, the last of the demigods had been done to 
 death. Angkor Thom lay in ashes. The 
 
SEEDS 235 
 
 surrounding country had been pillaged, and 
 property wantonly demolished, that an idle 
 populace might gorge themselves with food, and 
 slake a stupid thirst for destruction. The fear 
 and awe inspired by the Gods, the reverence and 
 obedience which the demigods had exacted, were 
 alike forgotten ; and Chun, looking around upon 
 the ruin he had wrought, perteived that without 
 these restraints his fellows were foolish and 
 ruthless as the beasts that perish. 
 
 But how replace that which had been riven 
 from the hearts and minds of men ? How bring 
 order out of this universal chaos.' How avert 
 the famine which must surely fall as a scourge 
 upon the people in punishment for their follies 
 and their sins ? 
 
 These were the problems which now beset 
 Chun's mind, sleeping and waking; and as yet 
 to them he could find no answer. 
 
 Old Slat came out of the porch of the temple, 
 and seated himself on the narrow platform at 
 Chun's side. 
 
 " You gaze into the dark, my son," he croaked. 
 "There is only darkness into which to gaze. 
 All is dark, dark, dark." 
 
 "The moon will rise ere long," said Chun, 
 refusing to take the other's meaning. 
 
 Slat gave vent to a low laugh that was like 
 a snarl. 
 
 "This is a darkness upon which no moon will 
 rise," he said. "Though there be no gods. 
 
236 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GOUS 
 
 yet are the Gods angry; and presently they 
 will strike, with famine and with pestilence, 
 as is their godly way. The demigods are 
 no more ; yet will the people be driven to toil, 
 as of old, by the task-masters who never 
 die — by necessity and by hunger ; but, ere that 
 befall, more folk than the Brahmans ever slew 
 will perish, by reason of their own folly and 
 idleness. It is magnificent, in truth, my son, 
 this ruin which you have wrought ; and wisely 
 do the wise fools name you Liberator of the 
 Sudras, Benefactor of our Kind!" 
 
 Chun turned upon him angrily. 
 
 " Be still ! " he said. "It was not I who put 
 folly into the hearts of fools." 
 
 "And yet," said Slat, musingly. " I dreamed 
 that it was you, my son, who spoke to the people 
 from the summit of the Ba Phun, telling them 
 that the Gods were dead, that the demigods 
 must die, flogging the live souls of them to 
 an insanity of rage. Bravely did you pull 
 down, in a day, that which had been builded 
 in an eternity of time ; and now that all our 
 world lies shattered at your feet, you sit here 
 and gaze into the darkness which is of your 
 making." 
 
 "The people heard me then," Chun said. 
 " Now they will not listen. The Gods are dead, 
 the demigods have perished, and our folk to-day 
 are masterless." 
 
 "Aye, they are masterless," croaked Slat, 
 "and even if the demigods were restored to 
 
SEEDS 237 
 
 life, the people would no longer serve them. 
 Remains, then, only the Gods." 
 
 " But they too are dead. On the altars their 
 images lie broken. Our people slaughter cattle 
 in the holy places, camp in the shrines, and defile 
 the cloisters with their revelries," said Chun. 
 
 "Aye," said Slat again. "The old gods are 
 cast down from their thrones ; but in the secret 
 heart of man there lurks always some buried 
 seeds of worship." 
 
 A deep voice spoke suddenly from the shadows 
 of the porch. 
 
 " Even the cult of the High Gods failed to 
 root out from the heart of the people the cursed 
 heresy of the Snake," it said. 
 
 Both Chun and Slat turned about, and saw 
 old Baguan Dass squatting at the head of the 
 low stone steps which led into the interior of the 
 temple. Even in the darkness his full, white 
 beard was visible, covering his chest. 
 
 "Men said that the king was wont to visit 
 the Seven-headed One nightly in her secret 
 shrine,"^ said Chun, suddenly reminded of the 
 superstitious belief which, for centuries, had been 
 current among the Khmers, "and that she 
 appeared to him in the likeness of a beautiful 
 woman, and gave to him much wise counsel 
 concerning the affairs of the kingdom. Also, 
 that until, at the stroke of two fairy gongs, she 
 vanished from his sight, not even the first queen 
 was suffered to approach. I have heard many 
 
 » Notes. 
 
238 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 of our women say that, were they the queen, 
 they would not have suffered any damsel, human 
 or divine, to withhold them at night-times from 
 the sleeping-mats of their men ; yet, if folk speak 
 truly, the queen was forced to restrain her 
 impatience till the Snake Spirit had had her will 
 of the king, and if he failed her, some storm or 
 fire or pestilence forthwith befell."^ 
 
 "Lies! All lies!" growled Baguan Dass. 
 "Lies devised by fools. As the holy books 
 relate, the Snake is the symbol of the kundalim 
 — the coiled-up energy, which is divine. From 
 it is sprung the cosmic force that is in all 
 things. In man it hath its abiding-place at 
 the base of the spinal-column, in a triangular 
 plexus near the sacrum. It is the aim of the 
 Yog^i to arouse from its slumber this coiled-up 
 force, to lure it step by step up the spinal- 
 column to the thousand-petalled lotus, which 
 is the plexus of the brain. Then — ^then at last 
 — the Yogi, hath at his command all the cosmic 
 energy ; attains to perfect illumination ; and 
 shares their divinity with the Gods."^ 
 
 " But young men," mocked Slat, "are content 
 with the possession of that energy, whereof the 
 quality depends more on desire than on medita- 
 tion. This son of thine — this saviour of the 
 Sudras and destroyer of his father's race — ^hath 
 more use for a snake turned wanton, than for 
 any coiled-up force that, worming its slow way 
 up the spinal-column, wins at the last to a power 
 
 » Notes. * F/V&note9. 
 
SEEDS 239 
 
 that rules the world. So it hath ever been, 
 since young blood first was young; so it will 
 ever be, while a wanton winks a v/icked eye, 
 tempting men to turn their backs on duty." 
 
 Again Chun flung round at the old man, with 
 flashing eyes and angry words upon his lips ; 
 but now yet another voice spoke suddenly from 
 the interior of the Wat. It was that of his 
 brother Muth. 
 
 " She bids you come," it said ; and forthwith 
 Chun sprang to his feet, and with quick, glad 
 steps, hurried in the direction of the inner 
 shrine. 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THE THRONE OF THE SNAKE 
 
 Chun passed swiftly through the passages and 
 courtyards of the Wat, his head held high, 
 his shoulders swinging a little, his gait lithe and 
 buoyant — every movement of his body and 
 limbs betokening the immense reserves of 
 physical energy that were latent within him. 
 Youth and health were his, endowing him with 
 courage and with force; yet was his mind 
 freighted with almost intolerable burdens. 
 
 The sights, of which he was a daily witness, 
 told an uncompromising story of the utter 
 demoralisation of the people. The ceaseless 
 jibes and taunts of old Slat stirred into a tortur- 
 ing restlessness his sense of responsibility for 
 all that had befallen. The foresight with 
 which he was cursed forbade him to ignore 
 the sure calamities that lay ambushed in the 
 future, by which the populace would presently 
 be beset, if nought could be done to allay or 
 check the dementia which had seized upon 
 them. 
 
 The necessity for action was imperative, if the 
 mob were to be saved from the results of their 
 
 240 
 
THE THRONE OF THE SNAKE 241 
 
 own folly; and in existing circumstances, he 
 alone could act effectively. Not an instant, he 
 knew, was to be lost : and this knowledge was 
 like a goad, driven deep into the soul of him. 
 Yet, despite the strength of his conviction of 
 the extreme urgency of the need, he felt himself 
 to be bound by fetters of inaction and bewilder- 
 ment — not knowing where to begin, what to do, 
 nor how even to set about devising a remedy for 
 the evils he so clearly saw. 
 
 His anxieties, in combination with the 
 certainty that immediate measures must be 
 taken to control the general madness, and 
 the inability to hit upon any effective line of 
 action, occasioned a suspense so unbear- 
 able that he was often tempted by a futile 
 longing for escape. The jungles lay open to 
 him, and in them, by the aid of his two brothers, 
 he could fashion some sort of home in which to 
 pass uneventfully the remainder of his days, 
 freed from all responsibilities, save those of the 
 primitive bread-winner. The idea was full of 
 allurements. But forthwith there rose before 
 his eyes the face of the girl who still inhabited 
 the inner shrine, and he knew the vision to be 
 vain. 
 
 For while his thought was beset by fears for 
 the land whose people he had plunged into 
 the welter of anarchical revolution, Chun had 
 himself been accumulating many emotional 
 experiences. 
 
 Upon the night which had seen the life torn 
 
242 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 by his hands out of the struggling body of 
 Chandra Dass, he had won his heart's desire — 
 and forthwith had found his desire unfulfilled. 
 Then and since, this girl had given herself to 
 him with a passionate delight which had in it 
 the violence of frenzy. She had whispered to 
 him exquisite things of that love which is of the 
 flesh; revelling in her own fastidious enjoy- 
 ment of its subtleties ; dazzling him with the 
 delicate artistry of her conceptions and dis- 
 coveries ; and she had worked upon the desire 
 in his blood, as a skilled player draws music 
 from his instrument : but throughout, it 
 had seemed to him that she was taking — not 
 giving. There was in her relation to him 
 nothing of the subordination of the woman to 
 the man who has possessed her; and he knew 
 his possession of her to be incomplete. Ker 
 body was his, as — he winced at the knowledge 
 — it had been the plaything of many ; but the 
 heart of her, the soul of her — that which he 
 most coveted — the real woman within her, 
 continued to elude him. 
 
 This he knew ; and the knowledge lent to their 
 union an element which he felt to be degrading. 
 In some strange way, which he lacked the wit to 
 explain or completely to understand, it caused 
 their respective positions to become transposed 
 — reduced him to the condition of the wanton ; 
 and left her untouched, save by the pleasure he 
 afforded her, and the open triumph which she 
 displayed in his moral debasement. 
 
THE THRONE OF THE SNAKE 243 
 
 Yet, nightly, at her bidding, he visited her, 
 drawn irresistibly by the hypnotic force which 
 emanated from her ; and if the summons were 
 delayed, he plumbed the depths of misery. He 
 was suspicious of her always — jealous even of 
 his loutish brethren who kept gfuard without her 
 door ; and she had forced him, not orice, but 
 many times, to listen to every odious detail of 
 her experiences. She seemed to extract a 
 morbid delight from the act of impressing upon 
 his imagination every circumstance of degrada- 
 tion which had gone to the making of her life as 
 a woman of the temple. It was as though she 
 could not sufficiently insist upon and glory in 
 her own defilement, since it made his own 
 subjection to her the more defiling. 
 
 Chun, writhing body and soul, had no will but 
 her will. The crown of his suffering was the 
 knowledge that he would forgive her any 
 wickedness, any deception, any infidelity — as he 
 had forgiven her her love-passages with Chandra 
 Dass. 
 
 For Chun loved her with the one love, the 
 great love, which is not of the flesh ; and though 
 his desire of her was an enslaving passion, it 
 was upon the elusive, wayward soul of her that 
 his heart was set. 
 
 They sat together, in the half-light of oil-lamps, 
 upon the soft mats which were piled upon the 
 floor at the foot of the altar. For near an hour 
 the silence had been unbroken — the girl sitting 
 
244 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 cross-legged, elbows on knees, chin supported in 
 the hollow of her joined hands, her eyes fixed 
 upon the shadows with an unseeing stare — 
 Chun, motionless beside her, hardly daring to 
 draw breath, lest the faint sound should disturb 
 and irritate her. 
 
 He had become used to these periods of 
 complete inertia which, with this girl, frequently 
 followed upon paroxysms of violent emotion ; 
 and inevitably they led his thoughts into the 
 past, and recalled to his mind similar moods, 
 which he had noted in her, when, early in their 
 intercourse, she had stolen forth to 'meet him 
 near the steps of the lower temple. He con- 
 trolled his limbs, even the expression of his 
 features ; but the comprehension which now was 
 his, set him wincing and writhing inwardly. 
 
 At last she spoke. 
 
 "Well? Is there no news? Here am I, 
 penned in this hateful place, like some captive 
 animal, while you go abroad and take your 
 pleasure ; and when, after long delay, you come 
 to me, you have no word to say." 
 
 "I thought " began Chun; but with an 
 
 impatient gesture she interrupted him. 
 
 " I have no use for your thought — nor, in- 
 deed, for anything that is you. I want to 
 hear what folk are doing, what men say, what 
 is befalling — out there, beyond these deadening 
 walls." 
 
 "There is no news, save ill news," said Chun 
 wearily. " The people are mad and drunken 
 
THE THRONE OF THE SNAKE 245 
 
 with folly. They eat and drink only, feasting 
 upon the fruit of their pillag^e. The crops rot in 
 the fields, for no man will work. Those whom 
 the fires have rendered houseless have crowded 
 into the cloisters of the temples, or have made 
 for themselves sheds in all the open spaces. 
 Each man has collected for his own use that 
 upon which he can lay his hands, and many have 
 destroyed, in their wantonness, all that they 
 cannot carry away. For the moment there is 
 plenty to be had without toil, and men use it 
 wastefuUy, as though it would last for ever. 
 There is no law, no order, no forethought, no 
 hope — only a masterless people who blindly 
 compass their own destruction." 
 
 " And you, O Liberator of the Sudras f — as 
 you would have me believe that fools name you — 
 you sit here, like a weeping, woman, wringing 
 your hands and making moan ! Why do you 
 not do something ? " 
 
 "What can I do?" asked Chun, despairingly. 
 " I tell you the people are smitten with madness. 
 They will not listen. They care only for their 
 food and drink. And there is worse behind — 
 the Thai ! They have beaten our army. 
 Presently Angkor will be filled with the hosts of 
 the routed — and how shall We feed them 
 too?" 
 
 " Pferchance, among the leaders of the army, 
 there will be found a man — one who can curb 
 and rule these casteless wretches." 
 
 " I doubt it," said Chun wearily. " The army 
 
246 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 has suffered defeat ; its chiefs will be discredited ; 
 and already, men say, the warriors have risen up 
 and destroyed the Brahmans who were with 
 them. In the day of uproar, the people hearkened 
 to my words. When I led, they followed 
 willingly. I " 
 
 "You!" she exclaimed with infinite scorn. 
 "Why should they yield obedience to you, who 
 are of low caste, like themselves ? " 
 
 " But I, too, am a Brahman," said Chun, with 
 a spurt of pride. 
 
 " A Brahman ! " she sneered. " Aye, a 
 Brahman, conceived in shame and littered in the 
 gutter ! 'Tis not to Brahmans such as you that 
 the people bow down in worship." 
 
 "Our folk worship no longer," said Chun. 
 " But the blood of the rulers has still some 
 magic when it stirs in the veins and the brain of 
 a man. Though they knew it not, it was 
 because I was a Brahman that the people 
 followed me : yet, to-day they will not follow." 
 
 "I blame them not at all," she snapped at 
 him. 
 
 For a space there was silence; then Chun 
 spoke again. 
 
 " I fear that the Thai — the Barbarians — will 
 follow hard on the heels of the army. It passeth 
 the wit of man to forecast what will then 
 befall." 
 
 " I see clearly," she said. " Many will perish ; 
 many will endure slavery ; and we others — 
 women-folk, who possess beauty and are skilled 
 
THE THRONE OF THE SNAKE 247 
 
 in the enchantment of the hearts of men — we 
 shall get new lovers. Among- them — who 
 knows — perchance, here and there, one or 
 another of us may happen upon a man. For 
 myself, it seems to me, there is little to fear; 
 and anything will be better than this burial in a 
 tomb while life is still quick in me." 
 
 "That," said Chun, with calm conviction, "is 
 a dream that can never come true." 
 
 " Why ? " she flashed at him. 
 
 "Why?" echoed Chun. "Because, ere I 
 would suffer you to fall into the possession of 
 any other living man, I— even I, who sit here 
 beside you — would crush the life out of you, as, 
 before your eyes, I tore it out of your lover, 
 Chandra Dass." 
 
 She turned her face to him with a smile, and 
 putting up one little hand, softly caressed his 
 face. 
 
 "I like that!" she whispered. "Moreover, I 
 believe you would do that which you say. 
 There are times when almost I am persuaded 
 that even you are a man." 
 
 " I utter no jest," said Chun grimly. 
 
 " I know. That is why I love you," she said, 
 still smiling. "There is much of the brute in 
 you, for all the ease with which I master you ; 
 and no man is man who is not part brute. 
 Believe me, who have known many men." 
 
 He turned upon her furiously. 
 
 "Be still! "he shouted. 
 
 " What evil have I done ? " she asked mock- 
 
248 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 ingly, simulating terror. " I did but say that I 
 have known many men — and how should it be 
 otherwise ? Was I not a wanton of the temple ? 
 And think you that such as I learn nought 
 concerning the sex that uses us for its 
 pleasure ? " 
 
 " I will not listen," cried Chun, pressing his 
 hands against his ears. 
 
 She twined her fingers about his, and drew 
 them to her lap. 
 
 " I have done," she said. " But there is more 
 that I would hear. "What do men say of 
 me?" 
 
 " They know nought concerning you," said 
 Chun. 
 
 At once her face was eloquent of her dis- 
 pleasure. 
 
 " How mean you that they know nought of 
 me ? " she asked. " Do they not whisper that the 
 Liberator of the Sudras " — she paused to laugh 
 disdainfully — " repairs nightly to the innermost 
 shrine of the Wat, even as of old the king was 
 wont to visit the incarnate Spirit who had her seat 
 upon the Throne of the Snake ? Do they not 
 tell one another that Indra hath returned the 
 Sword into thy keeping — that it too is within 
 the central sanctuary — that Baguan Dass, and 
 the priest-dogs who follow him, are its wardens, 
 sitting without the portals, guarding it from 
 afar, lest aUght of ill overtake the sacred 
 weapon ? " 
 
 "May be they say these things," said Chun 
 
THE THRONE OF THE SNAKE 249 
 
 stupidly, "but in my hearing they are not 
 said." 
 
 " And, therefore, you fancy that no such talk is 
 current ! " the girl exclaimed, with intense scorn. 
 " I was wrong : you are a man ! No woman would 
 be so dull as not to know — words or no words." 
 
 "But you . . .?" cried Chun, turning upon 
 her savagely, his eyes ablaze with jealousy and 
 suspicion. "How do you know? You, who 
 are hidden here in the very heart of seclusion ? 
 With whom have you had speech ? " 
 
 The girl returned his gaze with a look of 
 amusement and pity. 
 
 " I know, because I am a woman, not a mere 
 dolt of a man. Also, mayhap, I have overheard 
 the talk of those two clowns, your brothers, and 
 the oafs who come to visit them, and of that foul 
 slut who is their leman. I tell you that all 
 Angkor is a-buzz with rumour — when men are 
 idlfe, then do their tongues most wag — and 
 already the people weave legends around you, 
 and (though they know it not) around me, too. 
 You only are deaf to it, and need a woman to tell 
 you that which hourly is shouted in your ears." 
 
 For a few moments after she ceased speaking, 
 Chun sat still and in silence. Then, suddenly, 
 he smote his thigh with the palm of his right 
 hand, and looking up at her — his face alive with 
 excitement — gazed into her mocking eyes. 
 
 "Behold! That points the way. The 
 Sword! The Spirit of the Snake! The 
 worship, more ancient than the ritual of the 
 
250 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 Brahmans, brought back to life once more! 
 Our people must be yoked to an idea, to a 
 faith, to a belief in high, invisible Powers, if the 
 order and discipline, which alone can save them, 
 are to be revived. In this lies salvation, for 
 them, for us, for . , ." 
 
 " My friend," she said quietly, laying a hand 
 upon his arm. " Have I not been telling you 
 this for a good hour past ? Be not unduly puffed 
 up because, at the long last, you too have grasped 
 the obvious. For days I have sought by hint and 
 by suggestion to kindle this thought in your brain; 
 and only now has the slow tinder caught the 
 flame." 
 
 " Where is the Sword ? " asked Chun, too much 
 excited by the idea which had taken possession 
 of him to pay any heed to her taunts. 
 
 "It is in my keeping," she replied, calmly, 
 emphasising the pronoun. 
 
 " But you must give it into my hands," cried 
 Chun. " It is indeed a true saying that in that 
 sacred blade the mystic Spirit of our Land 
 abides. Now, in the hour of our extreme 
 necessity, that Spirit shall save our people! 
 It was because the Sword had passed from out 
 the keeping of the Brahmans, that the populace 
 rose against them, and their power was brought 
 to nought. It is with that Sword in my clasp 
 that I will bring order out of chaos, peace and 
 good government out of anarchy, and with it 
 will I establish a new despotism. I have hungered 
 and thirsted after liberty ; but men are fools. 
 
THE THRONE OF THE SNAKE 251 
 
 and our people know not the difference between 
 freedom and license. They are not ripe for self- 
 rule; for the will of the blind and selfish 
 majority means, in the end, the destruction of all. 
 I have seen it — with mine own eyes have I 
 beheld it. A masterless people are like a herd 
 of maddened cattle, that crush and gore them- 
 selves and one another; but I and the Sword 
 will be their master." 
 
 "Have done!" cried the girl. "Cease your 
 babble, and listen, for a space, to me." 
 
 Chun was silent in an instant, and sat still 
 with his eyes fixed upon her face. For a 
 while she, too, was motionless, and her eyes had 
 in them a far-away look. She was immersed in 
 thought. Across her face there flitted that 
 strange, fateful expression which gave to the 
 small and mobile features so extraordinary an 
 air of age and unearthly wisdom. 
 
 "You, in your blindness, have seen in me 
 nought but a woman," she said, "and a woman 
 I have been to you and to others : yet, in part 
 only am I of this world. In the beginning, when 
 first I appeared to you at the brink of the 
 Brahmans' bathing-tank, for a moment light 
 was vouchsafed to you, and kneeling at my feet, 
 you worshipped me as an incarnation of the 
 Shining Ones. Then I rejected your adoration, 
 for the appointed hour had not yet come : but 
 search your thought. Who inspired the revolt 
 against the self-styled demigods ? Who exposed 
 the vanity of the lies which were as a rampart 
 
252 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 reared around them ? Who freed you from the 
 yoke of superstition, beneath which your neck 
 was bowed, and using you as an instrument, 
 wrought with you more greatly than you 
 dreamed? Who compelled you to seize the 
 Sacred Sword of Indra, and breathed into you 
 the courage to brave even the Gods? Whose 
 hand has led you, as a mother leads her child, 
 supporting, guiding, coercing, restraining? Is 
 it not mine ? And is this, think you, the work 
 of a mere wanton of the temple ?^ 
 
 "Search your thought once more. Am I as 
 other Women? Do you, even in your secret 
 heart, judge me as others you would judge? 
 Am I not above and beyond all law? Could 
 aught that I might do be, in your eyes, so sinful 
 as to overpass the limits of forgiveness ? My 
 body of flesh and blood has lain in your 
 arms; but have you touched the spirit that 
 makes of it its habitation ? Can defilement 
 defile me, or degradation degrade? Hath not 
 the divine in me triumphed always over that in 
 me which is of the dust — the common clay 
 wherefrom mankind is fashioned ? " 
 
 Chun sat gazing at her fascinated, at first 
 with a startled and incredulous surprise which, 
 as she proceeded, gave gradual way to doubt, to 
 wonder, and, at the last, to the excitement of 
 conviction. The hypnotic power of suggestion, 
 which she had exercised over his mind from the 
 earliest moment of their intercourse, paralysed 
 his reason. The glamour which she cast over 
 
THE THRONE OF THE SNAKE 253 
 
 herself, over him, over all his world, blinded him 
 now, as always it had blinded him. While he 
 was held by the spell of those strange eyes, 
 while the music of her voice set every nerve in 
 him vibrating, faith was easy; the impossible 
 became credible, the miraculous became merged 
 into the normal. For Chun was not only a man 
 who had surrendered his very soul into the 
 keeping of a woman ; he was also an Asiatic 
 peasant, and, in spite of his scorn of the ancient 
 Gods whose impotence had been made manifest 
 to him, there lurked in his mind embers of belief in 
 the supernatural, which awaited but a breath to 
 fan them into flame. Her words, as he listened to 
 them, seemed to flash light into the ob^urity by 
 which his vision had been dimmed. They resolved 
 mysteries of which he had been remotely conscious 
 — made clear much which had baffled him, not 
 only in connection with public events, but with 
 regard to his own psychological experiences. Un- 
 known to himself, the knowledge that he had been 
 enslaved, not by a woman, but by an incarnation 
 of divinity, was as balm to his wounded pride. 
 
 " Do you not know it for the truth ? " she was 
 saying. "Have you not felt it a thousand 
 times? Have you not caught of it, now and 
 again, countless subtle hints ? Have you not 
 been conscious of it always — deep down in the 
 hidden recesses of your heart ? Speak ! " 
 
 "Aye," he responded, bowing down his head. 
 'VAye. I think that, from the very beginning, I 
 have known it." 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 THE HEART OF THE MULTITUDE 
 
 The chill hour of reaction, after the uproar and 
 excitement of recent events, had come to the 
 people of Angkor ; and men who had had much 
 to lose, had time now to look about them and 
 to make a reckoning of their loss. These, of 
 necessity, were in a minority, but possessing 
 more of intelligence and enlightenment than their 
 fellows, their thought leavened that of the mob, 
 and they formed a nucleus, around which mal- 
 contents instinctively gathered. They were 
 traders, mostly, who had always held the quarry- 
 folk in deep disdain, and hating the Brahmans 
 mainly because they were tax-gatherers who 
 levied heavy dues on merchandise, and because, 
 from the height of their fabled divinity, the 
 demigods looked down upon all men who were 
 not of the twice-born caste, drawing scant 
 distinction between class and cla-is. To many 
 of these it had seemed that, if once the Brahmans 
 were extirpated, the dominant power would 
 pass, naturally, into their hands. Now they 
 stood aghast, gazing upon the ashes of their 
 
 2U 
 
THE HEART OF THE MULTITUDE 255 
 
 homes and property, watching the Sudras 
 plundering and pillaging unchecked, and yet 
 not daring to stir a finger in their own defence, 
 lest the bloody fate which had overtaken the 
 Brahmans should fall also upon them. 
 
 There were others — well-to-do men of the 
 higher castes — who, though they had not shared 
 the divinity claimed by the demigods.had enjoyed, 
 under their rule, some measure of popular defer- 
 ence and respect. These were now outraged to 
 find themselves merged in the general equality ; 
 yet dared raise no protest, less worse things 
 should befall them. 
 
 Among the people, too — even among its dregs 
 — there were many who still held the ancient Gods 
 in awful reverence; and to these, the icono- 
 clastic fury of the mob was as a madness where- 
 with heaven had smitten the land, which 
 presently would be punished by famine, earth- 
 quake, and pestilence. These crept timidly 
 through the crowds of disorderly folk, momen- 
 tarily expecting a catastrophe, and gazing fear- 
 fully into one another's eyes. 
 
 The time was one of signs and marvels. It 
 had witnessed the sudden shattering of the 
 tremendous myth, whereby the Brahmans, for 
 so long, had exercised dominion over the souls 
 of men, and had compelled the labour of the 
 multitude; and to many this was a miracle, 
 inspiring awe and wonder and fear, but in no 
 wise shaking their faith in the innate divinity of 
 the demigods whom a sacrilegious mob had 
 
256 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 done to death. It was felt that in an hour in 
 which such things had been suffered to come to 
 pass, the bounds of the impossible were flung 
 wide ; that no cataclysm could any longer 
 occasion surprise. Men whispered together, 
 foretelling the imminence of the world's ending. 
 
 And even among the quarrymen, who still, 
 like their fellows Sud and Muth, found much 
 delight in idleness, in gorging themselves with 
 stolen food, in sleep, and in love-making, a spirit 
 of fear and unrest was awakening. They were 
 possessed by something of the uneasy feeling of 
 the schoolboy who plays truant. They could 
 not, in their innermost Tiearts, win to a secure 
 belief in their own emancipation. They, who 
 for so many generations had been enslaved, still 
 looked about involuntarily, searching for a 
 master to whom to yield obedience. Since, 
 as a class, they had always hated the merchants 
 and property-owners, envying their comparative 
 ease and luxury, they would recognise no leader 
 among them ; but, as Chun himself had said, it 
 was the Brahman in him, not the quarryman, 
 whom his fellow-workers followed. They saw 
 in him, ostensibly, one of themselves ; but sub- 
 consciously they detected a difference, and 
 to this, instinctively and unreasoningly, they did 
 obeisance. 
 
 Also, though with savage pleasure they had 
 slaughtered the Brahmans, and had smashed 
 with stupid shouts and laughter the beautiful 
 images of the Gods, each man among them 
 
THE HEART OF THE MULTITUDE 257 
 
 craved secretly for something beyond humanity 
 to which to offer prayer. Already many of them 
 had fashioned little phalli of wood or stone, and 
 adored the spirit of generation with uncouth, 
 natural symbolism, hoping thereby to increase 
 the vigour of their own bodies, weakened by 
 unaccustomed debauch. Others worshipped 
 the seven-headed Cobras, whose effigies were 
 repeated endlessly among the Khmer temples ; 
 and shreds and tags of half- forgotten superstition 
 were recalled to mind, and whispered from man 
 to man. 
 
 Gradually the rumour spread among the 
 people that some wonder was about to befall. 
 Men, who all their lives had dragged worn-out 
 bodies to their sleeping-mats soon after dusk had 
 changed ^to night, spoke fearfully of strange 
 stars in the sky, which never before had been 
 marked by human eyes. The imaginative saw 
 ominous signs and portents in the heavens and 
 upon the earth, and their stories met with 
 instant belief from their credulous fellows. 
 The unwonted idleness of the bodies of men 
 inured to heavy labour, set minds, hitherto 
 linked closely to material things, groping their 
 stumbling way through labyrinths of inconse- 
 quent thought and peculation. All the world 
 was agog, awaiting breathlessly some tremend- 
 ous event. 
 
 It came in a night of storm, that befell just 
 before the new moon was due ; for again old 
 Slat, and a few folk whom he had gathered 
 
258 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 about him, saw for an instant the naked form 
 of the great god Indra, clothed in elusive flame, 
 poised for a moment on the central dome of the 
 Wat. 
 
 The news spread like wildfire ; and when the 
 dawn broke, grey and tranquil, after a night of 
 thunder and tumult and downpour, and as the 
 sun emerged at last from behind the heavy 
 banks of mist, Angkor hummed, throughout 
 its length and breadth, lik^ a disturbed beehive. 
 
 From the Tha Phrom, from the temples of 
 Angkor Thorn, from the Be^ Keng, upon its hill, 
 from every outlying hamlet where the homeless 
 folk of the capital were seeking a crowded shelter, 
 the people poured toward the Wat. The Sword 
 of Indra had returned, and with it the fortune of 
 the land! Men shouted the news gleefully to 
 one another, as they shouldered their way 
 through the mobs, which all hurried to a 
 common centre. The great god Indra, patron 
 of the Khmers, had become incarnate, as of old, 
 and descending from heaven in flame, had 
 restored the Sword to his people, who, at his bid- 
 ding, had wreaked a righteous vengeance upon 
 the Brahmans, the betrayers of their trust. 
 There was joy, there was triumph, there was 
 relief in the very air. Men pushed on and on, 
 talking, shouting, gesticulating. Their faces 
 were joyful and expectant. The fear of famine, 
 of the invading Thai, of the fell wrath of the 
 outraged Gods, all had vanished in an hour. 
 Only now that these shadows were lifted, did 
 
THE HEART OF THE MULTITUDE 259 
 
 men realise how darkly they had brooded over 
 their minds. The sudden ending of the world, 
 for which so many had looked in terror, was felt 
 in a moment to be remote. The great Khmer 
 empire, which had seemed to be tottering to its 
 fall, was seen to be standing on the threshold of 
 a new and yet more glorious era. Hail be to 
 Indra, Lord of the Thunders, who in thunder 
 had descended to work the salvation of his 
 people ! 
 
 Easily cast down, as easily lifted up, the 
 multitude surrendered itself to a delirium of 
 ecstatic excitement. 
 
 At noon a sound was heard which had not 
 echoed through Angkor since the procession of 
 the false sword ; and at the first note a great 
 silence fell upon the people. The crowd had 
 surged past the exterior cloisters, covered the 
 causeway from end to end, overflowed into the 
 open spaces on either hand, and now thronged 
 the stairways and galleries of Angkor Wat, and 
 filled every inch of the great courtyard, in the 
 centre of which, supported on its cliff-like plinth, 
 rose the upper temple, crowned by its gigantic 
 domes. 
 
 In an instant the tumult arising from this 
 mighty concourse was stilled, and men with 
 tense and expectant faces stood stock still, 
 holding their breath, and straining their ears to 
 listen. 
 
 As the rustle and shufifle of their movement 
 
260 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 and the clamour of voices died away, there came 
 from the sanctuary of the upper temple the 
 shrill scream of a conch. Loud, discordant, 
 vibrating, it stabbed the silence as with 
 a tongue of flame that flared up, quivering, 
 leaping and falling, till the very sunlight seemed 
 to glow with the fire of its wild music. The 
 insistent, penetrating sound scarified the nerves, 
 and whipped the excitement of the multitude to 
 a madness of religious enthusiasm. From 
 infancy, the shrilling of the conch had been 
 connected in men's minds with the worship of 
 the Gods ; and now, after the long silence of the 
 temples, it played with irresistible force upon the 
 chords of memory. Here and there, a sinner 
 transported out of himself, lifted up his voice 
 in loud penitential lamentation. Men with 
 clenched fists, smote themselves cruelly on head 
 and breast and face. Strained countenances, 
 down which the tears ran unchecked, were 
 raised toward the heavens. Arms were waved 
 and brandished. Sobs and cries arose. After 
 many days, there had returned to the people 
 their faith in higher powers, and they hailed it 
 in a frenzy of excitement. 
 
 Then, presently, while the tumult of drum 
 and conch continued to sound from within the 
 Wat, from the great western portals of the 
 upper temple, a procession began slowly to 
 emerge. Those who led grouped themselves 
 along the narrow platform to the right and left, 
 making room for those behind. Others took up 
 
THE HEART OF THE MULTITUDE 261 
 
 a position upon the stone steps of the great door 
 itself, till only a small aperture was left free ; 
 and through this, at the last,- came Baguan 
 Dass, walking reverently, surrounded by the 
 priests who had survived with him, and bearing 
 in his hands the Sword of Indra, shrouded in 
 silken veils. 
 
 At the sight, the entire crowd — although it 
 was so closely packed that it could barely move 
 — subsided earthward, and became suddenly a 
 sea of upturned, passionate faces surmounted 
 by outstretched arms and praying hands. 
 Even above the clamour of conch and drum, the 
 resonant murmur of universal prayer was heard, 
 like the complaining sob of the sea. 
 
 The attendant priests drew near, and one by 
 one the wrappings were unwound from about 
 the sheath of the Sword, until the very last had 
 been laid aside. Then the aged hierophants fell 
 back, leaving Baguan Dass standing alone and 
 prominent, with the sacred weapon held rever- 
 ently before him. 
 
 Naked to the waist, and with a single white 
 garment falling thence, in stiff folds, to his 
 ankles, he held himself erect, his eyes fixed upon 
 the Sword, and in his face the absorption and 
 the proud veneration of the devotee who per- 
 forms sacred oflfices. His long white hair 
 mingled with the beard that streamed down his 
 chest; the skin of his body, bronze in the 
 sunlight, was covered with wrinkles ; his 
 massive features were lined and scarred by age 
 
262 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 and thought ; but his extended arms, holding 
 their precious burden, were unshaken by a 
 tremor. Only his lips were restless, mouthing 
 inaudibly words of the ancient tongue. 
 
 Behind him rose the grey portals of the 
 temple, framing a dark oblong of shadow, over 
 which writhed an effigy of the seven-headed 
 cobra ; and above this again the walls of the 
 Wat soared up and up to roof-ridge and carving, 
 culminating in the huge domes, outlined strongly 
 against the flawless blue of the sky. 
 
 Before him, its hilt grasped in his hands, its 
 tip pointing heavenward, the great Sword, 
 sheathed in its scabbard of red gold, blazed in 
 the sunshine like a flame ; and below him, in 
 the courtyard, in the cloisters and doorways, 
 along the length of the causeway and on either 
 side of it, to the outer limits of the sacred 
 precincts, the multitude crouched with ecstatic 
 faces and lifted hands. 
 
 From the priests, a thin chant arose, its 
 sound well-nigh lost in the vastness of the place, 
 and drowned by the inarticulate, murmurous 
 supplication of the people ; and then, at a sign 
 from their leader, his acolytes drew near once 
 more, and two of them began, with infinite 
 slowness, to draw the golden scabbard upward. 
 
 A tremor ran through the crowd, as a breath 
 of cold air ripplc;s over the surface of red-hot 
 metal, and a sound like a great sigh came from 
 them. 
 
 Inch by inch the gnarled, black blade was 
 
THE HEART OF THE MULTITUDE 263 
 
 exposed, till nearly a span of its length was 
 visible. Then the priests desisted, drawing aside 
 that the people might see more clearly, while 
 their hands still grasped the wavering sheath. 
 No living soul in all that multitude had ever 
 been suffered by the Brahmans to behold a 
 larger fragment of the sacred weapon. 
 
 Then, from the dark interior of the portals, 
 Chun suddenly stepped forth, and joined the 
 group of priests upon the narrow platform. He 
 was dressed in gorgeous silk clothes of many 
 colours, and a splendid dagger was thrust into 
 his girdle. He raised his right arm above his 
 head, with a gesture commanding silence; and 
 then his clear young voice rang out, carrying far 
 over the heads of the multitude. 
 
 " Behold, my brethren ! " he shouted. " Be- 
 hold, the great god Indra, Lord of the Thunders, 
 this day hath restored the Sword, which is the 
 emblem of his protection, into the keeping of 
 his people!" 
 
 Shouts and cries arose, mingled with the name 
 of the god, and loud acclamations of Chun, the 
 Liberator of the Sudras. It was some minutes 
 before he again could make himself heard. 
 
 "The High Gods," he cried, "have been busy 
 with our destinies. Last night, as many know, 
 Indra himself, incarnate as of old, descended to 
 earth, and gave back the Sword, in which the 
 mystic Spirit of the Land abides. In his wrath, 
 he reft it from the Brahmans, because they had 
 abused the trust reposed in them : and forthwith. 
 
264 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the Brahmans and all their works were brought 
 to nought." 
 
 Again he was interrupted by loud shouts and 
 acclamations. 
 
 "Now, in his infinite mercy, he hath restored 
 it to us, his people ; yet he gave it not into 
 human hands. The Spirit who hath her seat 
 upon the Throne of the Snake, hath assumed 
 once more her ancient incarnation. I — I, who 
 speak to you — I, by day and by night, have had 
 speech with her ! " 
 
 A murmur of awe and wonder arose from the 
 multitude, and many hid their eyes with their 
 hands. It seemed to them that the face of the 
 man who had held converse with Divinity, 
 shone with a light upon which human beings 
 could not look unblinded.^ 
 
 " Into her hands did Indra give the Sword ! " 
 Chun shouted. " He bade those Brahmans, 
 whom he hath decreed should not perish with their 
 fellows, keep watch and ward over it, ^.s of old ; 
 but he ordained that they should hold lit in trust 
 for us, his people." ' 
 
 Again the revelation was received with a 
 mighty uproar of satisfaction. 
 
 " And in token thereof," Chun continued, when 
 once again he could make his voice audible — 
 " in token thereof, he hath appointed this day of 
 full moon for the complete unveiling of the sacred 
 blade, before the eyes of all the mi^titude — a 
 privilege never before accorded to man." 
 
 ' Note lo. 
 
THE HEART OF THE MULTITUDE 265 
 
 Wild cries of joy and of delight broke from 
 the mob. Men leaped to their feet, shouting and 
 gesticulating in their excitement. As a long 
 swell moves in the sea, the crowd surged forward, 
 each individual seeking to gain a nearer view of 
 the mystic weapon which, since the beginning of 
 things, had been hidden from the sight of man. 
 
 Again Chun's arm and hand were held aloft, 
 demanding silence. 
 
 " But first," he cried, " She who hath her seat 
 upon the Throne of the Snake, hath bidden me, 
 her servant, give this message to you, my 
 brethren — and thus hath She spoken : The season 
 of rest and of revelry must end. I, who am her 
 henchman, and Baguan Dass, the Warden of 
 the Sword, and Slat, the old wise man, with 
 others whom She hath named, are enjoined to 
 take order, that peace, and respect for property, 
 and good government, and seemliness of carriage 
 may be restored amongst us ; that foodstuffs be 
 garnered and hoarded ; that measures be taken 
 to resist the Barbarians, the invading Thai. It 
 is by toil — thus speaks the Spirit — it is by toil 
 alone that men can live — not labour expended 
 endlessly upon unyielding stones. ..." 
 
 A roar of applause rose from the quarrymen, 
 and old Slat, seated just within the portals of 
 the Wat, gnashed his toothless jaws and cursed 
 softly, under his breath. 
 
 "Not travail of thew and sinew that beareth 
 no fruit save these cruel monuments of our pain," 
 Chun continued, "but work done in field and 
 
266 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 mart, that the earth may bring forth crops, that 
 wealth and plenty may visit the land, that peace 
 and prosperity may abide with us." 
 
 This, too, was popular, as was shbwn by the 
 general acclamation with which it was greeted. 
 All the forces among the people, which made for 
 law and order, hailed with delight the re-establish- 
 inent of settled government. Those who had 
 salved a moiety of their property from the general 
 wreckage, saw now a chance of maintaining 
 their hold upon it. Those who had nothing, 
 beheld themselves, in imagination, transformed 
 into prosperous landowners or thriving traders. 
 The quarrymen, firmly set in the habits of 
 labour and obedience, welcomed the promised 
 exchange of toil in the building-yards for the 
 casual husbandry of the East. 
 
 "And if we obey not this, her command^ — so 
 speaks the Spirit — famine shall stalk amongst us, 
 devastating the land ; disease and storm and 
 pestilence shall take their toll of us ; and the 
 Thai, like a fiery scourge, shall fall upon and 
 utterly destroy us ! 
 
 "Say, O my brothers, will you obey the 
 behests of the Spirit who hath her seat, now 
 and always, upon the awful Throne of the 
 Snake?" 
 
 "We will! We will!" the people cried, with 
 one voice ; and a mighty acclamation arose from 
 them in praise of Indra, Lord of the Thunders, 
 of the Sword which was his gift, of the Incarnate 
 Spirit of the Snake, and of Chun, who once 
 
THE HEART OV THE MULTITUDE 267 
 
 again was hailed on all sides as the Liberator of 
 the Sudras. 
 
 Making a sign with his hand to the priests, he 
 stepped back into the portals, whence he had 
 eme'rged. 
 
 The roar of the multitude made in his ears a 
 tremendous, stimulating music. He was intoxi- 
 cated with enthusiasm and excitement ; and so 
 possessed was he by his faith in the divinity of 
 the woman he loved, by whom he felt himself to 
 be inspired and guided, that amid all the wild 
 medley of truth and falsehood which he had 
 uttered he was unable to distinguish where fact 
 merged into fiction. He stood in the shadow 
 of the porch, with his hand pressed against his 
 forehead, reeling like a drunken man ; and old 
 Slat, squatting close beside him, watched him 
 with a sneer on his lips. 
 
 Slowly, slowly, the priests raised the scabbard, 
 till at last — as they drew it over the point of the 
 Sword — it flamed anew, flashing in the sun- 
 shine ; and in its place, rising erect from the 
 hands of Baguan Dass, the dull, black blade 
 was upreared, exposed in its entirety lo the 
 public gaze, for the first time for centuries. 
 
 Then, with a sound like a mighty sob, the 
 immense crowd of people — even as Chun had 
 done obeisance before the woman in the central 
 shrine — bowed low their heads in an ecstasy 
 of adoration. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 t 
 
 THE HEART OF THE RULER 
 
 In the more southerly of the two stone buildings 
 which, on the western side, half fill the central 
 courtyard of Angkor Wat, Chun was seated, 
 just after the night had fallen, engaged in the 
 transaction of public business. 
 
 Formerly, these solid and elaborately sculp- 
 tured structures had served as guard-rooms, in 
 which the wardens of the sacred places had 
 been wont to keep unending vigil ; but Chun 
 had made of them respectively his council- 
 chamber and his audience-hall — the little power- 
 houses whence was transmitted the energy that 
 ruled, and made belief to revivify the Khmer 
 nation. 
 
 In Chun, the Liberator of the Sudras, the 
 chosen Servant of the Snake, the past few 
 weeks had wrought many changes. His figure 
 was as erect and as alert as ever ; but the 
 feverish rapidity of his movements, and the 
 slight trembling of his hands, told their own 
 tale of wire-drawn nerves. He had lost much 
 flesh, and there were dark, bruise-like shadows 
 
THE HEART OF THE RULER 269 
 
 beneath his restless eyes, and deep hollows 
 below his high cheek-bones. Care, responsi- 
 bility, and many emotions had scored heavy 
 lines across his forehead, between his eyebrows, 
 and around the corners of his mouth. There 
 was about him an indefinable air of unrest — of 
 unhealthy, morbid excitement — of acute irrita- 
 bility, with difficulty suppressed. He looked 
 like a man whose vitality was being consumed 
 by some secret, devouring flame ; and those 
 who watched him daily, noted in him a steadily 
 rising impatience, an increasing intolerance of 
 advice or interference, and a tyrannical demean- 
 our which, beginning in a tendency to browbeat 
 and domineer, had rapidly developed into a 
 vicious and despotic cruelty. Even Baguan 
 Dass — who now rarely spoke, and seemed, 
 for the most part, to be sunken in a sort of 
 torpor — and old Slat — who contented himself 
 usually with a word or two of cynical jibe or 
 scoff — had ceased to have much weight with 
 him. For the rest, he had organised the stoutest 
 of the quarrymen into an armed rabble, and 
 since he fed them well, clothed them lavishly, 
 and winked at their private delinquencies and 
 exactions, they did ruthlessly his bidding, which 
 was often ruthless. 
 
 His earliest public measures had been wise, 
 though wisdom had not always been brought to 
 their execution. 
 
 The fugitives from Angkor Thom, who had 
 sought accommodation in the Wat, had been 
 
270 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 driven forth at a moment's notice, to seek 
 such shelter as they could find in a place 
 already dangerously overcrowded. This had 
 been the beginning of the discontent ; and 
 the exacerbation of the sufferers had been 
 increased by twenty-four hours of unbroken, 
 tropical downpour. 
 
 Every atom of foodstuff that could be collected 
 had been gathered together by Chun's orders, 
 and stored in the courts and cloisters of the 
 temple whose occupants had been thus evicted. 
 The entire population had been placed upon 
 rations, calculated on none too liberal a scale ; 
 and after the plenty and the waste in which, of 
 late, the people had rioted, the sudden restric- 
 tion was keenly felt. 
 
 The young and the able-bodied, without regard 
 to caste or clas^ or social standing, had been 
 herded in batches, and driven like cattle to the 
 fields, where they were forced to work, while 
 Chun's quarrymen stood over them, quickening 
 theif flagging energies with outrageous blows 
 and curses. 
 
 Men who, of old, had been owners of property, 
 gnashed their teeth in impotent rage, as they 
 watched all things being thrown into a common 
 stock, over which Chun and his ruffianly 
 followers exercised uncontrolled dominion. 
 They recalled with tears of regret the days 
 of prosperity and security which they had 
 enjoyed under the rule of the Brahmans, and 
 cursed the hour that had seen the rise of the 
 
THE HEART OF THE RULER 271 
 
 emancipated Sudras — folk who, now that they 
 were without fear, knew no reverence for rights 
 of person or of property. 
 
 Here and there some greedy wretch attempted 
 to break in upon the stores of hoarded rice 
 and dried fish, or a trader, driven to the fields, 
 refused, with the unconquerable obstinacy of the 
 Oriental, to address himself to the unaccustomed 
 labour. Such were haled before Chun, where 
 he sat daily in his audience-hall ; and already 
 the open spaces beyond the outer cloisters were 
 studded with the scaffolds of the crucified. 
 
 Chun was fully conscious now that his rule, 
 like that of the Brahmans which had preceded 
 it, was stepped and rooted in fear — fear of 
 condign, physical punishment, and fear, too, 
 of a supernatural force which the popular 
 imagination pictured as guiding and inspiring 
 the material power that now governed the land. 
 
 Insensibly, as this truth became more and 
 more apparent to his understanding, a greater 
 measure of recklessness and cruelty began to 
 characterise his actions. Having once baptised 
 his rule in blood, he found it difficult to stay his 
 hand. The infliction of death was. so easy— a 
 word spoken, a curt order given, and the 
 culprit's doom was sealed. Presently, death 
 unattended by torture, became in his sight a 
 thing too simple to supply an adequate example. 
 He sought object-lessons of a kind that would 
 impress the minds of the most stupid and 
 unimaginative — spectacles capable of making a 
 
272 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 special appeal to a brutalised people who, in their 
 secret hearts, looked for cruelty, and expected an 
 insatiable appetite for pain and bloody, human 
 sacrifice from the gods of their worship. 
 
 Left to himself, Chun, perhaps, would have 
 used his power with greater mildness and 
 wisdom ; but nightly the Spirit of Destruction 
 spoke with him, and listened — licking her lips 
 and moved by a strange excitement — to the 
 details of the day's executions. 
 
 For if Chun ruled with barbarous despotism, 
 he was himself the victim of a crushing 
 tyranny. 
 
 Every evening, in obedience to her summons, 
 he visited the occupant of the inner shrine. 
 The conchs shrilled and the drvmis throbbed 
 and pulsed, as he passed in state to the 
 threshold of her sanctuary, across which he 
 alone was suffered to set foot ; and the cowering 
 people, hearkening to the tumult from afar, 
 shuddered at the sound, asking one another 
 in fearful -whispers what fresh command would 
 be laid upon him during the supernatural inter- 
 view to which he went. 
 
 Chun himself did not know whether these 
 nightly meetings with the strange being, who 
 so compelled his body and so dominated his 
 soul, were most fraught, for him, with pain or 
 with delight. 
 
 Her moods, her wiiywardness, and her 
 unending caprice kept him in a constant 
 ebullition of nervous irritation, all the more 
 
THE HEART OF THE RULER 273 
 
 violent since he was forced rigidly to suppress 
 it. Often, nothing that he could do, nothing 
 that he could leave undone, had the least power 
 to please her. For an hour on end, she would 
 gird and rail at him with an insanity of wrath 
 that was as vehement as it was unreasoning; 
 and when at last she panted herself into silence, 
 Chun would feel as though the very soul of him 
 were raw and bleeding. She would seize upon 
 some trifling word or act of his, and weave 
 therefrom a web of fancied offence in which, 
 in a moment, he would find himself hopelessly 
 entangled. Over and over again she would 
 call upon him to make renewed profession of 
 his belief in her divinity ; and this she most 
 required when, by her own speech and deeds, 
 she had rendered belief most difficult. At 
 other times she would be plunged in thunderous 
 silence, from which any chance movement of 
 his would bring her, ravening like a wild beast 
 from its lair ; or with jibes and flouts and bitter 
 mockery, she would pour scorn on him — the 
 base-born knave who had crept to place and 
 power over the murdered bodies of his betters 
 — and with blistering contempt, would deride 
 herself and him and the lies upon which his 
 brief authority was based. 
 
 Yet, a moment later, she would be demanding 
 from him fantastic and degrading homage, in 
 her capacity as an incarnate deity. 
 
 But there were other times which, when they 
 came, obliterated for a space all memory of the 
 
274 THli DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 many and grievous things that she caused 
 Chun to suffer. Then, for a little, the goddess 
 would be forgotten, and would be replaced by 
 all that was most seductive, all that was most 
 tender and gracious and wooing in woman ; 
 and almost Chun would persuade himself that 
 at last, at last, she loved him. There was no 
 need then to bid him patter a formula of faith, 
 or to demand the performance of extravagant 
 acts of self-abasement. She was, in his eyes, 
 divinity incarnate, and with all his soul he 
 worshipped her. 
 
 If only she were always thus! The thought 
 pursued and persecuted him : but he knew that 
 it enshrined a hope faint and elusive as a 
 vision of the night. Also — though of this 
 he was unconscious — a constant kindness 
 might, perhaps, have palled upon him ; whereas 
 the capricious changefulness of her moods kept 
 him, by reason of the torture they inflicted, in 
 a perpetual quiver of uncertainty and of desire. 
 
 For the physical passion, which she excited 
 in him, took to itself a more compelling violence 
 with each hour that he spent in her company ; 
 till, gradually, it seemed to Chun to have 
 debased and swallowed up every other senti- 
 ment that she had aroused in his nature. 
 When she gave herself to him, he was in 
 heaven ; when she denied herself to his embrace, 
 he was in hell. The thought of what the 
 approaching night might give, or might with- 
 hold, never quitted him during all his hours of 
 
THE HEART OF THE RULER 276 
 
 labour and waking. It obsessed his mind — 
 now numbing it, now goading it to a desperate 
 irritation. The ever-present memory of her 
 was like a heavy burden that weighed upon 
 his spirit. He began to see only through her 
 eyes ; to feel, not for himself, but vicariously, 
 as he fancied that she would feel. Daily he 
 acted, ordered, decided, not as to him seemed 
 best, but in the way that he believed to be 
 most likely to gratify her savage humour. 
 Little by little he lost all sense of right and 
 wrong, of policy and impolicy, of discretion, of 
 restraint, and of the proportion of things. He 
 was convinced that his tenure of this woman 
 was precarious ; and he grabbed and grasped 
 and sinned wildly, in the desperate hope that 
 he might thereby prolong it. Undisputed 
 possession of her was, in his eyes, the 
 sole end of the unlimited power which he 
 wielded ; nay, it was the very essence and 
 meaning of power. He clutched frantically 
 at the reins of despotism lest, losing his grip 
 on them, he also should lose her — who made of 
 him her bondsman. 
 
 In bitter introspection, and with a flare of 
 anger against himself and her, he recognised 
 that it was by all thit was lowest and most 
 vile in his nature that he was, through her, 
 enslaved ; that the love, pure, generous, and 
 unselfish, which in the beginning she had 
 inspired, lay dead and lacerated in the dust, 
 its life stamped out of it by her little wanton 
 
276 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 feet; that she held him, and only desired to 
 hold him, by the monstrous passions which 
 she kindled in him so skilfully, tormented with 
 such tireless ingenuity, and from time to time 
 allayed with such undrearried-of perfection. 
 
 He knew, too, that his slavish subservience 
 to her caprice was loosening his hold upon the 
 authority which alone enabled him to make 
 and keep her his. He noted how his fellows 
 glanced at him, with wonder and distrust in 
 their eyes, when he issued some command, 
 whereof the atrocity stayed their breath, and of 
 which the malignity was her conception. But 
 ever she demanded from him an exact account of 
 all that he had done ; and to her he could not lie. 
 
 There had been times when he had pleaded 
 with her, seeking to mitigate the ferocity of 
 the deeds she required him to do; but at the 
 first hint of restraint, her wrath flamed up, 
 while she flashed at him the question whether 
 it was he, or she, who was to rule over Angkor. 
 He dared not insist ; and later he had meanly 
 sought to propitiate her by succulent accounts 
 of the barbarities which he had practised in her 
 name. 
 
 From the first, he had racked his brains and 
 ransacked his imagination to hit upon some 
 means of affording her more natural pleasures. 
 He had loaded her with ornaments of silver and 
 gold, and had piled at her feet gems which he 
 had taken from the royal treasure-houses. The 
 wardrobes of the Brahman women had been 
 
THE HEART OF THE RULER 277 
 
 pillaged to provide her with gorgeous raiment ; 
 and at a time when all the populace was sub- 
 sisting upon the scanty rations doled out to 
 them, every dainty known to the Khmer civilisa- 
 tion had been sought for far and wide, the better 
 to tempt her appetite. But she usually poured 
 scorn upon Chun and upon his gifts, or tossed 
 his offerings contemptuously aside ; and with 
 misery and dismay preying at his heart, he 
 marked in her an increasing restlessness, a 
 growing dissatisfaction which nothing had any 
 power to quiet or allay. 
 
 Chun, sitting lonely in his council-chamber, 
 after a day passed in dealing out insensate 
 punishments for trivial crimes, felt that the 
 foundations of his world were crumbling beneath 
 his feet. 
 
 Old Slat entered the building, and seated 
 himself, without a word, upon the stone dais 
 which occupied its centre. 
 
 Very deliberately he crushed a quid of betel- 
 nut in a long, silver tube, embossed with scaly 
 effigies of dragons. Chun had looted it at the 
 sack of the palace, and had presented it to his 
 old friend. It was the only thing, by which he 
 seemed to set any store, that Slat had gotten 
 out of the revolution. 
 
 When he had forced the little cylindrical mash 
 of nut, s^ambir, and pepper-leaf, fused together 
 by lime, out of the end of the tube, and had 
 transferred it carefully to his red-stained mouth, 
 
278 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 he looked up at his companion, and spoke, 
 tauntingly, as was his wont. 
 
 " Have you drunk your gallon of blood, my 
 friend ? And is your consuming thirst quenched 
 for this one day, at least ? " he asked. 
 
 Chun bent a sullen gaze upon him ; but he 
 said no word. 
 
 "The Brahmans, curse them! were a sorry 
 crew," Slat continued. " But they made things. 
 They ground the Sudras into the dust, perhaps ; 
 but from the dust they fashioned immortal 
 Beauty. It was left to you, O Liberator of 
 your Kind, to erect nothing more noble than 
 gallows, to create nothing more exquisite than 
 pain, and to heap up nothing more magnificent 
 than a pile of mangled corpses. You do well to 
 be proud of your handiwork. Never since time 
 was, has there arisen so stupendous a monument 
 to the wisdom, the clemency, and the power of a 
 born ruler of men." 
 
 " Have a care, lest I make of you its cupola," 
 cried Chun. His eyes flashed anger, and his 
 hands were hard clenched. 
 
 Slat turned upon him with a snarl, no whit 
 less angry. 
 
 "Peace, fool! You dare not touch me — me, 
 Slat, the old wise man, who in this season of the 
 breaking up of faiths, sways all men by the 
 fear of his magic. When you spouted lies from 
 the platform overhead, and poured maggots 
 into the ears of the people, even then you did 
 not dare exclude old Slat from the number of 
 
THE HEART OF THE RULER 279 
 
 the Snake's chosen councillors. Snake, indeed I 
 Spirit of Lies! A wanton hussy who, even in 
 the hour of your victory, played you false with a 
 lad whose good looks had set her fickle fancy 
 itching' ! And you did not dare to punish her, 
 as man should punish woman, with fist and 
 stick, when her light desires lead her a-straying. 
 Incarnation of Divinity ! How must the old 
 gods laugh, shaking their sides. Ye Spirits of 
 earth and air I Incarnation of Mischief— of 
 feminine Malice and Naughtiness ! So do I 
 name her, spitting upon her; yet by her ar^ 
 you ruled, and you, forsooth, would seek to 
 rule me — even me ! " 
 
 The old man, beside himself with indignation 
 and disgust, flung his body about, as he sat, 
 mouthing and gesticulating. 
 
 "Silence! Silence, I pray you," pleaded 
 Chun, in Ipw, earnest tones. "If anyone should 
 overhear you ! Think ! Think ! " 
 
 " Ha ! Ha I " said Slat, more quietly, but 
 with venomous mockery. " So that sobers you, 
 since the Truth hath power to sober even a 
 drunken fool. But / may not so lightly forget 
 that you dared to threaten me. Hark, Saviour of 
 Nothing and Ruiner of all, reason hath deserted 
 you, and wisdom and you were never close 
 acquainted ; but it is I, Slat, the old wise man, 
 who speaks and decrees that you should listen. 
 
 " Men differ from the beasts : they may not 
 be ruled by fear alone. By fear the Brahmans 
 sought to rule our people, and they brought to 
 
280 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the labour of governance engines more finely 
 tempered than any of the rude tools which you 
 know how to handle. Therefore, for a Space 
 their dominion endured ; yet even it, in the full- 
 ness of time, was reduced to ruin. You — whose 
 hands still are rough with toil at cartwheel and 
 lever — and the hussy in the shrinfe yonder, 
 have not behind you the prestige of the twice- 
 born ; and knowing this, you still dare, in the 
 madness which has smitten you, to outrage and 
 oppress our people, as never by the Brahmans 
 were they outraged or oppressed. For a little, 
 perhaps, they will endure, though daily you pile 
 upon their backs burdens by no means to be 
 borne ; but, in the end . . . ! " 
 
 Slat, shrugging his shoulders, left his sentence 
 unfinished. 
 
 " You lie," said Chun, with the brutal direct- 
 ness of the Asiatic peasant. " I do but maintain 
 authority in the eyes of fools whose perversity 
 bids them set it at nought." 
 
 "Yet, you dare not exert that authority," said 
 Slat, musingly. 
 
 "Again you lie," said Chun. "There is 
 nothing that I do not dare — no command that I 
 need hesitate to issue — no order of mine 
 that the multitude would have the courage to 
 defy." 
 
 Slat looked into Chun's eyes and laughed 
 sourly. 
 
 "The Brahmans perished because the myth 
 in which they trusted was of a sudden shattered ; 
 
THE HEART OF THE RULER 281 
 
 yet it stooc^ far more four-square than that on 
 which you rely. And it seems to me, verily it 
 seems to me, that a word or two whispered here 
 and there into gaping ears by Slat, the old wise 
 man, would go far to set the edifice of lies which 
 you have devised a-rocking on its plinth. Then, 
 if it tottered to its fall, you, my son, and the so- 
 called Snake, would be like to be crushed in its 
 ruins, like the little woodpeckers in the tree that 
 is felled by the woodsman." 
 
 " It is you who threaten now," growled 
 Chun. 
 
 The old man drew himself suddenly erect, and 
 fixed commanding eyes upon his companion. 
 
 " Aye," he said. " I threaten, and with mean- 
 ing; for I have had enough of this folly and 
 wickedness. You say that there is no order 
 that'you dare not give ; and it is well, for now /, 
 Slat, whose word can utterly undo you, demand, 
 as the price of my silence, that forthwith you 
 issue a command to our people of which I will 
 dictate the terms. Too long have I watched you 
 breaking and rending. The time hath come for 
 a new making and building up. You shall drive 
 the craftsmen of the quarry and the labour-yard 
 back to their toil upon the temples, and of those 
 new works, I, even I, will be the master- 
 architect." 
 
 " I dare not," said Chun, in a fearful whisper. 
 
 " But you shall," said Slat, simply. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 THE INCARNATE SPIRIT 
 
 In the middle of a discordant, frantic note, the 
 scream of the conchs broke off abruptly ; with 
 one last brazen clash the cymbals ceased their 
 harsh reverberations ; with a rapid roll and 
 patter, the throbbing beat of the drums dropped 
 back into the silence ; and Chun, stepping from 
 beneath the state umbrella, which two of his 
 henchmen had been holding over his head, 
 walked alone up the three stone steps that led 
 to the threshold of the inner shrine. 
 
 As he laid his hand upon one of the enormous 
 metal bolts, by means of which the two heavy 
 doors were secured, the musicians and the mob 
 of armed quarrymen, who formed his escort, 
 sank in squatting attitudes upon the Bags, their 
 heads bowed, their faces buried between their 
 extended arms. 
 
 Chun stood still for a moment, glancing back 
 at them over his shoulder. 
 
 With mingled scorn and satisfaction he 
 noted how abjectly the people grovelled ; and 
 he drew pleasure and confidence from the know- 
 
 282 
 
THE INCARNATE SPIRIT 283 
 
 ledge that the awe in which they held the Spirit 
 of the Snake acquired an added extravagance 
 from their fear of him. Here, outside the 
 shrine, he could cheat himself into the belief 
 that he was still the ruler. While meaner folk 
 crouched upon the ground, bowing their faces 
 to the earth, he alone might stand erect. It 
 was symbolical of the lordship that was his. 
 It comforted the wounds which old Slat's threats 
 had inflicted upon his pride — the pride which 
 suffered yet more deadly hurt from his fore- 
 knowledge of the humiliations that awaited him 
 when once those doors were passed. 
 
 To-night he was more than ordinarily loath 
 to exchange the apparent omnipotence, that 
 was his by day, for the galling thraldom 
 which he endured during the hours of dark- 
 ness. He was debilitated physically; mentally 
 exhausted. The strain which this woman, in 
 convbination with circumstance, was putting 
 upon him was assuming an intensity that was 
 intolerable. Under it — body and mind — he felt 
 himself to be breaking. 
 
 The whole world, as he had known it, had 
 from the beginning of his experience been ruled 
 and swayed by fear- — fear of the Gods, fear of 
 the twice-born Brahmans ; and he, in his turn, 
 had sought to govern and dominate his fellows 
 by fear alone. But how, suddenly, as he stood 
 here upon the threshold of the shrine, he realised 
 that he himself was enslaved by the same awful 
 force — that he was afraid — afraid of Slat, of his 
 
284 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 venomous tongue, of the evils it might work ; of 
 the contempt of consequences which his obses- 
 sion by a single idea inspired in that old man. 
 
 And the closed doors of the sanctuary divided 
 him from a still more compelling terror. He 
 had suffered so much, that he now was morbidly 
 sensitive to, morbidly afraid of pain — the 
 torture of the mind which this woman inflicted 
 upon him with such tireless skill. In antici- 
 pation, he hardly knew how to summon the 
 fortitude necessary for its endurance. 
 
 For the moment, even his desire of her was 
 numbed. The idea of its satisfaction had 
 become blent in his mind with the carking ache 
 that was in his heart and flesh. 
 
 It was to him as though his very soul had 
 been flayed alive, and the lightest touch was now 
 an unspeakable agony. 
 
 For a little he stood there, with his hand upon 
 the bolt, the gorgeous gilding and colours of the 
 door making a background to his lean figure. 
 Then he drew the portals apart, and stepped 
 into the dusky interior of the shrine. 
 
 Thick mats were piled upon the altar, and on 
 these, facing him, the girl lay prone. On her 
 right, a bronze effigy of Siva, Lord of the 
 Dance, pranced with majestic gaiety, his four 
 arms brandished, his legs capering joyously. 
 On the left, its outline almost lost in the 
 shadows, stood an image of Indra. 
 
 Clothed in brilliant crimson draperies — in and 
 out of the folds of which writhed dragons, 
 
THE INCARNATE SPIRIT 285 
 
 embroidered in silver and gold — she lay ex- 
 tended ; her elbows on the mat, her chin sup- 
 ported by her hands, her fingers framing the 
 perfect oval of her cheeks. The soft masses of 
 her hair made a dark nimbus about her head. 
 Her red lips were sucked inward. In her eyes, 
 fires, sullen and slow, seemed to glow and 
 smoulder. 
 
 To Chun's im.agination, as he prostrated 
 himself before her in an attitude of adoration, 
 she was visualised suddenly as a tigress that 
 waited for its prey with all the calmness of 
 certainty. 
 
 Neither by glance nor movement did she 
 betray a consciousness of his presence — though 
 she knew full well the meaning of the tumult of 
 wild music which a moment earlier had shattered 
 the vault-like quiet of the temple — and Chun, 
 his obeisance ended, sat back upon his heels, 
 patiently waiting upon her will. His head was 
 bowed upon his breast ; his clasped hands lay 
 limply in his lap ; his eyes were fixed upon the 
 carved base of the altar-stone. He knew by 
 heart every line and convolution of that tracery, 
 for his sight had unravelled ' its intricacies a 
 hundred times, subconsciously, while all his 
 other senses had been engrossed by the suffer- 
 ings this woman's words were causing him to 
 endure. With them the labyrinthine carvings 
 had become so closely associated in his mind 
 that the identity of both was merged, the one 
 into the other ; and merely to follow with the 
 
286 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 eye the elaborate details of this sculptured stone 
 was now to him a mental pain. 
 
 For nearly half an hour, perhaps, she kept 
 him in the suspense and humiliation of a silence 
 he dared not break. Then she spoke. 
 
 "The clown in you becomes more prominent 
 every day," she said, critically. "How was it 
 that I once thought to trace in you some signs of 
 birth and breeding ? " 
 
 " I am what I am," said Chun sullenly. 
 
 "Aye," she said quickly, "that is the burden 
 of my complaint." 
 
 "And what I am, you have made me," Chun 
 went on. "In your presence I am, mayhap, a 
 clown and a dolt, because always you put me in 
 the wrong, no matter whether I speak, or whether 
 I hold my peace." 
 
 "Then, why do you come here? "she asked 
 derisively. "Why do you not send some other 
 man to relieve the tedium of my solitude? 
 There must be many, young and comely, who 
 would very willingly take your place, and become 
 in your stead the chosen servant of the Snake." 
 
 Chun writhed and was silent. 
 
 "You think only of yourself," she went on, 
 her voice rising in her anger " Never of me do 
 you think. Picture to yourself the life which I 
 lead, cooped up here like a wild animal in a cage ; 
 with no pleasures to beguile the interminable 
 hours ; with nothing to break the monotony of 
 my days save the visits of one eternal man who 
 comes hither to brag of his great deeds, or else 
 
THE INCARNATE SPIRIT 287 
 
 to sit silent and sulky, wearying me with his 
 lower' ng looks, and adding a new gloom to this 
 sad prison of damp, grey stones. All my years 
 I have been used to sunshine, to colour, to 
 beauty, to movement, to variety. I dreamed 
 then that I wanted only peace, and solitude, and 
 quiet ; but now that I have had my fill of these, 
 I know that they have no power to satisfy me." 
 
 Chun listened in miserable silence. He knew 
 that she spoke the truth, and in answer he could 
 find no word to say. 
 
 " It is easy and pleasant for you" the girl 
 resumed, speaking with a concentrated anger 
 so intense that she was shaken by it, and 
 uttering each sentence as though it were a whip- 
 thong with which she sought to lash him. "It 
 is easy and pleasant for you. You — making 
 arrogant and selfish use of a power which 
 emanates from »ie alone — wield over men a 
 tyrannical sway, and come hither to prate of it : 
 but how does that profit me? If the shrine 
 were empty, and you set yourself to the invention 
 of new lies, wherewith to blacken your soul, the 
 result for you would be the same. You would 
 have me believe that in all things .you do my 
 bidding : but how do I know that you, who lie 
 so freely to the multitude, do not lie to me also ? " 
 
 " To you I tell only the truth, and the whole 
 truth," said Chun. " What profit would there 
 be in lies, since you, an Incarnate Spirit, would 
 forthwith detect their fallacy ? " 
 
 She wriggled her whole body, where she lay. 
 
288 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 in an anger and impatience which she could not 
 control. 
 
 "You sneer," she cried. "You dare to sneer 
 at vte ! Though I be a god, you know full well 
 that my senses are shackled by this body of 
 human clay in which my spirit is pent ; and you, 
 in your ingratitude — you whom I have made, as 
 children fashion atomies from mud — you dare to 
 deride the limitations which voluntarily I have 
 assumed in order to work the salvation of you 
 and of my people." 
 
 " I know. I know. I am ungrateful," said 
 Chun, soothingly. He spoke as one might 
 speak who sought to pacify a wayward child. 
 
 She lashed out with her legs at the shadows 
 behind her, and clenched the little hands by 
 which her face was framed. 
 
 "You shall not answer me like that," she 
 screamed. "You filch from me wy power, and 
 put it to your own vile uses, and now you would 
 bear yourself toward me as though I were a 
 creature unreasoning and impotent. Bully your 
 quarrymen, if they be fools enough to endure 
 your tyrannies, but seek not to browbeat me, 
 who am the sacred source whence flows all your 
 authority." 
 
 Chun, bowing himself to the flags, murmured 
 hurried excuses and protestations. As he did 
 so, he knew, in his heart, that his short-lived 
 belief in her divinity had long been dead — that 
 she had killed it in him, together with so much 
 more of greater value. Also he speculated in- 
 
THE INCARNATE SPIRIT 289 
 
 voluntarily as to how far she herself was really 
 deceived by the fiction which was of her 
 invention. It was a question to which she, too, 
 might perhaps have experienced a difficulty in 
 supplying an answer. 
 
 In spite of the abjectness of his homage, and 
 the feverish words with which he strove to 
 propitiate her wrath, she was instinctively 
 conscious of his unbelief; and while it enraged 
 her, his grotesque and unsuccessful efforts to 
 conceal it moved her to a bitter contempt 
 against him. 
 
 "Have done!" she cried. "Seek not to 
 deceive me with your lies. Though this gross 
 veil of human flesh be drawn across my finer 
 senses, yet I can still see into the depths of your 
 false heart. With your head wallowing in the 
 dust, and with the lip-service of your tongue, 
 you make pretence to do me worship ; but I can 
 detect beneath this play-acting the blasphemies 
 which you try to hide with them. And if you 
 believe not in my godhead, why do you debase 
 yourself before me? Why do you lack the 
 courage to avow your profanity ? " 
 
 Chun drew his body erect, and sat back upon 
 his heels. His eyes glared at her. 
 
 " Because I love you!" he cried in a voice of 
 concentrated fury, "Because I love you; and 
 often I hate you — you hurt me so much." 
 
 She spat at him. 
 
 " Love ! " she echoed with unutterable scorn. 
 " I would be loved by a man, not by a slave." 
 
290 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 At the word, he sprang to his feet, took two 
 strides toward her, and seized her little body 
 roughly in his grasp. She fought and struggled, 
 furiously and in silence ; but easily he mastered 
 her, and bending his face to hers, crushed it 
 against her red lips. 
 
 "But it is true — that which I told you. I 
 cannot any longer endure this life." 
 
 They were lying upon the mats, heaped upon 
 the altar-stone, and her face was pillowed in the 
 hollow of his shoulder. His arms held her in a 
 protecting clasp. 
 
 "Men do not understand the hearts of 
 women such as I. Some there be who are 
 fashioned by the Gods to serve men as their 
 wives — others to bear children, and to be 
 mothers all their days* yea, even to the men- 
 folk who love them. But I belong to the 
 number of those in whose hearts, from the 
 beginning, the demons of air and water have 
 set the fickleness of the wind, the restlessness 
 of the wave. For such there is no abiding 
 joy in the gentle bondage of wedlock — no 
 enduring solace in the pangs and the delights, 
 the cares and the consolations, the sorrows 
 and the vicarious triumphs of motherhood. 
 I, and those who are made as I am made, 
 are afflicted ever with a cruel itch of the 
 flesh — a gnawing unrest of the spirit — which 
 only power can allay — power over the passions 
 of men, since only through their passions can 
 
THE INCARNATE SPIRIT 291 
 
 men be swayed by women. Some there be 
 who are content to work through the men 
 whom they enslave — to use them as their 
 instruments, even as I have used you; but 
 I am not of these. Wayward as the winds 
 that blow, restless as the waves that gather 
 and break upon the storm-torn surface of the 
 Great Lake, I may not rest and be at peace, 
 guiding and controlling the energy which I 
 inspire. There is that within me which will 
 not suffer me to be still. Nought that men 
 may do at my bidding, in obedience to my 
 decree, subservient to my suggestion, slavish 
 to my whim, can satisfy the fierce desire that 
 tears me. I myself must hold all power in 
 these two hands of mine." She extended her 
 arms, and her fingers clutched and grasped 
 at the empty air. " I myself must do — must 
 see accomplished the deeds upon which my 
 will is set — must be visible to all men as the 
 substance, not the hidden shadow of authority. 
 And you, if you love me, must aid me, that 
 my desire may be fulfilled. Until I have tasted 
 this draught for which I crave — until I have 
 drained to the dregs this cup of omnipotence — 
 of unshackled dominion over the bodies and the 
 souls of men — never, never shall my heart know 
 satisfaction." 
 
 She clung to him, half in entreaty, half in 
 command, with a grip so violent that it hurt 
 him. 
 
 " I am afraidj" said Chun in a low whisper. 
 
292 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 She drew herself from his clasp, and sat erect 
 upon the mat. 
 
 " Afraid ? " she echoed scornfully. 
 
 Chun also sat up, facing her. 
 
 "Aye," he said slowly. "Aye. I am afraid 
 — not for myself, but for you. 
 
 " Have no fear for me," she said, with confi- 
 dence. 
 
 " But I have — I am consumed with fear . . ." 
 
 She interrupted him with an impatient 
 gesture. 
 
 "You are jealous," she asserted. "You are 
 afraid lest other men, looking upon me, should 
 desire me." 
 
 "That, maybe, is true," said Chun thought- 
 fully. His eyes wore an abstracted look; his 
 forehead was furrowed ; his brows knit. 
 "Maybe that is true," he repeated, "but it 
 was not upon that that my mind was set. 
 There are some shadows which are mightier 
 than any substance. Remember the divinity 
 of the Brahmans, how long it endured as a 
 shadow. When men put it to the test, not 
 as an offshoot of the imagination, but as a 
 concrete fact, it vanished almost at a touch. 
 Now you are a myth — wrapped around with 
 the mystery of the unseen — awful because 
 unknown. If you dispense with these things 
 — these veils of illusion — I know not what 
 may befall." 
 
 "And I reck not!" she exclaimed. "Only 
 this I know — that the worship of a multitude 
 
THE INCARNATE SPIRIT 293 
 
 which I cannot see — which cannot see my 
 face — is to me nothing worth. Better were 
 the excitement of the venture, of the attempt 
 — even if it proved vain — to snatch victory 
 and boundless power from between the very 
 jaws of peril, than longer to endure the burden 
 of these heavy, uneventful days. I am so 
 strangely fashioned that monotony to me is 
 alone intolerable. Always would I choose 
 that calamity should fall upon me; that I 
 should suffer pain and grief, aye, and death 
 itself, rather than that slow hours should creep 
 by, bringing forth no happening to lend a spice 
 to life. For me the grave or the huming-g-Aai, 
 rather than the inanition of heart and soul 
 which, in this tomb of cold, unyielding stone, 
 too long I have endured." 
 
 " It is to woo death," said Chun grimly. 
 
 "Yes — or to seize, once and for all, every- 
 thing that life can give!" she cried, with 
 flashing eyes. 
 
 For a space there was silence between them. 
 Then Chun spoke, deliberately and impres- 
 sively. 
 
 "It chances that our rule— your rule exerted 
 through me — is near unto its ending. This 
 very evening came old Slat to me, with threats 
 upon his lips. JItm, I . . . we . . . you ..." 
 he hesitated, "dare not touch. The people 
 fear his magic. Even my quarrymen would 
 not injure a hair of his head — curse him! 
 Now that their faith in the ancient gods is 
 
294 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 dead, they cling the more closely to their 
 belief in wizards — and Slat, in their eyes, is 
 a prince of medicine-men. Perhaps they see 
 truly; perhaps the old man hath, indeed, a 
 wisdom beyond the grasp of ordinary men. 
 When he is moved by wrath. I — even I — fear 
 him." 
 
 He made the confession shamefacedly in a 
 shocked whisper. 
 
 The girl was silent, shuddering a little. 
 
 "He hath some secret plan, whereby he 
 dreams that he will compel stones to stand 
 in a form like a rainbow, without the leverage 
 of overlaps ; and I myself have seen him fit 
 together with his fingers a little model which, 
 by virtue of I know not what charm weaved, 
 or spell whispered, stood four-square and solid, 
 as though some invisible force from without 
 welded the blocks together. 
 
 "It is ever in his mind that he would drive 
 our people again to labour— as of old they 
 toiled for the Brahmans — piling stone on stone, 
 and building therewith a mighty temple, greater 
 even than this vast Wat. In this monument of 
 dreams every cloister's roof, every portal, every 
 dome, will be fashioned — not in the form that 
 has been our immemorial usage — but with curves 
 more perfect than those of the crescent-moon ; 
 after a design which — so he avers — hath been 
 breathed into his brain by the spirits during 
 the long watches of the night. 
 
 "Now he threatens to spread dissension and 
 
THE INCARNATE SPIRIT 295 
 
 unbelief among the people, to stir up their 
 enmity against you and against me, if I will 
 not lay this command upon them." 
 
 "And you hesitate ?" cried the girl, incredu- 
 lously. 
 
 " Aye, I hesitate," Chun made answer. " We 
 have ruled, you and I, with a tyranny more 
 bloodguilty than that which the Brahmans used ; 
 but from this, at least, we have rescued the 
 people — from the travail that had no ending 
 — from the unfruitful toil which brought forth 
 no inci;ease from the earth, and added nothing 
 to the wealth, the enjoynient, or the happiness of 
 mankind. Why, think you, do the quarrymen 
 rally round me, acclaim me when I appear — name 
 me Liberator of the Sudras? Why are they 
 ready to execute my will — ^your will — be it 
 never so wanton or wicked ? Is it not because 
 I have freed them from the bondage of the pick 
 and the pulley, the cartwheel and the lever — 
 from the cruel despotism of the ashlar — from 
 the oppression of the cold, blind stones which 
 crushed their fathers, from generation to genera- 
 tion, and by which, in their turn, the manhood 
 of each one of them was being crushed ? Even 
 those whom I have forced to labour in the fields, 
 find in the light tasks of weeding and tilling and 
 reaping, an undreamed-of restfulness and relief 
 to the muscles which long struggles with the 
 monoliths had wrenched. Think! You who 
 are wise with a wisdom beyond my reach. It 
 would be to dare greatly, desperately, to try to 
 
296 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 drag these liberated wretches back to the yoke 
 from which so recently they have been torn." 
 
 "Yes," she whispered, her voice quivering 
 with excitement. "It would, indeed, be to dare 
 greatly : but I am of the company of those who 
 greatly dare. What are they — these casteless 
 creatures of the gutter and the mire — that they 
 should dictate to me what orders I shall, or 
 shall not decree? — to me who have shed their 
 foul blood like water for my whim. Obedient 
 to my will, they shall bow again their brutish 
 backs to labour in the quarry and the building- 
 yard. Slat, the old wise man, shall be my 
 henchman, and with the visions of his brain and 
 the toil of the quarrymen's hands, he shall build 
 me a temple in my honour, that shall surpass in 
 beauty and in magnitude all the conceptions of 
 the dreamers in stone, time out of mind ! " 
 
 She sprang to her feet, her body quivering, 
 her face transfigured, her arms extended 
 above her head, in a passion of prophetic 
 excitement. 
 
 " And in this temple I will reign," she cried, 
 "a god confessed, claiming and receiving the 
 abject worship of the populace, and wielding 
 power — Power — such as never in all the long 
 history of the world has been possessed by 
 woman or by man ! " 
 
 The dim light of the shrine fell full upon her 
 upturned face, her outstretched arms, bare to 
 the shoulder, from which the scarlet draperies 
 fell back, cascading to her white . feet like a 
 
THE INQARNATE SPIRIT 297 
 
 garment of flame ; and Chun sat gazing up at 
 her with a strange mingling of love, admiration 
 and fear in his eyes. 
 
 "Always I am your servant," he said in a low 
 voice. 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 THE SETTING SUN 
 
 For many days, every effort had been made 
 by the schemers in the Wat to kindle anew, 
 among the people of Angkor, the fiery religious 
 enthusiasm by which, so short a while before, 
 they one and. all had been consumed. 
 
 Chun's despotism had gathered around it, 
 not only the mob of ruffianly quarrymen who 
 were its undisciplined army, and the sweepings 
 of those men of the warrior caste who had 
 straggled back to the capital after the disastrous 
 encounter with the invading barbarians, but also 
 a number of pseudo-scholars and pandits, tale- 
 bearers and spies — men who possessed a little 
 more learning, wit, or cunning than their fellows, 
 and who, in this hour of rising scum, came 
 naturally to the surface. This band of panders 
 and sycophants — with one eye cocked upon their 
 master, the better to anticipate his pleasure, and 
 the other watching the wind, as it played among 
 the straws, lest by some sudden gust of popular 
 feeling their cockle-boats should be taken aback — 
 had of late been busy. They were ubiquitous — 
 
 298 
 
THE SETriNG SUN 299 
 
 they frequented the eating-booths of the town ; 
 mingled with the crowds which awaited the 
 periodical issue of rations ; squatted among the 
 groups of toilers in the fields, when these, at 
 intervals, rested from their labours. In the 
 markets, where men still bartered and traded, 
 they came and went; swelled the rabble of 
 quarrymen, idling or gambling in the long 
 cloisters which served them as their barracks ; 
 or joined the knots of loafers who had had the 
 good fortune to evade work upon the crops. 
 Also, as evening was falling, they made part 
 of the band of spectators who watched the 
 younger men kicking a basket-work ball high 
 into the air from one to another, or sat with the 
 elders, gathered around the bases of the big fig- 
 trees to discuss the gossip of the place. 
 
 These men who could claim a personal know- 
 ledge of the Liberator and his councillors, and 
 who professed a greater intimacy with them 
 than they, in fact, possessed, were treated on all 
 sides with elaborate courtesy, were listened to 
 with deference, but were regarded with suspicion. 
 Caution and prudence forbade free talk in their 
 hearing ; and men were apt to tell them, hot the 
 thoughts which engaged the mind of the popu- 
 lace, but those things which they fancied would 
 be most pleasing to their masters. Yet it was 
 only by the reports which were brought to him 
 by these creatures of his despotism, that Chun 
 was able even a little to gauge the temper of the 
 people. This task was rendered still more 
 
300 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 difficult by the fact that these sycophants were 
 loath to repeat to him anything that would not 
 fall gratefully upon his ears. 
 
 Living by their wits, they were quick to 
 seize upon any hint thrown out to them; and 
 very soon they were making Angkor buzz with 
 rumour and with report, were doing all that in 
 them lay to stimulate the excitement and curiosity 
 of the multitude, and to spread abroad a feeling 
 of expectation and unrest. Old Slat knew the 
 value of contradictory tidings as a provoker of 
 discussion ; and indeed the palace news-bearers 
 had little enough of actual fact upon which to 
 work. The Spirit of the Snake had vanished, 
 and Chun was now paying nightly visits to a 
 deserted shrine — so said some, whispering fear- 
 fully to one another, with quick, nervous glances 
 thrown over their shoulders in search of possible 
 eavesdroppers. She had issued to her Chosen 
 Servant a new decree of forbearance and com- 
 passion — and credibility was lent to this by the 
 fact that, in her name, the scale of rations had 
 suddenly been revised upon more liberal lines, and 
 that simultaneously the bloody tortures and execu- 
 tions had ceased. Sated with human sacrifice, it 
 was said, she was about to inaugurate a new era 
 of clemency and peace ; in future her wrath was 
 to be wreaked only on the presumptuous Thai. 
 The invaders, so rumour had it, were to be 
 suffered to approach Angkor, that the power of 
 the Snake might be made manifest in the eyes 
 of all the people. In the appointed hour, she 
 
THE SEITING SUN 301 
 
 would blast them with her magic so that, with- 
 out a blow struck, they would be destroyed to 
 the last man, and their camp would be given 
 over to sack and pillage. This was a comfort- 
 able doctrine, and as such it found many 
 adherents. She had not quitted her incarnation 
 and returned to the skies, as by some had been 
 blasphemously alleged. The Snake would not 
 desert her people, who so moved her love, in the 
 hour of their sorest need ; but presently she 
 would disclose her ordinance, whereby the 
 barbarian hordes might be routed and driven 
 back. Also, as the Sacred Sword of Indra had 
 been exposed in its entirety to the popular gaze, 
 for the first time in recorded history, so now, 
 in this age of miracles, not only her Chosen 
 Servant, but all her people, to the last and the 
 least of them, would be suffered presently to feast 
 their eyes upon this Incarnation of Divinity. 
 
 Over this last rumour old men shook their 
 heads anxiously. 
 
 "The Gods give nought for nought," they 
 said gravely, with unconscious blasphemy. 
 "If the Snake incarnate vouchsafes the sight 
 of her countenance to all men — to the clean and 
 to the unclean — to Brahman and Sudra, and 
 even to the Pariah and the foul Chdnddla" 
 (recent events had not yet stamped out all ancient 
 prejudices, and in the mouths of the people the 
 old terms still lingered), "be sure that she will 
 exact payment from us in ample measure." 
 
 " What more can she demand of us } " asked 
 
302 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 others. "Hath she not already drunk her fill of 
 our blood? My wife's half-brother's son — a 
 mere stripling — he did but steal a ration not his 
 own, and . . ." 
 
 Then would follow ghastly details of the 
 torture and death inflicted in the dread name of 
 the Snake. 
 
 So the people talked together ; but something 
 of lethargy was discernible in the interest and 
 the curiosity which were aroused by the sedu- 
 lously circulated rumours. Events, of late, had 
 so crowded upon one another's heels, that the 
 public mind was exhausted. There was lacking 
 to it now the enthusiasm and the spontaneity 
 which had characterised the riot in the forum and 
 the attack upon the palace ; and which, a few 
 weeks later, had borne the multitude, like one 
 man, to the precincts of the Wat, to witness the 
 exposition of the Sword, which Indra had 
 restored into their keeping. The popular faith 
 • — which had sustained a rude shock through 
 the downfall of the demigods, and the impunity 
 with which the images of the deities had been 
 broken upon their altars — had momentarily 
 been stirred to fanatical fury by the vision of the 
 sacred blade ; but the ferment had subsided 
 quickly. Material discontent, occasioned by 
 Chun's administrative acts, had replaced 
 religious fervour. The fear which is near akin 
 to hatred had taken possession of many hearts. 
 
 Also, men of the higher castes, who had always 
 held the Sudras in contempt, mocked secretly at 
 
THE SETTING SUN 303 
 
 their plebeian autocrat, and his fabled Snake. 
 When secure of their audience, they whispered 
 tales to one another of the solecisms uttered, 
 and the absurdities committed by this peasant 
 who masqueraded as a ruler of men. These 
 stories, repeated from mouth to mouth with 
 sneering comment and exaggeration, delighted 
 an enmity which could laugh at, if it dared not 
 offer open defiance or resistance to, the object 
 of its detestation. 
 
 The foundation-stones of Chun's despotism 
 were already loosened by the most potent 
 destroyers of authority — hatred and contempt 
 in league with ridicule. 
 
 Upon a certain day, messengers from the 
 Wat spread the word among the people, that 
 their presence was required within the sacred 
 precincts of the temple at the hour when the 
 kine go down to water — in the late afternoon. 
 
 Few of the inhabitants of the outlying hamlets 
 bestirred themselves to obey the summons, 
 since compliance with it would entail a return 
 to their home by moonlight; but, the time 
 chosen being the most idle in the day — that at 
 which men have ceased their labours, and have 
 not yet settled down in their huts for the evening 
 meal and the sleep which, in Asia, follows so 
 hard upon it — the people of Angkor itself 
 assembled in goodly numbers. 
 
 In the big open spaces, within the exterior 
 cloisters, along the whole length of the causeway 
 
304 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 — from the steps of the great western portals to 
 the domed entrance, a furlongr distant — and on 
 either side of it, to the limits of the enclosure, 
 the people squatted on the flags or on the ground 
 — a dense mass of black heads, and brown backs 
 and faces, above a kaleidoscopic display of 
 coloured garments. 
 
 They chatted listlessly to one another, while 
 they apathetically awaited the event. The pre- 
 vailing air was one of weariness and indifference, 
 rather than interest ; and a few of the more 
 intelligent asked themselves what new insult 
 was about to be offered to their understanding. 
 
 The clash of cymbals, the blare of conchs, 
 and the restless beat of drums heralded the 
 appearance of Chun upon the narrow platform, 
 without the western porch of the upper temple. 
 
 The sinking sun — casting long rays over the 
 roofs of the outer cloisters, and the palm-fronds 
 and tree-tops massed behind them — threw its 
 light full upon him ; causing the golden head- 
 dress that he wore to flash blindingly, and 
 rendering more vivid the gorgeous colours of 
 the silk garments, and the splendour of the 
 weapons' with which his person was adorned. 
 He stood with head erect, his chin tilted some- 
 what upward. His left hand was on his hip, 
 the arm akimbo. His right hand grasped a 
 long, naked sword, its point directed toward the 
 earth. 
 
 His was an imposing, even a kingly figure, in 
 all the strength and beauty of his young man- 
 
THE SETTING SUN 305 
 
 hood ; but his air was subtly suggestive of 
 defiance, rather than of confidence, as he stood 
 forth from his escort, and in silence, suffered his 
 eyes to roam for a space over the multitude. In 
 his heart, he held them in the disdain which soon 
 is bred in a man for those over whom he has 
 wielded unfettered dominion — power of life and 
 death, and of the infliction, at will, of torments 
 more terrible than death : yet, beneath the 
 contempt there lurked also something of anxiety 
 and fear. 
 
 His reception was not encouraging. 
 His rabble of quarrymen raised a brave shout, 
 and here and there among the multitude a 
 solitary voice broke out into acclamation, 
 abruptly checked, that died down falteringly, as 
 though ashamed of the nakedness of its solitude. 
 From the crowd there came a dull, resonant 
 murmur ; but it was without the vibration of 
 enthusiasm, and sounded no note of welcome or 
 applause. 
 
 The contrast which this wave of ominous 
 muttering presented to the roar that still rever- 
 berated in his memory, and which, at the 
 moment, had almost stunned his brain, was like 
 a cold douche that chilled the feverish tumult in 
 his veins. It aroused in him a sullen anger. At 
 once his attitude unconsciously became more 
 pronouncedly defiant. 
 
 "Listen, O ye people!" he cried; and men 
 noted that he no longer addressed them as his 
 brethren. Also, some, nudging one another, 
 
306 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 drew attention to the plebeian accent, which his 
 excitement and the straining of his voice 
 rendered more distinct. "Listen, O ye people! 
 I, her chosen servant, bring to you a message 
 from the Snake. In the plenitude of her pity 
 and compassion, and the boundless love which 
 she bears to us, her unworthy servitors — the 
 august and awful Spirit that hath become 
 incarnate in our midst — upon the miracle of 
 whose beauty I alone of the sons of men have 
 hitherto been permitted to look — hath vouch- 
 safed to issue from her shrine ! " 
 
 He paused, expectant of acclamations, similar 
 to those which had greeted his announcement of 
 the intention to unveil the Sword ; but the 
 shouts of his quarrymen and of the sycophants 
 of the Wat, sank abashed into the general 
 silence ; which was not so much silence as 
 a murmurous sound, inarticulate and vaguely 
 threatening, 
 
 Chun, his anger mounting against the fickle 
 people, and a little shaken in his confidence, 
 resumed his speech. Involuntarily, his words 
 assumed something of a bullying and hectoring 
 tone. 
 
 "And hearken, " he cried. "She, who is above 
 the sun and the moon and the stars, and yet 
 deigns, for your vile sakes, to put on the likeness 
 of a woman, will to-morrow appear among you ! 
 I know not whether she will condescend so far as 
 to unveil that countenance of unspeakable beauty, 
 whereof the pale reflection, as ye have all 
 
THE SETTING SUN 307 
 
 witnessed, when mirrored in my face, caused it 
 to shine with a light that dazzled you." 
 
 Somewhere, far off in the crowd, a loud, clear 
 laugh was raised; and with startled eyes, men 
 gazed in the direction whence it came ; but its 
 author remained undetected ; and Chun, his 
 forehead contracted in an ominous frown, pro- 
 ceeded, feigning to have heard nothing. 
 
 " That hath not yet been revealed to me by the 
 Goddess, whose slave and humble worshipper 
 am I. Maybe the glory of her eyes would smite 
 many of you with blindness, or perhaps your 
 reason would be consumed by it, as it were by 
 fire. I know not. But this I know — that the 
 Spirit, moved by clemency and compassion, be- 
 holding the sore need of her chosen people, will 
 to-morrow move through your midst. It is the 
 fifteenth day of moon, when her handmaiden of 
 the heavens arises, clothed in her fullest panoply 
 —that handmaiden from whose veins the Spirit 
 of the Snake deigns, from time to time, to accept 
 the nectar that is her mystic sustenance — and 
 this day hath she selected for her first breaking 
 upon the dazzled vision of mankind. 
 
 " To-morrow at noon, issuing from her hidden 
 shrine, she will pass in procession through your 
 midst, borne aloft upon the white elephant, 
 which never before has carried so sacred a 
 burden ; here, from the temple of Angkor Wat 
 to the threshold of the Ba Yon, 
 
 " Standing at the head of the stairway, and 
 looking forth over the forum, which witnessed 
 
308 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the beginning of the liberation that, through 
 her inspiration, hath been wrought among you, 
 the incarnate Spirit will issue to you all a new 
 ordinance. Illumined by supernatural wisdom, 
 gazing into the future, as men see into the 
 clear depths of a pool, she hath sure fore- 
 knowledge of all the manifold mischances that 
 await her people, if she be not moved to 
 interfere on their behalf. The hordes of 
 barbarous Thai draw near. Already they slake 
 their brutish thirst in the waters of the Great 
 Lake. Calamity and destruction are knocking 
 at the very doors of the kingdom. But from 
 these, aye and from worse evils, the Spirit of 
 the Snake can deliver you, if, doing her worship, 
 faithful to her ordinance, bowing yourselves to 
 her will, ye fulfil the commands that presently 
 she shall lay upon you." 
 
 He paused, gazing around him, and the 
 murmur of the crowd rose in loud reverberation, 
 as men questioned neighbours no wiser than 
 themselves, speculating concerning the new 
 troubles which this announcement might fore- 
 bode. 
 
 The sun was sinking rapidly ; and the huge 
 domes, that soared high above the platform 
 upon which Chun was standing, were dipped 
 suddenly in pale and glowing gold, in vivid 
 contrast to the heavy shadows massed beneath 
 them. 
 
 " I ask you not now, as formerly I asked you, 
 whether you will do the behests of the Spirit 
 
THE SETTING SUN 309 
 
 who hath her seat, now and always, upon the 
 awful throne pf the Snake," Chun shouted. 
 
 More and more deeply was the great courtr 
 yard at his feet sunken in gloom, while the sun's 
 rays, striking upward above the walls and roofs 
 of the encircling cloisters, gilded the vast cones 
 of the temple with a transient glory. 
 
 "You have felt since then the weight of her 
 hand set on you in punishment for your sins. 
 You have learned to fear her. Now will she 
 suffer you to taste of her mercy, even as a 
 mother comforts the child at her knee, and dries 
 the tears occasioned by her chastisement. 
 And you, who before her are as little 
 children, in love and fealty, in worship and 
 deep humility, will make yourselves obedient 
 to her will." 
 
 Even as he ceased speaking, a change with 
 incredible rapidity was wrought in the great 
 pile behind him. The gold paled, faded, 
 vanished ; and almost as quickly, the greys 
 and blacks and the elusive purples, which it had 
 gilded, vanished too. Then suddenly, not only 
 the domes, but the whole enormous mass of 
 stones, emerging as it were from the shadows, 
 were overspread by a pallid, green tint, livid and 
 ghastly as that which, now and again, may be 
 marked upon the faces of the dead.^ 
 
 It was as though this monstrous monument, 
 which had been builded in the blood and the 
 tears of thousands, was about to crumble away 
 
 ' Note 10. 
 
310 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 before the eyes of the multitude, and to dissolve 
 into a mountain of corruption. 
 
 It was an effect which, once in a while, had 
 been noted by almost every member of that star- 
 ing throng ; but now the impression was felt to 
 be one of sheer horror. 
 
 Men saw in the phenomenon an ominous 
 presage. 
 
 Chun turned and re-entered the temple, his 
 escort following him ; and the crowd dispersed, 
 gloomily, to their homes. 
 
 Quickly the night crept up. The moon was 
 obscured by impenetrable banks of cloud. 
 Darkness enveloped the earth ; and Angkor 
 Wat became a huge, shapeless bulk of shadow, 
 set in the heart of a shadowy world. 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 THE TRIUMPH OF THE SNAKE 
 
 Old Slat, a grey figure, huddled to the chin in a 
 cloak against the chill of the dawn, squatted aj; 
 the head of the steps near the north-eastern 
 corner of the upper temple, watching the day 
 break. 
 
 First, low down in the east, the sky became 
 faintly luminous, the dead darkness giving 
 gradual place to a wan and sallow light. Then 
 a soft, pink tinge suffused it ; and next the sky 
 was ripped suddenly, across and across, by 
 great streaks and slashes of crimson. 
 
 As Slat sat watching, the intensity of the 
 colour kindled and glowed — as though upon the 
 fires of some huge furnace, hidden below the 
 sky-line, mighty bellows were at work ; and from 
 the horizon, immense waves of crimson rose 
 higher and higher, invading in quick succession 
 each shadowy bank of cloud, until the very 
 zenith of the heavens was attained. Answering 
 fires awakened in the west ; and presently the 
 whole firmament had become one fervent, 
 glorious canopy. Here and there, where 
 
 311 
 
312 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 heavy doud-banks were massed, the colour 
 smouldered sullenly and was tinged with purple 
 and gold ; in places, slender inlets of a delicate 
 azure showed, ethereal and pure ; and again, the 
 flood of brilliant hues shaded away to dim reds 
 and rosy pinks, against a background of 
 luminous grey. 
 
 For a minute or two that wonderful, all- 
 enveloping glow lasted ; and then, as it seemed, 
 almost in a single bound, the sun sprung clear 
 of the horizon. The warm tints faded and died 
 magically ; and very soon the miracle of the 
 daybreak had given place to the merciless, 
 colourless heat of a white morning in the 
 tropics. 
 
 Slat watched the rapid processes of this 
 tremendous transformation scene with apprecia- 
 tive eyes ; for, to him, unlike the majority of 
 Asiatics, the beauties of nature made a strong 
 appeal. Yet this morning, the dawn had for 
 him a special and portentous significance. It 
 marked the beginning of a day upon which all 
 the hopes and dreams of his lifetime were to 
 be put to the hazard. He knew full well 
 the desperate nature of the venture. With 
 savage anger he had marked overnight the 
 sullen temper of the people ; but this had only 
 hardened his resolve, and added fuel to the 
 fires of his rage against a generation of fools. 
 His Dream, he swore, should have this one 
 last chance of realisation. If that failed, he 
 cared not who or what might go down, 
 
THE TRIUMPH OF THE SNAKE 313 
 
 swamped and ruined amid the general 
 wreckage. 
 
 Already in the courtyard at his feet, and 
 in the cloisters and galleries of the lower 
 temple, men were busy, making ready for 
 the great procession. The howdahs and 
 trappings of the elephants were being brought 
 out to be ranged along the flags; men passed 
 to and fro, jostling one another in their haste, 
 like bees in a hive; and through the level 
 entrances on the extreme right and left of 
 the exterior cloisters, long lines of slow-moving, 
 slate-coloured monsters, each with a driver 
 upon its neck and one or two ragged creatures 
 astride upon its back, were converging upon 
 the main portals of the temple. 
 
 As the morning advanced, and Slat still 
 sat watching, the bustle within the temple 
 increased; Here and there, a man, with frantic 
 shouts and gesticulations, gave directions to 
 his fellows, who stood listening stupidly. 
 Others, heated and dishevelled, pushed their 
 way through doorways, bearing in their arms 
 articles for which they had been sent, that 
 almost invariably, with loud discussion, were 
 declared to be everything except that which, 
 at the moment, was most urgently required. 
 In knots, men squatted on their heels, devour- 
 ing hasty meals, which they interrupted to 
 bawl to their fellows, through full mouths, 
 fresh admonition or advice. The courtyard 
 was littered with caparisons and trappmgs, 
 
314 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 like the property-room of a pantomime ; and 
 everywhere there was confusion, hurry, noise. 
 Some of those engaged upon the task of 
 preparation had won experience of similar 
 work during the regime of the Brahmans ; but, 
 for the most part, the rabble of loafers and 
 quarry men, who now swarmed about the 
 temple, were wholly ignorant of the details of 
 pageant or ceremonial. In the past, on such 
 occasions, the hierophants had organised 
 everything, and had themselves performed all 
 save the most menial labours. Now the race 
 of priests had been extirpated — except Baguan 
 Dass and his little band of fellow-survivors ; 
 and these to-day sat aloof, watching with 
 complacency, malice, and contempt the inexpert 
 methods of the folk who had replaced them. 
 
 The midday hour had come and gone, and 
 the sun had begun its descent adown the 
 heavens, before the procession, which was to 
 have set forth at noon, had been marshalled 
 into anything resembling order. 
 
 From his vantage-point upon the threshold of 
 the porch, at the north-western angle of the upper 
 temple, to which he had removed, old Slat could 
 see it creeping out along the raised causeway. 
 The crowds of spectators filled the big spaces on 
 either hand ; and again above the tumult of 
 voices arose the strident scream of conchs, 
 the brazen clamour of cymbals, the jingle 
 of tambourines, and the pulse and roll of 
 the drums. 
 
THE TRIUMPH OF THE SNAKE 315 
 
 The armed quarrymen, gaily clad in their 
 stolen finery, led the van and guarded the 
 flanks ; while outlying skirmishing parties 
 kept the causeway, ahead of the procession, 
 free from the encroachments of the mob. Slat 
 noted how their sticks rose and fell, almost 
 incessantly, raining blows upon the heads and 
 backs of the people, who, ffom time to time, 
 driven forward by the pressure of those behind, 
 were forced to seek a lodgment on the pavement 
 above them, if they were to avoid being crushed 
 to death against the massive stone blocks upon 
 which its flags reposed. 
 
 The roofs of the outer cloister and of the two 
 small but exquisite temples, which stood back 
 a little, one on each side, half-way down the 
 causeway, were black with people, clinging to 
 them; and this sight was more abhorrent to 
 Slat than the unnecessary punishment which 
 the quarrymen were inflicting. In the days of 
 the Brahmans, no man would have dreamed of 
 thus desecrating the holy buildings ; and Slat, 
 who so worshipped their beauty, was offended 
 by the idea that they could be put to such 
 unworthy uses by hosts of vulgar sightseers. 
 Also, to him, the spectacle was eloquent of 
 the prevailing anarchy and undiscipline, which 
 so excited his detestation and disgust. 
 
 "The last throw of the dice!" the old man 
 muttered to himself, half aloud ; and a jeering 
 laugh at his elbow answered him. 
 
 He turned and saw Bagiian Dass sitting on 
 
316 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the steps of the porch, watching- the progress 
 of the procession with a grim, disdainful satis- 
 faction. The deeply sunken eyes of the priest 
 glowed in their cavernous sockets ; and as Slat 
 watched, his mocking laugh was repeated. 
 
 "The last and crowning folly of a season of 
 madness!" he croaked. "The final act in this 
 drama of insanity ! " 
 
 " You think the attempt will fail ? " asked Slat, 
 with fear and with eagerness. 
 
 " I do not think. I know. The procession 
 of the false sword began the upheaval. The 
 procession of the false avatar ends it. Had 
 it not been for the thraldom of the harlot who, 
 too long, has polluted the inner shrine, Chun 
 perchance might have . . . But what avails it 
 to speculate upon what might have been ; since, 
 as you say, the die is cast ? " 
 
 "Maybe, even now, the Liberator of the 
 Sudras will prevail," said Slat. " He hath force 
 and courage and energy above the common 
 measure — your gifts, master of mine." 
 
 "Aye," said Baguan Dass slowly. "I gave 
 them to him . . . with the aid of a woman ; 
 a woman who ... to me . . . was not as other 
 women. But, it is ever so . . . That with 
 which a man is endowed by the woman who 
 bore him in pain, he, in the fulness of time — in 
 pain no less bitter — shall yield up to the woman 
 he loves. From women we derive everything ; to 
 women we surrender all. So hath it been with 
 Chun. He had a soul finer, cleaner, stronger 
 
THE TRIUMPH OF THE SNAKE 317 
 
 than that of his fellows ; but now by this wanton 
 of the temple it hath been sapped and under- 
 mined till only the empty husk of it remains." 
 
 "None the less," said Slat, "perhaps he will 
 triumph ; and if that comes to pass, then will 
 I build a temple such as the rebel brain of man 
 hath never before had the insolence to conceive, 
 or the hjinds of man the skill to fashion. And 
 if he fail . . . Yonder lies the forest, and 
 beneath its towering arches a great peace 
 abides." 
 
 "And I," said Baguan Dass, "shall remain 
 here; for I am the servant of the Sword. 
 While / live, no impious hand shall be laid upon 
 it. Even at the entreaty of Chun, my son, 
 I would not suffer it to be borne in the procession 
 of the false avatar. I, who am weary of life — 
 since in punishment for forgotten iniquity I 
 have been doomed to see perish all that I hold 
 sacred — ^long unspeakably for death — which is 
 the gate to new and happier births. If I perish, 
 guarding the Sword, then shall I acquire merit ; 
 but I fear that I may be doomed to live, so that 
 yet a little longer I may guard it. That, to me, 
 were the harder penance. Mayhap, I and those 
 who have survived with me, and the children 
 we have saved— ^Brahmans all — may furnish 
 wardens of the Sword for ever ; ^ but from me, 
 who am very old, the merciful kiss of Azrael, 
 Angel of Death, cannot now be much longer 
 withheld." 
 
 • Note I. 
 
318 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 "Yet I still cling to the hope that, perchance, 
 he may succeed," said Slat. 
 
 The procession had wriggled slowly along 
 the causeway, and had been swallowed up by 
 the great porched gate which, in the centre, 
 broke with its conical dome the long line of the 
 outer cloister. Behind it the people had closed 
 in from all sides, surging after it through the 
 big arch, and pouring through the two level 
 exits at the northern and southern extremities. 
 Much delay was caused by the elephants, which 
 were forced unwillingly to descend the broad 
 stone stairs leading from the outer cloister to 
 the open space beyond the sacred precincts. 
 They let themselves down, step by step, with 
 ungainly hunching of their limbs and joints, 
 testing with cautious foot the ability of each 
 stair to bear their weight, and questing hither 
 and thither with suspicious trunks. 
 
 Before them went a mob of quarrymen, followed 
 by bands of temple women — whom Chun had 
 collected for the occasion from the husbands or 
 lovers who had appropriated them, together 
 with the rest of the plunder looted from the 
 shrines of the Gods. 
 
 They were magnificently attired in clinging 
 bodices of almost transparent silk, and skirts 
 of cloth-of-gold, strained tightly round them, 
 emphasising every curve of their bodies, and 
 hanging from their girdles, in front, in stiff rich 
 
THE TRIUMPH OF THE SNAKE 319 
 
 folds. Their bangles and anklets clanked and 
 jingled as they went ; great, embossed, lozenge- 
 shaped plates of gold were fixed, like belt- 
 buckles, at their waists ; and their head-dresses 
 were gilded too — immense erections with triple 
 peaks, in shape closely resembling the domes of 
 the great Wat.^ 
 
 They carried tambourines in their hands, and 
 from time to time, encouraged by outbursts of 
 discordant music, performed mystical dances, 
 advancing and retreating in unison. Again, as 
 they moved forward at a more sober pace, 
 one of their number raised her voice in song, 
 intoning a verse in the ancient tongue ; and all 
 her companions repeated it in monotonous 
 chorus. Few, if any, of those present, including 
 the singers themselves, knew the meaning of the 
 words they chanted ; but thus they had always 
 danced and sung when attending a procession 
 in honour of the Gods, and thus they danced and 
 sang now to glorify with voice and limb the 
 incarnate Spirit of the Snake.^ 
 
 Above this glittering throng the bulky, grey 
 bodies of the elephants, their heads and flanks 
 half-covered by trappings of crimson and gold, 
 lurched forward, with rolling gait ; and last of 
 all came the old and very sacred white elephant 
 — its pink and blotchy skin visible beneath the 
 magnificence of its caparison — led by Chun, 
 who paced gravely at its left shoulder. It bore 
 
 * Note 3. 2 Note 3. 
 
320 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 on its back the howdah of the Avatar, hung 
 with heavy silken curtains closely drawn. 
 
 The excited bands of armed men led, flanked, 
 and followed the procession ; and their efforts 
 hardly availed to force a way for it through the 
 immense throng of curious spectators, or to 
 prevent it being jostled by the crowds pressing 
 upon it from the sides and rear. Nearly three 
 hours were occupied in traversing the two and a 
 half miles which separate Angkor Wat from the 
 forum ; and more time elapsed before the white 
 elephant could be brought through the lines into 
 which the rest of the procession had grouped 
 itself, and could be induced painfully to scale the 
 stairway of the Ba Yon. 
 
 Here it was faced about, in the sight of all 
 the people ; Chun still keeping his place at its 
 side, and standing there, with the curve of a 
 long, curiously-wrought, gold elephant-goad 
 hooked over the creature's left ear. The mahout 
 squatted on the flags, holding the beast's trunk 
 with his hand. It was his way of letting his 
 charge know that a friend was near him. 
 
 Sud and Muth, looking all the more loutish 
 and plebeian for the gorgeous garments in 
 which their brother's generosity had clothed 
 their hulking bodies, shambled forward, and 
 with long gold rods, drew back the silken 
 curtains of the howdah. It was roofed by a 
 gilded dome, and was some six feet in height, 
 and within it, erect upon cushions of crimson, 
 stood the Spirit of the Snake. 
 
THE TRIUMPH OF THE SNAKE 321 
 
 The eyes of the entire multitude were fixed 
 upon the little, graceful figure, lightly poised 
 upon the shapely feet, and with a carriage so 
 confident and proud. 
 
 Above the shadowy masses of her hair — 
 visible through the veil of gauze, whereof the 
 folds concealed all save the faintest outline of 
 her face — rose a head-dress fashioned of gold 
 and silver scales, representing seven snake-masks, 
 with the expanded hoods behind them fanning 
 out into a single, spreading cowl, beautiful, but 
 sinister. From the mouths of these reptiles, 
 little forked tongues of red gold protruded, and 
 their eyes were emeralds, which flashed with a 
 green light in the sunshine of the afternoon. 
 
 Her body was clothed in a closely-fitting 
 garment of silver and gold scales, which re- 
 vealed and accentuated every curve and line of 
 her figure, and shot forth rays, scintillating with 
 every movement. Her slender arms, bare to the 
 shoulder, were loaded with bangles and bracelets, 
 in which great jewels shone with a dazzling 
 refulgence. From her anklets, and from the 
 rings she wore on the toes of her little, white 
 feet, gems glittered and sparkled like super- 
 natural glow-worms. 
 
 In her hands she fondled a live cobra, that 
 writhed, coiling itself about her arms and neck, 
 and gliding in and out of her clasp, seemed to 
 pour its sinuous length over her, like an animated 
 stream, liquid, yet solid. 
 
 For a little the people stood at gaze, while 
 
322 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the conchs, drums, and cymbals broke forth 
 anew into a salvo of wild and hysterical music ; 
 and then, with a sound like a universal intake 
 of the breath, the multitude sank earthward, 
 in an attitude of adoration. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 THE snake's decree 
 
 Chun, crouchingr on the ground with the rest, 
 but in spirit uplifted and thrilled by the intensity 
 of his relief and exultation, glanced upward, over 
 his shoulder, at the small, erect figure standing 
 alone and above him under the gilded canopy of 
 the howdah. 
 
 Even through the gauze of her veil he could 
 see how her eyes shone. Her breast, beneath the 
 glittering scales, heaved ; her whole frame 
 quivered with the ecstasy of her triumph. 
 
 She had conquered — his dear Divinity ! Had 
 vanquished this mob of the discontented, the 
 rebellious, and the sceptical, even as, at her first 
 coming, she had enslaved his own soul. 
 
 Her victory was complete ; and Chun, freed 
 suddenly from the crushing burden of his 
 anxiety and fear for her, found in her success an 
 intoxication and a delight more potent than any 
 achievement of his own could ever havie pro- 
 duced. The knowledge that it was through him 
 that the woman he so loved had attained to this 
 pinnacle of ascendancy over the inhabitants of 
 
 823 
 
324 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 the only world they knew, set a crown upon his 
 joy. 
 
 As he squatted there in the dust, gazing up 
 at her through adoring eyes — his confidence 
 restored, every fibre of his being responding to 
 and sharing in the elation that was hers — 
 Chun experienced the supreme moment of his 
 life. 
 
 Obedient to a gesture of her uplifted hand, 
 the music died into silence, and the multitude 
 thrilled to the sound of her full, melodious 
 voice. 
 
 " Let the chosen servant of the Snake stand 
 forth!" she commanded; and Chun sprang 
 erect at the word. 
 
 " Tell unto my people my decree ! " she cried. 
 
 Chun, turning toward her, placed the finger- 
 tips of both hands against his forehead, covering 
 his face with the palms, and bowed low, in deep 
 obeisance. Then, once more he faced the 
 people. 
 
 Immediately before him squatted the motley 
 crowd of those who had formed the procession 
 — musicians, dancing-girls, and a rabble of 
 armed quarrymen and warriors — with the huge, 
 caparisoned elephants grouped to the right and 
 left. Beyond these was the dense throng of men 
 and women and children, crouching on the 
 ground, and raising expectant faces to gaze upon 
 him and upon the Snake. Behind them again, 
 on the opposite side of the forum, the vast pile 
 
THE SNAKE'S DECREE 325 
 
 of the Ba Phun arose, solid and pyramidal, 
 against the blue of the sky. 
 
 At Chun's side, toweringf above him, stood the 
 old vwhite elephant, rocking a little, and with 
 restless trunk — on its back, framed in the golden 
 uprights of the howdah, the incarnate Spirit of 
 the Snake. 
 
 Immediately to the rear of this group, the 
 great, square minarets of the Ba Yon made an 
 impressive background of cold, grey stone, 
 holding aloft, carved on each gigantic facet, 
 effigies of the head of Brahma, impassive in 
 their tireless expectation. 
 
 " O my brothers ! " cried Chun, in a loud voice 
 that carried far and wide. "My brothers, and 
 children of the most sacred Snake ! " He turned 
 once more, to salaam reverently toward her. 
 " Listen well to the words I speak, obedient to 
 her dread command. 
 
 "The barbarous Thai are upon us — even at 
 our doors. Our armies, as a punishment for our 
 transgressions, have suffered defeat on many 
 stricken fields. The reinforcements sent have 
 not availed to stay the on-coming of these 
 brutish invaders. Already the camps of the 
 enemy are pitched upon the shores of Tonl6- 
 Sap. 
 
 " The need of our nation is sore — the danger 
 dire. 
 
 " Therefore, mindful of her people in this hour 
 of their extreme necessity, the most glorious, 
 most merciful, and most omnipotent Snake hath 
 
326 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 vouchsafed to assume once more the fetters of 
 human flesh, and to make herself visible to the 
 eyes of all men, 
 
 " And thus, through me her unworthy mouth- 
 piece, doth she make known to you her will. 
 
 " She will save you from the invading Thai ! " 
 
 A loud acclamation arose from the multitude, 
 and with a wave-like motion their prostrations 
 were renewed. 
 
 " She will save your homes from flames, your 
 women-folk from dishonour, your children from 
 slavery, and yourselves from the sword ! " 
 
 The shouts were redoubled. 
 
 " Of those fit to bear arms, she bids me select 
 five thousand, and lead them in person against 
 the barbarians, and she sets upon our heads the 
 crown of certain victory. The shores of the 
 Lake shall be white with the bones of the slain, 
 and their rotting bodies shall manure our crops. 
 The wealth which by pillage they have gotten 
 shall be our spoil, their women-folk our hand- 
 maidens, their children our thralls from genera- 
 tion unto generation, and their king shall 
 become a sweeper of the outer courts of the 
 temple of the Snake ! " 
 
 This picture made a strong appeal to the 
 popular imagination, and Chun's words were 
 greeted by prolonged shouts and acclamations. 
 
 " But " continued Chun, his face growing 
 
 stern, his tones more insistent and impressive, 
 — " but, as a token of our worship and our grati- 
 tude for this her boundless mercy showered 
 
THE SNAKE'S DECREE 327 
 
 upon us, she decrees that forthwith a temple be 
 builded in her honour, whereof the splendour 
 shall transcend the monuments fashioned by the 
 accursed Brahmans in honour of the false gods 
 who fell with them," 
 
 The low, threatening mutter, which till now 
 had not that day been heard, came from the mob, 
 and was loudest in those places where the quarry- 
 men were gathered together. 
 
 " She appoints Slat, the old wise man, whose 
 skill and magical power is known to all of us, to 
 be her master-builder; and to him she hath 
 miraculously revealed the design of the great 
 shrine which in the fulness of time shall become 
 the abode of her divinity." 
 
 The murmurs grew louder. Slat, in his day, 
 as foreman in the labour-yards, had proved a 
 tyrannical task-setter. 
 
 "And she bids me," cried Chun, raising his 
 voice — "she bids me choose from the number 
 of the skilful fashioners of stone, three thousand 
 craftsmen whose high privilege it shall be to 
 erect this mighty monument of her glory." 
 
 The muttering swelled to an uproar, which 
 rose and fell ominously. With difficulty could 
 Chun make the end of his speech heard by those 
 nearest to him. 
 
 " Listen ! Listen well ! Only by fulfilling the 
 command of the most sacred Snake can our land 
 be saved from the calamity that threatens it." 
 
 But the people would not listen. Many had 
 risen to their feet. All were talking at once. 
 
328 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 The awe of the Snake, by which for a little space 
 they had been hypnotised, was forgotten ; and 
 Chun's quarrymen were among those who 
 showed the most open signs of rebellion. To 
 the entire population the very thought of the 
 exacting, senseless toil of temple-building — of 
 the unending battle with gigantic monoliths, of 
 the eternal straining, of the frequent crushings 
 and maimings — had become a thing abhorrent. 
 No power divine or human could force them back 
 to the cruel bondage of the quarry and the labour- 
 yard. Goaded to savagery at the mere notion, 
 they raved and shouted and blasphemed, lashing 
 themselves into a delirium of fury. 
 
 For a moment or two Chun stood still, looking 
 about him irresolutely, with anxious, wrathful 
 eyes beneath his lowering brow. Then he 
 yelled an order, bidding the procession reform. 
 His single preoccupation was to get the woman 
 he loved safely conveyed from out the heart 
 of this tumult. 
 
 Striking the terrified mahout with the golden 
 goad, he screamed to him to make the old white 
 elephant descend the stairway into the crowded 
 forum, and the panic-stricken man reluctantly 
 obeyed. The aged and feeble animal emitted 
 blasts of complaining sound, as limb by limb he 
 hunched himself down the steps, while Chun 
 made shift, by the aid of the goad, to draw the 
 silken curtains of the howdah, and to shield the 
 girlish figure from the gaze of the maddened 
 people. 
 
THE SNAKE'S DECREE 329 
 
 Immediately a little hand from within drew 
 them back again, and even through the noise that 
 deafened him, Chun heard her shrill and angry 
 tones. 
 
 " Let the curtains be I " she cried. 
 
 She had seated herself now, cross-legged upon 
 the crimson cushions, and even as he watched, 
 and before he could make a movement to prevent 
 her, she had torn aside the veil that hid her face. 
 
 A sudden silence fell, as the multitude, whose 
 eyes, like those of one man, were fixed upon her, 
 noted her act. 
 
 And then, abruptly, a woman's laugh rent the 
 stillness. It came from among the dancing-girls 
 who were grouped about the foot of the temple- 
 stairs. 
 
 " This is no incarnation of the Snake ! " cried 
 a feminine voice, high-pitched and clear as crystal. 
 "It is Gunda . . . little Gunda . . . who, like 
 us, was a woman of the temple ! " 
 
 Instantly the crowd seized the word and passed 
 it from mouth to mouth, with scornful laughter 
 and bitter and brutal mockery. Obscene cries 
 were uttered; foul taunts and questions were 
 flung at her ; and she, springing erect, and beside 
 herself with rage and humiliation, gave back jibe 
 for jibe. 
 
 A stone was flung ; many followed in its wake ; 
 and Chun, dropping the goad, clambered up the 
 side of the elephant, thrust the girl down among 
 the cushions, and strove with his body to protect 
 her from the flying missiles. 
 
330 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 He saw below him the frightened faces of the 
 dancing-girls, terrified by the violence of the mob 
 by which they were surrounded; but in the 
 features of many of them he read expressions of 
 fury, jealousy, and indigfnation. They remem- 
 bered that they had been tricked into performing 
 mystical services in a pageant designed to glorify 
 one of their own despised class ; and the injury to 
 their pride was not one easy to forgive. 
 
 He saw the ruffianly faces of his quarrymen, 
 debased and brutal at all times, but distorted to 
 a new ugliness now by fierce animal passions — 
 grins of stupid mirth, scowls of rage, clumsily 
 expressed contempt, which spluttered into erup- 
 tions of filthy jeers and cat-calls. 
 
 He saw the mob, swaying and surging, with 
 brandished weapons and clenched fists shaken in 
 his direction, while they howled their execration 
 with inarticulate yells and ravings. 
 
 At the opposite side of the forum he saw a 
 little knot of men leap on to- some hidden object 
 which raised them above the heads of their 
 fellows, and heard a stentorian voice proclaim : 
 
 " Behold ! Here is yet another incarnation of 
 Divinity! Worship and bow low, O my 
 brothers ! " 
 
 Then, hauled up from the depths of the crowd, 
 and raised, struggling in the grip of his 
 tormentors, appeared the idiot Phun, his head 
 sagging and lolling this way and that, his 
 cavernous mouth agape, his features, with their 
 odious mutilations, contracted hideously by pain 
 
THE SNAKE'S DECREE 331 
 
 and fear. Imperfectly controlled by his wrecked 
 brain, his arms wavered, in loose gesticulations. 
 
 Savage howls and laughter greeted the rude 
 humour of this piece of grotesque horseplay ; 
 and then the mob turned its attention once more 
 to the man and woman on the white elephant 
 — and stones flew thick and fast. 
 
 Though he strove to ward them off with his 
 uplifted arms, they struck Chun again and 
 again. Setting his teeth, he flung himself from 
 side to side, resolute to defend the girl from the 
 hail of missiles. ^ Already blood flowed from his 
 mouth, and from a score of flesh wounds. 
 
 "Get down!" he cried. "Get down and 
 save yourself!" 
 
 He could not see whether the girl obeyed him, 
 for hardly had he uttered the words, when a 
 great fragment of sandstone struck him full 
 upon the forehead, and he toppled backward 
 from his perch before the howdah, into the arms 
 of Sud and Muth. 
 
 These two practical creatures had already 
 divested themselves of the gorgeous clothes 
 which made them so conspicuous : and without 
 attempting to stanch his wounds, they at- once 
 rendered a like service to their unconscious 
 brother. He had fallen among the crowd of 
 dancing-girls, all of whom were intent upon 
 the woman he had sought to protect, or else 
 were trying to avoid the stones which the mob 
 was flinging with a reckless lack of precision ; 
 and the two stalwart peasants had little 
 
332 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 difficulty in forcing their way backward through 
 them to the foot of the wide stairs, up whicjii 
 bearing Chun's naked body between them, they 
 ran quickly. 
 
 They plunged into the Ba Yon ; passed 
 through it without a halt; dived into the 
 blackened and deserted ruins which, at the 
 rear of it, were all that remained of a 
 portion of the capital city ; and so made good 
 their escape into the forest behind. 
 
 A stone hurled by a quarryman scarred a 
 deep wound on Gunda's forehead as, quiver- 
 ing with wrath and defiant to the last, she 
 stood, erect and fearless, facing the multitude 
 of her enemies. But when she fell stricken, 
 from the back of the old white elephant, it was 
 by the women of the temple that she was torn 
 to pieces. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 THE HUT IN THE FOREST 
 
 The short dusk of the tropics lay, like a soft 
 coverlet, over the hot face of the land ; and in 
 the interior of the hut, under the high-pitched 
 roof of thatch, it was already dark. 
 
 In the mud fireplace at the back, pots stood 
 above the flames, supported on flat stones, 
 blackened by wood-smoke. Two or three 
 women busied themselves with the cooking, 
 and a little group of children of both sexes 
 squatted near them, occasionally scolding or 
 striking at a couple of lean cats which prowled 
 about, restless and expectant. On a palm-leaf 
 mat near the low doorway, from which a ladder 
 of untrimmed wood led to the littered space 
 before the hut. Slat, now a very old and feeble 
 man, was seated, chewing his betel-quid 
 mechanically. At a little distance from him, 
 Sud and Muth, grown heavier with years, 
 squatted placidly in bovine silence. 
 
 Through the uneven obloftg of the door, and 
 beneath the ragged fringe of thatch above it, 
 
 £38 
 
334 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 could be seen a small plot of irrigated rice-field, 
 round which the forest, now little more than 
 a dark shadow in the twilight, shut down like 
 a fallen drop-scene, 
 
 A footstep sounded without, and presently 
 Chun climbed the ladder and entered the hut. 
 He paused at the threshold to wash the mud 
 from his feet and legs, with water from a big 
 gourd which stood ready for the purpose ; then 
 flung to the floor the rattan knapsack, filled 
 with yams and other jungle produce, with 
 which he had been laden ; and in silence seated 
 himself near Slat. 
 
 Muth pushed the clumsy, wooden betel-box 
 across the mat toward him, and in silence he 
 prepared his quid. 
 
 "You have been far, my son?" old Slat 
 enquired, in quavering tones. 
 
 "Yonder," replied Chun, pointing with his 
 outstretched chin toward the north. 
 
 No further word was spoken ; and presently 
 the women brought the food — piles of speckled 
 rice and a mess of vegetables cooked with 
 cardamoms and rock-salt. The men and the 
 little boys squatted in silence around the rough 
 platters, a;nd ate their fill, while the women 
 served them. Then each in turn lifted a gourd 
 to his lips, and drank a long draught of water. 
 Next, they gathered once more about the betel- 
 box, and the women and girls removed the 
 leavings to the back of the hut, and made 
 their own meal ; after which they set them- 
 
THE HUT IN THE FOREST 335 
 
 selves to the task of cleaning the pots and 
 platters. 
 
 "How far did you go, Chun?" asked Slat 
 presently. 
 
 " I went ..." came the slow reply. " I 
 went ... to the Great Wat ... for the 
 first time since ... for the first time for 
 years." 
 
 With a sound like a little gasp of pain, old 
 Slat ijihaled his breath, 
 
 " Grass grows in the courts," Chun continued, 
 "and on either side of the causeway the brush- 
 wood stands chin-high. Already the trees of 
 the fdrest begin to invade the sanctuaries, and 
 the wild fig vines thrust their tendrils between 
 stone and stone. The Thai, when they wreaked 
 their wrath upon the temples, were powerless to 
 demolish them; but the jungle is proving a 
 more ruthless foeman." 
 
 "Yet I think," said old Slat, with a ghost-- 
 like flicker of the enthusiasm which afore- 
 time was wont to thrill him. " I think the 
 works which our fathers builded will endure for 
 ever." 
 
 " May be," said Chun, with a shrug. " But 
 the place is utterly forsaken. A mouse-deer 
 sprang from a corner of the inner cloister, as I 
 approached, and on the platform of the upper 
 temple a wild cat was prowling. Our people — 
 after the last stand which they made against the 
 Thai, behind the ramparts they had reared 
 about the thirty temples of the Tha Phrom, 
 
336 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 while I lay sick of my hurt — dispersed into the 
 forest. They are no longer a nation, though 
 the Thai, in their fort on the banks of the 
 little river that flows to the Great Lake, make 
 believe to rule them. They have become a 
 race of jungle-dwellers, camped even as we, in 
 scattered clearings of the forest. The Khmer 
 empire is as though it had never been; yet 
 still in the fort of our conquerors the survivors 
 of the Brahmans serve as the wardens of the 
 Sword." 
 
 He was silent, lost in thought. 
 
 "I stood beside the bathing-tank — empty 
 now, for the roots of a banyan have started a 
 leak, and the water has drained away," he 
 said presently. "I sat for a while on the 
 big stairway near the great western portals 
 of the Wat. I climbed the broken steps 
 which lead upward to the threshold of the 
 central temple. I stood on the platform 
 without the entrance, and gazed around upon 
 the forest and the desolation of the deserted 
 place. I ... I ... " He hesitated, and his 
 voice dropped. " I penetrated even to the Inner 
 Shrine." 
 
 Again he was silent, his head bowed upon his 
 breast, his mind wandering through misty by- 
 paths glamoured by wonderful memories. 
 
 "And nowhere," he resumed presently, "did I 
 see traces of a living soul ; but as I came hither, 
 I met a little band of Sudras laden with offerings 
 for the chief of the Thai." 
 
THE HUT IN THE FOREST 387 
 
 " I warned you not to go alone, brother," 
 growled Muth. 
 
 "Yet, only alone could I go," said Chun 
 mildly, and paused upon the word. 
 
 " I spoke with them, and they offered me no 
 violence. None the less I told them nothing of 
 this, our abiding-place. They said that the Thai 
 delight in dances and stage-plays, and that they 
 reward lavishly those of our people who are skilled 
 in such arts. They told me too that one whose 
 name I have forgotten — a clownish fellow who 
 of old was a quarryman of mine — had won for 
 himself much honour by his laughter-provoking 
 antics. He wears a grotesque mask, and a head- 
 dress fashioned to imitate that of the Brahmans 
 of our sculptures, and he is the butt of the other 
 players, who. treat him villainously, to the 
 amusement of all that behold."^ 
 
 Chun's hearers received the news with slack 
 interest, but the women in the background, 
 beyond the range of the clamar-torch.es, giggled 
 together. 
 
 "And they say," continued Chun, "that the 
 Thai bring tidings of a new god, whose teaching 
 is a doctrine of mercy and love ; and that they 
 are pitiful to those who do him worship. They 
 name him Gautama, the Buddha."^ 
 
 " I have had enough of gods and worship," 
 growled old Slat. "They rise and pass and are 
 forgotten, like the mists of morning. Only the 
 
 ' Note II. * Note 12. 
 
338 THE DOWNFALL OF THE GODS 
 
 temples which men rear in their honour, seeking 
 therewith to make articulate the dumb agony of 
 their own souls — they — they only — endure. I 
 have had enough of gods." 
 " I too," said Chun. 
 
 FINIS' 
 
NOTES 
 
 Note i. {Pages 83 and 317.) 
 
 THE SWORD OF INDRA 
 
 This weapon,. which is still preserved in a shrine in 
 the royal enclosure of the King of Kambodia, is said to 
 have been presented to the first Khmer monarch of 
 Angkor by the Thunder God himself. The wardens 
 who serve in the sanctuary in which the Sword is kept, 
 and who alone are suffered to touch the sacred weapon, 
 are Brahmans — the last survivors of the race that once 
 ruled over the Khmer empire. They live at the charges 
 and under the protection of the King of Kambodia, who, 
 in common with all his subjects, is a Buddhist. Only 
 some six or eight inches of the blade, near the hilt, are 
 exposed to the view of visitors to the little shrine ; and 
 the Sword, in which the mystic Spirit of the L^nd is 
 popularly supposed to abide, is the object of immense 
 veneration to all the natives of the country, who come 
 from far and wide to make pilgrimage to it. So far as it 
 was possible to form an opinion from the glimpse which 
 was vouchsafed, the Sword was judged by the author to 
 be very ancient. It appeared to be fashioned, not of 
 steel, but of iron, and the elaborate carvings and 
 the gold waterings which ornament its surface suggest 
 Indian workmanship. The magnificent scabbard of 
 carved gold is, on the other hand, certainly the 
 work of an Indo-Chiilese, probably of a Kambodian 
 goldsmith. 
 
 A similar sword is worshipped as a god by the 
 semi-savage hill-folk somewhere in the Hinterland of 
 Annam ; and to this, too, pious pilgrimage is made by 
 the Buddhists of Kambodia. These journeys are 
 
 839 
 
340 NOTES 
 
 attended by some risk ; for if any unfortunate event 
 occurs after the sword has been visited by strangers, the 
 hill-men attribute it forthwith to the anger of their god, 
 and hasten to avenge him upon the pilgrims who are 
 supposed to have occasioned his wrath. 
 
 Note 2. {Page iii.) 
 
 THE WOMEN OF THE TEMPLE 
 
 Those who are curious on this subject may be 
 referred to Mr Frazer's great book, Adonis, Attis, 
 and Osiris : Studies in Oriental Religion (Macmillan 
 and Co., 1907). The belief in which religious prostitu- 
 tion had its origin was that the land was rendered 
 fruitful through the fertilisation of women by the gods. 
 These latter were represented by the priests of the temple, 
 or in some instances by strangers ; but the favours of the 
 temple women were always denied to the laymen living 
 in the vicinity of their abodes. Religious prostitution is 
 still practised, notably in some of the Hindu temples of 
 southern India. 
 
 Note 3. {Pages 119 and 319.) 
 
 COSTUMES AND DANCES OF THE TEMPLE 
 WOMEN 
 
 The dances and costumes here described are to be 
 seen to this day in the palace of the King of Kambodia 
 at Phnom Penh, both being made use of in the dramatic 
 representations which take place on state occasions. 
 They are of considerable archaeological interest, and are 
 obviously a perpetuation of a tradition which coexisted 
 with the designing and execution of the bas-reliefs and 
 many of the sculptures of Angkor. 
 
NOTES 341 
 
 Note 4. {Page 123.) 
 THE LEPROUS KING 
 There is a tradition, which is believed to be histori- 
 cally correct, that a king who was a leper ruled over 
 Angkor. An image, which represents a sedent and 
 almost nude figure, stands to-day in what must once 
 have been the royal enclosure of the Palace at Angkor 
 Thom, and this, for no very sufficient reason, has been 
 described by some savants as an effigy of the leprous 
 king. An examination of this image led the author to 
 the conclusion that it was a comparatively recent piece 
 of work, and that its character is Buddhistic rather than 
 Hindu. It is devoid of artistic merit or interest, and it 
 compares most unfavourably with the work of the Khmer 
 sculptors. 
 
 Note S- {Page 152.) 
 THE THAI 
 Thai is the name by which the Siamese call them- 
 selves to this day, and it is by this name that they are 
 known in Indo-China. It is an historical fact that 
 the Khmer empire, at the moment of its decline, was 
 attacked and defeated by the Siamese. The subsequent 
 history of Kambodia is a record of warfare between the 
 Siamese and the Kambodians, in which the former were 
 usually successful. It was in order to escape from 
 Siamese aggression that Norodom, the Kambodian king, 
 threw himself and his country into the arms of France ; 
 but until the treaty of 1902 was concluded, by which 
 Siamreap and Batambang were exchanged by Siam for 
 Chantabun, Angkor continued to be accounted a Siamese 
 province. 
 
 Note 6. {Page 153.) 
 THE CHINESE EMBASSY 
 The Embassy of which mention is here made was 
 ordered, in 1295, to proceed to the kingdom of Chin-Li, 
 
342 NOTES 
 
 the name by which the Khmer empire was then known to 
 the Chinese. The ambassador, whose name is unknown, 
 but who has left a record of his journey and experiences, 
 started from Ming-Cheu in the second month of the 
 following year ; travelled thence to the port of Wen- 
 Chu ; whence he put to sea oh the twentieth day of the 
 same month. On the fifteenth day of the third month 
 — viz., twenty-five days later — he arrived ofT the coast of 
 Cochin-China ; but he relates that he did not succeed in 
 reaching his destination until the seventh moon, owing 
 to the contrary winds which he encountered. He 
 returned to China in 1297, again travelling by sea. A 
 translation of his journal is to be found in M. Abel 
 Remusat's Noveaux Melanges Asiatiques. At the time of 
 his visit, Angkor was a flourishing city, the capital of a 
 great empire, and the temple of Angkor Wat was still 
 under construction. When the place was next visited 
 by a traveller who has left a record behind him, it was 
 what it is to-day — a vast collection of temples, long 
 deserted, and overgrown by vegetation ; yet this was 
 after the lapse of less than three centuries, in 1570. The 
 account is to be found in a book published by Christoval 
 de Jaque, a Portuguese traveller, who published his 
 work in 1606. He mentions the fact that even in 1570 
 the inscriptions at Angkor (which are written variously, 
 either in Sanskrit characters, or in Sanskrit words trans- 
 literated into Kambodian character) were unintelligible to 
 the natives, thus showing how completely the learning of 
 the Brahmans had been lost. He also mentions that the 
 natives of the country feared to approach the temples, 
 and ascribed their construction to demons and giants. 
 
 Note 7. (Page 230.) 
 
 THE EXODUS OF THE BATS 
 
 The spectacle here described was witnessed by the 
 author many times during December 1908, and even the 
 efforts which the French Government are making to 
 reduce the numbers of the bats which infest the temples 
 
NOTES 343 
 
 at Angkor are attended with only partial success. It is 
 certain that no similar attempts were made in the time 
 of th^ Brahmans, since Hindus are averse from the 
 avoidable destruction of animal life ; wherefore it maiy 
 be surmised that thje bats inhabited the buildings in 
 vast numbers even before they were abandoned. 
 
 Note 8. {Pages 237 and 238.) 
 
 THE HE'RESY OF THE S'NAKE 
 
 The existence of this belief among the Khmer people 
 is an historical fact. The following mention of it is 
 made in the account of Angkor, written by the Chinese 
 ambassador, to whom reference has been made in 
 Note 6 :— 
 
 " Several natives of distinguished rank have told 
 me that formerly there used to be a fairy in that 
 tower in the form of a dragon with nine heads, who 
 was the protectress of the kingdom ; that under the 
 reign of each king of the country the fairy assumed 
 every night the form of a woman, and sought the 
 king in the tower; and even though he were 
 married, the queen, his wife, dared not intrude 
 before a certain hour ; but, at a signal of two strokes, 
 the fairy vanished, and the king was then able to 
 receive his queen and his other wives ; if the fairy 
 allowed a single night to pass without appearing, it 
 w^s a sign that the death of the king was near at 
 hand ; if, on his side, the king failed to meet her, 
 it was certain that a fire or some other calamity 
 would occur." 
 
 It is probable that the Chinese envoy was rtiistaken 
 as to the number of the dragons' heads. They should 
 be seven, not nine. 
 
344 NOTES 
 
 Note 9. (Page 238.) 
 
 THE SYMBOL OF THE SNAKE IN HINDU MYTHOLOGY 
 
 The author is indebted to his friend, the Hon. Mr P. 
 Arunachalam, of the Ceylon Civil Service, for the 
 explanation, and almost for the words here put into the 
 mouth of Baguan Dass. 
 
 Note 10. {Page 309.) 
 
 The sunset effect here described is not due to any 
 effort of the imagination. It was witnessed by the 
 author on more than one occasion during his stay at 
 Angkor. 
 
 Note ii. {Page 337.) 
 
 The cl6wn in the Kambodian dance, witnessed by 
 the author in the palace of the King of Kambodia, wears 
 a caricature of the head-dress of the Brahmans, and is the 
 object of the insults of the other players and of the 
 derision of the spectators. He is called Bram, a con- 
 traction of Brahman, a word which reappears in Malay 
 as /V««, the term applied to the clown in the dramatic 
 representations called Ma^ong, which are clearly derived 
 from the Kambodian dance. 
 
 Note 12. [Page 337.) 
 
 The natives of Kambodia, and indeed of all Indo- 
 China, are to-day Buddhists to a man, if the wild tribes 
 of the Hinterland and the hills be excepted. Their con- 
 version to Buddhism is believed to have been wrought 
 by the Siamese ; and here, as elsewhere, it is to be 
 regarded in its popular forms less as a separate religion 
 than as a purified and reformed Hinduism. 
 
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