Modern Survivals of the Ordeal. brick projected to supply a rest for one foot. The young man now placed his right foot against this, and* thrust his head and shoul ders into the opening about as far as the visitor had done. How he was to get far ther, the latter could not see for the life of him. The next moment, however, the young man gave a quick strong push with his bent leg from the wall, and as he did so a groan was forced from his chest, and his face which came ha'f out grew purple and distorted like that of a man in the clutch of apoplexy. His foot and leg seemed to go on thrusting his body forward independently of his will, and as recklessly as if it were dead matter. The sound of the scrunching of the cartilage of the lungs, as they were jammed and driven by main force into the tree made the Eng lishman feel actually sick. The struggle lasted about five minutes. After the first groan, which was produced no doubt by the mechanical expulsion of the air from the lungs, the man never uttered a sound. The priest stood by, silent and grave. The poor soul went through his bitter ordeal alone. Presently it was clear that the worst was over. As soon as the young man's chest and arms were free, the priest showed him how to support one hand on a little knotty excrescence of the trunk below him, while the other grasped a small branch that grew out above. So directed, he had no very great difficulty in getting the rest of his body through, and there he stood apparently very little the worse for his painful experience. A thing which struck the Englishman as peculiar was the calm indifference of the spectators. They had looked on with no more excitement perceptible in their manner than if they had been watching a sheep try ing to get through a thorn fence. There were no congratulations and no expressions of sympathy with the awful sufferings that this incomparable brother must have under gone. The little party gathered up its be
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longings and went away as composedly as if they were just returning from an afternoon call. When left alone with the priest, the tour ist made his acknowledgments, whereupon the old gentleman smiled in a superior man ner. " The Pir Sahib is a doer of justice," he said simply, pocketing his fee of one rupee. Does the reader desire any further explan ation of this remarkable scene? I give the conclusion in the tourist's own words. " In thinking the matter over I came to believe that there was a certain amount of power in the hands of the priest. You see it was the upper part of the opening that was passed. There was no jugglery in that; nothing but the most determined resolution, kept up by the most utter faith, could drive a man through those torturing Symplegades. But when the chest was clear and the narrower waist came above the narrower part of the upper and under apertures, I can fancy that the body, if unsupported, would naturally sink and the waist be received in the lower one. Once there, no amount of struggling would clear the shoulders or the hips, and the vic tim would remain literally 'caught by the loins'— the very penalty he had invoked upon himself. According to this theory, the critical moment was that at which the priest indicated to the man, already practically free, where to place his hands, ostensibly merely so as to spare him the awkwardness of roll ing out head first, unsupported, upon the ground below. Had his hands not been so placed the indispensable support would have been wanting, and the saint would have seized the convicted offender exactly at the moment when he fancied himself 'out of the wood.' f "That afternoon," concluded the English man, " I was nearer in spirit to the Middle Ages than I ever shall be again."
