He paused for a moment or two, and then with an emphasis that would have made the term of reproach sound absurd, but for the fierce revengeful look in his countenance, he added-- "Nigger!" There was an intensity of scorn in his utterance of the word that was tragic; and as I lay back there on my cushion I read in it the fierce turning at last of the trampled worm--the worm as represented by the venomous serpent of the conquered land, and I knew from my own experience what endless cases there were of patient, humbled, and crushed-down men, no higher in position than slaves, ill-used, and treated with contempt by my insolent, overbearing countrymen of that self-assertive class who cannot hold power without turning it to abuse. The silence in the tent as my captor knelt by me was intense, and I could hear his hard breathing, and see how he was striving to master the fierce emotion in his breast. His eyes were mostly fixed on me with a savage scowl, and for a moment or so I fancied that he must have saved my life so as to take it himself in some way which would add torture and throw dismay amongst the English ranks. But I was ready to smile at my own vanity as I thought to myself of what a little consequence the life of a young artillery subaltern would be in the great revolt now in progress. Then I felt a strong desire to speak, to make some great utterance such as would impress him and raise me in his estimation sufficiently to make him treat me with the respect due to an English officer; but no such utterance would come. I felt that I was only a poor, weak, wounded lad, lying there at the mercy of this fierce rajah, and when at last my lips parted, as if forced to say something in answer to his searching gaze, I writhed within myself and felt ashamed of the contemptible words. For his utterance of that term of contumely so liberally used toward one of a race of people who had been for countless generations great chiefs in their own land, and whose cities were centres of a civilisation, barbaric, perhaps, but whose products we were only too glad to welcome in England. "Nigger" still seemed to ring in my ears, as I gazed still as if fascinated in the handsome pale-brown eastern face, and I said feebly, just about in the tone of voice in which some contemptible young found-out sneak of a schoolboy, who was trying to hide a fault with a miserable lie, might say, "Please, sir, it wasn't me--" "I never insulted you, or called you so." His face changed like magic, and he bent low over my pillow, as he cried excitedly, and with a passionate fervour in his voice, which almost startled me-- "Never! never, sahib." He paused, frowned, and then his face lit up again, and he uttered a merry laugh. "You see," he cried, "I am one of the conquered race. You have been our masters so long that it comes natural to say _sahib_. But that is at an end now; we are the masters, and the reign of the great Koompanni is at an end."