An orderly brought a card to Orde, who took it with a movement of irritation at the interruption, and handed it to Pagett: a large card with a ruled border in red ink, and in the centre in school-boy copper-plate, _Mr. Dina Nath_. “Give salaam,” said the civilian, and there entered in haste a slender youth, clad in a closely fitting coat of gray homespun, tight trousers, patent-leather shoes, and a small black velvet cap. His thin cheek twitched, and his eyes wandered restlessly, for the young man was evidently nervous and uncomfortable, though striving to assume a free-and-easy air. “Your honour may perhaps remember me,” he said in English, and Orde scanned him keenly. “I know your face, somehow. You belonged to the Shershah district, I think, when I was in charge there?” “Yes, sir, my father is writer at Shershah, and your honour gave me a prize when I was first in the Middle School examination five years ago. Since then I have prosecuted my studies, and I am now second year’s student in the Mission College.” “Of course: you are Kedar Nath’s son—the boy who said he liked geography better than play or sugar-cakes, and I didn’t believe you. How is your father getting on?” “He is well, and he sends his salaam, but his circumstances are depressed, and he also is down on his luck.” “You learn English idioms at the Mission College, it seems.” “Yes, sir, they are the best idioms, and my father ordered me to ask your honour to say a word for him to the present incumbent of your honour’s shoes, the latchet of which he is not worthy to open, and who knows not Joseph; for things are different at Shershah now, and my father wants promotion.” “Your father is a good man, and I will do what I can for him.” At this point a telegram was handed to Orde, who, after glancing at it, said he must leave his young friend, whom he introduced to Pagett, “a member of the English House of Commons who wishes to learn about India.” Orde had scarcely retired with his telegram when Pagett began: “Perhaps you can tell me something of the National Congress movement?” “Sir, it is the greatest movement of modern times, and one in which all educated men like us _must_ join. All our students are for the Congress.” “Excepting, I suppose, Mahommedans, and the Christians?” said Pagett, quick to use his recent instruction. “These are some _mere_ exceptions to the universal rule.” “But the people outside the College, the working classes, the agriculturists; your father and mother, for instance.” “My mother,” said the young man, with a visible effort to bring himself to pronounce the word, “has no ideas, and my father is not agriculturist, nor working class; he is of the Kayeth caste; but he had not the advantage of a collegiate education, and he does not know much of the Congress. It is a movement for the educated young-man”—connecting adjective and noun in a sort of vocal hyphen.