Meanwhile that Indian Krishna, deep in muse, Masked with impassable demeanor mild From all about him, from himself even, masked A trouble of wonder that he could not lay. He gazed with gentle furtiveness at Paul And strove to read the riddle of the man. He felt Paul's spirit different from his own; His own was placid with placidity Resembling death, or trance and apathy That would be, were it perfect, death. But Paul, Not placid, peaceful rather, seemed to live Not less but more intensely than the rest, His fellow-creatures round him in the world; A life of passion reconciled with peace! 'Impossible! Passion reconciled with peace!' Thought Krishna; 'I seek peace through passion slain, Expecting, I the seeker, not to be At all, the moment I a finder am. This Hebrew has the secret now of peace; Strange peace, not passionless, but passionate!-- Extinction not of being, here forestalled, Like that for which I strive by ceasing striving (With fear lest after all I miss the mark, And only strive to cease, not cease to strive) Nay, no nirvâna antedated, his-- That hope of our lord Buddha hard to win-- But life increased with life to such a power As is the mighty river's grown too great To register in eddy or ripple even Resistance in its channel overcome. Is life then, boundless, better than blank death?' So Krishna mused in doubt beholding Paul, Until at last to Sergius Paulus he, Breaking the seals of silence, spoke and said: "If to thy thinking meet, bring me, I pray, To speak with Paul, so named, thy friend as seems. But first tell me who was, and what, that Jew To such plight of sheer wretchedness reduced That to be rid by lightning of his life Seemed blessing, whatsoever might ensue Hereafter to him in his next estate, Doubtless some sad metempsychosis due. Was he perhaps a kinsman near of Paul?" "Nay, kinsman none, save as all Jews are kin, Descended from the same forefather old," Said Sergius. "Then perhaps of some of those, Near kinsman," Krishna said, "women with men, Who watched with that long patience over him, And won him as from death to life with love?" "Nay, also not their kinsman," Sergius said, Pleasing himself with saying no more, to see How far the silence-loving Indian drawn By unaccustomed wonder still would seek. "Some reverend father of his people, then," Krishna adventured guessing, "whom, oppressed With undeserved calamity, they yet Honored themselves with honoring to the end?" "O nay, far otherwise than such, he was," Said Sergius, "vile, most vile by them esteemed, And that of rich desert, a man of shame And crime committed or fomented still." "Then haply--not of purpose, but by chance"-- Said Krishna, groping deeper in his dark,