Although Sangster had nearly seven years of service, he knew nothing about the East; his knowledge of its peoples and their characters expressed itself in two words, brief and strong. He knew nothing and cared less for the complex laws, the mystic philosophy, the immemorial civilization of the great empire which he, in his small way, was helping to hold for England. He fortunately represented only a small class of the servants of the Queen, that class who hold the native to be a brute, a little, if at all, better than the grey ape who leered over the devotee's shoulder at the Arab and his rider. Sangster, however, knew something of the language, and some devil prompted him to rein in, and imperiously ask the sitting figure if the boar had gone that way. He might as well have asked the ape, for that figure, seated there in the dust, with its rigid arm stretched out, and dull look staring into vacancy, would have been oblivious if a hundred boars had passed before it, and was so lost in abstraction that it was even unconscious of the presence of the fiery champing horse and equally impatient man, who were right in front of its unwinking eyes. Of course there was no answer, and Sangster angrily repeated the question, lowering the point of his spear as he did so, and slightly pricking the man below him. What came into the little brain of the ape it is hard to say; but it was an instinct that told him his master was in danger, and with a dog-like fidelity he resolved to defend him. Springing forward the beast grasped the shaft of the lance, and, with chattering teeth, pushed it violently on one side. All the little temper Sangster had left went to shreds; with an oath he drew back his arm, the spear-head flashed, and the next moment passed clean through the shrieking animal, and was out again, no longer bright but dripping red. With a pitiful moan the poor brute almost flung itself into the devotee's lap, and died there, its arms clasped around the lean waist of its master. All this happened so suddenly, so quickly, that Sangster had barely time to think of what he had done; but, as he raised his red spear, a horror came on him, so human was the cry of the dying ape, so like a child did it lie in its death-agony. He would have turned away and ridden off, but a power he could not control kept him there, and for a space there was a silence, broken only by the drip from the spear-head, and the soft whistle of a _huryal_ or green pigeon from the shade of the leaves overhead.