"Can no one save him? Can no one help him? Many rush to the sahib's aid, and plunge into the tank; but how are they to find the colonel under those hundreds of yards of wet floating cloth! They try to lift the heavy mass; they tear it here; they drag it there; every minute seems long as an hour, every minute lessens the chance of finding the colonel alive! At last there's a cry, 'He's found!' And shortly afterwards something that—not a half-hour before—was a brave, strong man, is dragged from under the wide spread of cloth! Alas! The bold heart has ceased to beat! The unhappy colonel has perished!" "And why did he perish?" cried the bunniah, who had taken his hookah out of his mouth. "Was it not because he had trusted himself to a balloon of flimsy cloth that had holes, through which the gas could escape!" "Now, to my mind that poor colonel's death preaches a lesson to us," observed Isa Dás. "There are some who make as sure of going to happiness when they die as the colonel sahib did of rising into the clouds. Now, I like to ask my conscience,—is my hope a sure one, or is it rather like the cracked balloon?" "I do not trouble myself with such thoughts," observed the bunniah. "I perform my religious duties, I make offerings, I feast the Brahmins,—I have nothing to fear." And, like an easygoing man of the world as he was, he resumed his hookah. "But, my friend, do you never tell a lie, not even to make a good bargain?" asked Isa Dás. Those around laughed, for the character of the bunniah was like that of most of his class; only the doctor was grave. "Have you never cheated or spoken evil of one whom you hated, or flattered another whose favour you wished to gain?" pursued the Christian. "Such things are trifles, they matter not!" said the bunniah,—and again the hubble-bubble of the hookah, interrupted for a moment, was heard. "Ah! Friend, what you call trifles are as the cracks in the balloon!" cried Isa Dás. "Your righteousness is flimsy as the cloth of which the great ball was made. If it was rash in the colonel to trust his body to a balloon which raised him a little from earth, only to dash him down into destruction, are you not worse than rash if you trust your soul to what never can save it?" The question made as little impression on the bunniah as it did on his hookah; but the zemindar, who was a man of a simple, teachable spirit, asked, "What is it that can save souls?" "We need something much stronger, better, more perfect than any goodness of our own to carry us up to heaven," said Isa Dás; "and such righteousness is offered to us in the Gospel, even that of the Lord Jesus Christ!" "Who was He?" inquired the zemindar. "He is the only Man who over lived on earth and never knew sin," was the reply, "the only perfectly holy. Even his enemies could prove nothing against Him; even His judge declared, 'I find no fault in this man.'" "But of what use is His righteousness to us?" asked the zemindar.