Little news was received from Pantulu Iyer and his wife. It was conjectured that there was none to impart. If he became decidedly worse the family at Chirapore would be duly informed; but if he only continued to drift gradually down the hill nothing would be said. Sooba and his wife, ever ready to believe as they hoped, made up their minds that the head of the house could not last much longer, and that the younger brother would soon be called upon to perform those ceremonies which should belong to the son, the performance of which established the right of the performer to be recognised as head of the house. Could they have glanced at the presumably dying man they would have sustained a shock. Contrary to all expectation Pantulu was improving in health every day. He recovered his appetite as well as his strength and spirits with a readiness that astonished his wife. Away from his home and surrounded by new interests he shook off the terrible depression caused by his son's conversion to Christianity. A reaction was setting in, enabling him to detach his thoughts from the trouble and centre them elsewhere. The silk farm was one of his early ventures, when, as a young man, he had tried with considerable success to improve the culture of silk-worms. The system he introduced answered so well that it was generally adopted throughout the silk-growing districts, with the result that a finer and stronger silk was produced. Perfection, however, was not attained, and of late years there had been a forward movement in the Far East which again placed the silk of Chirakul in the background. The relative in charge of the farm was an enthusiast in his way, and he was delighted to find that in Pantulu he had a ready and sympathetic listener. He was quite sure that further improvement might be effected in the boiling of the cocoons and the bleaching of the silk. He had made a few experiments himself and he exhibited the results with some pride. Together they pored over the evil-smelling stuff that was one day to robe a woman's dainty form, and exhale nothing but the atta of rose and sandal-wood with which it should be scented. It was a good strand of silk, but the tint, a dull stain, would only take crude strong dyes, that lost their brilliancy and purity through the stain. The manager of the farm had recently been to Bombay where he had met some silk growers from China. Though these men were reticent and jealous of imparting their knowledge to foreigners, he managed to extract some information and to gather that more might be learned by a visit to China and Japan. Since his return he had made the attempt to improve the silk; and though the result left much to be desired, it was sufficiently encouraging to show the old expert that the experiment should be pursued.