The peasant could use his eyes, it seemed, but Malcolm passed the phrase without comment. "We have lost our way," he said. "We want to reach the river and take boat speedily to Allahabad. If one like thyself were willing to ride with us to the nearest village on the bank where boats can be obtained, we would give him ten rupees, and, moreover, let him keep the horse that carried him." The ryot was delighted with his good fortune. "Blessed be Kali!" he cried. "I saw five female ghosts with goats' heads in a tree last night, and my wife said it betokened a journey and wealth. Not only can I bring you by the shortest road, huzoor, but my brother has a budgerow moored at the ghât, meaning to carry my castor-oil seeds to Mirzapur. I am not ready for him yet for three weeks or more, and he will ask no better occupation than to drop down stream with you and your camp." "I have no camp," said Malcolm, "but I pay the same rates for the boat." "The sahib means that his camp marches by road," put in Chumru, severely. "Didst not hear him say that we have mislaid the track?" The ryot apologized for his stupidity, and Frank recognized that his retainer disapproved very strongly of such strict adherence to the truth. On the plea that they must hasten if the midday heat were to be avoided, they cut short the halt to less than an hour. When they came to tighten the girths again they found that Chumru's horse had fallen lame. As Nejdi, too, was showing signs of stiffness, Malcolm mounted one of the spare animals and led the Arab. Chumru and the ryot bestrode the third horse, and under the guidance of one who knew every path, they set out for the Ganges. There are few features of the landscape so complex in their windings as the foot-paths of India. Owing to the immense distances between towns--the fertile and densely populated Doab offers no standard of comparison for the remainder of a vast continent--roads were scarce and far between in Mutiny days. The Grand Trunk Road and the rivers Ganges and Jumna were the main arteries of traffic. For the rest, men marched across country, and the narrow ribands of field tracks meandered through plowed land and jungle, traversed nullah and hill and wood, and intersected each other in a tangle that was wholly inextricable unless one traveled by the compass or by well-known landmarks, where such were visible. The ryot, of course, familiar with each yard of the route, practically followed a straight line. After a steady jog of an hour and a half they saw the silver thread of the Ganges from the crest of a small ridge that ran north and south. The river was then about three miles distant, and they were hurrying down the descent when they came upon an ekka, a little native two-wheeled cart, without springs, and drawn by a diminutive pony. Alone among wheeled conveyances, the ekka can leave the main roads in fairly level country, and this one had evidently brought a zemindar from a river-side village.