A hermit in the Himalayas

A HERMIT IN THE HIMALAYAS

very much as it was before. Had Buddha known how to laugh at
life, Asia's religious history would have been different.

But I must rewrap my trans-Himalayan treasure and put it
tenderly away for the while.

Then the Nepalese prince prepares his farewell. I thank him
for the delightful surprise of intellectual stimulus which has come
to me so unexpectedly through him, after so many weeks of solilo-
quizing among the trees, the rocks and the ravines* He leaps into
the saddle of his horse and, with a final wave of his hand, disappears
among the firs down the tree-shaded trail below my bungalow,
holding himself stoutly against a high wind. His lithe vigorous
figure has joined the small procession of those who have come and
gone, as the stars come out with the night and depart with the
dawn. The world to which he belongs has reclaimed its own, but
something which that world does not perceive and cannot perceive
roots in his heart and grows in secret like a delicate plant which is
destined to bear a fine blossom*

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