right to the European races, seems the most plausible theory of their
origin yet put forward, and serves as an additional proof of the enormous
influence exercised upon posterity by the famous country of the Nile.

Thus perhaps the legend of storm and shipwreck is not false, but records in
poetic diction the arrival on these shores of men who presumably had in
some degree inherited the genius of the most famous and most civilized
country of prehistoric ages, and who had by long trafficking in dangerous
waters and by the hardships of long migration acquired that self-reliance
and love of mastery which has been bequeathed almost unchanged to their
Brahmanised descendants. The Chitpavans were indeed the children of the
storm, and something of the spirit of the storm lives in them still. Some
trace is theirs of the old obstinacy which taught those pale ancestors to
fight against insuperable forces until they were cast naked and broken upon
the seashore. And peradventure the secret lesson of the ancient folk-tale
is this, that the God of the Axe, despite the curse, is still at hand to
help them along the path to new birth, provided always that their cause is
fair, that they invoke not his aid for trivial or unjust ends, and that
they have been truly purified in the pyres of affliction.




XV.

NUR JAN.

"The singer only sang the Joy of Life,
For all too well, alas! the singer knew,
How hard the daily toil, how keen the strife,