1 100 THE COURT OF THE SIKH 80TERSIGNS.
2 become very inarticulate. The Faquir would then
3 ^^ make shots" at the meaning, and got rebuked
4 sometimes. He was often ashamed to say what he
5 understood well enough, when he would content
6 himself with saying " Eysh^ eysK' (ecstacy) ; some-
7 times driven to total incomprehension, he would
8 say, in his softest diplomatic tones (in Arabic, for
9 the greater secrecy), " MafuMmtoo'' — u e. " I did
10 not understand;*^ he would then be taken seri-
11 ously ill, and disappear for the evening. He was
12 an extraordinary anomaly, this man: a titular
13 Mussulman Faquir serving the extirpators of hi.
14 race and the persecutors of his religion, and that
15 faithfully ; assisting at their carousals, writing in
16 the name of the Supreme Being as worshipped
17 by them, and yet a bigoted Mussulman for all
18 that. His brother, Noor-ood-deen, was an inge-
19 nious person, a good deal trusted and employed
20 by Runjeet about the arsenal and commissariat
21 matters, and even made governor of Govindghur.
22 His sons were also in the service of the state, but
23 none promised to be like the Faquir. He is in-
24 deed the last of the indigenous diplomatists of
25 Hindostan, of those men whose skill in the art
26 has been so much and so long belauded. The
27 day for them has gone by ; they have done their
28 work, and are gathered to their fathers."]