him.  He had heard of Thugs, and told them to be off.  They smiled at his idle suspicions, and tried to remove them, but in vain.  The Mogul was determined; they saw his nostrils swelling with indignation, took their leave, and followed slowly.  The next morning he overtook the same number of men, but of a different appearance, all Musalmans.  They accosted him in the same respectful manner; talked of the danger of the road, and the necessity of their keeping together, and taking advantage of the protection of any mounted gentleman that happened to be going the same way.  The Mogul officer said not a word in reply, resolved to have no companions on the road.  They persisted—­his nostrils began again to swell, and putting his hand to his sword, he bid them all be off, or he would have their heads from their shoulders.  He had a bow and quiver full of arrows over his shoulders,[9] a brace of loaded pistols in his waist-belt, and a sword by his side, and was altogether a very formidable-looking cavalier.  In the evening another party that lodged in the same “sarai"[10] became very intimate with the butler and groom.  They were going the same road; and, as the Mogul overtook them in the morning, they made their bows respectfully, and began to enter into conversation with their two friends, the groom and butler, who were coming up behind.  The Mogul’s nostrils began again to swell, and he bid the strangers be off.  The groom and butler interceded, for their master was a grave, sedate man, and they wanted companions.  All would not do, and the strangers fell in the rear.  The next day, when they had got to the middle of an extensive and uninhabited plain, the Mogul in advance, and his two servants a few hundred yards behind, he came up to a party of six poor Musalmans, sitting weeping by the side of a dead companion.  They were soldiers from Lahore,[11] on their way to Lucknow, worn down by fatigue in their anxiety to see their wives and children once more, after a long and painful service.  Their companion, the hope and prop of his family, had sunk under the fatigue, and they had made a grave for him; but they were poor unlettered men, and unable to repeat the funeral service from the holy Koran-would his Highness but perform this last office for them, he would, no doubt, find his reward in this world and the next.  The Mogul dismounted—­the body had been placed in its proper position, with its head towards Mecca.  A carpet was spread—­the Mogul took off his bow and quiver, then his pistols and sword, and placed them on the ground near the body—­called for water, and washed his feet, hands, and face, that he might not pronounce the holy words in an unclean state.  He then knelt down and began to repeat the funeral service, in a clear, loud voice.  Two of the poor soldiers knelt by him, one on each side in silence.  The other four went off a few paces to beg that the butler and groom would not come so near as to interrupt the good Samaritan at his devotions.