Chapter 51 - Page 2

Drink as much of it as you want. It is for fever.

5. Smallpox. Go straight from there to the central Ghat. At its
upstream end you will find a small whitewashed building, which is a
temple sacred to Sitala, goddess of smallpox. Her under-study is there
--a rude human figure behind a brass screen. You will worship this for
reasons to be furnished presently.

6. The Well of Fate. For certain reasons you will next go and do homage
at this well. You will find it in the Dandpan Temple, in the city. The
sunlight falls into it from a square hole in the masonry above. You will
approach it with awe, for your life is now at stake. You will bend over
and look. If the fates are propitious, you will see your face pictured
in the water far down in the well. If matters have been otherwise
ordered, a sudden cloud will mask the sun and you will see nothing. This
means that you have not six months to live. If you are already at the
point of death, your circumstances are now serious. There is no time to
lose. Let this world go, arrange for the next one. Handily situated, at
your very elbow, is opportunity for this. You turn and worship the image
of Maha Kal, the Great Fate, and happiness in the life to come is
secured. If there is breath in your body yet, you should now make an
effort to get a further lease of the present life. You have a chance.
There is a chance for everything in this admirably stocked and
wonderfully systemized Spiritual and Temporal Army and Navy Store. You
must get yourself carried to the

7. Well of Long Life. This is within the precincts of the mouldering and
venerable Briddhkal Temple, which is one of the oldest in Benares. You
pass in by a stone image of the monkey god, Hanuman, and there, among the
ruined courtyards, you will find a shallow pool of stagnant sewage. It
smells like the best limburger cheese, and is filthy with the washings of
rotting lepers, but that is nothing, bathe in it; bathe in it gratefully
and worshipfully, for this is the Fountain of Youth; these are the Waters
of Long Life. Your gray hairs will disappear, and with them your
wrinkles and your rheumatism, the burdens of care and the weariness of
age, and you will come out young, fresh, elastic, and full of eagerness
for the new race of life. Now will come flooding upon you the manifold
desires that haunt the dear dreams of the morning of life. You will go
whither you will find

8. Fulfillment of Desire. To wit, to the Kameshwar Temple, sacred to
Shiva as the Lord of Desires. Arrange for yours there. And if you like
to look at idols among the pack and jam of temples, there you will find
enough to stock a museum. You will begin to commit sins now with a
fresh, new vivacity; therefore, it will be well to go frequently