“Hear an incident of my life which has been to me as a parable,” said old Isaac. “Before I had one white hair in my beard, I went on a journey in a mountainous part of our land. Going up a steep place, my horse stumbled and threw me, and I fell down a precipice; but my dress caught in some bushes, and though hurt I was able to regain the road and again mount my horse. Riding on again, I had not gone far when a cheetah burst from the thicket, and suddenly sprang upon me. I was a strong man then, and carried a sharp knife in my girdle; after a struggle the cheetah was killed, but I bear on me the marks of its claws to this day. Weary and weakened by the loss of blood, I was forced to stop at the nearest house, though it was the house of one whom I had known as a deadly enemy. He received me with sullen looks, but denied me not rest nor food. He brought to me a cup of wine, and I drank it; I knew not that there was poison in the cup. The evil that I saw not, O Jai Singh! was worse than the more startling dangers through which I had passed. I suffered more from the poison hidden in my frame, than from the fall down the precipice, or the claws of the cheetah.”