With joy received, these wandering tribes their guides--
For love makes friends where selfishness breeds strife--
They soon are led to where their kindred dwell.
They saw the vanity of chasing wealth
Through hunger, danger, desolation, death.
They felt a power sustaining Purna's steps--
A power unseen yet ever hovering near--
They saw the truth of Buddha's burning words
That selfishness and greed drag down the soul,
While love can nerve the feeblest arm with strength,
And asked that Purna take them as his aids.
But ere brave Purna reached his journey's end,
Near many hamlets, many Indian towns,
The moon, high risen to mark the noon of night,
Through many sacred fig-tree's rustling leaves[2]
Sent trembling rays with trembling shadows mixed
Upon a noble youth in orange robes,
His alms-bowl by his side, stretched out in sleep,
Dreaming, perchance, of some Benares maid,
Perchance of home and joys so lately left.
Meanwhile the master with his little band
Toward Rajagriha backward wends his way,
Some village tree their nightly resting--place,
Until they reached the grove that skirts the base
Of that bold mountain called the vulture-peak,
Through which the lotus-covered Phalgu glides,
O'erarched with trees festooned with trailing vines,
While little streams leap down from rock to rock,
Cooling the verdant slopes and fragrant glades,
And vines and shrubs and trees of varied bloom
Loaded the air with odors rich and sweet,
And where that sacred fig-tree spread its shade
Above the mound that held the gathered dust
Of those sage Brahmans who had sought to aid
The young prince struggling for a clearer light,
And where that banyan-tree for ages grew,
So long the home of those five noble youths,
Now sundered far, some tree when night may fall
Their resting-place, their robe and bowl their all,
Their only food chance gathered day by day,
Preaching the common brotherhood of man,
Teaching the law of universal love,
Bearing the light to those in darkness sunk,
Lending a helping hand to those in need,
Teaching the strong that gentleness is great.
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