To those who have given up worldly pleasures, light and darkness, a good and a bad road, are all one.

It was now far on in the night; now and then it lightened; the darkness itself was preferable, was less frightful than those flashes of light.
"Friend!" Plodding along in the darkness the _Brahmachari_ heard suddenly in the pathway some such sound, followed by a long sigh.

The sound was muffled, nevertheless it seemed to come from a human throat, from some one in pain.

The _Brahmachari_ stood waiting, the lightning flashed brightly; he saw something lying at the side of the road--was it a human being?
Still he waited; the next flash convinced him that his conjecture was correct.

He called out, "Who are you lying by the roadside ?" No one made reply.