Lives of Alcyone

with them for ever and with all that they symbolised. Bending before
the abbot, clad in one simple white robe only, he then had to submit
to a long and weary catechism, and to hear the recitation of a great
number of texts; but at last the vow of the Order was solemnly
administered to him, and he was allowed to go with his chosen
teacher (for every applicant must choose one among the elder
monks for his responsible teacher) into a sort of vestry, where he
cast off even his white robe and put on instead the beautiful robe of
the Sangha.
That dress at least had been unchanged through all the
centuries of his sojourn in the heaven world; and even as he endued
himself with sojourn in the heaven-world; and even as he returned
himself with the three robes which were henceforth to represent all
his worldly possessions, the act seemed somehow strangely familiar
to him, and there came to him a half-memory of the glorious
Presence in which ones before he had performed the symbolical act.
Then he went out again into the great hall of monastery, and
prostrated himself at the feet of the chief abbot, even as twelve
hundred years before at the feet of the Lord Himself, and so once
more he took upon himself the life of the ascetic, though this time at
the age of fifteen instead of forty-two.
He plunged into his new studies with ardour, in order to help
him to forget his love—or rather, not to forget but to sanctify it, and
to raise it to a higher level. The monastery to which he belonged
was a great and rich one, and among other things it was noted for its
magnificent library. Dhammalankara devoted himself to this, even
beyond the studies that were expected from him. He seemed to
have a love for the books, and applied to the librarian for permission
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