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 LETTERS OF MARQUE 
 
 BY 
 
 RUDYARD KIPLING 
 
 New York 
 THE LOVELL COMPANY 
 
 23 DuANE Street
 
 LETTERS OF MARQUE 
 
 Except for those who, under compulsion 
 of a sick certificate, are flying Bombaywards, 
 it is good for every man to see some little of 
 the great Indian Empire and the strange folk 
 who move about it. It is good to escape for 
 a time from the House of Rimmon — be it 
 office or cutchery — and to go abroad under no 
 more exacting master than personal inclina- 
 tion, and with no more definite plan of travel 
 than has the horse, escaped from pasture, 
 free upon the countryside. The first result of 
 such freedom is extreme bewilderment, and 
 the second reduces the freed to a state of mind 
 which, for his sins, must be the normal por- 
 tion of the Globe-trotter — the man who " does " 
 kingdoms in days and writes books upon 
 them in weeks. And this desperate facility 
 is not as strange as it seems. By the time 
 that an Englishman has come by sea and rail 
 via America, Japan, Singapur, and Ceylon, to 
 India, he can — these eyes have seen him 
 do so — master in five minutes the intricacies 
 
 5
 
 6 Letters of Marque 
 
 of the India?i Bradshaw, and tell an old resi- 
 dent exactly how and where the trains run. 
 Can we wonder that the intoxication of suc- 
 cess in hasty assimilation should make him 
 overbold, and that he should try to grasp — but 
 a full account of the insolent Globe-trotter 
 must be reserved. He is worthy of a book. 
 Given absolute freedom for a month, the mind, 
 as I have said, fails to take in the situation 
 and, after much debate, contents itself with 
 following in old and well-beaten ways — paths 
 that we in India have no time to tread, but 
 must leave to the country cousin who wears 
 his/^^;v tail-fashion down his back, and says 
 ** cabman" to the dnvQX oiiheticca-ghari. 
 
 Now, Jeypore from the Anglo-Indian point 
 of view is a station on the Rajputana-Malwa 
 line, on the way to Bombay, where half an 
 hour is allowed for dinner, and where there 
 ought to be more protection from the sun than 
 at present exists. Some few, more learned 
 than the rest, know that garnets come from 
 Jeypore, and here the limits of our wisdom 
 are set. We do not, to quote the Calcutta 
 shopkeeper, come out " for the good of our 
 'ealth," and what touring we accomplish is 
 for the most part off the line of rail. 
 
 For these reasons, and because he wished 
 to study our winter birds of passage, one of 
 the few thousand Englishmen in India on a 
 date and in a place which have no concern 
 with the story, sacrificed all his self-respect 
 and became — at enormous personal inconve-
 
 Letters of Marque 7 
 
 nience — a Globe-trotter going to Jeypore, and 
 leaving behind him for a little while all that 
 old and well-known life in which Commis- 
 sioners and Deputy Commissioners, Governors 
 and Lieutenant-Governors, Aides-de-camp, 
 Colonels and their wives, Majors, Captains, 
 and Subalterns after their kind move and rule 
 and govern and squabble and fight and sell 
 each other's horses and tell wicked stories of 
 their neighbors. But before he had fully 
 settled into his part or accustomed himself 
 to saying, " Please take out this luggage," to 
 the coolies at the stations, he saw from the 
 train the Taj wrapped in the mists of the 
 morning. 
 
 There is a story of a Frenchman who feared 
 not God, nor regarded man, sailing to Egypt 
 for the express purpose of scoffing at the 
 Pyramids and — though this is hard to believe 
 — at the great Napoleon who had warred 
 under their shadow. It is on record that 
 that blasphemous Gaul came to the Great 
 Pyramid and wept through mingled reverence 
 and contrition ; for he sprang from an emo- 
 tional race. To understand his feelings it 
 is necessary to have read a great deal too 
 much about the Taj, its design and propor- 
 tions, to have seen execrable pictures of it at 
 the Simla Fine Arts Exhibition, to have had 
 its praises sung by superior and traveled 
 friends till the brain loathed the repetition of 
 the word, and then, sulky with want of sleep, 
 heavy-eyed, unwashed, and chilled, to come
 
 8 Letters of Marque 
 
 upon it suddenly. Under these circumstances 
 everything, you will concede, is in favor of 
 a cold, critical, and not too impartial verdict. 
 As the Englishman leaned out of the carriage 
 he saw first an opal-tinted cloud on the 
 horizon, and, later, certain towers. The 
 mists lay on the ground, so that the splendor 
 seemed to be floating free of the earth ; and 
 the mists rose in the background, so that at 
 no time could everything be seen clearly. 
 Then as the train sped forward, and the mists 
 shifted, and the sun shone upon the mists, 
 the Taj took a hundred new shapes, each 
 perfect and each beyond description. It was 
 the Ivory Gate through which all good dreams 
 come ; it was the realization of the gleaming 
 halls of dawn that Tennyson sings of ; it was 
 veritably the " aspiration fixed," the " sign 
 made stone," of a lesser poet ; and over and 
 above concrete comparisons, it seemed the 
 embodiment of all things pure, all things holy, 
 and all things unhappy. That was the mystery 
 of the building. It may be that the mists 
 wrought the witchery, and that the Taj seen 
 in the dry sunlight is only, as guide-books 
 say, a noble structure. The Englishman 
 could not tell, and has made a vow that he 
 will never go nearer the spot, for fear of break- 
 ing the charm of the unearthly pavilions. 
 
 It may be, too, that each must view the 
 Taj for himself with his own eyes, working 
 out his own interpretation of the sight. It is 
 certain that no man can in cold blood and
 
 Letters of Marque 9 
 
 colder ink set down his impressions if he has 
 been in the least moved. 
 
 To the one who watched and wondered that 
 November morning- the thing seemed full of 
 sorrow — the sorrow of the man who built it 
 for the woman he loved, and the sorrow of 
 the workmen who died in the building — used 
 up like cattle. And in the face of this sorrow 
 the Taj flushed in the sunlight and was beau- 
 tiful, after the beauty of a woman who has 
 done no wrong. 
 
 Here the train ran in under the walls of 
 Agra Fort, and another train — of thought 
 incoherent as that written above — came to 
 an end. Let those who scoff at overmuch 
 enthusiasm look at the Taj and thenceforward 
 be dumb. It is well on the threshold of a 
 journey to be taught reverence and awe. 
 
 But there is no reverence in the Globe-trot- 
 ter : he is brazen. A Young Man from Man- 
 chester was traveling to Bombay in order — 
 how the words hurt ! — to be home by Christ- 
 mas. He had come through America, New 
 Zealand, and Australia, and finding that he 
 had ten days to spare at Bombay, conceived 
 the modest idea of " doing India." " I don't 
 say that I've done it all ; but you may say 
 that I've seen a good deal." Then he ex- 
 plained that he had been "much pleased" at 
 Agra, "much pleased " at Delhi, and, last pro- 
 fanation, "very much pleased" at the Taj. 
 Indeed, he seemed to be going through life 
 just then " much pleased " at everything.
 
 10 Letters of Marque 
 
 With rare and sparkling originality he remarked 
 that India was a "big place," and that there 
 were many things to buy. Verily, this Young 
 Man must have been a delight to the Delhi 
 boxwallahs. He had purchased shawls and 
 embroidery " to the tune of " a certain num- 
 ber of rupees duly set forth, and he had 
 purchased jewelry to another tune. These 
 were gifts for friends at home, and he consid- 
 ered them " very Eastern." If silver filigree 
 work modeled on Palais Royal patterns, or 
 aniline blue scarves be Eastern, he had suc- 
 ceeded in his heart's desire. For some in- 
 scrutable end it had been decreed that man 
 shall take a delight in making his fellow-man 
 miserable. The Englishman began to point 
 out gravely the probable extent to which the 
 Young Man from Manchester had been 
 swindled, and the Young Man said : ' By 
 Jove. You don't say so. I hate being done. 
 If there's anything I hate, it's being done ! " 
 He had been so happy in the " thought of 
 getting home by Christmas," and so charm- 
 ingly communicative as to the members of his 
 family for whom such and such gifts were 
 intended, that the Englishman, cut short the 
 record of fraud and soothed him by saying 
 that he had not been so very badly " done," 
 after all. This consideration was misplaced, 
 for, his peace of mind restored, the Young 
 Man from Manchester looked out of the win- 
 dow and, waving his hand over the Empire 
 generally, said : " I say. Look here. All
 
 Letters of Marque ii 
 
 those wells are wrong, you know ! " The wells 
 were on the wheel and inclined plane system ; 
 but he objected to the incline, and said that it 
 would be much better for the bullocks if they 
 walked on level ground. Then light dawned 
 upon him, and he said : " I suppose it's to 
 exercise all their muscles. Y' know a canal 
 horse is no use after he has been on the 
 tow-path for some time. He can't walk any- 
 where but on the flat, y' know, and I suppose 
 it's just the same with bullocks." The spurs 
 of the Aravalis, under which the train was 
 running, had evidently suggested this brilliant 
 idea which passed uncontradicted, for the 
 Englishman was looking out of the window. 
 
 If one were bold enough to generalize after 
 the manner of Globe-trotters, it would be easy 
 to build up a theory on the well incident to 
 account for the apparent insanity of some of 
 our cold weather visitors. Even the Young 
 Man from INfanchester could evolve a complete 
 idea for the training of well-bullocks in the 
 East at thirty seconds' notice. How much 
 the more could a cultivated observer from, let 
 us say, an English constituency, blunder and 
 pervert and mangle ? We in this country have 
 no time to work out the notion, which is worthy 
 of the consideration of some leisurely Teuton 
 intellect. 
 
 Envy may have prompted a too bitter judg- 
 ment of the Young Man from Manchester ; 
 for, as the train bore him from Jeypore to 
 Ahmedabad, happy in " his getting home by
 
 12 Letters of Marque 
 
 Christmas," pleased as a child with his Delhi 
 atrocities, pink-cheeked, whiskered and su- 
 perbly self-confident, the Englishman whose 
 home for the time was a dark bungaloathsome 
 hotel, watched his departure regretfully ; for he 
 knew exactly to what sort of genial, cheery 
 British household, rich in untraveled kin, that 
 Young Man was speeding. It is pleasant to 
 play at Globe-trotting; but to enter fully into 
 the spirit of the piece, one must also be 
 "going home for Christmas."
 
 Letters of Marque 13 
 
 11. 
 
 If any part of a land strewn with dead men's 
 bones have a special claim to distinction, 
 Rajputana, as the cock-pit of India, stands 
 first. East of Suez men do not build towers 
 on the tops of hills for the sake of the view, 
 nor do they stripe the mountain sides with 
 bastioned stone walls to keep in cattle. Since 
 the beginning of time, if we are to credit the 
 legends, there was fighting — heroic fighting — 
 at the foot of the Aravalis and beyond, in the 
 great deserts of sand penned by those kindly 
 mountains from spreading over the heart 
 of India. The " Thirty-six Royal Races " 
 fought as royal races know how to do, Chohan 
 with Rahtor, brother against brother, son 
 against father. Later — but excerpts from the 
 tangled tale of force, fraud, cunning, desperate 
 love and more desperate revenge, crime worthy 
 of demons and virtues fit for gods, may be 
 found, by all who care to look, in the book of 
 the man who loved the Rajputs and gave a 
 life's labors in their behalf. From Delhi to 
 Abu, and from the Indus to the Chambul, each 
 yard of ground has witnessed slaughter, pil- 
 lage, and rapine. But, to-day, the capital of 
 the State, that Dhola Race, son of Soora 
 Singh, hacked out more than nine hundred 
 years ago with the sword from some weaker
 
 14 Letters of Marque 
 
 ruler's realm, is lighted with gas, and pos- 
 sesses many striking and English peculiarities. 
 
 Dhola Rae was killed in due time, and for 
 nine hundred years Jeypore, torn by the in- 
 trigues of unruly princes and princelings, 
 fought Asiatically. 
 
 When and how Jeypore became a feudatory 
 of British power and in what manner we put 
 a slur upon Rajput honor — punctilious as 
 the honor of the Pathan — are matters of 
 which the Globe-trotter knows more than we 
 do. He ' ' reads up " — to quote his own words 
 — a city before he comes to us, and, straight- 
 way going to another city, forgets, or, worse 
 still, mixes what he has learnt — so that in the 
 end he writes down the Rajput a IVIahratta, 
 says that Lahore is in the Northwest Provinces, 
 and was once the capital of Sivaji, and pite- 
 ously demands a "guide-book on all India, a 
 thing that you can carry in your trunk, y' know 
 — that gives you plain descriptions of things 
 without mixing you up." Here is a chance 
 for a writer of discrimination and void of con- 
 science ! 
 
 But to return to Jeypore — a pink city set on 
 the border of a blue lake, and surrounded by 
 the low, red spurs of the Aravalis — a city to 
 see and to puzzle over. There was once a 
 ruler of the State, called Jey Singh, who lived 
 in the days of Aurungzeb, and did him service 
 with foot and horse. He must have been the 
 Solomon of Rajputana, for through the forty- 
 four years of his reign his " wisdom remained
 
 Letters of Marque 15 
 
 with him." He led armies, and when fighting 
 was over, turned to Hterature ; he intrigued 
 desperately and successfully, but found time 
 to gain a deep insight into astronomy, and, 
 by what remains above ground now, we can 
 tell that whatsoever his eyes desired, he kept 
 not from him. Knowing his own worth, he 
 deserted the city of i^mber founded by Dhola 
 Rae among the hills, and, six miles further, 
 in the open plain, bade one Vedyadhar, his 
 architect, build a new city, as seldom Indian city 
 was built before — with huge streets straight 
 as an arrow, sixty yards broad, and cross- 
 streets broad and straight. Many years after- 
 ward the good people of America builded their 
 towns after this pattern, but knowing nothing 
 of Jey Singh, they took all the credit to them- 
 selves. 
 
 He built himself everything that pleased him, 
 palaces and gardens and temples, and then 
 died, and was buried under a white marble 
 tomb on a hill overlooking the city. He was 
 a traitor, if history speaks truth, to his own kin, 
 and he was an accomplished murderer, but he 
 did his best to check infanticide ; he reformed 
 the Mahometan calendar ; he piled up a superb 
 library and he made Jeypore a marvel. 
 
 Later on came a successor, educated and 
 enlightened by all the lamps of British Prog- 
 ress, and converted the city of Jey Singh into 
 a surprise — a big, bewildering, practical joke. 
 He laid down sumptuous trottoirs of hewn 
 stone, and central carriage drives, also of
 
 1 6 Letters of Marque 
 
 hewn stone, in the main street ; he, that is to 
 say. Colonel Jacob, the Superintending Engi- 
 neer of the State, devised a water supply for 
 the city and studded the ways with standpipes. 
 He built gas works, set afoot a School of Art, 
 a Museum — all the things in fact which are 
 necessary to Western municipal welfare and 
 comfort, and saw that they were the best of 
 their kind. How much Colonel Jacob has 
 done, not only for the good of Jeypore city 
 but for the good of the State at large, will 
 never be known, because the officer in ques- 
 tion is one of the not small class who reso- 
 lutely refuse to talk about their own work. 
 The result of the good work is that the old 
 and the new, the rampantly raw and the sul- 
 lenly old, stand cheek-by-jowl in startling con- 
 trast. Thus, the branded bull trips over the 
 rails of a steel tramway which brings out the 
 city rubbish ; the lacquered and painted cart 
 behind the two little stag-like trotting bullocks 
 catches its primitive wheels in the cast-iron 
 gas-lamp post with the brass nozzle a-top, 
 and all Rajputana, gaily clad, small-turbaned 
 swaggering Rajputana, circulates along the 
 magnificent pavements. 
 
 The fortress-crowned hills look down upon 
 the strange medley. One of them bears on 
 its flank in huge white letters the cheery in- 
 script, " Welcome ! " This was made when 
 the Prince of Wales visited Jeypore to shoot 
 his first tiger; but the average traveler of to- 
 day may appropriate the message to himself,
 
 Letters of Marque 17 
 
 for Jeypore takes great care of strangers and 
 shows them all courtesy. This, by the way, 
 demoralizes the Globe-trotter, whose first cry 
 is, " Where can we get horses ? Where can 
 we get elephants ? Who is the man to write 
 to for all these things ? " 
 
 Thanks to the courtesy of the Maharaja, it 
 is possible to see everything, but for the incu- 
 rious who object to being driven through their 
 sights, a journey down any one of the great 
 main streets is a day's delightful occupation. 
 The view is as unobstructed as that of the 
 Champs Elysees ; but in place of the white- 
 stone fronts of Paris, rises a long line of open- 
 work screen-wall, the prevailing tone of which 
 is pink, caramel-pink, but house-owners have 
 unlimited license to decorate their tenements 
 as they please. Jeypore, broadly considered, 
 is Hindu, and her architecture of the riotous, 
 many-arched type which even the Globe-trotter 
 after a short time learns to call Hindu. It is 
 neither temperate nor noble, but it satisfies 
 the general desire for something that " really 
 looks Indian." A perverse taste for low com- 
 pany drew the Englishman from the pavement 
 — to walk upon a real stone pavement is in 
 itself a privilege — up a side-street, where he 
 assisted at a quail fight and found the low- 
 caste Rajput a cheery and affable soul. The 
 owner of the losing quail was a trooper in the 
 Maharaja's army. He explained that his pay 
 was six rupees a month paid bi-monthly. He 
 was cut the cost of his khaki blouse, brown- 
 2
 
 1 8 Letters of Marque 
 
 leather accoutrements, and jack-boots ; lance, 
 saddle, sword, and horse were given free. He 
 refused to say for how many months in the 
 year he was drilled, and said vaguely that his 
 duties were mainly escort ones, and he had no 
 fault to find with them. The defeat of his 
 quail had vexed him, and he desired the Sahib 
 to understand that the sowars of His High- 
 ness's army could ride. A clumsy attempt at 
 a compliment so fired his martial blood that 
 he climbed into his saddle, and then and there 
 insisted on showing off his horsemanship. 
 The road was narrow, the lance was long, and 
 the horse was a big one, but no one objected, 
 and the Englishman sat him down on a doorstep 
 and watched the fun. The horse seemed in 
 some shadowy way familiar. His head v/as 
 not the lean head of the Kathiawar, nor his 
 crest the crest of the Marwarri, and his fore- 
 legs did not belong to these stony districts. 
 " Where did he come from ? " The sowar 
 pointed northward and said, " from Amritsar," 
 but he pronounced it " Armtzar." Many 
 horses had been bought at the spring fairs 
 in the Punjab ; they cost about two hun- 
 dred rupees each, perhaps more, the sowar 
 could not say. Some came from Hissar and 
 some from other places beyond Delhi. They 
 were very good horses. "That horse there," 
 he pointed to one a little distance down the 
 street, "is the son of a big Government horse 
 — the kind that the Sirkar make for breeding 
 horses — so high ! " The owner of " that horse "
 
 Letters of Marque 19 
 
 swaggered up, jaw bandaged and cat-mous- 
 tached, and bade the Englishman look at his 
 mount ; bought, of course, when a colt. Both 
 men together said that the Sahib had better 
 examine the Maharaja Sahib's stable, where 
 there were hundreds of horses, huge as ele- 
 phants or tiny as sheep. 
 
 To the stables the Englishman accordingly 
 went, knowing beforehand what he would find, 
 and wondering whether the Sirkar's " big 
 horses" were meant to get mounts for Rajput 
 sowars. The Maharaja's stables are royal 
 in size and appointments. The enclosure 
 round which they stand must be about half a 
 mile long — it allows ample space for exercis- 
 ing, besides paddocks for the colts. The 
 horses, about two hundred and fifty, are bedded 
 in pure white sand — bad for the coat if they roll, 
 but good for the feet — the pickets are of white 
 marble, the heel-ropes in every case of good 
 sound rope, and in every case the stables are 
 exquisitely clean. Each stall contains above 
 the manger, a curious little bunk for the syce 
 who, if he uses the accommodation, must as- 
 suredly die once each hot weather. 
 
 A journey round the stables is saddening, 
 for the attendants are very anxious to strip 
 their charges, and the stripping shows so 
 much. A few men in India are credited with 
 the faculty of never forgetting a horse they 
 have once seen, and of knowing the produce 
 of every stallion they have met. The English- 
 man would have given something for their
 
 20 Letters of Marque 
 
 company at that hour. His knowledge of 
 horseflesh was very limited ; but he felt cer- 
 tain that more than one or two of the sleek, 
 perfectly groomed country-breds should have 
 been justifying their existence in the ranks 
 of the British cavalry, instead of eating their 
 heads off on six seers of gram and one of 
 sugar per diem. But they had all been honestly 
 bought and honestly paid for : and there was 
 nothing in the wide world to prevent His 
 Highness, if he wished to do so, from sweep- 
 ing up the pick and pride of all the stud-bred 
 horses in the Punjab. The attendants ap- 
 peared to take a wicked delight in saying 
 "eshtudbred" very loudly and with unneces- 
 sary emphasis as they threw back the loin- 
 cloth. Sometimes they were wrong, but in 
 too many cases they were right. 
 
 The Englishman left the stables and the great 
 central maidan, where a nervous Biluchi was 
 being taught, by a perfect network of ropes, 
 to "monkey-jump," and went out into the 
 streets reflecting on the working of horse 
 breeding operations under the Government 
 of India, and the advantages of having un- 
 limited money wherewith to profit by other 
 people's mistakes. 
 
 Then, as happened to the great Tartarin 
 of Tarescon, wild beasts began to roar, and 
 a crowd of little boys laughed. The lions of 
 Jeypore are tigers, caged in a public place for 
 the sport of the people, who hiss at them and 
 disturb their royal feelings. Two or three of
 
 Letters of Marque 21 
 
 the six great brutes are magnificent. All of 
 them are short-tempered, and the bars of 
 their captivity not too strong. A pariah-dog 
 was furtively trying to scratch out a fragment 
 of meat from between the bars of one of the 
 cages, and the occupant tolerated him. Grow- 
 ing bolder, the starveling growled ; the tiger 
 struck at him with his paw, and the dog fled 
 howling with fear. When he returned, he 
 brought two friends with him, and the three 
 mocked the captive from a distance. 
 
 It was not a pleasant sight and suggested 
 Globe-trotters — gentlemen who imagine that 
 " more curricles " should come at their bidding, 
 and on being undeceived become abusive.
 
 22 Letters of Marque 
 
 III. 
 
 And what shall be said of Amber, Queen 
 of the Pass — the city that Jey Singh bade his 
 people slough as snakes cast their skins ? 
 The Globe-trotter will assure you that it must 
 be " done " before anything else, and the 
 Globe-trotter is, for once, perfectly correct. 
 Amber lies between six and seven miles from 
 Jeypore among the tumbled fragments of the 
 hills, and is reachable by so prosaic a con- 
 veyance as a ticca-ghari, and so uncomfortable 
 a one as an elephant. He is provided by the 
 Maharaja, and the people who make India 
 their prey, are apt to accept his services as a 
 matter of course. 
 
 Rise very early in the morning, before the 
 stars have gone out, and drive through the 
 sleeping city till the pavement gives place to 
 cactus and sand, and educational and en- 
 lightened institutions to mile upon mile of 
 semi-decayed Hindu temples — brown and 
 weather-beaten — running down to the shores 
 of the great Man Sagar Lake, wherein are 
 more ruined temples, palaces, and fragments 
 of causeways. The water-birds have their 
 home in the half-submerged arcades and the 
 crocodile nuzzles the shafts of the pillars. 
 It is a fitting prelude to the desolation of 
 Amber. Beyond the Man Sagar the road of
 
 Letters of Marque 23 
 
 to-day climbs up-hill, and by its side runs the 
 huge stone* causeway of yesterday — blocks 
 sunk in concrete. Down this path the swords 
 of Amber went out to kill. A triple wall rings 
 the city, and, at the third gate, the road drops 
 into the valley of Amber. In the half light of 
 dawn, a great city sunk between hills and built 
 round three sides of a lake is dimly visible, 
 and one waits to catch the hum that should 
 arise from it as the day breaks. The air in 
 the valley is bitterly chill. With the growing 
 light, Amber stands revealed, and the traveler 
 sees that it is a city that will never wake. A 
 few 7neenas live in huts at the end of the 
 valley, but the temples, the shrines, the pal- 
 aces, and the tiers-on-tiers of houses are deso- 
 late. Trees grow in and split upon the walls, 
 the windows are filled with brushwood, and 
 the cactus chokes the street. The English- 
 man made his way up the side of the hill to 
 the great palace that overlooks everything 
 except the red fort of Jeighur, guardian of 
 Amber. As the elephant swung up the steep 
 roads paved with stone and built out on the 
 sides of the hill, the Englishman looked into 
 empty houses where the little gray squirrel sat 
 and scratched its ears. The peacock walked 
 on the house-tops, and the blue pigeon roosted 
 within. He passed under iron-studded gates 
 whose hinges were eaten out with rust, and by 
 walls plumed and crowned with grass, and 
 under more gateways, till, at last, he reached 
 the palace and came suddenly into a great
 
 24 Letters of Marque 
 
 quadrangle where two blinded, arrogant stal- 
 lions, covered with red and gold trappings, 
 screamed and neighed at each other from 
 opposite ends of the vast space. For a little 
 time these were the only visible living beings, 
 and they were in perfect accord with the spirit 
 of the spot. Afterwards certain workmen ap- 
 peared, for it seems that the Maharaja keeps 
 the old palace of his forefathers in good repair, 
 but they were modern and mercenary, and 
 with great difficulty were detached from the 
 skirts of the traveler. A somewhat extensive 
 experience of palace-seeing had taught him 
 that it is best to see palaces alone, for the 
 Oriental as a guide is undiscriminating and 
 sets too great a store on corrugated iron roofs 
 and glazed drain-pipes. 
 
 So the Englishman went into this palace 
 built of stone, bedded on stone, springing out 
 of scarped rock, and reached by stone ways — 
 nothing but stone. Presently, he stumbled 
 across a little temple of Kali, a gem of marble 
 tracery and inlay, very dark and, at that hour 
 of the morning, very cold. 
 
 If, as Viollet-le-Duc tells us to believe, a 
 building reflects the character of its inhabit- 
 ants, it must be impossible for one reared in 
 an Eastern palace to think straightly or speak 
 freely or — but here the annals of Rajputana 
 contradict the theory — to act openly. The 
 crampt and darkened rooms, the narrow 
 smooth-walled passages with recesses where 
 a man might wait for his enemy unseen, the
 
 Letters of Marque 25 
 
 maze of ascending and descending stairs lead- 
 ing nowhitlier, the ever-present screens of 
 marble tracery that may hide or reveal so much, 
 — all these things breathe of plot and counter- 
 plot, league and intrigue. In a living palace 
 where the sightseer knows and feels that there 
 are human beings everywhere, and that he is 
 followed by scores of unseen eyes, the impres- 
 sion is almost unendurable. In a dead palace 
 — a cemetery of loves and hatreds done with 
 hundreds of years ago, and of plottings that 
 had for their end, though the graybeards who 
 plotted knew it not, the coming of the British 
 tourist with guide-book and sun-hat — oppres- 
 sion gives place to simply impertinent curiosity. 
 The Englishman wandered into all parts of the 
 palace, for there was no one to stop him — 
 not even the ghosts of the dead Queens — 
 through ivory-studded doors, into the women's 
 quarters, where a stream of water once flowed 
 over a chiseled marble channel. A creeper 
 had set its hands upon the lattice there, and 
 there was the dust of old nests in one of the 
 niches in the wall. Did the lady of light virtue 
 who managed to become possessed of so great 
 a portion of Jey Singh's library ever set her 
 dainty feet in the trim garden of the Hall of 
 Pleasure beyond the screen-work ? Was it in 
 the forty-pillared Hall of Audience that the 
 order went forth that the Chief of Birjooghar 
 was to be slain, and from what wall did the 
 King look out when the horsemen clattered 
 up the steep stone path to the palace, bearing
 
 26 Letters of Marque 
 
 on their saddle-bows the heads of the bravest 
 of Rajore ? There were questions innumer- 
 able to be asked in each court and keep and 
 cell ; but the only answer was the cooing of 
 the pigeons. 
 
 If a man desired beauty, there was enough 
 and to spare in the palace ; and of strength 
 more than enough. With inlay and carved 
 marble, with glass and color, the Kings who 
 took their pleasure in that now desolate pile, 
 made all that their eyes rested upon royal and 
 superb. But any description of the artistic 
 side of the palace, if it were not impossible, 
 would be wearisome. The wise man will visit 
 it when time and occasion serve, and will then, 
 in some small measure, understand what must 
 have been the riotous, sumptuous, murderous 
 life to which our Governors and Lieutenant- 
 Governors, Commissioners and Deputy Com- 
 missioners, Colonels and Captains and the 
 Subalterns, have put an end. 
 
 From the top of the palace you may read if 
 you please the Book of Ezekiel written in stone 
 upon the hillside. Coming up, the English- 
 man had seen the city from below or on a 
 level. He now looked into its very heart— 
 the heart that had ceased to beat. There was 
 no sound of men or cattle, or grindstones in 
 those pitiful streets — nothing but the cooing 
 of the pigeons. At first it seemed that the 
 palace was not ruined at all — that soon the 
 women would come up on the house-tops and 
 the bells would ring in the temples. But as
 
 Letters of Marque 27 
 
 he attempted to follow with his eye the turns 
 of the streets, the Englishman saw that they 
 died out in wood tangle and blocks of fallen 
 stone, and that some of the houses were rent 
 with great cracks, and pierced from roof to 
 road with holes that let in the morning sun. 
 The drip-stones of the eaves were gap-toothed, 
 and the tracery of the screens had fallen out 
 so that zenana-rooms lay shamelessly open to 
 the day. On the outskirts of the city, the 
 strong-walled houses dwindled and sank down 
 to mere stone-heaps and faint indications of 
 plinth and wall, hard to trace gainst the 
 background of stony soil. The shadow of the 
 palace lay over two-thirds of the city and the 
 trees deepened the shadow. " He who has 
 bent him o'er the dead" after the hour of 
 which Byron sings, knows that the features of 
 the man become blunted as it were — the face 
 begins to fade. The same hideous look lies 
 on the face of the Queen of the Pass, and when 
 once this is realized, the eye wonders that it 
 could have ever believed in the life of her. 
 She is the city " whose graves are set in the 
 side of the pit, and her company is round about 
 her graves," sister of Pathros, Zoan, and No. 
 Moved by a thoroughly insular instinct, the 
 Englishman took up a piece of plaster and 
 heaved it from the palace wall into the dark 
 streets. It bounded from a house-top to a 
 window-ledge, and thence into a little square, 
 and the sound of its fall was hollow and echo- 
 ing as the sound of a stone in a well. Then
 
 28 Letters of Marque 
 
 the silence closed up upon the sound, till in the 
 far-away courtyard below the roped stallions 
 began screaming afresh. There maybe deso- 
 lation in the great Indian Desert to the west- 
 ward, and there is desolation on the open seas ; 
 but the desolation of Amber is beyond the 
 loneliness either of land or sea. Men by the 
 hundred thousand must have toiled at the 
 walls that bound it, the temples and bastions 
 that stud the walls, the fort that overlooks all, 
 the canals that once lifted water to the palace, 
 and the garden in the lake of the valley. Re- 
 nan could describe it as it stands to-day, and 
 Vereschaguin could paint it. 
 
 Arrived at this satisfactory conclusion, the 
 Englishman went down through the palace and 
 the scores of venomous and suggestive little 
 rooms, to the elephant in the courtyard, and 
 was taken back in due time to the Nineteenth 
 Century in the shape of His Highness, the 
 Maharaja's Cotton-Press, returning a profit of 
 twenty-seven per cent, and fitted with two en- 
 gines, of fifty horse-power each, an hydraulic 
 press, capable of exerting a pressure of three 
 tons per square inch, and everything else to 
 correspond. It stood under a neat corrugated 
 iron roof close to the Jeypore Railway Station, 
 and was in most perfect order, but somehow it 
 did not taste well after Amber. There was 
 aggressiveness about the engines and the smell 
 of the raw cotton. 
 
 The modern side of Jeypore must not be 
 mixed with the ancient.
 
 Letters of Marque 29 
 
 IV. 
 
 From the Cotton-Press the Englishman 
 wandered through the wide streets till he came 
 into a Hindu temple — rich in marble stone 
 and inlay, and a deep and tranquil silence, 
 close to the Public Library of the State. The 
 brazen bull was hung with flowers, and men 
 were burning the evening incense before 
 Mahadeo ; while those who had prayed their 
 prayer beat upon the bells hanging from the 
 roof and passed out, secure in the knowledge 
 that the god had heard them. If there be 
 much religion, there is little reverence, as 
 Westerns understand the term, at the services 
 of the gods of the East. A tiny little maiden, 
 child of a monstrously ugly, wall-eyed priest, 
 staggered across the marble pavement to the 
 shrine and threw, with a gust of childish 
 laughter, the blossoms she was carrying into the 
 lap of the great Mahadeo himself. Then she 
 made as though she would leap up to the bell 
 and ran away, still laughing, into the shadow 
 of the cells behind the shrine, while her father 
 explained that she was but a baby and that 
 Mahadeo would take no notice. The temple, 
 he said, was specially favored by the Maha- 
 raja, and drew from lands an income of twenty 
 thousand rupees a year. Thakoors and great 
 men also gave gifts out of their benevolence ;
 
 30 Letters of Marque 
 
 and there was nothing in the wide world to 
 prevent an EngHshman from following their 
 example. 
 
 By this time — for Amber and the Cotton- 
 Press had filled the hours — night was falling, 
 and the priests unhooked the swinging jets 
 and began to light up the impassive face of 
 Mahadeo with gas ! They used Swedish 
 matches. 
 
 Full night brought the hotel and its curiously 
 composed human menagerie. 
 
 There is, if a work-a-day world will believe, 
 a society entirely outside, and unconnected 
 with, that of the Station — a planet within a 
 planet, where nobody knows anything about 
 the Collector's Vv^ife, the Colonel's dinner- 
 party, or what was really the matter with the 
 Engineer. It is a curious, an insatiably 
 curious, thing, and its literature is Newman's 
 Bradshaw. Wandering " old arm-sellers " 
 and others live upon, it and so do the garnet- 
 men and the makers of ancient Rajput shields. 
 The world of the innocents abroad is a touch- 
 ing and unsophisticated place, and its very at- 
 mosphere urges theAnglo-Indian unconsciously 
 to an extravagant mendacity. Can you won- 
 der, then, that a guide ofilong-standing should 
 in time grow to be an accomplished liar "i 
 
 Into this world sometimes breaks the Anglo- 
 Indian returned from leave, or a fugitive to 
 the sea, and his presence is like that of a v^^ell- 
 known landmark in the desert. Tlie old arms- 
 seller knows and avoids him, and he is detested
 
 Letters of Marque 31 
 
 by the jobber of gharis who calls every one 
 " my lord " in English, and panders to the 
 " glaring race anomaly " by saying that every 
 carriage not under his control is " rotten, my 
 lord, having been used by natives." One of 
 the privileges of playing at tourist is the 
 brevet-rank of " Lord." Hazur is not to be 
 compared with it. 
 
 There are many, and some very curious, 
 methods of seeing India. One of these is 
 buying English translations of the more Zola- 
 istic of Zola's novels and reading them from 
 breakfast to dinner-time in the veranda. 
 Yet another, even simpler, is American in its 
 conception. Take a Newman's Bradsliaiv and 
 a blue pencil, and race up and down the 
 length of the Empire, ticking off the names of 
 the stations " done." To do this thoroughly, 
 keep strictly to the railway buildings and form 
 your conclusions through the carriage-win- 
 dows. These eyes have seen both ways of 
 working in full blast ; and, on the whole, the 
 first is the most commendable. 
 
 Let us consider now with due reverence the 
 modern side of Jeypore. It is difficult to 
 write of a nickel-plated civilization set down 
 under the immemorial Aravalis in the first 
 state of Rajputana. The red-gray hills seem 
 to laugh at it, and the ever-shifting sand- 
 dunes under the hills take no account of it, 
 for they advance upon the bases of the mono- 
 grammed, coronet-crowned lamp-posts, and 
 fill up the points of the natty tramways near
 
 32 Letters of Marque 
 
 the Waterworks, which are the outposts of 
 the civilization of Jeypore. 
 
 Escape from the city by the Railway Station 
 till you meet the cactus and the mud-bank and 
 the Maharaja's Cotton-Press. Pass between 
 a tramway and a trough for wayfaring camels 
 till your foot sinks ankle-deep in soft sand, 
 and you come upon what seems to be the 
 fringe of illimitable desert — mound upon 
 mound of tussocks overgrown with plumed 
 grass where the parrots sit and swing. Here, 
 if you have kept to the road, you shall find a 
 dam faced with stone, a great tank, and 
 pumping machinery fine as the heart of a 
 municipal engineer can desire — pure water, 
 sound pipes, and well-kept engines. If you 
 belong to what is sarcastically styled an 
 "able and intelligent municipality" under 
 the British Rule, go down to the level of the 
 tank, scoop up the water in your hands and 
 drink, thinking meanwhile of the defects of 
 the town whence you came. The experience 
 will be a profitable one. There are statistics 
 in connection with the Waterworks figures 
 relating to "three-throw-plungers," delivery 
 and supply, which should be known to the 
 professional reader. They would not interest 
 the unprofessional who would learn his lesson 
 among the thronged standpipes of the city. 
 
 While the Englishman was preparing in his 
 mind a scathing rebuke for an erring munici- 
 pality that he knew of, a camel swung across 
 the sands, its driver's jaw and brow bound
 
 Letters of Marque 33 
 
 mummy-fashion to guard against the dust. 
 The man was evidently a stranger to the 
 place, for he pulled up and asked the Eng- 
 lishman where the drinking-troughs were. He 
 was a gentleman and bore very patiently with 
 the Englishman's absurd ignorance of his dia- 
 lect. He had come from some village, with 
 an unpronounceable name, thirty kos away to 
 see his brother's son, who was sick in the 
 big Hospital. While the camel was drinking 
 the man talked, lying back along his mount. 
 He knew nothing of Jeypore, except the 
 names of certain Englishmen in it, the men 
 who, he said, had made the Waterworks and 
 built the Hospital for his brother's son's com- 
 fort. 
 
 And this is the curious feature of Jeypore ; 
 though happily the city is not unique in its 
 peculiarity. When the late Maharaja as- 
 cended the throne, more than fifty years ago, 
 it was his royal will and pleasure that Jey- 
 pore should advance. Whether he was 
 prompted by love for his subjects, desire for 
 praise, or the magnificent vanity with which 
 Jey Singh must have been so largely dowered, 
 are questions that concern nobody. In the 
 latter years of his reign, he was supplied with 
 Englishmen who made the State their father- 
 land, and identified themselves with its prog- 
 ress as only Englishman can. Behind them 
 stood the Maharaja ready to spend money 
 with a lavishness that no Supreme Govern- 
 ment would dream of ; and it would not be 
 3
 
 34 Letters of Marque 
 
 too much to say that the two made the State 
 what it is. When Ram Singh died, Madho 
 Singh, his successor, a conservative Hindu, 
 forbore to interfere in any way with the work 
 that was going forward. It is said in the city 
 that he does not overburden himself with the 
 cares of State, the driving power being 
 mainly in the hands of a Bengali, who has 
 everything but the name of Minister. Nor 
 do the Englishmen, it is said in the city, mix 
 themselves with the business of government ; 
 their business being wholly executive. 
 
 They can, according to the voice of the city, 
 do what they please, and the voice of the city 
 — not in the main roads, but in the little side- 
 alleys where the stall-less bull blocks the 
 path — attests how well their pleasure has 
 suited the pleasure of the people. In truth, to 
 men of action few things could be more de- 
 lightful than having a State of fifteen thou- 
 sand square miles placed at their disposal, as 
 it were, to leave their mark on. Unfortunately 
 for the vagrant traveler, those who work hard 
 for practical ends prefer not to talk about their 
 doings, and he must, therefore, pick up what 
 information he can at second-hand or in the 
 city. The men at the standpipes explain that 
 the Maharaja Sahib's father gave the order 
 for the Waterworks and that Yakub (Jacob) 
 Sahib made them — not only in the city, but 
 out away in the district. " Did the people 
 grow more crops thereby?" " Of course 
 they did. Were canals made only to wash
 
 Letters of Marque 35 
 
 in?" "How much more crops?" ^'Who 
 knows ? The Sahib had better go and ask 
 some official." Increased irrigation means 
 increase of revenue for the State somewhere, 
 but tlie man wlio brought about the increase 
 does not say so. 
 
 After a few days of amateur Globe-trotting, 
 a shamelessness great as that of the other 
 loafer — the red-nosed man who hangs about 
 compounds and is always on the eve of start- 
 ing for Calcutta — possesses the masquerader ; 
 so that he feels equal to asking a Resident for 
 a parcel-gilt howdah, or dropping into dinner 
 with a Lieutenant-Governor. No man has a 
 right to keep anything back from a Globe- 
 trotter, who is a mild, temperate, gentlemanly, 
 and unobtrusive seeker after truth. There- 
 fore he who, without a word of enlightenment 
 sends the visitor into a city which he himself 
 has beautified and adorned and made clean 
 and wholesome, deserves unsparing exposure. 
 And the city may be trusted to betray him. 
 The maUi in the Ram Newas Gardens — 
 Gardens which are finer than any in India and 
 fit to rank with the best in Paris — says that 
 the Maharaja gave the order and Yakub 
 Sahib made the Gardens. He also says that 
 the Hospital just outside the Gardens was 
 built by Yakub Sahib, and if the Sahib will 
 go to the center of the Gardens, he will find 
 another big building, a Museum by the same 
 hand. 
 
 But the Englishman went first to the Hos-
 
 36 Letters of Marque 
 
 pital, and found the out-patients beginning to 
 arrive. A Hospital cannot tell lies about its 
 own progress as a municipality can. Sick folk 
 either come or lie in their own villages. In 
 the case of the Mayo Hospital, they came, and 
 the operation book showed that they had been 
 in the habit of coming. Doctors at issue with 
 provincial and local administrations, Civil 
 Surgeons who cannot get their indents com- 
 plied with, ground-down and mutinous practi- 
 tioners all India over, would do well to visit 
 the Mayo Hospital, Jeypore. They might, in 
 the exceeding bitterness of their envy, be able 
 to point out some defects in its supplies, or 
 its beds, or its splints, or in the absolute inso- 
 lation of the women's quarters from the men's. 
 From the Hospital the Englishman went to 
 the Museum in the center of the Gardens, and 
 was eaten up by it, for Museums appealed to 
 him. The casing of the jewel was in the first 
 place superb — a wonder of carven white stone 
 of the Indo-Saracenic style. It stood on a 
 stone plinth, and was rich in stone-tracery, 
 green marble columns from Ajmir, red marble, 
 white marble colonnades, courts with foun- 
 tains, richly carved wooden doors, frescoes, 
 inlay, and color. The ornamentation of the 
 tombs of Delhi, the palaces of Agra, and the 
 walls of Amber have been laid under contri- 
 bution to supply the designs in bracket, arch, 
 and soffit ; and stone-masons from the Jeypore 
 School of Art have woven into the work tlie 
 best that their hands could produce. The
 
 Letters of Marque 37 
 
 building in essence if not in the fact of to-day, 
 is the work of Freemasons. The men were 
 allowed a certain scope in their choice of de- 
 tail and the result . . . but it should be seen 
 to be understood, as it stands in those Impe- 
 rial Gardens. And, observe, the man who had 
 designed it, who had superintended its erec- 
 tion, had said no word to indicate that there 
 were such a thing in the place, or that every 
 foot of it, from the domes of the roof to the 
 cool green chunam dadoes and the carving of 
 the rims of the fountains in the courtyard, 
 was worth studying ! Round the arches of the 
 great center court are written in Sanskrit and 
 Hindi, texts from the great Hindu writers of 
 old, bearing on the beauty of wisdom and the 
 sanctity of true knowledge. 
 
 In the central corridor are six great frescoes, 
 each about nine feet by five, copies of illustra- 
 tions in the Royal Folio of the Razmnameh, 
 the Mahabharata, which Abkar caused to be 
 done by the best artists of his day. The orig- 
 inal is in the Museum, and he who can steal 
 it will find a purchaser at any price up to fifty 
 thousand pounds.
 
 38 Letters of Marque 
 
 Internally, there is, in all honesty, no 
 limit to the luxury of the Jeypore Museum. 
 It revels in " South Kensington " cases — of 
 the approved pattern — that turn the beholder 
 homesick, and South Kensington labels, 
 whereon the description, measurements, and 
 price of each object are fairly printed. These 
 make savage one who knows how labelling is 
 bungled in some of the Government Museums 
 — our starved barns that are supposed to hold 
 the economic exhibits, not of little States, but 
 of great Provinces. 
 
 The floors are of dark red chunam, overlaid 
 with a discreet and silent matting ; the doors, 
 where they are not plate glass, are of carved 
 wood, no two alike, hinged by sumptuous 
 brass hinges on to marble jambs and opening 
 without noise. On the carved marble pillars 
 of each hall are fixed revolving cases of the 
 S. K. M. pattern to show textile fabrics, gold 
 lace, and the like. In the recesses of the 
 walls are more cases, and on the railing of the 
 gallery that runs round each of the three great 
 central rooms, are fixed low cases to hold 
 natural history specimens and models of fruits 
 and vegetables. 
 
 Hear this, Governments of India from the 
 Punjab to Madras ! The doors come true to
 
 Letters of Marque 39 
 
 the jamb, and cases, which have been through 
 a hot weather, are neither warped nor cracked, 
 nor are there unseemly tallow-drops and flaws 
 in the glasses. The maroon cloth, on or 
 against which the exhibits are placed, is of 
 close texture, untouched by the moth, neither 
 stained nor meager nor sunfaded ; the revolv- 
 ing cases revolve freely without rattling ; 
 there is not a speck of dust from one end of 
 the building to the other, because the menial 
 staff are numerous enough to keep everything 
 clean, and the Curator's office is a veritable 
 office — not a shed or a bath-room, or a loose- 
 box partitioned from the main building. These 
 things are so because money has been spent 
 on the Museum, and it is now a rebuke to all 
 other Museums in India from Calcutta down- 
 w^ards. Whether it is not too good to be 
 buried away in a native State is a question 
 which envious men may raise and answer as 
 they choose. Not long ago, the editor of a 
 Bombay paper passed through it, but having 
 the interests of the Egocentric Presidency 
 before his eyes, dwelt more upon the idea of 
 the building than its structural beauties ; say- 
 ing that Bombay, who professed a weakness 
 for technical education, should be ashamed of 
 herself. And he was quite right. 
 
 The system of the Museum is complete in 
 intention, as are its appointments in design. 
 At present there are some fifteen thousand 
 objects of art, covering a complete exposition 
 of the arts, from enamels to pottery and from
 
 40 Letters of Marque 
 
 brass-ware to stone-carving, of the State of 
 Jeypore. They are compared with similar 
 arts of other lands. Thus a Damio's sword — 
 a gem of lacquer-plated silk and stud-work — 
 flanks the tuliva?'s of Marwar and the jezails 
 of Tonk ; and reproductions of Persian and 
 Russian brass-work stand side by side with 
 the handicrafts of the pupils of the Jeypore 
 School of Art. A photograph of His High- 
 ness the present Maharaja is set among the 
 arms, which are the most prominent features 
 of the first or metal-room. As the villagers 
 enter, they salaam reverently to the photo, 
 and then move on slowly, with an evidently 
 intelligent interest in what they see. Ruskin 
 could describe the scene admirably — pointing 
 out how reverence must precede the study of 
 art, and how it is good for Englishmen and 
 Rajputs alike to bow on occasion before 
 Geisler's cap. They thumb the revolving 
 cases of cloths do those rustics, and artlessly 
 try to feel the texture through the protecting 
 glass. The main object of the Museum is 
 avowedly, provincial — to show the craftsman 
 of Jeypore the best that his predecessors 
 could do, and what foreign artists have done. 
 In time — but the Curator of the Museum has 
 many schemes which will assuredly bear fruit 
 in time, and it would be unfair to divulge 
 them. Let those who doubt the thoroughness 
 of a Museum under one man's control, built, 
 filled and endowed with royal generosity — an 
 institution perfectly independent of the Gov-
 
 Letters of Marque 41 
 
 ernment of India — go and exhaustively visit 
 Dr. Hendley's charge at Jeypore. Like the 
 man who made the building, he refuses to 
 talk, and so the greater part of the work that 
 he has in hand must be guessed at. 
 
 At one point, indeed, the Curator was 
 taken off his guard. A huge map of the 
 kingdom showed in green the portions that 
 had been brought under irrigation, while blue 
 circles marked the towns that owned dispen- 
 saries. " I want to bring every man in the 
 State within twenty miles of a dispensary — 
 and I've nearly done it," said he. Then he 
 checked himself, and went off to food-grains 
 in little bottles as being neutral and color- 
 less things. Envy is forced to admit that the 
 arrangement of the Museum — far too impor- 
 tant a matter to be explained off-hand — is Con- 
 tinental in its character, and has a definite 
 end and bearing — a trifle omitted by many 
 institutions other than Museums. But — in 
 fine, what can one say of a collection whose 
 very labels are gilt-edged ! Shameful extrav- 
 agance ? Nothing of the kind — only finish, 
 perfectly in keeping with the rest of the fit- 
 tings — a finish that we in kutcha India have 
 failed to catch. 
 
 From the Museum go out through the city 
 to the Maharaja's Palace — skilfully avoiding 
 the man who would show you the Maharaja's 
 European billiard-room, — and wander through 
 a wilderness of sunlit, sleepy courts, gay with 
 paint and frescoes, till you reach an inner
 
 42 Letters of Marque 
 
 square, where smiling gray-bearded men 
 squat at ease and play chaupur — just such a 
 game as cost the Pandavs the fair Draupadi — 
 with inlaid dice and gaily lacquered pieces. 
 These ancients are very polite and will press 
 you to play, but give no heed to them, for 
 chaiipur is an expensive game — expensive as 
 quail-fighting, when you have backed the 
 wrong bird and the people are laughing at 
 your inexperience. The Maharaja's Palace 
 is gay, overwhelmingly rich in candelabra, 
 painted ceilings, gilt mirrors, and other evi- 
 dences of a too hastily assimilated civilization ; 
 but, if the evidence of the ear can be trusted, 
 the old, old game of intrigue goes on as mer- 
 rily as of yore. A figure in saffron came out 
 of a dark arch into the sunlight, almost fall- 
 ing into the arms of one in pink. "Where 
 have you come from ? " "I have been to 
 
 see '" the name was unintelligible. " That 
 
 is a lie ; you have notl^^ Then, across the 
 court, some one laughed a low, croaking 
 laugh. The pink and saffron figures sepa- 
 rated as though they had been shot, and dis- 
 appeared into separate bolt-holes. It was a 
 curious little incident, and might have meant 
 a great deal or just nothing at all. It dis- 
 tracted the attention of the ancients bowed 
 above the chaupiir cloth. 
 
 In the Palace-gardens there is even a greater 
 stillness than that about the courts, and here 
 nothing of the West, unless a critical soul 
 might take exception to the lamp-posts. At
 
 Letters of Marque 43 
 
 the extreme end lies a lake-like tank swarm- 
 ing with muggers. It is reached through an 
 opening under a block of zenana buildings. 
 Remembering that all beasts by the palaces 
 of Kings or the temples of priests in this 
 country would answer to the name of 
 " Brother," the Englishman cried with the 
 voice of faith across the water. And the 
 mysterious freemasonry did not fail. At the 
 far end of the tank rose a ripple that grew 
 and grew and grew like a thing in a night- 
 mare, and became presently an aged 77iiigge7\ 
 As he neared the shore, there emerged, the 
 green slime thick upon his eyelids, another 
 beast, and the two together snapped at a cigar- 
 butt — the only reward for theircourtesy. Then, 
 disgusted, they sank stern first with a gentle 
 sigh. Now a mugger's sigh is the most sug- 
 gestive sound in animal speech. It suggested 
 first the zenana buildings overhead, the walled 
 passes through the purple hills beyond, a 
 horse that might clatter through the passes 
 till he reached the Man Sagar Lake below 
 the passes, and a boat that might row across 
 the Man Sagar till it nosed the wall of the 
 Palace-tank, and then — then uprose the 
 mugger with the filth upon his forehead and 
 winked one horny eyelid — in truth he did ! — 
 and so supplied a fitting end to a foolish 
 fiction of old days and things that might 
 have been. But it must be unpleasant to 
 live in a house whose base is washed by 
 such a tank.
 
 44 Letters of Marque 
 
 And so back through the chunamed courts, 
 and among the gentle sloping paths between 
 the orange trees, up to an entrance of the 
 palace, guarded by two rusty brown dogs 
 from Kabul, each big as a man, and each re- 
 quiring a man's charpoy to sleep upon. Very 
 gay was the front of the palace, very brilliant 
 were the glimpses of the damask-couched, 
 gilded rooms within, and very, very civilized 
 were the lamp-posts with Ram Singh's mono- 
 gram, devised to look like V. R., at the bot- 
 tom, and a coronet at the top. An unseen 
 brass band among the orange bushes struck 
 up the overture of the Bfonze Horse. Those 
 who know the music will see at once that 
 that was the only tune which exacted and per- 
 fectly fitted the scene and its surroundings. 
 It was a coincidence and a revelation. 
 
 In his time, and when he was not fighting, 
 Jey Singh, the second, who built the city, was 
 a great astronomer — a royal Omar Khayyam, 
 for he, like the tent-maker of Nishapur, re- 
 formed a calendar, and strove to wring their 
 mysteries from the stars with instruments 
 worthy of a king. But in the end he wrote 
 that the goodness of the Almighty was above 
 everything, and died; leaving his observatory 
 to decay without the palace-grounds. 
 
 From the Bronze Horse to the grass-grown 
 enclosure that holds the Yantr Samrat, or 
 Prince of Dials, is rather an abrupt passage. 
 Jey Singh built him a dial with a gnomon 
 some ninety feet high, to throw a shadow
 
 Letters of Marque 45 
 
 against the sun, and the gnomon stands to- 
 day, though there is grass in the kiosque at 
 the top and the flight of steps up the hypot- 
 enuse is worn. He built also a zodiacal dial 
 — twelve dials upon one platform — to find the 
 moment of true noon at any time of the year, 
 and hollowed out of the earth place for two 
 hemispherical cups, cut by belts of stone, for 
 comparative observations. 
 
 He made cups for calculating eclipses, and 
 a mural quadrant and many other strange 
 things of stone and mortar, of which people 
 hardly know the names and but very little of 
 the uses. Once, said a man in charge of two 
 tiny elephants, Lidur and Har^ a Sahib came 
 with the Viceroy, and spent eight days in the 
 enclosure of the great neglected observatory, 
 seeing and writing things in a book. But he 
 understood Sanskrit — the Sanskrit upon the 
 faces of the dials, and the meaning of the 
 gnoma and pointers. Nowadays no one 
 understands Sanskrit — not even the Pundits ; 
 but without doubt Jey Singh was a great man. 
 
 The hearer echoed the statement, though 
 he knew nothing of astronomy, and of all the 
 wonders in the observatory was only struck 
 by the fact that the shadow of the Prince of 
 Dials moved over its vast plate so quickly 
 that it seemed as though Time, wroth at the 
 insolence of Jey Singh, had loosed the Horses 
 of the Sun and were sweeping everything — 
 dainty Palace-gardens and ruinous instru- 
 ments — into the darkness of eternal night.
 
 46 Letters of Marque 
 
 So be went away chased by the shadow on 
 the dial, and returned to the hotel, where he 
 found men who said — this must be a catch- 
 word of Globe-trotters — that they were " much 
 pleased at " Amber. They further thought 
 that " house-rent would be cheap in those 
 parts," and sniggered over the witticism. 
 There is a class of tourists, and a strangely 
 large one, who individually never get farther 
 than the "much pleased " state under any cir- 
 cumstances. This same class of tourists, it 
 has also been observed, are usually free with 
 hackneyed puns, vapid phrases, and alleged 
 or bygone jokes. Jey Singh, in spite of a few 
 discreditable laches^ was a temperate and tol- 
 erant man ; but he would have hanged those 
 Globe-trotters in their trunk straps as high as 
 the Yantr Samrat. 
 
 Next morning, in the gray dawn, the Eng- 
 lishman rose up and shook the sand of Jeypore 
 from his feet, and went with Master Coryatt 
 and Sir Thomas Roe to " Adsmir,'^ wondering 
 whether a year in Jeypore would be sufficient 
 to exhaust its interest, and why he had not 
 gone out to the tombs of the dead Kings and 
 the passes of Gulta and the fort of Motee 
 Dungri. But what he wondered at most — 
 knowing how many men who have in any way 
 been connected with the birth of an institution, 
 do, to the end of their days, continue to drag 
 forward and exhume their labors and the 
 honors that did not come to them — was the 
 work of the two men who, together for years
 
 Letters of Marque 47 
 
 past, have been pushing Jeypore along the 
 stone-dressed paths of civilization, peace, and 
 comfort. " Servants of the Raj " they called 
 themselves, and surely they have served the 
 Raj past all praise. The people in the city 
 and the camel-driver from the sand-hills told 
 of their work. They themselves held their 
 peace as to what they had done, and, when 
 pressed, referred — crowning baseness — to 
 reports. Printed ones !
 
 48 Letters of Marque 
 
 VI. 
 
 Arrived at Ajmir, the Englishman fell 
 among tents pitched under the shadow of a 
 huge banian tree, and in them was a Punjabi. 
 Now there is no brotherhood like the brother- 
 hood of the Pauper Province ; for it is even 
 greater than the genial and unquestioning 
 hospitality which, in spite of the loafer and 
 the Globe-trotter, seems to exist throughout 
 India. Ajmir being British territory, though 
 the inhabitants are allowed to carry arms, is 
 the headquarters of many of the banking firms 
 who lend to the Native States. The com- 
 plaint of the Setts to-day is that their trade is 
 bad, because an unsympathetic Government 
 induces Native States to make railways and 
 become prosperous. " Look at Jodhpur ! " 
 said a gentleman whose possessions might be 
 roughly estimated at anything between thirty 
 and forty-five lakhs. " Time was when Jodh- 
 pur was always in debt — and not so long ago, 
 either. Now, they've got a railroad and are 
 carrying salt over it^ and, as sure as I stand 
 here, they have a surplus I What can we 
 do ? '' Poor pauper ! However, he makes a 
 little profit on the fluctuations in the coinage 
 of the States round him, for every small king 
 seems to have the privilege of striking his own 
 image and inflicting the Great Exchange
 
 Letters of Marque 49 
 
 Question on his subjects. It is a poor State 
 that has not two seers and five different ru- 
 pees. 
 
 From a criminal point of view, Ajmir is not 
 a pleasant place. The Native States lie all 
 around and about it, and portions of the dis- 
 trict are ten miles off, Native State-locked 
 on every side. Thus the criminal, who may 
 be a burglarious Meena lusting for the money 
 bags of the Setts, or a Peshawari down south 
 on a cold weather tour, has his plan of cam- 
 paign much simplified. 
 
 The Englishman made only a short stay in 
 the town, hearing that there was to be a cere- 
 mony — tamasha covers a multitude of things — 
 at the capital of His Highness the Maharana 
 of Udaipur — a town some hundred and eighty 
 miles south of Ajmir, not known to many 
 people beyond Viceroys and their Staffs and 
 the officials of the Rajputana Agency. So he 
 took a Neemuch train in the very early morn- 
 ing and, with the Punjabi, went due south to 
 Chitor, the point of departure for Udaipur. 
 In time the Aravalis gave place to a dead, 
 flat, stone-strewn plain, thick with dhak- 
 jungle. Later the date-palm fraternized with 
 the dhak, and low hills stood on either side of 
 the line. To this succeeded a tract rich in 
 pure white stone — the line was ballasted with 
 it. Then came more low hills, each with a 
 comb of splintered rock a-top, overlooking 
 dhak-jungle and villages fenced with thorns — 
 places that at once declared themselves tiger- 
 4
 
 50 Letters of Marque 
 
 ish. Last, the huge bulk of Chitor showed 
 itself on the horizon. The train crossed the 
 Cumber River and halted almost in the 
 shadow of the hills on which the old pride of 
 Udaipur was set. 
 
 It is difficult to give an idea of the Chitor 
 fortress ; but the long line of brown wall 
 springing out of bush-covered hill suggested 
 at once those pictures, such as the Graphic 
 publishes, of the Inflexible or the Devastation 
 — gigantic men-of-war with a very low free- 
 board plowing through green sea. The hill 
 on which the fort stands is ship-shaped and 
 some miles long, and, from a distance, every 
 inch appears to be scarped and guarded. But 
 there was no time to see Chitor. The busi- 
 ness of the day was to get, if possible, to 
 Udaipur from Chitor Station, which was com- 
 posed of one platform, one telegraph-room, a 
 bench, and several vicious dogs. 
 
 The State of Udaipur is as backward as 
 Jeypore is advanced — if we judge it by the 
 standard of civilization. It does not approve 
 of the incursions of Englishmen, and, to do it 
 justice, it thoroughly succeeds in conveying 
 its silent sulkiness. Still, where there is one 
 English Resident, one Doctor, one Engineer, 
 one Settlement Officer, and one Missionary, 
 there must be a mail at least once a day. 
 There was a mail. The Englishman, men 
 said, might go by it if he liked, or he might 
 not. Then, with a great sinking of the heart, 
 he began to realize that his caste was of no
 
 Letters of Marque 51 
 
 value in the stony pastures of Mewar, among 
 the swaggering gentlemen who were so lavishly 
 adorned with arms. There was a mail, the 
 ghost of a tonga, with tattered side-cloths and 
 patched roof, inconceivably filthy within and 
 without, and it was Her Majesty's. There was 
 another tonga, — an arafn tonga, a carriage of 
 ease — but the Englishman was not to have it. 
 It was reserved for a Rajput Thakur who was 
 going to Udaipur with his " tail." The Tha- 
 kur, in claret-colored velvet with a blue tur- 
 ban, a revolver — Army pattern — a sword, and 
 five or six friends, also with swords, came by 
 and indorsed the statement. Now, the mail 
 tonga had a wheel which was destined to be- 
 come the Wheel of Fate, and to lead to many 
 curious things. Two diseased yellow ponies 
 were extracted from a dung-hill and yoked to 
 the tonga ; and after due deliberation Her 
 Majesty's mail started, the Thakur following. 
 
 In twelve hours, or thereabouts, the seventy 
 miles between Chitor and Udaipur would be 
 accomplished. Behind the tonga cantered an 
 armed sowar. He was the guard. The Tha- 
 kur's tonga came up with a rush, ran deliber- 
 ately across the bows of the Englishman, 
 chipped a pony, and passed on. One lives 
 and learns. The Thakur seems to object to 
 following the foreigner. 
 
 At the halting-stages, once in every six 
 miles, that is to say, the ponies were carefully 
 undressed and all their accoutrements fitted 
 more or less accurately on to the backs of any
 
 52 Letters of Marque 
 
 ponies that might happen to be near ; the re- 
 leased animals finding their way back to their 
 stables alone and unguided. There were no 
 grooms, and the harness hung on by special 
 dispensation of Providence. Still the ride 
 over a good road, driven through a pitilessly 
 stony country, had its charms for a while. At 
 sunset the low hills turned to opal and wine- 
 red and the brown dust flew up pure gold ; 
 for the tonga was running straight into the 
 sinking sun. Now and again would pass a 
 traveler on a camel, or a gang of Bunjar7-as 
 with their pack-bullocks and their women ; 
 and the sun touched the brasses of their 
 swords and guns till the poor wretches seemed 
 rich merchants come back from traveling with 
 Sindbad. 
 
 On a rock on the right-hand side, thirty- 
 four great vultures were gathered over the 
 carcass of a steer. And this was an evil 
 omen. They made unseemly noises as the 
 tonga passed, and a raven came out of a bush 
 on the right and answered them. To crown 
 all, one of the hide and skin castes sat on the 
 left-hand side of the road, cutting up some of 
 the flesh that he had stolen from the vultures. 
 Could a man desire three more inauspicious 
 signs for a night's travel ? Twilight came, 
 and the hills were alive with strange noises, as 
 the red moon, nearly at her full, rose over 
 Chitor. To the low hills of the mad geolog- 
 ical formation, the tumbled strata that seem 
 to obey no law, succeeded level ground, the
 
 Letters of Marque 53 
 
 pasture lands of Mewar, cut by the Beruch 
 and Wyan, streams running over smooth 
 water-worn rock, and, as the heavy embank- 
 ments and ample waterways showed, very 
 lively in the rainy season. 
 
 In this region occurred the last and most 
 inauspicious omen of all. Something had 
 gone wrong with a crupper, a piece of blue and 
 white punkah-cord. The Englishman pointed 
 it out, and the driver, descending, danced on 
 that lonely road an unholy dance, singing the 
 while : " The dumchi I The dumchil The 
 diwichi! " in a shrill voice. Then he returned 
 and drove on, while the Englishman wondered 
 into what land of lunatics he was heading. At 
 an average speed of six miles an hour, it is 
 possible to see a great deal of the country ; 
 and, under brilliant moonlight, Mewar was 
 desolately beautiful. There was no night 
 traffic on the road no one except the patient 
 sowar, his shadow an inky blot on white, can- 
 tering twenty yards behind. Once the tonga 
 strayed into a company of date trees that 
 fringed the path, and once rattled through 
 a little town, and once the ponies shied at 
 what the driver said was a rock ; but it jumped 
 up in the moonlight and went away. 
 
 Then came a great blasted heath whereon 
 nothing was more than six inches high — a 
 wilderness covered with grass and low thorn ; 
 and here, as nearly as might be midway be- 
 tween Chitor and Udaipur, the Wheel of Fate, 
 which had been for some time beating against
 
 S4 Letters of Marque 
 
 the side of the tonga, came off, and Her 
 Majesty's mails, two bags including parcels, 
 collapsed on the wayside : while the English- 
 man repented him that he had neglected the 
 omens of the vultures and the raven, the low- 
 caste man and the mad driver. 
 
 There was a consultation and an examina- 
 tion of the wheel, but the whole tonga was 
 rotten, and the axle was smashed and the axle 
 pins were bent and nearly red-hot. " It is 
 nothing," said the driver, " the mail often 
 does this. What is a wheel?" He took a 
 big stone and began hammering proudly on 
 the tire, to show that that at least was sound. 
 A hasty court-martial revealed that there was 
 absolutely not one single relief vehicle on the 
 whole road between Chitor and Udaipur. 
 
 Now this wilderness was so utterly waste that 
 not even the barking of a dog or the sound 
 of a night-fowl could be heard. Luckily the 
 Thakur had, some twenty miles back, stepped 
 out to smoke by the roadside, and his tonga 
 had been passed meanwhile. The sowar was 
 sent back to find that tonga and bring it on. 
 He cantered into the haze of the moonlight 
 and disappeared. Then said the driver : 
 " Had there been no tonga behind us, I should 
 have put the mails on a horse, because the 
 Sirkar's mail cannot stop." The Englishman 
 sat down upon the parcels-bag, for he felt 
 that there was trouble coming. The driver 
 looked East and West and said : *' I, too, 
 will go and see if the tonga can be found for
 
 Letters of Marque 55 
 
 the Sirkar's dak cannot stop. Meantime, oh, 
 Sahib, do you take care of the mails — one 
 bag and one bag of parcels." So he ran 
 swiftly into the haze of the moonlight and was 
 lost, and the Englishman was left alone in 
 charge of Her Majesty's mails, two unhappy 
 ponies, and a lop-sided tonga. He lit a fire, 
 for the night was bitterly cold, and only 
 mourned that he could not destroy the whole 
 of the territories of His Highness, the Maha- 
 rana of Udaipur. But he managed to raise a 
 very fine blaze, before he reflected that all 
 this trouble was his own fault for wandering 
 into Native States undesirous of English- 
 men. 
 
 The ponies couched dolorously from time to 
 time, but they could not lift the weight of a 
 dead silence that seemed to be crushing the 
 earth. After an interval measurable by 
 centuries, sowar, driver and Thakur's tonga 
 reappeared ; the latter full to the brim and bub- 
 bling over with humanity and bedding. " We 
 will now,'' said the driver, not deigning to 
 notice the Englishman who had been on guard 
 over the mails, "put the Sirkar's mail into this 
 tonga and go forward." Amiable heathen ! 
 He was going — he said so — to leave the Eng- 
 lishman to wait in the Sahara, for certainly 
 thirty hours and perhaps forty-eight. Tongas 
 are scarce on the Udaipur road. There are 
 a few occasions in life when it is justifiable 
 to delay Her Majesty's mails. This was one 
 of them. Seating himself upon the parcels-
 
 56 Letters of Marque 
 
 bag, the Englishman cried in what was in- 
 tended to be a very terrible voice, but the 
 silence soaked it up and left only a thin trickle 
 of sound, that any one who touched the bags 
 would be hit with a stick, several times, over 
 the head. The bags were the only link be- 
 tween him and the civilization he had so rashly 
 foregone. And there was a pause. 
 
 The Thakur put his head out of the tonga 
 and spoke shrilly in Mewari. The English- 
 man replied in English-Urdu. The Thakur 
 withdrew his head, and from certain grunts 
 that followed seemed to be wakening his re- 
 tainers. Then two men fell sleepily out of the 
 tonga and walked into the night. " Come 
 in," said the Thakur, " you and your bag- 
 gage. My pistol is in that corner ; be care- 
 ful." The Englishman, taking a mail-bag in 
 one hand for safety's sake, — the wilderness 
 inspires an Anglo-Indian Cockney with un- 
 reasoning fear, — climbed into the tonga, which 
 was then loaded far beyond Plimsoll mark, 
 and the procession resumed its journey. 
 Every one in the vehicle — it seemed as full as 
 the railway carriage that held Alice through 
 the Looking-Glass — was Sahib ^.T\d Hazur. 
 Except the Englishman. He was simple turn 
 (thou), and a revolver, Army pattern, was 
 printing every diamond in the chequer-work of 
 its handle, on his right hip. When men 
 desired him to move, they prodded him with 
 the handles of tuhvars till they had coiled him 
 into an uneasy lump. Then they slept upon
 
 Letters of Marque 57 
 
 him, or cannoned against him as the tonga 
 bumped. It was an ara7n tonga, a tonga for 
 ease. That was the bitterest thought of all. 
 
 In due season the harness began to break 
 once every five minutes, and the driver vowed 
 that the wheels would give way also. 
 
 After eight hours in one position, it is ex- 
 cessively difficult to walk, still more difficult 
 to climb up an unknown road into a dak- 
 bungalow ; but he who has sought sleep on an 
 arsenal and under the bodies of burly Raj- 
 puts can do it. The gray dawn brought 
 Udaipur and a French bedstead. As the tonga 
 jingled away, the Englishman heard the famil- 
 iar crack of broken harness. So he was not 
 the Jonah he had been taught to consider 
 himself all through that night of penance ! 
 
 A jackal sat in the veranda and howled 
 him to sleep, and he dreamed that he caught 
 a Viceroy under the walls of Chitor and beat 
 him with a tulwar till he turned into a dak- 
 pony whose near foreleg was perpetually com- 
 ing off and who would say nothing but turn 
 when he was asked why he had not built a 
 railway from Chitor to Udaipur.
 
 58 Letters of Marque 
 
 VII. 
 
 It was worth a night's discomfort and re- 
 volver-beds to sleep upon — this city of the 
 Suryavansi, hidden among the hills that en- 
 compass the great Pichola lake. Truly, the 
 King who governs to-day is wise in his deter- 
 mination to have no railroad to his capital. 
 His predecessor was more or less enlightened, 
 and had he lived a few years longer, would 
 have brought the iron horse through the Do- 
 barri — the green gate which is the entrance 
 of the Girwa or girdle of hills around Udai- 
 pur; and, with the train, would have come 
 the tourist who would have scratched his 
 name upon the Temple of Garuda and laughed 
 horse-laughs upon the lake. Let us, there- 
 fore, be thankful that the capital of Mewar is 
 hard to reach. 
 
 Each man in this land who has any claims 
 to respectability walks armed, carrying his 
 tulwar sheathed in his hand, or hung by a 
 short sling of cotton passing over the shoulder, 
 under his left armpit. His matchlock, or 
 smooth-bore, if he has one, is borne naked on 
 the shoulder. 
 
 Now it is possible to carry any number of 
 lethal w^eapons without being actually danger- 
 ous. An unhandy revolver, for instance, 
 may be worn for years, and, at the end, ac-
 
 Letters of Marque 59 
 
 complish nothing more noteworthy than the 
 murder of its owner. But the Rajput's 
 weapons are not meant for display. The 
 Englishman caught a camel-driver who talked 
 to him in Mewari, which is a heathenish dia- 
 lect, something like Multani to listen to ; and 
 the man, very gracefully and courteously, 
 handed him his sword and matchlock, the latter 
 a heavy stump-stock arrangement without 
 pretense of sights. The blade was as sharp 
 as a razor, and the gun in perfect w^orking 
 order. The coiled fuse on the stock was 
 charred at the end, and the curled ram's-horn 
 powder-horn opened as readily as a much- 
 handled whisky-flask. Unfortunately, igno- 
 rance of Mewari prevented conversation ; so 
 the camel-driver resumed his accoutrements 
 and jogged forward on his beast — a superb 
 black one, with the short curled hubshee hair 
 — while the EngHshman went to the city, which 
 is built on hills on the borders of the lake. 
 By the way, everything in Udaipur is built on 
 a hill. There is no level ground in the place, 
 except the Durbar Gardens, of which more 
 hereafter. Because color holds the eye more 
 than form, the first thing noticeable was neither 
 temple nor fort, but an ever-recurring picture, 
 painted in the rudest form of native art, of a 
 man on horseback armed with a lance, charg- 
 ing an elephant-of-war. As a rule, the ele- 
 phant was depicted on one side the house-door 
 and the rider on the other. There was no 
 representation of an army behind. The fig-
 
 6o Letters of Marque 
 
 ures stood alone upon the whitewash on house 
 and wall and gate, again and again and again. 
 A highly intelligent priest grunted that it was 
 a picture ; a private of the Maharana's regu- 
 lar army suggested that it was an elephant; 
 while a wheat-seller, his sword at his side, 
 was equally certain that it was a Raja. Be- 
 yond that point, his knowledge did not go. 
 The explanation of the picture is this. In 
 the days when Raja Maun of Amber put his 
 sword at Akbar's service and won for him great 
 kingdoms, Akbar sent an army against Mewar, 
 whose then ruler was Pertap Singh, most 
 famous of all the princes of Mewar. Selim, 
 Akbar's son, led the army of the Toork ; the 
 Rajputs met them at the pass of Huldighat 
 and fought till one-half of their band was 
 slain. Once, in the press of battle, Pertap 
 on his great horse, Chytak, came within strik- 
 ing distance of Selim's elephant, and slew the 
 mahout, but Selim escaped, to become Je- 
 hangir afterwards, and the Rajputs were 
 broken. That was three hundred years ago, 
 and men have reduced the picture to a sort of 
 diagram that the painter dashes in, in a few 
 minutes, without, it would seem, knowing 
 what he is commemorating. 
 
 Thinking of these things, the Englishman 
 made shift to get to the city, and presently 
 came to a tall gate, the gate of the Sun, on 
 which the elephant-spikes, that he had seen 
 rotted with rust at Amber, were new and 
 pointed and effective. The City gates are
 
 Letters of Marque 6i 
 
 said to be shut at night, and there is a story 
 of a Viceroy's Guard-of- Honor which arrived 
 before daybreak, being compelled to crawl 
 ignominiously man by man through a little 
 wicket-gate, while the horses had to wait 
 without till sunrise. But a civilized yearning 
 for the utmost advantages of octroi, and not 
 a fierce fear of robbery and wrong, is at the 
 bottom of the continuance of this custom. 
 The walls of the City are loopholed for mus- 
 ketry, but there seem to be no mounting for 
 guns, and the moat without the walls is dry 
 and gives cattle pasture. Coarse rubble in 
 concrete faced with stone makes the walls 
 moderately strong. 
 
 Internally, the City is surprisingly clean, 
 though with the exception of the main street, 
 paved after the fashion of Jullundur, of which, 
 men say, the pavement was put down in the 
 time of Alexander and worn by myriads of 
 naked feet into deep barrels and grooves. In 
 the case of Udaipur, the feet of the passengers 
 have worn the rock veins that crop out every- 
 where, smooth and shiny ; and in the rains 
 the narrow gullies must spout like fire-hoses. 
 The people have been untouched by cholera 
 for four years, proof that Providence looks 
 after those who do not look after themselves, 
 for Neemuch Cantonment, a hundred miles 
 away, suffered grievously last summer. " And 
 what do you make in Udaipur ? " " Swords," 
 said the man in the shop, throwing down an 
 armful of tulwa?'s, kuttars, and khandas on the
 
 62 Letters of Marque 
 
 stones. ** Do you want any ? Look here ! " 
 Hereat, he took up one of the commoner 
 swords and flourished it in the sunshine. 
 Then he bent it double, and, as it sprang 
 straight, began to make it " speak." Arm- 
 venders in Udaipur are a sincere race, for they 
 sell to people who really use their wares. 
 The man in the shop was rude — distinctly so. 
 His first flush of professional enthusiasm 
 abated, he took stock of the Englishman and 
 said calmly : " What do you want with a 
 sword ? " Then he picked up his goods and 
 retreated, while certain small boys, who 
 deserved a smacking, laughed riotously from 
 the coping of a little temple hard by. Swords 
 seem to be the sole manufacture of the place. 
 At least, none of the inhabitants the English- 
 man spoke to could think of any other. 
 
 There is a certain amount of personal vio- 
 lence in and about the State, or else where 
 would be the good of the weapons .'* There 
 are occasionally dacoities more or less impor- 
 tant ; but these are not often heard of, and, 
 indeed, there is no special reason why they 
 should be dragged into the light of an unholy 
 publicity, for the land governs itself in its own 
 way, and is always in its own way, which is 
 by no means ours, very happy. The Thakurs 
 live, each in his own castle on some rock-faced 
 hill, much as they lived in the days of Tod ; 
 though their chances of distinguishing them- 
 selves, except in the school, and dispensary 
 line, are strictly limited. Nominally, they pay
 
 Letters of Marque 63 
 
 chufoo7id, or a sixth of their revenues to the 
 State, and are under feudal obligations to 
 supply their Head with so many horsemen per 
 thousand rupees ; but whether the cJiutoond 
 justifies its name and what is the exact extent 
 of the " tail " leviable, they, and perhaps the 
 Rajputana Agency, alone know. They are 
 quiet, give no trouble except to the wild boar, 
 and personally are magnificent men to look 
 at. The Rajput shows his breeding in his 
 hands and feet, which are almost dispropor- 
 tionately small, and as well shaped as those 
 of a woman. His stirrups and sword-handles 
 are even more unusable by Westerns than 
 those elsewhere in India, whereas the Bhil's 
 knife-handle gives as large a grip as an Eng- 
 lish one. Now the little Bhil is an aborigine, 
 which is humiliating to think of. His tongue, 
 which may frequently be heard in the City, 
 seems to possess some variant of the Zulu 
 click, which gives it a weird and unearthly 
 character. From the main gate of the City 
 the Englishman climbed uphill towards the 
 Palace and the Jugdesh Temple built by one 
 Juggat Singh at the beginning of the last cen- 
 tury. This building must be — but ignorance 
 is a bad guide — Jain in character. From 
 basement to the stone socket of the temple 
 flagstaff, it is carved in high relief with ele- 
 phants, men, gods, and monsters in friezes 
 of wearying profusion. 
 
 The management of the temple have daubed 
 a large portion of the building with whitewash,
 
 64 Letters of Marque 
 
 for which their revenues should be " cut '' for 
 a year or two. The main shrine holds a large 
 brazen image of Garuda, and, in the corners 
 of the courtyard of the main pile, are shrines 
 to Mahadeo, and the jovial, pot-bellied 
 Ganesh. There is no repose in this architec- 
 ture, and the entire effect is one of repulsion ; 
 for the clustered figures of man and brute seem 
 always on the point of bursting into unclean, 
 wriggling life. But it may be that the builders 
 of this form of house desired to put the fear 
 of all their many gods into the hearts of the 
 worshipers. 
 
 From the temple whose steps are worn 
 smooth by the feet of men, and whose courts 
 are full of the faint smell of stale flowers and 
 old incense, the Englishman went to the Pal- 
 aces which crown the highest hill overlooking 
 the City. Here, too, whitewash had been 
 unsparingly applied, but the excuse was that 
 the stately fronts and the pierced screens were 
 built of a perishable stone which needed pro- 
 tection against the weather. One projecting 
 window in the fa9ade of the main palace had 
 been treated with Minton tiles. Luckily it 
 was too far up the wall for anything more than 
 the color to be visible, and the pale blue 
 against the pure white was effective. 
 
 A picture of Ganesh looks out over the 
 main courtyard, which is entered by a triple 
 gate, and hard by is the place where the 
 King's elephants fight over a low masonry 
 wall. In the side of the hill on which the
 
 Letters of Marque 65 
 
 Palaces stand is built stabling for horses and 
 elephants — proof that the architects of old 
 must have understood their business thor- 
 oughly. The Palace is not a " show place," 
 and, consequently, the Englishman did not see 
 much of the interior. But he passed through 
 open gardens with tanks and pavilions, very 
 cool and restful, till he came suddenly upon 
 the Pichola lake, and forgot altogether about 
 the Palace. He found a sheet of steel-blue 
 water, set in purple and gray hills, bound in, 
 on one side, by marble bunds, the fair white 
 walls of the Palace, and the gray, time-worn 
 ones of the city ; and, on the other, fading 
 away through the white of shallow water, and 
 the soft green of weed, marsh, and rank-pas- 
 tured river-field, into the land. 
 
 To enjoy open water thoroughly, live for a 
 certain number of years barred from anything 
 better than the yearly swell and shrinkage of 
 one of the Five Rivers, and then come upon 
 two and a half miles of solid, restful lake, 
 with a cool wind blowing off it and little 
 waves spitting against the piers of a veritable, 
 albeit hideously ugly, boat-house. On the 
 faith of an exile from the Sea, you will not 
 stay long among Palaces, be they never so 
 lovely, or in little rooms paneled with Dutch 
 tiles. 
 
 And here follows a digression. There is 
 
 no life so good as the life of a loafer who 
 
 travels by rail and road ; for all things and 
 
 all people are kind to him. From the chill 
 
 5
 
 66 Letters of Marque 
 
 miseries of a dak-bungalow where they slew 
 one hen with as much parade as the French 
 guillotined Pranzini, to the well-ordered 
 sumptuousness of the Residency, was a step 
 bridged over by kindly and unquestioning 
 hospitality. So it happened that the English- 
 man was not only able to go upon the lake in 
 a soft-cushioned boat, with everything hand- 
 some about him, but might, had he chosen, 
 have killed wild-duck with which the lake 
 swarms. 
 
 The mutter of water under a boat's nose was 
 a pleasant thing to hear once more. Starting 
 at the head of the lake, he found himself shut 
 out from sight of the main sheet of water in 
 a loch' bounded by a sunk, broken bund to 
 steer across which was a matter of some 
 nicety. Beyond that lay a second pool 
 spanned by a narrow-arched bridge built, men 
 said, long before the City of the Rising Sun, 
 which is little more than three hundred years 
 old. The bridge connects the City with Brah- 
 mapura — a white-walled enclosure filled with 
 many Brahmins and ringing with the noise of 
 their conches. Beyond the bridge, the body of 
 the lake, with the City running down to it, 
 comes into full view ; and Providence has ar- 
 ranged for the benefit of such as delight in 
 colors, that the Rajputni shall wear the most 
 striking tints that she can buy in the bazaars, 
 in order that she may beautify the ghats where 
 she comes to bathe. 
 
 The bathing-ledge at the foot of the City
 
 Letters of Marque 67 
 
 wall was lighted with women clad in raw 
 vermilion, dull red, indigo and sky-blue, saf- 
 fron and pink and turquoise ; the water faith- 
 fully doubling everything. But the first im- 
 pression was of the unreality of the sight, for 
 the Englishman found himself thinking of the 
 Simla Fine Arts Exhibition and the overdaring 
 amateurs who had striven to reproduce scenes 
 such as these. Then a woman rose up, and 
 clasping her hands behind her head, looked at 
 the passing boat, and the ripples spread out 
 from her waist, in blinding white silver, far 
 across the water. As a picture, a daringly in- 
 solent picture, it was superb. 
 
 The boat turned aside to shores where huge 
 turtles were lying, and a stork had built her 
 nest, big as a haycock, in a withered tree, 
 and a bevy of coots were flapping and gab- 
 bling in the weeds or between great leaves of 
 the Vict07'ia regia — an " escape " from the 
 State Gardens. Here were divers and waders, 
 kingfishers and snaky-necked birds of the 
 cormorant family, but no duck. They had 
 seen the guns in the boat and were flying to 
 and fro in companies across the lake, or 
 settling — wise things ! — in the glare of the 
 sun on the water. The lake was swarming 
 with them, but they seemed to know exactly 
 how far a twelve-bore would carry. Perhaps 
 their knowledge had been gained from the 
 Englishman at the Residency. Later, as the 
 sun left the lake, and the hills began to glow 
 like opals, the boat made her way to the
 
 68 Letters of Marque 
 
 shallow side of the lake, through fields of 
 watergrass and dead lotus-raffle that rose 
 as high as the bows and clung lovingly about 
 the rudder, and parted with the noise of silk 
 when it is torn. There she waited for the fall 
 of twilight when the duck would come home to 
 bed, and the Englishman sprawled upon the 
 cushions in deep content and laziness, as he 
 looked across to where two marble Palaces 
 floated upon the waters and saw all the glory 
 and beauty of the City, and wondered whether 
 Tod, in cocked hat and stiff stock, had ever 
 come shooting among the reeds, and, if so, how 
 in the world he had ever managed to bowl 
 over. . . . 
 
 " Duck and drake, by Jove ! Confiding 
 beasts, weren't they. Hi ! Lalla, jump out 
 and get them ! " It was a brutal thing, this 
 double-barreled murder penetrated in the 
 silence of the marsh when the kingly wild-duck 
 came back from his wanderings with his mate 
 at his side, but — but — the birds were very good 
 to eat. 
 
 If the Venetian owned the Pichola Sagar 
 he might say with justice : " See it and die." 
 But it is better to live and go to dinner, and 
 strike into a new life — that of the men who 
 bear the hat-mark on their brow as plainly as 
 the well-born native carries the tfisul of Shiva. 
 
 They are of the same caste as the toilers 
 on the Frontier — tough, bronzed men, with 
 wrinkles at the corners of the eyes, g-otten by 
 looking across much sun-glare. When they
 
 Letters of Marque 69 
 
 would speak of horses they mention Arab ponies, 
 and their talk, for the most part, drifts Bom- 
 baywards, or to Abu, which is their Simla. 
 By these things the traveler may see that he 
 is far away from the Presidency ; and will 
 presently learn that he is in a land where the 
 railway is an incident and not an indispensable 
 luxury. Folk tell strange stories of drives in 
 bullock-carts in the rains, of break downs in 
 nullahs fifty miles from everywhere, and of 
 elephants that used to sink for rest and re- 
 freshment half-way across swollen streams. 
 Every place here seems fifty miles from every- 
 where and the legs of a horse are regarded as 
 the only natural means of locomotion. Also, 
 and this to the Indian Cockney, who is ac- 
 customed to the bleached or office man, is 
 curious, there are to be found many veritable 
 "tiger-men " — not story-spinners, but such as 
 have, in their wanderings from Bikaneer to 
 Indore, dropped their tiger in the way of 
 business. They are enthusiastic over prince- 
 lings of little known fiefs, lords of austere 
 estates perched on the tops of unthrifty hills, 
 hard riders, and good sportsmen. And five, six, 
 yes, fully nine hundred miles to the northward, 
 lives the sister branch of the same caste — the 
 men who swear by Pathan, Biluch, and Brahui, 
 with whom they have shot or broken bread. 
 
 There is a saying in Upper India that the 
 more desolate the country, the greater the 
 certainty of finding a Padre-Sahib. The pro- 
 verb seems to hold good in Udaipur, where
 
 70 Letters of Marque 
 
 the Scotch Presbyterian Mission have a post, 
 and others at Todgarh to the north and else- 
 where. To arrive, under Providence, at the 
 cure of souls through the curing of bodies 
 certainly seems the rational method of conver- 
 sion ; and this is exactly what the Missions are 
 doing. Their Padre in Udaipur is also an 
 M. D., and of him a rather striking tale is told. 
 Conceiving that the City could bear another 
 hospital in addition to the State one, he took 
 furlough, went home, and there, by crusade 
 and preaching raised sufficient money for the 
 scheme, so that none might say that he was 
 beholden to the State. Returning, he built his 
 hospital, a very model of neatness and comfort, 
 and, opening the operation-book, announced 
 his readiness to see any one and every one who 
 was sick. How the call was and is now re- 
 sponded to, the dry records of that book will 
 show ; and the name of the Padre-Sahib is hon- 
 ored, as these ears have heard, throughout 
 Udaipur and far around. The faith that sends 
 a man into the wilderness, and the secular- 
 energy which enables him to cope with an ever- 
 growing demand for medical aid, must, in time, 
 find their reward. If patience and unweary- 
 ing self-sacrifice carry any merit, they should 
 do so soon. To-day the people are willing 
 enough to be healed, and the general influence 
 of the Padre-Sahib is very great. But be3^ond 
 that. . . , Still it was impossible to judge 
 aright.
 
 Letters of Marque 71 
 
 VIII. 
 
 In this land men tell '* sad stories of the 
 death of Kings " not easily found elsewhere; 
 and also speak of sati^ which is generally sup- 
 posed to be out of date in a manner which 
 makes it seem very near and vivid. Be 
 pleased to listen to some of the tales, but with 
 all the names cut out, because a King has 
 just as much right to have his family affairs 
 respected as has a British householder paying 
 income tax. 
 
 Once upon a time, that is to say when the 
 British power was well established in the land 
 and there were railways, was a King who lay 
 dying for many days, and all, including the 
 Englishmen about him, knew that his end was 
 certain. But he had chosen to lie in an outer 
 court or pleasure-house of his Palace ; and 
 with him were some twenty of his favorite 
 wives. The place in which he lay was very 
 near to the city ; and there was a fear that his 
 womankind should, on his death, going mad 
 with grief, cast off their veils and run out into 
 the streets, uncovered before all men. In 
 which case nothing, not even the power of the 
 Press, and the locomotive, and the telegraph, 
 and cheap education and enlightened munici- 
 pal councils, could have saved them from the
 
 72 Letters of Marque 
 
 burning-pyre, for they were the wives of a 
 King. So the Political did his best to induce 
 the dying man to go to the Fort of the City, a 
 safe place close to the regular zenana, where 
 all the women could be kept within walls. 
 He said that the air was better in the Fort, 
 but the King refused ; and that he would re- 
 cover in the Fort ; but the King refused. 
 After some days, the latter turned and said : 
 " JV/iy are you so keen, Sahib, upon getting 
 my old bones up to the Fort?" Driven to 
 his last defences, the Political said simply : 
 " Well, Maharana Sahib, the place is close to 
 the road, you see, and ..." The King saw 
 and said : " Oh, f/iafs it ? I've been puzzling 
 my brain for four days to find out what on 
 earth you were driving at. I'll go to-night." 
 *' But there may be some difficulty," began the 
 Political. "You think so," said the King. 
 " If I only hold up my little finger, the women 
 will obey me. Go now, and come back in five 
 minutes, and all will be ready for departure." 
 As a matter of fact, the Political withdrew for 
 the space of fifteen minutes, and gave orders 
 that the conveyances which he had kept in 
 readiness day and night should be got ready. 
 In fifteen minutes those twenty women, with 
 their hand-maidens, were packed and ready 
 for departure ; and the King died later at the 
 Fort, and nothing happened. Here the Eng- 
 lishman asked why a frantic woman must of 
 necessity become a sa/i, and felt properly 
 abashed when he was told that she musf.
 
 Letters of Marque 73 
 
 There was nothing else for her if she went out 
 unveiled. 
 
 The rush-out forces the matter. And, in- 
 deed, if you consider the matter from the 
 Rajput point of view it does. 
 
 Then followed a very grim tale of the death 
 of another King; of the long vigil by his bed- 
 side, before he was taken off the bed to die 
 upon the ground ; of the shutting of a certain 
 mysterious door behind the bed-head, which 
 shutting was followed by a rustle of women's 
 dress ; of a walk on the top of the palace, to 
 escape the heated air of the sick room ; and 
 then, in the gray dawn, the wail upon wail 
 breaking from the zenana as the news of the 
 King's death went in. " I never wish to hear 
 anything more horrible and awful in my life. 
 You could see nothing. You could only hear 
 the poor wretches," said the Political, with a 
 shiver. 
 
 The last resting-place of the Maharanas of 
 Udaipur is at Ahar, a little village two miles 
 east of the City. Here they go down in their 
 robes of state, their horse following behind, 
 and here the Political saw, after the death of 
 a Maharana, the dancing-girls dancing before 
 the poor white ashes, the musicians playing 
 among the cenotaphs, and the golden hookah, 
 sword, and water-vessel laid out for the naked 
 soul doomed to hover twelve days round the 
 funeral pyre, before it could depart on its 
 journey toward a fresh birth. Once, in a 
 neighboring State it is said, one of the danc-
 
 74 Letters of Marque 
 
 ing-girls stole a march in the next world's pre- 
 cedence and her lord's affections, upon the 
 legitimate queens- The affair happened, by 
 the way, after the Mutiny, and was accom- 
 plished with great pomp in the light of day. 
 Subsequently those who might have stopped 
 it but did not, were severely punished. The 
 girl said that she had no one to look to but 
 the dead man, and followed him, to use Tod's 
 formula, "through the flames." It would be 
 curious to know whether sail is altogether 
 abolished among these lonely hills in the 
 walled holds of the Thakurs. 
 
 But to return from the burning-ground to 
 modern Udaipur, as at present worked under 
 the Maharana and his Prime Minister Rae 
 Punna Lai, C. I. E. To begin with, His High- 
 ness is a racial anomaly in that, judged by the 
 strictest European standard, he is a man of 
 temperate life, the husband of one wife whom 
 he married before he was chosen to the throne 
 after the death of the Maharana Sujjun 
 Singh in 1884, Sujjun Singh died childless 
 and gave no hint of his desires as to succes- 
 sion and — omitting all the genealogical and 
 political reasons which would drive a man 
 mad — Futteh Singh was chosen, by the 
 Thakurs, from the Seorati Branch of the family 
 which Sangram Singh II. founded. He is 
 thus a younger son of a younger branch of a 
 younger family, which lucid statement should 
 suffice to explain everything. The man who 
 could deliberately unravel the succession of
 
 Letters of Marque 75 
 
 any one of the Rajput States would be per- 
 fectly capable of explaining the politics of all 
 the Frontier tribes from Jumrood to Quetta. 
 Roughly speaking, the Maharana and the 
 Prime Minister — in whose family the office 
 has been hereditary for many generations — 
 divide the power of the State. They control, 
 more or less, the Mahand Raj Sabha or council 
 of Direction and Revision. This is composed 
 of many of the Rawats and Thakurs of the 
 State, am/the Poet Laureate who, under a less 
 genial administration, would be presumably the 
 Registrar. There are also District Officers, 
 Officers of Customs, Superintendents of the 
 Mint, Masters of the Horses, and Supervisor 
 of Doles, which last is pretty and touching. 
 The State officers itself, and the Englishman's 
 investigations failed to unearth any Bengalis. 
 The Commandant of the State Army, about 
 five thousand men of all arms, is a retired 
 non-commissioned officer, a Mr. Lonergan ; 
 who, as the medals on his breast attest, has 
 done the State some service, and now in his 
 old age rejoices in the local rank of Major- 
 General, and teaches the Maharaja's guns to 
 make uncommonly good practice. The In- 
 fantry are smart and well set up, while the 
 Cavalry — rare thing in Native States — have 
 a distinct notion of keeping their accouter- 
 ments clean. They are, further, well mount- 
 ed on light, wiry Mewar and Kathiawar horses. 
 Incidentally, it may be mentioned that the 
 Pathan comes down with his pickings from
 
 "jb Letters of Marque 
 
 the Punjab to Udaipur, and finds a market 
 there for animals that were much better em- 
 ployed in our service — but the complaint is a 
 stale one. Let us see, later on, what the Jodh- 
 pur stables hold ; and then formulate an 
 indictment against the Government. So much 
 for the indigenous administration of Udaipur. 
 The one drawback in the present Maharaja, 
 from the official point of view, is his want of 
 education. He is a thoroughly good man, 
 but was not brought up with the kingship 
 before his eyes, consequently he is not an 
 English-speaking man. 
 
 There is a story told of him which is worth 
 the repeating. An Englishman who flattered 
 himself that he could speak the vernacular 
 fairly well, paid him a visit and discoursed 
 with a round mouth. The Maharana heard 
 him politely, and turning to a satellite, demand- 
 ed a translation ; which was given. Then said 
 the Maharana : — " Speak to him in Angreziy 
 The Aiigrezi spoken by the interpreter was 
 Urdu as the Sahibs speak it and the English- 
 man, having ended his conference, departed 
 abashed. But this backwardness is eminently 
 suited to a place like Udaipur, and a Euro- 
 pean prince is not always a desirable thing. 
 The curious and even startling simplicity of 
 his life is worth preserving. Here is a speci- 
 men of one of his days. Rising at four — and 
 the dawn can be bitterly chill — he bathes and 
 prays after the custom of his race, and at six 
 is ready to take in hand the first instalment
 
 Letters of Marque 77 
 
 of the day's work which comes before him 
 through his Prime Minister, and occupies 
 him for three or four hours till the first meal 
 of the day is ready. At two o'clock he at- 
 tends the Mahand Raj Sabha, and works till 
 five, retiring at a healthily primitive hour. 
 He is said to have his hand fairly, firmly upon 
 the reins of rule, and to know as much as 
 most monarchs know of the way in which his 
 revenues — some thirty lakhs — are disposed 
 of. The Prime Minister's career has been a 
 chequered and interesting one, including a 
 dismissal from power (this was worked by 
 the Queens from behind the scene), an arrest, 
 and an attack with swords which all but 
 ended in his murder. He has not so much 
 power as his predecessors had, for the reason 
 that the present Maharaja allows little but 
 tiger-shooting to distract him from the super- 
 vision of the State. His Highness, by the 
 way, is a first-class shot and has bagged eigh- 
 teen tigers already. He preserves his game 
 carefully, and permission to kill tigers is not 
 readily obtainable. 
 
 A curious instance of the old order giving 
 place to the new is in process of evolution 
 and deserves notice. The Prime Minister's 
 son, Futteh Lai, a boy of twenty years old, 
 has been educated at the Mayo College, Aj- 
 mir, and speaks and writes English. There 
 are few native officials in the State who do 
 this ; and the consequence is that the lad has 
 won a very fair insight into State affairs, and
 
 78 Letters of Marque 
 
 knows generally what is going forward both 
 in the Eastern and Western spheres of the 
 little Court. In time he may qualify for 
 direct administrative powers, and Udaipur 
 will be added to the list of the States that 
 are governed English fashion. What the end 
 will be, after three generations of Princes and 
 Dewans have been put through the mill of 
 the Rajkumar Colleges, those who live will 
 learn. 
 
 More interesting is the question, For how 
 long can the vitality of a people whose life 
 was arms be suspended? Men in the North 
 say that, by the favor of the Government 
 which brings peace, the Sikh Sirdars are rot- 
 ting on their lands ; and the Rajput Thakurs 
 say of themselves that they are growing rusty. 
 The old, old problem forces itself on the 
 most unreflective mind at every turn in the 
 gay streets of Udaipur. A Frenchman might 
 write : " Behold there the horse of the Rajput 
 — foaming, panting, caracoling, but always 
 fettered with his head so majestic upon his 
 bosom so amply filled with a generous heart. 
 He rages, but he does not advance. See 
 there the destiny of the Rajput who bestrides 
 him, and upon whose left flank bounds the 
 saber useless — the haberdashery of the iron- 
 monger only ! Pity the horse in reason, for 
 that life there is his raison d'etre. Pity ten 
 thousand times more the Rajput, for he has 
 no raison iVetre. He is an anachronism in a 
 blue turban."
 
 Letters of Marque 79 
 
 The Gaul might be wrong, but Tod wrote 
 things which seem to support this view, in 
 the days when he wished to make " buffer- 
 states " of the land he loved so well. 
 
 Let us visit the Durbar Gardens, where little 
 naked Cupids are trampling upon fountains 
 of fatted fish, all in bronze, where there are 
 cypresses and red paths, and a deer-park full 
 of all varieties of deer, besides two growling, 
 fluffy little panther cubs, a black panther who 
 is the Prince of Darkness and a gentleman, 
 and a terrace-full of tigers, bears, and Guzerat 
 lions brought from the King of Oudh's sale.
 
 8o Letters of Marque 
 
 IX. 
 
 Above the Durbar Gardens lie low hills, in 
 which the Maharana keeps, very strictly 
 guarded, his pig and his deer, and anything 
 else that may find shelter in the low scrub or 
 under the scattered boulders. These preserves 
 are scientifically parceled out with high, red- 
 stone walls ; and here and there are dotted 
 tiny shooting-stands — masonry sentry-boxes, 
 in which five or six men may sit at ease and 
 shoot. It had been arranged to entertain the 
 Englishmen who were gathered at the Resi- 
 dency to witness the investiture of the King 
 with the G. C. S. I. — that there should be a 
 little pig-drive in front of the Kala Odey or 
 black shooting-box. The Rajput is a man 
 and a brother, in respect that he will ride, 
 shoot, eat pig, and drink strong waters like an 
 Englishman. Of the pig-hunting he makes 
 almost a religious duty, and of the wine-drink- 
 ing no less. Read how desperately they used 
 to ride in Udaipur at the beginning of the 
 century when Tod, always in his cocked hat 
 to be sure, counted up the tale of accidents 
 at the end of the day's sport. 
 
 There is something unfair in shooting pig; 
 but each man who went out consoled himself 
 with the thought that it was utterly impossible
 
 Letters of Marque 8i 
 
 to ride the brutes up the almost perpendicular 
 hillsides, or down rocky ravines, and that he 
 individually would only go " just for the fun 
 of the thing." Those who stayed behind 
 made rude remarks on the subject of "pork 
 butchers," and the dangers that attended 
 shooting from a balcony. There are ways and 
 ways of slaying pig — from the orthodox method 
 which begins with " Tlie Boar — the Boar — the 
 7nighiy Boar I ^^ overnight, and ends with a 
 shaky bridle-hand next morn, to the sober and 
 solitary pot-shot at dawn, from a railway em- 
 bankment running through river marsh ; but 
 the perfect way is this. Get a large, four-horse 
 break, and drive till you meet an unlimited 
 quantity of pad-elephants waiting at the foot 
 of rich hill-preserves. Mount slowly and with 
 dignity, and go in swinging procession, by the 
 marble-faced border of one of the most lovely 
 lakes on earth. Strike off on a semi-road, 
 semi-hill-torrent path through unthrifty, thorny 
 jungle, and so climb up and up and up, till 
 you see, spread like a map below, the lake 
 and the Palace and the City, hemmed in by 
 the sea of hills that lies between Udaipur and 
 Mount Abu a hundred miles away. Then 
 take your seat in a comfortable chair, in a fine 
 two-storied Grand Stand, with an awning 
 spread atop to keep off the sun, while the 
 Rawat of Amet and the Prime Minister's heir 
 — no less — invite you to take your choice of 
 the many rifles spread on a ledge at the front 
 of the building. This, gentlemen who screw
 
 82 Letters of Marque 
 
 your pet ponies at early dawn after the sounder 
 that vanishes into cover soon as sighted, or 
 painfully follow the tiger through the burning 
 heats of Mewar in May, this is shooting after 
 the fashion of Ouida — in musk and ambergris 
 and patchouli. 
 
 It is demoralizing. One of the best and 
 hardest riders of the Lahore Tent Club in the 
 old days, as the boars of Bouli Lena Singh 
 knew well, said openly: "This is a first-class 
 scheme," and fell to testing his triggers as 
 though he had been a pot-hunter from his 
 birth. Derision and threats of exposure 
 moved him not. " Give me an armchair ! " 
 said he. '* This is the proper way to deal 
 with pig ! " And he put up his feet on the 
 ledge and stretched himself. 
 
 There were many weapons to choose from 
 the double-barreled '500 Express, whose bullet 
 is a tearing, rending shell, to the Rawat of 
 Amet's regulation military Martini-Henri. A 
 profane public at the Residency had suggested 
 clubs and saws as amply sufficient for the 
 work in hand. Here they were moved by 
 envy, which passion was tenfold increased 
 when — but this comes later on. The beat 
 was along a deep gorge in the hills, flanked 
 on either crest by stone walls, manned with 
 beaters. Immediately opposite the shooting- 
 box, the wall on the upper or higher hill made 
 a sharp turn down-hill, contracting the space 
 through which the pig would have to pass to 
 a gut which was variously said to be from one
 
 Letters of Marque 83 
 
 hundred and fifty to four hundred yards across. 
 Most of the shooting was up or down hill. 
 
 A philanthropic desire not to murder more 
 Bhils than were absolutely necessary to main- 
 tain a healthy current of human life in the 
 Hilly Tracts, coupled with a well founded 
 dread of the hinder, or horse, end of a double- 
 barreled '500 Express which would be sure 
 to go off both barrels together, led the Eng- 
 lishman to take a gunless seat in the back- 
 ground. Then a silence fell upon the party, 
 and very far away up the gorge the heated 
 afternoon air was cut by the shrill tremolo 
 squeal of the Bhil beaters. Now a man may 
 be in no sort or fashion a shikari — may hold 
 Buddhistic objections to the slaughter of liv- 
 ing things — but there is something in the extra- 
 ordinary noise of an agitated Bhil, which makes 
 even the most peaceful mortals get up and 
 yearn, like Tartarin of Tarescon for " lions,'' 
 always at a safe distance be it understood. 
 As the beat drew nearer, under the squealing 
 — the " ul-al-lu-lu-lu " — was heard a long- 
 drawn bittern-like boom of " So-oor I " " So- 
 oorl'' (Pig! Pig!) and the crashing of 
 boulders. The guns rose in their places, 
 forgetting that each and all had merely come 
 " to see the fun,'' and began to fumble among 
 the little mounds of cartridges under the chairs. 
 Presently, tripping delicately over the rocks, 
 a pig stepped out of a cactus-bush, and the 
 fusillade began. The dust flew and the 
 branches chipped, but the pig w-ent on — a
 
 84 Letters of Marque 
 
 blue-gray shadow almost undistinguishable 
 against the rocks, and took no harm. " Sight- 
 ing shots," said the guns, sulkily. The beat 
 came nearer, and then the listener discovered 
 what the bubbling scream was like ; for he 
 forgot straightway about the beat and went 
 back to the dusk of an Easter Monday in the 
 Gardens of the Crystal Palace before the 
 bombardment of Kars, " set piece ten thou- 
 sand feet square " had been illuminated, and 
 about five hundred 'Arries were tickling a 
 thousand 'Arriets. Their giggling and noth- 
 ing else was the noise of the Bhil. So curi- 
 ously does Sydenham and Western Rajputana 
 meet. Then came another pig, who was 
 smitten to the death and rolled down among 
 the bushes, drawing his last breath in a hu- 
 man and horrible manner. 
 
 But full on the crest of the hill, blown 
 along — there is no other word to describe it — 
 like a ball of thistledown, passed a brown shad- 
 ow, and men cried: '-^ Bnghccra,'' ox "Pan- 
 ther ! " according to their nationalities, and 
 blazed. The shadow leaped the wall that had 
 turned the pig downhili, and vanished among 
 the cactus. "Never mind," said the Prime 
 Minister's son, consolingly, " we'll beat the 
 other side of the hill afterwards and get him 
 yet." "Oh, he's a mile off by this time," said 
 the guns ; but the Rawat of Amet, a magnifi- 
 cent young man, smiled a sweet smile and said 
 nothing. More pig passed and were slain, 
 and many more broke back through the beat-
 
 Letters of Marque 85 
 
 ers who presently came through the cover in 
 scores. They were in russet green and red 
 uniform, each man bearing a long spear, and 
 the hillside was turned on the instant to a 
 camp of Robin Hood's foresters. Then they 
 brought up the dead from behind bushes and 
 under rocks — among others a twenty-seven- 
 inch brute who bore on his flank (all pigs shot 
 in a beat are ex-officio boars) a hideous, half- 
 healed scar, big as a man's hand, of a bullet 
 wound. Express bullets are ghastly things 
 in their effects, for, as the shikari^ is never tired 
 of demonstrating, they knock the inside of 
 the animals into pulp. 
 
 The second beat, of the reverse side of the 
 hill, had barely begun when the panther re- 
 turned — uneasily as if something were keep- 
 ing her back — much lower down the hill. 
 Then the face of the Rawat of Amet changed, 
 as he brought his gun up to his shoulder. 
 Looking at him as he fired, one forgot all 
 about the Mayo College at which he had been 
 educated, and remembered only some trivial 
 and out-of-date affairs, in which his forefathers 
 had been concerned, when a bridegroom, with 
 his bride at his side, charged down the slope 
 of the Chitor road and died among Akbar's 
 men. There are stories connected with the 
 House of Amet, which are told in Mewar to- 
 day. The young man's face, for as short a 
 time as it takes to pull trigger and see where 
 the bullet falls, was a white light upon all 
 these tales.
 
 86 Letters of Marque 
 
 Then the mask shut down, as he clicked 
 out the cartridge, and, very sweetly, gave it 
 as his opinion that some other gun, not his 
 own, had bagged the panther who lay shot 
 through the spine, feebly trying to drag her- 
 self downhill into cover. It is an awful thing 
 to see a big beast die, when the soul is 
 wrenched out of the struggling body in ten 
 seconds. Wild horses shall not make the 
 Englishman disclose the exact number of 
 shots that were fired. It is enough to say 
 that four Englishmen, now scattered to the 
 four winds of heaven, are each morally cer- 
 tain that he and he alone shot that panther. 
 In time, when distance and the mirage of the 
 sands of Uodhpur shall have softened the 
 harsh outlines of truth, the Englishman who 
 did not fire a shot will come to believe that 
 he was the real slayer, and will carefully 
 elaborate that lie. 
 
 A few minutes after the murder, a two-year- 
 old cub came trotting along the hillside, and 
 was bowled over by a very pretty shot be- 
 hind the left ear and through the palate. 
 Then the beaters' lances showed through the 
 bushes, and the guns began to realize that they 
 had allowed to escape, or had driven back by 
 their fire, a multitude of pig. 
 
 This ended the beat, and the procession re- 
 turned to the Residency to heap dead panthers 
 upon those who had called them "pork 
 butchers," and to stir up the lake of envy with
 
 Letters of Marque 87 
 
 the torpedo of brilliant description. The Eng- 
 lishman's attempt to compare the fusillade 
 which greeted the panther to the continuous 
 drumming of a ten-barreled Nordenfeldt was, 
 however, coldly received. Thus harshly is 
 truth treated all the world over. 
 
 And then, after a little time, came the end, 
 and a return to the road m search of new 
 countries. But shortly before the departure, 
 the Padre- Sahib, who knows every one in 
 Udaipur, read a sermon m a sentence. The 
 Maharana^s investiture, which has already 
 been described in the Indian papers, had taken 
 place, and the carriages, duly escorted by the 
 Erinpura Horse, were returning to the Resi- 
 dency. In a niche of waste land, under the 
 shadow of the main gate, a place strewn with 
 rubbish and shards of pottery, a dilapidated 
 old man was trying to control his horse and a 
 hookah on the saddle-bow. The blundering 
 garron had been made restive by the rush past, 
 and the hookah all but fell from the hampered 
 hands. " See that man," said the Padre, 
 
 tersely. " That's Singh. He intrigued 
 
 for the throne not so very long ago." It was 
 a pitiful little picture, and needed no further 
 comment. 
 
 For the benefit of the loafer it should be 
 noted that Udaipur will never be pleasant or 
 accessible until the present Mail Contractors 
 have been hanged. They are extortionate 
 and untruthful, and their one set of harness 
 and one tonga are as rotten as pears. How-
 
 88 Letters of Marque 
 
 ever, the weariness of the flesh must be great 
 indeed, to make the wanderer blind to the 
 beauties of a journey by clear starlight and in 
 biting cold to Chitor. About six miles from 
 Udaipur, the granite hills close in upon the 
 road, and the air grows warmer until, with a 
 rush and a rattle, the tonga swings through 
 the great Dobarra, the gate in the double circle 
 of hills round Udaipur on to the pastures of 
 Mewar. More than once the Girwa has been 
 a death-trap to those who rashly entered it ; 
 and an army has been cut up on the borders 
 of the Pichola Lake. Even now the genius 
 of the place is strong upon the hills, and 
 as he felt the cold air from the open 
 ground without the barrier, the Englishman 
 found himself repeating the words of one of 
 the Hat-marked tribe whose destiny kept him 
 within the Dobarra. " You must have a hobby 
 of some kind in these parts or you'll die." 
 Very lovely is Udaipur, and thrice pleasant 
 are a few days spent within her gates, but. . . 
 read what Tod said who stayed two years be- 
 hind the Dobarra, and accepted the deserts 
 of Marwar as a delightful change. 
 
 It is good to be free, a wanderer upon the 
 highways, knowing not what to-morrow will 
 bring forth — whether the walled-m niceties of 
 an English household, rich in all that makes 
 life fair and desirable, or a sleepless night in 
 the society of a goods-^/^;/7-booking-office-<rz^w- 
 parcels-clerk, on fifteen rupees a month, who 
 tells in stilted English the story of his official
 
 Letters of Marque 89 
 
 life, while the telegraph gibbers like a maniac 
 once in an hour and then is dumb, and the 
 pariah-dogs fight and howl over the cotton- 
 bales on the platform. 
 
 Verily, there is no life like life on the road — 
 when the skies are cool and all men are kind.
 
 Qo Letters of Marque 
 
 X 
 
 There is a certain want of taste, an almost 
 actual indecency, in seeing the sun rise on 
 the earth. Until the heat-haze begins and 
 the distances thicken, Nature is so very naked 
 that the Actaeon who has surprised her dress- 
 ing, blushes. Sunrise on the plains of Mewar 
 is an especially brutal affair. 
 
 The moon was burnt out and the air was 
 bitterly cold, when the Englishman headed 
 due east in his tonga, and the patient sowar 
 behind nodded and yawned in the saddle. 
 There was no warning of the day's advent. 
 The horses were unharnessed, at one halting- 
 stage, in the thick, soft shadows of night, and 
 ere their successors had limped under the 
 bar, a raw and cruel light was upon all things, 
 so that the Englishman could see every rent 
 seam in the rocks around. A little further, 
 and he came upon the black bulk of Chitor 
 between him and the morning sun. It has 
 already been said that the Fort resembles a 
 man-of-war. Every distant view heightens 
 this impression, for the swell of the sides fol- 
 lows the form of a ship, and the bastions on the 
 south wall make the sponsons in which the 
 machine-guns are mounted. From bow to 
 stern, the thing more than three miles long, 
 is between three and five hundred feet high.
 
 Letters of Marque 91 
 
 and from one-half to one-quarter of a mile 
 broad. Have patience, now, to listen to a 
 rough history of Chitor. 
 
 In the beginning, no one knows clearly 
 who scraped the hillsides of the hill rising 
 out of the bare plain, and made of it a place 
 of strength. It is written that, eleven and a 
 half centuries ago, Bappa Rawul, the demi- 
 god whose stature was twenty cubits, whose 
 loin-cloth was five hundred feet long, and 
 whose spear was beyond the power of mortal 
 man to lift, took Chitor from " Man Singh, 
 the Mori Prince," and wrote the first chapter 
 of the history of Mewar, which he received 
 ready-made from Man Singh who, if the 
 chronicles speak sooth, was his uncle. Many 
 and very marvelous legends cluster round 
 the name of Bappa Rawul ; and he is said to 
 have ended his daj^s far away from India, in 
 Khorasan, where he married an unlimited 
 number of the Daughters of Heth, and was 
 the father of all the Nowshera Pathans. 
 Some who have wandered, by the sign-posts 
 of inscription, into the fogs of old time, aver 
 that, two centuries before Bappa Rawul took 
 Chitor the Mori division of the Pramar Raj- 
 puts, who are the ruling family of Mewar, 
 had found a hold in Bhilwara, and for four 
 centuries before that time had ruled in 
 Kathiawar ; and had royally sacked and slain 
 and been sacked and slain in turn. But these 
 things are for the curious and the scholar, 
 and not for the reader who reads lightly.
 
 92 Letters of Marque 
 
 Nine princes succeeded Bappa, between 728 
 and 106S A. D., and among these was one 
 Alluji, who built a Jain tower upon the brow 
 of the hill, for in those days, though the Sun 
 was worshiped, men were all Jains. 
 
 And here they lived and sallied into the 
 plains, and fought and increased the borders 
 of their kingdom, or were suddenly and 
 stealthily murdered or stood shoulder to 
 shoulder against the incursions of the " Devil 
 men " from the north. In 1150 a. d. was 
 born Samar Singh, and he married into the 
 family of Prithi Raj, the last Hindu Em- 
 peror of Delhi, who was at feud, in regard 
 to a succession question, with the Prince 
 of Kanauj. In the war that followed, Kanauj, 
 being hard pressed by Prithi Raj, and Samar 
 Singh, called Shahabuddin Chori to his aid. 
 At first, Samar Singh and Prithi Raj broke the 
 army of the Northern somewhere in the lower 
 Punjab, but two years later Shahabuddin 
 came again, and, after three days' fighting 
 on the banks of the Kaggar, slew Samar 
 Singh, captured and murdered Prithi Raj, and 
 sacked Delhi and Amber, while Samar Singh's 
 favorite queen became sati at Chitor. But 
 another wife, a princess of Patun, kept her life, 
 and when Shahabuddin sent down Kutbuddin 
 to waste her lands, led the Rajput army, in per- 
 son, from Chitor, and defeated Kutbuddin. 
 
 Then followed confusion, through eleven tur- 
 bulent reigns that the annalist has failed to un- 
 ravel. Once in the years between 1193 and
 
 Letters of Marque 93 
 
 the opening of the fourteenth century, Chitor 
 must have been taken by the Mussulman, for 
 it is written that one prince " recovered Chi- 
 tor and made the name of Rana to be recog- 
 nized by all." Six princes were slain in bat- 
 tles against the Mussulman, in vain attempts to 
 clear the land from the presence of the infidel. 
 Then Ala-ud-din Khilji, the Pathan Emperor 
 swept the country to the Dekkan. In those 
 days, and these things are confusedly set 
 down as having happened at the end of the 
 thirteenth century, a relative of Rana Lakhs- 
 man Singh, the then Rana of Chitor, had 
 married a Rajput princess of Ceylon — Pudmi- 
 ni, *' And she was fairest of all flesh on earth." 
 Her fame was sung through the land by the 
 poets, and she became, in some sort, the Helen 
 of Chitor. Ala-ud-din heard of her beauty and 
 promptly besieged the Fort. When he found 
 his enterprise too difficult, he prayed that he 
 might be permitted to see Pudmini's face in a 
 mirror, and this wish, so says the tale, was 
 granted. Knowing that the Rajput was a 
 gentleman, he entered Chitor almost unarmed, 
 saw the face in the mirror, and was well 
 treated ; the husband of the fair Pudmini 
 accompanying him, in return, to the camp at 
 the foot of the hill. Like Raja Runjeet in 
 the ballad the Rajput he — 
 
 "... trusted a Mussulman's word 
 Wah ! Wah ! Trust a liar to lie. 
 Out of his eyrie they tempted my bird. 
 Fettered his ^v•ings that he could not fly."
 
 94 Letters of Marque 
 
 Pudmini's husband was caught by a trick, and 
 Ala-ud-din demanded Pudmini as the price of 
 his return. The Rajputs here showed that 
 they too could scheme, and sent, in great state, 
 Pudmini's litter to the besiegers' intrench- 
 ments. But there was no Pudmini in the 
 litter, and her following of handmaidens was a 
 band of seven hundred armed men. Thus, in 
 the confusion of a camp-fight, Pudmini's hus- 
 band was rescued, and Ala-ud-din's soldiery 
 followed hard on his heels to the gates of 
 Chitor, where the best and bravest on the 
 rock were killed before Ala-ud-din withdrew, 
 only to return soon after and, with a doubled 
 army, besiege in earnest. His first attack 
 men called the half-sack of Chitor, for though 
 he failed to win within the walls, he killed the 
 flower of the Rajputs. The second attack 
 ended in the first sack and the awful sati of 
 the women on the rock. 
 
 When everything was hopeless and the very 
 terrible Goddess, who lives in the bowels of Chi- 
 tor, had spoken and claimed for the death eleven 
 out of the twelve of the Rana's sons, all who 
 were young or fair women betook themselves 
 to a great underground chamber, and the fires 
 were lit and the entrance was walled up and 
 they died. The Rajputs opened the gates and 
 fought till they could fight no more, and Ala- 
 ud-din the victorious entered a wasted and 
 desolated city. He wrecked everything except 
 only the Palace of Pudmini and the old Jain 
 tower before mentioned. That was all he could
 
 Letters of Marque 95 
 
 do, for there were few men alive of the defenders 
 of Chitor when the day was won, and the 
 women were ashes underground. 
 
 Ajai Singh, the one surviving son of Lakhs- 
 man Singh, had at his father's insistence, 
 escaped from Chitor to " carry on the line '' 
 when better days should come. He brought 
 up Hamir, son of one of his elder brothers, 
 to be a thorn in the side of the invader, and 
 Hamir overthrew Meldeo, chief of Jhalore and 
 vassal of Ala-ud-din, into whose hands Ala- 
 ud-din had, not too generously, given what was 
 left to Chitor. So the Sesodias came to their 
 own again, and the successors of Hamir ex- 
 tended their kingdoms and rebuilt Chitor, as 
 kings know how to rebuild cities in a land 
 wdiere human labor and life are cheaper than 
 bread and water. For two centuries, saith 
 Tod, Mewar flourished exceedingly and was 
 the paramount kingdom of all Rajasthan. 
 Greatest of all the successors of Hamir, was 
 Kumbha Rana who, when the Ghilzai dynasty 
 was rotting away and Viceroys declared 
 themselves kings, met, defeated, took captive, 
 and released without ransom, Mahmoud of 
 INIalwa. Kumbha Rana built a Tower of Vic- 
 tory, nine stories high, to commemorate this 
 and the other successes of his reign, and the 
 tower stands to-day a mark for miles across 
 the plains. 
 
 But the well-established kingdom weakened, 
 and the rulers took favorites and disgusted 
 their best supporters — after the immemorial
 
 96 Letters of Marque 
 
 custom of too prosperous rulers. Also they 
 murdered one another. In 1535 a. d., Baha- 
 dur Shah, King of Gujarat, seeing the decay, 
 and remembering how one of his predecessors, 
 together with ^lahmoud of Malwa, had been 
 humbled by Mewar in years gone by, set out 
 to take his revenge of Time and i\Iewar then 
 ruled by Rana Bikrmajit, who had made anew 
 capital at Deola. Bikrmajit did not stay to 
 give battle in that place. His chiefs were 
 out of hand, and Chitor was the heart and 
 brain of Mewar; so he marched thither, and 
 the Gods were against him. Bahadur Shah 
 mined one of the Chitor bastions, and wiped 
 out in the explosion the Hara Prince of Boon- 
 dee, with five hundred followers. Jowahir 
 Bae, Bikrmajit's mother, headed a sally from 
 the walls, and was slain. There were Frank 
 gunners among Bahadur Shah's forces, and 
 they hastened the end. The Rajputs made a 
 second johur, a sacrifice greater than the 
 sacrifice of Pudmini ; and thirteen thousand 
 were blown up in the magazines, or stabbed 
 or poisoned, before the gates were opened and 
 the defenders rushed down. 
 
 Out of the carnage was saved Udai Singh, 
 a babe of the Blood Royal, who grew up to be 
 a coward, and a shame to his line. The story 
 of his preservation is written large in Tod, 
 and Edwin Arnold sings it. Read it, who 
 are interested. But, when Udai Singh came 
 to the throne of Chitor, through blood and 
 misrule, after Bahadur Shah had withdrawn
 
 Letters of Marque 97 
 
 from the wreck of the Fort, Akbar sat on 
 the throne of Delhi, and it was written that 
 few people should withstand the '^ Guardian 
 of Mankind." Moreover, Udai Singh was the 
 slave of a woman. It was Akbar's destiny to 
 subdue the Rajputs, and to win many of them 
 to his own service ; sending a Rajput Prince 
 of Amber to get him far-away Arrakan. Ak- 
 bar marched against Chitor once, and was 
 repulsed ; the woman who ruled Udai Singh 
 heading a charge against the besiegers because 
 of the love she bore to her lover. Something 
 of this sort had happened in Ala-ud-din's time, 
 and, like Ala-ud-din, Akbar returned and sat 
 down, in a huge camp, before Chitor in 1568 
 A. D. Udai Singh fled what was coming ; and 
 because the Goddess of Chitor demands always 
 that a crowned head must fall if the defense of 
 her home is to be successful, Chitor fell as it 
 had fallen before — in ^.j'oJiur of thousands, a 
 last rush of the men, and the entry of the 
 conqueror into a reeking, ruined slaughter- 
 pen. Akbar's sack was the most terrible of 
 the three, for he killed everything that had 
 life upon the rock, and wrecked and over- 
 turned and spoiled. The wonder, the lasting 
 wonder, is that he did not destroy Kumbha 
 Rana's Tower of Victory, the memorial of the 
 defeat of a Mahometan prince. With the 
 third sack the glory of Chitor departed, and 
 Udai Singh founded himself a new capital, 
 the city of Udaipur. Though Chitor was re- 
 covered in Jehangir's time by Udai Singh's 
 7
 
 98 Letters of Marque 
 
 grandson, it was never again made the capital 
 of Mewar. It stood, and rotted where it stood, 
 till enlightened and loyal feudatories, in the 
 present years of grace, made attempts, with 
 the help of Executive Engineers, to sweep it 
 up and keep it in repair. The above is 
 roughly, very roughly indeed, the tale of the 
 sacks of Chitor. 
 
 FoUov/s an interlude, for the study even of 
 inaccurate history is indigestible to many. 
 There was an elephant at Chitor, to take birds 
 of passage up the hill, and she — she was fifty- 
 one years old, and her name was Gerowlia — ■ 
 came to the dak-bungalow for the English- 
 man. Let not the word dak-bungalow deceive 
 any man into believing that there is even 
 moderate comfort at Chitor. Gerowlia waited 
 in the sunshine, and chuckled to herself like 
 a female pauper when she receives snuff. Her 
 mahout said that he would go away for a 
 drink of water. So he walked, and walked, and 
 walked, till he disappeared on the stone-strewn 
 plains, and the Englishman was left alone with 
 Gerowlia, aged fifty-one. She had been tied 
 by the chain on her near hind leg to a pillar 
 of the veranda ; but the string was coir, and 
 more an emblem of authority than a means of 
 restraint. When she had thoroughly ex- 
 hausted all the resources of the country 
 within range of her trunk, she ate up the 
 string and began to investigate the veranda. 
 There was more coir string, and she ate it all, 
 while the carpenter, who was repairing the
 
 Letters of Marque 99 
 
 dak-bungalow, cursed her and her ancestry 
 from afar. About this time the Englishman 
 was roused to a knowledge of the business, 
 for Gerowlia, having exhausted the string, 
 tried to come into the veranda. She had, 
 most unwisely, been pampered with biscuits 
 an hour before. The carpenter stood on an 
 outcrop of rock, and said angrily : " See 
 what damage your hathi has done. Sahib." 
 " 'Tisn't my hatki,^^ said the Sahib, plaintively. 
 " You ordered it," quoth he, " and it has been 
 here ever so long, eating up everything." He 
 threw pieces of stone at Gerowlia, and went 
 away. It is a terrible thing to be left alone 
 with an unshackled elephant, even though 
 she be a venerable spinster. Gerowlia moved 
 round the dak-bungalow, blowing her nose in 
 a nervous and undecided manner, and pres- 
 ently found some more string and thatch, 
 which she ate. This was too much. The 
 Englishman went out and spoke to her. She 
 opened her mouth and salaamed ; meaning 
 thereby "biscuits." So long as she remained 
 in this position she could do no harm. 
 
 Imagine a boundless rock-strewn plain, 
 broken here and there by low hills, dominated 
 by the rock of Chitor, and bisected by a 
 single metre-gauge railway track running into 
 the Infinite, and unrelieved by even a way-in- 
 spector's trolley. In the foreground put a 
 brand-new dak-bungalow, furnished with a 
 French bedstead, and nothing else ; in the 
 veranda place an embarrassed Englishman,
 
 100 Letters of Marque 
 
 smiling into the open mouth of an idiotic female 
 elephant. But Gerowlia could not live on 
 smiles alone. Finding that no food was forth- 
 coming, she shut her mouth, and renewed her 
 attempts to get into the veranda, and ate 
 more thatch. To say " Hi ! " to an elephant 
 is a misdirected courtesy. It quickens the 
 pace, and if you flick her on the trunk with a 
 wet towel, she curls the trunk out of harm's 
 way. Special education is necessary. A 
 little breechless boy passed, carrying a lump 
 of stone. '•' Hit her on the feet, Sahib," said 
 he ; " hit her on the feet." Gerowlia had by 
 this time nearly scraped off her pad, and there 
 were no signs of the inahoiit. The English- 
 man went out and found a tent-peg, and 
 returning, in the extremity of his wrath smote 
 her bitterly on the nails of the near forefoot. 
 Gerowlia held up her foot to be beaten, 
 and made the most absurd noises — squawked 
 in fact, exactly like an old lady who has nar- 
 rowly escaped being run over. She backed 
 out of the veranda, still squawking, on three 
 feet, and in the open held up near and off 
 forefoot alternately to be beaten. It was 
 very pitiful, for one swing of her trunk could 
 have knocked the Englishman flat. He 
 ceased whacking her, but she squawked for 
 some mmute^i, and then fell placidly asleep 
 in the sunshine. When the mahout returned, 
 he beat her for breaking her tether exactly as 
 the Englishman had done, but much more 
 severely, and the ridiculous old thing hopped
 
 Letters of Marque loi 
 
 on three legs for fully five minutes. " Come 
 along, Sahib," said the mahout. " I will 
 show this mother of bastards who is the driver. 
 Fat daughter of the Devil, sit down. You 
 would eat thatch, would you? How does the 
 iron taste.'"' And he gave Gerowlia a head- 
 ache, which affected her temper all through 
 the afternoon. She set off, across the railway 
 line which runs below the rock of Chitor, into 
 broken ground cut up with nullahs and cov- 
 ered with low scrub, over which it would have 
 been difficult to have taken a sure-footed 
 horse, so fragmentary and disconnected was 
 its nature.
 
 102 Letters of Marque 
 
 XI. 
 
 The Gamberi River — clear as a trout-stream 
 — runs through the waste round Chitor, and 
 is spanned by an old bridge, very solid and 
 massive, said to have been built before the 
 sack of Ala-ud-din. The bridge is in the 
 middle of the stream — the floods have raced 
 round either end of it — and is reached by a 
 steeply sloping stone causeway. From the 
 bridge to the new town of Chitor, which lies 
 at the foot of the hill, runs a straight and well- 
 kept road, flanked on either side by the scat- 
 tered remnants of old houses, and, here and 
 there, fallen temples. The road, like the 
 bridge, is no new thing, and is wide enough 
 for twenty horsemen to ride abreast. 
 
 New Chitor is a very dirty, and apparently 
 thriving, little town, full of grain-merchants 
 and sellers of arms. The ways are barely 
 wide enough for the elephant of dignity and 
 the little brown babies of impudence. The 
 Englishman went through, always on a slope 
 painfully accentuated by Gerowlia who, with 
 all possible respect to her years, must have 
 been a baggage-animal, and no true Sahib's 
 mount. Let the local Baedeker speak for a 
 moment : " The ascent to Chitor, which be- 
 gins from within the southeast angle of the 
 town, is nearly a mile to the upper gate, with
 
 Letters of Marque 103 
 
 a slope of about i in 15. There are two zig- 
 zag bends, and on the three portions thus 
 formed, are seven gates, of which one, how- 
 ever, has only the basement left." This is 
 the language of fact, which, very properly, 
 leaves out of all account the Genius of the 
 Place who sits at the gate nearest the new city 
 and is with the sightseer throughout. The 
 first impression of repulsion and awe is given 
 by a fragment of tumbled sculpture close to a 
 red daubed lingavi^ near the Padal Pol or 
 lowest gate. It is a piece of frieze, and the 
 figures of the men are worn nearly smooth by 
 time. What is visible is finely and frankly 
 obscene to an English mind. 
 
 The road is protected on the cliff side by a 
 thick stone wall, loopholed, for musketry, one 
 aperture to every two feet, between fifteen and 
 twenty feet high. This wall is being repaired 
 throughout its length by the Maharana of 
 Udaipur. On the hillside, among the boulders, 
 loose stones, and dhak-scriib, lies stone wreck- 
 age that must have come down from the brown 
 bastions above. 
 
 As Gerowlia labored up the stone-shod 
 slope, the Englishman wondered how much 
 life had flowed down this sluice of battles, and 
 been lost at the Padal Pol — the last and lowest 
 gate — where, in the old days the besieging 
 armies put their best and bravest battalions. 
 Once at the head of the lower slope, there is 
 a clear rundown of a thousand yards wath no 
 chance of turning aside either to the right or
 
 104 Letters of Marque 
 
 left. Even as he wondered, he was brought 
 abreast of two stone chhatris, each carrying 
 a red daubed stone. They were the graves 
 of two very brave men, Jeenial of Bedmore, 
 and Kalla,who fell in Akbar'ssack fighting like 
 Rajputs. Read the story of their deaths, and 
 learn what manner of warriors they were. Their 
 graves were all that spoke openly of the hun- 
 dreds of struggles on the lower slope where 
 the fight was always fiercest. 
 
 At last, after half an hour's climb, the main 
 gate, the Ram Pol, was gained, and the Eng- 
 lishman passed into the City of Chitor and — 
 then and there formed a resolution, since 
 broken, not to write one word about it for 
 fear that he should be set down as a babbling 
 and a gushing enthusiast. Objects of arch- 
 aeological interest are duly described in an ad- 
 mirable little book of Chitor which, after one 
 look, the Englishman abandoned. One cannot 
 "do" Chitor with a guide-book. The Chap- 
 Iain of the English jNIission to Jehangir said 
 the best that was to be said, when he described 
 the place three hundred years ago, writing 
 quaintly : " Chitor, an ancient great kindgom, 
 the chief city so called which standeth on a 
 mighty high hill, flat on the top, walled about 
 at the least ten English miles. There appear 
 to this day above a hundred churches ruined 
 and divers fair palaces which are lodged in 
 like manner among their ruins, as many Eng- 
 lishmen by the observation have guessed. Its 
 chief inhabitants to-day are Zum and Ohim,
 
 Letters of Marque 105 
 
 birds and wild beasts, but the stately ruins 
 thereof give a shadow of its beauty while it 
 flourished in its pride." Gerowlia struck into 
 a narrow pathway, forcing herself through 
 garden-trees and disturbing the peacocks. An 
 evil guide-man on the ground waved his hand, 
 and began to speak ; but was silenced. The 
 death of Amber was as nothing to the death of 
 Chitor — a body whence the life had been 
 driven by riot and the sword. Men had par- 
 celled the gardens of her palaces and the 
 courtyards of her temples into fields ; and 
 cattle grazed among the remnants of the shat- 
 tered tombs. But over all — over rent and 
 bastion, split temple wall, pierced roof, and 
 prone pillar — lay the " shadow of its beauty 
 while it flourished in its pride." The English- 
 man walked into a stately palace of many 
 rooms where the sunlight streamed in through 
 wall and roof and up crazy stone stairways, 
 held together, it seemed, by the marauding 
 trees. In one bastion, a wind-sown peepul 
 had wrenched a thick slab clear of the wall, but 
 held it tight pressed in a crook of a branch, as 
 a man holds down a fallen enemy under his 
 elbow, shoulder, and forearm. In another 
 place, a strange, uncanny wind sprung from 
 nowhere, was singing all alone among the 
 pillarsof what may have been a Hall of Au- 
 dience. The Englishman wandered so far in 
 one palace that he came to an almost black- 
 dark room, high up in a wall, and said proudly 
 to himself : " I must be the first man who has
 
 io6 Letters of Marque 
 
 been here ; " meaning no harm or insult to any 
 one. But he tripped and fell, and as he put 
 out his hands, he felt that the stairs had been 
 worn hollow and smooth by the tread of 
 innumerable naked feet. Then he was afraid, 
 and came away very quickly, stepping deli- 
 cately over fallen friezes and bits of sculptured 
 men, so as not to offend the Dead ; and was 
 mightily relieved when he recovered his ele- 
 phant and allowed the guide to take him to 
 Kumbha Rana's Tower of Victory. 
 
 This stands, like all things in Chitor, 
 among ruins, but time and the other enemies 
 have been good to it. It is a Jain edifice, nine 
 stories high, crowned atop — was this designed 
 insult or undesigned repair .'' — with a purely 
 Mahometan dome, where the pigeons and the 
 bats live. Excepting this blemish, the Tower 
 of Victory is nearly as fair as when it left the 
 hands of the builder whose name has not 
 been handed down to us. It is to be observed 
 here that the first, or more ruined. Tower 
 of Victory, built in AUuji's days, when Chitor 
 was comparatively young, was raised by some 
 pious Jain as proof of conquest over things 
 spiritual. The second tower is more worldly 
 in intent. 
 
 Those w^ho care to look, may find elsewhere 
 a definition of its architecture and its more 
 striking peculiarities. It was in kind, but not 
 in degree, like the Jugdesh Temple at Udaipur, 
 and, as it exceeded it in magnificence, so its 
 effect upon the mind was more intense. The
 
 Letters of Marque 107 
 
 confusing intricacy of the figures with which it 
 was wreathed from top to bottom, the recur- 
 rence of the one calm face, the God en- 
 throned, holding the Wheel of the Law, and 
 the appalling lavishness of decoration, all 
 worked toward the instilment of fear and 
 aversion. 
 
 Surely this must have been one of the objects 
 of the architect. The tower, in the arrange- 
 ment of its stairways, is like the interior of a 
 Chinese carved ivory puzzle-ball. The idea 
 given is that, even while you are ascending, you 
 are wrapping yourself deeper and deeper in the 
 tangle of a mighty maze. Add to this the half- 
 light, the thronging armies of sculptured figures, 
 the mad profusion of design splashed as impar- 
 tially upon the undersides of the stone window- 
 slabs as upon the door-beam of the thres- 
 hold — add, most abhorrent of all, the slippery 
 sliminess of the walls, always worn smooth by 
 naked men, and you will understand that the 
 tower is not a soothing place to visit. The 
 Englishman fancied presumptuously, that he 
 had, in a way, grasped the builder's idea ; and 
 when he came to the top story and sat among 
 the pigeons his theory was this : To attain 
 power, wrote the builder of old, in sentences of 
 fine stone, it is necessary to pass through all 
 sorts of close-packed horrors, treacheries, 
 battles, and insults, in darkness and without 
 knowledge whether the road leads upward or 
 into a hopeless cul-de-sac. Kumbha Ran a 
 must many times have climbed to the top story,
 
 io8 Letters of Marque 
 
 and looked out toward the uplands of Alalwa 
 on the one side and his own great Mewar on 
 the other, in the days when all the rock 
 hummed with life and the clatter of hooves 
 upon the stony ways, and Mahmoudof Malwa 
 was safe in hold. How he must have swelled 
 with pride — fine insolent pride of life and rule 
 and power — power not only to break things 
 but to compel such builders as those who piled 
 the tower to his royal will ! There was no 
 decoration in the top story to bewilder or 
 amaze — nothing but well-grooved stone-slabs, 
 and a boundless view fit for kings who traced 
 their ancestry — 
 
 " From times when forth from the sunUght, the first of 
 our Kings came down, 
 And had the earth for his footstool, and wore the 
 stars for his crown." 
 
 The builder had left no mark behind him — 
 not even a mark on the threshold of the door, 
 or a sign in the head of the topmost step. 
 The Englishman looked in both places, be- 
 lieving that those were the places generally 
 chosen for mark-cutting. So he sat and 
 meditated on the beauties of kingship and the 
 unholiness of Hindu art, and what power a 
 shadowland of lewd monstrosities had upon 
 those who believed in it, and what Lord Duf- 
 ferin, w^ho is the nearest approach to a king in 
 this India, must have thought when aide-de- 
 camps clanked after him up the narrow steps. 
 But the day was wearing, and he came down — 
 in both senses — and, in his descent, the carven
 
 Letters of Marque 109 
 
 things on every side of the tower, and above 
 and below, once more took hold of and per- 
 verted his fancy, so that he arrived at the 
 bottom in a frame of mind eminently fitted 
 for a descent into the Gau-Mukh, which is 
 nothing- more terrible than a little spring, 
 falling into a reservoir, in the side of the hill. 
 He stumbled across more ruins and passed 
 between tombs of dead Ranis, till he came to 
 a flight of steps, built out and cut out from 
 rock, going down as far as he could see into 
 a growth of trees on a terrace below him. 
 The stone of the steps had been worn and 
 polished by the terrible naked feet till it 
 showed its markings clearly as agate ; and 
 where the steps ended in a rock-slope, there 
 was a visible glair, a great snail-track, upon 
 the rocks. It was hard to keep safe footing 
 upon the sliminess. The air was thick with 
 the sick smell of stale incense, and grains of 
 rice were scattered upon the steps. But there 
 was no one to be seen. Now this in itself 
 was not specially alarming ; but the Genius of 
 the Place must be responsible for making it 
 so. The Englishman slipped and bumped on 
 the rocks, and arrived, more suddenly than he 
 desired, upon the edge of a dull blue tank, 
 sunk between walls of timeless masonry. In 
 a slabbed-in recess, water was pouring through 
 a shapeless stone gargoyle, into a trough ; 
 which trough again dripped into the tank. 
 Almost under the little trickle of water, was 
 the loathsome Emblem of Creation, and there
 
 no Letters ot Marque 
 
 were flowers and rice around it. Water was 
 trickling from a score of places in the cut face 
 of the hill ; oozing between the edges of the 
 steps and welling up between the stone slabs 
 of the terrace. Trees sprouted in the sides 
 of the tank and hid its surroundings. It 
 seemed as though the descent had led the 
 Englishman, firstly, two thousand years away 
 from his own century, and secondly, into a 
 trap, and that he would fall off the polished 
 stones into the stinking tank, or that the Gau- 
 Mukh would continue to pour water until the 
 tank rose up and swamped him, or that some 
 of the stone slabs would fall forward and 
 crush him flat. 
 
 Then he was conscious of remembering, 
 with peculiar and unnecessary distinctness, 
 that, from the Gau-Mukh, a passage led to the 
 subterranean chambers in which the fair Pud- 
 mini and her handmaids had slain themselves. 
 And, that Tod had written and the Station- 
 master at Chitor had said, that some sort of 
 devil, or ghoul, or Something, stood at the 
 entrance of that approach. All of which was 
 a nightmare bred in full day and folly to boot ; 
 but it was the fault of the Genius of the Place, 
 who made the Englishman feel that he had 
 done a great wrong in trespassing into the 
 very heart and soul of all Chitor. And, be- 
 hind him, the Gau-Mukh guggled and choked 
 like a man in his death-throe. The English- 
 man endured as long as he could— about two 
 minutes. Then it came upon him that he
 
 Letters of Marque in 
 
 must go quickly out of this place of years and 
 blood — must get back to the afternoon sun- 
 shine, and Gerowlia, and the dak-bungalow 
 with the French bedstead. He desired no 
 archaeological information, he wished to take 
 no notes, and, above all, he did not care to 
 look behind him, where stood the reminder 
 that he was no better than the beasts that 
 perish. But he had to cross the smooth, worn 
 rocks, and he felt their sliminess through his 
 bootsoles. It was as though he were treading 
 on the soft, oiled skin of a Hindu. As soon 
 as the steps gave refuge, he floundered up 
 them, and so came out of the Gau-Mukh, be- 
 dewed with that perspiration which follows 
 alike on honest toil or — childish fear. 
 
 " This," said he to himself, " is absurd ! " 
 and sat down on the fallen top of a temple to 
 review the situation. But the Gau-Mukh had 
 disappeared. He could see the dip in the 
 ground and the beginning of the steps, but 
 nothing more. 
 
 Perhaps it was absurd. It undoubtedly 
 appeared so, later. Yet there was something 
 uncanny about it all. It was not exactly a 
 feeling of danger or pain, but an apprehension 
 of great evil. 
 
 In defense, it may be urged that there is 
 moral, just as much as there is mine, choke- 
 damp. If you get into a place laden with the 
 latter you die, and if into the home of the 
 former you . . . behave unwisely, as con- 
 stitution and temperament prompt. If any
 
 112 Letters of Marque 
 
 man doubt this, let him sit for two hours in a 
 hot sun on an elephant, stay half an hour in 
 the Tower of Victory, and then go down into 
 the Gau-Mukh, which, it must never be for- 
 gotten, is merely a set of springs " three or 
 four in number, issuing from the cliff face at 
 cow-mouth carvings, now mutilated. The 
 water, evidently percolating from the Hathi 
 Kund above, falls first in an old pillared hall 
 and thence into the masonry reservoir below, 
 eventually, when abundant enough, supplying 
 a little waterfall lower down. " That, Gentle- 
 men and Ladies, on the honor of one who has 
 been frightened of the dark in broad daylight, 
 is the Gau-Mukh, as though photographed. 
 
 The Englishman regained Gerowlia and de- 
 manded to be taken away, but Gerowlia's 
 driver went forward instead and showed him 
 a new Mahal just built by the present Maha- 
 rana. Carriage drives, however, do not con- 
 sort well with Chitor and the "shadow of her 
 ancient beauty." The return journey, past 
 temple after temple and palace upon palace, 
 began in the failing light, and Gerowlia was 
 still blundering up and down narrow by- 
 paths — for she possessed all an old woman's 
 delusion as to the slimness of her waist when 
 the twilight fell, and the smoke from the town 
 below began to creep up the brown flanks of 
 Chitor, and the jackals howled. Then the 
 sense of desolation, which had been strong 
 enough in all conscience in the sunshine, be- 
 gan to grow and grow.
 
 Letters of Marque 113 
 
 Near the Ram Pol there was some semblance 
 of a town with living people in it, and a priest 
 sat in the middle of the road and howled aloud 
 upon his gods, until a little boy came and 
 laughed in his face and he went away grum- 
 bling. This touch was deeply refreshing ; in 
 the contemplation of it, the Englishman clean 
 forgot that he had overlooked the gathering 
 in of materials for an elaborate statistical, his- 
 torical, geographical account of Chitor. All 
 that remained to him was a shuddering rem- 
 iniscence of the Gau-Mukh and two lines of 
 the " Holy Grail," 
 
 " And up into the sounding halls he passed, 
 But nothing in the sounding halls he saw." 
 
 Post Scrlptum. — There was something very 
 uncanny about the Genius of the Place. He 
 dragged an ease-loving egotist out of the 
 French bedstead with the gilt knobs at head 
 and foot, into a more than usually big folly — 
 nothing less than a seeing of Chitor by moon- 
 light. There was no possibility of getting 
 Gerowlia out of her bed, and a mistrust of the 
 Maharana's soldiery who in the daytime 
 guarded the gates, prompted the Englishman 
 to avoid the public way, and scramble straight 
 up the hillside, along an attempt at a path 
 which he had noted from Gerowlia's back. 
 There was no one to interfere, and nothing 
 but an infinity of pestilent nullahs and loose 
 stones to check. Owls came out and hooted
 
 114 Letters of Marque 
 
 at him, and animals ran about in the dark and 
 made uncouth noises. It was an idiotic jour- 
 ney, and it ended — Oh, horror ! in that un- 
 speakable Gau-Mukh — this time entered from 
 the opposite or brushwooded side, as far as 
 could be made out in the dusk and from the 
 chuckle of the water which, by night, was 
 peculiarly malevolent. 
 
 Escaping from this place, crab-fashion, the 
 Englishman crawled into Chitor and sat upon 
 a fiat tomb till the moon, a very inferior and 
 second-hand one, rose, and turned the city of 
 the dead into a city of scurrying ghouls — in 
 sobriety, jackals. The ruins took strange 
 shapes and shifted in the half light and cast 
 objectionable shadows. 
 
 It was easy enough to fill the rock with the 
 people of old times, and a very beautiful 
 account of Chitor restored, made out by the 
 help of Tod, and bristling with the names of 
 the illustrious dead, would undoubtedly have 
 been written, had not a woman, a living 
 breathing woman, stolen out of a temple — 
 what was she doing in that galley? — and 
 screamed in piercing and public-spirited fash- 
 ion. The Englishman got off the tomb and 
 departed rather more noisily than a jackal ; 
 feeling for the moment that he was not much 
 better. Somebody opened a door with a 
 crash, and a man cried out : " Who is there ? '* 
 But the cause of the disturbance was, for his 
 sins, being most horribly scratched by some 
 thorny scrub over the edge of the hill — there
 
 Letters of Marque 115 
 
 are no bastions worth speaking of near the 
 Gau-Mukh — and the rest was partly rolling, 
 partly scrambling, and mainly bad language. 
 
 When you are too lucky sacrifice something, 
 a beloved pipe for choice, to Ganesh. The 
 Englishman has seen Chitor by moonlight — 
 not the best moonlight truly, but the watery 
 glare of a nearly spent moon — and his sacri- 
 fice to Luck is this. He will never try to 
 describe what he has seen — but will keep it 
 as a love-letter, a thing for one pair of eyes 
 only — a memory that few men to-day can be 
 sharers in. And does he, through this fiction, 
 evade insulting, by pen and ink, a scene as 
 lovely, wild, and unmatchable as any that 
 mortal eyes have been privileged to rest 
 upon ? 
 
 An intelligent and discriminating public are 
 perfectly at liberty to form their own opinions.
 
 ii6 Letters of Marque 
 
 XII. 
 
 Come away from the monstrous gloom of 
 Chitor and escape northwards. The place is 
 unclean and terrifying. Let us catch To-day 
 by both hands and return to the Station- 
 master who is also booking- parcels and tele- 
 graph-clerk, and who never seems to go to 
 bed — and to the comfortably wadded bunks 
 of the Rajputana-Malwa line. 
 
 While the train is running, be pleased to 
 listen to the perfectly true story of the bJui^iia 
 of Jhaswara, which is a story the sequel 
 whereof has yet to be written. Once upon a 
 time, a Rajput landholder, a hhumia, and a 
 Mahometan Jaghirdar, were next-door neigh- 
 bors in Ajmir territory. They hated each 
 other thoroughly for many reasons, all con- 
 nected with land ; and X\\^ jaghirdar was the 
 bigger man of the two. In those days, it was 
 the law that the victims of robbery or dacoity 
 should be reimbursed by the owner of the 
 lands on which the affair had taken place. 
 The ordinance is now swept away as imprac- 
 ticable. There w^as a highway robbery on 
 the hhimiia's holding ; and he vowed that it 
 had been " put up " by the Mahometan who, 
 he said, was an Ahab. The reive-gelt payable 
 nearly ruined the Rajput, and he, laboring 
 under a galling grievance or a groundless sus-
 
 Letters of Marque 117 
 
 picion, fired thejaghirdar's crops, was detected 
 and brought up before the English Judge who 
 gave him four years' imprisonment. To the 
 sentence was appended a recommendation 
 that, on release, the Rajput should be put on 
 heavy securities for good behavior. " Other- 
 wise," wrote the Judge, who seems to have 
 known the people he was dealing with, " he 
 will certainly kill \.hQ Jaghirdar." Four years 
 passed, and the jaghirdar obtamed wealth 
 and consideration, and was made, let us say, 
 a Khan Bahadur, and an Honorary Magis- 
 trate ; but the bhumia remained in jail and 
 thought over the highway robbery. When 
 the day of release came, a new Judge hunted 
 up his predecessor's finding and recommen- 
 dation, and would have put the hhumia on 
 security. " Sahib," said the bhtcmia, " I have 
 no people. I have been in jail. What am I 
 now ? And who will find security for me ? 
 If you will send me back to jail again I can 
 do nothing, and I have no friends." So they 
 released him, and he went away into an out- 
 lying village and borrowed a sword from one 
 house, and had it sharpened in another, for 
 love. Two days later fell the birthday of the 
 Khan Bahadur and the Honorary Magistrate, 
 and his friends and servants and dependants 
 made a little levee and did him honor after 
 the native custom. The bhumia also attended 
 the levee, but no one knew him, and he was 
 stopped at the door of the courtyard by the 
 servant. " Say that the bhumia of Jhaswara
 
 ii8 Letters of Marque 
 
 has come to pay his salaams," said he. They 
 let him in, and in the heart of Ajmir City, in 
 broad daylight, and before all the jaghirdar^s 
 household, he smote off his enemy's head so 
 that it rolled upon the ground. Then he fled, 
 and though they raised the countryside against 
 him he was never caught, and went into 
 Bikanir. 
 
 Five years later, word came to Ajmir that 
 Chimbo Singh, the bhurnia of Jhaswara, had 
 taken service under the Thakur Sahib of Pal- 
 itana. The case was an old one, and the 
 chances of identification misty, but the sus- 
 pected was caught and brought in, and one 
 of the leading native barristers of the Bombay 
 Bar was retained to defend him. He said 
 nothing and continued to say nothing, and 
 the case fell through. He is believed to be 
 *' wanted " now for a fresh murder committed 
 within the last few months, out Bikanir way. 
 
 And now that the train has reached Ajmir, 
 the Crewe of Rajputana, whither shall a tramp 
 turn his feet ? The Englishman, set his stick 
 on end, and it fell with its point Northwest as 
 nearly as might be. This being translated, 
 meant Jodhpur, which is the city of the 
 Houyhnhnms. If you would enjoy Jodhpur 
 thoroughly, quit at Ajmir the decent conven- 
 tionalities of " station " life, and make it your 
 business to move among gentlemen — gentle- 
 men in the Ordnance or the Commissariat, or 
 better still, gentlemen on the Railway. At 
 Ajmir, gentlemen will tell you what manner
 
 Letters of Marque 119 
 
 of place Jodhpur is, and their accounts, though 
 flavored with oaths, are amusing. In their 
 eyes the desert that rings the city has no 
 charms, and they discuss affairs of the State, 
 as they understand them, in a manner that 
 would curl the hair on a Political's august 
 head. Jodhpur has been, but things are 
 rather better now, a much-favored camping 
 ground for the light-cavalry of the Road — the 
 loafers with a certain amount of brain and 
 great assurance. The explanation is simple. 
 There are more than four hundred horses in 
 His Highness's city stables alone ; and where 
 the Houyhnhnm is, there also will be the 
 Yahoo. This is sad but true. 
 
 Besides the Uhlans who come and go on 
 Heaven knows what mysterious errands, there 
 are bagmen traveling for the big English 
 firms. Jodhpur is a good customer, and pur- 
 chases all sorts of things, more or less useful, 
 for the State or its friends. These are the 
 gentlemen to know, if you would understand 
 something of matters which are not written in 
 reports. 
 
 The Englishman took a train from Ajmir to 
 Marwar Junction, which is on the road to 
 Mount Abu, westward from Ajmir, and at five 
 in the morning, under pale moonlight, was 
 uncarted at the beginning of the Jodhpur 
 State Railway — one of the quaintest little lines 
 that ever ran a locomotive. It is the Maha- 
 raja's very own, and pays about ten per cent ; 
 but its quaintness does not lie in these things.
 
 120 Letters of Marque 
 
 It is worked with rude economy, and started 
 life by singularly and completely falsifying 
 the Government estimates for its construction. 
 An intelligent bureau asserted that it could 
 not be laid down for less than — but the error 
 shall be glossed over. It was laid down for a 
 little more than seventeen thousand rupees a 
 mile, with the help of second-hand rails and 
 sleepers; and it is currently asserted that the 
 Station-masters are flagmen, pointsmen, ticket- 
 collectors, and everything else, except plat- 
 forms, and lamp-rooms. As only two trains 
 are run in the twenty-four hours, this economy 
 of staff does not matter. The State line, with 
 the comparatively new branch to the Pachpa- 
 dra salt-pits, pays handsomely and is exactly 
 suited to the needs of its users. True, there 
 is a certain haziness as to the hour of starting, 
 but this allows laggards more time, and fills 
 the packed carriages to overflowing. 
 
 From Marwar Junction to Jodhpur, the 
 train leaves the Aravalis and goes northwards 
 into the region of death that lies beyond the 
 Luni River. Sand, ak bushes, and sand-hills, 
 varied with occasional patches of unthrifty 
 cultivation, make up the scenery. Rain has 
 been very scarce in Marwar this year, and the 
 country, consequently, shows at its worst, for 
 almost every square mile of a kingdom nearly 
 as large as Scotland is dependent on the sky 
 for its crops. In a good season, a large vil- 
 lage can pay from seven to nine thousand 
 rupees revenue without blenching. In a bad
 
 Letters of Marque 121 
 
 one, " all the king's horses and all the king's 
 men " may think themselves lucky if they 
 raise fifteen rupees from the same place. The 
 fluctuation is startling. 
 
 From a countryside, which to the uninitiated 
 seems about as valuable as a stretch of West 
 African beach, the State gets a revenue of 
 nearly forty lakhs ; and men who know the 
 country vow that it has not been one tithe ex- 
 ploited, and that there is more to be made 
 from salt marble and — curious thing in this 
 wilderness — good forest conservancy, than an 
 open-handed Durbar dreams of. An amiable 
 weakness for unthinkingly giving away villages 
 where ready cash failed, has somewhat ham- 
 pered the revenue in past years ; but now — 
 and for this the Maharaja deserves great 
 credit — Jodhpur has a large and genuine sur- 
 plus and a very compact little scheme of rail- 
 way extension. Before turning to a consid- 
 eration of the City of Jodhpur, hear a true 
 story in connection with the Hyderabad- 
 Pachpadra project which those interested in 
 the scheme may lay to heart. 
 
 His State line, his *' ownest own," as has 
 been said, very much delighted the Maharaja 
 who, in one or two points, is not unlike Sir 
 Theodore Hope of sainted memory. Pleased 
 with the toy, he said effusively, in words 
 which may or may not have reached the ears 
 of the Hyderabad-Pachpadra people : " This 
 is a good business. If the Government will 
 give me independent jurisdiction, I'll make
 
 122 Letters of Marque 
 
 and open the line straight away from Pach- 
 padra to the end of my dominions, i. e., all 
 but to Hyderabad." 
 
 Then " up and spake an elder knight, sat 
 at the King's right knee," who knew some- 
 thing about the railway map of India and the 
 Controlling Power of strategical lines : " Ma- 
 haraja Sahib — here is the Indus Valley State 
 line and here is the Bombay-Baroda line. 
 Where would yon be ? " " By Jove," quoth 
 the Maharaja, though he swore by quite an- 
 other god : " I see 1 " and thus he abandoned 
 the idea of a Hyderabad line, and turned his 
 attention to an extension to Nagore, with a 
 branch to the Makrana marble quarries which 
 are close to the Sambhar salt lake near Jeypore. 
 And, in the fulness of time, that extension 
 will be made and perhaps extended to Baha- 
 walpur. 
 
 The Englishman came to Jodhpur at mid- 
 day, in a hot, fierce sunshine that struck back 
 from the sands and the ledges of red rock, as 
 though it were May instead of December. 
 The line scorned such a thing as a regular 
 ordained terminus. The single track gradu- 
 ally melted away into the sands. Close to 
 the station was a grim stone dak-bungalow, 
 and in the veranda stood a brisk, bag-and- 
 flask-begirdled individual, cracking his joints 
 with excess of irritation. 
 
 JVota Bene. — When one is on the road it is 
 above all things necessary to " pass the time 
 o' day " to fellow-wanderers. Failure to com-
 
 Letters of Marque 123 
 
 ply with this law implies that the offender is 
 " too good for his company " ; and this, on 
 the Road, is the unpardonable sin. The 
 Englishman " passed the time o' day " in due 
 and ample form. "Ha! Ha!" said the 
 gentleman with the bag. " Isn't this a sweet 
 place ? There ain't no ticca- ghai'ies^ and 
 there ain't nothing to eat, if you haven't 
 brought your vittles, an' they charge you three- 
 eight for a bottle of whisky. Oh ! it's a sweet 
 place." Here he skipped about the veranda 
 and puffed. Then turning upon the English- 
 man, he said fiercely : " What have you come 
 here for ? " Now this was rude, because the 
 ordinary form of salutation on the Road is 
 usually, " And what are you for } " meaning 
 *' what house do you represent?" The Eng- 
 lishman answered dolefully that he was travel- 
 ing for pleasure, which simple explanation 
 offended the little man with the courier-bag. 
 He snapped his joints more excruciatingly 
 than ever: '^ For pleasure? My God! For 
 pleasure ? Come here an' wait five weeks for 
 your money, an', mark what I'm tellin' you 
 now, you don't get it then ! But per'aps your 
 ideas of pleasure is different from most 
 people's. For pleasure ! Yah ! " He 
 skipped across the sands toward the station, 
 for he was going back with the down train, 
 and vanished in a whirlwind of luggage and 
 the fluttering of female skirts : in Jodhpur the 
 women are baggage coolies. A level, drawl- 
 ing voice spoke from an inner room : " 'E's a
 
 124 Letters of Marque 
 
 bit upset. That's what 'e is ! I remember 
 when I was at Gworlior " — the rest of the 
 story was lost, and the Englishman set to 
 work to discover the nakedness of the dak- 
 bungalow. For reasons which do not concern 
 the public, it is made as bitterly uncomfortable 
 as possible. The food is infamous, and the 
 charges seem to be wilfully pitched about 
 eighty per cent above the tariff, so that some 
 portion of the bill, at least, may be paid with- 
 out bloodshed, or the unseemly defilement of 
 walls with the contents of drinking glasses. 
 This is short-sighted policy, and it would, 
 perhaps, be better to lower the prices and 
 hide the tariff, and put a guard about the 
 house to prevent jackal-molested donkeys 
 from stampeding into the verandas. But 
 these be details. Jodhpur dak-bungalow is 
 a merry, merry place, and any writer in search 
 of new ground to locate a madly improbable 
 story in, could not do better than study it 
 diligently. In front lies sand, riddled with 
 innumerable ant-holes, and beyond the sand 
 the red sandstone wall of the city, and the 
 Mahometan burying-ground that fringes it. 
 Fragments of sandstone set on end mark the 
 resting places of the Faithful, who are of no 
 great account here. Above everything, a 
 mark for miles around, towers the dun-red 
 pile of the Fort which is also a Palace. This 
 is set upon sandstone rock whose sharper 
 features have been worn smooth by the wash 
 of the windblown sand. It is as monstrous
 
 Letters of Marque 125 
 
 as anything in Dore's illustrations of the 
 Cojites Di'olatiques and, wherever it wanders, 
 the eye comes back at last to its fantastic bulk. 
 There is no greenery on the rock, nothing but 
 fierce sunlight or black shadow. A line of 
 red hills forms the background of the city, 
 and this is as bare as the picked bones of 
 camels that lie bleaching on the sand below. 
 
 Wherever the eye falls, it sees a camel or 
 a string of camels — lean, racer-built sowarri 
 camels, or heavy, black, shag-haired trading 
 ships bent on their way to the Railway Station. 
 Through the night the air is alive with the 
 bubbling and howling of the brutes, who as- 
 suredly must suffer from nightmare. In the 
 morning the chorus round the station is deaf- 
 ening. 
 
 Knowing what these camels meant, but 
 trusting nevertheless that the road would not 
 be very bad, the Englishman went into the 
 city, left a well-kunkered road, turned through 
 a sand-worn, red sandstone gate, and sank 
 ankle-deep in fine reddish white sand. This 
 was the main thoroughfare of the city. Two 
 tame lynxes shared it with a donkey ; and 
 the rest of the population seemed to have 
 gone to bed. In the hot weather, between 
 ten in the morning and four in the afternoon 
 all Jodhpur stays at home for fear of death 
 by sun-stroke, and it is possible that the habit 
 extends far into what is officially called the 
 " cold weather " ; or, perhaps, being brought 
 up among sands, men do not care to tramp
 
 126 Letters of Marque 
 
 them for pleasure. The city internally is a 
 walled and secret place ; each courtyard being 
 hidden from view by a red sandstone wall ex- 
 cept in a few streets where the shops are poor 
 and mean. 
 
 In an old house now used for the storing 
 of tents, Akbar's mother lay two months, be- 
 fore the " Guardian of Mankind " was born, 
 drawing breath for her flight to Umarkot 
 across the desert. Seeing this place, the 
 Englishman thought of many things not worth 
 the putting down on paper, and went on till 
 the sand grew deeper and deeper, and a great 
 camel, heavily laden with stone, came round 
 a corner and nearly stepped on him. As the 
 evening fell, the city woke up, and the goats 
 and the camels and the kine came in by hun- 
 dreds, and men said that wild pig, which are 
 strictly preserved by the Princes for their 
 own sport, were in the habit of wandering 
 about the roads. Now if they do this in the 
 capital, what damage must they not do to the 
 crops in the district.? Men said that they 
 did a very great deal of damage, and it was 
 hard to keep their noses out of anything they 
 took a fancy to. On the evening of the Eng- 
 lishman's visit, the Maharaja went out, as is 
 his laudable custom, alone and unattended, to 
 a road actually in the city along which one 
 specially big pig was in the habit of passing. 
 His Highness got his game with a single shot 
 behind the shoulder, and in a few days, it was 
 pickled and sent off to the Maharana of Udai-
 
 Letters of Marque 127 
 
 pur, as a love-gift. There is great friendship 
 between Jodhpur and Udaipur, and the idea 
 of one King going abroad to shoot game for 
 another has something very pretty and quaint 
 in it. 
 
 Night fell and the Englishman became 
 aware that the conservancy of Jodhpur might 
 be vastly improved. Strong stenches, say 
 the doctors, are of no importance ; but there 
 came upon every breath of heated air — and 
 in Jodhpur City the air is warm in mid-winter 
 — the faint, sweet, sickly reek that one has 
 always been taught to consider specially 
 deadly. A few months ago there was an im- 
 pressive outbreak of cholera in Jodhpur, and 
 the Residency Doctor, who really hoped that 
 the people would be brought to see sense, 
 did his best to bring forward a general cleans- 
 ing-scheme. But the city fathers would have 
 none of it. Their fathers had been trying to 
 poison themselves in well-defined ways for an 
 indefinite number of years ; and they were not 
 going to have any of the Sahib's " sweeper- 
 nonsense." 
 
 To clinch everything, one traveled member 
 of the community rose in his place and said : 
 " Why, I've been to Simla. Yes, to Simla ! 
 And even /don't want it ! " 
 
 When the black dusk had shut down, the 
 Englishman climbed up a little hill and saw 
 the stars come out and shine over the desert. 
 Very far away, some camel-drivers had lighted 
 a fire and were singing as they sat by the side
 
 128 Letters of Marque 
 
 Df their beasts. Sound travels as far over 
 sand as over water, and their voices came into 
 the city wall and beat against it in multiplied 
 echoes. 
 
 Then he returned to the House of Strange 
 Stories — the Dak-bungalow — and passed the 
 time o' day with a light-hearted bagman — a 
 Cockney, in whose heart there was no thought 
 of India, though he had traveled for years 
 throughout the length and breadth of the Em- 
 pire and over New Burma as well. There was 
 a fort in Jodhpur, but you see that was not in 
 his line of business exactly, and there were 
 stables, but " you may take my word for it, 
 them who has much to do with horses is a bad 
 lot. You get hold of the Maharaja's coach- 
 man and he'll drive you all around the shop. 
 I'm only waiting here collecting money." 
 Jodhpur dak-bungalow seems to be full of 
 men " waiting here." They lie in long chairs 
 in the veranda and tell each other intermin- 
 able stories, or stare citywards and express 
 their opinion of some dilatory debtor. They 
 are all waiting for something ; and they vary 
 the monotony of a life they make wilfully dull 
 beyond words, by waging war with the dak- 
 bungalow khansama. Then they return to 
 their long chairs or their couches, and sleep. 
 Some of them, in old days, used to wait as 
 long as six weeks — six weeks in May, when 
 the sixty miles from Marwai* Junction to Jodh- 
 pur was covered in three days by slow-pacing 
 bullock carts! Some of them are bagmen,
 
 Letters of Marque 129 
 
 able to describe the demerits of every dak- 
 bungalow from the Peshin to Pagan, and 
 southward to Hyderabad — men of substance 
 who have " The Trades " at their back. It is 
 a terrible thing to be in "The Trades," that 
 great Doomsday Book of Calcutta, in whose 
 pages are written the names of doubtful 
 clients. Let light-hearted purchasers take 
 note. 
 
 And the others, who wait and swear and 
 spit and exchange anecdotes — what are they .'' 
 Bummers, land-sharks, skirmishers for their 
 bread. It would be cruel in a fellow-tramp to 
 call them loafers. Their lien upon the State 
 may have its origin in horses, or anything 
 else ; for the State buys anything vendible, 
 from Abdul Rahman's most promising impor- 
 tations to a patent, self-acting corkscrew. 
 They are a mixed crew, but amusing and full 
 of strange stories of adventure by land and 
 sea. x\nd their ends are as curiously brutal 
 as their lives. A wanderer was once swept 
 into the great, still backwater that divides the 
 loaferdom of Upper India — that is to say, 
 Calcutta and Bombay — from the north-going 
 current of Madras, where Nym and Pistol are 
 highly finished articles with certificates of edu- 
 cation. This backwater is a dangerous place 
 to break down in, as the men on the Road 
 know well. " You can run Rajputana in a 
 pair o' sack breeches an' an old hat, but go to 
 Central Injia with money," says the wisdom 
 of the Road. So the waif died in the bazaar, 
 9
 
 130 Letters of Marque 
 
 and the Barrack- master Sahib gave orders for 
 his burial. It might have been the bazaar 
 sergeant, or it might have been an hireUng 
 who was charged with the disposal of the 
 body. At any rate, it was an Irishman who 
 said to the Barrack-master Sahib : " Fwhat 
 about that loafer ? " " Well, what's the mat- 
 ter?" "I'm considtherin whether I'm to 
 mash in his thick head, or to break his long 
 legs. He won't fit the store-coffin anyways." 
 
 Here the story ends. It may be an old 
 one ; but it struck the Englishman as being 
 rather unsympathetic in its nature ; and he 
 has preserved it for this reason. Were the 
 Englishman a mere Secretary of State instead 
 of an enviable and unshackled vagabond, he 
 would remodel that Philanthropic Institution 
 of Teaching Young Subalterns how to Spell 
 — variously called the Intelligence and the 
 Political Department — and giving each boy 
 the pair of sack breeches and old hat, above 
 prescribed, would send him out for a twelve- 
 month on the Road. Not that he might learn 
 to swear Australian oaths (which are superior 
 to any ones in the market) or to drink bazaar- 
 drinks (which are very bad indeed), but in 
 order that he might gain an insight into the 
 tertiary politics of States — things less impos- 
 ing than succession-cases and less wearisome 
 than boundary disputes, but very well worth 
 knowing. 
 
 A small volume might be written of the ways 
 and the tales of Indian loafers of the more
 
 Letters of Marque 131 
 
 brilliant order — such Chevaliers of the Order 
 of Industry as would throw their glasses in 
 your face did you call them loafers. They 
 are a genial, blasphemous, blustering crew, 
 and preeminent even in a land of liars.
 
 132 Letters of Marque 
 
 XIII. 
 
 The hospitality that spreads tables in the 
 wilderness, and shifts the stranger from the 
 back of the hired camel into a two-horse vic- 
 toria, must be experienced to be appreciated. 
 
 To those unacquainted with the peculiari- 
 ties of the native-trained horse, this advice 
 may be worth something. Sit as far back as 
 ever you can, and, if Oriental courtesy have 
 put an English bit and bridoon in a mouth by 
 education intended for a spiked curb, leave 
 the whole contraption alone. Once acquaint- 
 ed with the comparative smoothness of Eng- 
 lish ironmongery, your mount will grow frivo- 
 lous. In which event a four pound steeple- 
 chase saddle, accepted through sheer shame, 
 offers the very smallest amount of purchase to 
 untrained legs. 
 
 The Englishman rode up to the Fort, and 
 by the way learnt all these things and m.any 
 more. He was provided with a racking, 
 female horse who swept the gullies of the city 
 by dancing sideways. 
 
 The road to the Fort, which stands on the 
 Hill of Strife, wound in and out of sixty-foot 
 hills, with a skilful avoidance of all shade ; 
 and this was at high noon, when puffs of 
 heated air blew from the rocks on all sides. 
 " What must the heat be in May ? " The
 
 Letters of Marque 133 
 
 Englishman's companion was a cheery Brah- 
 min, who wore the hghtest of turbans and 
 sat the smallest of neat little countrybreds. 
 " Awful ! " said the Brahmin. " But not so 
 bad as in the district. Look there ! " and he 
 pointed from the brow of a bad eminence, 
 across the quivering heat-haze, to where the 
 white sand faded into bleach blue sky and 
 the horizon was shaken and tremulous. " It's 
 very bad in summer. Would knock you — oh 
 yes — all to smash, but we are accustomed to 
 it." A rock-strewn hill, about half a mile, as 
 the crow flies, from the Fort was pointed out as 
 the place whence, at the beginning of this cen- 
 tury, the Pretender Sowae besieged Raja Maun 
 for five months, but could make no headway 
 against his foe. One gun of the enemy's bat- 
 teries specially galled the Fort, and the Jodhpur 
 King offered a village to any of his gunners 
 who should dismount it. "It was smashed," 
 said the Brahmin. " Oh yes, all to pieces." 
 Practically, the city which lies below the Fort 
 is indefensible, and during the many wars of 
 Marwar has generally been taken up by the 
 assailants without resistance. 
 
 Entering the Fort by the Jeypore Gate, and 
 studiously refraining from opening his um- 
 brella, the Englishman found shadow and 
 coolth, took off his hat to the tun-bellied, 
 trunk-nosed God of Good-Luck who had been 
 very kind to him in his wanderings, and sat 
 down near half a dozen of the Maharaja's 
 guns bearing the Mark, " A. Broome, Cossi-
 
 134 Letters of Marque 
 
 pore, 1857," ^^ " G- Hutchinson, Cossipore, 
 1838." Now rock and masonry are so curi- 
 ously blended in this great pile that he who 
 walks through it loses sense of being among 
 buildings. It is as though he walked through 
 mountain-gorges. The stone-paved, inclined 
 planes, and the tunnel-like passages driven 
 under a hundred feet height of buildings, in- 
 crease this impression. In many places the 
 wall and rock runs up unbroken by any win- 
 dow for forty feet. 
 
 It would be a week's work to pick out even 
 roughly the names of the dead who have 
 added to the buildings, or to describe the 
 bewildering multiplicity of courts and ranges 
 of rooms ; and, in the end, the result would 
 be as satisfactory as an attempt to describe a 
 nightmare. It is said that the rock on \vhich 
 the Fort stands is four miles in circuit, but 
 no man yet has dared to estimate the size of 
 the city that they call the Palace, or the mile- 
 age of its ways. Ever since Ras Joda, four 
 hundred years ago, listened to the voice of a 
 /ogi, and leaving Mundore built his eyrie on 
 the *' Bird's nest " as the Hill of Strife was 
 called, the Palaces have grown and thickened. 
 Even to-day the builders are still at work. 
 Takht Singh, the present ruler's predecessor, 
 built royally. An incomplete bastion and a 
 Hall of Flowers are among the works of his 
 pleasure. Hidden away behind a mighty wing 
 of carved red sandstone lie rooms set apart 
 for Viceroys, Durbar Halls and dinner-rooms
 
 Letters of Marque 135 
 
 without end. A gentle gloom covers the evi- 
 dences of the catholic taste of the State in 
 articles of " bigotry and virtue " ; but there 
 is enough light to show the raison d'eh'e of the 
 men who wait in the dak-bungalow. And, 
 after all, what is the use of Royalty in these 
 days if a man may not take delight in the pride 
 of the eye ? Kumbha Rana, the great man of 
 Chitor, fought like a Rajput, but he had an in- 
 stinct which made him build the Tower of Vic- 
 tory at, who knows what cost of money and life. 
 The fighting-instinct thrown back upon itself 
 must have some sort of outlet ; and a merci- 
 ful Providence wisely ordains that the Kings 
 of the East in the nineteenth century shall take 
 pleasure in shopping on an imperial scale. 
 Dresden China snuff-boxes, mechanical en- 
 gines, electro-plated fish-slicers, musical boxes, 
 and gilt blown-glass Christmas tree balls do 
 not go well with the splendors of a Palace 
 that might have been built by Titans and col- 
 ored by the morning sun. But there are ex- 
 cuses to be made for Kings who have no 
 fighting to do. 
 
 In one of the higher bastions stands a curi- 
 ous specimen of one of the earliest mitrail- 
 leuses — a cumbrous machine carrying twenty 
 gun-barrels in two rows, which small-arm fire 
 is flanked by two tiny cannon. As a muzzle- 
 loading implement its value after the first 
 discharge would be insignificant ; but the 
 soldiers lounging by assured the Englishman 
 that in had done good service in its time.
 
 136 Letters of Marque 
 
 A man may spend a long hour in the upper 
 tiers of the Palaces, but still far from the 
 roof-tops, in looking out across the desert. 
 There are Englishmen in these wastes, who 
 say gravely' that there is nothing so fascinat- 
 ing as the sand of Bikanir and Marwar. 
 "You see," explained an enthusiast of the 
 Hat-marked Caste, " you are not shut in by 
 roads, and you can go just as you please. 
 And, somehow, it grows upon you as you get 
 used to it, and you end, y' know, by falling in 
 love with the place." Look steadily from the 
 Palace westward where the city with its tanks 
 and serais is spread at your feet, and you 
 will, in a lame way, begin to understand the 
 fascination of the Desert which, by those who 
 have felt it, is said to be even stronger than 
 the fascination of the Road. The city is of 
 red sandstone and dull and somber to look at. 
 Beyond it, where the white sand lies, the 
 country is dotted with camels limping into 
 the Eiwigkeit or coming from the same place. 
 Trees appear to be strictly confined to the 
 suburbs of the city. Very good. If you look 
 long enough across the sands while a voice in 
 your ear is telling you of half-buried cities, 
 old as old Time, and wholly unvisited by 
 Sahibs, of districts where the white man is 
 unknown, and of the wonders of far-away 
 Jeysulmir ruled by a half-distraught king, 
 sand-locked and now smitten by a terrible 
 food and water famine, you will, if it happen 
 that you are of a sedentary and civilized na-
 
 Letters of Marque 137 
 
 ture, experience a new emotion — will be con- 
 scious of a great desire to take one of the 
 lobbing camels and get away into the desert, 
 away from the last touch of To-day, to meet 
 the Past face to face. Some day a novelist 
 will exploit the unknown land from the Rann, 
 where the wild ass breeds, northward and 
 eastward, till he comes to the Indus. 
 
 But the officials of Marwar do not call their 
 country a desert. On the contrary, they ad- 
 minister it very scientifically and raise, as has 
 been said, about thirty-eight lakhs from it. 
 To come back from the influence and the pos- 
 sible use of the desert to more prosaic facts. 
 Read quickl}'- a rough record of things in 
 modern Marwar. The old is drawn in Tod, 
 who speaks the truth. The Maharaja's right 
 hand in the work of the State is Maharaj Sir 
 Pertab Singh, Prime Minister A. — D. — C. to 
 the Prince of Wales, capable of managing the 
 Marwari who intrigues like a — Marwari, 
 equally capable, as has been seen, of moving 
 in London Society, and Colonel of a newly 
 raised crack cavalry corps. The Englishmen 
 would have liked to have seen him, but he 
 was away in the desert somewhere, either 
 marking a boundary or looking after a suc- 
 cession case. Not very long ago, as the Setts 
 of Ajmir knew well, there was a State debt of 
 fifty lakhs. This has now been changed into 
 a surplus of three lakhs, and the revenue is 
 growing. Also, the simple Dacoit who used 
 to enjoy himself very pleasantly, has been
 
 138 Letters of Marque 
 
 put into a department, and the Thug with 
 him. 
 
 Consequently, for the department takes a 
 genuine interest in this form of shikar, and 
 the jail leg-irons are not too light, dacoities 
 have been reduced to such an extent that men 
 say " you may send a woman, with her orna- 
 ments upon her, from Sojat to Phalodi, and 
 she will not lose a nose-ring." Again, and this 
 in a Rajput State is an important matter, the 
 boundaries of nearly every village in Marwar 
 have been demarcated, and boundary fights, 
 in which both sides preferred small-arm fire 
 to the regulation club, are unknown. The 
 open-handed system of giving away villages 
 had raised a large and unmannerly crop of 
 Jaghifdars. These have been taken up and 
 brought in hand by Sir Pertab Singh, to the 
 better order of the State. 
 
 A Punjabi Sirdar, Har Dyal Singh, has re- 
 formed, or made rather. Courts on the Civil 
 and Criminal Side; and his hand is said to 
 be found in a good many sweepings out of 
 old corners. It must always be borne in mind 
 that everything that has been done, was car- 
 ried through over and under unlimited in- 
 trigue, for Jodhpur is a native State. Intrigue 
 must be met with intrigue by all except Gor- 
 dons or demi-gods ; and it is curious to hear 
 how a reduction in tariff, or a smoothing out 
 of some tangled Court, had to be worked by 
 shift and byway. The tales are comic, but 
 not for publication. Howbeit, Har Dyal
 
 Letters of Marque 139 
 
 Singh got his training in part under the Pun- 
 jab Government, and in part in a Httle Native 
 State far away in the Himalayas, where in- 
 trigue is not altogether unknown. To the 
 credit of the " Pauper Province " be it said, 
 it is not easy to circumvent a Punjabi. The 
 details of his work would be dry reading. 
 The result of it is good, and there is justice 
 in Marwar, and order and firmness in its ad- 
 ministration. 
 
 Naturally, the land-revenue is the most in- 
 teresting thing in Marwar from an adminis- 
 trative point of view. The basis of it is a 
 tank about the size of a swimming-bath, with 
 a catchment of several hundred square yards, 
 draining through leeped channels. When 
 God sends the rain, the people of the village 
 drink from the tank. When the rains fail, as 
 they failed this year, they take to their wells, 
 which are brackish and breed guinea-worm. 
 For these reasons the revenue, like the Re- 
 public of San Domingo, is never alike for two 
 years running. There are no canal questions 
 to harry the authorities ; but the fluctuations 
 are enormous." Under the Aravalis the soil 
 is good : further north they grow millet and 
 pasture cattle, though, said a Revenue Officer 
 cheerfully, " God knows what the brutes find 
 to eat." Apropos of irrigation, the one canal 
 deserves special mention, as showing how 
 George Stephenson came to Jodhpur and 
 astonished the inhabitants. Six miles from 
 the city proper lies the Balsaman Sagar, a
 
 140 Letters of Marque 
 
 great tank. In the hot weather, when the 
 city tanks ran out or stank, it was the pleasant 
 duty of the women to tramp twelve miles at 
 the end of the day's work to fill their lotahs. In 
 the hot weather Jodhpur is — let a simile suffice. 
 Sukkur in June would be Simla to Jodhpur. 
 
 The State Engineer, who is also the Jodh- 
 pur State Line, for he has no European sub- 
 ordinates, conceived the idea of bringing the 
 water from the Balsaman into the cit3\ Was 
 the city grateful .? Not in the least. It is 
 said that the Sahib wanted the water to run 
 uphill and was throwing money into the tank. 
 Being true Marwaris, men betted on the sub- 
 ject. The canal — a built out one, for water 
 must not touch earth in these parts — was 
 made at a cost of something over a lakh, and 
 the water came down because its source was 
 a trifle higher than the city. Now, in the hot 
 weather, the women need not go for long 
 walks, but the Marwari cannot understand 
 how it was that the waters came down to Jodh- 
 pur. From the Marwari to money matters 
 is an easy step. Formerly, that is to say, up 
 to within a very short time, the Treasury of 
 Jodhpur was conducted in a shiftless, happy- 
 go-lucky sort of fashion, not uncommon in 
 Native States, whereby the Mahajuns "held 
 the bag " and made unholy profits on discount 
 and other things, to the confusion of the Dur- 
 bar Funds and their own enrichment. There is 
 now a Treasury modeled on English lines, and 
 English in the important particular that money
 
 Letters of Marque 141 
 
 is not to be got from it for the asking, and the 
 items of expenditure are strictly looked after. 
 In the middle of all this bustle of reform 
 planned, achieved, frustrated, and replanned, 
 and the never-ending underground warfare 
 that surges in a Native State, move the Eng- 
 lish officers — the irreducible minimum of 
 exiles. As a caste, the working Englishmen 
 in Native States are curiously interesting; 
 and the traveler whose tact by this time has 
 been blunted by tramping, sits in judgment 
 upon them as he has seen them. In the first 
 place, they are, they must be, the fittest who 
 have survived ; for though, here and there, 
 you shall find one chafing bitterly against the 
 burden of his life in the wilderness, one to be 
 pitied more than any chained beast, the bulk 
 of the caste are honestly and unaffectedly fond 
 of their work, fond of the country around 
 them, and fond of the people they deal with. 
 In each State their answer to a question is 
 the same. The men with whom they are in 
 contact are "all right" when you know them, 
 but you've got to " know them first," as the 
 music-hall song says. Their hands are full 
 of work ; so full that, when the incult wanderer 
 said : ^' What do you find to do } " they look 
 upon him with contempt and amazement, ex- 
 actly as the wanderer himself had once looked 
 upon a Globe-trotter, who had put to him the 
 same impertinent query. And — but here the 
 Englishman may be wrong — it seemed to him 
 that in one respect their lives were a good
 
 142 Letters of Marque 
 
 deal more restful and concentrated than those 
 of their brethren under the British Govern- 
 ment. There was no talk of shiftings and 
 transfers and promotions, stretching across a 
 Province and a half, and no man said any- 
 thing about Simla. To one who has hitherto 
 believed that Simla is the hub of the Empire, 
 it is disconcerting to hear : " Oh, Simla ! 
 That's where you Bengalis go. We haven't 
 anything to do with Simla down here." And 
 no more they have. Their talk and their in- 
 terests run in the boundaries of the States 
 they serve, and, most striking of all, the 
 gossipy element seems to be cut altogether. 
 It is a backwater of the river of Anglo-Indian 
 life — or is it the main current, the broad 
 stream that supplies the motive power, and is 
 the other life only the noisy ripple on the sur- 
 face .'' You who have lived, not merely looked 
 at, both lives, decide. Much can be learned 
 from the talk of the caste, many curious, many 
 amusing, and some startling things. One 
 hears stories of men who take a poor, im- 
 poverished State as a man takes a wife, "for 
 better or worse," and, moved by some incom- 
 prehensible ideal of virtue, consecrate — that 
 is not too big a word — consecrate their lives 
 to that State in all single-heartedness and 
 purity. Such men are few, but they exist to- 
 day, and their names are great in lands where 
 no Englishman travels. Again the listener 
 hears tales of grizzled diplomats of Rajputana 
 — Machiavellis who have hoisted a powerful
 
 Letters of Marque 143 
 
 intriguer with his own intrigue, and bested 
 priestly cunning, and the guile of the Oswal, 
 simply that the way might be clear for some 
 scheme which should put money into a totter- 
 ing Treasury, or lighten the taxation of a few 
 hundred thousand men — or both ; for this can 
 be done. One tithe of that force spent on 
 their own personal advancement would have 
 carried such men very far. 
 
 Truly the Hat-marked Caste are a strange 
 people. They are so few and so lonely and so 
 strong. They can sit down in one place for 
 years, and see the works of their hands and 
 the promptings of their brain grow to actual 
 and beneficent life, bringing good to thousands. 
 Less fettered than the direct servant of the 
 Indian Government, and working over a much 
 vaster charge, they seem a bigger and a more 
 large-minded breed. And that is saying a 
 good deal. 
 
 But let the others, the little people bound 
 down and supervised, and strictly limited and 
 income-taxed, always remember that the Hat- 
 marked are very badly off for shops. If they 
 want a neck-tie they must get it up from Bom- 
 bay, and in the Rains they can hardly move 
 about ; and they have no amusements and 
 must go a day's railway journey for a rubber, 
 and their drinking-water is doubtful : and there 
 is less than one white woman /^r ten thousand 
 square miles. 
 
 After all, comparative civilization has its 
 advantao:es.
 
 144 Letters of Marque 
 
 XIV. 
 
 JoDHPUR differs from the other States of 
 Rajputana in that its Royalty are peculiarly 
 accessible to an inquiring public. There are 
 wanderers, the desire of whose life it is " to 
 see Nabobs," which is the Globe-trotter's title 
 for any one in unusually clean clothes, or an 
 Oudh Taluqdar in gala dress. Men asked in 
 Jodhpur whether the Englishman would like to 
 see His Highness. The Englishman had a great 
 desire to do so if his Highness would be in no 
 way inconvenienced. Then they scoffed : 
 " Oh, he won't durbar you, you needn't flatter 
 yourself. If he's in the humor he'll receive you 
 like an English country-gentleman." How in 
 the world could the owner of such a place as 
 Jodhpur Palace be in any way like an English 
 country-gentleman ? The Englishman had not 
 long to wait in doubt. His Highness intimated 
 his readiness to see the Englishman between 
 eight and nine in the morning at the Raika- 
 Bagh. The Raika-Bagh is not a Palace, for 
 the lower story and all the detached buildings 
 round it are filled with horses. Nor can it in 
 any way be called a stable, because the upper 
 story contains sumptuous apartments full of all 
 manner of valuables both of the East and the 
 West. Nor is it in any sense a pleasure-garden,
 
 Letters of Marque 145 
 
 for it stands on soft white sand, close to a 
 multitude of litter and sand training tracks, 
 and is devoid of trees for the most part. 
 Therefore the Raika-Bagh is simply the Raika- 
 Bagh and nothing else. It is now the chosen 
 residence of the Maharaja who loves to live 
 among his four hundred or more horses. All 
 Jodhpur is horse-mad by the way, and it be- 
 hoves any one who wishes to be any one to 
 keep his own race-course. The Englishman 
 went to the Raika-Bagh, which stands half a 
 mile or so from the city, and passing through 
 a long room filled with saddles by the dozen, 
 bridles by the score, and bits by the hundred, 
 was aware of a very small and lively little 
 cherub on the roof of a garden-house. He 
 was carefully muffled, for the morning was 
 chill. " Good morning," he cried cheerfully in 
 English, waving a mittened hand. " Are you 
 going to see my faver and the horses ? " It 
 was the Maharaja Kanwar, the Crown Prince, 
 the apple of the Maharaja's eye, and one of 
 the quaintest little bodies that ever set an 
 Englishmen disrespectfully laughing. He 
 studies English daily with one of the English 
 officials of the State, and stands a very good 
 chance of being thoroughly spoiled, for he is 
 a general pet. As befits his dignity, he has 
 his own carriage or carriages, his own twelve- 
 hand stable, his own house and retinue. 
 
 A few steps further on, in a little enclosure 
 in front of a small two-storied white bunga- 
 low, sat His Highness the Maharaja, deep in 
 10
 
 146 Letters of Marque 
 
 discussion with the State Engineer. He wore 
 an English ulster, and within ten paces of him 
 was the first of a long range of stalls. There 
 was an informality of procedure about Jodh- 
 pur which, after the strained etiquette of 
 other States, was very refreshing. The State 
 Engineer, who has a growing line to attend 
 to, cantered away and His Highness after a 
 few introductory words, knowing what the 
 Englishman would be after, said : " Come 
 along, and look at the horses." Other for- 
 mality there was absolutely none. Even the 
 indispensable knot of hangers-on stood at a 
 distance, and behind a paling, in this most 
 rustic country residence. A well-bred fox- 
 terrier took command of the proceediwgs, after 
 the manner of dogs the world over, and the 
 Maharaja led to the horse-boxes. But a man 
 turned up, bending under the weight of much 
 bacon. " Oh ! here's the pig I shot for Udai- 
 pur last night. You see that is the best 
 piece. It's pickled, and that's what makes it 
 yellow to look at." He patted the great side 
 that was held up. "There will be a camel 
 sowar to meet it half way to Udaipur ; and I 
 hope Udaipur will be pleased with it. It was 
 a very big pig." " And where did you shoot 
 it, Maharaja Sahib ? " " Here," said His 
 Highness, smiting himself high up under the 
 armpit. " Where else would you have it ? " 
 Certainly this descendant of Raja Maun was 
 more like an English country-gentleman than 
 the Englishman in his ignorance had deemed
 
 Letters of Marque 147 
 
 possible. He led on from horse-box to horse- 
 box, the terrier at his heels, pointing out each 
 horse of note ; and Jodhpur has many. 
 "There's Raja^ twice winner of the Civil 
 Service Cup." The Englishman looked reve- 
 rently and Raja rewarded his curiosity with a 
 vicious snap, for he was being dressed over, 
 and his temper was out of joint. Close to him 
 stood Autocrat , the gray with the nutmeg 
 marks on the off-shoulder, a picture of a 
 horse, also disturbed in his mind. Next to 
 him was a chestnut Arab, a hopeless cripple, 
 for one of his knees had been smashed and 
 the leg was doubled up under him. It was 
 Tiu-qiwise^ who, six or eight years ago, re- 
 warded good feeding by getting away from his 
 groom, falling down and ruining himself, but 
 who, none the less, has lived an honored 
 pensioner on the Maharaja's bounty ever 
 since. No horses are shot in the Jodhpur 
 stables, and when one dies — they have lost 
 not more than twenty-five in six years — his 
 funeral is an event. He is wrapped in a white 
 sheet which is strewn with flowers, and, amid 
 the weeping of the saises, is borne away to the 
 burial ground. 
 
 After doing the honors for nearly half an 
 hour the Maharaja departed, and as the Eng- 
 lishman has not seen m^re than forty horses, 
 he felt justified in demanding more. And he 
 got them. Eclipse and Yoimg Revenge were 
 out down-country, but Sherwood at the stud, 
 Shere Aliy Co?iqiieror, Tynedale^ Sherwood 11^
 
 148 Letters of Marque 
 
 a maiden of Abdul Rahman's, and many others 
 of note, were in, and were brought out. 
 Among the veterans, a wrathful, rampant, red 
 horse still, came Brian Boru, whose name has* 
 been written large in the chronicles of the 
 Indian turf, jerking his sais across the road. 
 His near-fore is altogether gone, but as a pen- 
 sioner he condescends to go in harness, and is 
 then said to be a '' handful." He certainly 
 looks it. 
 
 At the two hundred and fifty-seventh horse, 
 and perhaps the twentieth block of stables, 
 the Englishman's brain began to reel, and he 
 demanded rest and information on a certain 
 point. He had gone into some fifty stalls, 
 and looked into all the rest, and in the looking 
 had searchingly sniffed. But, as truly as he 
 was then standing far below Brian Boru's 
 bony withers, never the ghost of a stench had 
 polluted the keen morning air. The City of 
 the Houyhnhnms was specklessly clean — 
 cleaner than any stable, racing or private, 
 that he had been into. How was it done ? 
 The pure white sand accounted for a good 
 deal, and the rest was explained by one of 
 the Masters of Horse : '' Each horse has one 
 sais at least — old Ringwood has four — and we 
 make 'em work. If we didn't, we'd be mucked 
 up to the horses' bellies in no time. Every- 
 thing is cleaned off at once ; and whenever the 
 sand's tainted it's renewed. There's quite 
 enough sand, you see, hereabouts. Of course 
 we can't keep their coats so good as in other
 
 Letters of Marque 149 
 
 stables, by reason of the rolling ; but we can 
 keep 'em pretty clean." 
 
 To the eye of one who knew less than noth- 
 ing about horse-flesh, this immaculate purity 
 was very striking, and quite as impressive was 
 the condition of the horses, which was Eng- 
 lish-quite English. Naturally, none of them 
 were in any sort of training beyond daily exer- 
 cise, but they were fit and in such thoroughly 
 good fettle. Many of them were out on the 
 various tracks, and many were coming in. 
 Roughly, two hundred go out of a morning, 
 and, it is to be feared, learn from the heavy 
 going of the Jodhpur courses how to hang in 
 their stride. This is a matter for those who 
 know, but it struck the Englishman that agood 
 deal of the unsatisfactory performances of the 
 Jodhpur stables might be accounted for by 
 their having lost their clean stride on the sand, 
 and having to pick it up gradually on the less 
 holding down-country courses — unfortunately 
 when they were not doing training gallops, 
 but the real thing. 
 
 It was pleasant to sit down and watch the 
 rush of the horses through the great opening — 
 gates are not affected — going on to the country- 
 side where they take the air. Here a boister- 
 ous, unschooled Arab shot out across the road 
 and cried, " Ha ! Ha ! " in the scriptural man- 
 ner before trying to rid himself of the grinning 
 black imp on his back. Behind him a Cabuli 
 — surely all Cabulis must have been born with 
 Pelhams in their mouths — bored sulkily
 
 1 50 Letters of Marque 
 
 across the road, or threw himself across the 
 path of a tall, mild-eyed Kurnal-bred young- 
 ster, whose cocked ears and swinging head 
 showed that, though he was so sedate, he was 
 thoroughly taking in his surroundings, and 
 would very much like to know if there were 
 anybody better than himself on the course that 
 morning. Impetuous as a schoolboy and irre- 
 sponsible as a monkey, one of the Prince's 
 polo ponies, not above racing in his own set, 
 would answer the question by rioting past the 
 pupil of Parrot, the monogram on his bodycloth 
 flapping free in the wind, and his head and 
 hogged tail in the elements. The youngster 
 would swing himself round, and polka-mazurka 
 for a few paces, till his attention would be 
 caught by some dainty Child of the Desert, 
 fresh from the Bombay stables, sweating at 
 every sound, backing and filling like a rudder- 
 less ship. Then, thanking his stars that he 
 was wiser than some people, Number 177 
 would lob on to the track and settle down to 
 his spin like the gentleman he was. Else- 
 where, the eye fell upon a cloud of nameless 
 ones, purchases from Abdul Rahman, whose 
 worth will be proved next hot weather, when 
 they are seriously taken in hand — skirmishing 
 over the face of the land and enjoying them- 
 selves immensely. High above everything 
 else, like a collier among barges, screaming 
 shrilly, a black, flamboyant Marwari stallion, 
 with a crest like the crest of a barb, barrel-bel- 
 lied, goose-rumped, and river-maned, pranced
 
 Letters of Marque 151 
 
 through the press, while the slow-pacing 
 waler carriage-horses eyed him with deep dis- 
 favor, and the Maharaja Kanwar's tiny mount 
 capered under his pink, Roman nose, kicking 
 up as much dust as the Foxhall colt who had 
 got on to a lovely patch of sand and was 
 dancing a saraband in it. In and out of the 
 tangle, going down to or coming back from 
 the courses, ran, shuffled, rocketed, plunged, 
 sulked, or stampeded countless horses of all 
 kinds, shapes, and descriptions — so that the 
 eye at last failed to see what they were, and 
 only retained a general impression of a whirl 
 of bays, grays, iron grays, and chestnuts with 
 white stockings, some as good as could be 
 desired, others average, but not one distinctly 
 bad. 
 
 '•' We have no downright bad 'uns in this 
 stable. What's the use ? " said the Master of 
 Horse, calmly. " They are all good beasts 
 and, one with another, must cost more than a 
 thousand rupees each. This year's new ones 
 bought from Bombay and the pick of our 
 own studs are a hundred strong about. May 
 be more. Yes, they look all right enough ; 
 but you can never know what they are going 
 to turn out. Live-stock is very uncertain." 
 " And how are the stables managed ? how do 
 you make room for the fresh stock ? " Some- 
 thing this way. Here are all the new ones 
 and Parrott's lot, and the English colts that 
 Maharaja Pertab Singh brought out with him 
 from Home. Winterlake out o' Queen'' s Con
 
 1 52 Letters of Marque 
 
 sort that chestnut is with the two white stock- 
 ings you're looking at now. Well, next hot 
 weather we shall see what they're made of and 
 which is who. There's so many that the 
 trainer hardly knows 'em one from another 
 till they begin to be a good deal forward. 
 Those that haven't got the pace, or that the 
 Maharaja don't fancy, they're taken out and 
 sold for what they'll bring. The man who takes 
 the horses out has a good job of it. He comes 
 back and says : " I sold such and such for so 
 much, and here's the money." That's all. 
 Well, our rejections are worth having. They 
 have taken prizes at the Poona Horse Show. 
 See for yourself. Is there one of those that 
 you wouldn't be glad to take for a hack, and 
 look well after too t Only they're no use to 
 us, and so out they go by the score. We've got 
 sixty riding-boys, perhaps more, and they've 
 got their work cut out to keep them all going. 
 What you've seen are only the stables. 
 We've got one stud at Bellara eighty miles 
 out, and they come in sometimes in droves of 
 three and four hundred from the stud. They 
 raise Marwaris there too, but that's entirely 
 under native management. We've got noth- 
 ing to do with that. The natives reckon a 
 Marwari the best country-bred you can lay 
 hands on ; and some of them are beauties ! 
 Crests on 'em like the top of a wave. Well, 
 there's that stud and another stud and, reck- 
 oning one with another, I should say the 
 Maharaja has nearer twelve hundred than a
 
 Letters of Marque 153 
 
 thousand horses of his own. For this place 
 here, two wagon-loads of grass come in every 
 day from Marwar Junction. Lord knows how 
 many saddles and bridles we've got. I never 
 counted. I suppose we've about forty car- 
 riages, not counting the ones that get shabby 
 and are stacked in places in the city, as I sup- 
 pose you've seen. We take 'em out in the 
 morning, a regular string altogether, brakes and 
 all ; but the prettiest turn-out we ever turned 
 out was Lady Dufferin's pony four-in-hand. 
 Walers — thirteen-two the wheelers, I think, and 
 thirteen-one the leaders. They took prizes in 
 Poona. That 7aas a pretty turn-out. The 
 prettiest in India. Lady Dufferin, she drove 
 it when the Viceroy was down here last year. 
 There are bicycles and tricycles in the car- 
 riage department too. I don't know how 
 many but when the Viceroy's camp was held, 
 there was about one apiece for the gentlemen, 
 with remounts. They're somewhere about the 
 place now, if you want to see them. Plow do 
 we manage to keep the horses so quiet ? You'll 
 find some o' the youngsters play the goat a 
 good deal when they come out o' stable, but, 
 as you say, there's no vice generally. It's this 
 way. We don't allow any curry-combs. If 
 we did, the saises would be wearing out their 
 brushes on the combs. It's all elbow-grease 
 here. They've got to go over the horses with 
 their hands. They must handle 'em, and a 
 native he's afraid of a horse. Now an Eng- 
 lish groom, when a horse is doing the fool,
 
 154 Letters of Marque 
 
 clips him over the head with a curry-comb, or 
 punches him in the belly ; and that hurts the 
 horse's feelings. A native, he just stands 
 back till the trouble is over. He must handle 
 the horse or he'd get into trouble for not 
 dressing him, so it comes to all handling and 
 no licking, and that's why you won't get hold 
 of a really vicious brute in these stables. 
 Old Rmgwood he had four saises, and he 
 wanted 'em every one, but the other horses 
 have no more than one sais apiece. The Ma- 
 haraja he keeps fourteen or fifteen horses for 
 his own riding. Not that he cares to ride now, 
 but he likes to have his horses ; and no one 
 else can touch 'em. Then there's the horses 
 that he mounts his visitors on, when they 
 come for pig-sticking and such like, and then 
 there's a lot of horses that go to Maharaja 
 Pertab Singh's new cavalry regiment. So you 
 see a horse can go through all three degrees 
 sometimes before he gets sold, and be a good 
 horse at the end of it. And I think that's 
 about all ! " 
 
 A cloud of youngsters, sweating freely and 
 ready for any mischief, shot past on their way 
 to breakfast, and the conversation ended in a 
 cloud of sand and the drumming of hurrying 
 hooves. 
 
 In the Raika-Bagh are more racing cups 
 than this memory holds the names of. Chief- 
 est of all was the Delhi Assemblage Cup — 
 the Imperial Vase, of solid gold, won by 
 Crown Prince. The other pieces of plate
 
 Letters of Marque 155 
 
 were not so imposing. But of all the Crown 
 Jewels, the most valuable appeared at the end 
 of the inspection. It was the small Maharaja 
 Kanwar lolling in state in a huge barouche — 
 his toes were at least two feet off the floor — 
 that was taking him from his morning drive. 
 " Have you seen my horses ? " said the Maha- 
 raja Kanwar. The four twelve-hand ponies 
 had been duly looked over, and the future 
 ruler of Jodhpur departed satisfied.
 
 156 Letters of Marque 
 
 XV. 
 
 " A TWENTY-FIVE per cent, reduction all 
 roun' an' no certain leave when you wants 
 it. (9/" course the best men goes somewhere 
 else. That's only natural, and 'ere's this 
 sanguinary down mail a-stickin' in the eye of 
 the Khundwa down ! I tell you, Sir, Injia's 
 a bad place — a very bad place. 'Tisn't what 
 it was when I came out one and thirty year 
 ago, an' the drivers was getting their seven 
 and eight 'undred rupees a month an' was 
 treated as meny 
 
 The Englishman was on his way to Nasira- 
 bad, and a gentleman in the Railway was 
 explaining to him the real reason of the de- 
 cadence of the Empire. It was because the 
 Rajputana-Malwa Railway had cut all its 
 employes twenty-five per cent. It is ungen- 
 erous to judge a caste by a few samples; but 
 the Englishman had on the Road and elsewhere 
 seen a good dealof gentlemen on the Railway, 
 and they spend their pay in a manner that 
 would do credit to an income of a thousand a 
 month. Now they say that the twenty-five 
 per cent, reduction deprives them of all the 
 pleasures of life. So much the better if it 
 makes them moderately economical in their 
 expenditure. Revolving these things in his 
 mind, together with one or two stories of 
 extravagances not quite fit for publication,
 
 Letters of Marque 157 
 
 the Englishman came to Nasirabad, before 
 sunrise, and there to an evil-looking tonga. 
 Quoth Ram Baksh, proprietor, driver, sais, 
 and everything else, calmly : " At this time 
 of the year and having regard to the heat of 
 the sun who wants a top to a tonga ? I have 
 no top. I have a top, but it would take till 
 twelve o'clock to put it on. And behold, 
 Sahib, Padre Martum Sahib went in this 
 tonga to Deoli. All the Officer Sahibs of 
 Deoli and Nasirabad go in this tonga for 
 shikar. This is a ' shutin-tonga ' ! " " When 
 Church and Army are brought against one, 
 argument is in vain." But to take a soft, 
 office-bred unfortunate into the wilderness, 
 upon a skeleton, a diagram of a conveyance, 
 is brutality. Ram Baksh did not see it, and 
 headed his two thirteen-hand rats straight 
 towards the morning sun, along a beautiful 
 military road. "We shall get to Deoli in six 
 hours," said Ram Baksh the boastful, and, 
 even as he spoke, the spring of the tonga bar 
 snapt " mit a harp-like melodious twang." 
 " What does it matter } " said Ram Baksh. 
 " Has the Sahib never seen a tonga-iron break 
 before ? Padre Martum Sahib and all the 
 Officer Sahibs in Deoli—" "Ram Baksh," 
 said the Englishman, sternly, "I am not a 
 Padre Sahib nor an Officer Sahib, and if you 
 say anything more about Padre Martum Sahib 
 or the officer in Deoli I shall grow very angry. 
 Ram Baksh." 
 
 " Humph," said Ram Baksh, " I knew you
 
 158 Letters of Marque 
 
 were not a Padre Sahib." The little mishap 
 was patched up with string, and the tonga 
 went on merrily. It is Stevenson who says 
 that the " invitation to the road," nature's 
 great morning song, has not yet been properly 
 understood or put to music. The first note 
 of it is the sound of the dawn-wind through 
 long grass. It is good, good beyond expres- 
 sion, to see the sun rise upon a strange land 
 and to know that you have only to go forward 
 and possess that land — that it will dower you 
 before the day is ended with a hundred new 
 impressions, and, perhaps, one idea. It is 
 good to snuff the wind when it comes in over 
 large uplands or down from the tops of the 
 blue Aravalis — dry and keen as a new-ground 
 sword. Best of all is to light the First Pipe 
 — is there any tobacco so good as that we 
 burn in honor of the breaking day .? — and, 
 while the ponies wake the long white road 
 with their hooves and the birds go abroad in 
 companions together, to thank your stars that 
 you are neither the Subaltern who has Orderly 
 Room, the 'Stunt who has ofhce, or the Judge 
 who has the Court to attend ; but are only a 
 loafer in a flannel shirt bound, if God pleases, 
 to " little Boondi," somewhere beyond the 
 faint hills beyond the plain. 
 
 But there was alloy in this delight. Men 
 had told the Englishman darkly that Boondi 
 State had no love for Englishmen, that there 
 was nowhere to stop, and that no one would 
 do anything for money. Love was out of the
 
 Letters of Marque 159 
 
 question. Further, it was an acknowledged 
 fact that there were no EngHshmen of any 
 kind in Boondi. But the Englishman trusted 
 that Ganesh would be good to him, and that 
 he would, somehow or other, fall upon his 
 feet as he had fallen before. The road from 
 Nasirabad to Deoli, being military in its 
 nature, is nearly as straight as a ruler and 
 about as smooth. Here and there little rocky 
 hills, the last off-shoots of the Aravalis to the 
 west, break the ground ; but the bulk of it is 
 fair and without pimples. The Deoli Force 
 are apparently so utterly Irregular that they 
 can do without a telegraph, have their mails 
 carried by runners, and dispense with bridges 
 over all the fifty-six miles that separate them 
 from Nasirabad. However, a man who goes 
 shikarring for any length of time in one of 
 Ram Baksh's tongas would soon learn to dis- 
 pense with anything and everything. " All 
 the Sahibs use my tonga; I've got eight of 
 them and twenty pairs of horses," said Ram 
 Baksh. " They go as far as Gangra, where 
 the tigers are, for they are ' shutin-tongas.' " 
 Now the Englishman knew Gangra slightly, 
 having seen it on the way to Udaipur ; and it 
 was as perverse and rocky a place as any man 
 would desire to see. He politely expressed 
 doubt. " I tell you my tongas go anywhere," 
 said Ram Baksh, testily. A hay-wagon — 
 they cut and stack their hay in these parts — 
 blocked the road. Ram Baksh ran the tonga 
 to one side, into a rut, fetched up on a tree-
 
 i6o Letters of Marque 
 
 stump, rebounded on to a rock, and struck the 
 road again. " Observe," said Ram Baksh ; 
 " but that is nothing. You wait till we get 
 on the Boondi road, and I'll make you shake, 
 shake like a bottle." *' Is it very bad t " 
 " I've never been to Boondi myself, but I 
 hear it is all rocks — great rocks as big as this 
 tonga." But though he boasted himself and 
 his horses nearly all the way, he could not 
 reach Deoli in anything like the time he had 
 set forth. " If I am not at Boondi by four," 
 he had said, at six in the morning, " let me go 
 without my fee." But by midday he was still 
 far from Deoli, and Boondi lay twenty-eight 
 miles beyond that station. " What can I 
 do ? " said he. " I've laid out lots of horses 
 — any amount. But the fact is I've never 
 been to Boondi. I shan^t go there in the 
 night." Ram Baksh's " lots of horses " were 
 three pair between Nasirabad and Deoli — 
 three pair of undersized ponies who did won- 
 ders. At one place, after he had quitted a 
 cotton wagon, a drove of gipsies, and a man 
 on horseback, with his carbine across his 
 saddle-bow, the Englishman came to a stretch 
 of road so utterly desolate that he said : 
 "Now I am clear of everybody who ever knew 
 me. This is the beginning of the waste into 
 which the scape-goat was sent." 
 
 From a bush by the roadside sprang up a fat 
 man who cried aloud in English : " How does 
 Your Honor do ? I met Your Honor in 
 Simla this year. Are you quite well .-*
 
 Letters of Marque i6i 
 
 Ya-as, I am here. Your Honor remembers 
 me ? I am traveling. Ya-as. Ha ! Ha ! " 
 and he went on, leaving His Honor bemazed. 
 It was a Babu — a Simla Babu, of that there 
 could be no doubt ; but who he was or what 
 he was doing, thirty miles from anywhere. 
 His Honor could not make out. The native 
 moves about more than most folk, except rail- 
 way people, imagine. The big banking firms 
 of Upper India naturally keep in close touch 
 with their great change-houses in Ajmir, 
 despatching and receiving messengers regu- 
 larly. So it comes to pass that the neces- 
 sitous circumstances of Lieutenant Ranna- 
 mack, of the Tyneside Tailtwisters, quartered 
 on the Frontier, are thoroughly known and 
 discussed, a thousand miles south of the can- 
 tonment where the light-hearted Lieutenant 
 goes to his money-lender. 
 
 This is by the way. Let us return to the 
 banks of the Banas river, where " poor 
 Carey," as Tod calls him, came when he was 
 sickening for his last illness. The Banas is 
 one of those streams which runs '^ over golden 
 sands with feet of silver," but, from the scarp 
 of its banks, Deoli in the rains must be iso- 
 lated. Ram Baksh, questioned hereon, 
 vowed that all the Officer Sahibs never 
 dreamed of halting, but went over in boats or 
 on elephants. According to Ram Baksh the 
 men of Deoli must be wonderful creatures. 
 They do nothing but use his tongas. A 
 break in some low hills gives on to the dead 
 II
 
 1 62 Letters of Marque 
 
 flat plain in which Deoli stands. " You must 
 stop here for the night," said Ram Baksh. 
 " 1 will not take my horses forward in the 
 dark ; God know^s where the dak-bungalow is. 
 I've forgotten, but any one of the Officer 
 Saliibs in Deoli will tell you." 
 
 Those in search of a new emotion would 
 do well to run about an apparently empty 
 cantonment, in a disgraceful shooting-tonga, 
 hunting for a place to sleep in, Chaprassis 
 come out of back verandas, and are rude, and 
 regimental Babus hop off godowns, and are 
 flippant, while in the distance a Sahib looks 
 out of his room, and eyes the dusty forlorn- 
 hope with silent contempt. It should be men- 
 tioned that the dust on the Deoli Road not 
 only powders but masks the face and raiment 
 of the passenger. 
 
 Next morning Ram Baksh was awake with 
 the dawn, and clamorous to go on to Boondi. 
 " I've sent a pair of horses, big horses, out 
 there and the sais is a fool. Perhaps they 
 will be lost; I want to find them." He 
 dragged his unhappy passenger on the road 
 once more and demanded of all who passed the 
 dak-bungalow which was the way to Boondi. 
 '■' Observe," said he, " there can be only one 
 road, and if I hit it we are all right, and I'll 
 show you what the tonga can do." "Amen," 
 said the Englishman, devoutly, as the tonga 
 jumped into and out of a larger hole. " ^^'ith- 
 out doubt this is the Boondi Road," said Ram 
 Baksh ; " it is so bad."
 
 Letters of Marque 163 
 
 It has been before said that the Boondi State 
 has no great love for Sahibs. The state of 
 the road proves it. " This," said Ram Baksh, 
 tapping the wheel to see whether the last 
 plunge had smashed a spoke, "is a very good 
 road. You wait till you see what is ahead." 
 And the funeral staggered on — over irrigation 
 cuts, through buffalo wallows, and dried pools 
 stamped with the hundred feet of kine (this, 
 by the way, is the most cruel road of all), up 
 rough banks where the rock ledges peered 
 out of the dust, down steep-cut dips orna- 
 mented with large stones, and along tw^o-feet 
 deep ruts of the rains, where the tonga went 
 slantwise even to the verge of upsetting. It 
 was a royal road — a native road — a Raj 
 road of the roughest, and, through all its jolts 
 and bangs and bumps and dips and heaves, 
 the eye of Ram Baksh rolled in its blood-shot 
 socket, seeking for the " big horses" he had 
 so rashly sent into the wilderness. The 
 ponies that had done the last twenty miles 
 into Deoli were nearly used up, and did their 
 best to lie down in the dry beds of nullahs. 
 
 A man came by on horseback, his servant 
 walking before with platter and meal-bag. 
 " Have you seen any horses hereabouts ? '' 
 cried Ram Baksh. " Horses ? What the 
 Devil have I to do with your horses ? D'you 
 think I've stolen them } " Now this was 
 decidedly a strange answer, and showed the 
 rudeness of the land. An old woman under 
 a tree cried out in a strange tongue and
 
 164 Letters of Marque 
 
 ran away. It was a dreamlike experience, 
 this hunting for horses in a wilderness with 
 neither house nor hut nor shed in sight. *' If 
 we keep to the road long enough we must 
 find them. Look at the road. This Raj 
 ought to be smitten with bullets." Ram 
 Baksh had been pitched forward nearly on 
 the off-pony's rump, and was in a very bad 
 temper indeed. The funeral found a house 
 — a house walled with thorns — and near by 
 were two big horses, thirteen-two if an inch, 
 and harnessed quite regardless of expense. 
 
 Everything was repacked and rebound with 
 triple ropes, and the Sahib was provided with 
 an extra cushion ; but he had reached a sort of 
 dreamsome Nirvana, having several times bit- 
 ten his tongue through, cut his boot against 
 the wheel-edge, and twisted his legs into a 
 true-lovers'-knot. There was no further 
 sense of suffering in him. He was even 
 beginning to enjoy himself faintly and by 
 gasps. The road struck boldly into hills with 
 all their teeth on edge, that is to say, their 
 strata breaking across the road in little rip- 
 ples. The effect of this was amazing. The 
 tonga skipped merrily as a young fawn, from 
 ridge to ridge. It shivered, it palpitated, it 
 shook, it slid, it hopped, it waltzed, it rico- 
 chetted, it bounded like a kangaroo, it blun- 
 dered like a sledge, it swayed like a top-heavy 
 coach on a down-grade, it " kicked " like a 
 badly coupled railway carriage, it squelched 
 like a country-cart, it squeaked in its torment,
 
 Letters of Marque 165 
 
 and lastly, it essayed to plow up the ground 
 with its nose. After three hours of this per- 
 formance, it struck a tiny little ford, set be- 
 tween steeply sloping banks of white dust, 
 where the water was clear brown and full of 
 fish. And here a blissful halt was called un- 
 der the shadow of the high bank of a tobacco 
 field. 
 
 Would you taste one of the real pleasures 
 of Life ? Go through severe acrobatic exer- 
 cises in and about a tonga for four hours ; 
 then, having eaten and drank till you can no 
 more, sprawl in the cool of a nullah bed with 
 your head among the green tobacco, and your 
 mind adrift with the one little cloud in a roy- 
 ally blue sky. Earth has nothing more to 
 offer her children than this deep delight of 
 animal well-being. There were butterflies in 
 the tobacco — six different kinds, and a little 
 rat came out and drank at the ford. To him 
 succeeded the flight into Egypt. The white 
 banks of the ford framed the picture perfectly 
 — the Mother in blue, on a great white 
 donkey holding the Child in her arms, and 
 Joseph walking beside, his hand upon the 
 donkey's withers. By all the laws of the 
 East, Joseph should have been riding and the 
 Mother walking. This was an exception de- 
 creed for the Englishman's special benefit. It 
 was very warm and very pleasant, and, some- 
 how, the passers by the ford grew indistinct, 
 and the nullah became a big English garden, 
 with a cuckoo singing far down in the orchard,
 
 1 66 Letters of Marque 
 
 among the apple-blossoms. The cuckoo 
 started the dream. He was the only real thing 
 in it, for on waking the garden slipped back 
 into the water, but the cuckoo remained and 
 called and called for all the world as though he 
 had been a veritable English cuckoo. " Cuckoo 
 — cuckoo — cuck " ; then a pause and renewal 
 of the cry from another quarter of the horizon. 
 After that the ford became distasteful, so the 
 procession was driven forward and in time 
 plunged into what must have been a big city 
 once, but the only inhabitants were oil- 
 men. There were abundance of tombs here, 
 and one carried a lifelike carving in high 
 relief of a man on horseback spearing a foot- 
 soldier. Hard by this place the road or rut 
 turned by great gardens, very cool and pleas- 
 ant, full of tombs and black-faced monkeys 
 who quarreled among the tombs, and shut in 
 from the sun by gigantic banians and mango 
 trees. Under the trees and behind the walls, 
 priests sat singing ; and the Englishman would 
 have inquired into what strange place he had 
 fallen, but the men did not understand him. 
 
 Ganesh is a mean little God of circum- 
 scribed powers. He was dreaming, with a 
 red and flushed face, under a banian tree ; 
 and the Englishman gave him four annas to 
 arrange matters comfortably at Boondi. His 
 priest took the four annas, but Ganesh did 
 nothing whatever, as shall be shown later. 
 His only excuse is that his trunk was a good 
 deal worn, and he would have been better for
 
 Letters of Marque 167 
 
 some more silver leaf, but that was no fault of 
 the Englishman. 
 
 Beyond the dead city was a jhil, full of snipe 
 and duck, winding in and out of the hills ; 
 and beyond the jhil, hidden altogether among 
 the hills, was Boondi. The nearer to the city 
 the viler grew the road and the more over- 
 whelming the curiosity of the inhabitants. 
 But what befel at Boondi must be reserved for 
 another chapter.
 
 1 68 Letters of Marque 
 
 XVI. 
 
 It is high time that a new treaty were made 
 with Maha Rao Raja Ram Singh, Bahadur, 
 Raja of Boondi. He keeps the third article 
 of the old one too faithfully, which says that 
 he " shall not enter into negotiations with any 
 one without the consent of the British Govern- 
 ment." He does not negotiate at all. Arrived 
 at Boondi Gate, the Englishman asked where 
 he might lay his head for the night, and the 
 Quarter Guard with one accord said : " The 
 Sukh Mahal, which is beyond the city," and 
 the tonga went thither through the length of 
 the town till it arrived at a pavilion on a lake 
 — a place of two turrets connected by an open 
 colonnade. The " house " was open to the 
 winds of heaven and the pigeons of the Raj ; 
 but the latter had polluted more than the first 
 could purify. A snowy-bearded choivkidar 
 crawled out of a place of tombs, which he 
 seemed to share with some monkeys, and 
 threw himself into Anglo-Saxon attitudes. He 
 was a great deal worse than Ram Baksh, 
 for he said that all the Officer Sahibs of Deoli 
 came to the Sukh Mahal for shikar and — 
 never went away again, so pleased were they. 
 The Sahib had brought the Honor of his 
 Presence, and he was a very old man, and 
 without a written permit could do nothing.
 
 Letters of Marque 169 
 
 Then he fell deeply asleep without warning ; 
 and there was a pause, of one hour only, which 
 the Englishman spent in seeing the lake. It, 
 like the jhils on the road, wound in and out 
 among the hills, and, on the bund side, was 
 bounded by a hill of black rock crowned with 
 a chhatri of gray stone. Below the bund was 
 a garden as fair as eye could wish, and the 
 shores of the lake were dotted with little tem- 
 ples. Given a habitable house, — a mere dak- 
 bungalow, — it would be a delightful spot to 
 rest in. Warned by some bitter experiences 
 in the past, the Englishman knew that he was 
 in for the demi-semi-royal or embarrassing 
 reception, when a man, being the unwelcome 
 guest of a paternal State, is neither allowed 
 to pay his way and make himself comfortable, 
 nor is he willingly entertained. When he 
 saw a one-eyed niunshi (clerk), he felt certain 
 that Ganesh had turned upon him at last. 
 The vi2inshi demanded and received the piir- 
 wana., or written permit. Then he sat down 
 and questioned the traveler exhaustively as 
 to his character and profession. Having 
 thoroughly satisfied himself that the visitor 
 was in no way connected with the Government 
 or the " Agenty Sahib Bahadur," he took no 
 further thought of the matter and the day 
 began to draw in upon a grassy bund, an 
 open-work pavilion, and a disconsolate tonga. 
 At last the faithful servitor, who had helped 
 to fight the Battle of the Mail Bags at Udaipur, 
 broke his silence, and vowing that all these
 
 1 70 Letters of Marque 
 
 devil-people — not more than twelve — had 
 only come to see the fun, suggested the 
 breaking of the 7?tunshPs head. And, indeed, 
 that seemed the best way of breaking the ice ; 
 for the 7nHnski\\?id, in the politest possible lan- 
 guage, put forward the suggestion that there 
 was nothing particular to show that the Sahib 
 who held X\\e punvana had really any right to 
 hold it. The chowkidai' woke up and chanted a 
 weird chant, accompanied by the Anglo-Saxon 
 attitudes, a new set. He was an old man, 
 and all the Sahib-log said so, and within the 
 pavilion were tables and chairs and lamps and 
 bath-tubs, and everything that the heart of 
 man could desire. Even nov/ an enormous 
 staff of menials were arranging all these things 
 for the comfort of the Sahib Bahadur and 
 Protector of the Poor, who had brought the 
 honor and glory of his Presence all the way 
 from Deoli. What did tables and chairs and 
 eggs and fowls and very bright lamps matter 
 to the Raj ? He was an old man and . . . 
 "Who put the present Raja on the throne ? " 
 " Lake Sahib," promptly answered the chowki- 
 dar. " I was there. That is the news of 
 many old years." Now Tod says it was he 
 himself who installed " Lalji the beloved " in 
 the year 182 1. The Englishman began to 
 lose faith in the chowkidar. The munshi said 
 nothing but followed the Englishman with his 
 one workable eye. A merry little breeze 
 crisped the waters of the lake, and the fish 
 began to frolic before going to bed.
 
 Letters of Marque 171 
 
 " Is nobody going to do or bring anything ? " 
 said the Englishman, faintly, wondering 
 whether the local jail would give him a bed if 
 he killed the munshi. " I am an old man,"' 
 said the chowkidar and because of their great 
 respect and reverence for the Sahib in whose 
 Presence I am only a bearer of orders and a 
 servant awaiting them, men, many men, are 
 bringing now tent-flies which I with my own 
 hands will wrap, here and there, there and 
 here, in and about the pillars of the place ; 
 and thus you, O Sahib, who have brought the 
 honor of your Presence to the Boondi Raj 
 over the road to Deoli, which is a kutcha road, 
 will be provided with a very fine and large 
 apartment over which I will watch while you 
 go to kill the tigers in these hills. 
 
 By this time two youths had twisted canvas 
 round some of the pillars of the colonnade, 
 making a sort of loose-box with a two-foot 
 air-way all round the top. There was no 
 door, but there were unlimited windows. Into 
 this enclosure the choivkadir heaped furniture 
 on which many generations of pigeons had 
 evidently been carried off by cholera, until he 
 was entreated to desist. " What," said he, 
 scornfully, " are tables and chairs to this Raj ? 
 If six be not enough, let the Presence give an 
 order, and twelve shall be forthcoming. Every- 
 thing shall be forthcoming." Here he filled a 
 native lamp with kerosene oil and set it in a 
 box upon a stick. Luckily, the oil which he 
 poured so lavishly from a quart bottle was
 
 172 Letters of Marque 
 
 bad, or he would have been altogether con- 
 sumed. 
 
 Night had fallen long before this magnifi- 
 cence was ended. The superfluous furniture 
 — chairs for the most part — was shoveled out 
 into the darkness, and by the light of a flam- 
 boyant lamplet — a merry wind forbade candles 
 — the Englishmen went to bed, and was lulled 
 to sleep by the rush of the water escaping 
 from the overflow trap and the splash of the 
 water-turtle as he missed the evasive fish. It 
 was a curious sight. Cats and dogs rioted 
 about the enclosure, and a wind from the lake 
 bellied the canvas. The brushwood of the 
 hills around snapped and cracked as beasts 
 went through it, and creatures — not jackals — 
 made dolorous noises. On the lake it seemed 
 that hundreds of water-birds were keeping a 
 hotel, and that there were arrivals and depar- 
 tures throughout the night. The Raj insisted 
 upon providing a guard of two sepoys, very 
 pleasant men, on four rupees a month. These 
 said that tigers sometimes wandered about on 
 the hills above the lake, but were most gen- 
 erally to be found five miles away. And the 
 Englishman promptly dreamed that a one-eyed 
 tiger came into his tent without a piwwaiia. 
 But it was only a wild cat after all ; and it fled 
 before the shoes of civilization. 
 
 The Sukh Mahal was completely separated 
 from the city, and might have been a country- 
 house. It should be mentioned that Boondi 
 is jammed into a V-shaped gorge — the valley
 
 Letters of Marque 173 
 
 at the main entrance being something less 
 than five hundred yards across. As it splays 
 out, the thickly packed houses follow its lines, 
 and, seen from above, seem like cattle herded 
 together preparatory to a stampede through 
 the gate. Owing to the set of the hills, very 
 little of the city is visible except from the 
 Palace. It was in search of this latter that 
 the Englishman went abroad and became so 
 interested in the streets that he forgot all 
 about it for a time. Jeypore is a show-city 
 and is decently drained ; Udaipur is blessed 
 with a State Engineer and a printed form of 
 Government ; for Jodhpur the dry sand, the 
 burning sun, and an energetic doctor have 
 done a good deal, but Boondi has none of 
 these things. The crampedness of the locality 
 aggravates the evil, and it can only be in the 
 rains which channel and furrow the rocky hill- 
 sides that Boondi is at all swept out. The 
 Nal Sagar, a lovely little stretch of water, 
 takes up the head of the valley called Banda 
 Gorge, and must, in the nature of things, re- 
 ceive a good deal of unholy drainage. But 
 setting aside this weakness, it is a fascinating 
 place — this jumbled city of straight streets 
 and cool gardens, where gigantic mangoes and 
 peepuls intertwine over gurgling watercourses, 
 and the cuckoo comes at midday. It boasts 
 no foolish Municipality to decree when a 
 house is dangerous and uninhabitable. The 
 newer shops are built into, on to, over, and 
 under time-blackened ruins of an older day,
 
 174 Letters of Marque 
 
 and the little children skip about tottering 
 arcades and grass-grown walls, while their 
 parents chatter below in the crowded bazaar. 
 In the black slums, the same stones seem to 
 be used over and over again for house build- 
 ing. Wheeled conveyances are scarce in 
 Boondi city — there is scant room for carts, and 
 the streets are paved with knobsome stones, 
 unpleasant to walk over. From time to time 
 an inroad of Bunjaras'' pack-bullocks sweeps 
 the main streets clear of life, or one of the 
 Raja's elephants — he has twelve of them — 
 blocks the way. But, for the most part, the 
 foot-passengers have all the city for their 
 own. 
 
 They do not hurry themselves. They sit in 
 the sun and think, or put on all the arms 
 in the family, and, hung with ironmongery, 
 parade before their admiring friends. Others, 
 lean, dark men, with bound jaws and only a 
 tulwar for weapon, dive in and out of the dark 
 alleys, on errands of State. It is a beautifully 
 lazy city, doing everything in the real, true, 
 original native way, and it is kept in very good 
 order by the Durbar. There either is or is 
 not an order for everything. There is no 
 order to sell fishing-hooks, or to supply an 
 Englishman with milk, or to change for him 
 currency notes. He must only deal with the 
 Durbar for whatever he requires ; and where- 
 ever he goes he must be accompanied by at 
 least two armed men. They will tell him 
 nothing, for they know or affect to know noth-
 
 Letters of Marque 175 
 
 ing of the city. They will do nothing except 
 shout at the little innocents who joyfully run 
 after the stranger and demand pice, but there 
 they are, and there they will stay till he leaves 
 the city, accompanying him to the gate, and 
 waiting there a little to see that he is fairly off 
 and away. Englishmen are not encouraged 
 in Boondi. The intending traveler would do 
 well to take a full suit of Political uniform 
 with the sunflowers, and the little black sword 
 to sit down upon. The local god is the 
 " Agenty Sahib," and he is an incarnation 
 without a name — at least among the lower 
 classes. The educated, when speaking of 
 him, always use the courtly "Bahadur" affix ; 
 and yet it is a mean thing to gird at a State 
 which, after all, is not bound to do anything 
 for intrusive Englishmen without any visible 
 means of livelihood. The King of this fair 
 city should declare the blockade absolute, and 
 refuse to be troubled with any one except 
 " Colon-nel Baltah, Agenty Sahib Bahadur " 
 and the Politicals. If ever a railway is run 
 through Kotah, as men on the Bombay side 
 declare it must be, the cloistered glory of 
 Boondi will depart, for Kotah is only twenty 
 miles easterly of the city and the road is 
 moderately good. In that day the Globe- 
 trotter will pry about the place, and the 
 Charitable Dispensary — a gem among dispen- 
 saries — will be public property. 
 
 The Englishman was hunting for the statue 
 of a horse, a great horse hight Hunja, who was a
 
 176 Letters of Marque 
 
 steed of Irak, and a King's gift to Rao Omeda, 
 one time monarch of Boondi. He found it in 
 the city square as Tod had said ; and it was 
 an unlovely statue, carven after the dropsical 
 fashion of later Hindu art. No one seemed 
 to know anything about it. A little further 
 on, one cried from a byway in rusty English : 
 " Come and see my Dispensary." There are 
 only two men in Boondi who speak English. 
 One is the head, and the other the assistant, 
 teacher of the English side of Boondi Free 
 School. The third was, some twenty years ago, 
 a pupil of the Lahore Medical College when 
 that institution was young; and he only re- 
 membered a word here and there. He was 
 head of the Charitable Dispensary ; and in- 
 sisted upon, then and there, organizing a small 
 levee and pulling out all his books. Escape 
 was hopeless : nothing less than a formal in- 
 spection and introduction to all the native phy- 
 sicians would serve. There were sixteen beds 
 in and about the courtyard, and between twenty 
 and thirty out-patients stood in attendance. 
 Making allowances for untouched Orientalism, 
 the Dispensary is a good one, and must relieve 
 a certain amount of human misery. There is 
 no other in all Boondi. The operation-book, 
 kept in English, showed the principal com- 
 plaints of the country. They were : " Asth- 
 ama," " Numonia," " Skindiseas," " Daba- 
 laty " and "Loin-bite." This last item oc- 
 curred again and again — three and four cases 
 per week — and it was not until the Doctor said
 
 Letters of Marque 177 
 
 " Sher se mara " that the Englishman read it 
 aright. It was " lion-bite," or tiger, if you 
 insist upon zoological accuracy. There was 
 one incorrigible idiot, a handsome young man, 
 naked as the day, who sat in the sunshine, 
 shivering and pressing his hands to his head. 
 " I have given him blisters and setons — have 
 tried native and English treatment for two 
 years, bui it is no use. He is always as you 
 see him, and now he stays here by the favor of 
 the Durbar, which is a very good and pitiful 
 Durbar," said the Doctor. There were many 
 such pensioners of the Durbar — men afiflicted 
 with chronic " asthama" who stayed " by 
 favor," and were kindly treated. They were 
 resting in the sunshine their hands on their 
 knees, sure that their daily dole of grain and 
 tobacco and opium would be forthcoming. 
 " All folk, even little children, eat opium here," 
 said the Doctor, and the diet-book proved it. 
 After laborious investigation of everything, 
 down to the last indent to Bombay for Europe 
 medicines, the Englishman was suffered to de- 
 part. " Sir, I thank . . . ," began the Native 
 Doctor, but the rest of the sentence stuck. 
 Sixteen years in Boondi does not increase 
 knowledge of English ; and he went back to his 
 patients, gravely conning over the name of the 
 Principal of the Lahore Medical School — a 
 College now — who had taught him all he knew, 
 and to whom he intended to write. There 
 was something pathetic in the man's catching 
 at news from the outside world of men he had 
 12
 
 178 Letters of Marque 
 
 known as Assistant and House Surgeons who 
 are now Rai Bahadurs, and his parade of the 
 few shreds of English that still clung to him. 
 May he treat " loin-bites " and " catrack " 
 successfully for many years. In the happy, 
 indolent fashion that must have merits which 
 we cannot understand, he is doing a good 
 work, and the Durbar allows his Dispensary 
 as much as it wants. 
 
 Close to the Dispensary stood the Free 
 School, and thither an importunate 77iunshi 
 steered the Englishman, who, by this time, was 
 beginning to persuade herself that he really 
 was an accredited agent of Government, sent 
 to report on the progress of Boondi. From a 
 peepul-shaded courtyard came a clamor of 
 young voices. Thirty or forty little ones, from 
 five to eight years old, were sitting in an open 
 veranda learning accounts and Hindustani, 
 said the teacher. No need to ask from what 
 castes they came, for it was written on their 
 faces that they were Mahajans, Oswals, Agger- 
 wals, and in one or two cases, it seemed, 
 Sharawaks of Guzerat. They were learning- 
 the business of their lives, and, in time, would 
 take their father's places, and show in how 
 many ways money might be manipulated. 
 Here the profession-type came out with start- 
 ling distinctness. Through the chubbiness of 
 almost babyhood, or the delicate suppleness of 
 maturer years, in mouth and eyes and hands, 
 it betrayed itself. The Rahtor, who comes of 
 a fighting stock, is a fine animal, and well bred ;
 
 Letters of Marque 179 
 
 the Hara, who seems to be more compactly 
 built, is also a fine animal ; but for a race that 
 show blood in every line of their frame, from 
 the arch of the instep to the modeling of the 
 head, the financial — trading is too coarse a 
 word — the financial class of Rajputana appears 
 to be the most remarkable. Later in life may 
 become clouded with fat jowl and paunch ; 
 but in his youth, his quick-eyed, nimble youth, 
 the young Marwar, to give him his business 
 title, is really a thing of beauty. His mianners 
 are courtly. The bare ground and a few slates 
 sufficed for the children who were merely learn- 
 ing the ropes that drag States ; but the English 
 class, of boys from ten to twelve, was supplied 
 with real benches and forms and a table with 
 a cloth top. The assistant teacher, for the 
 head was on leave, was a self-taught man of 
 Boondi, young and delicate looking, who pre- 
 ferred reading to speaking English. His 
 youngsters were supplied with " The Third 
 English Reading Book," and were painfully 
 thumbing their way through a doggerel poem 
 about an " old man with hoary hair." One 
 boy, bolder than the rest, slung an English 
 sentence at the visitor, and collapsed. It was 
 his little stock-in-trade, and the rest regarded 
 him enviously. The Durbar supports the 
 school, which is entirely free and open ; a just 
 distinction being maintained between the va- 
 rious castes. The old race prejudice against 
 payment for knowledge came out in reply to a 
 question. " You must not sell teaching," said
 
 i8o Letters of Marque 
 
 the teacher ; and the class murmured applau- 
 sively, "You must not sell teaching." 
 
 The population of Boondi seems more 
 obviously mixed than that of the other States. 
 There are four or five thousand Mahometans 
 within its walls, and a sprinkling of aborigines 
 of various varieties, besides the human raffle 
 that the Bunjaras bring in their train, with 
 Pathans and sleek Delhi men. The new 
 heraldry of the State is curious — something 
 after this sort. Or^ a demi-god, sable^ issuant 
 of flames, holding in right hand a sword and 
 in the left a bow — all proper. In chief, a dag- 
 ger of the second, sheathed vert, fessewise over 
 seven arrows in sheaf of the secojid. This latter 
 blazon Boondi holds in commemoration of the 
 defeat of an Imperial Prince who rebelled 
 against the Delhi Throne in the days of Jehan- 
 gir, when Boondi, for value received, took 
 service under the Mahometan. It might also 
 be, but here there is no certainty, the memorial 
 of Rao Rutton's victory over Prince Khoorm, 
 w^hen the latter strove to raise all Rajputana 
 against Jehangir his father ; or of a second 
 victory over a riotous lordling who harried 
 Mewar a little later. For this exploit, the 
 annals say, Jehangir gave Rao Rutton honor- 
 ary flags and kettle-drums which may have 
 been melted down by the science of the Her- 
 alds College into the blazon aforesaid. All 
 the heraldry of Rajputana is curious, and, to 
 such as hold that there is any worth in the 
 " Royal Science," interesting. Udaipur's
 
 Letters of Marque i8i 
 
 shield is, naturally gules a sun in splendor, as 
 befits the " children of the Sun and Fire," and 
 one of the most ancient houses in India. Her 
 crest is the straight Rajput sword, the Khaiida^ 
 for an account of the worship of which very 
 powerful divinity read Tod. The supporters 
 are a Bhil and a Rajput, attired for the forlorn- 
 hope ; commemorating not only the defenses 
 of Chitor, but also the connection of the great 
 Bappa Rawul with the Bhils,who even now play 
 the principal part in the Crown-Marking of a 
 Rana of Udaipur. Here, again, Tod explains 
 the matter atlength. Banswara claims alliance 
 with Udaipur, and carries a sun, with a label 
 of difference of some kind. Jeypore has the 
 five-colored flag of Amber with a sun, because 
 the House claim descent from Rama, and her 
 crest is a kuchnar tree, which is the bearing of 
 Dasaratha, father of Rama. The white horse, 
 which faces the tiger as supporter, may or may 
 not be memorial of the great aswamedha yuga, 
 or horse sacrifice, that Jey Singh, who built 
 Jeypore, did — ?iot carry out. 
 
 Jodhpurhas the five-colored flag, with a fal- 
 con, in which shape Durga, the patron Goddess 
 of the State, has been sometimes good enough 
 to appear. She has perched in the form of a 
 wagtail on the howdah of the Chief of Jeysul- 
 mir, whose shield is blazoned with "forts in 
 a desert land," and a naked left arm holding 
 a broken spear, because, the legend goes, Jey- 
 sulmir was once galled by a horse with a 
 magic spear. They tell the story to-day, but
 
 1 82 Letters of Marque 
 
 it is a long one. The supporters of the 
 shield — this is canting heraldry with a ven- 
 geance ! — are antelopes of the desert spangled 
 with gold coin, because the State was long the 
 refuge of the wealthy bankers of India. 
 
 Bikanir, a younger House of Jodhpur, car- 
 ries three white hawks on the five-colored 
 flag. The patron Goddess of Bikanir once 
 turned the thorny jungle round the city to 
 fruit trees, and the crest therefore is a green 
 tree — strange emblem for a desert principality. 
 The motto, however, is a good one. When 
 the greater part of the Rajput States were 
 vassals of Akbar, and he sent them abroad to 
 do his will, certain Princes objected to cross- 
 ing the Indus, and asked Bikanir to head the 
 mutiny because his State was the least acces- 
 sible. He consented, on condition that they 
 v\''ould all for one day greet him thus : '"'' Jey 
 Jafigal dar Badshah ! " History shows what 
 became of the objectors, and Bikanir's 
 motto : " Hail to the King of the Waste ! " 
 proves that the tale must be true. But from 
 Boondi to Bikanir is a long digression, bred 
 by idleness on the bund of the Burra. It 
 would have been sinful not to let down a line 
 into those crowded waters, and the Guards, 
 who were Mahometans, said that if the Sahib 
 did not eat fish, they did. And the Sahib 
 fished luxuriously, catching two and three 
 pounders, of a perch-like build, whenever he 
 chose to cast. He was wearied of schools 
 and dispensaries, and the futility of heraldry
 
 Letters of Marque 183 
 
 accorded well with sloth — that is to say 
 Boondi. 
 
 It should be noted, none the less, that in 
 this part of the world the soberest mind will 
 believe anything — believe in the ghosts by 
 the Gau Mukh, and the dead Thakurs who 
 get out of their tombs and ride round the 
 Burra Talao at Boondi — will credit every 
 legend and lie that rises as naturally as the 
 red flush of sunset, to gild the dead glories 
 of Rajasthan.
 
 184 Letters of Marque 
 
 XVII. 
 
 " This is a devil's place you have come to, 
 Sahib. No grass for the horses, and the 
 people don't understand anything, and their 
 dirty //^^ are no good in Nasirabad. Look 
 here." Ram Baksh wrathfuUy exhibited a 
 handful of lumps of copper. The nuisance of 
 taking a native out of his own beat is that he 
 forthwith regards you not only as the author 
 of his being, but of all his misfortunes as well. 
 He is as hampering as a frightened child and 
 as irritating as a man. " Padre Martum 
 Sahib never came here," said Ram Baksh, 
 with an air of one who had been led against 
 his will into bad company. 
 
 A story about a rat that found a piece of 
 turmeric and set up a bunnia's shop had sent 
 the one-eyed ;;z//7zj-/z/ away, but a company of 
 lesser 7}ums/us, runners, and the like were in 
 attendance, and they said that money might 
 be changed at the Treasury, which was in the 
 Palace. It was quite impossible to change it 
 anywhere else — there was no order. From the 
 Sukh Mahal to the Palace the road ran 
 through the heart of the city, and by reason 
 of the continual shouting of the mwishis^ not 
 more than ten thousand of the fifty thousand 
 people of Boondi knew for what purpose the 
 Sahib was journeying through their midst.
 
 Letters of Marque 185 
 
 Cataract was the most prevalent affliction, 
 cataract in its worst forms, and it was, there- 
 fore, necessary that men should come very 
 close to look at the stranger. They were in no 
 sense rude, but they stared devoutly. " He 
 has not come for shikar, and he will not take 
 petitions. He has come to see the place, and 
 God knows what he is." The description was 
 quite correct, as far as it went ; but, somehow 
 or another, when shouted out at four cross- 
 ways in the midst of a very pleasant little 
 gathering it did not seem to add to dignity or 
 command respect. 
 
 It has been written " the coup d'ceil of the 
 castellated Palace of Boondi, from whichever 
 side you approach it, is perhaps the most 
 striking in India. Whoever has seen the 
 Palace of Boondi can easily picture to him- 
 self the hanging gardens of Semiramis." This 
 is true — and more too. To give on paper 
 any adequate idea of the Bondi-ki-Mahal is 
 impossible. Jeypore Palace may be called the 
 Versailles of India ; Udaipur's House of 
 State is dwarfed by the hills round it and the 
 spread of the Pichola Lake ; Jodhpur's House 
 of Strife, gray towers on red rock, is the work 
 of giants, but the Palace of Boondi, even in 
 broad daylight, is such a Palace as men build 
 for themselves in uneasy dreams — the work 
 of goblins more than of men. It is built into 
 and out of the hillside, in gigantic terrace on 
 terrace, and dominates the whole of the city. 
 But a detailed description of it were useless.
 
 1 86 Letters of Marque 
 
 Owing to the dip of the valley in which the 
 city stands, it can only be well seen from one 
 place, the main road of the city ; and from 
 that point looks like an avalanche of masonry 
 ready to rush down and block the gorge. Like 
 all the other Palaces of Rajputana, it is the 
 work of many hands, and the present Raja 
 has thrown out a bastion of no small size 
 on one of the lower levels, which has been 
 four or five years in the building. No one 
 knows where the hill begins and where the 
 Palace ends. Men say that there are sub- 
 terranean chambers leading into the heart 
 of the hills, and passages communicating 
 with the extreme limits of Taragarh, the 
 giant fortress that crowns the hill and flanks 
 the whole of the valley on the Palace side. 
 They say that there is as much room under 
 as above ground, and that none have tra- 
 versed the whole extent of the Palace. Look- 
 ing at it from below, the Englishman could 
 readily believe that nothing was impossible 
 for those who had built it. The dominant 
 impression was of height — height that heaved 
 itself out of the hillside and weighed upon 
 the eyelids of the beholder. The steep slope 
 of the land had helped the builders in secur- 
 ing this effect. From the main road of the 
 city a steep stone-paved ascent led to the 
 first gate — name not communicated by the 
 zealous following. Two gaudily painted fishes 
 faced each other over the arch, and there 
 was little except glaring color ornamentation
 
 Letters of Marque 187 
 
 visible. This gate gave into wliat they called 
 the chowJz of the Palace, and one had need to 
 look twice ere realizing that this open space, 
 crammed with human life, was a spur of the 
 hill on which the Palace stood, paved and built 
 over. There had been little attempt at level- 
 ing the ground. The foot-worn stones fol- 
 lowed the contours of the ground, and ran up 
 to the walls of the Palace smooth as glass. 
 Immediately facing the Gate of the Fish was 
 the Quarter-Guard barracks, a dark and dirty 
 room, and here, in a chamber hollowed out in 
 a wall, were stored the big drums of State, the 
 iiakarras. The appearance of the Englishman 
 seemed to be the signal for smiting the big- 
 gest of all, and the dull thunder rolled up the 
 Palace chowk, and came back from the un- 
 pierced Palace walls in hollow groaning. It 
 was an eerie welcome — this single, sullen 
 boom. In this enclosure, four hundred years 
 ago, if the legend be true, a son of the great 
 Rao Bando, who dreamed a dream as Pharaoh 
 did and saved Boondi from famine, left a little 
 band of Haras to wait his bidding while he 
 went up into the Palace and slew his two un- 
 cles who had usurped the throne and aban- 
 doned the faith of their fathers. When he 
 had pierced one and hacked the other, as 
 they sat alone and unattended, he called out 
 to his followers, who made a slaughter-house 
 of the enclosure and cut up the usurpers' ad- 
 herents. At the best of times men slip on 
 these smooth stones ; and when the place was
 
 1 88 Letters of Marque 
 
 swimming in blood, foothold must have been 
 treacherous indeed. 
 
 An inquiry for the place of the murder of 
 the uncles — it is marked by a staircase slab, 
 or Tod, the accurate, is at fault — was met 
 by the answer that the Treasury was close 
 at hand. They speak a pagan tongue 
 in Boondi, swallow half their words; and 
 adulterate the remainder with local patois. 
 What can be extracted from a people who 
 call four miles variously do kosh, do kush, 
 dhi hkas, doo-a kot/i, and diakast all one word ? 
 The country-folk are quite unintelligible ; 
 which simplifies matters. It is the catching 
 of a shadow of a meaning here and there, the 
 hunting for directions cloaked in dialect, that 
 is annoying. Foregoing his archseological 
 researches, the Englishman sought the Treas- 
 ury. He took careful notes ; he even made 
 a very bad drawing, but the Treasury of 
 Boondi defied pinning down before the pub- 
 lic. There was a gash in the brown flank of 
 the Palace — and this gash was filled with 
 people. A broken bees' comb with the whole 
 hive busily at work on repairs will give a very 
 fair idea of this extraordinary place — the 
 Heart of Boondi. The sunlight was very 
 vivid without and the shadows were heavy 
 within, so that little could be seen except this 
 clinging mass of humanity wriggling like 
 maggots in a carcass. A stone staircase ran 
 up to a rough veranda built out of the wall, 
 and in the wall was a cave-like room, the
 
 Letters of Marque 189 
 
 guardian of whose depths was one of the re- 
 fined financial classes, a man with very small 
 hands and soft, low voice. He was girt with 
 a sword, and held authority over the Durbar 
 funds. He referred the Englishman courte- 
 ously to another branch of the department, to 
 find which necessitated a blundering progress 
 up another narrow staircase crowded with 
 loungers of all kinds. Here everything shone 
 from constant contact of bare feet and hurry- 
 ing bare shoulders. The staircase was the 
 thing that, seen from without, had produced 
 the bees' comb impression. At the top was 
 a long veranda shaded from the sun, and 
 here the Boondi Treasury worked, under the 
 guidance of a gray-haired old man, whose 
 sword lay by the side of his comfortably 
 wadded cushion. He controlled twenty or 
 thirty writers, each wrapped round a huge, 
 country paper account-book, and each far 
 too busy to raise his eyes. 
 
 The babble on the staircase might have 
 been the noise of the sea so far as these men 
 were concerned. It ebbed and flowed in 
 regular beats, and spread out far into the 
 courtyard below. Now and again the dick- 
 click-cUck of a scabbard tip being dragged 
 against the wall, cut the dead sound of tramp- 
 ing naked feet, and a soldier would stumble 
 up the narrow way into the sunlight. He 
 was received, and sent back or forward by a 
 knot of keen-eyed loungers, who seemed to 
 act as a buffer between the peace of the Se-
 
 1 90 Letters of Marque 
 
 cretariat and the pandemonium of the Admin- 
 istrative. Saises and grass-cutters, mahouts of 
 elephants, brokers, mahajuns, villagers from 
 the district, and here and there a shock-headed 
 aborigine, swelled the mob on and at the foot 
 of the stairs. As they came up, they met the 
 buffer-men who spoke in low voices and ap- 
 peared to filter them according to their merits. 
 Some were sent to the far end of the veranda, 
 where everything melted away in a fresh 
 crowd of dark faces. Others were sent back, 
 and joined the detachment shuffling for their 
 shoes in the chowk. One servant of the 
 Palace withdrew himself to the open, under- 
 neath the veranda, and there sat yapping 
 from time to time like a hungry dog : " The 
 grass ! The grass ! The grass ! " But the 
 men with the account-books never stirred. 
 And they bowed their heads gravely and 
 made entry or erasure, turning back the rus- 
 tling leaves. Not often does a reach of the 
 River of Life so present itself that it can with- 
 out alteration be transferred to canvas. But 
 the Treasury of Boondi, the view up the long 
 veranda, stood complete and ready for any 
 artist who cared to make it his own. And by 
 that lighter and less malicious irony of Fate, 
 who is always giving nuts to those who have 
 no teeth, the picture was clinched and brought 
 together by a winking, brass hookah-bowl of 
 quaint design, pitched carelessly upon a roll 
 of dull red cloth in the foreground. The faces 
 of the accountants were of pale gold, for they
 
 Letters of Marque 191 
 
 were an untanned breed, and the face of the 
 old man, their controller, was frosted silver. 
 
 It was a strange Treasury, but no other 
 could have suited the Palace. The English- 
 man watched, open-mouthed, blaming himself 
 because he could not catch the meaning of the 
 orders given to the flying chaprassies, nor 
 make anything of the hum in the veranda 
 and the tumult on the stairs. The old man 
 took the commonplace currency note and 
 announced his willingness to give change in 
 silver. " We have no small notes here," he 
 said. " They are not wanted. In a little 
 while, when you next bring the Honor of 
 your Presence this way, you shall find the 
 silver." 
 
 The Englishman was taken down the steps 
 and fell into the arms of a bristly giant who 
 had left his horse in the courtyard, and the 
 giant spoke at length, waving his arms in the 
 air, but the Englishman could not understand 
 him and dropped into the hubbub at the Palace 
 foot. Except the main lines of the building 
 there is nothing straight or angular about it. 
 The rush of people seems to have rounded 
 and softened every corner, as a river grinds 
 down boulders. From the lowest tier, two 
 zigzags, all of rounded stones sunk in mortar, 
 took the Englishman to a gate where two 
 carved elephants were thrusting at each other 
 over the arch ; and, because neither he nor 
 anyone round him could give the gate a name, 
 he called it the ''Gate of the Elephants."
 
 192 Letters of Marque 
 
 Here the noise from the Treasury was soft- 
 ened, and entry through the gate brought him 
 into a well-known world, the drowsy peace 
 of a King's Palace. There was a courtyard 
 surrounded by stables, in which were kept 
 chosen horses, and two or three grooms were 
 sleeping in the sun. There was no other life 
 except the whir and coo of the pigeons. In 
 time — though there really is no such a thing 
 as time off the line of railway — an official ap- 
 peared begirt with the skewer-like keys that 
 open the native bayonet-locks, each from six 
 inches to a foot long. Where was the Raj 
 Mahal in which, sixty-six years ago, Tod for- 
 mally installed Ram Singh, "who is now in 
 his eleventh year, fair and with a lively, in- 
 telligent cast of face " ? The warden made 
 no answer, but led to a room, overlooking the 
 courtyard, in which two armed men stood 
 before an empty throne of white marble. 
 They motioned silently that none must pass 
 inmediately before the seat of the King, but 
 go round, keeping to the far side of the double 
 row of pillars. Near the walls were stone 
 slabs pierced to take the butts of long, ven- 
 omous, black bamboo lances ; rude coffers 
 were disposed about the room, and ruder 
 sketches of Ganesh adorned the walls. " The 
 men," said the warden, " watch here day and 
 night because this place is the Rutton Daulat. " 
 That, you will concede, is lucid enough. He 
 who does not understand it, may go to for a 
 thick-headed barbarian.
 
 Letters of Marque 193 
 
 From the Rutton Daulat the warden un- 
 locked doors that led into a hall of audience 
 — the Chutter Mahal — built by Raja Chutter 
 Lai, who was killed more than two hundred 
 years ago in the latter days of Shah Jehan for 
 whom he fought. Two rooms, each supported 
 on double rows of pillars, flank the open space, 
 in the center of which is a marble reservoir. 
 Here the Englishman looked anxiously for 
 some of the atrocities of the West, and was 
 pleased to find that, with the exception of a 
 vase of artificial flowers and a clock, there was 
 nothing that jarred with the exquisite pillars, 
 and the raw blaze of color in the roofs of the 
 rooms. In the middle of these impertinent 
 observations, something sighed — sighed like 
 a distressed ghost. Unaccountable voices are 
 at all times unpleasant, especially when the 
 hearer is some hundred feet or so above ground 
 in an unknown Palace in an unknown land. 
 A gust of wind had found its way through one 
 of the latticed balconies, and had breathed 
 upon a thin plate of metal, some astrological 
 instrument, slung gongwise on a tripod. The 
 tone was as soft as that of an ^olian harp, 
 and, because of the surroundings, infinitely 
 more plaintive. 
 
 There was an inlaid ivory door, set in lintel 
 and posts crusted with looking-glass — all ap- 
 parently old work. This opened into a dark- 
 ened room where there were gilt and silver 
 charpoys, and portraits, in the native fashion, 
 of the illustrious dead of Boondi. Beyond the 
 13
 
 194 Letters of Marque 
 
 darkness was a balcony clinging to the sheer 
 side of the Palace, and it was then that the 
 Englishman realized to what a height he had 
 climbed without knowing it. He looked down 
 upon the bustle of the Treasury and the stream 
 of life flowing into and out of the Gate of the 
 Fishes where the big drums lie. Lifting his 
 eyes, he saw how Boondi City had built itself, 
 spreading from west to east as the confined 
 valley became too narrow and the years more 
 peaceable. The Boondi hills are the barrier 
 that separates the stony, uneven ground near 
 Deoli from the flats of Kotah, twenty miles 
 away. From the Palace balcony the road to 
 the eye is clear to the banks of the Chumbul 
 River, which was the Debatable Ford in times 
 gone by and was leaped, as all rivers with any 
 pretensions to a pedigree have been, by more 
 than one magic horse. Northward and east- 
 erly the hills run out to Indurgarh, and south- 
 ward and westerly to territory marked " dis- 
 puted " on the map in the present year of 
 grace. From this balcony the Raja can see 
 to the limit of his territory eastward, his em- 
 pire all under his hand. He is, or the Politi- 
 cals err, that same Ram Singh who was in- 
 stalled by Tod in 182 1, and for whose success 
 in killing his first deer, Tod was, by the Queen- 
 Mother of Boondi, bidden to rejoice. To-day 
 the people of Boondi say: "This Durbar is 
 very old : so old that few men remember its 
 beginning, for that was in our father's time." 
 It is related also of Boondi that, on the occa-
 
 Letters of Marque 195 
 
 sion of the Queen's Jubilee, they said proudly 
 that their ruler had reigned for sixty years, 
 and he was a man. They saw nothing aston- 
 ishing in the fact of a woman having reigned 
 for fifty. History does not say whether they 
 jubilated ; for there are no Englishmen in 
 Boondi to write accounts of demonstrations 
 and foundation-stone laying to the daily news- 
 papers, and Boondi is very, very small. In the 
 early morning you may see a man pantingly 
 chased out of the city by another man with a 
 naked sword. This is the mail and the mail- 
 guard; and the effect is as though runner and 
 swordsman lay under a doom — the one to fiy 
 with the fear of death always before him as 
 men fly in dreams, and the other to perpetually 
 fail of his revenge. 
 
 The warden unlocked more doors and led 
 the Englishman still higher, but into a garden 
 — a heavily timbered garden with a tank for 
 gold fish in the midst. For once the impas- 
 sive following smiled when they saw that the 
 Englishman was impressed. 
 
 " This," said they, " is the Rang Bilas." 
 " But who made it ? " " Who knows ? It 
 was made long ago." The Englishman 
 looked over the garden-wall, a foot-high 
 parapet, and shuddered. There was only the 
 flat side of the Palace, and a drop on to the 
 stones of the zigzag scores of feet below. 
 Above him was the riven hillside and the 
 decaying wall of Taragarh, and behind him 
 this fair garden, hung like Mahomet's coffin,
 
 196 Letters of Marque 
 
 but full of the noise of birds and the talking 
 of the wind in the branches. The warden 
 entered into a lengthy explanation of the 
 nature of the delusion, showing how — but he 
 was stopped before he was finished. His 
 listener did not want to know " how the trick 
 was done." Here was the garden, and there 
 were three or four stories climbed to reach it. 
 At one end of the garden was a small room, 
 under treatment by native artists who were 
 painting the panels with historical pictures, 
 in distemper. Theirs was florid polychromatic 
 art, but skirting the floor was a series of fres- 
 coes in red, black, and white, of combats with 
 elephants, bold and temperate as good Ger- 
 man work. They were worn and defaced in 
 places ; but the hand of some bygone limner, 
 who did not know how to waste a line, showed 
 under the bruises and scratches, and put the 
 newer work to shame. 
 
 Here the tour of the Palace ended ; and it 
 must be remembered that the Englishman 
 had not gone the depth of three rooms into 
 one flank. Acres of building lay to the right 
 of him, and above the lines of the terraces he 
 could see the tops of green trees. " Who 
 knew how many gardens, such as the Rang 
 Bilas, were to be found in the Palace ? " No 
 one answered directly, but all said that there 
 were many. The warden gathered up his 
 keys, and, locking each door behind him as 
 he passed, led the way down to earth. But 
 before he had crossed the garden the English-
 
 Letters of Marque 197 
 
 man heard, deep down in the bowels of the 
 Palace, a woman's voice singing, and the 
 voice rang as do voices in caves. All Palaces 
 in India excepting dead ones, such as that of 
 Amber, are full of eyes. In some, as has been 
 said, the idea of being watched is stronger 
 than in others. In Boondi Palace it was 
 overpowering — being far worse than in the 
 green shuttered corridors of Jodhpur. There 
 were trap-doors on the tops of terraces, and 
 windows veiled in foliage, and bull's-eyes set 
 low in unexpected walls, and many other 
 peep-holes and places of vantage. In the end, 
 the Englishman looked devoutly at the floor, 
 but when the voice of the woman came up 
 from under his feet, he felt that there was 
 nothing left for him but to go. Yet, excepting 
 only this voice, there was deep silence every- 
 where, and nothing could be seen. 
 
 The warden returned to the Chutter Mahal 
 to pick up a lost key. The brass table of 
 the planets was sighing softly to itself as 
 it swung to and fro in the wind. That was 
 the last view of the interior of the Palace, 
 the empty court, and the swinging, sighing 
 astrolabe. 
 
 About two hours afterwards, when he had 
 reached the other side of the valley and seen 
 the full extent of the buildings, the English- 
 man began to realize first that he had not 
 been taken through one-tenth of the Palace ; 
 and secondly, that he would do well to meas- 
 ure its extent by acres, in preference to
 
 198 Letters of Marque 
 
 meaner measures. But what made him blush 
 hotly, all alone among the tombs on the 
 hillside, was the idea that he with his ridicu- 
 lous demands for eggs, firewood, and sweet 
 drinking water should have clattered and 
 chattered through any part of it at all. 
 
 He began to understand why Boondi does 
 not encourage Englishmen.
 
 Letters of Marque 199 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 " Let us go hence my songs, she will not 
 hear. Let us go hence together without 
 fear." But Ram Baksh the irrepressible sang 
 it in altogether a baser key. He came by 
 night to the pavilion on the lake, while the 
 sepoys were cooking their fish, and reiterated 
 his whine about the devildom of the country 
 into which the Englishman had dragged him. 
 Padre Martum Sahib would never have thus 
 treated the owner of sixteen horses, all fast 
 and big ones, and eight superior " shutin-ton- 
 gas." " Let us get away, " said Ram Baksh. 
 '' You are not here for shikar, and the water 
 is very bad." It was indeed, except when 
 taken from the lake, and then it only tasted 
 fishy. " We will go, Ram Baksh," said the 
 Englishman. " We will go in the very early 
 morning, and in the mean time here is fish to 
 stay your stomach with." 
 
 When a transparent piece of canvas, which 
 fails by three feet to reach ceiling or floor, 
 is the only bar between the East and the 
 West, he would be a churl indeed who stood 
 upon invidious race distinctions. The Eng- 
 lishman went out and fraternized with the 
 Military — the four-rupee soldiers of Boondi 
 who guarded him. They were armed, one 
 with an old Tower musket crazy as to nipple
 
 2 00 Letters of Marque 
 
 and hammer, one with a native-made smooth- 
 bore, and one with a composite contrivance — 
 English sporting muzzle-loader stock with a 
 compartment for a jointed cleaning-rod and 
 hammered octagonal native barrel, wire-fas- 
 tened, a tuft of cotton on the foresight. All 
 three guns were loaded, and the owners were 
 very proud of them. They were simple folk, 
 these men-at-arms, with an inordinate appetite 
 for broiled fish. They were not always sol- 
 diers they explained. They cultivated their 
 crops until called for any duty that might 
 turn up. They were paid now and again, at in- 
 tervals, but they were paid in coin and not in 
 kind. 
 
 The 77iu7ishis and the vakils and the run- 
 ners had departed after seeing that the Eng- 
 lishman was safe for the night, so the free- 
 dom of the little gathering on the bund was 
 unrestrained. The chowkidar Q,2sa^ out of his 
 cave into the firelight. He took a fish and 
 incontinently choked, for he was a feeble old 
 man. Set right again, he launched into a very 
 long and quite unintelligible story while the 
 sepoys said reverently : " He is an old man 
 and remembers many things." As he babbled, 
 the night shut in upon the lake and the valley 
 of Boondi. The last cows were driven into 
 the water for their evening drink, the water- 
 fowl and the monkeys went to bed, and the 
 stars came out and made a new firmament in 
 the untroubled bosom of the lake. The light 
 of the fire showed the ruled lines of the bund
 
 Letters of Marque 201 
 
 springing out of the soft darkness of the 
 wooded hill on the left and disappearing into 
 the solid darkness of a bare hill on the right. 
 Below the bund a man cried aloud to keep 
 wandering pigs from the gardens whose tree- 
 tops rose to a level with the bund-edge. 
 Beyond the trees all was swaddled in gloom. 
 When the gentle buzz of the unseen city died 
 out, it seemed as though the bund were the 
 very Swordwide Bridge that runs, as every 
 one knows, between this world and the next. 
 The water lapped and muttered, and now and 
 again a fish jumped, with the shatter of 
 broken glass, blurring the peace of the re- 
 flected heavens. 
 
 " And duller should I be than some fat weed 
 That rolls itself at ease on Lethe's wharf." 
 
 The poet who wrote those lines knew noth- 
 ing whatever of Lethe's wharf. The English- 
 man had found it, and it seemed to him, at 
 that hour and in that place, that it would be 
 good and desirable never to return to the 
 Commissioners and the Deputy Commissioners 
 any more, but to lie at ease on the warm sun- 
 lit bund by day, and, at night, near a shadow- 
 breeding fire, to listen for the strangled voices 
 and whispers of the darkness in the hills. 
 Thus after as long a life as the chozvkidat^ s 
 dying easily and pleasantly, and being buried 
 in a red tomb on the borders of the lake. 
 Surely no one would come to reclaim him 
 across those weary, weary miles of rock-strewn
 
 202 Letters of Marque 
 
 road .... "And this," said the chowkidar, 
 raising his voice to enforce attention, " is true 
 talk. Everybody knows it, and now the Sahib 
 knows it. I am an old man. " He fell asleep 
 once, with his head on the clay pipe that 
 was doing duty for a ^vhole huqa among the 
 company. He had been talking for nearly a 
 quarter of an hour. 
 
 See how great a man is the true novelist ! 
 Six or seven thousand miles away, Walter 
 Besant of the Golden Pen had created Mr. 
 Maliphant — the ancient of figurehead, in the 
 All So7is and Conditions of Men, and here, in 
 Boondi, the Englishman had found Mr. Mali- 
 phant in the withered flesh. So he drank 
 Walter Besant's health in the water of the 
 Burra Talao. One of the sepoys turned him- 
 self round, with a clatter of accouterments, 
 shifted his blanket under his elbow, and told 
 a tale. It had something to do with his khet^ 
 and a gimna which certainly w^as not sugar- 
 cane. It was elusive. At times it seemed 
 that it was a woman, then changed to a right 
 of way, and lastly appeared to be a tax; but 
 the more he attempted to get at its meaning 
 through the curious patois in which its doings 
 or its merit were enveloped, the more dazed 
 the Englishman became. None the less the 
 story was a fine one, embellished with much 
 dramatic gesture which told powerfully against 
 the firelight. Then the second sepoy, who 
 had been enjoying the pipe all the time, told 
 a tale, the purport of which was that the dead
 
 Letters of Marque 203 
 
 in the tombs round the lake were wont to get 
 up of nights and go hunting. This was a fine 
 and ghostly story ; and its dismal effect was 
 much heightened by some clamor of the 
 night far up the lake beyond the floor of stars. 
 
 The third sepoy said nothing. He had 
 eaten too much fish and was fast asleep by 
 the side of the chozvkidar. 
 
 They were all Mahometans, and conse- 
 quently all easy to deal with. A Hindu is an 
 excellent person, but . . . but . . . there is no 
 knowing what is in his heart, and he is hedged 
 about with so many strange observances. 
 
 This Hindu or Musalman bent, which each 
 Englishman's mind must take before he has 
 been three years in the country, is, of course, 
 influenced by Province or Presidency. In 
 Rajputana generally, the Political swears by 
 the Hindu, and holds that the Mahometan 
 is untrustworthy. But a man who will eat 
 with you and take your tobacco, sinking the 
 fiction that it has been doctored with infidel 
 wines, cannot be very bad after all. 
 
 That night when the tales were all told and 
 the guard, bless them, were snoring peaceably 
 in the starlight, a man came stealthily into the 
 enclosure of canvas and woke the Englishman, 
 muttering " Sahib, Sahib," in his ear. It was 
 no robber but some poor devil with a petition 
 — a grimy, welted paper. He was absolutely 
 unintelligible, and stammered almost to 
 dumbness. He stood by the bed, alternately 
 bowing to the earth and standing erect, his
 
 204 Letters of Marque 
 
 arms spread aloft, and his whole body work- 
 ing as he tried to force out some rebellious 
 word in a key that should not wake the men 
 without. What could the Englishman do ? 
 He was no Government servant, and had no 
 concern with petitions. The man clicked and 
 choked and gasped in his desperate desire to 
 make the Sahib understand. But it was no 
 use ; and in the end he departed as he had 
 come — bowed, abject, and unintelligible. 
 ****** 
 
 Let every word written against Ganesh be 
 rescinded. It was by his ordering that the 
 Englishman saw such a dawn on the Burra 
 Talao as he had never before set eyes on. 
 Every fair morning is a reprint, blurred per- 
 haps, of the First Day ; but this splendor was 
 a thing to be put aside from all other days 
 and remembered. The stars had no fire in 
 them and the fish had stopped jumping, when 
 the black water of the lake paled and grew 
 gray. While he watched it seemed to the 
 Englishman that voices on the hills were in- 
 toning the first verses of Genesis. The gray 
 light moved on the face of the waters till, with 
 no interval, a blood-red glare shot up from the 
 horizon and, inky black against the intense 
 red, a giant crane floated out towards the sun. 
 In the still-shadowed city the great Palace 
 Drum boomed and throbbed to show that the 
 gates were open, while the dawn swept up the 
 valley and made all things clear. The blind 
 man who said, " The blast of a trumpet is
 
 Letters of Marque 205 
 
 red," spoke only the truth. The breaking of 
 the red dawn is like the blast of a trumpet. 
 
 "What,'' said the choivkidar^ picking the 
 ashes of the overnight fire out of his beard, 
 " what, I say, are five eggs or twelve eggs to 
 such a Raj as ours ? What also are fowls — 
 what are ''..." There was no talk of fowls. 
 Where is the fowl-man from whom you got the 
 eggs t " " He is here. No, he is there. I do 
 not know. I am an old man, and I and the 
 Raj supply everything without price. The 
 fowl-man will be paid by the State — liberally 
 paid. Let the Sahib be happy. Wah, 
 Wall." 
 
 Experience of forced labor in Himalayan 
 villages had made the Englishman very tender 
 in raising supplies that were given gratis ; 
 but the fowl-man could not be found, and the 
 value of his wares was, later, paid to Ganesh 
 — Ganesh of Situr, for that is the name of 
 the village full of priests, through which the 
 Englishman had passed in ignorance two days 
 before. A double handful of sweet smelling 
 flowers made the receipt. 
 
 Boondi was wide-awake before half-past 
 seven in the morning. Her hunters, on foot 
 and on horse, were filing towards the Deoli 
 Gate. They would hunt tiger and deer they 
 said, even wdth matchlocks and muzzle load- 
 ers as uncouth as those the Sahib saw. They 
 were a merry company and chaffed the Quar- 
 ter-Guard at the gate unmercifully when a 
 bullock-cart, laden with the cases of the
 
 2o6 Letters of Marque 
 
 *' Batonm Naphtha and Oil Company " blocked 
 the road. One of them had been a soldier of 
 the Queen, and, excited by the appearance of 
 a Sahib, did so rebuke and badger the Quar- 
 ter-Guard for their slovenliness that they 
 threatened to come out of the barracks and 
 destroy him. 
 
 So, after one last look at the Palace high 
 up the hillside, the Englishman was borne 
 away along the Deoli Road. The peculiarity 
 of Boondi is the peculiarity of the covered pit- 
 fall. One does not see it till one falls into it. 
 A quarter of a mile from the gate, town and 
 Palace were invisible. But the Englishman 
 was grieved at heart. He had fallen in love 
 with Boondi the beautiful, and believed that 
 he would never again see anything half so 
 fair. The utter untouchedness of the town 
 was one-half the charm and its association 
 the other. Read Tod, who is far too good to 
 be chipped or sampled ; read Tod luxuriously 
 on the bund of the Burra Talao, and the spirit 
 of the place will enter into you and you will 
 be happy. 
 
 To enjoy life thoroughly, haste and bustle 
 must be abandoned. Ram Baksh has said 
 that Englishmen are always bothering to go 
 forward, and for this reason, though beyond 
 doubt they pay well and readily, are not wise 
 men. He gave utterance to this philosophy 
 after he had mistaken his road and pulled up 
 in what must have been a disused quarry hard 
 by a cane-field. There were patches and
 
 Letters of Marque 207 
 
 pockets of cultivation along the rocky road, 
 where men grew cotton, chillies, tobacco, and 
 sugar-cane. " I will get you sugar-cane," said 
 Ram Baksh. "Then we will go forward, 
 and perhaps some of these jungly-fools 
 will tell us where the road is." A " jungly 
 fool," a tender of goats, did in time appear, 
 but there was no hurry ; the sugar-cane was 
 sweet and purple and the sun warm. 
 
 The Englishman lay out at high noon on 
 the crest of a rolling upland crowned with 
 rock, and heard, as a loafer had told him he 
 would hear, the " set of the day," which is as 
 easily discernible as the change of tone be- 
 tween the rising and the falling tide. At a 
 certain hour the impetus of the morning dies 
 out, and all things, living and inanimate, turn 
 their thoughts to the prophecy of the coming 
 night. The little wandering breezes drop for 
 a time, and, when they blow afresh, bring the 
 message. The " set of the day," as the loafer 
 said, has changed, the machinery is beginning 
 to run down, the unseen tides of the air are 
 falling. This moment of change can only be 
 felt in the open and in touch with the earth, 
 and once discovered, seems to place the finder 
 in deep accord and fellowship with all things 
 on earth. Perhaps this is why the genuine 
 loafer, though " frequently drunk," is " always 
 polite to the stranger," and shows such a 
 genial tolerance towards the weaknesses of 
 mankind, black, white, or brown. 
 
 In the evening when the jackals were scut-
 
 2o8 Letters of Marque 
 
 tling across the roads and the cranes had gone 
 to roost, came Deoli the desolate, and an un- 
 pleasant meeting. Six days away from his 
 kind had bred in a Cockney heart a great de- 
 sire to see a fellow-subject. An elaborate 
 loaf through the cantonment — fifteen minutes' 
 walk from end to end — showed only one dis- 
 tant dog-cart and a small English child with 
 an ayah. There was grass in the soldierly 
 straight roads, and some of the cross-cuts had 
 never been used at all since the days when the 
 cantonment had been first laid out. In the 
 western corner lay the cemetery — the only 
 carefully tended and newly whitewashed thing 
 in this God-forgotten place. Some years ago 
 a man had said good-by to the Englishman ; 
 adding cheerily : " We shall meet again. 
 The world's a very little place y'know. " 
 
 His prophecy was a true one, for the two 
 met indeed, but the prophet was lying in Deoli 
 Cemetery near the well, which is decorated so 
 ecclesiastically with funeral urns.
 
 Letters of Marque 209 
 
 XIX. 
 
 In the morning the tonga rattled past Deoli 
 Cemetery into the open, where the Deoli Irregu- 
 lars were drilling. They marked the beginning 
 of civilization and white shirts ; and so they 
 seemed altogether detestable. Yet another 
 day's jolting, enlivened by the philosophy 
 of Ram Baksh, and then came Nasirabad. 
 The last pair of ponies suggested serious 
 thought. They had covered eighteen miles 
 at an average speed of eight miles an hour, 
 and were well-conditioned little rats. " A 
 Colonel Sahib gave me this one for a present," 
 said Ram Baksh, flicking the near one. " It 
 was his child's pony. The child was five 
 years old. When he went away, the Colonel 
 Sahib said : " Ram Baksh, you are a good 
 man. Never have I seen such a good man. 
 This horse is yours." Ram Baksh was getting 
 a horse's work out of a child's pony. Surely 
 we in India work the land much as the 
 Colonel Sahib worked his son's mount ; mak- 
 ing it do child's work when so much more can 
 be screwed out of it. A native and a native 
 State deals otherwise with horse and holding. 
 Perhaps our extreme scrupulousness in hand- 
 ling may be statecraft, but, after even a short 
 sojourn in places which are dealt with not so 
 tenderly, it seems absurd. There are States 
 H
 
 210 Letters of Marque 
 
 where things are done, and done without pro- 
 test, that would make the hair of the educated 
 native stand on end with horror. These 
 things are of course not expedient to write ; 
 because their publication would give a great 
 deal of unnecessary pain and heart-searching 
 to estimable native administrators who have 
 the hope of a star before their eyes and would 
 not better matters in the least. 
 
 Note this fact though. With the exception 
 of such journals as, occupying a central posi- 
 tion in British territory, levy blackmail from 
 the neighboring States, there are no indepen- 
 dent papers in Rajputana. A King may start 
 a weekly, to encourage a taste for Sanskrit 
 and high Hindi, or a Prince may create a 
 Court Chronicle ; but that is all. A " free 
 press " is not allowed, and this the native 
 journalist knows. With good management, 
 he can, keeping under the shadow of our flag, 
 raise two hundred rupees from a big man 
 here, and five hundred from a rich man there, 
 but he does not establish himself across the 
 Border. To one who has reason to hold a 
 stubborn disbelief in even the elementary 
 morality of the native press, this bashfulness 
 and lack of enterprise is amusing. But to re- 
 turn to the native States' administrations. 
 There is nothing exactly wrong in the methods 
 of government that are overlaid with English 
 terms and forms. They are vigorous, in cer- 
 tain points ; and where they are not vigorous, 
 there is a cheery happy-go-luckiness about the
 
 Letters of Marque 211 
 
 arrangement that must be seen to be under- 
 stood. The shift and play of a man's fortune 
 across the Border is as sudden as anything in 
 the days of Haroun-al-Raschid of blessed mem- 
 ory, and there are stories, to be got for the un- 
 earthing, as wild and as improbable as those in 
 the lliousand a7td 07ie Nights. Most impres- 
 sive of all is the way in which the country is 
 " used," and its elasticity under pressure. In 
 the good old days the Durbar raised every- 
 thing it could from the people, and the King 
 spent as much as ever he could on his per- 
 sonal pleasures. Now the institution of the 
 Political agent has stopped the grabbing, for 
 which, by the way, some of the monarchs are 
 not in the least grateful — and smoothed the 
 outward face of things. But there is still a 
 difference, between our ways and the ways of 
 the other places. A year spent among native 
 States ought to send a man back to the 
 Decencies and the Law Courts and the Rights 
 of the Subject with a supreme contempt for 
 those who rave about the oppressions of our 
 brutal bureaucracy. One month nearly taught 
 an average Englishman that it was the proper 
 thing to smite anybody of mean aspect and 
 obstructive tendencies on the mouth with a 
 shoe. Hear what an intelligent loafer said. 
 His words are at least as valuable as these 
 babblings. He was, as usual, wonderfully 
 drunk, and the gift of speech came upon him. 
 The conversation — he was a great politician 
 this loafer — had turned on the poverty of
 
 212 Letters of Marque 
 
 India. ''Poor?" said he. "Of course it's 
 poor. Oh, yes, d — d poor. And I'm poor, 
 an' you're poor, altogether. Do you expect 
 people will give you money without you ask 
 'em ? No, I tell you, Sir, there's enough 
 money in India to pave Hell with if you could 
 only get at it. I've kep' servants in my day. 
 Did they ever leave me without a hundred or 
 a hundred and fifty rupees put by — and never 
 touched } You mark that. Does any black 
 man who had been in Guv'ment service go 
 away without hundreds an' hundreds put by, 
 and never touched } You mark tliat. Money ? 
 The place stinks o' money — just kept out o' 
 sight. Do you ever know a native that didn't 
 say Garib achni (I'm a poor man) ? They've 
 been sayin' Garib admi so long that the Guv'- 
 ment learns to believe 'em, and now they're 
 all bein' treated as though they was paupers, 
 I'm a pauper, an' you're a pauper — we 'aven't 
 got anything hid in the ground — an' so's 
 every white man in this forsaken country. 
 But the Injian he's a rich man. How do I 
 know ? Because I've tramped on foot, or 
 warrant pretty well from one end of the place 
 to the other, an' I know what I'm talkin' 
 about, and this 'ere Guv'ment goes peckin' 
 an' fiddlin' over its tuppenny-ha'penny little 
 taxes as if it was afraid. Which it is. You 
 see how they do things in . It's six sow- 
 ars here, and ten sowars there, and — ' Pay up, 
 3^ou brutes, or we'll pull your ears over your 
 head.' And when they've taken all they can
 
 Letters of Marque 213 
 
 get, the headman, he says : ' This is a dashed 
 poor yield. I'll come again.' Of course the 
 people digs up something outof the ground, and 
 they pay. I know the way it's done and that's 
 the way to do it. You can't go to an Injian 
 an' say : ' Look here. Can you pay me five 
 rupees ? He says : ' Garib adjni^^ of course, 
 an' would say it if he was as rich as banker. 
 But if you send a half a dozen swords at him 
 and shift the thatch off of his roof, he'll pay. 
 Guv'ment can't do that. I don't suppose it 
 could. There is no reason why it shouldn't. 
 But it might do something like it to show that 
 it wasn't going to have no nonsense. Why, 
 I'd undertake to raise a hundred million — 
 what am I talking of ? — a hundred and fifty 
 million pounds from this country per aimum. 
 and it wouldn't be strained tJien. One hundred 
 and fifty millions you could raise as easy as 
 paint, if you just made these 'ere Injians;under- 
 stand that they had to pay an' make no bones 
 about it. It's enough to make a man sick to 
 
 go in over yonder to and see what they do ; 
 
 and then come back an' see what we do. 
 Perfectly sickenin' it is. Borrer money ? 
 Why the country could pay herself an' every- 
 thing she wants, if she was only made to do 
 it. It's this bloomin' Garib adini swindle 
 that's been going on all these years, that has 
 made fools o' the Guv'ment." 
 
 Then he became egotistical, this ragged 
 ruffian who conceived that he knew the road 
 to illimitable wealth and told the story of his
 
 214 Letters of Marque 
 
 life, interspersed with anecdotes that would 
 blister the paper they were written on. But 
 through all his ravings, he stuck to his hun- 
 dred-and-fifty-million theory, and though the 
 listener dissented from him and the brutal 
 cruelty with which his views were stated, an 
 unscientific impression remained not to be 
 shaken off. Across the Border one feels that 
 the country is being used, exploited, *' made 
 to sit up," so to speak. In our territories the 
 feeling is equally strong of wealth " just round 
 the corner," as the loafer said, of a people 
 wrapped up in cotton wool and ungetat- 
 able. Will any man, who really knows some- 
 thing of a little piece of India and has not the 
 fear of running counter to custom before his 
 eyes, explain how this impression is produced, 
 and why it is an erroneous one .'' 
 
 Nasirabad marked the end of the English- 
 man's holiday, and there was sorrow in his 
 heart. " Come back again," said Ram Baksh, 
 cheerfully, " and bring a gun with you. Then 
 I'll take you to Gungra, and I'll drive you my- 
 self. 'Drive you just as well as IVe driven 
 these four days past." An amicable open- 
 minded soul was Ram Baksh. May his ton- 
 gas never grow less ! 
 
 3jC jfi ^ ^ ?fi 
 
 " This 'ere Burma fever is a bad thing to 
 have. It's pulled me down awful ; an' now I 
 am going to Peshawar. Are you the Station- 
 master ? " It was Thomas — white-cheeked, 
 sunken-eyed, drawn-mouthed Thomas — travel-
 
 Letters of Marque 215 
 
 ing from Nasirabad to Peshawar on pass ; 
 and with him was a Corporal new to his stripes 
 and doing station duty. Every Thomas is 
 interesting, except when he is too drunk to 
 speak. This Thomas was an enthusiast. He 
 had volunteered, from a Home-going regiment 
 shattered by Burma fever, into a regiment at 
 Peshawar, had broken down at Nasirabad on 
 his way up with his draft, and was now journey- 
 ing into the unknown to pick up another 
 medal. " There's sure to be something on 
 the Frontier," said this gaunt, haggard boy — 
 he was little more, though he reckoned four 
 years' service and considered himself some- 
 body. " When there's anything going, Pe- 
 shawar's the place to be in, they tell me ; but I 
 hear we shall have to march down to Calcutta 
 in no time." The Corporal was a little man 
 and showed his friend off with great pride : 
 " Ah, you should have come to us,^' said he; 
 " we're the regiment, we are. " " Well, I went 
 with the rest of our men," said Thomas. 
 " There's three hundred of us volunteered to 
 stay on, and we all went for the same regi- 
 ment. Not but what I'm saying yours is a 
 good regiment," he added with grave courtesy. 
 This loosed the Corporal's tongue, and he 
 descanted on the virtues of the regiment and 
 the merits of the officers. It has been written 
 that Thomas is devoid of esprit de corps, be- 
 cause of the jerkiness of the arrangements 
 under which he now serves. If this be true, 
 he manages to conceal his feelings very well ;
 
 2i6 Letters of Marque 
 
 for he speaks most fluently in praise of his 
 own regiment ; and, for all his youth, has a 
 keen appreciation of the merits of his officers. 
 Go to him when his heart is opened, and hear 
 him going through the roll of the subalterns, 
 by a grading totally unknown in the Army 
 List, and you will pick up something worth 
 the hearing. Thomas, with the Burma fever 
 on him, tried to cut in, from time to time, 
 with stories of his officers and what they had 
 done "when we was marchin' all up and 
 down Burma," but the little Corporal went on 
 gaily. 
 
 They made a curious contrast — these two 
 types. The lathy, town-bred Thomas with 
 hock-bottle shoulders, a little education, and 
 a keen desire to get more medals and stripes ; 
 and the little, deep-chested, bull-necked Cor- 
 poral brimming over with vitality and devoid 
 of any ideas beyond the "regiment." And 
 the end of both lives, in all likelihood, would be 
 a nameless grave in some cantonment burying- 
 ground with, if the case were specially in- 
 teresting and the Regimental Doctor had a 
 turn for the pen, an obituary notice in the 
 Indian Medical Journal. It was an unpleas- 
 ant thought. 
 
 From the Army to the Navy is a perfectly 
 natural transition, but one hardly to be ex- 
 pected in the heart of India. Dawn showed 
 the railway carriage full of riotous boys, 
 for the Agra and Mount Abu schools had 
 broken up for holidays. Surely it was natural
 
 Letters of Marque 217 
 
 enough to ask a child — not a boy, but a child 
 — whether he was going home for the holidays ; 
 and surely it was a crushing, a petrifying 
 thing to hear in a clear treble tinged with icy 
 scorn : " No. I'm on leave. I'm a midship- 
 man." Two " officers of Her Majesty's Navy" 
 — mids of a man-o'-war at Bombay — were 
 going up-country on ten days' leave. They 
 had not traveled much more than twice round 
 the world ; but they should have printed the 
 fact on a label. They chattered like daws, and 
 their talk was as a whiff of fresh air from the 
 open sea, while the train ran eastward under 
 the Aravalis. At that hour their lives were 
 bound up in and made glorious by the hope 
 of riding a horse when they reached their 
 journey's end. Much had they seen " cities 
 and men," and the artless way in which they 
 interlarded their conversation with allusions 
 to " one of those shore-going chaps, you see," 
 was delicious. They had no cares, no fears, 
 no servants, and an unlimited stock of won- 
 der and admiration for everything they saw, 
 from the " cute little well scoops " to a herd 
 of deer grazing on the horizon. It was not 
 until they had opened their young hearts with 
 infantile abandon that the listener could guess 
 from the incidental argot where these pocket- 
 Ulysseses had traveled. South African, Nor- 
 wegian, and Arabian words were used to help 
 out the slang of shipboard, and a copious vo- 
 cabulary of shipboard terms, complicated with 
 modern Greek. As free from self-conscious-
 
 2i8 Letters of Marque 
 
 ness as children, as ignorant as beings from an- 
 other planet of the Anglo-Indian life into which 
 they were going to dip for a few days, shrewd 
 and observant as befits men of the world 
 who have authority, and neat handed and re- 
 sourceful as — blue-jackets, they were a delight- 
 ful study, and accepted freely and frankly the 
 elaborate apologies tendered to them for the 
 unfortunate mistake about the " holidays." 
 The roads divided and they went their way ; 
 and there was a shadow after they had gone, 
 for the Globe-trotter said to his wife, " What 
 I like about Jeypore " — accent on the first 
 syllable, if you please — " is its characteristic 
 easternness." And the Globe-trotter's wife 
 said; "Yes. It is purely Oriental." 
 
 This was Jeypore with the gas-jets and the 
 water pipes as was shown at the beginning of 
 these trivial letters ; and the Globe-trotter 
 and his wife had not been to Amber. Joyful 
 thought ! They had not seen the soft splen- 
 dors of Udaipur, the nightmare of Chitor, 
 the grim power of Jodhpur, and the virgin 
 beauties of Boondi — fairest of all places that 
 the Englishman had set eyes on. The Globe- 
 trotter was great in the matter of hotels and 
 food, but he had not lain under the shadow 
 of a tonga in soft warm sand, eating cold pork 
 with a pocket-knife, and thanking Providence 
 who put sweet-water streams where wayfarers 
 wanted them. He had not drunk out the 
 brilliant cold-weather night in the company 
 of a King of Loafers, a grimy scallawag with
 
 Letters of Marque 219 
 
 a six days' beard and an unholy knowledge of 
 native States. He had attended service in 
 cantonment churches ; but he had not known 
 what it was to witness the simple, solemn cer- 
 emonial in the dining-room of a far-away 
 Residency, when all the English folk within 
 a hundred-mile circuit bowed their heads be- 
 fore the God of the Christians. He had 
 blundered about temples of strange deities 
 with a guide at his elbow ; but he had not 
 known what it was to attempt conversation 
 with a temple dancing-girl {iiot such an one as 
 Edwin Arnold invented), and to be rewarded 
 for a misturned compliment with a deftly 
 heaved bunch of marigold buds in his respec- 
 table bosom. Yet he had undoubtedly lost 
 much, and the measure of his loss was proven 
 in his estimate of the Orientalism of Jeypore. 
 
 But what had he who sat in judgment upon 
 him gained.? One perfect month of loafer- 
 dom, to be remembered above all others and 
 the night of the visit to Chitor, to be remem- 
 bered even when the month is forgotten. Also 
 the sad knowledge that of all the fair things 
 seen, the inept pen gives but a feeble and 
 blurred picture. 
 
 Let those who have read to the end, pardon 
 a hundred blemishes.
 
 THE SMITH ADMINISTRATION
 
 THE SMITH ADMINISTRATION 
 
 THE COW-HOUSE JIRGA 
 
 How does a King feel when he has kept 
 peace in his borders, by skilfully playing off 
 people against people, sect against sect, and 
 kin against kin ? Does he go out into the 
 back veranda, take off his terai-crown, and 
 rub his hands softly, chuckling the while — as 
 I do now ? Does he pat himself on the back 
 and hum merry little tunes as he walks up and 
 down his garden ? A man who takes no de- 
 light in ruling men — dozens of them — is no 
 man. Behold ! India has been squabbling 
 over the Great Cow Question any time these 
 four hundred years, to the certain knowledge 
 of history and successive governments. I, 
 Smith, have settled it. That is all ! 
 
 The trouble began, in the ancient and well- 
 established fashion, with a love-affair across 
 the Border, that is to say, in the next com- 
 pound. Peroo, the cowboy, went a-courting, 
 and the innocent had not sense enough to 
 keep to his own creed. He must needs make 
 love to Baktawri, Corkler's coachwan^s (coach- 
 man) little girl, and she being betrothed to 
 
 223
 
 224 The Smith Administration 
 
 Ahmed Buksh's son, ceiat nine, very properly 
 threw a cow-dung cake at his head. Peroo 
 scrambled back, hot and disheveled, over the 
 garden wall, and the vendetta began. Peroo 
 is in no sense chivalrous. He saved Chukki, 
 the ayah's (maid) little daughter, from a big 
 pariah dog once ; but he made Chukki give 
 him half a chapaiti for his services, and Chukki 
 cried horribly. Peroo threw bricks at Bak- 
 tawri when next he saw her, and said shame- 
 ful things about her birth and parentage. " If 
 she be not fair to me, I will heave a rock at 
 she," was Peroo's rule of life after the cow- 
 dung incident. Baktawri naturally objected 
 to bricks, and she told her father. 
 
 Without, in the least, wishing to hurt Cork- 
 ler's feelings, T must put on record my opinion 
 that his coachwan is a rA<7?^/^r-Mahometan, 
 not too long converted. The lines on which 
 he fought the quarrel lead me to this belief, 
 for he made a Creed-question of the brick- 
 throwing, instead of waiting for Peroo and 
 smacking that young cateran when he caught 
 him. Once beyond my borders, my people 
 carry their lives in their own hand — the Gov- 
 ernment is not responsible for their safety. 
 Corkler's coachwa?i did not complain to me. 
 He sent out an Army — Imam Din, his son — 
 with general instructions to do Peroo a mis- 
 chief in the eyes of his employer. This 
 brought the fight officially under my cogniz- 
 ance ; and was a direct breach of the neutral- 
 ity existing between myself and Corkier, who
 
 The Smith Administration 225 
 
 has " Punjab head," and declares that his 
 servants are the best in the Province. I know 
 better. They are the tailings of my compound 
 — "casters" for dishonesty and riotousness. 
 As an Army, Imam Din was distinctly inex- 
 perienced. As a General, he was beneath 
 contempt. He came in the night with a hoe, 
 and chipped a piece out of the dun heifer, — 
 Peroo's charge, — fondly imagining that Peroo 
 would have to bear the blame. Peroo was 
 discovered next morning weeping salt tears 
 into the wound, and the mass of my Hindu 
 population were at once up and in arms. Had 
 I headed them, they would have descended 
 upon Corkler's compound and swept it off the 
 face of the earth. But I calmed them with 
 fair words and set a watch for the cow hoer. 
 Next night. Imam Din came again with a 
 bamboo and began to hit the heifer over her 
 legs. Peroo caught him — caught him by the 
 leg — and held on for the dear vengeance, till 
 Imam Din was locked up in the gram go- 
 down, and Peroo told him that he would be 
 led out to death in the morning. But with the 
 dawn, the Clan Corkier came over, and there 
 was pulling of turbans across the wall, till the 
 Supreme Government was dressed and said, 
 " Be silent ! " Now Corkler's coachwaii's 
 brother was my coachwan^ and a man much 
 dreaded by Peroo. He was not unaccus- 
 tomed to speak the truth at intervals, and, by 
 virtue of that rare failing, I, the Supreme 
 Government, appointed him head of theyVr^^ 
 15
 
 226 The Smith Administration 
 
 (committee) to try the case of Peroo's unau- 
 thorized love-making. The other members 
 were my bearer (Hindu), Corkler's bearer 
 (Mahometan), with the ticca-dharzi (hired 
 tailor), Mahometan, for Standing Counsel. 
 Baktawri and Baktawri's father were wit- 
 nesses, but Baktawri's mother came all un- 
 asked and seriously interfered with the gravity 
 of the debate by abuse. But the dharzi up- 
 held the dignity of the Law, and led Peroo 
 away by the ear to a secluded spot near the 
 well. 
 
 Imam Din's case was an offense against the 
 Government, raiding in British territory and 
 maiming of cattle, complicated with trespass 
 by night — all heinous crimes for which he 
 might have been sent to jail. The evidence 
 was deadly conclusive, and the case was tried 
 summarily in the presence of the heifer. 
 Imam Din's counsel was Corkler's sais^ who, 
 with great acumen, pointed out that the boy 
 had only acted under his father's instructions. 
 Pressed by the Supreme Government, he ad- 
 mitted that the letters of marque did not spec- 
 ify cows as an object of revenge, but merely 
 Peroo. The hoeing of a heifer was a piece of 
 spite on Imam Din's part. This was ad- 
 mitted. The penalties of failure are dire. A 
 chowkidar (watchman) was deputed to do jus- 
 tice on the person of Imam Din, but sentence 
 was deferred pending the decision of theyVr^^ 
 on Peroo. The dha?'zi announced to the Su- 
 preme Government that Peroo had been
 
 The Smith Administration 227 
 
 found guilty of assaulting Baktawri, across the 
 Border in Corkler's compound, with bricks, 
 thereby injuring the honor and dignity of 
 Corkler's coachwan. For this offense, the 
 jirga submitted, a sentence of a dozen stripes 
 was necessary, to be followed by two hours 
 of ear-holding. The Corkier choivkidar was 
 deputed to do sentence on the person of 
 Peroo, and the Smith cliowkidar on that of 
 Imam Din. They laid on together with jus- 
 tice and discrimination, and seldom have two 
 small boys been better trounced. Followed 
 next a dreary interval of " ear-holding " side 
 by side. This is a peculiar Oriental punish- 
 ment, and should be seen to be appreciated. 
 The Supreme Government then called for 
 Corkler's coachwa7i and pointed out the bleed- 
 ing heifer, with such language as seemed 
 suitable to the situation. Local knowledge in 
 a case like this is invaluable. Corkler's 
 coachwan was notoriously a wealthy man, and 
 so far a bad Mussulman in that he lent money 
 at interest. As a financier he had few friends 
 among his co-servants. On the other hand, in 
 the Smith quarters, the Mahometan element 
 largely predominated ; because the Supreme 
 Government considered the minds of Mahom- 
 etans more get-at-able than those of Hindus. 
 The sin of inciting an illiterate and fanatic 
 family to go forth and do a mischief was duly 
 dwelt upon by the Supreme Government, to- 
 gether with the dangers attending the vicari- 
 ous jehad (religious war) . Corkler's coachwan
 
 228 The Smith Administration 
 
 offered no defense beyond the general state- 
 ment that the Supreme Government was his 
 father and his mother. This carried no 
 weight. The Supreme Government touched 
 lightly on the inexpediency of reviving an old 
 creed-quarrel, and pointed out a venture, that 
 the birth and education of a <r/^<^;;^(^r (low-caste 
 Hindu), three months converted, did not just- 
 ify such extreme sectarianism. Here the pop- 
 ulace shouted like the men of Ephesus, and 
 sentence was passed amid tumultuous ap- 
 plause. Corkler's coachiuaii was ordered to 
 give a dinner, not only to the Hindus whom 
 he had insulted, but also to the Mahometans 
 of the Smith compound, and also to his own 
 fellow-servants. His brother, the Smith 
 coachzaa?i, unconverted cha7nar^ was to see 
 that he did it. Refusal to comply with these 
 words entailed a reference to Corkier and the 
 "Inspector Sahib," who would send in his 
 constables, and, with the connivance of the 
 Supreme Government, would harry and vex 
 all the Corkier compound. Corkler's coach- 
 wan protested, but was overborne by Hindus 
 and Mahometans alike, and his brother, who 
 hated him with a cordial hatred, began to dis- 
 cuss the arrangements for the dinner. Peroo, 
 by the way, was not to share in the feast, nor 
 was Imam Din. The proceedings then ter- 
 minated, and the Supreme Government went 
 in to breakfast. 
 
 Ten days later the dinner came off and was 
 continued far into the night. It marked a
 
 The Smith Administration 229 
 
 new era in my political relations with the out- 
 lying states, and was graced for a few minutes 
 by the presence of the Supreme Government. 
 Corkler's coachwan hates me bitterly, but he 
 can find no one to back him up in any scheme 
 of annoyance that he may mature ; for have I 
 not won for my Empire a free dinner, with 
 oceans of sweetmeats ? And in this, gentle- 
 men all, lies the secret of Oriental administra- 
 tion. My throne is set where it should be — 
 on the stomachs of many people.
 
 230 The Smith Administration 
 
 A BAZAAR DHULIP. 
 
 I AND the Government are roughly in the 
 same condition ; but modesty forces me to 
 say that the Smith Administration is a few 
 points better than the Imperial. Corkler's 
 coachwaJi, you may remember, was fined a 
 caste-dinner by me for sending his son, Imam 
 Din, to mangle my dun heifer. In my last 
 published administration report, I stated that 
 Corkler's coachwan bore me a grudge for the 
 fine imposed upon him, but among my servants 
 and Corkler's, at least, could find no one to 
 support him in schemes of vengeance. I was 
 quite right — right as an administration with 
 prestige to support should always be. 
 
 But I own that I had never contemplated 
 the possibility of Corkler's coachwan going off 
 to take service with Mr. Jehan Concepcion 
 Fernandez de Lisboa Paul — a gentleman semi- 
 orientalized, possessed of several dwelling- 
 houses and an infamous temper. Corkier was 
 an Englishman, and any attempt on his coach- 
 wan' s part to annoy me would have been 
 summarily stopped. Mr. J. C. F. de L. Paul, 
 on the other hand . . . but no matter. The 
 business is now settled, and there is no neces- 
 sity for importing a race-question into the 
 story. 
 
 Once established in INIr. Paul's compound,
 
 The Smith Administration 231 
 
 Corkler's coac/nvan sent me an insolent message 
 demanding a refund, with interest, of all the 
 money spent on the caste-dinner. The Gov- 
 ernment, in a temperately framed reply, re- 
 fused point-blank, and pointed out that a 
 Mahometan by his religion could not ask for 
 interest. As I have stated in my last report, 
 Corkler's coachwan was a renegade chamar, 
 converted to Islam for his wife's sake. The 
 impassive attitude of the Government had the 
 effect of monstrously irritating Corkler's coach- 
 wan, who sat on the wall of Mr. Paul's com- 
 pound and flung highly flavored vernacular 
 at the servants of the State as they passed. 
 He said that it was his intention to make life 
 a burden to the Government- — profanely called 
 Eschmitt Sahib. The Government went to 
 office as usual and made no sign. Then 
 Corkler's coachwan formulated an indictment 
 to the effect that Eschmitt Sahib had, on the 
 occasion of the caste-dinner, pulled him 
 vehemently by the ears, and robbed him of one 
 rupee nine annas four pie. The charge was 
 shouted from the top of Mr. Paul's compound 
 wall to the four winds of Heaven. It was 
 disregarded by the Government, and the ref- 
 ugee took more daring measures. He came 
 by night, and wrote upon the white-washed 
 walls with charcoal disgraceful sentences which 
 made the Smith servants grin. 
 
 Now it is bad for any Government that its 
 servants should grin at it. Rebellion is as the 
 sin of witchcraft ; and irreverence is the parent
 
 232 The Smith Administration 
 
 of rebellion. Not content with writing, Cork- 
 ler's coachwan began to miscall the State — 
 always from the top of Mr. Paul's wall. He 
 informed intending 771113 salchis (scullions) 
 that Eschmitt Sahib invariably administered 
 his pantry with a polo-stock ; possible saises 
 (grooms) were told that wages in the Smith 
 establishment were paid yearly ; while khit- 
 matgars (butlers) learnt that their family hon- 
 or was not safe within the gate-posts of the 
 house of " Eschmitt." No real harm was done, 
 for the character of my rule is known among 
 all first-class servants. Still, the vituperation 
 and all its circumstantial details made men 
 laugh ; and I choose that no one shall laugh. 
 My relations with Mr. Paul had always — 
 for reasons connected with the incursions of 
 hens — been strained. In pursuance of a care- 
 fully matured plan of campaign I demanded 
 of Mr. Paul the body of Corkler's coachwan, to 
 be dealt with after my own ideas. Mr. Paul 
 said that the man was a good coachwa7i and 
 should not be given up. I then temperately 
 — always temperately — gave him a sketch of 
 the ruffian's conduct. Mr. Paul announced 
 his entire freedom from any responsibility in 
 this matter, and requested that the correspond- 
 ence might cease. It was vitally necessary 
 to the well-being of my administration that 
 Corkler's coackwafi should come into my pos- 
 session. He was daily growing a greater nui- 
 sance, and had drawn unto him a disaffected 
 dog-boy, lately in my employ.
 
 The Smith Administration 233 
 
 Mr. Paul was deaf to my verbal, and blind to 
 my written entreaties. For these reasons I was 
 reluctantly compelled to take the law into my 
 own hands — and break it. A k/iitmatgar was 
 sent down the length of Mr. Paul's wall to 
 " draw the fire ' of Corkler's coachwa?i, and 
 while the latter cursed him by his gods for 
 ever entering Eschmitt Sahib's service, Esch- 
 mitt Sahib crept subtilely behind the wall and 
 thrust the evil-speaker into the moonlit road, 
 where he was pinioned, in strict silence, by 
 the ambushed population of the Smith com- 
 pound. Once collared, I regret to say, Cork- 
 ler's coachwan was seized with an unmanly 
 panic ; for the memory of the lewd sentences 
 on the wall, the insults shouted from the top 
 of Mr. Paul's wall, and the warnings to way- 
 faring table-servants, came back to his mind. 
 He wept salt tears and demanded the protec- 
 tion of the law and of Mr. Paul. He received 
 neither. He was paraded by the State through 
 the quarters, that all men and women and 
 little children might look at him. He was 
 then formally appointed last and lowest of the 
 carriage-grooms — 7iauker-ke-nauker (servant 
 of servants) — in perpetuity, on a salary which 
 would never be increased. The entire Smith 
 people — Hindu and Mussulman alike — were 
 made responsible for his safe-keeping under 
 pain of having all the thatch additions to their 
 houses torn down, and the Light of the Favor 
 of the State — the Great Haziu^-ki-Mehrbani — 
 darkened forever.
 
 234 'T^^ Smith Administration 
 
 Legally the State was wrongfully detaining 
 Corkler's coacJiwan. Practically, it was aveng- 
 ing itself for a protracted series of insults to 
 its dignity. 
 
 Days rolled on, and Corkler's coachwan be- 
 came carriage-j'iz/i'. Instead of driving two 
 horses, it was his duty to let down the steps 
 for the State to tread upon. VA'hen the other 
 servants received cold-weather coats, he was 
 compelled to buy one, and all extra lean-to 
 huts round his house were strictly forbidden. 
 That he did not run away, I ascribe solely to 
 the exertions of the domestic police — that is 
 to say, every man, woman, and child of the 
 Smith Kingdom. He was delivered into tTleir 
 hands, for a prey and a laughing-stock ; and 
 in their hands, unless I am much mistaken, 
 they intend that he shall remain. I learn that 
 my khansainah (head butler) has informed Mr. 
 Paul that his late servant is in jail for robbing 
 the Roman Catholic Chapel, of which Mr. 
 Paul is a distinguished member; consequently 
 that gentleman had relaxed his attempts to un- 
 earth what he called his "so good coachwaji.'''' 
 That coachwan is now a living example and 
 most lively presentment of the unrelaxing 
 wrath of the State. However well he may 
 work, however earnestly strive to win my 
 favor, there is no human chance of his ever 
 rising from his present positjon so long as 
 Eschmitt Sahib and he are above the earth 
 together. For reasons which I have hinted 
 at above, he remains cleaning carriage-wheels,
 
 The Smith Administration 235 
 
 and will so remain to the end of the chapter ; 
 while the story of his fall and fate spreads 
 through the bazaars, and fills the ranks of 
 servantdom with an intense respect for Esch- 
 mitt Sahib. 
 
 A broad-minded Oriental administration 
 would have allowed me to nail up the head of 
 Corkler's coachwan over the hall door ; a 
 narrow-souled public may consider my present 
 lenient treatment of him harsh and illegal. 
 To this I can only reply that I know how to 
 deal with my own people. I will never, never 
 part with Corkler's coachwan.
 
 236 The Smith Administration 
 
 THE HANDS OF JUSTICE. 
 
 Be pleased to listen to a story of domestic 
 trouble connected with the Private Services 
 Commission in the back veranda, which did 
 good work, though I, the Commission, say so, 
 but it could not guard against the Unforeseen 
 Contingency. There was peace in all my 
 borders till Peroo, the cow-keeper's son, came 
 yesterday and paralyzed the Government. 
 He said his father had told him to gather 
 sticks — dry sticks — for the evening fire. I 
 would not check parental authority in any 
 way, but I did not see why Peroo should 
 mangle my s/rm-trees. Peroo wept copi- 
 ously, and, promising never to despoil my 
 garden again, fled from my presence. 
 
 To-day I have caught him in the act of 
 theft, and in the third fork of the white Doon 
 sirris, twenty feet above ground. I have 
 taken a chair and established myself at the 
 foot of the tree, preparatory to making up 
 my mind. 
 
 The situation is a serious one, for if Peroo 
 be led to think that he can break down my 
 trees unharmed, the garden will be a wilder- 
 ness in a week. Furthermore, Peroo has in- 
 sulted the Majesty of the Government. Which 
 is Me. Also he has insulted my sirris in say-
 
 The Smith Administration 237 
 
 ing that it is dry. He deserves a double 
 punishment. 
 
 On the other hand, Peroo is very young, 
 very small, and very, very naked. At present 
 he is penitent, for he is howling in a dry and 
 husky fashion, and the squirrels are frightened. 
 
 The question is — how shall I capture Peroo .'' 
 There are three courses open to me. I can 
 shin up the tree and fight him on his own 
 ground. I can shell him with clods of earth 
 till he makes submission and comes down ; or, 
 and this seems the better plan, I can remain 
 where I am, and cut him off from his supplies 
 until the rifles — sticks I mean — are returned. 
 
 Peroo, for all practical purposes, is a ma- 
 rauding tribe from the Hills — head-man, fight- 
 ing-tail and all. I, once more, am the State, 
 cool, collected, and impassive. In half an 
 hour or so Peroo will be forced to descend. 
 He will then be smacked : that is, if I can lay 
 hold of his wriggling body. In the mean time, 
 I will demonstrate. 
 
 " Bearer, bring me the tum-tum ki chabuq 
 (carriage-whip)." 
 
 It is brought and laid on the ground, while 
 Peroo howls afresh. I will overawe this child. 
 He has an armful of stolen sticks pressed to 
 his stomach. 
 
 " Bearer, bring also the chota mota chabuq 
 (the little whip) the one kept for the punnia 
 culta (spaniel)." 
 
 Peroo has stopped howling. He peers 
 through the branches and breathes through
 
 238 The Smith Administration 
 
 his nose very hard. Decidedly, I am im- 
 pressing him with a show of armed strength. 
 The idea of that cruel whip-thong curling 
 round Peroo's fat little brown stomach is not 
 a pleasant one. But I must be firm. 
 
 " Peroo, come down and be hit for stealing 
 the Sahib's wood." 
 
 Peroo scuttles up to the fourth fork, and 
 waits developments. 
 
 *' Peroo, will you come down ? " 
 
 " No. The Sahib will hit me. " 
 
 Here the goaila appears, and learns that his 
 son is in disgrace. " Beat him well, Sahib," 
 says the goaila. " He is a biidmash. I never 
 told him to steal your wood. Peroo, descend 
 and be very much beaten." 
 
 There is silence for a moment. Then, crisp 
 and clear from the very top of the sirris, float 
 down the answer of the treed dacoit 
 
 " Kubbi, kubbi nahin (Never — never — 
 No!)." 
 
 The goaila hides a smile with his hand and 
 departs, saying : " Very well. This night I 
 will beat you dead." 
 
 There is a rustle in the leaves as Peroo 
 wriggles himself into a more comfortable 
 seat. 
 
 " Shall I send 2. piinkha-coolie after him } " 
 suggests the bearer. 
 
 This is not good. Peroo might fall and 
 hurt himself. Besides I have no desire to 
 employ native troops. They demand too 
 much batta. Th^ pu?ik/ia-coolie would expect
 
 The Smith Administration 239 
 
 four annas for capturing Peroo. I will deal 
 with the robber myself. He shall be treated 
 judicially, when the excitement of wrong-doing 
 shall have died away, as befits his tender 
 years, with an old bedroom slipper, and the 
 bearer shall hold him. Yes, he shall be 
 smacked three times, — once gently, once 
 moderately, and once severely. After the 
 punishment shall come the fine. He shall 
 help the malli (gardener) to keep the flower- 
 beds in order for a week, and then — 
 
 " Sahib ! Sahib ! Can I come down ? " 
 
 The rebel treats for terms. 
 
 *' Peroo, you are a imt ait (a young 
 imp)." 
 
 " It was my father s order. He told me to 
 get sticks." 
 
 * From this tree ? " 
 
 "Yes; Protector of the Poor. He said 
 the Sahib would not come back from office 
 till I had gathered many sticks." 
 
 " Your father didn't tell me that." 
 
 " My father is a liar. Sahib ! Sahib ! Are 
 you going to hit me ? " 
 
 " Come down and I'll think about it." 
 
 Peroo drops as far as the third fork, sees 
 the whips, and hesitates. 
 
 "If you will take away the whips I will 
 come down." 
 
 There is a frankness in this negotiation 
 that I respect. I stoop, pick up the whips, 
 and turn to throw them into the verandah. 
 
 Follows a rustle, a sound of scraped bark,
 
 240 The Smith Administration 
 
 and a thud. When I turn, Peroo is down, 
 off and over the compound wall. He has 
 not dropped the stolen fire-wood, and I feel 
 distinctly foolish. 
 
 My prestige, so far as Peroo is concerned, 
 is gone. 
 
 This Administration will now go indoors 
 for a drink,
 
 The Smith Administration 241 
 
 THE SERAI CABAL. 
 
 Upon the evidence of a scullion, I, the 
 State, rose up and made sudden investigation 
 of the crowded serai. There I found and dis- 
 missed, as harmful to public morals, a lady 
 in a pink saree who was masquerading as 
 somebody's wife. The utter and abject lone- 
 liness of the mussalcki^ that outcast of the 
 cookroom, should. Orientally speaking, have 
 led him to make a favorable report to his 
 fellow-servants. That he did not do so I 
 attributed to a certain hardness of character 
 brought out by innumerable kickings and 
 scanty fare. Therefore I acted on his evi- 
 dence and, in so doing, brought down the 
 wrath of the entire serai, not on my head, — 
 for they were afraid of me, — but on the hum- 
 ble head of Karim Baksh, mussalchi. He 
 had accused the bearer of inaccuracy in money 
 matters, and the khansa7nah of idleness ; be- 
 sides bringing about the ejectment of fifteen 
 people — men, women, and children — related 
 by holy and unholy ties to all the servants. 
 Can you wonder that Karim Baksh was a 
 marked boy? Departmentally, he was under 
 the control of the khajisainah, I myself taking 
 but small mterest in the subordinate appoint- 
 ments on my staff. Two days after the evi- 
 dence had been tendered, I was not surprised 
 16
 
 242 The Smith Administration 
 
 to learn that Karim Baksh had been dis- 
 missed by his superior ; reason given, that he 
 was personally unclean. It is a fundamental 
 maxim of my administration that all power 
 delegated is liable to sudden and unexpected 
 resumption at the hands of the Head. This 
 prevents the right of the Lord-Proprietor from 
 lapsing by time. The khansamah^ s decision 
 was reversed without reason given, and the 
 enemies of Karim Baksh sustained their first 
 defeat. They were bold in making their first 
 move so soon. I, Smith, who devote hours 
 that would be better spent on honest money- 
 getting, to the study of my servants, knew 
 they would now try less direct tactics. Karim 
 Baksh slept soundly, over against the dram 
 that carries off the water of my bath, as the 
 enemy conspired. 
 
 One night I was walking round the house 
 when the pungent stench of a hookah drifted 
 out of the pantry. A hookah, out of place, is 
 to me an abomination. I removed it gingerly, 
 and demanded the name of the owner. Out 
 of the darkness sprang a man, who said, 
 *' Karim Baksh ! " It was the bearer. Run- 
 ning my hand along the stem, I felt the loop of 
 leather which a cha7?iar attaches, or should 
 attach, to his pipe, lest higher castes be defiled 
 unwittingly. The bearer lied, for the burning 
 hookah was a device of the groom — friend of 
 the lady in the pink sa?'£e — to compass the 
 downfall of Karim Baksh. So the second 
 move of the enemy was foiled, and Karim
 
 The Smith Administration 243 
 
 Baksh asleep as dogs sleep, by the drain, took 
 no harm. 
 
 Came thirdly, after a decent interval to 
 give me time to forget the Private Services 
 Commission, the gunmamah (the anonymous 
 letter) — stuck into the frame of the looking- 
 glass. Karim Baksh had proposed an elope- 
 ment with the sweeper's wife, and the morality 
 of the se?'ai was in danger. Also the sweeper 
 threatened murder, which could be avoided 
 by the dismissal of Karim Baksh. The blear- 
 eyed orphan heard the charge against him 
 unmoved, and, at the end, turning his face to 
 the sun, said : " Look at me. Sahib ! Am I 
 the man a woman runs away with ? " Then 
 pointing to the ayah, " Or she the woman to 
 tempt a Mussulman ? " Low as was Karim 
 Baksh, the miissalchi, he could by right of 
 creed look down upon a she-sweeper. The 
 charge under Section 498, I. P. C, broke 
 down in silence and tears, and thus the third 
 attempt of the enemy came to naught. 
 
 I, Smith, who have some knowledge of my 
 subjects, knew that the next charge would be 
 a genuine one, based on the weakness of 
 Karim Baksh, which was clumsiness — phenom- 
 enal ineptitude of hand and foot. Nor was 
 I disappointed. A fortnight passed, and the 
 bearer and the M^^/zj-f^Wf^/z simultaneously pre- 
 ferred charges against Karim Baksh. He had 
 broken two tea-cups and had neglected to 
 report their loss to me ; the value of the tea- 
 cups was four annas. They must have spent
 
 244 The Smith Administration 
 
 days spying upon Karim Baksh, for he was a 
 morose and solitary boy who did his cup- 
 cleaning alone. 
 
 Taxed with the fragments, Karim Baksh 
 attempted no defense. Things were as the 
 witnesses said, and I was his father and his 
 mother. By my rule, a servant who does not 
 confess a fault suffers, when that fault is dis- 
 covered, severe punishment. But the red 
 Hanumafi^ who grins by the well in the bazaar, 
 prompted the bearer at that moment to ex- 
 press his extreme solicitude for the honor and 
 dignity of my service. Literally translated, 
 the sentence ran, " The zeal of thy house has 
 eaten me up. " 
 
 Then an immense indignation and disgust 
 took possession of me, Smith, who have trod- 
 den, as far as an Englishman may tread, the 
 miry gulleys of native thought. I knew — none 
 better — the peculations of the bearer, the vices 
 of the kha7isa77iah, and the abject, fawning 
 acquiescence with which these two men would 
 meet the basest wish that my mind could con- 
 ceive. And they talked to me — thieves and 
 worse that they were — of their desire that I 
 should be well served ! Lied to me as though 
 I had been a griff but twenty minutes landed 
 on the Apollo Bunder ! In the middle stood 
 Karim Baksh, silent ; on either side was an 
 accuser, broken tea-cup in hand ; the khansa- 
 niah, mindful of the banished lady in the pink 
 saree ; the bearer remembering that, since the 
 date of the Private Services Commission, the
 
 The Smith Aaministration 245 
 
 whisky and the rupees had been locked up. 
 And they talked of the shortcomings of Karim 
 Baksh — the outcast — the boy too ugly to 
 achieve and too stupid to conceive sin — a 
 blunderer at the worst. Taking each accuser 
 by the nape of his neck, I smote their cunning 
 skulls the one against the other, till they saw 
 stars by the firmamentful. Then I cast them 
 from me, for I was sick of them, knowing how 
 long they had worked in secret to compass 
 the downfall of Karim Baksh. 
 
 And they laid their hands upon their mouths 
 and were dumb, for they saw that I, Smith, 
 knew to what end they had striven. 
 
 This Administration may not control a 
 revenue of seventy-two millions, more or less, 
 per annum, but it is wiser than — some peo- 
 ple.
 
 246 The Smith Administration 
 
 THE STORY OF A KING. 
 
 If there be any idle people who remember 
 the campaign against Peroo, the cow-man's 
 son, or retain any recollection of the great 
 intrigue set afoot by all the servants against 
 the scullion, — if, I say, there be any who bear 
 in mind these notable episodes in my ad- 
 ministration, I would pray their attention to 
 what follows. 
 
 The Gazette of hidia shows that I have 
 been absent for two months from the station 
 in which is my house. 
 
 The day before I departed, I called the 
 Empire together, from the bearer to the sals' 
 friends' hanger-on, and it numbered, with 
 wives and babes, thirty-seven souls — all well- 
 fed, prosperous, and contented under my rule, 
 which includes free phenyle and quinine. I 
 made a speech — a long speech — to the listen- 
 ing peoples. I announced that the inesti- 
 mable boon of local self-government was to be 
 theirs for the next eight weeks. They said 
 that it was "good talk." I laid upon the 
 Departments concerned the charge of my 
 garden, my harness, my house, my horse, my 
 guns, my furniture, all the screens in front of 
 the doors, both cows, and the little calf that 
 was to come. I charged them by their hope 
 of presents in the future to act cleanly and
 
 The Smith Administration 247 
 
 carefully by my chattels ; to abstain from fight- 
 ing, and to keep the serai sweet. That this 
 might be done under the eye of authority, I 
 appointed a Viceroy — the very strong man 
 Bahadur Khan, khihnatgar to wit — and, that 
 he might have a material hold over his sub- 
 jects, gave him an ounce-phial of cinchona 
 febrifuge, to distribute against the fevers of 
 September. Lastly — and of this I have never 
 sufficiently repented — I gave all of them their 
 two months' wages in advance. They were 
 desperately poor some of them, — how poor 
 only I and the money-lender knew, — but I 
 repent still of my act. A rich democracy 
 inevitably rots. 
 
 Eliminating that one financial error, could 
 any man have done better than I ? I know he 
 could not, for I took a plebiscite of the Empire 
 on the matter, and it said with one voice that 
 my scheme was singularly right. On that as- 
 surance I left it and went to lighter pleasures. 
 
 On the fourth day came the gum7iameh. In 
 my heart of hearts I had expected one, but 
 not so soon — oh, not so soon ! It was on a 
 postcard, and preferred serious accusations of 
 neglect and immorality against Bahadur Khan, 
 my Viceroy. I understood then the value of 
 the anonymous letter. However much you 
 despise it, it breeds distrust — especially when 
 it arrives with every other mail. To my shame 
 be it said I caused a watch to be set on Baha- 
 dur Khan, employing a tender Babu. But it 
 was too late. An urgent private telegram
 
 248 The Smith Administration 
 
 informed me : " Bahadur Khan secreted 
 sweeper's daughter. House leaks." The 
 head of my administration, the man with all 
 the cinchona febrifuge, had proved untrust- 
 worthy, and — the house leaked. The agonies 
 of managing an Empire from the Hills can only 
 be appreciated by those who have made the 
 experiment. Before I had been three weeks 
 parted from my country, I was compelled, by 
 force of circumstance, to rule it on paper, 
 through a hireling executive — the Babu — total- 
 ly incapable of understanding the wants of my 
 people, and, in the nature of things, purely 
 temporary. He had, at some portion of his 
 career, been in a subordinate branch of the 
 Secretariat. His training there had paralyzed 
 him. Instead of taking steps when Bahadur 
 Khan eloped with the sweeper's daughter, 
 whom I could well have spared, and the cin- 
 chona febrifuge, which I knew would be wanted, 
 he wrote me voluminous reports on both thefts. 
 The leakage of the house he dismissed in one 
 paragraph, merely stating that " much furniture 
 had been swamped." I wrote to my landlord, 
 a Hindu of the old school. He replied that 
 he could do nothing so long as my servants 
 piled cut fuel on the top of the houses, strain- 
 ing the woodwork of the verandas. Also, he 
 said that the bhisti (water-carrier) refused to 
 recognize his authority, or to sprinkle water 
 on the road-metal which was then being laid 
 down for the carriage drive. On this an- 
 nouncement came a letter from the Babu, in-
 
 The Smith Administration 249 
 
 timating that bad fever had broken out in the 
 se7'ai^ and that the servants falsely accused 
 him of having bought the cinchona febrifuge 
 of Bahadur Khan, ex- Viceroy, now political 
 fugitive, for the purpose of vending retail. 
 The fever and not the false charge interested 
 me. I suggested — this by wire — that the Babu 
 should buy quinine. In three days he wrote 
 to know whether he should purchase common 
 or Europe quinine, and whether I would repay 
 him. I sent the quinine down by parcel post, 
 and sighed for Bahadur Khan with all his 
 faults. Had he only stayed to look after my 
 people, I would have forgiven the affair of the 
 sweeper's daughter. He was immoral, but an 
 administrator, and would have done his best 
 with the fever. 
 
 In course of time my leave came to an end, 
 and I descended on my Empire, expecting the 
 worst. Nor was I disappointed. In the first 
 place, the horses had not been shod for two 
 months ; in the second, the garden had not 
 been touched for the same space of time ; in 
 the third, the serai was unspeakably filthy ; in 
 the fourth, the house was inches deep in dust, 
 and there were muddy stams on most of the 
 furniture ; in the fifth, the house had never 
 been opened ; in the sixth, seventeen of my 
 people had gone away and two had died of 
 fever ; in the seventh, the little calf was dead. 
 Eighthly and lastly, the remnant of my retain- 
 ers were fighting furiously among themselves, 
 clique against clique, creed against creed, and
 
 2So The Smith Administration 
 
 woman against woman ; this last was the most 
 overwhelming of all. It was a dreary home- 
 coming. The Empire formed up two deep 
 round the carriage and began to explain its 
 grievances. It wept and recriminated and 
 abused till it was dismissed. Next morning 
 I discovered that its finances were in a most 
 disorganized condition. It had borrowed 
 money for a wedding, and to recoup itself had 
 invented little bills of imaginary expenses 
 contracted during my absence. 
 
 For three hours I executed judgment, and 
 strove as best I could to repair a wasted, 
 neglected, and desolate realm. By 4 P.M. the 
 ship of state had been cleared of the greater 
 part of the raffle, and its crew — to continue 
 the metaphor — had beaten to quarters, united 
 and obedient once more. 
 
 Though I knew the fault lay with Bahadur 
 Khan — wicked, abandoned, but decisive and 
 capable-of-ruling-men Bahadur Khan — I could 
 not rid myself of the thought that I was wrong 
 in leaving my people so long to their own 
 devices. 
 
 But this was absurd. A man can't spend 
 all his time looking after his servants, can 
 he?
 
 The Smith Administration 251 
 
 THE GREAT CENSUS. 
 
 MowGi was a 77iehter (a sweeper), but he 
 was also a Punjabi, and consequently, had a 
 head on his shoulders. Mowgi was my niehter 
 — the property of Smith who governs a vast 
 population of servants with unprecedented 
 success. When he was my subject I did not 
 appreciate him properly. I called him lazy 
 and unclean ; I protested against the multitude 
 of his family. Mowgi asked for his dismissal, 
 — he was the only servant who ever volun- 
 tarily left the Shadow of my Protection, — and 
 I said : " O Mowgi, either you are an irreclaim- 
 able ruffian or a singularly self-reliant man. 
 In either case you will come to great grief. 
 Where do you intend to go 1 " *' God knows," 
 said Mowgi, cheerfully. " I shall leave my 
 wdfe and all the children here, and go some- 
 where el^se. If youy Sahib, turn them out, 
 they will die ! For you are their only pro- 
 tector. " 
 
 So I was dowered with Mowgi's wife — 
 wives rather, for he had forgotten the new 
 one from Rawalpindi ; and Mowgi went out 
 to the unknown, and never sent a single 
 letter to his family. The wives used to clam- 
 or in the verandah and accuse me of having 
 taken the remittances, which they said Mowgi 
 must have sent, to help out my awn pay.
 
 252 The Smith Administration 
 
 When I supported them they were quite sure 
 of the theft. For these reasons I was angry 
 with the absent Mowgi. 
 
 Time passed, and I, the great Smith, went 
 abroad on travels and left my Empire in Com- 
 mission. The wives were the feudatory Na- 
 tive States, but the Commission could not 
 make them recognize any feudal tie. They 
 both got married, saying that Mowgi was a 
 bad man, but they never left my compound. 
 
 In the course of my wanderings I came to 
 the great Native State of Ghorahpur, which, 
 as every one knows, is on the borders of the 
 Indian Desert. None the less, it requires 
 almost as many printed forms for its proper 
 administration as a real district. Among its 
 other peculiari ties, it was proud of its prisoners 
 — kaidis they were called. In the old days 
 Ghorahpur was wont to run its dacoits through 
 the stomach or cut them with swords ; but 
 now it prides itself on keeping them in leg- 
 irons and employing them on " remunerative 
 labor," that is to say, sitting in the sun by 
 the side of a road and waiting until some 
 road-metal comes and lays itself down. 
 
 A gang of kaidis was hard at work in this 
 fashion when I came by, and the warder was 
 picking his teeth with the end of his bayonet. 
 One of the fettered sinners came forward and 
 salaamed ^^^"^Xy to me. It was Mowgi, — fat, 
 well fed, and with a twinkle in his eye. " Is 
 the Presence in good health and are all in his 
 house well?" said Mowgi. "What in the
 
 The Smith Administration 253 
 
 world are you doing here ? " demanded the 
 Presence. "By your honors favor I am in 
 prison," said he, shaking one leg delicately to 
 make the ankle-iron jingle on the leg-bar, " I 
 have been in prison nearly a month. ' 
 
 " What for— dacoity ? '' 
 
 "I have been a Sahib's servant," said 
 Mowgi, offended. " Do you think that I 
 should ever become a low dacoit like these 
 men here ? I am in prison for making a 
 numbering for the people.'' 
 
 " A what ? " Mowgi grinned, and told the 
 tale of his misdeeds thus : — 
 
 " When I left your service. Sahib, I w'ent 
 to Delhi, and from Delhi I came to the Samb- 
 hur Salt Lake over there ! " He pointed 
 across the sand. " I was a Jemadar of mehters 
 (a headman of sweepers) there, because these 
 Marwarri people are without sense. Then 
 they gave me leave because they said I had 
 stolen money. It was true, but I was also 
 very glad to go away, for my legs were sore 
 from the salt of the Sambhur Lake. I went 
 away and hired a camel for twenty rupees a 
 month. That was shameful talk, but these 
 thieves of Marwarris would not let me have 
 it for less.'' 
 
 " Where did you get the money from ? " I 
 asked. 
 
 " I have said that I had stolen it. I am a 
 poor man. I could not get it by any other way." 
 
 *' But what did you want with a camel ?" 
 
 "The Sahib shall hear. In the house of a
 
 254 The Smith Administration 
 
 certain Sahib at Sambhur was a big book 
 which came from Bombay, and whenever the 
 Sahib wanted anything to eat or good tobacco, 
 he looked into the book and wrote a letter to 
 Bombay, and in a week all the things came as 
 he had ordered — ^soap and sugar and boots. 
 I took that book ; it was a fat one ; and I 
 shaved my moustache in the manner of Ma- 
 hometans, and I got upon my camel and went 
 away from that bad place of Sambhur." 
 
 " Where did you go ? " 
 
 " I cannot say. I went for four days over 
 the sand till I was very far from Sambhur. 
 Then I came to a village and said : ' I am 
 Wajib Ali, Bahadur, a servant of the Govern- 
 ment, and many men are wanted to go and 
 fight in Cabul. The order is written in this 
 book. How many strong men have you .?' 
 They were afraid because of my big book, 
 and because they were without sense. They 
 gave me food, and all the headmen gave me 
 rupees to spare the men in that village, and I 
 went away from there with nineteen rupees. 
 The name of that village was Kot. And as I 
 had done at Kot, so I did at other villages, — 
 Waka, Tung, Malair, Palan, Myokal, and 
 other places, — always getting rupees that the 
 names of the strong young men might not be 
 written down. I went from Bikanir to Jey- 
 sulmir, till my book in which I always looked 
 wisely so as to frighten the people, was back- 
 broken, and I got one thousand seven hundred 
 and eight rupees twelve annas and six pies,"
 
 The Smith Administration 255 
 
 '* All from a camel and a Treacher's Price 
 List ? " 
 
 " I do not know the name of the book, but 
 these people were very frightened of me. But 
 I tried to take my takkiis from a servant of 
 this State, and he made a report, and they 
 sent troopers, who caught me, — me, and my 
 little camel, and my big book. Therefore I 
 was sent to prison." 
 
 " Mowgi," said I, solemnly, "if this be true, 
 you are a great man. When will you be out 
 of prison 1 " 
 
 " In one year. I got three months for tak- 
 ing the numbering of the people, and one year 
 for pretending to be a Mahometan. But I 
 may run away before. All these people are 
 very stupid men." 
 
 *' My arms, Mowgi," I said, ^' will be open 
 to you when the term of your captivity is 
 ended. You shall be my body-servant." 
 
 "The Presence is my father and my 
 mother," said Mowgi. " I will come." 
 
 *'The wives have married, Mowgi," I said. 
 
 " No matter," said Mowgi. " I also have a 
 wife at Sambhur and one here. When I re- 
 turn to the service of the Presence, which one 
 shall I bring ? " 
 
 " Which one you please." 
 
 " The Presence is my protection and a son 
 of the gods," said Mowgi. "Without doubt I 
 will come as soon as I can escape." 
 
 I am waiting now for the return of Mowgi. 
 I will make him overseer of all my house.
 
 256 The Smith Administration 
 
 THE KILLING OF HATIM TAI 
 
 Now Hatint Tai was condemned to death 
 by the Government, because he had stepped 
 upon his mahout, broken his near-hind leg- 
 chain, and punched poor old pursy Durga 
 Fershad in the ribs till that venerable beast 
 squealed for mercy. Hati7?i Tai was danger- 
 ous to the community, and the mahoufs 
 widow said that her husband's soul would 
 never rest till Hatim^s little, piglike eye was 
 glazed in the frost of death. Did Haiim 
 care .-* Not he. He trumpeted as he swung 
 at his pickets, and he stole as niuch of Durga 
 Fershad's food as he could. Then he went 
 to sleep and looked that **all the to-morrows 
 should be as to-day," and that he should 
 never carry loads again. But the minions of 
 the Law did not sleep. They came by night 
 and scanned the huge bulk of Hativi Tai, and 
 took council together how he might best be 
 slain. 
 
 " If we borrowed a seven-pounder," began 
 the Subaltern, " or, better still, if we turned 
 him loose and had the Horse Battery out ! A 
 general inspection would be nothing to it ! I 
 wonder whether my Major would see it ? " 
 
 " Skittles," said all the Doctors togeth- 
 er. " He's our property." They severally 
 murmured, " arsenic," " strychnine," and
 
 The Smith Administration 257 
 
 " opium," and went their way, while Hatim 
 Tai dreamed of elephant loves, wooed and 
 won long ago in the Doon. The day broke, 
 and savage mahouts^ led him away to the place 
 of execution ; for he was quiet, being " fey," 
 as are both men and beasts when they ap- 
 proach the brink of the grave unknowing. " Ha, 
 Salah I Ha, Bicd77iash ! To-day you die ! " 
 shouted the niahoiits^ " and Mangli's ghost 
 will rode you with an anhis heated in the 
 flames of Piit^ O murderer and tun-bellied 
 thief." '* A long journey," thought Hatim 
 Tai. " ' Wonder what they'll do at the end of 
 it." He broke off the branch of a tree and 
 tickled himself on his jowl and ears. And so 
 he walked into the place of execution, where 
 men waited with many chains and grievous 
 ropes, and bound him as he had never been 
 bound before. 
 
 " Foolish people ! " said Hatim Tai. " Al- 
 most as foolish as Mangli when he called me 
 — the pride of all the Doon, the brightest 
 jewel in Sanderson Sahib's crown — a ' base- 
 born.' I shall break these ropes in a minute 
 or two, and then, between my fore and hind 
 legs, some one is like to be hurt." 
 
 " How much d'you think he'll want ? " said 
 the first Doctor. " About two ounces," an- 
 swered the second. " Say three to be on the 
 safe side," said the first ; and they did up the 
 three ounces of arsenic in a ball of sugar. 
 *' Before a fight it is best to eat," said Hatim 
 Tai, and he put away the gur with a salaam ; 
 17
 
 258 The Smith Admimstration 
 
 for he prided himself upon his manners. 
 The men fell back, and Hatim Tat was con- 
 scious of grateful warmth in his stomach. 
 " Bless their innocence ! " thought he. 
 " The3^'ve given me a mussala. I don't think 
 I want it ; but I'll show that I'm not ungrate- 
 ful." 
 
 And he did ! The chains and the ropes held 
 firm. "It's beginning to work," said a Doc- 
 tor. "Nonsense," said the Subaltern. "I 
 know old Hat'nn's ways. He's lost his tem- 
 per. If the ropes break we're done for. " 
 
 Hathn kicked and wriggled and squealed 
 and did his best, so far as his anatomy al- 
 lowed, to buck-jump ; but the ropes stretched 
 not one inch. 
 
 " I am making a fool of myself," he trum- 
 peted. " I must be calm. At seventy years 
 of age one should behave with dignity. None 
 the less, these ropes are excessively galling." 
 He ceased his struggles, and rocked to and 
 fro sulkily. " He is going to fall ! " whispered 
 a Doctor, " Not a bit of it. Now it's my 
 turn. We'll try the strychnine,^' said the 
 second. 
 
 Prick a large and healthy tiger with a cork- 
 ing-pin, and you will, in some small measure, 
 realize the difficulty of injecting strychnine 
 subcutaneously into an elephant nine feet elev- 
 en inches and one-half at the shoulder. Hatim 
 Tai forgot his dignity and stood on his head, 
 while all the world wondered. " I told you 
 that would fetch him ! " shouted the apostle
 
 The Smith Administration 259 
 
 of strychnine, waving an enormous bottle. 
 *' That's the death-rattle ! Stand back all ! " 
 
 But it was only Hatim Tai expressing his 
 regret that he had slain Mangli^ and so fallen 
 into the hands of the most incompetent ma- 
 houts that he had ever made string-stirrups. " I 
 was never jabbed with an ankus all over my 
 body before ; and I wonU stand it ! " blared 
 Hatim Tai. He stood upon his head afresh 
 and kicked. " Final convulsion," said the 
 Doctor, just as Hatii7i Tai grew weary and set- 
 tled into peace again. After all, it was not 
 worth behaving like a baby. He would 
 be calm. He was calm for two hours, and 
 the Doctors looked at their watches and 
 yawned. 
 
 " Now it's my turn," said the third Doctor. 
 "■ Afim lao." They brought it — a knob of 
 Patna opium of the purest, in weight half a 
 seer. Hatim swallowed it whole. Ghazipur 
 excise opium, two cakes of a seer each, fol- 
 lowed, helped down with much gur. " This 
 is good," said Hatim Tai. " They are sorry 
 for their rudeness. Give me some more." 
 
 The hours wore on, and the sun began to 
 sink, but not so Hatim Tai. The three Doc- 
 tors cast professional rivalry to the winds and 
 united in ravaging their dispensaries in Hatim 
 Tai's behalf. Cyanide of potassium amused 
 him. Bisulphide of mercury, chloral (very 
 little of that), sulphate of copper, oxide of 
 zinc, red lead, bismuth, carbonate of baryta, 
 corrosive sublimate, quicklime, stramonium,
 
 26o The Smith Administration 
 
 veratrium, colchiciim, muriatic acid, and lunar 
 caustic, all went down, one after another, in 
 the balls of sugar ; and Hathn Tai never 
 blenched. 
 
 It was not until the Hospital Assistant 
 clamored : " All these things Government 
 Store and Medical Comforts," that the Doc- 
 tors desisted and wiped their heated brows. 
 " ' Might as well physic a Cairo sarcophagus," 
 grumbled the first Doctor, and Hatirn 7"ai 
 gurgled gently ; meaning that he would like 
 another gu?'-baIL 
 
 " Bless my soul ! " said the Subaltern, w'ho 
 had gone away, done a day's work, and re- 
 turned with his pet eight-bore. " D'you mean 
 to say that you haven't killed Hatim Tai yet 
 — three of you ? Most unprofessional, I call 
 it. You could have polished off a battery in 
 that time." *' Battery ! '' shrieked the baffled 
 medicos in chorus. " He's got enough poison 
 in his system to settle the whole blessed 
 British Army ! " 
 
 "Let me try," said the Subaltern, unstrap- 
 ping the gun-case in his dog-cart. He threw 
 a handkerchief upon the ground, and passed 
 quickly in front of the elephant, Hatim Tai 
 lowered his head slightly to look, and even as 
 he did so the spherical shell smote him on 
 the "Saucer of Life" — the little spot no 
 bigger than a man's hand which is six inches 
 above a line drawn from eye to eye. ^'This 
 is the end," said Hathji Tai. " I die as Niwaz 
 Jung died ! " He strove to keep his feet,
 
 The Smith Administration 261 
 
 staggered, recovered, and reeled afresh. 
 Then, with one wild trumpet that rang far 
 through the twilight, Ilatim Tai fell dead 
 among his pickets. 
 
 " Might ha' saved half your dispensaries if 
 you'd called me in to treat him at first," said 
 the Subaltern, wiping out the eight-bore.
 
 262 The Smith Administration 
 
 A SELF-MADE MAN. 
 
 SuRjUN came back from Kimberley, which 
 is Tom Tiddler's Ground, where he had been 
 picking up gold and silver. He was no longer 
 a Purbeah. A real diamond ring sparkled 
 on his hand, and his tweed suit had cost him 
 forty-two shillings and sixpence. He paid 
 two hundred pounds into the Bank ;. and it 
 was there that I caught him and treated him 
 as befitted a rich man. " O Surjun, come to 
 my house and tell me your story.'' 
 
 Nothing loath, Surjun came — diamond ring 
 and all. His speech was composite. When 
 he wished to be impressive, he spoke English 
 checkered with the Low Dutch slang of the 
 Diamond Fields. When he would be expres- 
 sive, he returned to his vernacular, and was as 
 native as a gentleman with sixteen and six- 
 penny boots could be. 
 
 *' I will tell you my tale," said Surjun, dis- 
 playing the diamond ring. '' There was a 
 friend of mine, and he went to Kimberley, 
 and was a firm there selling things to the 
 digger-men. In thirteen years he made seven 
 thousand pounds. He came to me — I was 
 from Chyebassa in those days — and said, 
 ' Come into my firm.' I went with him. Oh 
 no ! I was not an emigrant. I took my own 
 ship, and we became the firm of Surjun and 
 Jagesser. Here is the card of my firm. You
 
 The Smith Administration 263 
 
 can read it : ' Surjun and Jagesser Dube, De 
 Beer's Terrace, De Beer's Fields, Kimberley. 
 We made an iron house, — all the houses are 
 iron there, — and we sold, to the diggers and 
 the Kaffirs and all sorts of men, clothes, flour, 
 mealies, that is Indian corn, sardines and milk, 
 and salmon in tins, and boots, and blankets, 
 and clothes just as good as the clothes as I 
 wear now. 
 
 " Kimberley is a good place. There are no 
 pennies there — what you call//V^ — except to 
 buy stamps with. Threepence is the smallest 
 piece of money, and even threepence will not 
 buy a drink. A drink is one shilling, one 
 shilling and threepence, or one shilling and 
 ninepence. And even the water there, it is 
 one shilling and threepence for a hundred gal- 
 lons in Kimberley. All things you get you 
 pay money for. Yes, this diamond ring cost 
 much money. Here is the bill, and there is 
 the receipt stamp upon the bill — * Behrendt 
 of Dutoitspan Road.' It is written upon the 
 bill, and the price was thirteen pounds four 
 shillings. It is a good diamond — Cape dia- 
 mond. That is why the color is a little, little 
 soft yellow. x\ll Cape diamonds are so. 
 
 " How did I get my money ? 'Fore Gott, I 
 cannot tell, Sahib. You sell one day, you 
 sell the other day, and all the other days — 
 give the thing and take the money — the money 
 comes. If we know man very well, we give 
 credit one week, and if very, very well, so 
 much as one month. You buy boots for
 
 264 The Smith Administration 
 
 eleven shillings and sixpence ; sell for sixteen 
 shillings. What you buy at one pound, you 
 sell for thirty shillings — at Kimberley. That 
 is the custom. No good selling bad things. 
 All the digger-men know and the Kaffirs too. 
 
 " The Kaffir is a strange man. He comes 
 into the shops and say, taking a blanket, 
 ' How much ? ' in the Kaffir talk— So ! " 
 
 Surjun here delivered the most wonderful 
 series of clicks that I had ever heard from a 
 human throat. 
 
 " That is how the Kaffir asks ' How much ? ' " 
 said Surjun, calmly, enjoying the sensation 
 that he had produced. 
 
 " Then you say, ' No, you say,' and you say 
 it so." (More clicks and a sound like a hur- 
 ricane of kisses.) " Then the Kaffir he say : 
 • No, no, that blanket your blanket, not my 
 blanket. You say.' " " And how long does 
 this business last ? " " Till the Kaffir he 
 tired, and says'^ answered Surjun. " And 
 then do you begin the real bargaining ? " 
 "Yes," said Surjun, " same as in bazaar here. 
 The Kaffir he says, ' I can't pay ! ' Then you 
 fold up blanket, and Kaffir goes away. Then 
 he comes back and says ^ gobu,' that is Kaffir 
 for blanket. And so you sell him all he wants. " 
 
 " Poor Kaffir ! And what is Kimberley 
 like to look at ? " 
 
 " A beautiful clean place — all so clean, and 
 there is a very good law there. This law. 
 A man he come into your compound after 
 nine o'clock, and say vootsac — same as nickle
 
 The Smith Administration 265 
 
 jao — and he doesn't w^/i-<2^ suppose you shoot 
 that man and he dies, and he calls you before 
 magistrate, he can't do nothing." 
 
 " Very few dead men can. Are you allowed 
 to shoot before saying vootsac ' 2 " 
 
 " Oh Hell, yes ! Shoot if you see him in 
 the compound after nine o'clock. That is 
 the law. Perhaps he have come to steal 
 diamonds. Many men steal diamonds, and buy 
 and sell without license. That is called Aidibi.'' 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "Aidibi." 
 
 " Oh ! ' I. D. B.' I see. Well, what hap- 
 pens to them ? " 
 
 " They go to jail for years and years. Very 
 many men in jail for I. D. B. Very many 
 men your people, very few mine. Heaps of 
 Kaffirs. Kaffir he swallows diamond, and 
 takes medicine to find him again. You get 
 not less than ten years for I. D. B. But I and 
 my friend, we stay in our iron house and mind 
 shop. That too is the way to make money.'' 
 
 " Aren't your people glad to see you when 
 you come back? " 
 
 " My people is all dead. Father dead, 
 mother dead; and only brother living with 
 some children across the river. I have been 
 there, but that is not my place. I belong to 
 nowhere now. They are all dead. After a 
 few weeks I take my steamer to Kimberley, 
 and then my friend he come here and put his 
 money in the Bank.'' 
 
 "Why don't you bank in Kimberley ? "
 
 266 The Smith Administration 
 
 " I wanted to see my brother, and I have 
 given him one thousand rupees. No, one 
 hundred pounds ; that is more, more. Here 
 is the Bank bill. All the others he is dead. 
 There are some people of this country at Kim- 
 berley, — Rajputs, Brahmins, Ahirs, Parsees, 
 Chamars, Bunnias, Telis, — all kinds go there. 
 But my people are dead. I shall take my 
 brother's son back with me to Kimberley, and 
 when he can talk the Kaffir talk, he will be 
 useful, and he shall come into the firm. My 
 brother does not mind. He sees that I am 
 rich. And now I must go to the village, Sahib. 
 Good day, sir." 
 
 Surjun rose, made as if to depart, but re- 
 turned. The Native had come to the top. 
 
 ^''Sahib ! Is this talk for publish in paper ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Then put in about this diamond ring." 
 He went away, twirling the ring lovingly on 
 his finger. 
 
 Know, therefore, O Public, by these presents 
 that Surjun, son of Surjun, one time resident 
 in the village of Jhusi, in the District of Al- 
 lahabad, in the Northwest Provinces, at pres- 
 ent partner in the firm of Surjun and Jagesser 
 Dube, De Beer's Terrace, De Beer's Fields, 
 Kimberley, who has tempted his fortune be- 
 yond the seas, owns legally and rightfully a 
 Cape stone, valued at thirteen pounds four 
 shillings sterling, sold to him by Behrendt of 
 Dutoitspan Road, Kimberley. 
 
 And it looks uncommonly well.
 
 The Smith Administration 267 
 
 THE VENGEANCE OF LAL BEG 
 
 This is the true story of the terrible disgrace 
 that came to JuUundri mehter, through Jamuna, 
 his wife. Those who say that a mehter has 
 no caste speak in ignorance, Those who 
 say that there is a caste in the Empire so 
 mean and so abject that there are no castes 
 below it, speak in greater ignorance. The 
 arain says that the chamar has no caste ; the 
 cha77iar knows that the mehter has none ; and 
 the mehter swears by Lai Beg, his god, that 
 the od whose god is Bhagirat is without caste. 
 Below the od lies the kaparia-bawaria in spite 
 of all that the low-caste Brahmins say or do. A 
 Teji mehter or a Siindoo mehter is as much 
 above a kaparia-bawaria as an Englishman is 
 above a mehter. Lai Beg is the Mehter-goA, 
 and his image is the Glorified Broom made 
 of [peacocks' feathers, red cloth, scraps of tinsel, 
 and the cast-off finery of English toilette 
 tables. 
 
 Jamuna was a Malka-sansi of Gujrat, an 
 eater of lizards and dogs, one " married under 
 the basket," a worshiper of Malang Shah. 
 When her first husband was cast into the 
 Lahore Central Jail for lifting a pony on the 
 banks of the Ravee, Jamuna cut herself adrift 
 from her section of the tribe and let it pass 
 on to Delhi. She believed that the govern-
 
 268 The Smith Administration 
 
 ment would keep her man for two or three 
 days only ; but it kept him for two years, — 
 long enough for a sa?isi to forget everything 
 in this world except the customs of her tribe. 
 Those are never forgotten. 
 
 As she waited for the return of her man, 
 she scraped acquaintance with a ^nehtrajiee 
 ayah in the employ of a Eurasian, and assisted 
 her in the grosser portions of her work. She 
 also earned money, — sufficient money to buy 
 her a cloth and food. '' The sansi^'^ as one 
 of their proverbs says, " will thrive in a 
 desert." " What are you ? " said the mehtraiiee 
 to Jamuna. " A Boorat mehtraneel^ said 
 Jamuna, for the sansi as one of their prov- 
 erbs says, are quick-witted as snakes. " A 
 Boorat w^///;'t7;/(?<? from the south," said Jamuna; 
 and her statement was not questioned, for 
 she wore good clothes, and her black hair 
 was combed and neatly parted. 
 
 Clinging to the skirts of the Eurasian's ayah 
 Jamuna climbed to service under an English- 
 man — a railway employe's wife. Jamuna had 
 ambitions. It was pleasant to be a fneht?-anee 
 of good standing. It will be better still, 
 thought Jamuna to turn Mussulman and be 
 married to a real table-servant, openly, by 
 the mullah. Such things had been ; and 
 Jamuna was fair.' 
 
 But Jullundri, mehter, was a man to win the 
 heart of woman, and he stole away Jamuna's 
 in the dusk, when she took the English babies 
 for their walks.
 
 The Smith Administration 269 
 
 " You have brought me a stranger-wife. 
 Why did you not marry among your own 
 clan ? " said his gray-haired mother to JuUun- 
 dri. "A stranger wife is a curse and a fire." 
 Jullundri laughed ; for he was a jemadar of 
 mekters, drawing seven rupees a month, and 
 Jamuna loved him. 
 
 " A curse and a fire and a shame," mut- 
 tered the old woman, and she slunk into her 
 hut and cursed Jamuna. 
 
 But Lai Beg, the very powerful God of the 
 mehte?'s^ was not deceived, and he put a 
 stumbling-block in the path of Jamuna that 
 brought her to open shame. " A sansi is as 
 quick-witted as a snake ;" but the snake longs 
 for the cactus hedge, and a sa7isi for the 
 desolate freedom of the wild ass. Jamuna 
 knew the chant of Lai Beg, the prayer to the 
 Glorified Broom, and had sung it many times 
 in rear of the staggering, tottering pole as it 
 was borne down the Mall. Lai Beg was in- 
 sulted. 
 
 His great festival in the month of Har 
 brought him revenge on Jamuna and Jullundri. 
 Husband and wife followed the Glorified 
 Broom, through the station and beyond, to the 
 desolate gray flats by the river, near the Forest 
 Reserve and the Bridge-of-Boats. Two hun- 
 dred meliters shouted and sang till their voices 
 failed them, and they halted in the sand, still 
 warm with the day's sun. On a spit near the 
 burning ^^/^/, a band of sansis had encamped, 
 and one of their number had brought in a
 
 2/0 The Smith Administration 
 
 ragged bag full of lizards caught on the 
 Meean Meer road. The gang were singing over 
 their captures, singing that quaint song of the 
 Passing of the Sansis," which fires the blood 
 of all true thieves. 
 
 Over the sand the notes struck clearly on 
 Jamuna's ear as the Lai Beg procession re- 
 formed and moved Citywards. But louder 
 than the cry of worshipers of Lai Beg rose 
 the song of Jamuna, the sober Boorat inehtra- 
 nee, and mother of Jullundri's children. Shrill 
 as the noise of the night-wind among rocks 
 went back to the sa7isi camp the answer of the 
 " Passing of the Sansis" and the mehtcrs drew 
 back in horror. But Jamuna heard only the 
 call from the ragged huts by the river, and 
 the call of the song — 
 
 " The horses, the horses, the fat horses, and the sticks, 
 the little sticks of the tents, Aho ! Aho ! 
 
 Feet that leave no mark on the sand, and fingers that 
 leave no trace on the door, Ako ! Aho ! 
 
 By the name of Malang Shah ; in darkness, by the reed 
 and the rope. . . ." 
 
 So far Jamuna sang, but the head man of 
 the procession of Lai Beg struck her heavily 
 across the mouth, saying, *' By this I know 
 that thou art a saiisi^
 
 The Smith Administration 271 
 
 HUNTING A MIRACLE. 
 
 Marching-orders as vague as the following 
 naturally ended in confusion : " There's a 
 priest somewhere, in Amritsar or outside it, or 
 somewhere else, who cut off his tongue some 
 days ago, and says it's grown again. Go and 
 look." Amritsar is a city with a population 
 of one hundred and fifty thousand, more or 
 less, and so huge that a tramway runs round 
 the walls. To lay hands on one particular 
 man of all the crowd was not easy ; for the 
 tongue having grown again, he would in no 
 way differ from his fellows. Now, had he re- 
 mained tongueless, an inspection of the mouths 
 of the passers-by would have been some sort 
 of guide. However, dumb or tongued, all 
 Amritsar knew about him. The small Parsee 
 boy, who appears to run the refreshment-room 
 alone, volunteered the startling information 
 that the " Priest without the tongue could be 
 found all anywhere, in the city or elsewhere," 
 and waved his little hands in circles to show 
 the vastness of his knowledge. A booking- 
 clerk — could it be possible that he was of the 
 Arya-Samaj ? — had also heard of the Sadku, 
 and, pen in hand, denounced him as an im- 
 postor, a "bad person," and a "fraudulent 
 mendicant." He grew so excited, and jabbed 
 his pen so viciously into the air that his
 
 272 The Smith Administration 
 
 questioner fled to a ticca-ghari\ where he was 
 prompted by some Imp of Perversity to sim- 
 ulate extreme ignorance of the language to 
 deceive the driver. So he said twice with 
 emphasis, " Sadhu ? " *' Jehan,'' said the 
 driver, "fush-class, Durbar Sahib!" Then 
 the fare thrust out his tongue, and the scales 
 fell from the driver's ejQS.'' Ba/iut acc/ia^'" said 
 the driver, and without further parley headed 
 into the trackless desert that encircles Fort 
 Govindghar. The Sahib's word conveyed 
 no meaning to him, but he understood the 
 gesture ; and, after a while, turned the carriage 
 from a road to a plain. 
 
 Close to the Lahore Veterinary School 
 lies a cool, brick-built, tree-shaded monastery, 
 studded wMth the tombs of the pious founders, 
 adorned with steps, terraces, and winding 
 paths, which is known as Chajju Bhagat's 
 Chubara. This place is possessed with the 
 spirit of peace, and is filled by priests in 
 salmon-colored loin-cloths and a great odor 
 of sanctity. The Amritsar driver had halted 
 in the very double of the Lahore chubara — 
 assuring his fare that here and nowhere else 
 would be found the Sadhu with the miraculous 
 tongue. 
 
 Indeed the surroundings were such as 
 delight the holy men of the East. There was 
 a sleepy breeze through the pipah overhead, 
 and a square court crammed with pigeon- 
 holes where one might sleep ; there were 
 fair walls and mounds and little mud plat-
 
 The Smith Administration 273 
 
 forms against or on which fires for cooking 
 could be built, and there were wells by the 
 dozen. There were priests by the score who 
 sprang out of the dust, and slid off balconies 
 or rose from cots as inquiries were made for 
 the Sadhu. They were nice priests, sleek, 
 full-fed, thick-jowled beasts, undefiled by 
 wood-ash or turmeric, and mostly good-look- 
 ing. The older men sang songs to the squir- 
 rels and the dust-puffs that the light wind was 
 raising on the plain. They were idle — very 
 idle. The younger priests stated that the 
 Sadhu with the tongue had betaken himself 
 to another chuhara some miles away, and was 
 even then being worshiped by hordes of 
 admirers. They did not specify the exact 
 spot, but pointed vaguely in the direction of 
 Jandiala. However, the driver said he knew 
 and made haste to depart. The priests pointed 
 out courteously that the weather was warm, 
 and that it would be better to rest awhile be- 
 fore starting. So a rest was called, and while 
 he sat in the shadow of the gate of the court- 
 yard, the Englishman realized for a few 
 minutes why it is that, now and then, men of 
 his race, suddenly going mad, turn to the 
 people of this land and become their priests ; 
 
 as did on the Bombay side, and later , 
 
 who lived for a time with thQ fakir on the top 
 of Jakko. The miraculous idleness — the 
 monumental sloth of the place ; the silence 
 as the priests settled down to sleep one by 
 one ; the drowsy drone of one of the younger 
 18
 
 274 The Smith Administration 
 
 men who had thrown himself stomach-down 
 in the warm dust and was singing under his 
 breath ; the warm airs from across the plain 
 and the faint smell of burnt ghi and incense, 
 laid hold of the mind and limbs till, for at 
 least fifteen seconds, it seemed that life would 
 be a good thing if one could doze, and bask, 
 and smoke from the rising of the sun till the 
 twilight — a fat hog among fat hogs. 
 
 The chase was resumed, and the ghari 
 drove to Jandiala — more or less. It aban- 
 doned the main roads completely, although it 
 was a " fush-class,'' and comported itself like 
 an ekka^ till Amritsar sunk on the horizon, 
 or thereabouts, and it pulled up at a second 
 chuhafa, more peaceful and secluded than the 
 first, and fenced with a thicker belt of trees. 
 There was an eruption under the horses' feet 
 and a scattering of dust, which presently 
 settled down and showed a beautiful young 
 man with a head such as artists put on the 
 shoulders of Belial. It was the head of an 
 unlicked devil, marvelously handsome, and 
 it made the horses shy. Belial knew nothing 
 of the Sadhu who had cut out the tongue. 
 He scowled at the driver, scowled at the fare, 
 and then settled down in the dust, laughing 
 wildly, and pointing to the earth and the sky. 
 Now for a native to laugh aloud, without 
 reason, publicly and at high noon, is a grew- 
 some thing and calculated to chill the blood. 
 Even the sight of silver coinage had no effect 
 on Belial. He dilated his nostrils, pursed his
 
 The Smith Administration 275 
 
 lips, and gave himself up to renewed mirth. 
 As there seemed to be no one else in the 
 chubara, the carriage drove away, pursued by 
 the laughter of the Beautiful Young Man in 
 the Dust. A priest was caught wandering on 
 the road, but for long, he denied all knowl- 
 edge of the Sadhii. In vain the Englishman 
 protested that he came as a humble believer 
 in cold tongue ; that he carried an offering of 
 rupees for the Sad/iu ; that he regarded the 
 Sadhu as one of the leading men of the 
 century, and would render him immortal for 
 at least twelve hours. The priest was dumb. 
 He was next bribed — extortionately bribed — 
 and said that the Sadhu was at the Durbar 
 Sahib preaching. To the Golden Temple 
 accordingly the carriage went and found the 
 regular array of ministers and the eternal 
 passage of Sikh women round and round the 
 Grunth ; which things have been more than 
 once described in this paper. But there was 
 no Sadlm. An old Nihang, gray-haired and 
 sceptical — for he had lived some thirty years 
 in a church as it were — was sitting on the steps 
 of the tank, dabbling his feet in the water. 
 " O Sahib," said he, blandly, ''what concern 
 have you with a miraculous Sadhu 2 You 
 are not a Poliswala. And, O Sahib, what 
 concern has the Sadhu with you ? " The 
 Englishman explained with heat — for fruitless 
 drives in the middle of an October day are 
 trying to the temper — his adventures at the 
 various chubaras, not omitting the incident of
 
 276 The Smith Administration 
 
 the Beautiful Young j\Ian in tlie Dust. The 
 Nihafig smiled shrewdly : " Without doubt, 
 Sahib, these men have told you lies. They 
 do not want you to see the Sadhu ; and the 
 Sadhu does not desire to see you. This affair 
 is an affair for the common people and not 
 for Sahibs. The honor of the Gods is in- 
 creased ; hwt you do not worship the Gods." 
 So saying he gravely began to undress and 
 waddled into the water. 
 
 Then the Englishman perceived that he had 
 been basely betrayed by the ^//<7r/-driver, and 
 all the priests of the first duibara, and the 
 wandering priest near the second chuhara ; 
 and that the only sensible person was the 
 Beautiful Young Man in the Dust, and he was 
 mad. 
 
 This vexed the Englishman, and he came 
 away. If Sadhus cut out their tongues and 
 if the great Gods restore them, the devotees 
 might at least have the decency to be inter- 
 viewed.
 
 The Smith Administration 277 
 
 THE EXPLANATION OF MIR BAKSH. 
 
 " My notion was that you had been 
 (Before they had this fit) 
 An obstacle that came between 
 Him and ourselves and it." 
 
 " That's the most important piece of evidence we've 
 heard yet," said the king, rubbing his hands. " So 
 now let the jury ..." 
 
 " If any one of them can explain it,' said Alice, " I'll 
 give him sixpence. / don't believe there's an atom of 
 meaning in it." 
 
 — Alice in Wonderla7id. 
 
 This, Protector of the Poor, is the hissab 
 (your bill of house expenses) for last month 
 and a little bit of the month before, — eleven 
 days, — and this, I think, is what it will be 
 next month. Is it a long bill in five sheets ? 
 Assuredly yes, Sahib. Are the accounts of 
 so honorable a house as the house of the 
 Sahib to be kept on one sheet only ? This 
 hissab cost one rupee to write. It is true that 
 the Sahib will pay the one rupee ; but consider 
 how beautiful and how true is the account, and 
 how clean is the paper. Ibrahim, who is the 
 very best petition-writer in all the bazaar, drew 
 it up. Ahoo ! Such an account is this account ! 
 And I am to explain it all ? Is it not written 
 there in the red ink, and the black ink, and 
 the green ink ? What more does the Heaven- 
 born want "i Ibrahim, who is the best of all
 
 278 The Smith Administration 
 
 the petition-writers in the bazaar, made this 
 hissah. There is an envelope aiso. Shall I 
 fetch that envelope ? Ibrahim has written 
 your name outside in three inks — a very 
 miirasla is this envelope. An explanation ? 
 Ahoo ! God is my witness that it is as plain 
 as the sun at noon. By your Honor's permis- 
 sion I will explain, taking the accounts in my 
 hand. 
 
 Now there are four accounts — that for last 
 month, which is in red ; that for the month 
 before, which is in black ; that for the month 
 to come, which is in green ; and an account 
 of private expense, and dispens which is in 
 pencil. Does the Presence understand that ? 
 Very good talk. 
 
 There was the bread, and the milk, and the 
 cow's food, and both horses, and the saddle- 
 soap for last month, which is in green ink. 
 No, red ink — the Presence speaks the truth. 
 It was red ink, and it was for last month, 
 and that was fifty-seven rupees eight annas ; 
 but there was the cost of a new manger for 
 the cow, to be sunk into mud, and that was 
 eleven annas. But I did not put that into the 
 last month's account. I carried that over to 
 this month — the green ink. No ? There is 
 no account for this month t Your Honor 
 speaks the truth. Those eleven annas I car- 
 ried thus — in my head. 
 
 The Sahib has said it is not a matter of 
 eleven annas, but of seventy-seven rupees. 
 That is quite true ; but, O Sahib, if I, and
 
 The Smith Administration 279 
 
 Ibrahim, who is the best petition-writer in the 
 bazaar, do not attend to the annas, how shall 
 your substance increase ? So the food and 
 the saddle-soap for the cows and the other 
 things were fifty-seven rupees eight annas, and 
 the servants' wages were a hundred and ten 
 — all for last month. And now I must think, 
 for this is a large account. Oh yes ! It was 
 in Jeth that I spoke to the Dhobi about the 
 washing, and he said, " my bill will be eleven 
 rupees two pies." It is written there in the 
 green ink, and that, in addition to the soap 
 was sixty-eight rupees, seven annas, two pies. 
 All of last month. And the hundred and ten 
 rupees for the servants' wages make the total 
 to one hundred and seventy-eight rupees, 
 seven annas, two pies, as Ibrahim, who is the 
 best petition-writer in the bazaar, has set 
 down. 
 
 But I said that all things would only be one 
 hundred and fifty t Yes. That was at first, 
 Sahib, before I was well aware of all 
 things. Later on, it will be in the memory of 
 the Presence that I said it would be one hun- 
 dred and ninety. But that was before I had 
 spoken to the Dhobi. No, it was before I had 
 bought the trunk-straps for which you gave 
 orders. I remember that I said it would be 
 one hundred and ninety. Why is the Sahib 
 so hot ? Is not the account long enough ? I 
 know always what the expense of the house 
 would be. Let the Presence follow my finger. 
 That is the green ink, that is the black, here
 
 28o The Smith Administration 
 
 is the red, and there is the pencil-mark of the 
 private expenses. To this I add what I said 
 six weeks ago before I had bought the trunk- 
 straps by your order. And so that is 2ijiftk 
 account. Very good talk ! The Presence 
 has seen what happened last month, and I 
 will now show the month before last, and the 
 month that is to come — together in little 
 brackets ; the one bill balancing to the other 
 like swinging scales. 
 
 Thus runs the account of the month before 
 last : — A box of matches three pies, and black 
 thread for buttons three annas (it was the best 
 black thread), khas-khas for the tatties twelve 
 annas ; and the other things forty-one rupees. 
 To which that of the month to come had an an- 
 swer in respect to the candles for the dog-cart ; 
 but I did not know how much these would cost, 
 and I have written one rupee two annas, for 
 they are always changing their prices in the 
 bazaar. And the oil for the carriage is one 
 rupee, and the other things are forty-one 
 rupees, and that is for the next month. 
 
 An explanation ? Still an explanation ? 
 Khuda-ka-kusm, have I not explained and has 
 not Ibrahim, who is notoriously the best peti- 
 tion-writer in the bazaar, put it down in the 
 red ink, and the green ink, and the black ; 
 and is there not the private dispens account, 
 withal, showing what should have been but 
 which fell out otherwise, and what might have 
 been but could not ? 
 
 Ai^ Sahib, what can I do ? It is perhaps
 
 The Smith Administration 281 
 
 a something heavy bill, but there were reasons ; 
 and let the Presence consider that the Dhobi 
 lived at the ghat over against the river, and I 
 had to go there — two kos, upon my faith ! — 
 to get his bill ; and, moreover, the horses were 
 shod at the hospital, and that was a kos away, 
 and the Hospital Babu was late in rendering 
 his accounts. Does the Sahib say that I 
 should know how the accounts will fall — not 
 only for the month before last, but for this 
 month as well ? I do — I did — I will do ! Is 
 it my fault that more rupees have gone than 
 I knew ? The Sahib laughs ! Forty years I 
 have been ?i khansajtiah to the Sahib-log — from 
 masalchi to mate, and head khansamah have 
 I risen {smites hi7nself on the b?'east), and 
 never have I been laughed at before. Why 
 does the Sahib laugh ? By the blessed 
 Imai7is^ my uncle was cook to Jan Larens, 
 and I am a priest at the Musjid ; and I 
 am laughed at ? Sahib, seeing that there 
 were so many bills to come in, and that the 
 Dhobi lived at the ghat as I have said, and 
 the Horse hospital was a kos away, and God 
 only knows where the sweeper lived, but his 
 account came late also, it is not strange that 
 I should be a little stupid as to my accounts, 
 whereof there are so many. For the Dhobi 
 was at the ghat, etc. Forty years have I been 
 a khatisaffiah, and there is no khansamah who 
 could have kept his accounts so well. Only 
 by my great and singular regard for the wel- 
 fare of the Presence does it come about that
 
 282 The Smith Administration 
 
 they are not a hundred rupees wrong. For 
 the Dhobi was at the ghat^ etc. And I will 
 not be laughed at ! The accounts are beauti- 
 ful accounts, and only I could have kept 
 
 them. 
 
 * * =H= * # 
 
 Sahib — Sahib ! Gariparwar ! I have been 
 to Ibrahim, who is the best petition-writer in 
 the bazaar, and he has written all that I have 
 said — all that the Sahib could not understand 
 — upon pink paper from Sialkot. So now 
 there are the five accounts and the explana- 
 tion ; and for the writing of all six you, O 
 Sahib, must pay ! But for my honor's sake 
 do not laugh at me any more.
 
 The Smith Administration 283 
 
 A LETTER FROM GOLAM SINGH. 
 
 From Golani Singh, Mistri, Landifi, Belait, 
 to Ra7n Singh, Mistri^ son of Jeewtin Singh, 
 iff the town of Rajah fung, in the tehsil of 
 Kasur, in the district of Lahore, in the Prov- 
 ifice of the Punjab. 
 
 Wah Gooroojee ki futteh. 
 
 Call together now our friends and brothers, 
 and our children, and the Lambardar, to the 
 big square by the well. Say that I, Golam 
 Singh, have written you a letter across the 
 Black Water, and let the town hear of the 
 wonders which I have seen in Belait. Rutton 
 Singh, the hunnia, who has been to Delhi, will 
 tell you, my brother, that I am a Har ; but I 
 have witnesses of our faith, besides the others, 
 who will attest when we return what I have 
 written. 
 
 I have now been many days in Belait, in 
 this big city. Though I were to write till my 
 hand fell from my wrist, I could not state its 
 bigness. I myself know that, to see one an- 
 other, the Sahib-log, of whom there are crores 
 of crores, use the railway dak, which is laid 
 not above the ground as is the Sirkar's rail- 
 way in our own country, but underneath it, 
 below the houses. I have gone down myself
 
 284 The Smith Administration 
 
 into this rail together with the other witnesses. 
 The air is very bad in those places, and this is 
 why the Sahib-log have become white. 
 
 There are more people here than I have 
 ever seen. Ten times as many as there are 
 at Delhi, and they are all Sahibs who do us 
 great honor. Many hundred Sahibs have 
 been in our country, and they all speak to us, 
 asking if we are pleased. 
 
 In this city the streets run for many miles 
 in a straight line, and are so broad that four 
 bullock-carts of four bullocks might stand side 
 by side. At night they are lit with English 
 lamps, which need no oil, but are fed by wind 
 which burns. I and the others have seen this. 
 By day sometimes the sun does not shine, and 
 the city becomes black. Then these lamps 
 are lit all day and men go to work. 
 
 The bazaars are three times as large as our 
 bazaars, and the shopkeepers, who are ail 
 Sahibs, sit inside where they cannot be seen, 
 but their name is written outside. There are 
 no bimnia's shops, and all the prices are 
 written. If the price is high, it cannot be 
 lowered ; nor will the shopkeeper bargain at 
 all. This is very strange. But I have 
 witnesses. 
 
 One shop I have seen was twice as large as 
 Rajah Jung. It held hundreds of shopkeeper- 
 sahibs and memsahibs, and thousands who 
 come to buy. The Sahib-log speak one talk 
 when they purchase their bazaar, and they 
 make no noise.
 
 The Smith Administration 285 
 
 There are no ekkas here, but there are 
 yellow and green ticca-gharies bigger than 
 Rutton Singh's house, holding half a hundred 
 people. The horses here are as big as ele- 
 phants. I have seen no ponies, and there 
 are no buffaloes. 
 
 It is not true that the Sahibs use the belaitee 
 2mnkah (the thermantidote) like as you and I 
 made for the Dipty Sahib two years ago. The 
 air is cold, and there are neither coolies nor 
 verandas. Nor do the Sahibs drink belaitee 
 pajiee (soda-water) when they are thirsty. 
 They drink water — very clean and good — as 
 we do. 
 
 In this city there are plains so vast that 
 they appear like jungle ; but when you have 
 crossed them you come again to lakhs of 
 houses, and there are houses on all sides. 
 None of the houses are of mud or wood, but 
 all are in brick or stone. Some have carved 
 doors in stone, but the carving is very bad. 
 Even the door of Rutton Singh's house is 
 better carved ; but Rutton Singh's house could 
 be put into any fore-court of these belaitee 
 houses. They are as big as mountains. 
 
 No one sleeps outside his house or in the 
 road. This is thought shameless ; but it is 
 very strange to see. There are no flat roofs 
 to the houses. They are all pointed ; I have 
 seen this and so have the others. 
 
 In this city there are so many carriages and 
 horses in the street that a man, to cross over, 
 must call a ^oXxQ^-wallah^ who puts up his
 
 286 The Smith Administration 
 
 hand, and the carriages stop. I swear to you 
 by our father that on account of me Golam 
 Singh mistri, all the carriages of many streets 
 have been stopped that I might cross like a 
 Padshah. Let Rutton Singh know this. 
 
 In this city for four annas you may send 
 news faster than the wind over four hundred 
 kos. There are witnesses ; and I have a 
 paper of the Government showing that this is 
 true. 
 
 In this city our honor is very great, and 
 we have learned to shekand like the Sahib- 
 logue. All the memsahibs, who are very 
 beautiful, look at us, but we do not under- 
 stand their talk. These memsahibs are like the 
 mefnsahibs in our country. 
 
 In this city there are a hundred dances 
 every night. The houses where they iiaiitch 
 hold many thousand people, and the nautch is 
 so wonderful that I cannot describe it. The 
 Sahibs are a wonderful people. They can 
 make a sea upon dry land, and then a fire, 
 and then a big fort with soldiers — all in half 
 an hour while you look. The other men will 
 say this too, for they also saw what I saw at 
 one of the nautches. 
 
 Rutton Singh's son, who has become a 
 pleader, has said that the Sahibs are only men 
 like us black men. This is a lie, for they know 
 more than we know. I will tell. When we 
 people left Bombay for Belait, we came upon 
 the Black Water, which you cannot understand. 
 For five days we saw only the water, as flat
 
 The Smith Administration 287 
 
 as a planed board with no marks on it. Yet 
 the Captain Sahib in charge of the fire-boat 
 ^aid, from the first, "In five days we shall 
 reach a little town, and in four more a big 
 canal." These things happened as he had 
 said, though there was nothing to point the 
 road, and the little town was no bigger than 
 the town of Lod. We came there by night, 
 and yet the Captain Sahib knew ! How, then, 
 can Rutton Singh's son say such lies ? I 
 have seen this city in which are crores of crores 
 of people. There is no end to its houses and 
 its shops, for I have never yet seen the open 
 jungle. There is nothing hidden from these 
 people. They can turn the night into day [I 
 have seen it], and they never rest from work- 
 ing. It is true that they do not understand 
 carpenter's work, but all other things they 
 understand, as I and the people with me have 
 seen. They are no common people. 
 
 Bid our father's widow see to my house 
 and little Golam Singh's mother ; for I return 
 in some months, and I have bought many 
 wonderful things in this country, the like of 
 which you have never seen. But your minds 
 are ignorant, and you will say I am a liar. I 
 shall, therefore, bring my witnesses to humble 
 Rutton Singh, bumiia, who went to Delhi, 
 and who is an owl and the son of an owl. 
 
 Ap-ki-das, Golam Singh.
 
 288 The Smith Administration 
 
 THE WRITING OF YAKUB KHAN 
 
 From Yakub Khan, Kuki Khel.of Lala China, 
 Malik ^ in the Englishman'' s City of Calcutta 
 with Vahbtahn Sahib, to Katal Khan, Kicki 
 Khel, of Lala China, which is i?i the Khai- 
 bar. This letter to go by the Sirkar's mail 
 to Piihbi, and thetice Mahbub AH, the writer^ 
 takes delivery and, if God pleases, gives to my 
 son. 
 
 Also, for my heart is clean, this writiiig g'oes on 
 to Sultan Khan, on the upper hill over 
 against Kuka Ghoz, which is in Bara, 
 through the country of the Zuka Khel. Mah- 
 bub AH goes through if God pleases. 
 
 To My Son. — Know this. I have come 
 with the others and Vahbtahn (Warburton) 
 Sahib, as was agreed, down to the river, and 
 the rail-dak does 7tot stop at Attock. Thus 
 the Mullah of Tordurra lied. Remember this 
 when next he comes for food. The rail-dak 
 goes on for many days. The others who came 
 v;ith me are witnesses to this. Fifteenth 
 times, for there was but little to do in the dak, 
 I made all the prayers from the 7iiyah to the 
 munajat, and yet the journey was not ended. 
 And at the places where we stopped there 
 were often to be seen the fighting-men of the 
 English, such as those we killed, when certain
 
 The Smith Administration 289 
 
 of our men went with the Bonerwals in the 
 matter of Umbeyla, whose guns I have in my 
 house. Everywhere there were fighting-men ; 
 but it may be that the English were afraid of 
 us, and so drew together all their troops upon 
 the line of the rail-dak and the fire-carriage. 
 Vahbtahn Sahib is a very clever man, and he 
 may have given the order. None the less, 
 there must be many troops in this country ; 
 more than all the Strength of the Afridis. But 
 Yar Khan says that all the land, which runs 
 to the east and to the west many days' journey 
 in the rail-dak, is also full of fighting-men, 
 and big guns by the score. Our Mullahs 
 gave us no news of this when they said that, 
 in the matter of six years gone, there were no 
 more English in the land, all having been 
 sent to Afghanistan, and that the country was 
 rising in fire behind them. Tell the Mullah 
 of Tordurra the words of Yar Khan. He has 
 lied in respect to the rail-dak, and it may be 
 that he will now speak the truth regarding 
 what his son saw when he went to Delhi with 
 the horses. I have asked many men for news 
 of the strength of the fighting-men in this 
 country, and all say that it is very great. 
 Howbeit, Vahbtahn Sahib is a clever man 
 and may have told them to speak thus, as I 
 told the women of Sikanderkhelogarhi to 
 speak when we were pressed by the Sangu 
 Khel, in that night when you, my son, took 
 Torukh Khan's head, and I saw that I had 
 bred a man.
 
 290 The Smith Administration 
 
 If there be as many men throughout the 
 place as I have seen and the people say, the 
 mouth of the Khaibar is shut, and it were 
 better to give no heed to our Mullahs. But 
 read further and see for what reasons I, who 
 am a Malak of the Kuki Khel, say this. I 
 have come through many cities — all larger 
 than Cabul. Rawal Pindi, which is far 
 beyond the Attock, whence came all the Eng- 
 lisli who fought us in the bi^iness of six years 
 gone. That is a great city, filled with fightiftg- 
 men — four thousand of both kinds, and guns. 
 Lahore is also a great city, with another four 
 thousand troops, and that is one night by the 
 rail-dak from Rawal Pindi. Amritsar has a 
 strong fort, but I do not know how many men 
 are there. The words of the people w^io go 
 down with the grapes and the almonds in the 
 winter are true, and our Mullahs have lied to 
 us. JuUundur is also a place of troops, and 
 there is a fort at Phillour, and there are many 
 thousand men at Umballa, which is one night, 
 going very swiftly in the rail-dak, from Lahore. 
 And at Meerut, which is half a day from Um- 
 balla, there are more men and horses ; and 
 at Delhi there are more also, in a very strong 
 fort. Our people go only as far south as 
 Delhi ; but beyond Delhi there are no more 
 strong Punjabi people — but only a mean race 
 "without strength. The country is very rich 
 here, flat, with cattle and crops. We, of the 
 villages of the Khaibar alone, could loot these 
 people ; but there are more fighting-men at
 
 The Smith Administration 291 
 
 Agra, and at Cawnpore, and at Allahabad, 
 and many other places, whose names do not 
 stay with me. Thus, my son, by day and by 
 night, always going swiftly in the rail-dak 
 we came down to this very big city of Cal- 
 cutta. 
 
 My mouth dripped when I saw the place 
 that they call Bengal — so rich it was; and 
 my heart was troubled when I saw how many 
 of the English were!? there. The land is very 
 strongly held, and there are a multitude of 
 English and half-English in the place. They 
 give us great honor, but all men regard us as 
 though we were strange beasts, and not fight- 
 ing-men with hundreds of guns. If Yar Khan 
 has spoken truth and the land throughout is 
 as I have seen, and no show has been made 
 to fill us with fear, I, Yakub Khan, tell you 
 my son, and you, O Sultan Khan ! that the 
 English do well to thus despise us ; for on 
 the Oath of a Pathan, we are only beasts in 
 their sight. It may be that Vahbtahn Sahib 
 has told them all to look at us in this manner 
 — for, though we receive great honor, no man 
 shows fear, and busies himself with his work 
 when we have passed by. Even that very 
 terrible man, the Governor of Cabul, would 
 be as no one in this great City of Calcutta. 
 Were I to write what I have seen, all our 
 people would say that I was mad and a liar. 
 But this I write privately, that only you, my 
 son, and Sultan Khan may see ; for ye know 
 that, in respect to my own blood, I am no liar.
 
 292 The Smith Administration 
 
 There are lights without oil or wood burning 
 brightly in this city ; and on the water of the 
 river lie boats which go by fire, as the rail-dak 
 goes, carrying men and fighting-men by two 
 and three thousand. God knows whence they 
 come ! They travel by water, and therefore 
 there must be yet another country to the east- 
 ward full of fighting-men. I cannot make 
 clear how these things are. Every day more 
 boats come. I do not think that this is ar- 
 ranged by Vahbtahn Sahib ; for no man in 
 those boats takes any notice of us ; and we 
 feel, going to and from every place, that we 
 are children. When that Kafiir came to us, 
 three years agone, is it in thy memory how, 
 before we shot him, we looked on him for a 
 show, and the children came out and laughed .? 
 In this place no children laugh at us ; but 
 none the less do we feel that we are all like 
 that man from Kafirstan. 
 
 In the matter of our safe-conduct, be at 
 ease. We are with Vahbtahn Sahib, and his 
 word is true. Moreover, as we said in the 
 Jirgah, we have been brought down to see 
 the richness of the country, and for that rea- 
 son they will do us no harm. I cannot tell 
 why they, being so strong, — if these things be 
 not all arranged by Vahbtahn Sahib, — took 
 any trouble for us. Yar Khan, whose heart 
 has become so soft within him in three days, 
 says that the louse does not kill the Afridi, 
 but none the less the Afridi takes off his up- 
 per-coat for the itching. This is a bitter say-
 
 The Smith Administration 293 
 
 ing, and I, O my son, and O my friend Sultan 
 Khan, am hard upon believing it. 
 
 I put this charge upon you. Whatever the 
 Mullah of Tordurra may say, both respecting 
 the matter that we know of, which it is not 
 prudent to write, and respecting the going-out 
 in spring against the Sangu Khel, do you, my 
 son, and you. Sultan Khan, keep the men of 
 the Khaibar villages, and the men of the Up- 
 per Bara, still, till I return and can speak with 
 my mouth. The blood-feuds are between 
 man and man, and these must go forward by 
 custom; but let there be no more than single 
 shots fired. We will speak together, and ye 
 will discover that my words are good. I 
 would give hope if I could, but I cannot give 
 hope. Yar Khan says that it were well to 
 keep to the blood-feuds only ; and he hath 
 said openly among us, in the smoking-time, 
 that he has a fear of the English, greater than 
 any fear of the curses of our Mullahs. Ye 
 know that I am a man unafraid. Ye knew 
 when I cut down the Malik of the Sipah Khel, 
 when he came into Kadam, that I was a man 
 unafraid. But this is no matter of one man's 
 life, or the lives of a hundred, or a thousand ; 
 and albeit I cursed Yar Khan with the others, 
 yet in my heart I am afraid even as he is. If 
 these English, and God know^s where their 
 homes lie, for they come from a strange place, 
 we do not know how strong in fighting-men, 
 — if, O my son, and friend of my heart Sultan 
 Khan, these devils can thus fill the land over
 
 294 The Smith Administration 
 
 four days' journey by this very swift rail-dak 
 from Peshawar, and can draw white light, as 
 bright as the sun, from iron poles, and can 
 send fire-boats full of men f7'om the east, and 
 moreover, as I have seen, can make new rupees 
 as easily as women make cow-dung cakes, — 
 what can the Afridis do ? 
 
 The Mullah of Tordurra said that they came 
 from the west, and that their rail-dak stopped 
 at Attock, and that there were none of them 
 except those who came into our country in the 
 great fight. In all three things he has lied. 
 Give no heed to him. I myself will shoot him 
 when I return. If he be a Saint, there will 
 be miracles over his tomb, which I will build. 
 If he be no Saint, there is but one Mullah the 
 less. It were better that he should die than 
 take the Khaibar villages into a new block- 
 ade ; as did the Mullah of Kardara, when we 
 were brought to shame by Jan Larens and I 
 was a young man. 
 
 The black men in this place are dogs and 
 children. To such an one I spoke yesterday, 
 saying, " Where is Vahbtahn Sahib "i " and he 
 answered nothing, but laughed. I took him 
 by the throat and shook him, only a little and 
 very gently, for I did not wish to bring trouble 
 on Vahbtahn Sahib, and he has said that our 
 customs are not the customs of this country. 
 This black man wept, and said that I had 
 killed him, but truly I had only shaken him 
 to and fro. He was a fat man, with white 
 stockings, dressed in woman's fashion, speak-
 
 The Smith Administration 295 
 
 ing English, but acting without courtesy either 
 to the Sahibs or to us. Thus are all the black 
 people in the city of Calcutta. But for these 
 English, we who are here now could loot the 
 city, and portion out the women, who are 
 fair. 
 
 I have bought an English rifle for you, my 
 son, better than the one which Shere Khan 
 stole from Cherat last summer, throwing to 
 two thousand paces ; and for Sultan Khan 
 an English revolver, as he asked. Of the 
 wonders of this great city I will speak when 
 we meet, for I cannot write them. 
 
 When I came from Lala China the tale of 
 blood between our house and the house of 
 Zarmat Shah lacked one on our side. I have 
 been gone many days, but I have no news 
 from you that it is made even. If ye have not 
 yet killed the boy who had the feud laid upon 
 him when I went, do nothing but guard your 
 lives till ye get the new rifle. With a steady 
 rest it will throw across the valley into Zar- 
 mat Shah's field, and so ye can kill the 
 women at evening. 
 
 Now I will cease, for I am tired of this writ- 
 ing. Make Mahbub Ali welcome, and bid 
 him stay till ye have written an answer to this, 
 telling me whether all be well in my house. 
 My blood is not cold that I charge you once 
 again to give no ear to the Mullahs, who have 
 lied, as I will show ; and, above all else, to 
 keep the villages still till I return. Nor am I a 
 clucking hen of a Khuttick if I write last, that
 
 296 The Smith Administration 
 
 these English are devils, against whom only 
 the Will of God can help us. 
 
 " And why should we beat our heads against a rock, 
 for we only spill our brains : 
 
 And when we have the Valley to content us, why 
 should we go out against the Mountain ? 
 
 A strong man, saith Kabir, is strong only till he 
 meet with a stronger."
 
 The Smith Administration 297 
 
 A KING'S ASHES. 
 
 1888 : On Wednesday morning last, the 
 ashes of the late ruler of Gwalior were con- 
 signed to the Ganges without the walls of 
 Allahabad Fort. Scindia died in June of last 
 year, and, shortly after the cremation, the 
 main portion of the ashes were taken to the 
 water. Yesterday's function, the disposal of 
 what remained (it is impossible not to be hor- 
 rible in dealing with such a subject), was 
 comparatively of an unimportant nature, but 
 sufficiently grim to witness. 
 
 Beyond the melon-beds and <r//^//^r villages 
 that stand upon the spit of sun-baked mud 
 and sand at the confluence of the Jumna and 
 the Ganges, lies a flag bedizened home of 
 fakirs, gurus, gosains, sajtyasis, and the like. 
 A stone's throw from this place boils and 
 eddies the line of demarcation between the 
 pure green waters of the Jumna and the tur- 
 bid current of the Ganges, and here they brought 
 the ashes of Scindia. With these came minor 
 functionaries of the Gwalior State, six Brah- 
 mins of the Court, and nine of Scindia's 
 relatives. In his lifetime, the Maharaja had 
 a deep and rooted distrust of his own family 
 and clan, and no Scindia was ever allowed 
 office about him. Indeed, so great was his 
 aversion that he would not even permit them
 
 298 The Smith Administration 
 
 to die in the Luskar, or City of Gwalior. 
 They must needs go out when their last hour 
 came, and die in a ne'ighhonng Jag'/iir village 
 which belonged to Sir Michael Filose, one of 
 that Italian family which has served the State 
 so long and faithfully. When such an one had 
 died, Scindia, by his own command, was not 
 informed of the event till the prescribed days 
 of mourning had elapsed. Then notice was 
 given to him by the placing of his bed on the 
 ground, — a sign of mourning, — and he would 
 ask, not too tenderly, " Which Scindia is 
 dead ? " 
 
 Considering this unaraiable treatment, the 
 wonder was that so many as nine of his own 
 kin could be found to attend the last rites on 
 that sun-dried mud-bank. There was, or 
 seemed to be, no attempt at ceremony, and, 
 naturally enough, no pretense at grief; nor 
 was there any gathering of native notables. 
 The common crowd and the multitude of 
 priests had the spectacle to themselves, if we 
 except a few artillery men from the Fort, who 
 had strolled down to see what was happening 
 to " one of them (qualified) kings." By ten 
 o'clock, a tawdry silken litter bearing the 
 the ashes and accompanied by the mourners, 
 had reached the water's edge, where wooden 
 cots had been run out into the stream, and 
 where the water deepened boats had been 
 employed to carry the press of sight-seers. 
 Underfoot, the w^et ground was trodden by 
 hundreds of feet into a slimy pulp of mud and
 
 The Smith Administration 299 
 
 stale flowers of sacrifice ; and on this com- 
 post slipped and blundered a fine white horse, 
 whose fittings were heavy with bosses of new 
 silver. He and a big elephant adorned with 
 a necklace of silver plaques, was a gift to the 
 priests who in cash and dinners would profit 
 by the day's work to the extent of eight or ten 
 thousand rupees. 
 
 Overhead a hundred fakirs^ flags, bearing 
 devices of gods, beasts, and the trident of Shiva, 
 fluttered in the air ; while all around, like 
 vultures drawn by carrion, crowded the priests. 
 There were burly, bull-necked, freshly oiled 
 rufiians, sleek of paunch and jowl, clothed in 
 pure white linen ; mad wandering mendicants 
 carrying the peacock's feather, the begging 
 bowl, and the patched cloak ; salmon-robed 
 sanyasis — from up country, — and evil-eyed 
 gosains from the south. They crowded upon 
 the wooden bedsteads, piled themselves upon 
 the boats, and jostled into the first places in 
 the crowd in the mud, and all their eyes were 
 turned toward two nearly naked men who 
 seemed to be kneading some Horror in their 
 hands and dropping it into the water. The 
 closely packed boats rocked gently, the crowd 
 babbled and buzzed, and uncouth music 
 wailed and shrieked, while from behind the 
 sullen, squat bulk of Allahabad Fort, the 
 booming of minute-guns announced that the 
 Imperial Government was paying honor to 
 the memory of his Highness Maharaja Jyaji 
 Rao Scindia, G. C. B., G. C. S. I., once owner
 
 300 The Smith Administration 
 
 of twenty thousand square miles of land, 
 nearly three million people, and treasure 
 untold, if all tales be true. Not fifty yards 
 up-stream, a swollen dead goat was bobbing 
 up and down in the water in a ghastly parody 
 on kidlike skittishness, and green filth was 
 cast ashore by every little wave. 
 
 Was there anything more to see ? The 
 white horse refused to be led into the water 
 and splashed all the bystanders with dirt, and 
 the elephant's weight broke up the sand it 
 was standing on and turned it to a quag. That 
 much was visible, but little else ; for the 
 clamoring priests forbade any English foot 
 to come too near, perhaps for fear that 
 their gains might be lessened. Where the 
 press parted, it was possible to catch a glimpse 
 of this ghoulish kneading by the naked men in 
 the boat, and to hear the words of a chanted 
 prayer. But that was all.
 
 The Smith Administration 301 
 
 THE BRIDE'S PROGRESS. 
 
 " And school foundations in the act 
 Of holiday, three files compact, 
 Shall learn to view thee as a fact. 
 Connected with that zealous tract 
 ' Rome, Babylon, and Nineveh.' " 
 
 — The Burden of Nineveh, 
 
 It would have been presumption and weari- 
 ness deliberately to have described Benares. 
 No man, except he who writes a guide-book, 
 " does " the Strand or Westminster Abbey. 
 The foreigner — French or American — tells 
 London what to think of herself, as the visitor 
 tells the Anglo-Indian what to think of India. 
 Our neighbor over the way always knows so 
 much more about us than we ourselves. The 
 Bride interpreted Benares as fresh youth and 
 radiant beauty can interpret a city gray and 
 worn with years. Providence had been very 
 good to her, and she repaid Providence by 
 dressing herself to the best advantage — which, 
 if the French speak truth, is all that a fair 
 woman can do toward religion. Generations, 
 of untroubled ease and well-being must have 
 builded the dainty figure and rare face, and 
 the untamable arrogance of wealth looked out 
 of the calm eyes. ''India," said The Bride, 
 philosophically, " is an incident only in our
 
 302 The Smith Administration 
 
 trip. We are going on to Australia and China, 
 and then Home by San Francisco and New 
 York. We shall be at Home again before 
 the season is quite ended." And she 
 patted her bracelets, smiling softly to herself 
 over some thought that had little enough to 
 do with Benares or India — whichever was the 
 *' incident." She went into the city of Benares. 
 Benares of the Buddhists and the Hindus — 
 of Durga of the Thousand Names — of two 
 thousand Temples, and tv/ice two thousand 
 stenches. Her high heels rang delicately upon 
 thes tone pavement of the gullies, and her 
 brow unmarked as that of a little child, 
 was troubled by the stenches. " Why does 
 Benares smell so ? " demanded the Bride, 
 pathetically. ^^ Micst we do it, if it smells like 
 this ? " The Bridegroom was high-colored, 
 fair-whiskered, and insistent, as an English- 
 man should be. " Of course we must. It 
 would never do to go home without having 
 seen Benares. Where is a guide ? " The 
 streets were alive with them, and the couple 
 chose him who spoke English most fluently. 
 "Would you like to see where the Hindus 
 are burnt" said he. They would, though The 
 Bride shuddered as she spoke, for she feared 
 that it would be very horrible. A ray of 
 gracious sunlight touched her hair as she 
 turned, walking cautiously in the middle of 
 the narrow way, into the maze of the byways 
 of Benares. 
 
 The sunlight ceased after a few paces, and
 
 The Smith Administration 303 
 
 the horrors of the Holy City gathered round 
 her. Neglected rainbow-hued sewage sprawled 
 across the path, and a bull, rotten with some 
 hideous disease that distorted his head out of 
 all bestial likeness, pushed through the filth. 
 The Bride picked her way carefully, giving the 
 bull the wall. A lean dog, dying of mange, 
 growled and yelped among her starveling 
 puppies on a threshold that led into the dark- 
 ness of some unclean temple. The Bride 
 stooped and patted the beast on the head. 
 " I think she's something like Bessie^^^ said 
 The Bride, and once again her thoughts wan- 
 dered far beyond Benares. The lanes grew 
 narrower and the symbols of a brutal cult 
 more numerous. Hanuman, red, shameless, 
 and smeared with oil, leaped and leered upon 
 the walls above stolid, black, stone bulls, 
 knee-deep in yellow flowers. The bells 
 clamored from unseen temples, and half- 
 naked men with evil eyes rushed out of dark 
 places and besought her for money, saying that 
 they were priests — padris, like the padris of 
 her own faith. One young man — who knows 
 in what Mission school he had picked up his 
 speech? — told her this in English, and The 
 Bride laughed merrily, shaking her head. 
 " These men speak English," she called back 
 to her husband. " Isn't it funny ! " 
 
 But the mirth went out of her face when a 
 turn in the lane brought her suddenly above 
 the burning-^//^?/, where a man was piling logs 
 on some Thing that lay wrapped in white
 
 304 The Smith Administration 
 
 cloth, near the water of the Ganges. " We 
 can't see well from this place," said the Bride- 
 groom, stolidly. " Let us get a little closer." 
 They moved forward through deep gray dust — 
 white sand of the river and black dust of 
 man blended — till they commanded a full 
 view of the steeply sloping bank and the 
 Thing under the logs. A man was laboriously 
 starting a fire at the river end of the pile ; 
 stepping wide now and again to avoid the hot 
 embers of a dying blaze actually on the edge 
 of the water. The Bride's face blanched, and 
 she looked appealingly to her husband, but he 
 had only eyes for the newly lit flame. Slowly, 
 very slowly, a white dog crept on his belly 
 down the bank, toward a heap of ashes among 
 which the water was hissing. A plunge, 
 followed by a yelp of pain, told that he had 
 reached food, and that the food was too hot 
 for him. With a deftness that marked long 
 training, he raked the capture from the ashes 
 on to the dust and slobbered, nosing it ten- 
 tatively. As it cooled, he settled, with noises 
 of animal delight, to his meal and worried and 
 growled and tore. *' Will ! " said The Bride, 
 faintly. The Bridegroom was watching the 
 newly lit pyre and could not attend. A log 
 slipped sideways, and through the chink 
 showed the face of the man below, smiling 
 the dull thick smile of death, which is such, 
 a smile as a very drunken man wears when he 
 has found in his wide-swimming brain a joke 
 of exquisite savor. The dead man grinned
 
 The Smith Administration 305 
 
 up to the sun and the fair face of The Bride. 
 The flames sputtered and caught and spread. 
 A man waded out knee-deep into the water, 
 which was covered with greasy black embers 
 and an oily scum. He chased the bobbing 
 driftwood with a basket, that it might be saved 
 for another occasion, and threw each take on 
 a mound of such economies or on the back of 
 the unheeding dog deep in the enjoyment of 
 his warm dinner. 
 
 Slowly, very slowly, as the flames crackled, 
 the Smihng Dead Man lifted one knee through 
 the light logs. He had just been smitten 
 with the idea of rising from his last couch and 
 confounding the spectators. It was easy to 
 see he was tasting the notion of this novel, 
 this stupendous practical joke, and would 
 presently, always smiling, rise up, and up, and 
 up, and . . . 
 
 The fire-shriveled knee gave way, and with 
 its collapse little flames ran forward and 
 whistled and whispered and fluttered from 
 heel to head. ^' Come away. Will," said The 
 Bride, " come away ! It is too horrible. I'm 
 sorry that I saw it." They left together, she 
 with her arm in her husband's for a sign to 
 all the world that, though Death be inevitable 
 and awful, Love is still the greater, and in its 
 sweet selfishness can set at naught even the 
 horrors of a burning-^/^<7/. 
 
 " I never thought what it meant before," 
 said The Bride, releasing her husband's arm 
 as she recovered herself ; " I see now.'' " See 
 20
 
 3o6 The Smith Administration 
 
 what?" "Don't you know?" said The 
 Bride, " what Edwin Arnold says : — 
 
 ' For all the tears of all the eyes 
 Have room in Gunga's bed, 
 And all the sorrow is gone to-morrow 
 When the white flames have fed.' 
 
 I see now. I think it is very, very horrible." 
 Then to the guide, suddenly, with a deep com- 
 passion, "And will you be — will you be burnt 
 in that way, too?" "Yes, your Ladyship," 
 said the guide, cheerfully, " we are all burnt 
 that way." " Poor wretch ! " said The Bride 
 to herself. " Now show us some more tem- 
 ples." A second time they dived into Benares 
 City, but it was at least five long minutes be- 
 fore The Bride recovered those buoyant 
 spirits which were hers by right of Youth and 
 Love and Happiness. A very pale and sober 
 little face peered into the filth of the temple 
 of the Cow where theodorof Holiness and Hu- 
 manity are highest. Fearful and wonderful 
 old women, crippled in hands and feet, body 
 and back, crawled round her ; some even 
 touching the hem of her dress. And at this 
 she shuddered, for the hands were very foul. 
 The walls dripped filth, the pavement sweated 
 filth, and the contagion of uncleanliness 
 walked among the worshippers. There might 
 have been beauty in the Temple of the Cow; 
 there certainly was horror enough and to 
 spare ; but The Bride was conscious only of 
 the filth of the place. She turned to the 
 wisest and best man in the world, asking in-
 
 The Smith Administration 307 
 
 dig-nantly, "Why don't these horrid people 
 clean the place out ? " " I don't know," said 
 The Bridegroom ; " I suppose their religion 
 forbids it." Once more they set out on their 
 journey through the city of monstrous creeds 
 — she in front, the pure white hem of her 
 petticoat raised indignantly clear of the mire, 
 and her eyes full of alarm and watchfulness. 
 Closed galleries crossed the narrow way, and 
 the light of day fainted and grew sick ere it 
 could climb down into the abominations of 
 the gullies. A litter of gorgeous red and gold 
 barred the passage to the Golden Temple. 
 '' It is the Maharani of Hazaribah," said the 
 guide, ''she coming to pray for a child." 
 " Ah ! " said The Bride, and turning quickly to 
 her husband, said, ''I wish mother were with 
 us." The Bridegroom made no answer. Per- 
 haps he was beginning to repent of dragging 
 a young English girl through the iniquities of 
 Benares. He announced his intention of re- 
 turning to his hotel, and The Bride dutifully 
 followed. At every turn lewd gods grinned 
 and mouthed at her, the still air was clogged 
 with thick odors and the reek of rotten mari- 
 gold flowers, and disease stood blind and 
 naked before the sun. " Let us get away 
 quickly," said the Bride ; and they escaped to 
 the main street, having honestly accomplished 
 nearly two-thirds of what was written in the 
 little red guide-book. An instinct inherited 
 from a century of cleanly English housewives 
 made The Bride pause before getting into the
 
 3o8 The Smith Administration 
 
 carriage, and, addressing the seething crowd 
 generally, murmur, " Oh ! you horrid people ! 
 Shouldn't I like to wash you." 
 
 Yet Benares — which name must certainly 
 be derived from be, without, and 7iares, nos- 
 trils — is not entirely a Sacred Midden. Very 
 early in the morning, almost before the light 
 had given promise of the day, a boat put out 
 from a ghat and rowed up-stream till it stayed 
 in front of the ruined magnificence of Scindia's 
 Ghat — a range of ruined wall and drunken 
 bastion. The Bride and Bridegroom had 
 risen early to catch their last glimpse of the 
 city. There was no one abroad at that hour, 
 and, except from three or four stone-laden 
 boats rolling down from Mirzapur, they were 
 alone upon the river. In the silence a voice 
 thundered far above their heads: ''/ bear 
 tvitness that there is no God but God.^^ It was 
 the mullah, proclaiming the Oneness of God 
 in the city of the Million Manifestations. 
 The call rang across the sleeping city and far 
 over the river, and be sure that the mullah 
 abated nothing of the defiance of his cry for 
 that he looked down upon a sea of temples 
 and smelt the incense of a hundred Hindu 
 shrines. The Bride could make neither head 
 nor tail of the business. *' What is he mak- 
 ing that noise for. Will 1 " she asked. " Wor- 
 shiping Vishnu," was the ready reply; for 
 at the outset of his venture into matrimony a 
 young husband is at the least infallible. The 
 Bride snuggled down under her wraps, keep-
 
 The Smith Administration 309 
 
 ing her delicate, chill-pinked little nose to- 
 ward the city. Day broke over Benares, and 
 The Bride stood up and applauded with both 
 her hands. It was finer, she said, than any 
 transformation scene ; and so in her gratitude 
 she applauded the earth, the sun, and the 
 everlasting sky. The river turned to a silver 
 flood and the ruled lines of the ghats to red 
 gold. '^ How can I describe this to mother ? " 
 she cried, as the wonder grew, and timeless 
 Benares roused to a fresh day. The Bride 
 nestled down in the boat and gazed round- 
 eyed. As water spurts through a leaky dam, 
 as ants pour out from the invaded nest, so the 
 people of Benares poured down the ghats to 
 the river. Wherever The Bride's eye rested, 
 it saw men and women stepping downwards, 
 always downwards, by rotten wall, worn step, 
 tufted bastion, riven-water gate, and stark, 
 bare, dusty bank, to the water. The hundred 
 priests drifted down to their stations under 
 the large mat-umbrellas that all pictures of 
 Benares represent so faithfully. The Bride's 
 face lighted with joy. She had found a simile. 
 " Will ! Do you recollect that pantomime we 
 went to ages and ages ago — before we were 
 engaged — at Brighton ? Doesn't it remind 
 you of the scene of the Fairy Mushrooms — 
 just before they all got up and danced, you 
 know ? Isn't it splendid ? " She leaned for- 
 ward, her chin in her hand, and watched long 
 and intently ; and Nature, who is without 
 doubt a Frenchwoman, so keen is her love
 
 310 The Smith Administration 
 
 for effect, arranged that the shell-like pink of 
 The Bride's cheek should be turned against a 
 dull-red house, in the windows of which sat 
 women in blood-red clothes, letting down 
 crimson turban-cloths for the morning breeze 
 to riot with. From the burning-^//^^/ rose 
 lazily a welt of thick blue smoke, and an eddy 
 of the air blew a wreath across the river. 
 The Bride coughed. " Will," she said, " prom- 
 ise me when I die you won't have me cre- 
 mated — if cremation is the fashion then, " 
 And " Will " promised lightly, as a man prom- 
 ises who is looking for long years. 
 
 The life of the city went forward. The 
 Bride heard, though she did not understand, 
 the marriage-song, and the chant of prayers, 
 and the wail of the mourners. She looked 
 long and steadfastly at the beating heart of 
 Benares and at the Dead for whom no day 
 had dawned. The place was hers to watch 
 and enjoy if she pleased. Her enjoyment 
 was tempered with some thought of regret ; 
 for her eyebrows contracted and she thought. 
 Then the trouble was apparent. *' Will ! " 
 she said softly, " they don't seem to think 
 much of us, do they ? " Did she expect, then, 
 that the whole city would make obeisance to 
 young Love, robed and crowned in a gray 
 tweed traveling dress and velvet toque ? 
 
 The boat drifted down-stream, and an hour 
 or so later the Dufferin Bridge bore a^vay The 
 Bride and Bridegroom on their travels, in 
 which India was to be "only an incident."
 
 The Smith Administration 311 
 
 " A DISTRICT AT PLAY." 
 
 1887. 
 
 Four or five years ago, when the Egerton 
 "Woolen Mills were young, and Dhariwal, on 
 the Amritsar and Pathankot Line, was just 
 beginning to grow, there was decreed an an- 
 nual holiday for all the workers in the Mill. 
 In time the little gathering increased from a 
 purely private tainasha to a fair, and now all 
 the Gurdaspur District goes a-merrymaking 
 with the Millhands. Here the history 
 begins. 
 
 On the evening of Friday, the 20th of Au- 
 gust, an Outsider went down to Dhariwal to 
 see that mela. He had understood that it 
 was an affair which concerned the People 
 only — that no one in authority had to keep 
 order — that there was no police, and that 
 everybody did what was right in their own 
 eyes ; none going wrong. This was refresh- 
 ing and pastoral, even as Dhariwal, which is 
 on the banks of the Canal, is refreshing and 
 pastoral. The Egerton Mills owns a baby 
 railway — twenty-inch gauge — which joins on 
 to the big line at Dhariwal station, so that the 
 visitor steps from one carriage into another, 
 and journeys in state. 
 
 Dusk was closing in as the locomotive — it
 
 312 The Smith Administration 
 
 wore a cloth round its loins and a string of 
 beads round its neck — ran the tiny carriage 
 into the Mill-yard, and the Outsider heard 
 the low grumble of turbines, and caught a 
 whiff of hot wool from a shed. (The Mills 
 were running and would run till eleven o'clock 
 that night, because, though holidays were 
 necessary, orders were many and urgent.) 
 Both smell and sound suggested the North 
 country at once, — bleak, paved streets of 
 Skipton and Keighley ; chimneys of Beverley 
 and Burnley ; gray stone houses within stone 
 walls, and the moors looking down on all. It 
 was perfectly natural, therefore, to find that 
 the Englishmen who directed the departments 
 of the establishment were from the North also ; 
 and delightful as it was natural to hear again 
 the slow, staid Yorkshire tongue. Here the 
 illusion stopped ; for, in place of the merry 
 rattle of the clogs as the mill-hands left their 
 work, there was only the soft patter of naked 
 feet on bare ground, and for purple, smoke- 
 girt moors, the far-off line of the Dalhousie 
 Hills. 
 
 Presently, the electric light began its work, 
 and a tour over the Mills was undertaken. 
 The machinery, the thousands of spindles, 
 and the roaring power-looms were familiar 
 as the faces of old friends ; but the workers 
 were strange indeed. Small brown boys, 
 naked except for a loin-cloth, " pieced " the 
 yarn from the spindles under the strong blaze 
 of the electric light, and semi-nude men toiled
 
 The Smith Administration 313 
 
 at the carding-machine between the whirring 
 belts. It was a shock and a realization — ■ 
 for boys and men seemed to know their work 
 in almost Yorkshire fashion. 
 
 But the amusement and not the labor of 
 the Mill was what the Outsider had come to 
 see — the amusement which required no 
 policemen and no appearance of control from 
 without. 
 
 Early on Saturday morning all Dhariwal 
 gathered itself on the banks of the Canal — 
 a magnificent stretch of water — to watch the 
 swimming-race, a short half-mile down-stream. 
 Forty-three bronzes had arranged themselves 
 in picturesque attitudes on the girders of the 
 Railway bridge, and the crowd chaffed them 
 according to their deserts. The race was won, 
 from start to finish, by a tailor with a wonderful 
 side-stroke and a cataract in one eye. The 
 advantage counterbalanced the defect, for he 
 steered his mid-stream course as straight as a 
 fish, was never headed, and won, sorely pump- 
 ed, in seven minutes and a few seconds. The 
 crowd ran along the bank and yelled instruc- 
 tions to its favorites at the top of its voice. 
 Up to this time not more than five hundred 
 folk had put in an appearance, so it was im- 
 possible to judge of their behavior in bulk. 
 
 After the swimming came the greased pole, 
 an entertainment the pains whereof are re- 
 served for light-limbed boys, and the prizes, 
 in the shape of gay cloths and rupees, are 
 appropriated by heavy fathers. The crowd
 
 314 The Smith Administration 
 
 had disposed itself in and about the shadow 
 of the trees, where one might circulate com- 
 fortably and see the local notabilities. 
 
 They are decidedly Republicans in Dha- 
 riwal, being innocent oi Darbaties^ C. I. E. 's, 
 fat old gentlemen in flowered brocade, 
 dressing-gowns, and cattle of that kind 
 Every one seemed much on a level, with the 
 exception of some famous wrestlers, who 
 stood aside with an air of conscious worth, 
 and grinned cavernously when spoken to. 
 They were the elite of the assembly, and were 
 to prove their claims to greatness on the 
 morrow. Until the Outsider realized how 
 great an interest the Gurdaspur District took 
 in wrestling, he was rather at a loss to under- 
 stand why men walked round and round each 
 other warily, like dogs on the eve of a quarrel. 
 
 The greasy pole competition finished, there 
 was a general move in the direction of the 
 main road, and couples were chosen from 
 among the Mill-hands for a three-legged race. 
 Here the Outsider joyfully anticipated diffi- 
 culty in keeping the course clear without a line 
 of policemen ; for all crowds, unless duly 
 marshalled, will edge forward to see what is 
 going on. 
 
 But the democracy of Dhariwal got into 
 their places as they were told, and kept them, 
 with such slight assistance as three or four 
 self-constituted office-bearers gave. Only 
 once, when the honor of two villages and 
 the Mill was at stake in the Tug-of~War, were
 
 The Smith Administration 315 
 
 they unable to hold in, and the Englishmen 
 had to push them back. But this was ex- 
 ceptional, and only evoked laughter, for in the 
 front rank of all — yellow-trousered and blue- 
 coated — was a real live policeman, who was 
 shouldered about as impartially as the rest. 
 More impartially, in fact ; for to keep a police- 
 man in order is a seldom-given joy, and 
 should be made much of. 
 
 Then back to the Mill bungalow for 
 breakfast, where there was a gathering of five 
 or six Englishmen, — Canal Officers and En- 
 gineers. Here follows a digression. 
 
 After long residence in places where folk 
 discuss such intangible things as Lines, Poli- 
 cies, Schemes, Measures, and the like, in an 
 abstract and bloodless sort of way, it was a 
 revelation to listen to men who talk of Things 
 and the People — crops and plows and 
 water-supplies, and the best means of using 
 all three for the benefit of a district. They 
 spoke masterfully, these Englishmen, as 
 owners of a country might speak, and it was 
 not at first that one realized how every one of 
 the concerns they touched upon with the air 
 of proprietorship were matters which had 
 not the faintest bearing on their pay or pros- 
 pects, but concerned the better tillage or 
 husbandry of the fields around. It was good 
 to sit idly in the garden, by the guava-trees, 
 and to hear these stories of work undertaken 
 and carried out in the interests of, and, best 
 of all, recognized by, Nubbi Buksh — the man
 
 3i6 The Smith Administration 
 
 whose mind moves so slowly and whose life 
 is so bounded. They had no particular love 
 for the land, and most assuredly no hope of 
 gain from it. Yet they spoke as though 
 their hopes of salvation were centered on driv- 
 ing into a Zemindar's head the expediency of 
 cutting his wheat a little earlier than his wont ; 
 or on proving to some authority or other that 
 the Canal-rate in such and such a district was 
 too high. Every one knows that India is a 
 country filled with Englishmen, who live down 
 in the plains and do things other than writing 
 futile reports, but it is wholesome to meet 
 them in the flesh. 
 
 To return, however, to the '' Tug-of-War " 
 and the sad story of the ten men of Futteh 
 Nangal. Now Futteh Nangal is a village of 
 proud people, mostly sepoys, full in the 
 stomach ; and Kung is another village filled 
 with Mill-hands of long standing, who have 
 grown lusty on good pay. When the tug 
 began, quoth the proud men of Futteh Nangal : 
 "Let all the other teams compete. We will 
 stand aside and pull the winners." This 
 hauteur was not allowed, and in the end it 
 happened that the men of Kung thoroughly 
 defeated the sepoys of Futteh Nangal amid a 
 scene of the wildest excitement, and secured 
 for themselves the prize, — an American 
 plow, — leaving the men of Futteh Nangal 
 only a new and improved rice-husker. 
 
 Other sports followed, and the crowd grew 
 denser and denser throughout the day, till
 
 The Smith Administration 317 
 
 evening, when every one assembled once more 
 by the banks of the Canal to see the fire- 
 works, which were impressive. Great boxes 
 of rockets and shells, and wheels and Roman- 
 candles, had come up from Calcutta, and the 
 intelligent despatchers had packed the whole 
 in straw, which absorbs damp. This didn't 
 spoil the shells and rockets — quite the con- 
 trary. It added a pleasing uncertainty to 
 their flight and converted the shells into very 
 fair imitations of the real article. The crowd 
 dodged and ducked, and yelled and laughed 
 and chaffed, at each illumination, and did their 
 best to fall into the Canal. It was a jovial 
 scuffle, and ended, when the last shell had 
 burst gloriously on the water, in a general ad- 
 journment to the main street of Dhariwal 
 village, where there was provided a magic- 
 lantern. 
 
 At first sight it does not seem likely that a 
 purely rustic audience would take any deep 
 interest in magic-lanterns ; but they did, and 
 showed a most unexpected desire to know 
 what the pictures meant. It was an out-of- 
 door performance, the sheet being stretched 
 on the side of a house and the people sitting 
 below in silence. Then the native doctor — 
 who was popular with the Mill-hands — went 
 up on to the roof and began a running commen- 
 tary on the pictures as they appeared ; and his 
 imagination was as fluent as his Punjabi. The 
 crowd grew irreverent and jested with him, 
 until they recognized a portrait of one of the
 
 3i8 The Smith Administration 
 
 native overseers and a khitjjiutgar. Then they 
 turned upon the two who had achieved fame 
 thus strangely, and commented on their 
 beauty. Lastly, there flashed upon the sheet 
 a portrait of Her Majesty the Empress. The 
 native doctor rose to the occasion, and, after 
 enumerating a few of our Great Lady's virtues, 
 called upon the crowd to salaam 2ind cheer; 
 both of which they did noisily, and even more 
 noisily, when they were introduced to the 
 Prince of Wales. One might moralize to any 
 extent on the effect produced by this little 
 demonstration in an out-of-the-way corner of 
 Her Majesty's Empire. 
 
 Next morning, being Sunday and cool, was 
 given up to wrestling. By this time the whole 
 of the Gurdaspur District was represented, and 
 the crowd was some five thousand strong. 
 Eventually, after much shouting, one hundred 
 and seventy men from all the villages, near 
 and far, were set down to wrestle, if time 
 allowed. And in truth the first prize — a plow 
 for the man who showed most " form " — was 
 worth wrestling for. Armed with a note-book 
 and a pencil, the Manager, by virtue of consid- 
 erable experience in the craft, picked out the 
 men who were to contend together ; and these, 
 fearing defeat, did in almost every instance 
 explain how their antagonist was too much 
 for them. The people sat down in companies 
 upon the grass, village by village, flanking a 
 huge square marked on the ground. Other re- 
 straint there was none. Within the square, was
 
 The Smith Administration 319 
 
 the roped ring for the wrestlers, and close to 
 the ring a tent for the dozen or so of English- 
 men present. Be it noted that anybody might 
 come into this tent who did not interfere with 
 a view of the wrestling. There were no lean 
 brown men, clasping their noses with their 
 hands and following in the wake of the Man- 
 ager Sahib. Still less were there the fat men 
 in gorgeous raiment before noted — the men 
 who shake hands " Europe fashion " and de- 
 mand the favor of your interest for their 
 uncle's son's wife's cousin. 
 
 It was a sternly democratic community, 
 bent on enjoying itself, and, unlike all other 
 democracies, knowing how to secure what it 
 wanted. 
 
 The wrestlers were called out by name, 
 stripped, and set to amid applausive shouts 
 from their respective villages and trainers. 
 There were many men of mark engaged, — 
 huge men who stripped magnificently ; light, 
 lean men, who wriggled like eels, and got the 
 mastery by force of cunning ; men deep in the 
 breast as bulls, lean in the flank as greyhounds, 
 and lithe as otters ; men who wrestled with 
 amicable grins ; men who lost their tempers 
 and smote each other with the clenched hand 
 on the face, and so were turned out of the 
 ring amid a storm of derision from all four 
 points of the compass ; men as handsome as 
 statues of the Greek gods, and foul-visaged 
 men whose noses were very properly rubbed 
 in the dirt.
 
 320 The Smith Administration 
 
 As he watched, the Outsider was filled with 
 a great contempt and pity for all artists at 
 Home, because he felt sure that they had 
 never seen the human form aright. One 
 wrestler caught another by the waist, and 
 lifting him breast-high, attempted to throw 
 him bodily, the other stiffening himself like a 
 bar as he was heaved up. The coup failed, 
 and for half a minute the two stayed motion- 
 less as stone, till the lighter weight wrenched 
 himself out of the other's arms, and the two 
 came down, — flashing through a dozen per- 
 fect poses as they fell, — till they subsided 
 once more into ignoble scuffle in the dust. 
 The story of that day's strife would be a long 
 one were it written at length, — how one man 
 did brutally twist the knee of another (which 
 is allowed by wrestling law, though generally 
 considered mean) for a good ten minutes, and 
 how the twistee groaned, but held out, and 
 eventually threw the twister, and stalked 
 round the square to receive the congratula- 
 tions of his friends ; how the winner in each 
 bout danced joyfully over to the tent to have 
 his name recorded (there were between three 
 and four hundred rupees given in prizes in 
 the wrestling matches alone ; ) how the Mill- 
 hands applauded their men ; and how Sid- 
 dum, Risada, Kalair, Narote, Sohul, Maha, 
 and Doolanager, villages of repute, yelled 
 in reply ; how the Sujhanpur men took many 
 prizes for the honor of the Sugar mills there ; 
 how the event of the day was a tussle be-
 
 The Smith Administration 321 
 
 tween a boy — a mere child — and a young 
 man ; how the youngster nearly defeated his 
 opponent amid riotous yells, but broke down 
 finally through sheer exhaustion ; how his 
 trainer ran forward to give him a pill of dark 
 and mysterious composition, but was ordered 
 away under the rules of the game. Lastly, 
 how a haughty and most wonderfully ugly 
 weaver of the Mill was thrown by an outsider, 
 and how the Manager chuckled, saying that a 
 defeat at wrestling would keep the weaver 
 quiet and humble for some time, which was 
 desirable. All these things would demand 
 much space to describe and must go unre- 
 corded. 
 
 They wrestled — couple by couple — for six 
 good hours by the clock, and a Kashmiri 
 weaver (why are Kashmiris so objectionable 
 all the Province over ? ) later on in the after- 
 noon, was moved to make himself a nuisance 
 to his neighbors. Then the four self-appoint- 
 ed office-bearers moved in his direction ; but 
 the crowd had already dealt with him, and the 
 Dormouse in Alice in WonderlaJid was never 
 so suppressed as that weaver. Which proves 
 that a democracy can keep order among 
 themselves when they like. 
 
 The Outsider departed, leaving the wrestlers 
 still at work, and the last he heard as he dived 
 through that most affable, grinning assembly, 
 was the shout of one of the Mill-hands, who 
 had thrown his man and ran to the tent to get 
 his name entered. Freely translated the 
 21
 
 322 The Smith Administration 
 
 words were exactly what Gareth, the Scullion- 
 Knight, said to King Arthur : — 
 
 " Yea mighty through thy meat and drinks am I, 
 And I can topple down a hundred such." 
 
 Then back to the Schemes and Lines and 
 Policies and Projects filled with admiration 
 for the Englishmen who live in patriarchal 
 fashion among the People, respecting and 
 respected, knowing their ways and their wants ; 
 believing (soundest of all beliefs) that " too 
 much progress is bad," and compassing with 
 their heads and hands real, concrete, and un- 
 deniable Things. As distinguished from the 
 speech which dies and the paper-work which 
 perishes.
 
 The Smith Administration 323 
 
 WHAT IT COMES TO. 
 
 " Men instinctively act under the excitement of the 
 battle-field, only as they have been taught to act in 
 peace." . . . These words deserve to be engraved in 
 letters of gold over the gates of every barrack and 
 drill-ground in the country. The drill of the soldier now 
 begins and ends in the company . . . Each Company 
 will stand for itself on parade, practically as indepen- 
 dent as a battery of artillery in a brigade, etc., etc. 
 Vide Comments on New German Drill Regulation, in 
 Pioneer. 
 
 Scene. Canteen of the Tyneside Tailtwisters 
 in full blast. Chumer of B Co7npany a?tnexes 
 the Pioneer on its arrival., by right of the strong 
 arm., a7id turns it over contemptuously. 
 
 Chumer. — 'Ain't much in this 'ere. On'y 
 Jack the Ripper and a lot about C7-vilians. 
 'Might think the 'ole country was full of Ci- 
 vilians. C/-vilians an' drill. 'Strewth a' 
 mighty ! As if a man didn't get 'nuff drill 
 outside o' his evenin' paiper. Anybody got 
 the fill of a pipe 'ere ? 
 
 Shuckbrugh {of B Company passing poucJi). 
 — Let's 'ave 'old o' that paper. Wot's on ? 
 Wot's in ? No more new drill 1 
 
 Chumer. — Drill be sugared ! When I was 
 at 'ome, now buyin' my Ti77ies orf the Rail- 
 way stall like a gentleman, /never read nothin' 
 about drill. There ivas7i^t no drill. Strike 
 me blind, these Injian papers ain't got nothin'
 
 324 The Smith Administration 
 
 else to write about. When 'tisn't our drill, 
 it's Rooshian or Prooshian or French. It's 
 Prooshian now. Brrh ! 
 
 Hookey {E Co77ipa7iy). — All for to improve 
 your mind, Chew ! You'll get a first-class 
 school-ticket one o' these days, if you go on. 
 
 Chumer {whose si?'o?ig poi7it is 7iot educa- 
 tion). — Yoti'W get a first-class head on top o' 
 your shoulders, 'Ook, if you go on. You mind 
 that I ain't no bloomin' litteratoor but . . . 
 
 Shuckbrugh. — Go on about the Prooshians 
 an' let 'Ook alone. 'Ook 'as a — wot's its 
 name ? — fas — fas — fascilitude for impartin' 
 instruction. 'E's down in the Captain's book 
 as sich. Ain't you, 'Ook .? 
 
 Chumer {a7ixious to vindicate kis edHcatio7i). 
 — Listen 'ere! " Men instinck — stinkivlyact 
 under the excitement of the battle-field on'y 
 as they 'ave been taught for to act in peace." 
 An' the man that wrote thatsez 't ought to be 
 printed in gold in our barricks. 
 
 Shuckbrugh {ivho has hee7i tJu-ough the Af- 
 gha7i War). — 'Might a told 'im that, if he'd 
 come to 77ie, any time these ten years 
 
 Hookey {loftily).— O I bid fair he's a 
 bloomin' General. Wot's 'e drivin' at .'' 
 
 Shuckbrugh. — 'E says wot you do on 
 p'rade you do without thinkin' under fire. If 
 you was taught to stand on your 'ed on p'rade, 
 you'd do so in action. 
 
 Chumer. — I'd lie on my belly first for a bit, 
 if so be there was aught to lie be'ind. 
 
 Hookey. — That's 'ow you've been taught.
 
 The Smith Administration 325 
 
 We're alius lyin' on our bellies be'ind every 
 bloomin' bush — spoilin' our best clobber. 
 Takin' advantage o' cover, they call it. 
 
 Shuckbrugh. — An' the more you lie the 
 more you want to lie. That's human natur'. 
 
 Chumer. — It's rare good — for the henemy. 
 I'm lyin' 'ere where this pipe is ; Shukky's 
 there by the 'baccy-paper ; 'Ook is there 
 be'ind the pewter, an' the rest of us all 
 over the place crawlin' on our bellies an' 
 poppin' at the smoke in front. Old Pompey, 
 arf a mile be'ind, sez, " The battalion will 
 now attack." Little Mildred squeaks out, 
 " Charrge ! " Shukky an' me, an' you, an' 
 'im. picks ourselves out o' the dirt, an' charges. 
 But 'ow the dooce can you charge from skir- 
 mishin' order? That's wot I want to know. 
 There ain't no touch— there ain't no chello ; 
 an' the minut' the charge is over, You've got 
 to play at bein' a bloomin' field-rat all over 
 again. 
 
 General Chorus. — Bray-vo, Chew ! Go 
 it, Sir Garnet ! Two pints and a hopper for 
 Chew ! Ke?'7iel Chew ! 
 
 Hookey {who has possessed himself 0/ the 
 paper). — Well, the Prooshians ain't goin' to 
 have any more o' that. There ain't goin' to 
 be no more battalion-drill — so this bloke says. 
 On'y just the comp'ny handed over to the 
 comp'ny orf'cer to do wot 'e likes with. 
 
 Shuckbrugh. — Gawd 'elp E Comp'ny if 
 they do that to us I 
 
 Chumer {hotly). — You're bloomin' pious
 
 326 The Smith Administration 
 
 all of a sudden. Wot's wrong with Little 
 Mildred, I'd like to know ? 
 
 Shuckbrugh. — Little Mildred's all right. 
 It's his bloomin' dandified Skipper — it's Collar 
 an' Cuffs — it's Ho de Kolone — it's Squeaky 
 Jim that I'm set against. 
 
 Chumer. — Well. Ho de Kolone is goin' 
 'Ome, an' maybe we'll have Sugartongs 
 instead. Sugartongs is a hard drill, but 'e's 
 got no bloomin' frills about 'im. 
 
 Hookey {of E Cofnpaiiy). — You ought to 
 'ave Hackerstone — f'd wheel yer into line. 
 Our Jemima ain't much to look at, but 'e 
 knows wot 'e wants to do an' he does it. E 
 don'tclub the company an' damn the Sargints, 
 Jemima doesn't. 'E's a proper man an' no 
 error. 
 
 Shuckbrugh. — Thank you for nothin'. 
 Sugartongs is a vast better. Mess Sargint 'e 
 told us that Sugartongs is goin' to be married 
 at 'Ome. If 'e's t/iat, o' course 'e won't be no 
 good ; but the Mess Sargint's a bloomin' liar 
 mostly. 
 
 Chumer. — Sugartongs won't marry — not 'e. 
 'E's too fond o' the regiment. Little Mildred's 
 like to do that first ; bein' so young. 
 
 Hookey [retuniing to paper). — " On'y the 
 comp'ny an' the comp'ny orf'cer doin' what 
 'e thinks 'is men can do." 'Strewth ! Our 
 Jemima'd make us dance down the middle an' 
 back again. But what would they do with our 
 Colonel "i I don't catch the run o' this new trick 
 of company officers thinkin' for themselves.
 
 The Smith Administration 327 
 
 Shuckbrugh. — Give 'im a stickin' plaster 
 to keep 'im on ^is 'orse at battalion p'rade, 
 an' lock 'im up in ord'ly-room 'tween whiles. 
 Me an' one or two more would see 'im now 
 an' again. Ho ! Ho ! 
 
 Chumer. a Colonel's a bloomin' Colonel 
 anyway. 'Can't do without a Colonel. 
 
 Shuckbrugh. — 'Oo said we would, you 
 fool ? Colonel'U give his order, " Go an' do 
 this an' go an' do that, an' do it quick." 
 Sugartongs 'e salutes an' Jemima "e salutes 
 an' orf we goes ; Little Mildred trippin' over 
 'is sword every other step. We know Sugar- 
 tongs ; you know Jemima ; an' f/iey know zfs. 
 *'Come on," sez they. *' Come on it is," sez 
 we ; an' we don' crawl on our bellies no more, 
 but comes on. Old Pompey has given 'is 
 orders an' we does 'em. Old Pompey can't 
 cut in to with : " Wot the this an' that are 
 you doin' there ? Retire your men. Go to 
 Blazes and cart cinders," an' such like. 
 There's a deal in that there notion of inde- 
 pendent commands. 
 
 Chumer. — There is. It's 'ow it comes in 
 action anywoys, if it isn't wot it comes on 
 p'rade. But look 'ere, wot 'appens if you 
 don't know your bloomin' orf'cer, an' 'e don't 
 know nor care a brass farden about you — 
 like Squeakin' Jim ? 
 
 Hookey. — Things *appens, as a rule ; an* 
 then again they don't some'ow. There's a 
 deal o' luck knockin' about the world, an' 
 takin' one thing with another a fair shares o*
 
 328 The Smith Administration 
 
 that comes to the Army, 'Cordin' to this 'ere 
 {Jte thumps the paper) we ain't got no weppings 
 worth the name, an' we don't know 'ow to use 
 'em when we 'ave — I didn't mean your belt, 
 Chew — we ain't got no orf'cers ; we 'ave got 
 bloomin' swipes forhquor. 
 
 Chumer [sotto voce). — Yuss. Undred an' 
 ten gallons beer made out of a heighty-four- 
 gallon cask an' the strength kep' up with 
 'baccy. Yah ! Go on, 'Ook. 
 
 Hookey. — We ain't got no drill, we ain't 
 got no men, we ain't got no kit, nor yet no 
 bullocks to carry it if we 'ad — where in the 
 name o' fortune do all our bloomin' victories 
 come from ? It's a tail-uppards way o' work- 
 in '; but where do the victories come from ? 
 
 Shuckbrugh {recovering his pipe from Hoc- 
 kefs mouth). — Ask Little Mildred — 'e carries 
 the Colors. Chew, are you goin' to the 
 bazaar ?
 
 The Smith Administration 329 
 
 THE OPINIONS OF GUNNER BAR- 
 NABAS. 
 
 A NARROW-MINDED Legislature sets its face 
 against that Atkins, whose Christian name is 
 Thomas, drinking with the " civilian." To 
 this prejudice I and Gunner Barnabas rise 
 superior. Ever since the night when he, weep- 
 ing, asked me whether the road was as frisky 
 as his mule, and then fell head-first from the 
 latter on the former, we have entertained a 
 respect for each other. I wondered that he 
 had not been instantly killed, and he that I 
 had not reported him to various high Military 
 Authorities then in sight, instead of gently 
 rolling him down the hillside till the danger 
 was overpast. On that occasion, it cannot be 
 denied that Gunner Barnabas was drunk. 
 Later on, as our intimacy grew, he explained 
 briefly that he had been " overtaken " for the 
 first time in three years ; and I had no reason 
 to doubt the truth of his words. 
 
 Gunner Barnabas was a lean, heavy-browed, 
 hollow-eyed giant, with a mustache of the 
 same hue and texture as his mule's tail. Much 
 had he seen from Karachi to Bhamo, and, so 
 his bosom friend, McGair, assured me, had 
 once killed a man " with 'e's naked fistes." 
 But it was hard to make him talk. When he 
 was moved to speech, he roved impartially
 
 330 The Smith Administration 
 
 from one dialect to another, being a Devon- 
 shire man, brought up in the slums of Fratton, 
 nearly absorbed into Portsmouth Dockyard, 
 sent to Ireland as a blacksmith's assistant, 
 educated imperfectly in London, and there 
 enlisted into what he profanely called a *' Jim- 
 jam batt'ry." " They want big 'uns for the 
 work we does," quoth Gunner Barnabas, bring- 
 ing down a huge hairy hand on his mule's 
 withers. "Big 'uns an' steady ^uns." He 
 flung the bridle over the mule's head, hitched 
 the beast to a tree, and settled himself on a 
 boulder ere lighting an unspeakably rank 
 bazaar-cheroot. 
 
 The current of conversation flowed for a 
 while over the pebbles of triviality. Then, in 
 answer to a remark of mine, Gunner Barnabas 
 heaved his huge shoulders clear of the rock 
 and rolled out his mind between puffs. We 
 had touched tenderly and reverently on the 
 great question of temperance in the Army. 
 Gunner Barnabas pointed across the valley to 
 the Commander-in-Chief's house and spoke : 
 " Tm as lives over yonder is goin' the right 
 way to work," said he. " You can make a 
 man march by reg'lation, make a man fire by 
 reg'lation, make a man load up a bloomin' 
 mule by reg'lation. You can't make him a 
 Blue Light by reg'lation, and that's the only 
 thing as 'ill make the Blue Lights stop grousin' 
 and stifhn'.'' It should be explained for the 
 benefit of the uninitiated, that a " Blue Light " 
 is a Good Templar, that " grousing " is sulking,
 
 The Smith Administration 331 
 
 and " stiffin " is using unparliamentary lan- 
 guage. " An' Blue Lights, specially when the 
 orf cer commanding is a Blue Light too, is a 
 won'erful fool. You never be a Blue Light, 
 Sir, not so long as you live." I promised 
 faithfully that the Blue Lights should burn 
 without me to all Eternity, and demanded of 
 Gunner Barnabas the reasons for his dislike. 
 My friend formulated his indictment slowly 
 and judicially. ^' Sometimes a Blue Light's a 
 blue shirker ; very often 'e's a noosance ; and 
 more than often 'e's a lawyer, with more chin 
 than 'e or 'is friends wants to 'ear. When a 
 man — any man — sez to me 'you're damned, 
 and there ain't no trustin' you,' — meanin' not 
 as you or I sittin' 'ere might say 'you be 
 damned * comfortable an' by way o' makin' 
 talk like, but reg'lar damned — why, naturally, 
 I ain't pleased. Now when a Blue Light ain't 
 sayiii' that 'e's throwin' out a forty-seven inch 
 chest hinside of 'isself as it was, an' letting 
 you see 'e thinks it. I hate a Blue Light. 
 But there's some is good, better than ord'nary, 
 and them I has nothing to say against. What 
 I sez is, too much bloomin' 'oliness ain't 
 proper, nor fit for man or beast." He threw 
 himself back on the ground and drove his 
 boot-heels into the mould. Evidently, Gunner 
 Barnabas had suffered from the " Blue Lights " 
 at some portion of his career. I suggested 
 mildly that the Order to which he objected 
 was doing good work, and quoted statistics to 
 prove thiS; but the great Gunner remained
 
 332 The Smith Administration 
 
 unconvinced. " Look 'ere," said he, "if you 
 knows anything o' the likes o' us, you knows 
 that the Blue Lights sez when a man drinks 
 he drinks for the purpose of meanin' to be 
 bloomin' drunk, and there ain't no safety 'cept 
 in not drinking at all. Now that ain't all true. 
 There's men as can drink their whack and be 
 no worse for it. Them's grown men, for the 
 boys drink for honor and glory — Lord 'elp 'em 
 — 'an they should be dealt with dilf'rent. 
 
 " But the Blue Light 'e sez to us : * You 
 drink mod'rate ? You ain't got it in you, an' 
 you don't come into our nice rooms no more. 
 You go to the Canteen an' hog your liquor 
 there.' Now I put to you, Sir, as a friend, 
 are that the sort of manners to projuce good 
 feelin' in a rig'ment or anywhere else t And 
 when 'Im that lives over yonder " — out went 
 the black-bristled hand once more towards 
 Snowdon — " sez in a — in a — pamphlick which 
 it is likely you 'ave seen " — Barnabas was 
 talking down to my civilian intellect — " sez 
 'come on and be mod'rate them as can, an' 
 I'll see that your Orf'cer Commandin' 'elps' 
 you ; ' up gets the Blue Lights and sez : 
 ' 'Strewth ! the Commander-in-Chief is aidin' 
 an' abettin' the Devil an' all 'is Angels. You 
 can't be mod'rate,' sez the Blue Lights, an' 
 that's what makes 'em feel 'oly. Garrn ! 
 It's settin' 'emselves up for bein' better men 
 than them as commands 'em, an' puttin' diffi- 
 culties all roun' an' about. That's a bloomin' 
 Blue Light all over, that is. What I sez is
 
 The Smith Administration 333 
 
 give the mod'rate lay a chance. I s'pose 
 there's room even for Blue Lights an' men 
 without aprins in this 'ere big Army. Let the 
 Blue Lights take off their aprins an' 'elp the 
 mod'rate men if they ain't too proud. I ain't 
 above goin' out on pass with a Blue Light if 
 'e sez I'm a man, an' not an — untrustable 
 Devil always a-hankerin' after lush. But con- 
 trariwise^' — Gunner Barnabas stopped. 
 
 " Contrariwise how ? " said L 
 
 " If I was 'Im as lives over yonder, an' you 
 was me, an' you u^ouldn't take the mod'rate 
 lay, an' was a-comin' on the books and other- 
 wise a-misconductin' of yourself, I would say : 
 ' Gunner Barnabas,' I would say, an' by that 
 I would be understood to be addressin' every- 
 body with a uniform, ' you are a incorrigable 
 in-tox-i-cator ' " — Barnabas sat up, folded his 
 arms, and assumed an air of ultra-judicial 
 ferocity — " ' reported to me as such by your 
 Orf'cer Commandin.' Very good, Gunner 
 Barnabas,' I would say. ' I cannot, knowin' 
 what I do o' the likes of you, subjergate your 
 indecent cravin' for lush ; but I will edgercate 
 you to hold your liquor without offense to 
 them as is your friends an' companions, an' 
 without danger to the Army if so be you're on 
 sentry-go. I will make your life. Gunner Bar- 
 nabas, such that you will pray on your two 
 bended knees for to be shut of it. You shall 
 be flogged between the guns if you disgracs a 
 Batt'ry, or in hollow square o' the rig'ment if 
 you belong to the Fut, or from stables to bar-
 
 334 The Smith Administration 
 
 ricks and back again if you are Cav'lry. I'll 
 clink you till you forget what the sun looks 
 like, an' I'll pack-drill you till your kit grows 
 into your shoulder-blades like toadstools on a 
 stump. I'll learn you to be sober when the 
 Widow requires of your services, an' if I don't 
 learn you I'll kill you. Understan' that^ 
 Gunner Barnabas ; for tenderness is wasted 
 on the likes o' you. You shall learn for to 
 control yourself for fear o' your dirty life ; an' 
 so long as that fear is over you, Gunner Bar- 
 nabas, you'll be a man worth the shootin '.' " 
 
 Gunner Barnabas stopped abruptly and 
 broke into a laugh. " I'm as bad as the Blue 
 Lights, only 'tother way on. But 'tis a fact 
 that in spite o' any amount o' mod'ration and 
 pamphlicks we've got a scatterin' o' young 
 imps an* old devils wot you can't touch excep' 
 through the hide o' them, and by cuttin' deep 
 at that. Some o' the young ones wants but 
 one leatherin' to keep the fear o' drink before 
 their eyes for years an' years ; some o' the 
 old ones wants leatherin' now and again, for 
 the want of drink is in their marrer. You talk, 
 an' you talk, an' you talk o' what a fine fellow 
 the Privit Sodger is — an so 'e is many of him ; 
 but there's one med'cin' or one sickness that 
 you've guv up too soon. Preach an' Blue 
 Light an' medal and teach us, but, for some 
 of us, keep the whipcord handy." 
 
 Barnabas had rather startled me by the 
 vehemence of his words. He must have seen 
 this, for he said with a twinkle in his eye :
 
 The Smith Administration 335 
 
 ** I should have made a first-class Blue Light 
 — rammin' double-charges home in this way. 
 Well, I know I'm speakin' truth, and the Blue 
 Light thinks he is, I s'pose; an' it's too big a 
 business for you an' me to settle in one after- 
 noon." 
 
 The sound of horses' feet came from the 
 path above our heads. Barnabas sprang up. 
 
 " Orfer an' 'rf'cer's lady," said he, relaps- 
 ing into his usual speech. 'Won't do for you 
 to be seen a-talkin' with the likes o' me. 
 Hutup kurcha I " 
 
 And with a stumble, a crash, and a jingle of 
 harness, Gunner Barnabas went his way.
 
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