For no one need associate the idea of discomfort, far less that of hardship, with the life of a commissioner going the round of his district in the cooler months of the year. A good double tent holds all that even luxury may require. The great Sahib has his numerous satellites,—munshi to write, khansamar to cook, and masalchi to wash up the dishes. He has his bearer to anticipate every want, khitmatgars to wait at his well-furnished table; sweeper, water-bearer, camel-drivers, and two servants to attend on each of his horses—one to groom him, the other to cut grass. Besides this troop of attendants, from each town and village near the halting-place come obsequious natives—those of the higher rank on gaily-caparisoned horses, the more lowly peasants on foot. Some come to offer petitions, some to seek employment, some, as it appears, only to pay their homage to one of the lords of creation. What lies under all this outward respect we need not now inquire. The government of our Empress-Queen’s vast possessions in India may be described as a kind of oligarchy, the English officials forming an aristocracy to which all pay at least the semblance of honour. Low are the saláms, fulsome the compliments paid to one of the higher grade, the official’s rank rising, it appears, in due proportion to the shortening of his titles. An assistant deputy commissioner is a chhotá Sahib (little gentleman); cut off the first word, and he rises, we may say, to the rank of a baron; cut off the second, and you may regard him as an earl at the least. Strange must it seem to our Anglo-Indians, on going home for good, to find themselves lost in a crowd, none to follow them, flatter and fawn, meat dear and chickens expensive. Some doubtless heave a sigh at the remembrance of the old days passed in India, when in the pleasant cold weather they went camping out in the district.
Mr. Thole received the missionaries with courtesy flavoured with condescension. Even tent-life had not shaken out of this bara Sahib (great gentleman) all his starch. Unlike some of his equals, he was in his nature rather pompous, and did not carry his dignity with the easy grace which distinguishes those who seem born to rule.
“I fear that we have come at an inconvenient time,” began Mr. Hartley; for already the servants were making preparations for serving in dinner. “A little matter of business—”
“Oh! we’ll waive the business for the present,” said the commissioner, with an expressive movement of the hand. “I’ve been at it since daybreak, settling disputes, listening to the jabber of villagers, each with a separate jargon; and now the first duty before me is to do justice to what comes before me—on the table. Take your seat, Mr. Hartley; you look as if you needed dinner and a good cigar after it even more than I do. What! dined already, you say? Forget the past; let bygones be bygones.” And with a little chuckle at his own mild joke, the commissioner sat down to his steaming plateful of rich mullagatawny. It was evident that to him dinner was an important business, to which all else must for the time be postponed.
In vain Mr. Hartley urged that the sun was setting, and that he was anxious to return to Talwandi before night should be far advanced. The commissioner must have his dinner before he could listen to anything which he called “shop.” The repast was a somewhat lengthy one, being made more so by conversation; for the commissioner enjoyed his own good stories as well as his soup. He told of hunting adventure, and adventure with a snake; then, as his servant filled and refilled his master’s glass, there came anecdotes of his horses, and a dissertation on camels.
“Apropos to camels,” said the commissioner, passing his damask napkin over his thick grizzled mustache, “I met with a curious instance of superstition the other day in regard to the slow-paced brute. An urchin had a fall from one of the baggage-camels—rather a tall one—and expecting at least a dislocation to be the result, I was surprised to see the boy sitting composedly on the ground as if nothing had happened. ‘Is the fellow not hurt?’ I inquired of a servant. ‘No, Sahib,’ was the careless reply; ‘it was only a fall from a camel—that is nothing; it would have been worse had it been from a donkey.’”
“How did he make out that?” asked Mr. Hartley.
“The man was a devout Mussulman, and he explained the matter in true Mohammedan fashion: ‘You see, Sahib, that the camel goes slowly on, as if saying “Bismillah” [in the name of God] at every step; whilst the donkey shambles on as if repeating, “Naddi tuti, naddi tuti” [Broken bone], as he jogs on his way.’—Nizam, bring in the lights.—I think that the Mohammedan is the most religious of men,” laughed Mr. Thole, “since his piety extends even to his camels.”
“The ‘Bismillah’ on his lips,” observed Mr. Hartley. “has often as little to do with his thoughts as the camel’s pace has to do with his religion.”
The conversation then took a different turn, as the dessert appeared on the table, and dates on the dish reminded the commissioner of dates on the tree.