Joti Prshad was a small man, and Ram Deen's blasé mood galled his sense of superiority; it was but right that he should snub this exasperatingly cool villager.
"Thanadar ji," he began, "thou and I know that nowhere in Hindoostan is there such greatness assembled as at Naini Tal during the Greater Barsât."
"Men say that the governor-general still goeth to Simla, but, doubtless, the sirdar knoweth best," said Ram Deen.
"The Lât-sahib, indeed, goeth to Simla, but those with him be mere karanis (clerks), and shopkeepers, and half-castes. 'Tis plain thou hast not seen Naini Tal, coach-wan."
"The Terai sufficeth me, Joti Prshad."
"They say," piped Goor Dutt, the little bullock driver, "that the mem-sahibs at Naini Tal bare their shoulders and bosoms and dance with strange men. Toba, toba!"
This being an indisputable fact, and one to which Joti Prshad had never reconciled himself, the latter did not speak, and the diversion thus made by the byl-wan was felt by all to be in Ram Deen's favor.
Taking advantage of the silence of Joti Prshad, Ram Deen went on: "The people of Naini Tal come and go, but the children of the Terai never forget their mother. What sayest thou, Thanadar ji?"
"'Tis even so, brothers," said the Thanadar, with the gravity of one who is in authority and under the stress of weighing his words.
As they evidently waited for him to proceed, the Thanadar continued: "The jungle is our father and our mother, and the huldoo trees our near kin, O my brothers; and we who have once seen the beauty of the morning in the jungle, and the rye-fields laughing in the clearings in the winter, may not live elsewhere."