Gopi. Sir, fear comes on good grounds. When the former Dewan was put in prison, his son came to ask for the last six months’ salary of his father. On which you told him to make an application. Then, on his making the application, you again said the salary cannot be given before the accounts are closed. Honored Sir, is this the judgment on a servant when he is put in prison?
Wood. Did not I know this? Thou stupid, ungrateful creature! What becomes of your salaries? If you did not devour the price of the Indigo, would there be any deadly Commission? Would the poor ryots have gone to the Missionaries with tears in their eyes? You, rascal, have destroyed every thing. If the Indigo lessen in quantity, I shall sell your houses and indemnify myself; thou arrant coward, hellish knave!
Gopi. Sir, we are like butcher’s dogs: we fill our bellies with the intestines. Had you, Sir, taken the Indigo from the ryots in the very same way as the (Mahajans) factors take the corn from their debtors, then the Indigo Factories would never have suffered such disgrace; there would have been no necessity for an overseer and the khalasis, and the people would never have reproached me with saying “Cursed Gopi! Cursed Gopi!”
Wood. Thou art blind, thou hast no eyes.
Enter an Umadar (an Apprentice).
I have seen with my own eyes (applying his hand to his own eyes) the Mahajans go to the ricefield, and quarrel with the ryots (their debtors). Ask this person.
Apprentice. Honored Sir, I can give many examples of that. The ryots say, it is through the grace of the Indigo Planters only that we are preserved from the hands of the Mahajans.
Gopi. (Aside, to the Apprentice.) My child, it is vain flattery. No employment is vacant now. (To Mr. Wood) It is true that the Mahajans go to the rice-fields and dispute with the ryots; but if your Honor had been acquainted with the mysterious intention of the Mahajans in going to the fields and raising disputes, you would never have compared with the going of the Mahajans to the fields, the punishment of the poor with Shamchand resembling the tortures which Lakhman, the son of Sumitra, suffered by the Sacti-sela,[[43]]—while they are without food.
Wood. Very well, explain it to me. There must be some reason why these fools speak to us of every thing else; but of the Mahajans they don’t say a single word.
Gopi. Honored Sir, these debtors, whatever sum of money they require for the whole year, they take from the Mahajans, and that quantity of rice which is necessary for them for that time, they also take from their creditors. At the end of the year, the debtors clear their debts either by selling the tobacco, sugar-cane, sesamum, and other things which they have, and then giving the sum collected to their creditors with the interest on the sum for the time; or by giving those very articles according to the market price: and of the corn which grows, they send to the Mahajans’ houses, a part half-prepared. That which remains proves sufficient for the expenses of the family for three or four months. If through famine or any improper expenses of the debtors, there fall any arrears in their supplies, the remainder of the debt is carried into the new account-book. Then, by and by, the remainder is filled up. The Mahajans never bring an action against their debtors; consequently the falling into arrears appears to them, as it were, a present loss. I suppose the Mahajans for that reason, sometimes go to the fields, observe the preparation of the rice and also enquire whether the extent of land for which the debtors have asked the revenue from them, is all cultivated with grain. Some inexperienced persons, taking under false pretences a larger sum than is necessary, and thus being burdened with heavy debts, cause losses on the part of the Mahajans and also themselves suffer great trouble. The Mahajans go to the fields for stopping these, and not like “Indigo Giants” (strikes his tongue).[[44]] Sir, the stupid, shameless Mahajans speak thus.