India and the Indians

by Edward Fenton Elwin

On the other hand, they often meet with a great deal of rudeness from certain English people, who resent the intrusion of a "native" into their carriage. Even some men who ought to know better are guilty in this respect. But it should also be remembered that men of very little education or refinement come out to India for the sake of the higher pay and position which they can secure in a variety of spheres. Some men of this stamp are apt to give themselves great airs, and they think to show their importance by their rudeness to the people of the country.

I once saw a man of this type in a railway carriage shove an Indian to one side with considerable violence, and take his seat. The Indian was a refined gentleman, much his superior both by birth and education, and speaking English excellently. He was reading a volume of Mark Twain for his recreation in the train. Although a good deal disturbed by the rudeness which he had received, he did not lose his temper, but remonstrated in emphatic but courteous language.

"'I say, guard, there is a native in this compartment; he must go somewhere else.' That is the kind of speech which hurts our feelings," said an Indian gentleman to me, who was my companion in the train for two nights and a day. "And yet," he said, "that is the sort of thing I am frequently subjected to, because I have to travel a good deal. Is it to be wondered at if we don't feel much love towards Englishmen, when they treat us in this way?"

I saw a Scotch doctor, engaged on plague inspection duty at a railway station, kick with savage violence a porter who accidently got in his way on the platform.

If you see a little crowd of bowing, smiling, well-dressed Indians at a station, gathered round a young Englishman in a sun tope, who is talking to them affably, and trying not to look embarrassed by the garland of flowers which they have put round his neck, you may know that it is probably the Collector, or Commissioner, of the district, who is being seen off by some of his constituents. The one or two attendants in blue coats and red turbans, and sashes with large brass plates upon them, waiting in the background, are the messengers, with which all Government officials are liberally supplied. The Collector is the practical ruler of the locality over which he is set to preside, and situations are constantly arising which demand a great deal of tact and wise judgment. That Collectors frequently win, not only the respect, but also the confidence and regard of the people over whom they have been set, is an instance of the capacity of the young Englishman, who is in earnest, to rise up to his responsibilities.

Nevertheless he remains an Englishman for all that. A Collector whom I knew, having had his usual "send off," travelled in the next carriage to myself. At a roadside station a Hindu judge made for the first-class carriage in which the Collector had established himself. Although he had been exceedingly courteous to the Indian gentry who had seen him off, he bitterly resented the intrusion of the Hindu judge. The latter was not to be rebuffed, and was determined to exercise his right to travel in a carriage in which there was plenty of room. The Collector accordingly called his servant, indignantly gathered up his belongings, and, having first come to the window of my carriage to tell me of his troubles, took refuge in some other part of the train.

"Well, this is a pretty state of things, when you find a native in a cabin!" said a young military officer to me, when he saw an Indian go into the adjoining cabin on board ship. "If he has paid for his berth, he has a right to it," I said; "besides, he is not in your cabin." "Well I did think that a P. & O. was a white man's ship," replied the young officer with great bitterness.

"No doubt you missionaries have learnt to get over the prejudice," said a delightful young army captain to me on board the same ship, "and I suppose it is very wrong of me; but I positively hate a black man."

Though there are certain drawbacks connected with some native passengers, they are much more courteous than the average Englishman is, even to his own countrymen. The stranger, who at some wayside station, intrudes into a carriage already sufficiently full, does not expect to be welcomed. At night the large clerical sun hat meets with a specially cold reception from the Englishman, who peeps out at the intruder from beneath his blankets. But the Indian traveller will assure you that there is plenty of room. He will cheerfully help you with your luggage, clearing away his own belongings in order to make space for yours; and on one occasion an Indian insisted on my taking his berth, while he himself sat up on a corner of a seat for the rest of the night.

However good the intentions of kindly Englishmen may be when travelling, it is almost impossible to avoid the appearance of acquiescing in arrangements which are trying to the Indian. On most lines there are third-class compartments reserved for Europeans and Eurasians. The arrangement is not merely to protect the Englishman from the intrusion of native fellow-passengers. The Hindu is at least equally unwilling to have the white man as an intruder in his own part of the train, and it is generally understood that just as the native must not trespass into the European compartments, so on his part the Englishman should keep out of the carriages allotted to Indians.