I think it may perhaps be interesting to give a complete list of servants necessary for the smallest Indian establishment:—
One sirdár-bearer (body-servant and valet).
Two maté-bearers (under-bearers, one to wait on child and ayah).
One or two ayahs (maid and nurse).
One khansamah (literally "Lord of the stores"), butler and head table-servant.
Two khitmutgars (under table-servants).
One coachman.
Two syces, or grooms for one pair of horses (the allowance being one syce and one grass-cutter to every horse).
Two ghasiaras (grass-cutters).
One chuprássi (literally badge-bearer), carrier of letters and messages.
One sirdár-mati (head-gardener).
One or two máte-matés (under-gardeners).
One bheestie (water-carrier).
One masátchi (literally torchbearer), scullion.
One cook.
One mihtu (sweeper).
One mithráni (sweeper-woman).
One dhobi (washerman).
In all twenty-three, and it must be remembered that all are absolutely necessary, as, for instance, no khitmutgar or máti-bearer would take a note or message in place of the chuprássi, and above all, one native in a garden or elsewhere would do a fraction only of the work of the same man in England.
Anglo-Indians are inordinate "grumblers." There is much to be said on their side; the exile for the best years of their life, the return then to England to be looked down upon as a "dried-up Indian official," the separation entailed from children, the same imposed upon wife from either husband or child, the exigencies of the climate, &c.; but on the other hand it ought to be remembered that the salaries are very large, the pensions fairly so in proportion, and that they are enabled to have far more luxuries in India than they could possibly hope for at home—abundance of horses and carriages, superabundance (I had almost said) of servants, at any rate sufficient to enable no Anglo-Indian ever to do or move for himself, and horses enough never to walk. I found a few, but yet a very few who took this view of the case, allowing that at home they would keep two, or at the most three, servants, and have no carriages or horses.
In the afternoon we drove to the lake, which is a beautiful feature of Ajmere. It is a lovely sheet of water—an Italian lake in miniature, with its marble balconies and platforms, with its white houses hanging over the water on the city side, while the other is formed by a range of mountains. It looked particularly smiling this afternoon, with a declining sun, as we toiled up to the Residency. This bungalow has a most perfect situation, built high up on a rocky platform, with broad verandah-rooms overlooking the lake. It seemed a pity that Colonel Bradford, the Resident, is only able to reside here for two months in the year.
In returning we passed the handsome stone building of the offices of the Rajputana-Malwar Railway, whose headquarters are at Ajmere. The adjoining bungalows of officials and clerks form quite a "line" to themselves. In the evening we performed the customary programme of going to the club for an hour, and then the drive home in the dark was made romantically beautiful by the illumination of the tomb of an old saint on the mountain-side, the lights seeming to glimmer and twinkle in mid-air in the density of the darkness.
We left Ajmere that evening, catching up the mail train again at midnight, and travelling for eighteen hours all night and through the day, till we reached Ahmedabad at five this afternoon.
Saturday, February 6th.—Chota hazri after the usual Indian custom, and then a morning's sight-seeing before breakfast at 10 a.m.
Ahmedabad ranks in population as the second town in the Bombay Presidency; and the native quarters, as usual enclosed within a city wall, entered by no less than seventeen gateways, is very large. There is very little of interest to be seen at Ahmedabad. We drove first to the Mogul Viceroy's palace, that of Azim Khán, which has two massive Norman towers flanking the gateway. It forms now a very suitable entrance for its present purpose, for the ci-devant palace is now the jail of the district.
On the other side lies the European quarter, the jail thus forming the boundary-line between the native and European populations. By the side of the walls, hidden away in a corner, are the celebrated windows of the Bhadar. They represent the trunk, branches, and foliage of a single tree in each window, in the carved and fretted stone-work. They are exceedingly beautiful, so much so, that copies of them are in the South Kensington Museum.