"That you may drink, little finger, when you are dry?"
But this ditty did not bring out the snake. I remarked this to the old man, who replied: "He hasn't made his toilet yet—hasn't rubbed his scales up, sir; but he'll be here presently. You will see. Keep your eye on that hole, sir. I am now going to give him a livelier tune, which is a great favourite of his"; and forthwith he struck up an old song, beginning
"'Twas in the merry month of May,
When bees from flower to flower did hum."
Out came the snake before the song was half over! Before it was concluded he had crawled slowly and (if I dare use such a word) rather majestically, to within a few paces of the spot where the old man was standing.
"Good morning to you, sir," said the old man to the snake. "I am happy to see you in your new suit of clothes. I have picked up your old suit, and I have got it in my pocket, and a very nice pair of slippers my old wife will make out of it. The last pair that she made of your rejected apparel were given as a present to Colonel Cureton, who, like myself, very much resembled the great General Blücher in personal appearance. Who will get the pair of which I have now the makings, Heaven only knows. Perhaps old Brigadier White, who has also a Blücher cut about him. What song would you like next? 'Kathleen Mavourneen?' Yes, I know that is a pet song of yours; and you shall have it."
The old man sung the melody with a tenderness and feeling which quite charmed me, as well as the snake, who coiled himself up and remained perfectly still. Little reason as I had to doubt the truth of any of the old man's statements, I certainly should have been sceptical as to the story of the snake if I had not witnessed the scene I have attempted to describe.
"Well, sir," said the old man, coming up to me, after he had made a salaam to the snake and left him, "it is almost breakfast-time, and I will, with your permission, bid you good morning."
I thanked him very much for his information, and suffered him to depart; and then, alone, I wandered about that well-filled piece of ground. I have always had a melancholy pleasure in strolling from tombstone to tombstone, and reading the various epitaphs, and on that morning, after all that I had heard from the old pensioner, I was just in the humour for gratifying this morbid desire.
Some miles to the northward of Meerut is the station of Burnampore. No troops are quartered here; it is what is called in India a purely civil station, containing only a magistrate (who is also the collector of the revenue), an assistant (a covenanted civilian), the establishment of the office, and a small police force. To these two gentlemen and their few subordinates were entrusted the care and the collections of a district as large as Lancashire or Yorkshire, and containing, possibly, as many inhabitants. The idea of two gentlemen keeping in order a district of such dimensions was simply absurd; but they did their best, and that was all that could be expected of them. I remained four days and nights at Burnampore, and during that time was a guest of the assistant magistrate, whose acquaintance I had made at Meerut. Anything more monotonous and dreary than the existence of a gentleman stationed at such a place it would be very difficult to imagine. My host assured me that if it were not for an occasional visit paid by some traveller on his way up or down the country, both himself and his superior officer would have died of ennui. "If it were not for the shooting, which is very good in this district," he added, "I would rather be a permanent passenger on board ship, or the inmate of a debtors' prison in London, or any other part of England—in either case, one would have something like company, and one would have, at all events, a somewhat cooler and more congenial climate."
In the district of Burnampore there are a great number of wolves, and during my short stay, even, two were brought in, and the Government reward (two rupees a-head) claimed upon them. These ferocious creatures often carry off the young children of poor people and devour them. It was in this district that "a wolf child," as the natives of India express it, was found some years ago, and taken to Meerut, where it was exhibited as a curiosity. "There can be no question," said my friend and host, when I spoke to him one morning on this subject, "that the male wolf, in all these cases, seizes and runs off with the infant, and that when he has carried it alive to the den, the female, especially if she happens to have cubs at the time, instead of killing and devouring, suckles and fosters the little human being. So, after all, the story of Romulus and Remus may not be a mere fable."