Even recently it is said that in Saugor no Bania dare go past a Bundela Rājpūt’s house without getting down from his pony and folding up his umbrella. In Hindu slang a ‘Chhatawāli’ or carrier of an umbrella was a term for a smart young man; as in the line, ‘An umbrella has two kinds of ribs; two women are quarrelling for the love of him who carries it.’ Now that the umbrella is free to all, and may be bought for a rupee or less in the bazār, the prestige which once attached to it has practically disappeared. But some flavour of its old associations may still cling to it in the minds of the sais and ayah who proudly parade to a festival carrying umbrellas spread over them to shade their dusky features from the sun; though the Rāja, in obedience to the dictates of fashion, has discarded the umbrella for a sola-topi.
[1] This article is based on papers by Mr. Vithal Rao, Naib-Tahsīldār, Bilāspur, and Messrs. Kanhya Lāl and Pyāre Lāl Misra of the Gazetteer office.
[2] Crooke, Tribes and Castes, art. Kol.
[3] Aegle Marmelos.
[4] Butea frondosa.
[5] Nāg, a cobra.
[6] Kept woman, a term applied to a widow.
[7] Moor’s Hindu Infanticide, p. 133.
[8] James Forbes, Oriental Memoirs, i. p. 313.