But behind his cheerful countenance and jaunty way of carrying himself lies a bulldog courage which, in turn, commands the admiration of his big brothers-in-arms—the British Highlanders. Those gleaming teeth are exposed in no kind of smile when he grips the deadly kukri in a hand-to-hand encounter, and there is no twinkle in the fierce black eyes as he sets his face to the foe, with the cool determination "never to go back," which is a tradition of his race.
On this point, Lt.-Col. Newnham-Davis, writing in "Town Topics," declares that "The Gurkha is the most thorough little man I have ever met in campaigning; he will never go back. He tackles any job that is given him like a bulldog, and he is never beaten. In manœuvres, as in action, one thing a Gurkha regiment will not do is to go back.
"I have seen the Chief Umpire and all his satellites vainly trying to explain to the native officers of a Gurkha company on manœuvres that they were surrounded and outnumbered and out of action, and that they must therefore retire from the mimic fight. The Gurkhas grinned and stopped where they were, and it was only by sounding the 'cease fire' and telling the little men to get back and cook their dinners that the Chief Umpire moved them off the ground."
"In the spring," says the Colonel, writing on the Gurkha War, "the little Gurkhas—jovial little fellows, broad-chested and big-limbed, short in stature, with their Tartar eyes, noses like pugdogs, and great good-natured gashes for mouths—flock down to enlist in our regiments. Brave as lions, vain as peacocks, faithful as dogs, with few prejudices in peace and none in war, the Gurkhas are the special friends and companions of our men.
"The stately Sikh throws away his food if a white man's shadow falls upon it, and between the Mahomedan and the Christian is always the bar of religion, but on a campaign the Gurkha eats his food with as few formalities as Tommy Atkins drinks his wine, and is good company at the camp-fire."
The Gurkha has a merry wit and an equally happy conceit, as the following incident will show. After the assault on Bhurtpore, where the Gurkhas raced with the grenadiers of the 59th for the bridge, the British soldiers praised them for their bravery. They returned the compliment by the following characteristic remark: "The English are as brave as lions; they are splendid Sepoys, and very nearly equal to us."
It may be seen from the above incident that the vanity of these little men is colossal. Indeed, it is only exceeded by their loyalty and gallantry, which can never be questioned, since Lord Roberts, the hero of Kabul, has accorded them the highest and warmest praise.
When Col. Younghusband, travelling in the Pamirs with an expedition of Gurkhas, met the great Russian explorer Gromschefski, a native officer of the Gurkhas asked leave to speak to Younghusband. "Tell him," he said, pointing to the big Russian, "that though we are small men, all the rest of our regiment are taller than he is."
The only ritual the Gurkha observes is that he washes his hands and face and takes off his head-dress before cooking his meals. Any meat that chances to come the Gurkhas' way they call shika (game). It is permitted by their religion to eat anything they have killed when hunting, but in their native land they prefer a kind of food made from rice. In the British service they take kindly but temperately to anything that the canteen supplies.
The Gurkhas were originally protectors of the cows, and this in India is a more or less Divine right. The Hindu regards the cow in the light of his mother, and frequently the beef-eating habit of the Sahib is pathetically reproached by the native in these terms: "What! would you eat your mother?" It may be permissible to stretch the derivation of their name in the present day and apply it to the fact that Britain is now their mother, and that they flocked westward to assist her in her great effort to uphold and ensure the integrity of the world.