On one occasion, while touring among the frontier villages, I was spending the night at a hujra, and after dark a Mullah had come in for discussion, and a great number of the men of the village, attracted by the hope of an interesting conflict between their champion and the Padre Sahib, had collected to listen.
It was winter, and there was a fire of twigs burning in the middle of the room, which was filling the place with its smoke, as there was only one quite inadequate aperture in the centre of the room by which it could find its exit. Round all four sides were a number of the native beds, on which both disputants and audience were seated cross-legged or reclining at their ease.
As the fire burnt low a boy would bring in some crackling thorns and branches which were piled outside the room, and throw some on the fire, which would blaze up and illuminate the faces of all around; for the only other light was the little earthen oil lamp in a niche in one corner, which only served to make the darkness visible.
The Mullah was evidently bent on making a display of his own dialectic skill at my expense, and began in a rather condescending tone to ask if I knew anything about theology; and on my replying that I had come to the country in order to teach the Christian religion, he turned to the audience, and said somewhat contemptuously:
“I do not suppose these Padres know much, but we will see.” He then turned to me and said: “Can you tell me the colour of faith?”
Rather puzzled by the question, I asked what he meant. He said:
“Why, is it white, or green, or red, or what colour?”
I replied that, as an abstract idea, it did not possess the quality of colour.
Mullah: “Then can you tell me what shape it is? Is it round, or square, or what?”
I: “Neither has it any shape. It is only an abstract quality.”