Considering him as being at least attached to, if not of the very same species, as the knave just described, I shall give a short description of the Podar; of whom mention has already been made. He is not always an attendant at an office, though, in great concerns, his presence is indispensable. He either receives from four to ten rupees per month, or is paid, by a very small centage, for whatever money he examines. We often admire the dexterity of our money-tellers; but the podar, who counts by fours, (i.e. gundahs,) finishes the detail of a thousand in so short a time, as would cause even our most expert money-tellers to stare with astonishment! It is only mixed money that is counted, when large sums are passing; most payments are first sorted, when, the several kinds of rupees being made into parcels, are weighed, fifty at a time: in this manner, a lac (i.e. a 100,000) may be speedily ascertained; each parcel of fifty being kept separate, until a certain number is completed: when the whole are accounted, and removed into bags, to make way for further operations. Here it may be proper to remark, that no sircar will take charge of money when his employer keeps the key: nor is it, on the other hand, customary for the sircar to have the entire charge. So many tricks have been played by changing the coin, that it is now a general rule for every treasure-chest to have two large padlocks, of different construction; the sircar, or tusseel-dar (cash keeper,) receiving one key, and the master retaining the other. This prevents aggression on either part, but is by no means pleasing to the banians, though they affect to be highly satisfied, because a command of specie will often enable them to make very advantageous purchases in Company’s paper; but such a precaution inevitably debars their access to master’s cash.

The Cranny, or clerk, may be either a native Armenian, a native Portugueze, or a Bengallee: the former are not very common; the second are more numerous; but the third are every where to be seen. It really is wonderful how well many of the latter can write, without understanding a word of what is written. They have a steady hand, a keen eye, and an admirable readiness in casting up accounts. Those who are habituated to our mode of book keeping, profess to consider it greatly superior to their own, but it is not a very easy matter to get them into it. That multiplicity of fractions which prevails, in consequence of the perpetual fluctuation in their currency, causes them to be very well versed in that branch of arithmetic, and to produce the most correct calculations. The rates of wages are different according to the abilities of individuals; thus, a clever cranny in a public office, such as the auditor general’s, or the pay-master general’s, or the assay and mint, may receive from forty to a hundred rupees monthly, while, in mercantile houses, they rarely receive more than thirty, generally, indeed, from ten to twenty; while many are glad to serve gratis, merely for the purpose of an introduction to that line of employment; as well as to perfect themselves in book keeping, and in a proper style of correspondence.

The use these gentry make of English words, is often highly diverting: they study synonymes very industriously; poring over Johnson’s dictionary, and carefully selecting such terms, as appear to them least in use; thinking that such must, of course, make finer language. The following may serve as a specimen: it was written by a cranny to his master, in consequence of an exterior window shutter having been blown down by a severe north-wester.

‘Honorable Sir,

‘Yesterday vesper arrive great hurricane; valve of little aperture not fasten; first make great trepidation and palpitation, then precipitate into precinct. God grant master more long life, and more great post.

I remain,

Honorable Sir,

in all token of respect,

Master’s writer,

BISSONAUT METRE.’