Chapter 9

Gopal, the _Gowlee_, haunts me in my dreams, complaining that he has been left out in the cold. I had classed him with the _borah_ and the baker, as outsiders with whom I had merely business relations; but Gopal seems to urge that he is not on the same footing with these. How can he be compared to a mercenary _borah_? Has he not ministered to my wants, morning and evening, in wet weather and dry? Have not my children grown up on his milk? He will not deny that they have eaten the baker’s bread too; but who is the baker? Does he come into the _saheb’s_ presence in person as Gopal does? No. He sits in his shop and sends a servant. Not so Gopal. He is one of my children, and I am his father and mother. And I am forced to admit there is some truth in this view of the case. The ill-favoured man who haunts my house of a morning, with a large basket of loaves poised slantwise on his head, and converses in a strange nasal brogue with the cook, is not Mr. de Souza, “baker of superior first and second sort bread, and manufacturer of every kind of biscuit, cake,” &c., but a mere underling. My intercourse with the head of the firm is confined to the first day of each month, when he waits on me in person, dressed in a smart black jacket, and presents his bill. Also on Good Friday he sends me a cake and his compliments, but the former, if it is not intercepted by the butler and applied to his own uses, is generally too unctuous for my taste. Very different are our relations with the _Doodwallah_. Our _chota hazree_ waits for him in the morning; our afternoon tea cannot proceed till he comes; the baby cries if the _Doodwallah_ is late. And even if you are one of the few who strike for independence and keep their own cow, I still counsel you to maintain amicable relations with the _Doodwallah_. One day the cow will kick and refuse to be milked, and the butler will come to you with a troubled countenance. It is a grave case and demands professional skill. The _Doodwallah_ must be sent for to milk the cow. In many other ways, too, we are made to feel our dependence on him. I believe we rarely die of cholera, or typhoid fever, without his unobtrusive assistance. And all his services are performed in person, not through any underling. That stately man who walks up the garden path morning and evening, erect as a betel-nut palm, with a tiara of graduated milk-pots on his head, and driving a snorting buffalo before him, is Gopal himself. Scarcely any other figure in the compound impresses me in the same way as his. It is altogether Eastern in its simple dignity, and symbolically it is eloquent. The buffalo represents absolute milk and the lessening pyramid of brass _lotas_, from the great two-gallon vessel at the base to the ¼-seer measure at the top, stand for successive degrees of dilution with that pure element which runs in the roadside ditches after rain. Thus his insignia interpret themselves to me. Gopal does not acknowledge my heraldry, but explains that the lowest _lota_ contains butter milk—that is to say, milk for making butter. The second contains milk which is excellent for drinking, but will not yield butter; the third a cheaper quality of milk for puddings, and so on. If you are an anxious mother, or a fastidious bachelor, and none of these will please you, then he brings the buffalo to the door and milks it in your presence. I think the truth which underlies the two ways of putting the thing is the same: Gopal and I differ in form of words only. However that may be, practice is more than theory, and I stipulate for milk for all purposes from the lowest _lota_—that is, milk which is warranted to yield butter. If it will not stand that test, I reject it. Gopal wonders at my extravagance, but consents. The milk is good and the butter from it plentiful. But as time goes on the latter declines both in quantity and quality, so gradually that suspicion is scarcely awakened. When at last you summon the butler to a consultation, he suggests that the weather has been too hot for successful butter making, or too cold. If these reasons do not satisfy you, he has others; if they fail, he gives his verdict against the _Doodwallah_. Next morning Gopal is called to superintend the making of the butter and convicted, convicted but not abashed. He expresses the greatest regret, but blames the buffalo; its calf is too old. To-morrow you shall have the produce of another buffalo. So next day you have the satisfaction of seeing a fine healthy pat of butter swimming in the butter dish, carved and curled with all the butler’s art, like a full-blown dahlia. But the milk in your tea does not improve, for Gopal, after ascertaining how much milk you set aside for butter every day, finds that the new buffalo yields only that quantity, and so what you require for other purposes comes from another source. The butler forgot to tell you this. What bond is there between him and honest Gopal? I cannot tell. Many are the mysteries of housekeeping in India, and puzzling its problems. If you could behead your butler when anything went wrong, I have very little doubt everything would go right, but the complicated methods of modern justice are no match for the subtleties of Indian petty wickedness. And yet under this crust of cunning there is a vein of simple stupidity which constantly crops up where you least expect it. I remember a gentleman, a bachelor, who set before himself a very high standard. He would be strictly just and justly strict. He suspected that his milk was watered, but his faithful boy protested that this could not be, as the milking was begun and finished in his presence. So the master provided himself with a lactometer, and the suspicion became certainty. Summoning his boy into his presence, he explained to him that that little instrument, which he saw floating in the so-called milk before him, could neither lie nor be deceived. “It declares,” he added sternly, “that there is twenty-five per cent. of water in this milk.” “Your lordship speaks the truth,” answered the faithful man, “but how could I tell a lie? The milk was drawn in my presence.” “Do you mean to say you were there the whole time the animal was being milked?” “The whole time, your lordship. Would I give those rogues the chance of watering the _saheb’s_ milk?” The master thought for a moment, and asked again, “Are you sure there was no water in the pail before the milking began?—these people are very cunning.” “They are as cunning as _sheitan_, your lordship, but I made the man turn the pail upside down and shake it.” Again the master turned the matter over in his just mind, and it occurred to him that the lactometer was of English manufacture and might be puzzled by the milk of the buffalo. “Is this cow’s milk, or buffalo’s?” he asked. The boy was beginning to feel his position uncomfortable and caught at this chance of escape. “Ah! that I cannot tell. It may be buffalo’s milk.” _Tableau_.

[Picture: The Doodwallahs—Milkmen]

I have spoken of having butter made in the house, but Gopal carries on all departments of a dairyman’s business, and you may buy butter of him at two annas a “cope.” Let philologists settle the derivation of the word. The “cope” is a measure like a small tea-cup, and when Gopal has filled it, he presses the butter well down with his hand, so that a man skilled in palmistry may read the honest milkman’s fortune off any cope of his butter. How he makes it, or of what materials, I dare not say. Many flavours mingle in it, some familiar enough, some unknown to me. Its texture varies too. Sometimes it is pasty, sometimes semi-fluid, sometimes sticky, following the knife. In colour it is bluish-white, unless dyed. All things considered, I refuse Gopal’s butter, and have mine made at home. The process is very simple, and no churn is needed. Every morning the milk for next day’s butter is put into a large flat dish, to stand for twenty-four hours, at the end of which time, if the dish is as dirty as it should be, the milk has curdled. Then, with a tin spoon, Mukkun skims off the cream and puts it into a large pickle bottle, and squatting on the ground, _more suo_, bumps the bottle upon a pad until the butter is made. The artistic work of preparing it for presentation remains. First it is dyed yellow with a certain seed, that it may please the _saheb’s_ taste, for buffalo butter is quite white, and you know it is an axiom in India that cow’s milk does not yield butter. Then Mukkun takes a little bamboo instrument and patiently works the butter into a “flower” and sends it to breakfast floating in cold water.

Gopal is a man of substance, owning many buffaloes and immensely fat Guzerat cows, with prodigious humps and large pendent ears. His family, having been connected for many generations with the sacred animal, he enjoys a certain consciousness of moral respectability, like a man whose uncles are deans or canons. In my mind, he is always associated rather with his buffaloes, those great, unwieldy, hairless, slate-coloured docile, intelligent antediluvians.

[Picture: Home butter making]

THE MISCELLANEOUS WALLAHS.

[Picture: The Kalai-wallah] I have yielded to the claim of the _doodwallah_ to be reckoned among the _nowkers_. His right is more than doubtful, and I will yield no further. Nevertheless, there is a cluster of petty dependents, a nebula of minor satellites, which have us for the focus of their orbit, and which cannot be left out of a comprehensive account of our system. Whence, for example, is that raucus stridulation which sets every tooth on edge and sends a rheumatic shiver up my spine? “It is only the _Kalai-wallah_,” says the boy, and points to a muscular black man, very nearly in the garb of a Grecian athlete, standing with both feet in one of my largest cooking pots. He grasps a post with both hands, and swings his whole frame fiercely from side to side with a circular motion, like the balance wheel of a watch. He seems to have a rough cloth and sand under his feet, so I suppose this is only his energetic way of scouring the pot preparatory to tinning it, for the _Kalai-wallah_ is the “tin-man,” whose beneficent office it is to avert death by verdigris and salts of copper from you and your family. His assistant, a semi-nude, fleshless youth, has already extemporized a furnace of clay in the ground hard by, and is working a huge pair of clumsy bellows. Around him are all manner of copper kitchen utensils, _handies_, or _deckshies_, kettles, frying-pans, and what not, and there are also on the ground some rings of _kalai_, commonly called tin; but pure tin is an expensive metal, and I do not think it is any part of the _Kalai-wallah’s_ care to see that you are not poisoned with lead. One notable peculiarity there is in this _Kalai-wallah_, or tin-man, which deserves record, namely, that he pays no _dustooree_ to any man. I take it as sufficient evidence of this fact that, though even the _matie_ could tell you that the pots ought to be tinned once a month, neither the butler nor the cook ever seems to remember when the day comes round. This is a matter which you must see to personally. Contrast with this the case of the _Nalbund_, the clink of whose hammer in the early morning tells that the 15th of the month has dawned. His portable anvil is already in the ground, and he is hammering the shoes into shape after a fashion; but he is not very particular about this, for if the shoe does not fit the hoof he can always cut the hoof to fit the shoe. This is an advantage which the maker of shoes for human feet does not enjoy, though I have heard of very fashionable ladies who secretly have one toe amputated that the rest may more easily be squeezed into that curious pointed thing, which, by some mysterious process of mind, is regarded as an elegant shoe. But this is by the way. To return to the _Nalbund_. His work is guaranteed to last one calendar month, and your faithful _ghorawallah_, who remembers nothing else, and scarcely knows the day of the week, bears in mind the exact date on which the horse has to be shod next, and if the careless _Nalbund_ does not appear, promptly goes in search of him. Does not this speak volumes for the efficiency of that venerable and wonderful institution _dustooree_, by which the interests of all classes are cemented together and the wheels of the social system are oiled? The shoeing of the bullock is generally a distinct profession, I believe, from the shoeing of the horse, and is not considered such a high art. The poor _byle_ is thrown, and, his feet being tied together, the assistant holds his nose to the ground, while the master nails a small slip of bad iron to each half of the hoof. I often stop on my way to contemplate this spectacle, which beautifully illustrates that cold patience, or natural thick-skinnedness, which fits the _byle_ so admirably for his lot in this land. He is yoked to a creaking cart and prodded with a sharp nail to make him go, his female ancestry reviled to the third generation, his belly tickled with the driver’s toes, and his tail twisted till the joints crack, but he plods patiently on till he feels disposed to stop, and then he lies down and takes with an even mind such cudgelling as the enraged driver can inflict. At last a fire of straw is lighted under him, and then he gets up and goes on. He never grows restive or frets, as a horse would, and so he does not wear out. This is the reason why bullocks are used throughout India for all agricultural purposes. The horse does not suit the genius of the people. I wish horses in India could do without shoes. In sandy districts, like Guzerat, they can, and are much better unshod; but in the stony Deccan some protection is absolutely necessary, and the poor beast is often at the mercy of the village bullock _Nalbund_. It carries my thoughts to the days of our forefathers, when the blacksmith was also the dentist.

[Picture: Nalbund]

[Picture: Grasswallah] The _Nalbund_ leads naturally to the _Ghasswallah_, or grass-man, whose sign is a mountain of green stuff, which comes nodding in at the back gate every day upon four emaciated legs. A small pony’s nose protrudes from the front, with a muzzle on, for in such matters the spirit of the law of Moses is not current in this country. The mild Hindoo does muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. His religion forbids him to take life, and he obeys, but he steers as near to that sin as he can, without actually committing it, and vitality is seen here at a lower ebb, perhaps, than in any other country under the sun. The grassman maintains just so much flesh on the bones of his beast as will suffice to hold them together under their burden, and this can be done without lucerne grass, so poor Tantalus toddles about, buried under a pile of sweet-scented, fresh, green herbage, ministering to the sleek aristocracy of his own kind, and returns to gnaw his daily allowance of _kurbee_. There is, however, one alleviation of his lot for which he may well be thankful, and that is that his burden so encompasses him about that the stick of his driver cannot get at any part of him. I believe the _Ghasswallah_ is an institution peculiar to our presidency—this kind of _Ghasswallah_, I mean, who is properly a farmer, owning large well-irrigated fields of lucerne grass. Hay is supplied by another kind of _Ghasswallah_, who does not keep a pony, but brings the daily allowance on his head. That allowance is five _polees_ for each horse. A _polee_ is a bundle of grass about as thick as a tree, and as long as a bit of string. This hay merchant does a large business, and used to send in a monthly bill to each of his constituents in due form, thus:—

To Hurree Ganesh, JANUARY. Mr. Esmith, Esquire _Dr._ To supplying grass to Rs. 7 0 0 one horse Ditto to ½ horse 3 8 0 Total Rs. 10 8 0 E. E.& contents received.

The ½ horse was a cow.

[Picture: Shirakee] As the monsoon draws to a close and the weather begins to get colder, a man in a tight brown suit and leather belt, with an unmistakable flavour of sport about him, presents himself at the door. This is the _shikaree_ come with _khubber_ of “_ishnap_,” and quail, and duck, and in fact of anything you like up to bison and tiger. But we must dismiss him to-day. He would require a chapter to himself, and would take me over ground quite outside of my present scope. What a _loocha_ he is!

[Picture: Ready-made-clothes Wallah] What shall I say of the _Roteewallah_ and the _Jooteewallah_, who comes round so regularly to keep your boots and shoes in disrepair, and of all the vociferous tribe of _borahs_? There is the _Kupprawallah_, and the _Boxwallah_, and the _Ready-made-clotheswallah_ (“readee made cloes mem sa-ab! dressin’ gown, badee, petticoat, drars, chamees, everyting, mem sa-ab, very che-eap!”) and the _Chowchowwallah_ and the _Maiwawallah_ or fruit man, with his pleasant basket of pomeloes and oranges, plantains, red and white, custard apples, guavas, figs, grapes, and pineapples, and those suspicious-looking old iron scales, hanging by greasy, knotted strings. Each of these good people, it seems, lives in this hard world for no other end but to supply my wants. One of them is positive that he supplied my father with the necessaries of life before I was born. [Picture: Sindworkwallah] He is by appearance about eighteen years of age, but this presents no difficulty, for if it was not he who ministered to my parent, it was his father, and so he has not only a personal, but a hereditary claim on me. He is a _workboxwallah_, and is yearning to show his regard for me by presenting me with a lady’s sandalwood dressing-case in return for the trifling sum of thirty-five rupees. The _sindworkwallah_, who has a similar esteem for me, scorns the thought of wishing to sell, but if I would just look at some of his beautiful things, he could go away happy. When they are all spread upon the ground, then it occurs to him that I have it in my power to make him lucky for the day by buying a fancy smoking-cap, which, by-the-by, he brought expressly for me. But this subject always makes me sad, for there is no disguising the fact that the _borah_ is fast passing away for ever, and with him all the glowing morning tints of that life which we used to live when India was still India. But let that regret pass. One _wallah_ remains, who presents himself at your door, not monthly, or weekly, but every day, and often twice a day, and not at the back verandah, but at the front, walking confidently up to the very easy-chair on which we stretch our lordly limbs. And I may safely say that, of all who claim directly or indirectly to have eaten our salt, there is not a man for whom we have, one and all of us, a kindlier feeling. You may argue that he is only a public servant, and has really far less claim on us than any of the others; never mind—

“I pray thee, peace. I will be flesh and blood.”

[Picture: Coolie] The English mail is in, and we feel, and will feel, towards that red-livened man as Noah felt towards the dove with the olive branch in her mouth. And when Christmas comes round, howsoever we may harden ourselves against others, scarcely one of us, I know, will grudge a rupee to the _tapalwallah_.

[Picture: Finis]