One of the most amusing of European ways in Burma and India is the
habit of adhering to hours of work and fashions of garments that suit
London. In the heat of the day the whites and their direct employees
are supposed to be working hard. This leaves the best hours of the
twenty-four for amusement, which is not exactly what was intended. The
fashion is set by men who live in the hills. That is the secret.
You cannot really ignore the sun in the Tropics, however; you can only
pretend to do it. Go into many a native quarter or bazaar in the
middle of the day, as the bear used to do at Kyauktan, and you behold
life honestly relaxed. The customers in the bazaar are country cousins
from a distance, if there are any customers. The buzz of an occasional
sewing-machine is like the drone of bees in summer, harmonious enough
in the ears of the bazaar-sellers, many of whom are taking a siesta.
When she wanted fun or fruit or to see the crowd--when she was on
business, so to speak--the bear went to the bazaar like other Kyauktan
people, in the morning, or perhaps the late afternoon. When she went
in the middle of the day, it was just because master was busy at court
and it was dull at home, and a rest seemed likely to be more enjoyable
in company.
When once she was sauntering towards it at this mid-day hour, she
passed an Indian cottage, in front of which, upon a "charpoy" or
bedstead, used also as a couch, and now set upon the ground in a shady
spot, a young Indian mother lay sound asleep, with baby in her lap, it
may be guessed. At any rate the baby had had enough for the time,
while mamma lay back upon the couch, breathing peacefully. Her plump
and healthy breasts were full of milk; and as the little bearess
looked, the instinct of childhood returned upon her, and she went up
softly and laid her lips to the nipple which the other baby had
abandoned. "She milked the woman dry," said people afterwards; but
nobody saw it being done. Nobody noticed anything till the street rang
with female shrieks. "Ayāh! Ayāh! Ayāh! Mother! mother! Help, help!
Come, all! Come, all! Come! Come! Come, all! Come, all! Help! help!
Ah, mother, mother, mother, mother! Ayāh! Ayāh!" The bear pushed her
way through the gathering crowd and hurried home unhurt. One does not
readily lift a hand against an old favourite; and she was home before
people realised the terrible event.
Luckily for everybody, Kyauktan was, and still is, blessed with that
most useful of men--an honest lawyer. He was a barrister-at-law; but
the queer convention of some parts of Europe, which restricts the best
lawyers to talking in court, and allows them to be consulted only
through another lawyer, is as unknown in Burma as in America. At
Kyauktan, as in Boston, you do _not_ need to be "lathered in one shop
and shaved in another." You choose your lawyer, and go to him,
straight.
The Kyauktan barrister had been an official once; but, as people said,
he had retired and reformed. In sober truth, he had been one of the
best Commissioners ever known in Burma; and now his mere presence at
Kyauktan made life more bearable to honest men, for many miles around.
To him the husband of the unhappy young mother, just milked dry, went
running, a score of women probably shrieking instructions after him,
and half the women in Kyauktan standing ready to advise. But,
wonderful to tell, there were many of them on the side of the bear,
poor harmless orphan; and when, after a while, the obedient husband
slowly returned to his wife, and did not announce a suit or anything
else to be done, some praised the lawyer, and others said that the man
had only pretended to go and consult him. The strangest thing of all,
significant of much, was that nobody then complained to the bear's
master or even told him of the matter. He was left to learn it later
from the bantering of the honest lawyer. Was there ever a pet so
popular before?