The social customs of the Darzis present no features of special
interest and resemble those of the lower castes in their locality. They
rank below the cultivating castes, and Brahmans will not take water
from their hands. Though not often employed by the Hindu villager
the Darzi is to Europeans one of the best known of all castes. He is
on the whole a capable workman and especially good at copying from a
pattern. His proficiency in this respect attracted notice so long ago
as 1689, as shown in an interesting quotation in the _Bombay Gazetteer_
referring to the tailors of Surat: [516] "The tailors here fashion
clothes for the Europeans, either men or women, according to every mode
that prevails, and fit up the commodes and towering head-dresses for
the women with as much skill as if they had been an Indian fashion,
or themselves had been apprenticed at the Royal Exchange. (The commode
was a wire structure to raise the cap and hair.)" Since then the Darzi
has no doubt copied in turn all the changes of English fashions. He
is a familiar figure in the veranda of the houses of Europeans,
and his idiosyncrasies have been delightfully described by Eha in
_Behind the Bungalow_. His needles and pins are stuck into the folds
of his turban, and Eha says that he is bandy-legged because of the
position in which he squats on his feet while sewing. In Gujarat
the tailor is often employed in native households. "Though even in
well-to-do families," Mr. Bhimbhai Kirparam writes, [517] "women sew
their bodices and young children's clothes for everyday wear, every
family has its own tailor. As a rule tailors sew in their own houses,
and in the tailor's shop may be seen workmen squatting in rows on a
palm-leaf mat or on cotton-stuffed quilts. The wives and sons' wives
of the head of the establishment sit and work in the shop along with
the men. Their busy time is during the marriage season from November
to June. A village tailor is paid either in cash or grain and is not
infrequently a member of the village establishment. During the rains,
the tailor's slack season, he supplements his earnings by tillage,
holding land which Government has continued to him on payment of
one-half the ordinary rental. In south Gujarat, in the absence of
Brahmans, a Darzi officiates at Bhawad marriages, and in some Brahman
marriages a Darzi is called with some ceremony to sew a bodice for the
bride. On the other hand, in the Panch Mahals and Rewa Kantha, besides
tailoring Darzis blow trumpets at marriage and other processions and
hold so low a position that even Dhedas object to eat their food." It
seems clear that in Gujarat the Darzi caste is of older standing
than in northern India, and it is possible that the art of sewing
may have been acquired through the sea trade which was carried on
between the western coast and Arabia and the Persian Gulf. Here the
Darzi has become a village menial, which he is not recorded as being
in any other part of India.