quarrel with the owner of that house, and he has hired a Brahmin, a
member of the priestly caste, to sit on his enemy's doorstep without
food or drink, until the latter will do justice. The Brahmin, having
undertaken the task, is certain to carry it through. He will starve
until the person at whose door he sits has given way. The latter always
happens. If the holy man were to starve to death, the sin would lie upon
the head of the owner of the house for ever, and his fate in the next
world would be dreadful. So, before long, some arrangement is made, and
the dispute is settled.
The house before which the Brahmin is performing dharna is that of the
money-lender, by far the most powerful man in the village. When a ryot
cannot make both ends meet, and he is in trouble either about his rent
or his taxes, it is to the money-lender that he flies for assistance.
From that powerful personage he borrows a few rupees to tide him over
the time of need till his crops shall be ready for sale, and he has to
pay a very heavy rate of interest for the loan.
The money-lender is one of the oldest features of Indian village life.
From the earliest times his trade has been in great vogue, and the
Indian peasant is to-day as dependent upon him as ever. Broadly
speaking, the ryot is always in debt. He is so careless, and thinks so
little of the future that he always lives from hand to mouth, and a
failure of his crop brings him within touch of famine at once. Then he
resorts to the money-lender to borrow money to buy food or pay his rent,
and to raise the money he often agrees to sell his next crop to the
money-lender at a price which the money-lender himself will fix.
The price is very low, and the money is at once swallowed up to pay rent
or the interest on the last loan, and so the peasant is driven to apply
to the money-lender once more to obtain funds to carry him on to the
next harvest. In this way the ryot falls completely into the hands of
the money-lender, and, in order that the unlucky husbandman may not
escape his clutches, the creditor employs men to watch the farmer's
crops day and night, and the latter has to pay all these expenses.
Just beyond the money-lender's house is the dwelling of the baid, the
doctor. He is sitting on his veranda, busily reading a very ancient
book on medicine. It is from the instructions in this book that he
treats all his patients. He has a store of herbs and roots, which he
uses to make pills and potions. He looks with the greatest contempt on
the European doctors and their medicines, and declares that they do not
know how to treat Hindoo patients.
As a rule, the baid is a very poor hand at curing his patients. If they
get well he takes all the credit; if they die he says that the hour of
their death had come, and who can resist fate? But here and there are
to be found men who have so great a knowledge of herbs and simples that
they can effect wonderful cures. "A curious cure of asthma is recorded
of a European who derived little benefit from the treatment of his own
countrymen. A baid offered to cure him when his case had become almost
hopeless. The European laughed. However, getting quite desperate, he
submitted to the treatment of the Hindoo doctor, and the few sweet black
pills which the latter administered wrought a complete cure. The
grateful patient begged the doctor to name his own reward; but he would
listen to nothing of the kind, nor would he tell of what ingredients the
pills were composed. Indeed, this the baids will never do."
*CHAPTER XX*
*IN AN INDIAN VILLAGE (*_*continued*_*)*
Now there comes up to the veranda a quiet-looking man with a little
bundle under his arm, and the baid lays aside his book. The village
barber has come to shave him. The Hindoo barber is a very important
man. Not only has he under his care the shaven crowns, the smooth
chins, and the close-cropped hair of his neighbours, but he is the
village surgeon also, for the baid knows nothing of surgery. It is the
barber who bores the ears and noses of the little girls to put in rings
and ornaments.
He squats down beside the doctor and unrolls his little bundle and
spreads out its contents. He has a razor, a pair of scissors, a small
steel instrument for cutting nails, a leather strop, a little brass cup,
a scrap of looking-glass, and a towel. He uses neither brush nor soap
for shaving, but puts cold water in the cup and dips his fingers into
it. With these fingers he wets and rubs the chin, and then sweeps his
razor over it with light and skilful hand, doing his work like a master.
When he has finished he rolls up his little bundle and goes on to the
next house, for he has a fixed round of customers, and no Hindoo,
whether rich or poor, ever shaves himself.
Going thus from house to house the barber knows every one, and is often
employed as a match-maker. In India parents always arrange the marriages
of their children, and the wishes of the latter are not consulted in the
affair. Indeed, marriages are often settled at so early an age that the
children do not understand what it means. A girl is fetched from her
play and married to a boy not much older than herself. She goes back to
her dolls, and he goes back to school, and perhaps neither sees the
other again for years.
In arranging these affairs there is often much coming and going of the
family barber. He has to find out how much dowry the parents of the
girl will give with their daughter, or, on the other hand, he is sent to
see what examinations the young man has passed. This is an important
point. The Hindoos think a great deal of such distinctions, and a young
man who has passed a University examination can get a much richer wife
than he who has not.
At the wedding the barber is a very busy man. Before the day he goes
round to the friends and relatives of the family inviting them to come
to the wedding-feast, and begging them not to fail in attendance. On
the day of the wedding he has to dress the bridegroom, and when the
guests are assembled he hands round betels to chew or hookahs to smoke.
He helps to serve the wedding-feast, and when it is over he distributes
the fragments among the beggars.
The barber's wife is as important a personage as himself. She is just
as busy among the women as he is among the men. She enters the zenana,
the women's portion of the house, to dress the ladies and adorn them.
At weddings she dresses the hair of the bride, trims her nails, and
arrays her in the richest robes. Both the barber and his wife belong to
the barber caste. In India trades are handed down from father to son,
from mother to daughter. The children of the barber and his wife are
taught from their earliest years the duties of their business: they,
too, will become barbers in due time.
As the barber goes away the water-carrier comes up. This is another
important personage; for, in the burning climate of India, fresh, pure
water is of the greatest importance. This water-carrier has not filled
his vessels at the village well, but has been to a spring at some
distance, where the water is very good. He carries it in two large
vessels of brass, and these are slung from the ends of a pole which he
carries across one of his shoulders, one vessel in front and one behind.
If there are Mohammedans in the village you will also see the bhistee,
the Mohammedan water-carrier. He bears his load in a skin on his
shoulders, or in a pair of skins which he slings across the back of a
bullock. He sells water only to people of his own faith, for no Hindoo
will use for any purpose water which a Mohammedan has handled.
The larger houses have flat roofs, and from the roofs of two standing
near each other a couple of boys are having a battle with fighting
kites. Flying kites is a very favourite amusement in India, and in some
villages old and young, rich and poor, spend much time on this sport.
The kites are square in shape, but of all sizes, and in the case of
fighting kites the string or thread is passed through a mixture of
pounded glass and starch and then dried. The thread has now a keen,
cutting edge, and if brought sharply across the string of another kite
will cut it through, and he who succeeds in setting his opponent's kite
adrift is the victor.
At the farther end of our village there is a large native inn. This is
by no means a common thing to find in such a place; but, as it happens,
a well-travelled road passes through the country at this point. To see
this inn at its busiest we must go on some evening when a fair is to be
held in the neighbouring town, and a throng of travellers pause in it
for the night.
The inn itself, as we approach it, shows a square of four flat naked
walls. There are neither doors nor windows to be seen, and the place is
entered by a wide opening, which can be closed by massive gates. Near
the gate are some small shops where one can buy rice, flour, salt, and
ghee to eat, or earthen pots for cooking.
Upon entering, we find ourselves in a big courtyard, the middle of which
is packed with the bullock waggons and carts, from which the ponies and
bullocks have just been released and turned out to graze. Round the
walls inside is a wide veranda, and behind this veranda are rooms
wherein the wayfarers may sleep. The scene is one of the greatest uproar
and confusion. Men and women are bustling to and fro, shouting and
calling to each other as they draw water, light fires, cook food, feed
their animals, spread their beds, and generally make ready for the
night.
Every inch of the veranda is taken up, and in front of each room burns
the fire of the party who intend to occupy it. A wealthy traveller will
engage a number of rooms for himself and his family or servants; but
poor men club together, and five or six engage a single room and stow
themselves away in it. The cost to them will then be about one farthing
per head.
The inn is under the charge of a number of inn-keepers, each of whom has
a certain part of the inn-yard under his care and a certain number of
rooms to let. These people crowd about the traveller on his arrival,
each clamouring that his rooms are the best, and begging for his custom.
They are a thievish and quarrelsome crew, and are looked down upon as a
very low and degraded class. In a native inn the traveller has to keep
a very sharp eye on his belongings. He takes care to keep his money in
a safe place, and he never accepts tobacco or any eatable from a
stranger. There may be a drug in it which will throw him into a deep
sleep, from which he will awake to find all his valuables gone.
When supper is dispatched the traveller prepares for sleep. If poor, he
stretches himself on the floor; if better off, he hires a wooden frame
from the inn-keeper, and spreads upon it his quilts and blankets. Now
the great gates are swung to and locked, and the inn is securely shut up
for the night. This is very necessary, or some of the animals would be
missing in the morning. There are also men who keep watch all night,
and the merchant with a stock of valuable goods gives one of these a
small sum to take particular care of his bales and animals.
BILLING AND SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, GUILDFORD.