THE SPOILT CHILD

A Tale of Hindu Domestic Life

BY

PEARY CHAND MITTER
(TEK CHAND THAKUR.)

TRANSLATED BY

G. D. OSWELL, M.A.,
Court of Wards, Bengal

Calcutta:

THACKER, SPINK AND CO.
1893
[All rights reserved.]

PRINTED BY THACKER, SPINK AND CO., CALCUTTA.

TO MY FATHER

REV. HENRY LLOYD OSWELL, M.A.

WHO, AFTER 50 YEARS OF ACTIVE WORK

IN THE CHURCH,

HAS SOUGHT A WELL-EARNED RETIREMENT

THIS VOLUME

IS

AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED.

PREFACE

The author of this novel, Babu Peary Chand Mitter, was born in the year 1814.

He represented the well-educated, thoroughly earnest, and courteous Bengali gentleman of the old school.

His life was devoted to the good of his fellow-countrymen, and he was especially eager in the cause of female education. In the preface to one of hisworks, written with that object in view, he writes:— “I was born in the year 1814. While a pupil of the Páthshálá at home, I found my grandmother, mother, and aunts reading Bengali books. They could write in Bengali and keep accounts. There were no female schools then, nor were there suitable books for the females. My wife was very fond of reading, and I could scarcely supply her with instructive books. I was thus forced to think how female education could be promoted in a substantial way. The conclusion I came to was that, unless womanhood were placed on a spiritual basis, education would never be productive of real good. For the furtherance of this end I have been humbly working. ”

Amongst the books he published with this end in view are the ‘Ramaranjika,’ the ‘Abhedi,’ and the ‘Adhyátwiká.’ The ‘Ramaranjika’ deals with female education under different aspects, and gives examples drawn from the lives of eminent Englishwomen, as well as biographical sketches of distinguished Hindu women, drawn from history and tradition. Of the ‘Abhedi’ the author says:— “It is a spiritual novel in Bengali, in which the hero and heroine have been described as earnest seekers after the knowledge of the soul, and as obtaining spiritual light by the education of pain.” Of the ‘Adhyátwiká,’ the author tells us:— “It brings before its readers the conversation and manners of different classes of people, in different circumstances, which have been pourtrayed in different styles, and which may perhaps be useful to foreigners wishing to acquire a colloquial knowledge of the Bengali language.”

Babu Peary Chand Mitter was a man who keenly felt the evils in society around him, and he used his pen in the cause of temperance and the purity of thedomestic circle as against drunkenness and debauchery; amongst his writings having this object in view is the ‘Mada Kháoya bara dáya,’ or ‘The great evils of dram-drinking.’ It is a novel marked by great humour, and shows the author to have been a satirist of no mean power.

Besides these novels he wrote ‘The Life of David Hare’ both in Bengali and in English. He also contributed essays to The Calcutta Review, and an American publication called The Banner of Light, besides writing articles for the Agri-Horticultural Society of India.

Babu Peary Chand Mitter died in 1883.

The novel ‘Alaler Gharer Dulál,’ or ‘The Spoilt Darling of an Ill-regulated House,’ was written more than forty years ago, and was very well received, as the criticisms of the day show. The Calcutta Review of the day says:— “We hail this book as the first novel in the Bengali language. Tek Chand Thakur has written a tale the like of which is not to be found within the entire range of Bengali literature. Our author’s quiet humour reminds us of Goldsmith, while his livelier passages bring to our recollection the treasures of Fielding’s wit. He seems to be familiar with Defoe, Fielding, Scott, Dickens, Bulwer, Thackeray, and other masters of fiction.”

Other critics of the day compared him to a Moliére or a Dickens.

Mr. John Beames, in his ‘Modern Aryan Languages of India,’ writes:— “Babu Peary Chand Mitter, who writes under the nom de plume of Tek Chand Thakur, has produced the best novel in the language ‘Alaler Gharer Dulál.’ He has had many imitators, and certainly stands high as a novelist. His story might fairly claim to be ranked with some of the best comic novels in our own language for wit, spirit, and clever touches of nature. He puts into the mouth of each of his characters the appropriate method of talking, and thus exhibits to the full the extensive range of vulgar idioms which his language possesses.”

In an introductory essay on Bengali novels, in his translation of Babu Bunkim Chandra Chatterjee’s novel ‘Kopal Kundala,’ Mr. Phillips writes:— “The position and character of Bengali literature is peculiar. A backward people have, so to speak, rushed into civilization at one bound: old customs and prejudices have been displaced, uno ictu, by a state of enlightenment and advanced ideas. The educated classes have suddenly found themselves face to face with the richest gems of Western learning and literature. The clash of widely divergent stages of civilization, the juxtaposition of the most advanced thought with comparative barbarism, has produced results which, though perhaps to be expected, are somewhat curious. If one tries to close a box with more than it can hold the lid may be unhinged,— new wine may burst old bottles. The colliding forces of divergent stages of civilization have produced a literature that for want of a better expression may be called a hybrid compromise between Eastern and Western ideas. So we find that the Bengali novel is to a great extent an exotic. It is a hot-house plant which has been brought from a foreign soil; but even crude imitations are better than the farragos of original nonsense, lists of which appear from time to time in the pages of the Calcutta Gazette.”

The above remarks are merely general, and there exist of course, bright and notable exceptions, among whom may be mentioned the names of Peary Chand Mitter (the father of Bengali novelists), Bunkim Chandra Chatterjea, Romesh Chandra Dutt, and Tarak Nath Ganguli.

The ‘Alaler Gharer Dulál’ of Peary Chand Mitter may be called a truly indigenous novel, in which some of the reigning vices and follies of the time are held up to scorn and derision. A deep vein of moral earnestness runs through all the writings of Peary Chand Mitter, and he takes the opportunity to interweave with the incidents of his story disquisitions on virtue and vice, truthfulness and deceit, charity and niggardliness, hypocrisy and straight-forwardness. Not only general vices, such as drinking and debauchery, but particular customs, such as a Kulin’s marrying a dozen wives, and living at their expense, are condemned in no measured terms. The book is written in a plain colloquial style, which, combined with a quiet humour, procured for it a considerable degree of popularity.

As further evidence, if such were wanting, of the popularity of this novel, it may be mentioned that it has been dramatized, having been published in the form of a natak or play, by Babu Hira Lall Mitter.

The leading characteristics of the novel, as they have appeared to the translator, are the humour, pathos, and satire that pervade almost every page of it.

The humour, though it may occasionally be broad, can never be called coarse, and much of it is the cultured humour that might be expected from a writer well acquainted with his own ancient classics. If Thackeray is the type of the cultured humorist of the West, Peary Chand Mitter is the type of the cultured humorist of the East.

The pathos is especially noticeable in some of the scenes which the author has pourtrayed for us with such vivid reality where the poor are brought before us. We see the utter dependence of the poor upon the generosity of the rich, a generosity that is rarely appealed to in vain: there is pathos too in the scene that brings before us the ryot and his landlord; and in the scenes in the zenana and the bathing-ghât where we have an insight into the lives and the thoughts of both the upper and lower classes of the women of the country. There is a deep pathos in the scene that brings before us the old man at Benares, spending the evening of his days in reading and meditation, in “The Holy City:” it is a scene that gives us an insight into the deeper religious side of the Hindu character.

The satire is only merciless where it is directed against the vices of drinking and debauchery, or against the custom of the much marrying of Kulins, or the marrying of old men to young girls, or solely for money. In other cases it is not unkindly, especially where it is directed against that not uncommon failing both in the West and the East, which Shakespeare has immortalized as ‘too much respect upon the world,’ and which is largely exhibited in the East in the form of lavish expenditure, regardless of debt, upon social and religious ceremonies.

Amongst other characteristics of this novel may be noted that deep vein of moral earnestness, already referred to, which runs through the whole book, and which is chiefly exhibited in the form of moral reflections, such as are so common in many of the Sanscrit tales.

Dramatic vividness is another noticeable feature of the book: a few strokes of the pen suffice to bring before us, as living realities, characters that are drawn from every class of life, and scenes that deal with almost every incident of life in Bengal. In fact a far more vivid picture of social life in Bengal, both in its inner and outer aspects, is presented to us in the pages of this book, than is presented in the pages of many books purporting to give us an account of that life.

And, with this dramatic vividness, there is a general faithfulness to reality that will be appreciated by those who have lived for any time amidst the scenes described; for, though the book describes life in Bengal as it appeared to the eyes of an acute observer writing more than forty years back, the picture, in its general outlines, is as true of the life of the people now as it was then.

Another noticeable feature of the book is the rhythmic flow which marks its language. This is a feature which appears to characterize all books written for the people in the language best understood of the people, no matter what that language is.

As regards the language in which Peary Chand Mitter wrote this novel, the Calcutta Review of the day writes:— “Endowed, as he was, with strong common sense, as well as high culture, he saw no reason why this idol of unmixed diction should receive worship at his hands, and he set about writing ‘Alaler Gharer Dulál’ in a spirit at which the Sanscritists stood aghast, and shook their heads. Going to the opposite extreme in point of style, he vigorously excluded from his works, except on very rare occasions, every word and phrase that had a learned appearance. His own works suffered from the exclusion, but the movement was well-timed. He scattered to the winds the time-honoured commonplaces, and drew upon nature and life for his materials. His success was eminent and well-deserved.”

One feature that has especially struck the translator in transferring this novel from its original Bengali into English, is that he has found it necessary to omit nothing, on the score of indelicacy, or bad taste,— a remark which could not be made of every Bengali novel. The author has written with the maxim of the old Roman satirist ever before his eyes,— maxima debetur puero reverentia.

The translator has had three classes of readers before his eyes, in making this translation.

It seemed to him that so excellent a picture of social life in Bengal could not but be interesting to those Englishmen and Englishwomen who are interested in the lives of their fellow-subjects in India.

It also occurred to him that as the rising generation of Bengalis no longer read Bengali literature as of old, it might interest them to see, in an English dress, a novel that has been so popular amongst their older compatriots.

English students of the Bengali language and its literature may also find the translation of use, as it has been made literal as far as was possible.

The task of translation, though it has been a pleasant one, has not been easy; owing to the many difficulties in the way of adequately rendering into English, without the qualities of the original suffering in the transfer, a book so essentially colloquial and idiomatic in style and character. The fact that Professor Cowell at one time contemplated a translation of this novel, but abandoned the idea owing to this very difficulty, has made the translator still more diffident of success, and he can only leave it to the indulgence of his Bengali readers to decide how far he has succeeded in his translation, in doing justice to the spirit of the original.

The translator’s thanks are due to Babu Mohiny Mohun Chatterjea, Solicitor, Calcutta, for his kindness in revising the translation for him, and to Babu Amrita Lall Mitter, the Honorary Secretary to the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Calcutta, and son of the author, for allowing him to publish it.

CONTENTS.

PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS.

THE SPOILT CHILD.

CHAPTER I.
MATILALL AT HOME.

BABURAM BABU, a resident of Vaidyabati, was a man of large experience in business affairs: he was famous for his long service in the Revenue and Criminal Courts. Now to walk uprightly without taking bribes when engaged in the public service, is not a very long-established custom. Baburam Babu’s procedure was in accordance with the old style, and being skilful at his work, he had succeeded, by servility and cringing, in imposing on his superior officers; as a consequence of which he had acquired considerable wealth within a very short time. In this country a man’s reputation keeps pace with the increase of his riches or with his advancement: learning and character have not anything like the same respect paid to them. There had been a time when Baburam Babu’s position had been a very inferior one, and when only a few individuals in his village had paid him any attention; but later, as he came into the possession of fine buildings, gardens, estates, and a good deal of influence in many ways, he found himself with a host of friends as his followers and advisers. Whenever during his intervals of leisure he went to his house, his reception-room would be crowded with people. It is always the case that when a man has a sudden accession of wealth there is a rush of people to him, just as the shop of a sweetmeat seller will become full of flies as long as there are sweetmeats to be had. At whatever time you might visit Baburam Babu’s house you would always find people with him: rich and poor, they would all sit round and flatter him, the more intelligent among them in indirect fashion only, the lesser folk outright and unblushingly, agreeing with everything he said. After some time spent in the way we have described, Baburam Babu took his pension, and remained at home occupied in the management of his estates and in trade.

Now in this world, entire happiness is the lot of hardly any one, and it is rare to find intelligence displayed in all the concerns of life. Baburam Babu had turned his attention solely to amassing wealth: the questions which had alone exercised his mind had been how to increase his resources, how to make the whole village aware of his importance, so that all might salute him properly, and how to celebrate his religious festivals on a larger scale than those of his neighbours. He had a son and two daughters: being himself a descendant of the great Kulin[1], Balaram Thakur, he had, with a view to the preservation of his caste, married the two girls at great expense almost immediately after their birth; but their husbands, being Kulins, had taken to themselves wives in a number of places, and would not so much as peep into the house of their father-in-law of Vaidyabati, except on condition of receiving a handsome remuneration for their trouble.

His son, Matilall, having been indulged in every possible way from his boyhood, was exceedingly self-willed; at times, he would say to his father: “Father, I want to catch hold of the moon!” “Father, I want to eat a cannon-ball!” Now and then he would roar and cry, so that all the neighbours would say: “We cannot get any sleep owing to that dreadful boy.” Having been so spoilt by his parents, the boy would not tolerate the bare idea of going to school, and thus it was that the duty of teaching him devolved upon the house clerk. On his very first visit to his teacher, Matilall howled aloud, and scratched and bit him. His tutor therefore went to the master of the house and said to him: “Sir, it is quite beyond my power to instruct your son[2].” The master of the house replied: “Ah, he is my only darling, my Krishna! use flattery and caresses if you will, only do teach him.”

Matilall was afterwards induced by means of many stratagems to attend school; and when his teacher was leaning up against the wall, nodding drowsily, with his legs crossed and a cane in his hand, reiterating— “Write boys, write,” Matilall would rise from his seat, make contemptuous gestures, and dance about the room. The teacher would go on snoring away, ignorant of what his pupil was doing, and when he opened his eyes again, Matilall would be seated near his writing materials of dry palm-leaves, drawing figures of crows and cranes. When later in the afternoon he had commenced the repetition lesson, Matilall, amid the confused babel of tongues, would utter cries of Hori Bol, and cleverly outwit his teacher by uttering the last letters only of the words that were being recited. Occasionally when his teacher was napping, he would tickle his nose or throw a live piece of charcoal into his lap, and then dart away like an arrow. When the hour for refreshment came, he would occasionally get some boy to give the master lime and water to drink, pretending that it was buttermilk. The teacher saw that the boy was a thorough good-for-nothing, who had made up his mind to have nothing more to do with education; so he concluded that as the boy had profited naught from all the canings he had had, but only learnt the art of playing tricks upon his teacher, it was high time to be released from the hands of such a pupil. The master of the house however would not hear of it, so he had to have recourse to stratagem. The occupation of clerk seemed to him to be better than that of teacher: in the latter occupation his wages were two rupees a month besides food and clothing, while his gains over and above that would be merely a present of rice and a pair of cloths or so at the time of the boy’s being first initiated into school-life[3]: on the other hand, in the occupation of a clerk who superintended all purchases in the market, there were constant pickings. Revolving such thoughts in his mind, he went to the master of the house and told him that Matilall’s education was complete so far as his writing was concerned, and that he had also been thoroughly taught to keep accounts, so far as estate-management was concerned. Baburam Babu was overwhelmed with joy on receiving this intelligence, and all his neighbours in conclave with him said: “Why should it not be so? Can a lion’s whelp ever become a jackal?”

Baburam Babu now thought that he ought to have his son taught the rudiments of Sanskrit grammar and a smattering of Persian. Having come to this determination, he called the priest who was in charge of the family worship, and said: “You sir! have you any knowledge of grammar?” This Brahman was the densest of blockheads, but he thought to himself: “I am now getting only rice and plantains, quite insufficient for me: here I see at length a means of making a living.” So he replied: “Yes, sir, I studied grammar for five years continuously in the Sanskrit Tol of Ishvar Chandra Vedanta Vagishwar of Kunnimora. But I have been very unlucky: I have gained nothing from all my learning: I am no more than your humble servant in spite of it all, and my food is but coarse grain and water.” Baburam Babu thereupon appointed him to teach his son the rudiments of Sanskrit grammar from that day. The Brahman, inebriated with hope, speedily got by heart a page or two of the Mugdha Bodh Grammar, and set about teaching the boy.

Thought Matilall to himself:— “ I have escaped from the hands of my old teacher; how am I to get rid of this rice-and-plantain-eating old Brahman? I am my father and mother’s darling, and whether I can write or not, they will say nothing to me. The only object of learning after all is to gain money, and my father has boundless wealth: what then is the good of my learning? It is quite enough for me to be able to sign my name; besides what will my intimate friends have left to do if I take to learning? their occupation in ministering to my pleasures will be gone! The present is the time for enjoyment: has the pain of learning any attractions for me just now? surely none! ” Having come to this determination, Matilall thus addressed his preceptor:— “Old Brahman, if you come here any more to plague me with this grammatical rubbish, I will throw away the family idol, and with it your last hope of a livelihood; and if you go to my father and tell him what I have said to you, I will just drop a brick onto you from the roof: then your wife will soon become a widow, and have to remove her bracelet from her wrist[4].” The Brahman, distressed by such remarks about his teaching, thought to himself: “For six months past I have been labouring at the peril of my life, and I have not yet been paid anything: the whole occupation is one that is most repugnant to my feelings, and I am in constant danger of my life. Let me now only get clear of him and I care not what happens to me afterwards.” As the Brahman was revolving all this in his mind, Matilall looked in his face and said: “Well, what are you in such a brown study about? Are you in want of money? Here, take this! But you must go to my father, and tell him that I have learned every thing.” The Brahman accordingly went to the boy’s father and said to him: “Sir, your Matilall is no common boy! he has a most extraordinary memory; he will remember for ever what he may have heard only once.” There was an astrologer at the time with Baburam, who observed to the Babu: “There is no necessity for you to give me an introduction to Matilall: he is a boy whose birth was at an auspicious moment; if only he lives he is bound to become a very great man”.

Baburam Babu next set about searching for a Munshi to teach his son Persian. After a long search, the grandfather of Aladi the tailor, Habibala Hoshan by name, was appointed to the post on a salary of one rupee eight annas a month, together with oil and firewood. The Munshi Saheb was a man with toothless gums, a grey beard, and a moustache like tow: his eyes would get inflamed whenever he was teaching, and when he bade his pupils repeat the letters after him, his face became hideously distorted in pronouncing the guttural Persian letters kaph, gaph, ain, ghain. The benefit that Matilall derived from learning Persian was pretty much what might have been expected from his possessing no taste whatever for the pursuit of knowledge, and having such a preceptor. As the Munshi Saheb was one day stooping over his book, repeating the maxims of Masnavi in a sing-song manner and keeping time with his hand, Matilall seized the opportunity to drop a lighted match from behind onto his beard. The poor Munshi’s beard at once flared up, crackling as it blazed, upon which Matilall remarked: “How now, Mussulman? you will not teach me any more after this, I expect.” The Munshi Saheb left speedily, shaking his head and exclaiming “Tauba! Tauba!” Then as the pain of the burn intensified, he shrieked: “Never, never have I seen so mad and wicked a boy as this: of a surety field labour in my own country were better than such slavery: it is cruel work coming to a place like this! Tauba! Tauba!”

CHAPTER II.
MATILALL’S ENGLISH EDUCATION.

WHEN Baburam heard of the evil plight of the Munshi Saheb, the only remark he made was: “My boy, Matilall, is not a boy like that. What can you expect from such a low fellow as that Mussulman?” He then considered that as Persian was going out of fashion, it might be a good thing for the boy to learn English. Just as a madman has occasional glimmerings of sense, so even a man lacking in intelligence has occasional happy inspirations. When he had come to this decision, it occurred to Baburam Babu that he was a very indifferent English scholar himself: he only knew one or two English words: his neighbours too, he reflected, knew about as much of it as he himself did: he must consult with some man of learning and experience. As he went over in his mind the list of his kinsmen and relatives, it struck him that Beni Babu, of Bally, was a very competent person. Business habits generate promptness of action, and he proceeded without delay to the Vaidyabati Ghât, taking with him a servant and a messenger.

In the first two months of the rainy season, the months Ashar and Shravan, most of the boatmen occupy themselves in catching hilsa fish with circular nets, and at midday, are generally busy taking their meals.Thus it came about that there was not a boat of any description at the Vaidyabati Ghât. Baburam Babu, full-whiskered, the sacred mark on his nose, dressed in fine lawn with coloured borders, with smart shoes from Phulapukur, a front like the front of Ganesh, a delicate muslin shawl neatly folded over his shoulders, and his cheeks swollen with pán, was walking impatiently up and down, calling out to his servant: “Ho, there, Hari! I must get to Bally quick; you must hire a passing boat for me for fourpice.” Rich men’s servants are often very disrespectful, and Hari made answer: “Sir, that is just like you! I had only just sat down to take my food and I have now had to throw it away and leave it in order to attend to your repeated calls. If there had been any boat going down-stream, it might have been hired for a small sum, but it is flood-tide just now, and the boatmen will have to work hard rowing and steering. You might get across for three or four pice if you would arrange to go with others. I cannot possibly hire a passing boat for you for four pice; you might as well ask me to make barley-meal cakes without water.” Baburam Babu scowled and said: “You are a very insolent fellow; if you speak like that to me again, you get a sound smacking.” Now the lower orders of Bengalees tremble even if they make a slip, so Hari endured the rebuke, and quaking all over said to his master: “Sir, how can I possibly find a boat? I had no intention of being insolent to you”.

While he was still speaking, a green boat that was being towed up the river on its return journey, approached the ghât where they were. After a long argument with the steersman of the boat a bargain was struck, and he agreed to take them across for eight annas. Baburam then got into the boat with his servant and his messenger. When they had got some way on their journey, he began looking about him in every direction, and said to his servant: “Hari, this is a fine boat we have got! Hi, steersman! whose house is that over there? Ho! surely that is a sugar factory. Ha! Now prepare me a pipe of tobacco, and strike me a light.” Then he pulled away at the gurgling hooka, now and again raising himself to look at the porpoises tumbling in the water, and hummed a song of the loves of Krishna[5].:—

“When late to Brindabun, O Krishna! I came,”
“Your home there, alas! I found only a name.”

As it was the ebb, the boat dropped quickly down-stream and the boatmen had no occasion to exert themselves: one sat on the edge of the boat; another, bearded like an old billy-goat, keeping his look-out on the top of the cabin, sang in the Chittagong dialect the popular song which goes:—

“E’en the earring of gold shall loosen its hold,”
“By the lute-string’s languishing strain cajoled.”

The sun had not yet set when the boat reached its moorings at the Deonagaji Ghât. Four boatmen, panting and puffing with their efforts, lifted Baburam Babu, a mass of solid flesh, out of the boat, and set him safe on land.

Beni Babu received his relative very courteously and begged him to be seated, while his house servant, Ram, at once brought some tobacco he had prepared for him. Baburam Babu was very fond of his pipe: after a few pulls he remarked: “How is it that this hooka is hissing?” A servant who is in constant attendance upon a man of intelligence soon becomes intelligent himself: Ram, divining what was wrong, put a clearing-rod in the hooka, changed the water, supplied it with some fresh tobacco, sweet and compact, and brought it back with a larger mouthpiece. Finding the hooka placed by him, Baburam Babu took entire possession, as though he had taken a permanent lease of it, and as he puffed away, emitting clouds of smoke, chattered with Beni Babu.

Beni.— Would you not like to get up now, sir, and take some light refreshment?

Baburam.— It is already rather late: I don’t think I will just now. I am quite at home, thank you; I would have called for it if I had wanted it. But please just listen to what I have to say. My son Matilall has shown that he possesses remarkable genius! You would be quite delighted to see the boy. I am anxious to have him taught English; do you think you can get me a master to teach him for some mere trifle?

Beni.— There are plenty of masters to be had, and a man of moderate ability might be got for from twenty to twenty-five rupees a month.

Baburam.— What, so much as that? Twenty-five rupees! Oh my dear friend, these religious ceremonies you know are a constant source of expense in my establishment: I have about a hundred people to feed every day; and besides all this, I shall very soon have my son’s marriage to arrange for. Why did I go to the expense of hiring a boat to come here and see you, only to be asked for as much as that after all?

With this, he put his hands on Beni Babu’s shoulders, and laughed immoderately.

Beni.— Then put him at some school in Calcutta: the boy might live with some relative, and his education need not in that case cost more than three or four rupees a month.

Baburam.— What, as much as that? Couldn’t one manage to get the prices down with a little haggling? And is a school education any better than a home one?

Beni.— Home education is a very excellent thing if you can secure a really first-rate teacher, but such a teacher is not to be had on a small salary. School education has its good points and also its bad points. A healthy spirit of emulation of course springs up amongst a number of boys who are being educated together; but at the same time some of the boys will always be in danger of being corrupted by bad company. Besides when twenty-five or thirty boys are reading in one class, there is a good deal of confusion, and equal attention cannot be paid every day to all the boys alike: consequently all do not make similar progress.

Baburam.— Anyhow I will send Matilall to you; and when you have looked about you, do try and make some cheap arrangement for me. None of the English gentlemen for whom I once did business are here now: if they had been, I might have got some of them to secure him schooling which would have cost me nothing: it would only have needed a little importunity. However it will be quite enough if my son obtains just a smattering of learning: if he becomes a scholar, he may not remain in the religion of his fathers. So kindly make it your business to see that he becomes a man: I lay the whole responsibility upon you, my friend.

Beni.— If a boy is to grow into a man, every attention is necessary both when he is at home and when he is away from home: the father must see everything with his own eyes and enter thoroughly into all the boy’s occupations. There is a good deal of business that may be done through commission agencies, but the education of a boy is not one of them.

Baburam.— That is all very true: regard Matilall then as your son. I shall now get some leisure for my ablutions in the Ganges, for reading the Puranas, and for looking after my concerns; for at present I have no time even for these: besides, all the English training that I possess is training of the old school. Matilall is yours, my dear friend, he is yours! I will rid myself of all anxiety by sending him to you. Adopt any course you think fit, but my dear friend, do take care that the expense is not heavy: you know my position as a man with a number of young children to look after: you can understand that thoroughly, can you not?

After this conversation with Beni Babu, Baburam Babu returned to his home at Vaidyabati.

CHAPTER III.
MATILALL AT SCHOOL.

MEN engaged in business all the week spend very lazy Sundays. They avail themselves of any excuse to postpone their bath and their meals: after they have bathed and eaten, some of them play chess and some cards: some occupy themselves in fishing, some play on the tomtom, and some on the sitar: some lie down and sleep, some go for a walk, and others read; but very little attention is paid to the improvement of the mind by study or conversation of an improving character. A good deal of idle talk is indulged in: perhaps somebody’s real or fancied disregard of caste-rules may be discussed, and how Shambhu ate three jack-fruit at a sitting. Such is the style of conversation with which the time will be wiled away. Beni Babu’s intelligence was of a different order. Most people in this country have a general notion that when school-days are over, education itself is complete; but this is a great error. However much may be the attention paid to the acquisition of knowledge from birth to death, the further shore of learning is never reached. Knowledge can only increase in proportion to the attention that is paid to learning: Beni Babu understood this well and acted accordingly.

He had risen as usual one morning, and having first looked into his household affairs, had taken up a book in order to prosecute his studies, when suddenly a boy of fourteen, with a charm round his neck, a ring in his ear, a bracelet on his wrist and an armlet on his arm, appeared before him and saluted him. Beni Baba was engrossed in his book, but was roused by the sound of approaching footsteps, and guessing who the boy was, said to him: “Come here, Matilall, come here! is all well at home?” “All is well,” replied the boy. Beni Babu bade Matilall stay with him for the night, and promised the next morning to take him to Calcutta and put him to school. Some little time after this, Matilall, having finished his meal, perceived that time was likely to hang heavy on his hands, as it would not be dark for a long time yet. Being naturally of a very restless disposition, it was always a hard thing for him to sit long in one place; so he rose very quietly from his seat, and proceeded to explore the house. First he tried to work the mill for husking rice with his feet; then he tramped about on the terraced roof of the house; then commenced throwing bricks and tiles at the passers by, running away when he had done so as hard as he could. Thus he made the circuit of Bally, tramping noisily about, stealing fruit out of people’s gardens and plucking the flowers, or else jumping about on the top of the village huts and breaking the water-jars. The people, annoyed by such conduct as this, asked each other: “Who is this boy? Surely our village will be ruined as Lanka was by Hanuman the house-burner.” Some of them, when they heard the name of the boy’s father, remarked: “Ah, he is the son of Baburam Babu! what then can you expect? Is it not written: ‘Men’s virtues are reflected in a son, in renown, and in water?’”

As the evening drew on the village resounded with the cries of jackals and the humming of innumerable insects. As many men of position reside in Bally, and the shalgram[6]. is to be found in the houses of most of them, there was no lack of the sound of handbells and conch shells. Beni Babu had just risen from his reading and was stretching his limbs preparatory to a smoke, when a great commotion suddenly arose. “Sir, the son of the zemindar of Vaidyabati has been throwing bricks at us!” “Sir, he has thrown away my basket!” “He has been pushing me about!” “He has grossly insulted me!” “He has broken my pot of ghee!” Beni Babu, being very tender-hearted, gave each of the men a present, and dismissed them; then he fell to musing on the kind of training this boy must have been given to behave in such a fashion. “A fine bringing up the lad must have had,” he said to himself, “in the short space of three hours he has thrown the whole village into a state of panic: it will be a great relief when he goes.” Presently some of the oldest and most respected of the inhabitants of the place came to him and said: “Beni Babu, who is this boy? We were taking our usual nap after our midday meal, when we were aroused by this clamour: it is most unpleasant to have our rest broken in upon in this way.” Beni Babu replied: “Please say no more; I have had a very heavy burden imposed upon me: one of my relatives, a zemindar, a man rather lacking in common sense if possessed of great wealth, has sent his son to me to put to school for him; and meanwhile I am being worn to a mere shadow with the annoyance. If I had to keep a boy like this with me for three days, my house would become a ruin for doves to come and roost in.”

As this conversation was proceeding, several boys approached, Matilall in their rear, all singing at the top of their voices the refrain—

“To Shambhu’s son all honour pay,”
“Shambu, the lord of night and day.”

“Ah!” said Beni Babu, “here he comes: keep quiet, perhaps he may take it into his head to beat us: I shall not breathe freely till I have got rid of the monkey.” Seeing Beni Babu, Matilall seemed somewhat ashamed of himself, and looked a little disconcerted: to his question however as to where he had been, he replied that he had merely been trying to form some idea of the size of the place. When they had entered the house, Matilall ordered Ram the servant to bring him some tobacco, but it was no good giving him the ordinary make; he smoked pipe after pipe of the very strongest, and Ram could not supply him fast enough. It was “Ram bring this!” “Ram, I do not want that!” in fact, Ram could not attend to any other work, but had to be constantly in attendance upon Matilall, keeping him supplied with tobacco. Beni Babu was astounded at such behaviour, and kept turning his head and glancing curiously in his direction. When the time for the evening meal came, Beni Babu took Matilall with him into the zenana side of the house and regaled him with all sorts of luxuries; then having taken the usual betel by way of a digestive, retired to rest. Matilall also retired to his sleeping chamber and got into bed, when he had chewed pán and smoked enough. For some time he tossed restlessly about, now on this side, now on that; and every now and then he would get up and walk about, singing snatches of the love songs of Nil Thakur, or the old story of the separation of Radha and Krishna as told by Ram Basu. At the noise he made, sleep fled from all in the house.

Ram and Pelaram, the gardener, an inhabitant of Kashijora, had been asleep in the common thatched hall used for the family worship. After the work of the day, sleep is a great relief, and to have it rudely disturbed is naturally a source of much irritation. Both Ram and Pelaram were roused from their rest by the noise of the singing. Pelaram exclaimed: “Ah, Ram, my father! I can get no sleep while this bull is bellowing in this way: I might just as well get up and sow some seeds in the garden.” Ram, turning himself round, replied: “Ah, it is midnight! why get up now? The master has done a fine thing in bringing this brat here[7]: it means ruin to us all. The boy is a terrible nuisance: we shall not breathe again till he goes.”

Early next morning, Beni Babu took Matilall away with him to the house of Becharam Banerjea of Bow Bazar. This gentleman was the son of Kenaram Babu, and a man of very old family: he was a childlike, simple-minded man, hair-lipped from his birth, and highly excitable on the smallest provocation. Seeing Beni Babu, he called to him in his peculiar nasal tone: “Come, tell me what is in your mind now?”

Beni.— Well, seeing that Baburam Babu has no relative like yourself in Calcutta, I have come to request of you that his boy Matilall may live in your house while he is attending school, going to Vaidyabati for his Saturday holiday.

Becharam.— Well, there can be no possible objection to that. He is perfectly welcome to come and stay in my house: this is as much his home as his father’s house is. I have no children of my own, and only two nephews; let Matilall then stay with me as long as he pleases.

On hearing Becharam Babu’s nasal twang, Matilall burst out laughing. Beni Babu gave a sigh of disgust, thinking to himself that there would be little peace here so long as such a boy as this was about. Becharam noted the jeering laugh, and observed to Beni Babu, “Ah! friend Beni, the youngster appears somewhat ill-mannered and boorish. I imagine that he must have been constantly indulged from infancy.”

Beni Babu was a very shrewd man. His former history was known to all. He too had led a wild life, but had remedied everything by his own good qualities. He now told himself that if he were to express his real opinion of Matilall, the boy might be ruined: there would be an end to his remaining in Calcutta and to his school education, and it was his own earnest wish that the boy should grow to man’s estate with some sort of training at least. So after exchanging ideas on many other topics, he took his leave of Becharam Babu and went with Matilall to the school of one Mr. Sherborn. Owing to the establishment of the Hindu College, this gentleman’s school had somewhat diminished in numbers: it required all his attention, and constant toil day and night, to keep it going. He himself was a stout man with heavy and bushy eyebrows; was never seen without pán in his mouth and a cane in his hand; and would vary his walks up and down his classes by occasionally sitting down and pulling at a hooka. Beni Babu having placed Matilall at his school, returned to Bally.

CHAPTER IV.
MATILALL IN THE POLICE COURT.

WHEN the British merchants first came to Calcutta, the Setts and Baisakhs were the great traders, but none of the people of the city knew English: all business communications with the foreigners had to be carried on by means of signs. Man will always find a way out of a difficulty if need be, and by means of these signs a few English words get to be known. After the establishment of the Supreme Court, increased attention was paid to English: this was chiefly due to the influence of the law courts. By that time Ram Ram Mistori and Ananda Ram Dass, who were representative men in Calcutta, had learned many English expressions: Ram Narayan Mistori, a pupil of Ram Ram Mistori, was engaged as clerk to an attorney and used to write out petitions for a great many people; he also kept a school, his pupils paying from fourteen to sixteen rupees a month. Following his example, others, as for instance Ram Lochan Napit and Krisha Mohun Basu, adopted the profession of schoolmaster: their pupils used to read some English book and learn the meaning of words by heart. At marriage ceremonies and festivals, everybody would contemplate with awe and astonishment, and loudly applaud, any boy who could utter a few English expressions. Following the example set by others, Mr. Sherborn had opened his school at a somewhat late period, and the children of people belonging to the upper grades of society were being educated at his establishment.

Now boys with a real desire to learn may pick up something or other, by dint of their own exertions, at any school they may be attending. All schools have their good and bad points, and there are a large number of lads so peculiarly constituted that they keep wandering about from school to school, under pretence of being dissatisfied with each one they go to, and think, by passing their time in this unsettled way, to deceive their parents into the belief that they are learning something. So Matilall, after attending Mr. Sherborn’s school for a few days, had himself entered anew at the school of a Mr. Charles.

The chief end in view in all education is the development of a good disposition and a high character, the growth of a right understanding, and the attainment of a thorough mastery of any work that may have to be attended to in the practical business of life. If the education of children is conducted on these lines, they may become in every way respectable members of society, competent to understand and duly execute all their business both at home and abroad. But to ensure that such a training shall be given, both parents and teachers have need to exert themselves. The young will naturally follow in the footsteps of their elders. Goodness in the parents is a necessary condition of the growth of goodness in the children. If a drunken father forbids his child liquor, why should the child listen to him? If a father, himself addicted to immorality, attempts to instruct a son in morals, he will at once recall the mousing cat that professed asceticism[8], and will only mock at his hypocrisy. The son whose father lives a virtuous life has no great need of advice and counsel: mere observation of his father will generate a good disposition. The mother too must keep her attention constantly fixed on her child: there is nothing so potent in its humanising effect on a child’s mind as a mother’s sweet conversation, kindness and caresses. A child’s good behaviour is assured when he distinctly realises that if he does certain things, his mother will not take him into her lap and caress him. Again, it is the teacher’s duty to guard against making a mere parrot of his pupil, when he is teaching him by book. If a boy has to get all he reads by heart, his faculty of memory may be strengthened, it is true; but if his intelligence is not promoted, and he gets no practical knowledge, then his education is all a sham. Whether the pupil be old or young, the matter should be explained to him in such a way that his mind may grasp what he is learning. By a good system of education, and judicious tact in teaching, an intelligent comprehension of a subject may be effected such as no amount of mere chiding will bring about.

Matilall had learned nothing of morality or good conduct in his Vaidyabati home, and now his residence in Bow Bazar proved a curse rather than a blessing. Becharam Babu had two nephews, whose names were Haladhar and Gadadhar. These boys had never known what it was to have a father; and though they occasionally went to school out of fear of their mother and uncle, it was more of a sham than anything else. They mostly wandered at their pleasure, unchecked, about the streets, the river ghâts, the terraced roofs of houses and the open common; and they utterly refused to listen to anybody who tried to restrain them. When their mother remonstrated, they would just retort: “If you do this we will both of us run away;” so they were left to do pretty much as they pleased. They found Matilall one of their own sort, and within a very short time a close intimacy sprang up between them; they became quite inseparable; would sit together, eat together, and sleep together; would put their hands on each other’s shoulders and go about both in doors and out of doors hand in hand, or with their arms round each other’s necks. Whenever Becharam’s wife saw them, she would say: “They are three brothers, sons of one mother.”

Neither children nor youths nor old men can remain for any length of time passive or engaged in one kind of occupation: they must have some way of dividing the twenty-four hours of the day and night between a variety of occupations. In the case of children, special arrangements will have to be made to ensure their having a combination of amusement with instruction. Neither continuous play nor continuous work is a good thing. The chief object of all recreation is to enable a man to pay greater attention to his labour afterwards, his body refreshed by relaxation. The mind only becomes enfeebled by unbroken exertion, and anything learnt in that condition simply floats about on the surface without sinking into it. But in all games there is this to be considered, that those only are beneficial in which there is a certain amount of bodily exertion; no benefit is to be derived from cards or dice or any pastimes of that kind: the only effect of such amusements is to increase the natural tendency to idleness, which is the source of such a variety of evils. Just as there is no good to be derived from unceasing work, so by continuous play the intelligence is apt to get blunted, for thereby the body only is strengthened, the mind is not disciplined at all; and as the latter must be engaged in something or other, is it to be wondered at that in such a condition it should adopt an evil rather than a good course? It is thus that many boys come to grief.

Matilall and his companions Haladhar and Gadadhar roamed about everywhere like so many Brahmini bulls, doing just as they pleased and paying no attention to any one. They were constantly amusing themselves either with cards and dice or else with kites and pigeon-flying. They could find no time either for regular meals or for sleep. If a servant came to call them into the house, they would only abuse him, and refuse to go in. If ever the maid came to tell them that her mistress could not retire to rest until they had had their supper, they would abuse her in a disgraceful manner. The maid-servant would sometimes retort: “What courteous language you have learned!” All the most worthless boys of the neighbourhood gradually collected together and formed a band. Noise and confusion reigned supreme in the house all day and night, and people in the reception-room could not hear each other’s voices: the only sounds were those of uproarious merriment. So much tobacco and ganja was consumed that the whole place was darkened with smoke: no one dared pass by that way when this company was assembled, and there was not a man who would venture to forbid such conduct. Becharam Babu indeed was disgusted when the smell of the tobacco reached him, as it occasionally did; but he would only give vent to his favourite exclamation of disgust and impatience.

Most terrible of all evils are the evils that spring from association with others. Even where there is unremitting attention on the part of parents and teachers, evil company may bring ruin; but where no such effort is made, the extent of corruption that association with others brings about cannot be estimated in language. Matilall’s character, far from improving, was, by the aid of his present associates, deteriorating day by day. He might attend school for one or two days in the week, but would merely remain seated there like a dummy, treating the whole thing as a supreme bore. He was continually joking with the other boys or drawing on his slate; would scarce attend for five minutes together to his lessons; and could think of nothing but the fine time he would have with his companions out of school. There are teachers possessed of sufficient skill and tact to draw to the acquisition of knowledge the mind of even such a boy as Matilall: being acquainted with various methods of imparting instruction, they adopt that which is likely to prove most efficacious in each particular case. Now the teaching in Mr. Charles school was as indifferent as the teaching in Government schools often is at the present day. Equal attention was not paid to all the classes and all the boys, and no pains were taken to ascertain whether they thoroughly understood the easy books they had to read before they proceeded to more difficult ones. A good many people are firmly convinced that a school derives its importance from the number of books prescribed, and the amount read. It was considered quite sufficient for the boys to repeat their lessons by heart: it was not supposed to be necessary to know whether they understood or not; and it was never taken into consideration at all whether the education they were receiving was one that would fit them for the practical business of afterlife. Unless influences are very strong in their favour, boys attending such schools have not much chance of receiving any education at all. Take into account Matilall’s father, the companions he had collected about him, the place he was living in, the school he was attending, and some idea may be formed of the extent of his intellectual training.

Teachers vary as much as schools do. One man will take immense pains, while another will simply trifle away his times, fidgetting about and pulling his moustache. Mr. Charles’ factotum was Bakreswar Babu, of Batalata; and he could do nothing without him. This man made it his practice to visit his pupils’ rich parents, and say to them all alike: “Ah sir, I always pay special attention to your boy! he is the true son of his father: he is no ordinary boy, that: he is a perfect model of a boy.” Bakreswar Babu had charge of the education of the higher classes in the school, but it was exceedingly doubtful whether he himself understood what he taught. If this had got generally known he would have been disgraced for life, so he kept very quiet on the subject. His sole work was to make the boys read; and if any boy asked him for the meaning of a word, he would bid him look in the dictionary. He was bound of course to make a few corrections here and there in the translation exercises the boys did for him; for if he were to pass them all as correct, where would be his occupation as a school-master? So he would make corrections, even when there was no necessity for doing so, and when by doing so he actually made mistakes which did not exist before: then if the boys asked him what he was about, he would tell them they were very insolent and had no business to contradict him. He generally paid most attention to rich men’s sons, and would question them at length about the rents and value of their property. In a very short time, Matilall became a great favourite with Bakreswar Babu: the boy would bring him presents of flowers or fruit or books, or handkerchiefs. Bakreswar Babu’s idea was that he ought not to let boys like Matilall slip out of his hands, for when they reached man’s estate, they might become as a “field of beguns”[9] to him,— a perpetual source of profit. What benefit too, he thought, would he derive in the next world from looking after the affairs of this school!

The time of the great autumn festival, the Durga Pujah, had now arrived. In the bazaars and everywhere there was a great stir, and the general bustle and confusion gave additional zest to Matilall’s passion for amusement. He suffered agonies so long as he had to remain in school: his attention was perpetually distracted; at one moment sitting at his desk, at the next playing on it; never still for a single moment. One Saturday he had been attending school as usual, and having got a half-holiday out of Bakreswar Babu, had left for home. On his way he purchased some betel and pán, and was proceeding merrily along, his whole attention fixed on the pigeon and kite shops that lined the road, and taking no note of the passers-by, when suddenly a sergeant of police and some constables came up and caught him by the arm, the sergeant telling him that he held a warrant for his arrest, and that he must go quietly along with him. Matilall did his best to get his arm free, but the sergeant was a powerful man and kept a firm grasp as he dragged him along. Matilall next threw himself on the ground and, bruised all over and covered with dust as he was, made repeated efforts to escape: the sergeant thereupon hit him with his fist several times. At last, as he lay overpowered on the ground, the thought of his father caused the boy to burst into tears, and there rose forcibly in his mind the question: “Why have I acted as I have done? Association with others has been my ruin.” A crowd now began to collect in the road, and people asked each other what was the matter. Some old women discussing the affair inquired: “Whose child is this that they are beating so?— the child with the moon-face? ah, it makes one’s heart bleed to hear him cry!” The sun had not set when Matilall was brought to the police-station: there he found Haladhar, Gadadhar, Ramgovinda and Dolgovinda, with other boys from his neighbourhood, all standing aside, looking extremely woe-begone. Mr. Blaquiere was police magistrate at that time, and it would have been his business to examine the prisoners; but he had gone home, so they had to remain for the night in the lock-up.

CHAPTER V.
BABURAM IN CALCUTTA.

SINGING snatches of a popular love-song:—

“For my lost love’s sake I am dying:”
“And my heart is faint with sighing.”

and varying his song with whistling, Meeah Jan, a cartman, was urging his bullocks along the road, abusing them roundly for their slowness, twisting their tails, and whacking them with his whip. A few clouds were overhead, and a little rain was falling. The bullocks as they went lumbering along, succeeded in overtaking the hired gharry in which Premnarayan Mozoomdar was travelling. It was swaying from side to side in the wind: the two horses were wretched specimens of their kind, and must surely have belonged to the far-famed race of the Pakshiraj, king of birds. They were doing their best to get along, poor beasts, but notwithstanding the blows that rained down on their backs from the driver’s whip, their pace did not mend very considerably. Before starting on his journey, Premnarayan had eaten a very hearty meal, and at each jolt of the gharry his heart was in his mouth. His disgust however increased as the bullock cart drew ahead of his vehicle. Premnarayan need not be blamed for this. Every man has some self-respect which he does not care to lose. The majority have a high opinion of themselves, and while some lose their tempers if there is the slightest failing in the respect they think due to them, others feel humiliated and depressed.

Premnarayan, in his passion, expressed his thoughts thus to himself:— “Ah! what a hateful thing is service. The servant is regarded as no better than a dog! he must run to execute any order that is given. How long has my soul been vexed by the rude behaviour of Haladhar, Gadadhar, and the other boys! They would never let me eat or sleep in peace: they have even composed songs in derision of me: their jests have been as irritating to me as ant-bites; they have signalled to other boys in the street to annoy me: they have gone so far as to clap their hands at me behind my back. Can any one submit tamely to such treatment as this? It is enough to drive a sane man out of his senses. I must have a good stock of courage not to have run away from Calcutta long ago: it is due to my good genius only that so far I have not lost my employment. At last the scoundrels have met with their desserts: may they now rot in jail, never to get out again! Yet after all these are idle words; is not my journey being made with the express object of effecting their release? has not this duty been imposed upon me by my employer? Alas, I have no voice in the matter! if men are not to starve, they must do and bear all this.”

Baburam Babu of Vaidyabati was seated in all a Babu’s state; his servant, Hari, was rubbing his master’s feet. Seated on one side of him the pandits were discussing some trivial points relating to certain observances enjoined by the Shástras, such as:— “Pumpkins may be eaten to-day, beguns should not be eaten to-morrow; to take milk with salt is quite as bad as eating the flesh of cows.” On the other side of him, some friends were engaged in a game of chess: one of them was in deep thought, his head supported on his hand: evidently his game was up, he was checkmated. Some musicians in the room were mingling their harmonies, their instruments twanging noisily. Near him were his mohurrirs writing up their ledgers, and before him stood sundry creditors, tenants of his, and tradesmen from the bazaar, some of whose accounts were passed, and others refused. People kept thronging into the reception-room. Certain of his tradespeople were explaining how they had been supplying him for years with one-thing and another, and now were in great distress, having hitherto received nothing by way of payment; how, moreover, from their constant journeyings to and fro, their business was being utterly neglected and ruined. Retail shopkeepers too, such as oilmen, timber-merchants and sweetmeat-sellers, were complaining bitterly that they were ruined, and that their lives were not worth a pin’s head: if he continued to treat them as he was doing, they could not possibly live: they had worn out the muscles of their legs in their constant journeyings to and fro to get payment: their shops were all shut, their wives and children starving. The whole time of the Babu’s dewan was taken up in answering these people. “Go away for the present,” he was saying, “you will receive payment all right; why do you jabber so much?” Did any of them venture to remonstrate, Baburam Babu would scowl, abuse him roundly, and have him forcibly ejected from the room.

A great many of the wealthy Babus of Bengal take the goods of the simple country-folk on credit: it would give them an attack of fever to have to pay ready-money for anything. They have the cash in their chests, but if they were not to keep putting their creditors off, how could they keep their reception-rooms crowded? Whether a poor tradesman lives or dies is no concern of theirs; only let them play the magnifico, and their fathers’ and grandfathers’ names be kept before the public! Many there are who thus make a false show of being rich; they present a splendid figure before the outside world, while within they are but men of straw after all.

“Out of doors you flaunt it bravely, wealth is in your very air:” “In the house the rats are squealing, and the cupboard’s mostly bare.”

It would be death to them to be obliged to regulate their expenditure by their income, for then they could not be the owners of gardens or live the luxurious life of the rich Babu. By keeping up a fine exterior they hope to throw dust in the eyes of their tradesmen. When they take money or goods from others, they practically borrow twice over; for when pressure is brought to bear upon them to make them pay, they borrow from one man only to pay what they owe someone else; and when at last a summons is issued against them, they register their property under another person’s name, and are off somewhere out of the way for the time being.

Baburam Babu was devoted to his money and very close-fisted[10]: it was always a great grief to him to be obliged to take cash out of his chest. He was engaged in wrangling with his tradespeople when Premnarayan arrived, and whispered in his ear the news from Calcutta. Baburam was thunderstruck for a time. When shortly after he recovered himself, he had Mokajan Meeah summoned to his presence. Now Mokajan was skilled in all matters of law. zemindars, indigo planters, and others were continually going to him for advice; for a man like this, gifted with such ability for making up cases, for suborning witnesses, for getting police and other officers of the court under his thumb, for disposing secretly of stolen property, for collecting witnesses in cases of disputes, and generally for making right appear wrong and wrong right, was not to be found every day. Out of compliment to him, people all called him Thakchacha.: this was a great gratification to him, and his thoughts often shaped themselves thus: “Ah, my birth must have taken place at an auspicious moment! my observances of the seasons of Ramjan and Eed, have answered well; and if I am only properly attentive to my patron saint, I fancy my importance will increase still further.” Though engaged in his ablutions at the time that Baburam Babu’s peremptory summons reached him, he came away at one and listened, in private, to all Baburam had to say. After a few minutes’ reflection, he said: “Why be alarmed, Babu? How many hundred cases of a similar kind have I disposed of! Is there any great difficulty in the way this time? I have some very clever fellows in my employ; I have only to take them with me, and will win the case on their testimony: you need be under no apprehension. I am going away just now, but I will return the first thing in the morning.”

Baburam, though somewhat encouraged by these words, was still not at all comfortable in his mind. He was much attached to his wife, and everything she said was always, in his view, shrewdly to the point: were she to say to him. “This is not water, it is milk,” with the evidence of his own eyes against him, he would reply: “Ah, you are quite right! this is not water, it is milk. If the mistress of the house says so, it must be so.” Most men, whatever the affection they have for their wives are at least able to exercise some discretion as to the matters in which those ladies are to be consulted and to what extent they should be listened to. Good men love their wives with heartfelt affection; but if they are to accept everything their wives say they may just as well dress in saris, and sit at home. Now Baburam Babu was entirely under his wife’s thumb: if she bade him get up, he would get up; if she bade him sit down, he would sit down.

Some months before this, she had presented her husband with a son, and she was busy nursing the infant on her lap, her two daughters seated by her. Their conversation was running on household affairs and other matters, when suddenly the master of the house came into the room and sitting down with a very sad countenance, said: “My dear wife, I am most unlucky! The one idea of my life has been to hand over the charge of all my property to Matilall on his reaching man’s estate, and to go and live with you at Benares[11]; but all my hopes have, I fear, been dashed to the ground.”

The Mistress of the House.— my dear husband, what is the matter? Quick, tell me! my breast is heaving with emotion. Is all well with my darling Matilall?

The Master.— yes, so far as his health goes he is well enough, but I have just received news that the police have apprehended him and put him in jail.

The Mistress.— What was that you said? They have dragged away Matilall to prison? And why, O why, my husband, have they imprisoned him? Alas, alas! The poor boy must be a mass of bruises! I expect, too, he has had nothing to eat and not been able to get any sleep. O my husband, what is to be done? Do bring my darling Matilall back to me again!

With this, the mistress of the house began to weep: her two daughters wiped away the tears from her eyes, and tried their best to console their mother. The infant too seeing its mother crying, began to howl lustily.

In the course of his enquiries, made under pretence of conversation, her husband got to know that Matilall had been in the habit, under one pretext or another, of getting money out of her. She had not mentioned the matter to her husband for fear of his displeasure: the boy had been unfortunate, and she could not tell what might have happened if he had got angry. Wives ought to tell all that concerns their children to their husbands, for a disease that is concealed from the surgeon can never be cured. After a long consultation with his wife, the master sent off a letter by night, to arrange for some of his relatives to meet him in Calcutta at his lodgings.

A night of happiness passes away in the twinkling of an eye, but how slowly drag the hours when the mind is sunk in an abyss of painful thought! It may be close to dawn, and the day may be every moment drawing nearer, but yet it seems to tarry. Ways and means occupied the whole of Baburam Babu’s thoughts throughout the night: he could no longer remain quietly in the house, and long before the morning came was in a boat with Thakchacha and his companions. As the tide was running strong, the boat soon reached the Bagbazaar Ghât.

Night had nearly come to an end: oil-dealers were busy putting their mills in order, ready to work: cartmen were leading their bullocks off to their day’s toil: the washermen’s donkeys were labouring with their loads upon the road: men were hurrying along at a swing-trot with loads of fish and vegetables. The pandits of the place were all off with their sacred vessels to the river for their morning bathe; the women were collecting at the different ghâts and exchanging confidences with each other. “I am suffering agonies from my sister-in-law’s cruelty,” said one. “Ah, my spiteful mother-in-law!” exclaimed another. “Oh, my friends!” cried another, “I have no wish to live any longer, my daughter-in-law tyrannises over me so, and my son says nothing to her; in fact, she has made my son like a sheep with her charms.” “Alas!” said another, “I have such a wretch of a sister-in-law! she tyrannises over me day and night.” Another lamented, “My darling child is now ten years old; my life is so uncertain, it is high time for me to think of getting him married.”

There had been rain in the night, and patches of cloud were still to be seen in the sky; the roads and the steps of the ghâts were all slippery in consequence. Baburam Babu puffed away at his hooka and looked out for a hired gharry or a palki, but he would not agree to the fare demanded: it was a great deal too much to his mind. When the boys who had collected in the road saw how Baburam Babu was chaffering, some of them said to him: “Had you not better, sir, be carried in a coolie’s basket? The charge for that will be only two pice.” As Baburam Babu ran after them and tried to hit them, roundly abusing them the while, he fell heavily to the ground. The boys only laughed at this and clapped their hands at him from a safe distance. Baburam with a woe-begone countenance then got into a gharry with Thakchacha and his companions. The gharry went creaking along, and eventually pulled up at the house of Bancharam Babu, of Outer Simla.

Bancharam Babu was the principal agent of a Mr. Butler, an attorney living inBoitakhana; he had had a good deal of experience in the law-courts and in cases-at-law: though his pay was only fifty rupees a month, there was no limit to his gains, and festivals were always in full swing in his house.

Beni Babu of Bally, Becharam Babu of Bow Bazar, and Bakreswar Babu of Batalata, were all seated in his sitting-room, waiting for Baburam Babu. With the arrival of that worthy the business of the day commenced.

Becharam.— Oh Baburam, what a venomous reptile have you been nourishing all this time! You would never listen to me, though time after time I sent word to you. Your boy Matilall has pretty well done for his chances in this world and in the next: he drinks his fill, he gambles[12], he eats things forbidden: caught in the very act of gambling, he struck a policeman: Haladhar, Gadadhar, and other boys were with him at the time. Having no children of my own, I had fondly thought that Haladhar and Gadadhar would be as sons to me, to offer the customary libation to my spirit when I was no more, but my hopes are as goor into which sand has fallen. I really have no words to express my disgust at the boy’s behaviour.

Baburam.— Which of them has corrupted the other it may be very difficult to say with any certainty; but just now please tell me how I am to proceed with reference to the investigation.

Becharam.— So far as I am concerned, you may do exactly as you think fit. I have been put to very great annoyance. The boys have been going into the temple at night and drinking heavily there: they have made the beams black with the smoke from tobacco and ganja: they have stolen my gold and silver ornaments and sold them; and one day they even went so far as to threaten to grind the holy shalgram to powder and eat it with their betel in lieu of lime. Can you expect me then to subscribe towards their release? Ugh! certainly not.

Bakreswar.— Matilall is not so bad as all that: I have seen a good deal of him at school: he has naturally a good disposition. He was no ordinary boy; he was a perfect model of behaviour: how then he can have become what you describe is beyond me.

Thakchacha.— May I ask what need there is of all this irrelevant talk? We are not likely to get our stomachs filled by simply chatting of oil and straw: let a case be thoroughly well got up for the trial.

Bancharam [highly delighted at the prospect of making a good thing out of the case].— Matters of business require a man of business. Thakchacha’s words are shrewdly to the point: we must get a few good witnesses together and have them thoroughly instructed in their role betimes; we must also engage our friend Mr. Butler the attorney. If after all that we do not win our case, I will take it up to the High Court. Then if the High Court can do nothing, I will go up to the Council with the case; and if the Council can do nothing, we must carry it to England for appeal. You may put implicit confidence in me: I am not a man to be trifled with[13]. But nothing can be done unless we secure the services of Mr. Butler. He is a thoroughly practical man: knows all manner of contrivances for upsetting cases, and trains his witnesses as carefully as a man trains birds.

Bakreswar.— A keen intelligence is needed in time of misfortune. A very careful preparation for the trial is required: why be jeered at for want of it?

Bancharam.— So clever an attorney as Mr. Butler it has never fallen to my lot to see. I have no language capable of expressing his astuteness: three words will suffice for him to have all these cases dismissed. Come, gentlemen, rise and let us go to him.

Beni.— Pardon me, sir, I could not do what I know to be wrong, even were my life at stake! I am prepared to follow your advice in most matters, but I cannot risk my chances of happiness in the next world. It is best to acknowledge a fault if one has really been committed: there is no danger in truth, whereas to take refuge in a lie only intensifies an evil.

Thakchacha.— Ha! ha! what business have bookworms with law? The very mention of the word sets them all atremble! If we take the course this gentleman advises, we may as well at once prepare our graves! Sage counsels indeed to listen to!

Bancharam.— At this rate, gentlemen, it will be the case of the old proverb over again,— “The festival is over, and your preparations still progressing.” I have no doubt that Beni Babu is a man of very solid parts; why, in the Niti Shástras, he is a second Jagannath Tarkapanchanan! I shall have to go some day to Bally to hold an argument with him, but we have no time for that just now; we must be up and doing.

Becharam.— Ah, Beni my friend, I am quite of your mind! I am getting an old man now: already three periods of my life have passed away and one only is left to me. I too will do no wrong, even if my life be at stake. Who are these boys that I should do what is wrong for them? They have made my life a perfect burden to me. Shall I be put to any expense for them? Certainly not: they may go to jail for all I care, and then perhaps I may contrive to live in peace. Why should I trouble myself any more about them? The very sight of their faces makes my blood boil. Ugh! the young wretches!

CHAPTER VI.
MATILALL’S MOTHER AND SISTERS.

THE Vaidyabati house was all astir with preparations for a religious ceremonial. The sun had not risen when Shridhar Bhattacharjea, Ram Gopal Charamani and other Brahman priests, set to work repeating mantras. All were employed upon something: one was offering the sacred basil to the deity: some were busy picking the leaves of the jessamine: others humming and beating time on their cheeks. One was remarking: “I am no Brahman if good fortune does not attend the sacrifices;” and another, “If things turn out inauspiciously, I will abandon my sacred thread.” The whole household was busily engaged, but not a member of it was happy in mind. The mistress of the house was sitting at an open window and calling in her distress upon her guardian deity: her infant boy lay near her, playing with a toy and tossing his little limbs in the air. Every now and again she glanced in the direction of the child, and said to herself: “Ah my darling, I cannot say what kind of destiny awaits you! To be childless is a single sorrow and anxiety: multiplied a hundred-fold is the misery that comes with children. How is a mother’s mind distracted if her child has the slightest complaint! she will cheerfully sacrifice her life in order to get him well again: so long as her babe is ill, all capacity for food and sleep deserts her: day and night to her are alike. If a child who has caused her so much sorrow grows up good, she feels her work accomplished; but if the contrary be the case, a living death is hers: she takes no interest in anything in the world and cares not to show herself in the neighbourhood. The haughty face grows wan and pinched: in her inmost heart, like Sita, she gives expression to this wish: ‘Oh, Earth, Earth, open, and let me hide myself within thy bosom!’ The good God knows what trouble I have taken to make Matilall a man: my young one has now learned to fly, and heavy is my chastisement. How it grieves me to hear of such evil conduct: I am almost heartbroken with sorrow and chagrin. I have not told my husband all: he might have gone mad had he heard all. Away with these thoughts! I can endure them no longer: I am but a weak woman. What will such laments avail me now? what must be, must be.”

A maid-servant came in at that moment and took the child away, and the mistress of the house engaged in her daily religious duties.

Man’s mind is so constituted that it cannot readily forget any particular matter it may be absorbed in, to attend to other affairs in hand. When therefore she tried to perform her usual devotions, she found herself unable to do so. Again and again she set herself to fix her attention on the mantras she had to repeat, but her mind kept wandering: the thought of Matilall surged up like a strong and irresistible flood. At one time she fancied that the orders for his imprisonment had been passed, and her imagination depicted him as already in fetters, and being led off to jail: she even thought she saw his father standing near him, his head bowed down in woe, weeping bitterly; and again she almost fancied that her son was come to see her, and was saying to her: “Mother, forgive me: what is past cannot now be mended, but I will never again cause you such trouble and sorrow.” She then began to dream of some great calamity as about to befall Matilall,— that he would be transported perhaps for life. When these phantoms of her imagination had left her, she began to say to herself: “Why, it is now high noon! can I have been dreaming? No, surely this is no dream! I must have seen a vision. I wish I could tell why my mind is so distracted to-day!” With these words she laid herself silently down on the ground, and wept bitterly.

Her two daughters, Mokshada and Pramada, were busy drying their hair on the roof, and Mokshada was saying to her sister: “Why sister Pramada, you have not half combed your hair, and how dry it is too! But it must be so, for it is ages since a drop of oil fell upon it. It is just the use of oil and water that keeps people in good health: to bathe once a month, and without using oil, would be bad for any one. But why are you so wrapped in thought? anxiety and trouble are making you as thin as a string.”

Pramada.— Ah, my sister, how can I help thinking? Cannot you understand it all? Our father brought the son of a Kulin Brahmin here when I was a mere child and married me to him. I only heard about this when I was grown up. Considering the number of the different places where he has contracted marriage, and considering his personal character too, I have no wish to see his face: I would rather not have a husband at all than such a one.

Mokshada.— Hush, my dear! you must not say that. It is an advantage to a woman to have a husband alive, whether his character be bad or good.

Pramada.— Listen then to what I have to tell you. Last year, when I was suffering from intermittent fever and had been lying long days and nights on my bed, too weak to rise, my husband came one day to the house. From the time of my earliest impressions, I had never seen what a husband was like: my idea was that there was no treasure a woman could possess like a husband, and I thought that if he only came and sat with me for a few moments and spoke to me, my pain would be alleviated. But, my sister you will not believe me when I say it! he came to my bedside, and said: “You are my lawful wife, I married you sixteen years ago: I have come to see you now because I am in need of money, and will go away again directly: I have told your father that he has cheated me: come, give me that bracelet off your wrist!” I told him that I would first ask my mother, and would do what she bade me. Thereupon he pulled the bracelet off my wrist by brute force; and when I struggled to prevent his doing so, he gave me a kick and left me. I fainted away, and did not recover till mother came and fanned me.

Mokshada.— Oh my dear sister Pramada, your story brings tears into my eyes. But consider, you still have a husband living: I have not even that.

Pramada.— A fine husband indeed, my sister! Happily for me, I once spent some time with my uncle, and learned to read and write and to do a little fancy work with my needle; so by constant work during the day and by a little occasional reading, writing or sewing, I keep my trouble hidden. If I sit idle for any time, and begin to think, my heart burns with indignation.

Mokshada.— What else can it do? Ah, it is because of the many sins committed by us in previous births that we are suffering as we are! It is by plenty of hard work that our bodies and minds retain their vigour: idleness only causes evil thoughts and evil imaginations and even disease to get a stronger hold upon us: it was uncle that told me that. I have done all I can to soften the pains of widowhood. I always reflect that everything is in God’s hands: reliance upon Him is the real secret of life. My dear sister, if you so constantly ponder on your grief, you will be overwhelmed in the ocean of anxiety: it is an ocean that has no shore. What good can possibly result from so much brooding? Just do all your religious and secular duties as well as you can: honour our father and mother in everything: attend to the welfare of our two brothers: nourish and cherish any children they may have, and they will be as your own.

Pramada.— Ah my sister, what you say is indeed true, but then our elder brother has gone altogether astray. He is given over to vicious ways and vicious companions; and as his disposition has changed for the worse, so his affection for his parents and for us has lessened. Ah, the affection that brothers have for their sisters is not one-hundredth part of the affection that sisters have for their brothers! In their devotion to their brothers, sisters will even risk their lives; but brothers always think that they will get on much better if they can only be rid of their sisters! We are Matilall’s elder sisters: if he comes near us at all, he may perhaps make himself agreeable for a short time, and we may congratulate ourselves upon it; but then have no any influence whatever upon his conduct?

Mokshada.— All brothers are not like that. There are brothers who regard their elder sisters as they would their mother, and their younger sisters as they would a daughter. I am speaking the truth: there are brothers who look upon their sisters in the same light as they do their brothers: they are unhappy unless they are free to converse with them; and if they fall into any danger, they risk their lives to save them.

Pramada.— That is very true, but it is our lot to have a brother just in keeping with our unhappy destiny. Alas, there is no such thing as happiness in this world!

At this moment, a maid-servant came to tell them her mistress was crying: the two sisters rushed downstairs as soon as they heard it.

It was a fine moonlight evening, the moon shedding her radiance over the breadth of the Ganges. A gentle breeze was diffusing the sweet fragrance of the wild jungle flowers; the waves danced merrily in the moonlight: the birds in a neighbouring grove were calling to each other in their varied notes. Beni Babu was seated at the Deonagaji Ghât, looking about him and singing snatches of some up-country song on the loves of Krishna and Radha. He was completely absorbed in his music and was beating time to it, when suddenly he heard somebody behind him calling his name and echoing his song. Turning round, he saw Becharam Babu of Bow Bazar: he at once rose, and invited his guest to take a seat.

Becharam opened the conversation. “Ah! Beni, my friend! those were home truths you told Baburam Babu to-day. I have been invited to your village: and as I was so pleased with what I saw of you the other day, I wanted to come and call on you just once before leaving.”

Beni.— Ah, my friend Becharam, we are poor sort of folk here! We have to work for our living: we prefer to visit places where the secrets of knowledge or virtue are investigated. We have a good many rich relatives and acquaintances, but we feel embarrassed in their presence; we visit them very occasionally, when we have fallen into any trouble, or have any very particular business on hand. It is never a pleasure to call on upon them, and when we do go we derive no intellectual benefit from the visit; for whatever respect rich men may show to other rich men, they have not much to say to us; they just remark “It is very hot to-day. How is your business getting on? Is it flourishing? Have a smoke?” If only they speak cheerfully and pleasantly to us, we are fully satisfied. Ah, learning and worth have nothing like the respect shown to them that is shown to wealth! Paying court to rich men is a very dangerous thing: there is a popular saying:— “The friendship of the rich is an embankment made of sand.” Their moods are capricious: a trifle will offend them just as a trifle will please them. People do not consider this: wealth has such magic in it that they will put up with any humiliation, any indignity from a rich man; they will even submit to a thrashing, and say to the rich man after it:— “It is your honour’s good pleasure.” However this be, it is a hard thing to live with the rich and not forfeit one’s chances of happiness in the next world. In that affair of to-day, for instance, we had a hard struggle for the right.

Becharam.— From observation of Baburam Babu’s general behaviour, I am inclined to think that his affairs are not prospering. Alas, alas, what counsellors he has got! That wretched Mahomedan, Thakchacha, a prince of rogues! there is an evil magic in him. Then Bancharam, the attorney’s clerk! he is like a fine mango, fair outside but rotten at the core. Well-practised in all the arts of chicanery, like a cat treading stealthily along in the wet, he simulates innocence while all the while exercising his wiles to entrap his prey. Anybody falling under the influence of that sorcery would be utterly, and for ever, ruined. Then there is Bakreswar the schoolmaster, a teacher of ethics forsooth! A passed master indeed in the art of cajolery, a very prince of flatterers! Ugh! But tell me, is it your English education that has given you this high moral standard?

Beni.— Have I this high moral standard you attribute to me? It is only your kindness to say so. The slight acquaintance I have with morality is entirely due to the kind favour of Barada Babu, of Badaragan: I lived with him for some time, and he very kindly gave me some excellent advice.

Becharam.— Who is this Barada Babu? Please tell me some particulars about him. It is always a pleasure to me to hear anything of this kind.

Beni.— Barada Babu’s home is in Eastern Bengal, in Pergunnah Etai Kagamari. On the death of his father he moved to Calcutta, and found great difficulty at first in providing himself with food and clothing: he had not even the wherewithal to buy his daily meal. But from his boyhood he had always engaged in meditation upon divine things, and so it was that when trouble befell him it did not affect him so much. At this time he used to live in a common tiled hut, his only means of subsistence being the two rupees a month which he received from a younger brother of his father’s. He was on terms of intimacy with a few good men and would associate with none but these: he was very independent, and refused to be under obligations to anybody. Not having the means to keep either a man-servant or a maid-servant, he did all his own marketing, cooking for himself as well; and he did not neglect his studies even when he was cooking. Morning noon and night, he calmly and peacefully meditated on God. The clothes in which he attended school were torn and dirty, and excited the derision of rich men’s sons: he pretended not to hear them when they laughed and jeered at him, and eventually succeeded by his pleasant and courteous address in winning them completely over. With very many, pride is the only result of English learning: they scorn the very earth they live on. This however found no place in the mind of Barada Babu: his disposition was too calm and mild. When he had completed his education he left school, and at once obtained employment as a teacher, on thirty rupees a month. He then took his mother, his wife and his two nephews to live with him, and did his very utmost to make them comfortable. He would also look after the wants of the many poor people living in his immediate neighbourhood, helping them, as far as his means allowed, with money, visiting them when they were sick, and supplying them with medicine. As none of these poor people could afford to send their children to school, he held a class for them himself every morning. One of his cousins who had fallen dangerously ill after his father’s death, recovered entirely, thanks to the unremitting attention of Barada Babu, who sat by his bedside for days and nights together. He was deeply devoted to his aunt, and regarded her quite as a mother. Some men appear to have a contempt for the things of this world in comparison with things of eternity, like the contempt for death that is characteristic of those who are in constant attendance at burning-ghâts. Does death or calamity befall any of their friends or kinsfolk, the world, they feel, is nothing, and God all. This idea is constantly present to the mind of Barada Babu: conversation with him and observation of his conduct soon make it apparent; but he never parades his opinions before the world. He is in no sense ostentatious: he never does anything for mere appearance sake. All his good deeds are done in secret: numbers of people meet with kindness from him, but only the person actually benefited by him is aware of it; and he is much annoyed if others get any inkling of it. Though a man of varied accomplishments, he is without a particle of vanity. It is the man who has only a smattering of learning who is puffed up with pride and self-importance. “Aha!” says such a one to himself, “what a very learned man I am! Who can write as I do? Who is so erudite as I? How I always do speak to the point!” Barada Babu is a different sort of man altogether: though his learning is so profound, he never treats the thoughts of others as beneath his attention. It does not annoy him to hear an opinion expressed opposite to his own: on the contrary, he listens with pleasure, and reviews his own beliefs. To describe in detail all his good qualities would be a long affair, but they may be summed up in the remark that so gentle and god-fearing a man has rarely been seen: he could not do wrong even if his life were at stake. Yes, the amount of instruction to be had from personal intercourse with Barada Babu far exceeds any to be got from books!

Becharam.— Ah, how it charms one to hear of a man like that! But now, as it is getting very late, and I have to cross the river, I will, with your permission, return home. Let me see you for a moment at the police court to-morrow.

CHAPTER VII.
THE TRIAL OF MATILALL.

VERY strange is this world’s course, and past man’s comprehension. How hard it is to determine the causes of things! When we remember for instance the account of the origin of Calcutta, it will appear almost miraculous; for even in a dream none could have imagined that Calcutta as it was could ever have become Calcutta as it is. The East India Company first had a factory at Hooghly, their factor being Mr. Job Charnock. On one occasion he quarrelled with the leading police official of the place; and as the East India Company did not in those days possess the power and dignity which they afterwards acquired, their agent was maltreated and forced to have recourse to flight. Job Charnock had a house and a bazaar of his own at Barrackpur, which in consequence has been known as Chanak, even down to the present time. He had married a woman whom he had rescued from the funeral pile just as she was about to become a suttee; but whether the marriage contributed to the mutual happiness of each, there is no evidence to show. Job Charnock was constantly journeying to and fro between Barrackpur and Uluberia, where he was building a new factory: it was the wish of his heart to have a factory there, but how many undertakings fall just short of completion[14]! As he journeyed to and fro, he used often to pass by Boitakhana, and would halt for a rest and a smoke under a large tree there. This tree was the favourite resort of many men of business, and Job Charnock was so enamoured of the shade of it that he decided upon building his factory there. The three villages of Sutanati, Govindpur and Calcutta, which he had purchased, soon filled up, and it was not long before people of all classes took up their abode there for trade, and so Calcutta soon became a city, and populous. The first beginnings of Calcutta as a city date from the year 1689 of the Christian era. Job Charnock died some three years after that. In those days the great plain where the Fort and Chowringhee now are was all jungle. The Fort itself formerly stood where the Custom House now stands, and Clive Street was the chief business quarter of the city. So fatal to health was Calcutta at one time considered, that the English gentlemen who had escaped with their lives during the year, would annually meet together on the 15th of November and offer their congratulations to each other. One prominent characteristic of Englishmen is to have everything about them scrupulously clean, and disease gradually diminished as sanitary precautions came more and more into vogue. But the people of Bengal do not take this lesson to heart: to the present day there are tanks near the houses of our wealthiest citizens, which smell so bad that one can hardly approach them.

In former days the duties connected with the Revenue and Criminal Courts and the Police Administration of Calcutta devolved upon a single Englishman: he had a Bengali official as his subordinate, and he himself was called the jemadar. Later on, there came to be other Courts; and with the view of checking the high-handedness of the English in the country, the Supreme Court was established. The administration of the Police was made an independent charge, and was very ably conducted. In the year 1798 of the Christian era, Sir John Richardson and others were employed as Justices of the Peace; and afterwards, in the year 1800, Mr. Blaquiere and others were appointed to hold this office. The jurisdiction of the Justices extended to every part of the country. When it became necessary for the jurisdiction of those who were simply Magistrates to extend beyond their head districts, the assistance of the Judge’s Court of the particular district had to be sought, and consequently many Magistrates in the Mofussil have now been made Justices of the Peace. Mr. Blaquiere has been dead some four years; it was currently reported that his father was an Englishman and his mother a Brahman woman, and that he had received his earliest education in India, but had afterwards gone to England and been well educated there. During his tenure of office as head of the Police Department, Calcutta trembled at his stern severity, and all were afraid of him. After some time he gave up the detective part of his work and the apprehension of criminals, to confine his attention to the trial of prisoners brought before him. He made an excellent judge, being well versed in the language of the country, its customs, manners, and all the inner details of the life of the people. He had the Criminal Law too at his fingers’ ends; and having for some time acted as interpreter to the Supreme Court, was thoroughly well acquainted with the proper method of conducting trials.

Time and water run apace. Monday came. Ten o’clock had just struck by the church clock: the police court was crowded with police officers, sergeants, constables, darogahs, naibs, sub-inspectors, chowkidars, and with all sorts and conditions of people. Some of these were keepers of low lodging-houses and women of loose character, who sat about the Court chewing betel and pán: some, as their bloodstained clothes sufficiently showed were victims of assaults: some were thieves, who sat apart dejected and sad: some, conspicuous by their turbans, were engaged in writing out petitions in English. Some were complainants in the different cases, who tramped noisily about the court; others, who were to be witnesses, were busily whispering to each other: the men who make it their business to provide bail were sitting about as thick as crows at a ghât. Here were pleaders’ touts, using all their arts to get clients for theirmasters: there were pleaders engaged in coaching their witnesses: and here the amlahs were writing out cases that had been sent up by the Police. The sergeants of police looked very important as they marched up and down with proud and pompous port. The chief clerks were discussing different English magistrates: this one was declared to be a great fool, that one a very cunning man, a third too mild and easily imposed upon, a fourth too harsh and rough; they pronounced also an unfavourable criticism on the orders passed the previous day in a particular case. The police court was so crowded, indeed, that it seemed the very Hall of Yama, and all looked forward with fear and trembling to their fate.

Baburam Babu came bustling up to the court, accompanied by his pleader, his counsellor Thakchacha, and some of his relatives. Thakchacha was wearing a conical cap, fine muslin clothes, and the peculiar turned-up shoes of his class. His crystal beads in hand, he was invoking the names of his special guardian genius and his Prophet, and muttering his prayers with repeated shakings of the head; but this was all mere ostentation. A man so full of tricks as Thakchacha is not met with every day. At the police court he spun about hither and thither, for all the world like a peg-top. At one moment he was coaching his witnesses in a whisper; the next, walking about hand in hand with Baburam Babu; the next, consulting with Mr. Butler: in this way he attracted everybody’s attention. Now it is a failing with many people to imagine their fathers and grandfathers (who may have been great rogues in reality) to have been celebrated people, well known to all; and the consequence is that when they have to introduce themselves to others they will do so, saying: “I am the son of so-and-so, and the grandson of so-and-so.” To anybody who came up to converse with Thakchacha, he would introduce himself as the son of Abdul Rahman Gul, and the grandson of Ampak Ghulam Hosain. A sircar in the court, who was fond of his joke, remarked to him: “Come, tell me what is your special business? A few low-class Mahomedans in your own neighbourhood may perhaps know the names of your father and grandfather, but who is likely to know them in this city of Calcutta? perhaps however they carried on the profession of syces.” Thakchacha, his eyes inflamed with passion, replied: “I can say nothing here, as this is the police court: in any other place, I would fall upon you and tear you to pieces.” As he said this, he grasped Baburam Babu’s hand in his, to make the sircar imagine him a man of much importance, held in high honour.

Meanwhile there was a stir near the steps of the police court: a carriage had just driven up: the door was opened, and a withered old gentleman alighted from it. The sergeants of police raised their hats in salute, and called out, “Mr. Blaquiere has arrived.” The magistrate, having taken his seat on the bench, disposed first of some cases of assault. Matilall’s case was then called: The complainants, Kale Khan and Phate Khan, took up their position on one side, while on the other side stood Baburam Babu of Vaidyabati, Beni Babu of Bally, Bakreswar Babu of Batalata, Becharam Babu of Bow Bazar, and Mr. Butler of Boitakhana. Baburam Babu was wearing a fine shawl, and had a gorgeous turban on his head: his sacred caste mark, with the sign of the Hom offering over it, was conspicuous on his forehead. With tears in his eyes, and his hands folded humbly in supplication, he gazed at the magistrate, who, he fondly imagined, would be sure to commiserate him if he saw his tears. Matilall, Haladhar, Gadadhar, and the other accused, were brought before the magistrate: Matilall stood there, with his head bowed low in shame. When Baburam Babu saw the boy’s face pinched from want of food, his heart was pierced. The complainants charged the accused with gambling in a place of ill-fame, and with having effected their escape when arrested by grievously assaulting them; and they stripped and showed the marks of the assault upon their persons. Mr. Butler cross-examined the complainants and their witness at some length, and conclusively showed that there was no case made out against Matilall. This was not at all surprising, considering that for one thing he had all a pleader’s art exercised in his favour, and for another that there was collusion between the complainants and the counsel of the accused. What will not money do? An old proverb[15] runs:—

“Gold for the dotard a fair bride will win.”

Mr. Butler afterwards produced his witnesses, who all declared that on the day the assault was said to have been committed, Matilall was at home at Vaidyabati; but on cross-examination by Mr. Blaquiere, they were not so clear. Thakchacha saw that things were not going well: a slight slip might ruin everything. Most people, reduced to the necessity of having recourse to law, give up all ideas of right and wrong: they sever themselves from all connection with truth, once they have to enter the Law Courts: their sole idea must be to win their case somehow or other. Thakchacha then went forward himself, and gave evidence that on the day and at the time mentioned by the prosecution he was engaged teaching Matilall Persian at his home in Vaidyabati. Though the magistrate subjected him to severe cross-examination, Thakchacha was not a man to be easily confused: he was well up in law-suits, and his original evidence was not shaken in any way. Then Mr. Butler addressed the Court, and after some deliberation the magistrate passed orders that Matilall should be released, but that the other accused should be imprisoned for one calendar month, and pay a fine of thirty rupees each.

Loud were the cries of Hori Bol on the passing of this order, and Baburam Babu shouted: “Oh Incarnation of Justice, most acute is your judgment! soon may you be made Governor of the land!”

When they were all in the courtyard of the police court, Haladhar and Gadadhar caught sight of Premnaryan Mozoomdar, and at once commenced singing in his ear with the intention of annoying him;—

“Hasten homeward, hasten homeward, Premnarayan Mozoomdar,”
“Hop into your native jungle, black-faced monkey that you are!”

Premnarayan only replied: “What wicked boys you are! Here you are going to jail, but you cannot cease your tricks.” While he was still speaking, they were led away to jail. When Beni Babu, who was a very worthy god-fearing man, saw virtue thus defeated and vice triumphant, he was perfectly astounded. Thakchacha, shaking his head and smiling sardonically, said to him: “How now, sir, what does the man of books say now? Why, if we had acted in accordance with your suggestions, it would have been all up with us.” At this moment Bancharam Babu came running up in haste, gesticulating and saying: “Ha! ha! see what comes of trusting me! I told you I was no fool.” Bakreswar too had his say. “Ah, he is no ordinary boy is Matilall! he is a very model of what a boy should be.” “Ugh!” exclaimed Becharam Babu: “It was not I that wished this wrong done: I didn’t want to see this case won, far from it.” Saying this, he took Beni Babu’s hand and went off with him. Baburam Babu having made his offerings at Kali’s shrine at Kalighat, embarked on a boat to return home.

Though the Bengalees have always great pride of caste, it may sometimes fall out that even a Mahomedan may be regarded as worthy of equal honour with the ancestral deity, and Baburam Babu began now to regard Thakchacha as a veritable Bhishma Deva: he put his arms round his neck and forgot everything else in the joy of victory: food and devotions were alike neglected. Again and again they repeated that Mr. Butler had no equal, that there was no one like Bancharam Babu that Becharam Babu and Beni Babu were utter idiots. Matilall gazed all about him, at one moment standing on the edge of the boat, at another pulling an oar, at another sitting on the roof of the cabin or hard at work with the rudder. “What are you doing, boy?” said Baburam to him, “Do sit quiet for a moment, if you can.” One of Baburam Babu’s gardeners, Shankur Mali, of Kashijora, prepared the Babu’s tobacco for him: his heart expanded with joy, when he saw his master looking so happy, and he asked him: “Will you have many nautches at the Durga Pujah this year, sir? Isn’t that a cotton factory over there? How many cotton factories have these unbelievers set up?”

Change is the order of things in this world. Anger cannot long remain latent in the mind, but must reveal itself sooner or later; and so with a storm in nature, when there is great heat, and a calm atmosphere, a squall[16] may suddenly rise. The sun was just setting, the evening coming on, when suddenly, in the twinkling of an eye, a small black cloud rose in the west: in a few minutes deep darkness had overspread the sky, and then with a rushing roar of wind the storm was on them. No one could see his neighbour: the boatmen shouted to each other to look out: the lightning flashed, and all were terrified at the loud and repeated thunder claps: down came the rain like a waterspout, and they were driven to take shelter in the cabin. The waters rose and dashed against the boats, several of which were swamped. Seeing this, the men in the remaining boats struggled hard to get to shore, but the violence of the wind drove them in the opposite direction. Thakchacha’s chattering ceased: frightened out of his senses, and clasping his bead chaplet in his hands, he gabbled aloud his prayers, calling on his Prophet and Patron,— Saint Mahomed Ali, and Satya Pir.

Baburam Babu too was in great anxiety. It seemed to be the beginning of the punishment of his misdeeds: who can remain calm in mind when he is conscious of wrong? Cunning and craft may suffice to conceal a crime from the eye of the world, but nothing can escape the conscience. The sinner is ever at the mercy of its sting: he is always in a state of alarm and dread, never at ease: he may occasionally indulge in laughter, but it is unnatural and forced. Baburam Babu wept from sheer fright, and said to Thakchacha: “Oh, Thakchacha, what is going to happen? I seem to see an untimely death before me! surely this is Nemesis. Alas, alas! to have just effected the release of my son, and yet to be unable to get him safe home and deliver him to his mother: my wife will die of grief if I perish. Ah, now I call to mind the words of my friend Beni Babu: all would have been well had I not turned aside out of the path of rectitude.” Thakchacha too was in a high state of alarm, but the old sinner was a great boaster, and so he answered: “Why be so alarmed, Babu? Even if the boat is swamped, I will take you to shore on my shoulders: it is misfortune that shows what a brave man really is.” The storm increased in violence, and the boat was soon in a sinking condition: all were in an extremity of terror, shouting for help, and Thakchacha’s only thought was his own safety.

CHAPTER VIII.
BABURAM AND MATILALL RETURN HOME.

MR. Butler had just arrived at his office and was overhauling his books to see what business was doing during the current month: his dog was asleep near him. Every now and again the Saheb would whistle, and take a pinch of snuff; then he would examine his account hook or stand up and stretch his legs. He thought anxiously of the large sums he would have to pay as fees in the different offices of the Court[17]: though by no means possessed of large resources, he knew very well that business would be at a standstill if he did not pay his money down before Term opened. He was thus engaged when the sircar of Mr. Howard, another attorney, entered his office, and put two papers into his hand. The Saheb’s face beamed with delight, and he called out to Bancharam to come to him at once. Bancharam, throwing his shawl over a chair and sticking his pen behind his ear, attended at once to the summons. “Ha, Bancharam!” said Mr. Butler, “I am in luck indeed: there are two cases against Baburam Babu— an action in ejectment for non-payment of revenue, and a suit in equity. Mr. Howard has served me with a notice, and a subpœna to attend.” On hearing this news Bancharam clapped his elbows against his sides with delight and said: “Aha, Saheb, see what a fine headman I am! all sorts of good things will come to us by my introduction of Baburam. Give me the two papers quick and let me go in person to Vaidyabati. These are not matters to be entrusted to another: I shall have to employ a good deal of coaxing and wheedling, and all my arts of persuasion will have to be called into requisition. If I can only once climb to the top of the Tree of Fortune, I will simply shower rupees down: just now we are very short of cash, and we cannot afford that in a business like ours; by a sudden dash like this we may safely reckon on getting something.”

Meanwhile in the Vaidyabati house, propitiatory sacrifices were being offered: musical instruments of all kinds were braying and jangling. The crash of drums, the blare of brass trumpets, the clashing of cymbals, astonished the dawn. In the great hall of worship offerings for Matilall’s welfare were in progress. The Brahmans were variously occupied in reciting the hymn to Durga, working up Ganges clay into representations of Siva, or offering leaves of the sacred basil to the holy shalgram in the centre of the hall. Others, deep in thought, their heads resting on their hands, were saying to each other: “How about our divine Brahmanhood now? so far from having saved Matilall, our master too must now have perished with him. If he was aboard yesterday, the boat must have been lost in the storm last night: there can be no doubt about that. Anyhow the family are ruined: the young Babu will now be proclaimed master, and what kind of man he is likely to turn out no one can say: our prospects of gain appear now to be very remote.” One of the Brahmans present said very quietly: “Why are you so anxious? nobody is depriving us of our gains. Apply to our own case the simile of the saw cutting the shell. The saw will cut chips off the shell whether it moves forward or whether it moves backwards: even if the master be no more, there will have to be a gorgeous shraddha. The master is not a young man, and if the old lady objects to spending much on his shraddha, everybody will abuse her.” Another remarked: “Ah, my friend, that may be all very true, but in case of his death our gains will become very precarious: I prefer the supply to be as constant as the Vasudhara[18]: let us be ever getting, ever eating, say I: one shower will not suffice a long-continued thirst.”

Baburam Babu’s wife was a most devoted partner: ever since her lord’s departure she had been very restless and had neglected her daily food. She had been sitting all night at one of the windows of the house from which the Ganges was visible. As the wind blew in strong gusts every now and again, she shuddered with fright: she kept gazing out into the storm, but her heart trembled as she looked: the continual rumbling of the thunder made her anxious, and she called upon the Almighty in her distress. Time went by: hardly a boat passed up or down the Ganges: whenever she heard a sound she would get up and look: occasionally she saw a light glimmering faintly in the distance and at once concluded it came from some vessel. At last a boat did come in sight, and she waited for it to come and tie up at the ghât; but when it passed on, only skirting the shore without coming to land, the agony of despair pierced her heart like a dart.

The night had almost come to an end and the storm had gradually lulled. How beautiful is the calm of creation that succeeds tumult and confusion! The stars again shone in the sky: the moon’s light seemed to dance sportively on the waters of the river: so still had the earth become that even the rustle of the leaves could be heard.

Baburam Babu’s wife, as she anxiously gazed about her, exclaimed in her impatience: “Oh Lord of Creation! to my knowledge I have done no wrong to any one: I have committed no sin that I am aware of. Must I now after so long a time endure all the pangs of widowhood? Wealth I care nothing for: ornaments I have no use for: to be poor would be no hardship to me, I should not grieve: but this one boon I pray for, that I may be able to look upon the faces of my husband and my son when I die.” Indeed her mental anguish was extreme, but being a cautious woman, as well as naturally reserved, she restrained herself lest her tears should distress her daughters. So the night passed away, and music in the house ushered in the dawn. The sound of melody, ordinarily so attractive, in the case of one afflicted in mind only serves to open the floodgates of grief; and the sorrow of the mistress of the house was but intensified by the sweet sounds.

Just then a fisherman came to the Vaidyabati house to sell fish: in answer to their enquiries, he said: “During the storm there was a boat in a more or less sinking condition on the sandbank known as the Bansberia Chur: I rather think it must have been swamped: there was a stout gentleman in it, a Mahomedan, a young gentleman, and others.” This news was as if a thunderbolt had fallen amongst them: the music at once ceased, and all the members of the household lifted up their voices and wept.

Later in the day, towards evening, Bancharam Babu arrived with his usual bustle at the reception-room of the Vaidyabati house, and enquired for the master: on hearing the news from one of the servants, he fell into deep thought, resting his head on his hand, and then exclaimed: “Alas, alas, a great man has departed!” Having given way for some time to loud lamentation, he finally called for a pipe of tobacco, and thus reflected, as he puffed away:— “Ah! Baburam Babu is now dead, would that I also were so! Where now are all those hopes with which I came? They have vanished, and here am I with the great Durga Festival coming off at home, the image not yet decorated, or even coloured, and without the wherewithal to pay for it: I am quite at a loss to know what to do. A few rupees just now would have been exceedingly serviceable, no matter how they might have been got. I could have given some to my master, some I would have kept for myself: it would have been a very simple thing to cook the accounts by making a false entry or two. Who could have anticipated that the heavens would have burst asunder and fallen upon my head like this?” Then, just for the look of the thing, he shed a few tears before the servants, weeping really for the loss of his dear rupees. The officiating Brahmans, seeing him there, came and sat down by him. The wearers of the sacred thread are, as a rule, a very astute sort of people: it is hard to get at their thoughts. Some began to recount the good qualities of Baburam Babu: others complained that they were now orphans, bereft of their father: others, unable to restrain their greed of gain, remarked: “There is no time now for mourning: we must bestir ourselves to ensure Baburam Babu’s happiness in the next world: he was a man of no ordinary importance.” Without paying much attention to what they were saying, Bancharam Babu smoked away, and nodded his head: he knew the old proverb: “What advantage does the crow get, even if the bael is ripe?” It seemed as if he had got to the end of all things, so thoroughly broken-hearted was he: he could only sigh as he listened to what was being said: he had no plans, nor, alas, could he think of anybody to fleece! The idea once occurred to him that he might make something by informing the family that some fine portions of their property might be lost to them unless they held a very careful enquiry, but then he considered that his words would be only wasted if he spoke when their grief was so fresh. While he was thus musing, a sudden stir arose at the door, where a messenger had just arrived with a letter: the address was in the handwriting of Baburam Babu, but the messenger could give no particulars. The mistress of the house snatched at the letter, carried it into the house, opened it hurriedly, and devoured its contents. The letter was as follows:—

“Last night I was in terrible danger: the boat I was in was carried away in the darkness, at the mercy of the storm, and the boatmen lost all control over it: finally, it capsized with the violence of the waves. I was in extreme terror as it was sinking, but at the next moment I remembered you: I imagined you standing near me and saying: ‘Be not afraid in the time of adversity: call on the Almighty with body, mind, and soul: He is merciful, and will rescue you out of your danger.’ I acted accordingly, and when I fell into the water I found myself upon a sandbank, where the water was only knee deep. The boat was soon dashed to pieces by the violence of the storm. I remained on the sandbank the entire night and reached Bansberia next morning. Matilall fell ill from exposure, but he has been under medical treatment and is now again convalescent. I expect to reach home by nightfall.”

The moment that she had read the letter, the heat of her grief was extinguished: she pondered long, and then exclaimed: “Can such a joyful destiny indeed befall so sorrowful a wretch as myself?” Even while she spoke, Baburam Babu arrived with his son and Thakchacha. Everywhere there was a great stir. The minds of all the members of the household had been shrouded in a mist of grief, and now the sun of joy had risen. As she gazed upon her husband and her son, holding her two daughters by the hand, the mistress of the house wept tears of joy. She had been intending to upbraid Matilall for his conduct, but now all was forgotten: the two girls, holding their brother’s hands, fell at their father’s feet and wept. Then the infant boy saw his father, it was as though he had found a treasure: he kept his arms tight round his neck, and for long refused to slacken his embrace: the women of the household too offered loud prayers for the welfare of their master, as though with pán and betel in hand, they were praying for the welfare of a bridegroom. Baburam Babu was for some time like a man in a trance, unable to utter a word. Matilall reflected to himself: “The sinking of the boat has been a piece of good luck for me: it has saved me from a good scolding from my mother.” As soon as the Brahmans in the outer apartments of the house saw Baburam Babu, they greeted him with vociferous blessings, saying in the Sanskrit tongue:— “Supreme over all is the might of the gods,” and adding: “How could any calamity befall you, sir, with your own merits on the one hand, and on the other the divine rites that have been performed on your behalf? If such can befall, then are we no Brahmans.”

Thakchacha rose up in great wrath when he heard this language, and said: “Sir, if it is by the influence of these men that calamity has been averted from you, is all my trouble on your behalf to go for nothing? do my prayers count for nothing?” The Brahmans at once humbly acquiesced saying: “Ah sir, just as the divine Krishna was once Arjuna’s charioteer, so you have been the master’s! all has happened by the might of your intelligence: you are a special incarnation: calamity flies far away from anyplace where you are, as from any place where we are.”

Bancharam Babu had been all this time like a serpent with its crest-jewel lost, depressed and sad. He shed a few sham tears, to show off before Baburam Baba (his eyes were always rather watery), and his breast heaved with emotion. Fish would fall to his bait, he was firmly persuaded, if now he only threw in sufficient. When he heard the Brahmans’ talk, he came up to them and with his favourite gesture, said: “I am no fool I can tell you: calamity could not possibly befall the master with me. Am I merely a Calcutta grasscutter that I could not have helped him?”

CHAPTER IX.
MATILALL AND HIS FRIENDS.

WHEN a child is once corrupted, it is hard to effect any improvement. Every means should be tried to instil good principles into the mind from childhood: the character may then ripen for good and the mind become more strongly bent towards the right than towards evil; but if a boy gets hold of bad companions or receives ill advice in his early boyhood, then, such is the unsteadiness natural to his age, all will probably go wrong with him thereafter. So long then as he remains still a boy, with the mind of a boy, he must be assiduously employed in a variety of good pursuits. If boys were to receive an education like this up to the age of twenty-five, there would be no probability of their following evil courses: their minds would by that time have become so elevated that the mere mention of evil would excite anger and loathing. But it is very difficult for children in this country to receive such a training, owing, in the first place, to the lack of good teachers, and in the second to the lack of good books. There is urgent need of works that will promote the growth of high principles and of sound judgment, but ordinary people are persuaded that a solid education consists in teaching the meaning of a number of sounds: then again, very few people seem to have any idea of the methods whereby good principles are implanted in the mind; and finally the nature of the home surroundings of children in this country is strongly against the implanting of such principles. One boy may have a drunkard or a gambler as his father, another may have as his uncles men of immoral life; the mother herself too, being unable to read or write, may not exert herself for her children’s education. A great deal of evil moreover is learnt from association with the different members of the household, the men and women servants; it may be also that from consorting with all kinds of boys in the village or at the village-school, children get to learn their evil ways and vicious habits, and so are ruined for life. Even where but one of the causes mentioned exists, the obstacle in the way of good education is grievous enough, but where they all exist in combination, there the drawbacks are simply terrible. It is like setting fire to straw: let a man only pour ghee where the fire is beginning to blaze, and within a very short space the flame is everywhere, and reduces to ashes whatever it finds in its way.

Many people thought that Matilall would have reformed after the affair of the police court; but the boy who is devoid of good qualities and high principles, and without any regard for honour or dishonour, has no particular feeling of abhorrence for punishments. Evil thoughts and good thoughts alike have their origin in the mind, and are therefore intimately bound up with the character: a mere physical affliction or trouble then cannot be expected to change the wind’s direction. Doubtless, when the sergeant of police was dragging Matilall along through the streets, he may have thought it at the actual time a trouble and a disgrace, but the feeling was only momentary: once in the guard-room, he seemed to have lost ail anxiety or fear or sense of dishonour and he was such a nuisance all that night and the whole of the next day to his neighbours, as he sang and imitated the cries of dogs and jackals, that they put their hands to their ears, and exclaiming “Ram, Ram!” said to each other: “Why, we are far worse off with this boy in our neighbourhood than if he were in prison.” When he stood before the magistrate next day, he kept his head bent down like Shishu Pal, of Mahabharata renown, but it was done to deceive his father. In reality he recked little whether he went to jail and was put in fetters, or what happened to him.

Boys absolutely devoid of respect, of fear, and of shame, and addicted to purely evil courses, are afflicted with no ordinary disease: their complaint is really mental, and if only the proper remedies are applied, a cure may in process of time be effected. But Baburam Babu had no ideas on the subject at all: he was firmly convinced that Matilall was a very good boy, and used at first to wax very wrath if he heard him abused. Though all sorts of people were continually telling him about his son, he was as one who heard not; and if afterwards from his own observations a doubt did arise in his mind, he kept his misgivings to himself, and for fear of being mortified before others, refrained from expressing them, but simply gave secret orders to the door-keeper not to let Matilall leave the house. This was no remedy: the disease had obtained too strong a hold upon the boy, and no possible good could result from simply keeping him a prisoner and constantly in his sight. You may put a bar of iron on a mind once corrupted, without making any impression: on the contrary, mere repression may only have the effect of intensifying the evil in the mind. At first Matilall used to get out of the house by jumping over the walk. On the release of his old companions of Bow Bazar from jail, they came to live at Vaidyabati, and some of the boys of the place having joined them, they formed themselves into a band. Matilall’s sense of respect and fear was soon destroyed altogether by his association with these young scamps, and he ended by paying no attention at all to his father.

Boys who have not been accustomed from their childhood to innocent and harmless amusements, are apt to take to diversions of a low kind. The children of Englishmen are instructed by their parents in a variety of innocent pastimes, in order that they may have sound minds and sound bodies: some draw and paint: some cultivate a taste for botany: some learn music: some devote themselves to sport and gymnastics: each takes up the form of harmless enjoyment most congenial to him. Boys in this country follow the example that is set them: their one wish is to be dressed in gorgeous attire, with a profusion of gold embroidery and jewels: to make up picnic parties of their chums and gay companions, and to live luxuriously in all a Babu’s style. Fondness for display and extravagance naturally characterizes the season of youth: if care is not very early exercised in this matter, the desire grows in intensity, and a variety of evils result, by which eventually body and mind alike may be irretrievably ruined.

Matilall gradually threw off all restraint: he became so depraved that continuing to throw dust in his father’s eyes, he now openly spoke of him in the most unfilial and atrocious manner. The constant burden of his talks with his companions was: “Ah, if my old father would but die, I could then enjoy myself to my heart’s content!” Any money he demanded from his parents they gave him: if there was any hesitation on their part, he would at once say: “Very well, then, I will go hang myself, or else take poison.” His parents in their alarm thought: “Ah, what must be, must! Our life is bound up with the boy’s life, he is our Shivratri[19] lamp: let him live and we shall have our libations when we are gone[20].”

Matilall spent his whole time in riotous living: he hardly spent a minute of his day at home: at one time he would be engaged at a picnic, taking part in a theatrical entertainment, or making one of a party of amateur musicians: at another, he would be running about getting up a procession in honour of some local deity, or else absorbed in contemplating a nautch: or again, he would be creating a disturbance, and making unprovoked assaults upon other people. His appetite for stimulants, whether it were ganja, opium or even wine, never failed him, and tobacco of course was in constant demand.

They carried foppery to an extreme, these young Babus, wearing their hair in curls and using powder for their teeth. Their dress was of fine Dacca muslin embroidered with gold lace: on their heads they wore embroidered caps; carried in their hands silk handkerchiefs perfumed with attar of roses, and light canes; and smart English dress shoes with silver buckles adorned their feet. As, moreover, they had no spare time for their regular meals, they carried about with them all sorts of dainty sweetmeats.

Unless an evil disposition is checked at the very outset, it grows worse every day, and in time becomes quite brute-like in its nature: just as when a man has once become enslaved to opium, the quantity he takes tends constantly to increase, so when a man has become addicted to evil habits, the craving for still more grievous courses comes naturally of itself. Matilall and his companions soon began to think the amusements they had hitherto been indulging in too tame: they no longer gave them any special pleasure; so they set to work to devise means for more solid pleasures. They now started sallying forth in a band late in the evenings, setting fire to and plundering houses, setting the thatch of poor people’s huts alight, visiting the houses of loose women and creating a disturbance, pulling their hair about, burning their mosquito curtains, and plundering their dresses and ornaments. Sometimes, they would even insult a respectable girl. The people of the place were terribly annoyed at all this, but the young men only snapped their fingers at them in derision, and consigned them all to perdition.

Baburam Babu had been for some time in Calcutta on business. One day towards evening, a zenana palki was passing the Vaidyabati house. As soon as the young scoundrels saw it, they at once ran out, surrounded it, and commenced beating the palki-bearers, who thereupon set the palki down and ran for their lives. Opening the palki, they saw a beautiful young girl inside. Matilall ran forward, seized the girl’s hand, and dragged her out of the palki trembling all over with confusion and fear. In vain she looked around her for help: she saw only pitiless dark space. Then weeping bitterly she called on the Almighty: “Oh Lord, protect the helpless young orphan! I am content to die, only grant that I may not lose my honour.” As the young Babus were all struggling together to get possession of her, she fell to the ground; they then tried to drag her by main force into the house. Matilall’s mother hastened outside in some trepidation when she heard the sound of the girl’s weeping, and the miscreants thereupon took to their heels. Seeing the mistress of the house, the young girl fell at her feet and said in her distress: “Oh dear lady, protect my honour! You must be a devoted wife yourself.” None but a faithful and virtuous wife can understand the danger of a virtuous woman. Baburam Babu’s wife at once lifted the girl off the ground and wiped away her tears with the border of her sari, saying as she did so: “My dear child, do not weep, you have no further cause for fear; I will cherish you as my own dear child: the Lord Almighty always protects the honour of the woman who is faithful to her vows.” With these words she dispelled the girl’s fears, and when she had soothed and consoled her, accompanied her to her home, and left her there.

CHAPTER X.
THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT.

THE waving of lamps and the loud clanging of bells showed the worship of the goddess Nistarini[21] to be in full swing in Sheoraphuli. Becharam Babu looked into the shrine of the goddess as he went by on foot: lining both sides of the road were shops: in some of them heaps of potatoes, grown at Bandipore and Gopalpore, were exposed for sale: in others, the shopkeepers were hard at work selling parched rice and sweetmeats, grain and dál. Here in one part were oil-merchants sitting near their mills, (which were simply the hollowed out trunks of trees,) and reading the Ramayana in the vulgar tongue: now and then they would urge on their cattle, as they went circling round, with a click of the tongue, and when the circle was completed, would shriek out the passage: “Oh Ram! we are monkeys, Ram, we are monkeys!” Women were busily engaged in cutting up fish for sale by the light of their lamps, and calling out: “Buy our fish, buy our fish!” while cloth merchants, reciting some passage from the Mahabharata were murdering its unhappy author[22]. All this, as he passed through the Bazaar,Becharam Babu was closely observing. When a man is taking a solitary walk, anything that has recently occupied his attention keeps recurring to his mind. Now, Becharam Babu was very fond in those days of processional singing; and as he went along an unfrequented path, after leaving his dwelling, one of his favourite songs came into his mind. The night was dark and there was hardly a soul about: only a few bullock-carts, their wheels creaking as they lumbered along, were on their way home: dogs were barking here and there. So Becharam Babu began to put all his lung-power into the song he was chanting in the monotone peculiar to processional music. The village women hearing his nasal twang, screamed aloud in their terror, for it is the rooted conviction of the country folk that only ghosts adopt this peculiar vocal style. Hearing the commotion Becharam was somewhat disconcerted, so he took to his heels and soon reached the Vaidyabati house.

Baburam Babu had a big gathering. Beni Babu of Bally, Bakreswar Babu of Batalata, Bancharam Babu of Outer Simla and many others were present. Thakchacha sat on a chair near the master. Several pandits were there discussing the Shástras; some had taken up passages of the treatises concerning logic and metaphysics for discussion: others were hotly discussing the dates that would be auspicious or otherwise for the annual festivals: others were giving their interpretation of the slokas out of a particular portion of the Bhagavad Gita: others were holding a great argument on grammatical niceties. One of the pandits, a man with an Assamese designation and a resident of Kamikhya, who was sitting near the master, said to him as he pulled away at his pipe: “You are a very fortunate man, sir, to possess two sons and two daughters. This year is a somewhat unpropitious one, but if you offer up a sacrifice, the stars may all be favourable again, and you can use their influence on your behalf.” In the midst of the discussion Becharam Babu arrived, and the whole company rose to their feet as he entered, and welcomed him most cordially. The visitor had been more or less in a bad temper since the affair of the police court, but a courteous and kind address has a great effect in turning a man’s wrath away; and Becharam Babu, mollified by the courteous welcome so unanimously accorded him, sat down with a smile close to Beni Babu. Baburam Babu thereupon said to him: “Sir, the seat you have taken is not a good one: come and sit with me on my couch.” Men after each other’s hearts are as inseparable as cranes, and notwithstanding the pressing invitation of Baburam Babu, Becharam Babu would not give up his seat near Beni Babu.

After some time spent in conversation on different topics, Becharam Babu asked: “What about Matilall’s marriage contract? Where has it been arranged?”

Baburam.— A good many proposals for a contract of marriage have come in: Haridas Babu of Guptipara, Shyma Charan Babu of Nakashipur, Ram Hari Babu of Kanchrapara, and many others belonging to different districts have sent in proposals. These have all been passed over, and a marriage has been arranged with the daughter of Madhav Babu of Manirampur. He is a man possessed of considerable property; we shall, moreover, make a good deal out of the connection.

Becharam.— Beni, my friend, what do you think about this? Come, tell me plainly and openly your opinion.

Beni.— Becharam, my dear friend, it is no easy matter to tell you plainly: you know the proverb: “A dumb man makes no enemies.” Besides what is the use of discussing, a thing that has been settled?

Becharam.— Oh, but you must tell me: I like to know the ins and outs of every marriage.

Beni.— Listen then: Madhav Babu of Manirampur is a very quarrelsome sort of person,— has not even the manners of a gentleman. He has a reputation amongst Brahmans for orthodoxy, only gained by making presents to them, but he is an utterly unscrupulous man. True, he may be able to make handsome presents of money and other things on the occasion of his daughter’s marriage; but is money the only thing worth taking into consideration when a marriage is in question? Surely the first requisite is a respectable family, and the next a good girl; and then if there is wealth as well, so much the better, but it does not very much matter. Now Ram Hari Babu of Kanchrapara is a very excellent person: he lives cheerfully and contentedly on the income he derives from his own exertions, and never casts a longing eye on another man’s wealth. He may not be in very good circumstances, I allow, but he has always been very careful to have his children well educated, and the one object of his thoughts has been the happiness and moral well-being of his family. To be connected with such a man as this would be a source of entire happiness.

Becharam.— Baburam Babu, who is the intelligent person who has recommended this match to you? Avarice will be your ruin yet. But what right have I to speak? It is after all our social system that is at fault: whenever the topic of marriage comes to the front, people always say: “How sir! will you give me a pot of silver? will you give me a necklace of pearls?” It is only an idiot who would think of saying; “Look first to see whether your proposed relation be respectable or not: enquire whether the girl be a good girl or otherwise.” This is a mere trifle: if only wealth is to be got, that is everything.

Bancharam.— We want family, we want beauty, and we want wealth as well: how can a family possibly get on if it professes to despise wealth?

Bakreswar.— True enough: we must keep up a proper respect for wealth. What do we get by intercourse with a poor man? Are our stomachs filled by it?

Thakchacha [bending down from his chair].— All this talk is a reflection upon me: it was I that counselled this match. I would have been ashamed to show my face in the world if I had not succeeded in getting a girl of noble parentage. I took immense pains to ascertain that Madhav Babu of Manirampur was a good man. Why, he is a man at whose name the tiger and cow might drink at the same pool together! besides, look at the advantage of being able to get his lathials, whenever we need them in cases of dispute. Then too everybody connected with the Law-Courts is under his thumb: there are a thousand ways in which he can be of assistance to us in any strait. Ram Hari Babu of Kanchrapara on the other hand, is a feeble sort of person: he makes a very precarious living: what would have been the good of an arrangement with him?

Becharam.— A fine counsellor you have got Baburam! If you listen to all such a counsellor has to advise, you are bound to get to heaven, body and all. And what a son, too, you have! And so he is actually about to be married? What do you think about it all, Beni Babu!

Beni.— I think that the man who will first thoroughly educate his son, and who will take special pains that he shall grow up thoroughly moral, will be best able to be of assistance to his son when the time comes that he should marry. Many evils are likely to arise if a boy is married at an unreasonable age.

On hearing all this, Baburam Babu rose in much irritation and hurriedly retreated into the inner apartments of the house, where his wife was engaged in discussing the match with some of the women of the village. Going up to her, he informed her of all that had been said outside, and as he stood there in some perplexity, inquired: “Cannot we put off Matilall’s marriage for a few days?” His wife replied: “What is this that you are saying? Plague take our enemies! By divine favour Matilall is now sixteen: would it look well not to marry him now? If you upset the arrangements now, the proper season for marriage will slip away. You surely do not know what you are doing: is the caste of a good man to be destroyed in this way? Go at once, and take the bridegroom off with you.”

At this advice from his wife, all the master’s indecision disappeared. He at once went outside and gave the order for the lamps to be lit: the musical instruments all struck up at the same time, and the English bands began to play. Baburam lifted the bridegroom into his palanquin, and taking Thakchacha by the hand, walked by the side, with heavy gait, accompanied by his kinsmen and near friends. From the roof of the house the boy’s mother gazed down upon her son’s face, and the women of the household called out, “Ah, mother of Mati! Ah, how beautiful is your child!” The friends of the bridegroom were all with him: they amused themselves by taking torches to the rear of the crowd and setting people alight, and by letting off squibs and fireworks near the houses and in the thick of the crowd. None of the poor people ventured to remonstrate, though they were sadly annoyed.

The bridegroom soon reached Manirampur, and got down from the palanquin. Both sides of the road were crowded with people gazing at the bridegroom. The women chattered away to each other about him. “The boy has a certain amount of beauty,” said one, “but if his nose were a bit straighter, he would look better.” Another remarked, “His complexion, fair as it is, would look better even fairer.”

The marriage was to take place at a late hour, but it had not struck ten when Madhav Babu, taking a durwan with a lantern, came out to meet the bridegroom and his guests. After he had joined the marriage procession in the street, nearly half an hour was wasted in the exchange of compliments, each man wishing to give precedence to the other. While one said: “Pray sir! precede me!” the other politely declined: “Nay sir! do you please go first.” At last, Beni Babu of Bally went forward and said: “Please one of you gentlemen go on ahead. I cannot stand here in the street and catch cold.” An amicable arrangement being at last come to, the whole company arrived at the house of the bride’s father and entered.

The bridegroom took his seat in the assembly. Numbers of roughs were standing about, ripe for mischief. The distribution of money to the village, and other subjects, then came up for discussion. Thakchacha was doing his best, but apparently without avail, to effect some arrangement for his own profit. A rough blustering sort of fellow came up to him and said: “Who is this low Mahomedan? Get out of this! what has a Mahomedan to do with Hindu concerns?” Thakchacha was furious, and shaking his head fiercely, his eyes inflamed with passion, abused the man roundly.

This was the very opportunity Matilall’s young friends, Haladhar, Gadadhar, and the other young Babus, had been longing for. They saw from the clouds that were gathering that a storm was imminent. One set to work to tear the carpet into pieces, another to extinguish the lamps: some set the chandeliers clashing and jingling, while others threw missiles among the assembled company[23]. Some of the people of the bride’s father, seeing the confusion they were creating, began to abuse them and strike them with their fists, and Matilall seeing the quarrel in progress; thought to himself: “I fancy I am not destined to get married. I may have to return home after all, with the thread only on my wrist[24].”

CHAPTER XI.
THE POETASTER.

THE pandits of Agarpara were enjoying their usual evening lounge beneath their favourite tree: they were all either taking snuff or smoking, coughing and sneezing, chaffing each other and joking. One of them asked: “How is Vidyaratna? The good Brahman, in his zeal for gain, has lamed himself going to Manirampur in response to an invitation. I was concerned to see him leaping on a stick yesterday as he went to bathe.” Vidyabhushan replied: “Oh! Vidyaratna is all right again: the pain in his foot has been considerably alleviated, what with warm lime and turmeric, and dry fomentations. Come, gentlemen, listen to the poetry which our friend the great poet Kankan[25] has composed with special reference to the Manirampur entertainment.”

Let the drum beat in triumph, uplift the glad song,
For the guests are assembled, a glittering throng;
In the gay halls of Madhub, as radiantly bright,
As the heaven of Indra, entrancing the sight.
How dazzling the glow that illuminates all,
How brilliant the flowers that engarland the wall!
See, apart sit the friends of the bridegroom and bride,
Retainers in scarlet on every side.
What ravishing melody floats on the air
With perfume of blossoms surpassingly rare!
Be sure, so celestial a scene to array
In Hymen’s sweet honour, took many a day.
But the ground is just soaking here under the tent
Where the rain is descending through many a rent.
And these up-country durwan, offensively loud,
What business have they to be hustling the crowd?
Discordant the noises that deafen the ear,
And the shouts and the hubbub are awful to hear.
Yet in view of the sweets and the dainties in store,
You’d put up with annoyances double or more.
See those figures in paste on the walls stuck about!
How the pedigree-poets their rhapsodies shout!
Now list to these verses, and publish the fame
Of Kankan,— the paragon verse-maker’s name!
The bridegroom is coming! A silence profound
Is felt for a moment, and plaudits resound.
But the juvenile Babus are eager for fun,
And lo! in a minute the row has begun.
His schemes are miscarrying, Thakchacha fears,
As he listens aghast to the shouts and the jeers.
We too are astounded;— this banging and crashing!
This rending of carpets and clanging and clashing!
Why, the glass chandeliers they are wantonly smashing!
We’d better be off, we are in for a thrashing!
In wonder sits Mati, revolving the thought,
“It seems my investiture’s profiting nought!”
“The scoundrel Bakreshwar!” uprises a shout,
“Give him a caning and hustle him out!”
And Bancharam also, the schemer profound,
Is wriggling in torture and howls on the ground.
Says Becharam hastily, “Here, come aside;”
“Things do not look promising: where shall we hide?”
And carries off Beni, bereft of resource.
While ever the tumult increases in force.
“Help, help!” holloas Baburam, much in alarm,
For support round a pillar entwining his arm.
Ho, speed to the rescue Thakchacha the brave!
But to keep a whole skin’s the one thought of the knave!
Whom, with head muffled up as he gingerly goes,
They arrest as chief culprit, and hurl on his nose,
And roll in the dust till his eyes are of sand full,
And tear out the hair of his head by the handful.
Hear “ Tauba!” and “ Tauba!” the Mussulman yell!
“Of my sins I repent, on the border of hell!”
“But I’d nothing whatever to do with it, no!”
“An innocent Moslem,— why badger him so?”
“Bismillah! alack! To appear on the scene”
“Such an outrage to suffer, was folly I ween!”
“Among the mild Hindus I guilelessly came”
“From the parent of motives; and this is their game!”
“Ah fool! the advice of thy friends to despise,”
“At the cost of thy beauty, thy beard, and thine eyes!”
Now enter the durwans athirst for the fray,
And round them their lathis impartially lay;
Then howls of excitement and terror and pain,
The crack of the truncheon and swish of the cane!
The friends of the bridegroom and those of the bride
Are scuttling in terror on every side:
Within flies the bridegroom, the company’s scattered,
And all the gay trappings of Hymen are shattered.
“Thakchacha still here!” some enthusiast shouts,
“Pour mud on his turban and tear off his clouts!”
In dishonour poor Baburam slinks from the hall
And all his brave show goes for nothing at all.
His costume’s in tatters within and without,
And shawlless and shoeless he stumbles about,
Distractedly moaning:— “How hard is my case”
“Whom death from exposure now stares in the face!”
“The oncoming tempest I hear from afar:”
“’Tis the progress triumphal of Death on his car!”
“Thus helpless and sole, not a creature to aid,”
“Can his dire visitation be longer delayed?”
“I am bruised and exhausted, and breath I have none:”
“The Fates are against me! O what have I done?”
“And my pitiful lot, if it reaches the ear”
“Of the wife of my bosom, will kill her, I fear.”
“Did the marriage come off I’m unable to tell!”
“From a blow on the cranium unconscious I fell.”
“These schemes matrimonial dictated by vanity”
“Have landed me here on the verge of insanity!”
Thus loudly bewailing, a cottage he spies.
Where no cruel warder an access denies.
And there in a corner, alone, on a mat,
Monumental in misery,— Thakchacha sat!
“Ah traitor and craven, ’twas cruelly done,”
“Thy comrade deserting, thou treacherous one!”
“O frailty of mortals! how falleth the best,”
“When the touchstone of peril puts love to the test!"”
“Hush, check your emotion!” his champion replies,
“For where are we safe from our enemies spies?”
“You’ll own, when you’ve heard me,— my confident trust is—”
“You’ve done your protector a grievous injustice”!
’Tis daybreak, as homeward they ruefully wend,
And Kankan his epic thus brings to an end.

On hearing this lampoon upon Baburam Babu, Tarkavagish was furious, and exclaimed: “Ha, ha! this is poetry indeed! Saraswati in the flesh! Kalidas come to life again! What profound learning too has the great poet Kankan displayed! So precocious a boy cannot possibly live long. The metre too,— astounding,— never heard anything like it,— it runs like a nursery rhyme! Now a man who is a Brahman and a pandit to boot will always speak good of a rich man: there is nothing gentlemanly in mere abuse.” With these words, he got up in a rage, and would have left the place, but the assembled pandits expressed their full approval of his words, and urging him to stop and be calm, got him at last by sheer force to sit down again. Another pandit then skilfully introduced other topics, and ignoring what had passed began to sing the praises of Baburam Babu and Madhab Babu. A Brahman, being generally rather dense, cannot easily see when a joke is intended: through constant study of the Shástras, his mind moves solely in the region of the Shástras and has no practice in worldly matters. Tarkavagish however was soon mollified and amused himself with the subject in hand.

CHAPTER XII.
BARADA BABU.

BECHARAM BABU of Bow Bazar was sitting in his reception-hall, and with him were a few persons singing snatches of songs. The Babu was himself selecting the different subjects, and his selection was a sufficiently varied one: the verses were being sung to the most popular tunes. Many people in the exuberance of their enthusiasm would have rolled about on the floor on hearing such ravishing strains, but Becharam Babu sat there as stolid as a painted marionette. Beni Babu of Bally arrived while the music was still in progress, and Becharam Babu at once stopped it, and said to his guest: “Ah! Beni, my friend! what, are you still alive? Baburam is still nursing his wrath; it is like fire smouldering amid burnt rags. He absolutely refuses to bid pacified. Some unpleasantness was bound to arise out of the affair of Manirampur: it has been an experience for us. It is commonly reported that the family has a bitter enemy, and that he went as one of the bridegroom’s party.”

Beni.— Speak to me no more on the subject of Baburam Babu: the whole affair has annoyed me extremely. I should like to get away altogether and give up my house at Bally: the old Sanscrit saying occurs to me, “What else may not destiny have in store for me?”

Becharam.— Well, such is the way things are going with Baburam: what else can you expect from such a man, with such a counsellor, such companions, and such a son? Yet his younger son is a good boy: how is that? He is the lotus flower on the dung-heap.

Beni.— You may well ask that: it is indeed extraordinary, but there is a reason for it. You may perhaps remember my having told you some time back about Babu Barada Prosad Biswas. Well, for some time past that gentleman has been living at Vaidyabati. I had been thinking a good deal on the subject, and I saw that if Baburam Babu’s youngest son, Ramlall, grew up like Matilall, the family would very soon become extinct, but that here was an excellent opportunity for the boy to learn to grow up a good man. I considered the matter well, and went to the gentleman I have mentioned, taking Ramlall with me. The boy has ever since then exhibited such an extraordinary affection for Biswas Babu that he is constantly at his side: he is very rarely at home, for he regards Biswas Babu as a father.

Becharam.— You did, it is true, once relate to me all the virtues of this Biswas Babu, but, to tell you the truth, I have never heard of a single individual possessed of so many virtues before: how is it, that now he has attained to so good a position, he is so modest, and unpretending?

Beni.— It is generally very difficult for a man to be humble and unassuming who has been accustomed to wealth from his boyhood, and who has never encountered adversity, but gone on steadily piling up riches. A man like this has, as a rule, no perception of the feelings of others: I mean by that, he has no idea what is pleasing or what is distasteful to others, for his thoughts are centred in himself: he considers himself a great man, and his people all encourage him in the idea by extolling his magnificence. Under these conditions pride reaches a fearful height: modesty and kindliness can never take firm root in such soil. It is on this account that in Calcutta the sons of rich men so rarely turn out well. Puffed up by their father’s wealth on the one hand or their own position on the other, they swagger through life, treating all men with contempt and derision. It is calamity and misfortune that alone avail to strengthen man’s mind. The first requisite of man is humility: that quality absent, a man has no chance of either discerning aright or correcting his faults, and without humility he cannot advance in virtue and in worth.

Becharam.— How was it that Barada Babu became so good?

Beni.— Barada Babu fell into trouble in his earliest boyhood, and from that time he used to meditate unceasingly on the Almighty: the result of this constant meditation was that he became firmly convinced that it was his bounden duty to do everything that was pleasing to God, and to avoid what was displeasing to Him even though life were at stake: this conviction he proceeded to carry into practice.

Becharam.— How did he settle with himself what was pleasing and what displeasing to the Almighty?

Beni.— There are two ways of attaining to knowledge, on this subject. First, the mind must be brought under control: to effect this, constant meditation and the steady growth of good principles are necessary. A searching self-examination, a course of severe and steady meditation, may develop the faculty of discrimination between right tad wrong; and in proportion as that faculty is developed, a man will become averse to conduct that is displeasing to the Almighty, and attached to a course that is pleasing to Him. In the second place that faculty may be steadily exercised by reading and reflecting on what good men have written. Barada Babu has left nothing undone that can help to make him good. He has never wandered aimlessly about like ordinary people. When he rises in the morning, he always offers up his prayers to God, and the tears in his eyes show the feelings that rise up in his mind at the time. He then calmly examines his conduct most searchingly, to see whether it has been good or bad. He never prides himself upon his good qualities, but is exceedingly distressed if he detects the very slightest fault in himself. He takes great delight in hearing of the good qualities of others, but he only expresses his sorrow after brotherly manner when he hears of their faults. By such assiduous practice it is that his mind has become pure and serene. Is there anything astonishing in the fact that a man should thus grow in virtue who so subdues his mind?

Becharam.— Ah, Beni my friend, it is most refreshing to hear of such people as Barada Babu! I must have an interview with a man like this, if only for once. How does he spend his days?

Beni.— He is engaged in business most of the day, but he is not like other people. Most men who are engaged in business think solely of position or wealth: he does not think so much of these things: he knows well that wealth and position are but as a drop of water: they may be pleasant to see, pleasant to hear of, but they do not accompany a man beyond the grave: nay, unless a man walks with great circumspection, they may both generate in him an evil disposition. His chief object in engaging in business is to get the means of exercising and putting to the test his own virtues. In a business career, bad qualities such as avarice, ill-will, and want of principle, are brought into prominence, and it is by the onslaught of such enemies that men are ruined. On the other hand, the truly virtuous man is the man who proceeds with circumspection. To talk of virtue in the abstract is an easy thing enough, but unless a man gives an illustration of it in, his own conduct, his words are a sham. Barada Babu is always saying that the world resembles a school. Genuine virtue is the outcome of a thorough discipline of the mind in the business of life.

Becharam.— Surely Barada Babu does not regard wealth as a thing of no account?

Beni.— No, not at all; he by no means considers wealth despicable, but virtue comes first in his estimation. Wealth is only of secondary importance; that is to say, in the acquisition of wealth, due regard must be paid to the maintenance of virtue.

Becharam.— What does Barada Babu do with himself in the evenings?

Beni.— When once the evening has set in, he spends his time in profitable conversation with his family, and in reading or listening to their talk. The members of his family all try to follow his example, observing the excellence of his character. He is so attached to his family that the heartfelt prayer of his wife is that she may have such another husband in all her births: if they lose sight of him even for a moment, his children fret with impatience. Barada Babu’s daughters are as good as his sons. While in many homes brothers and sisters are continually grumbling and quarrelling with each other, Barada Babu’s children never exchange high words: always, whether at their lessons, or at their meals, they converse affectionately together; and they are very unhappy if their parents are at all ailing.

Becharam.— I have heard that Barada Babu is always about in the village.

Beni.— That is quite true. Whenever he hears of any one being in trouble, or in misfortune, or sick, he cannot remain quiet at home. He assists many of his neighbours in manifold ways, but he never even hints it to any one: when lie has done a kindness to another, he considers himself the person benefited.

Becharam.— Ah, friend Beni, my eyes have never looked on such a man, much less have I ever heard him with my ears! Why, association with such a character would make even an old man good, much more help a young boy to grow up virtuous. Ah, my friend! it will indeed be a gratifying thing if the younger son of Baburam manages to grow up a good man.

CHAPTER XIII.
BARADA BABU’S PUPIL.

BARADA Babu had an extraordinary and unusual knowledge of educational methods. He had special acquaintance with all the different faculties and emotions of the mind, and with the methods whereby men may become intelligent and virtuous by the proper exercise of them. A teacher’s work is no light one: there are many who have but a mere smattering of knowledge, and take up teaching just from want of other occupation; good instruction cannot be expected from men of this type. To be a genuine teacher, a man must be thoroughly acquainted with the whole tendency of the mind and all its energies; and he must by calm and patient observation discover and learn the best way to become a really practical guide of youth. To teach in a haphazard fashion, without doing something of this kind, is like striking a stone with a kodàli; it may fall on the stone a hundred times, but not a handful of soil will it cut. Now Barada Babu was a man of great acuteness and shrewd observation: he had so long paid special attention to the subject of education that he was well versed in the best methods of instruction: and the learning that was imparted according his system was really solid. As education is now in Government schools, its real end is not attained, for the reason that nothing is done for the harmonious development of the faculties of the mind and the emotions. The scholars learn everything by heart, and consequently memory alone is awakened: the faculty of thought and reflection generally lies dormant, and the idea of bringing the different activities of the mind into play seems not to exist. The chief end of education being to develop the mental powers and qualities harmoniously with the gradual growth of the scholar, one faculty should not be abnormally exerted at the expense of another. Just as the body gets compact and grows well-knit by an harmonious exercise of all the limbs, so the mind is strengthened and the intelligence developed by an harmonious exercise of the sum total of their energies. All the moral qualities likewise should be simultaneously elicited: because one may be brought into play it does not follow that all will be. Reverence for truth, for instance, may be developed, without a single particle of kindliness: a man may have a large element of kindliness in his nature, but no practical knowledge of the business of life. Again, he may be perfectly honest in his business relations, and yet display indifference or absolute want of affection for his father, mother, wife and children; or he may be all that is proper in his domestic relations, but wanting in uprightness in his business affairs. Barada Babu was well aware in fact, that faith in God was the foundation of the due development and exercise of the qualities of the mind, and that they could only be duly developed in proportion as that faith increased; for otherwise the task was as futile as trying to write on water.

Most fortunately for him, Ramlall had become Barada Babu’s pupil, and all his faculties were being harmoniously developed and exercised. Association with a good man is a far more potent factor in developing moral qualities than mere instruction; indeed by such intercourse a mind may be as completely transformed as a branch of the wild plum grafted on to a mango tree. So great is the majesty of a really noble character that even its shadow falling on one that is base and corrupt raises it in time to its own image. By association with Barada Babu the mind of Ramlail became almost a complete reflection of his. With the object of making himself strong, as soon as he rose in the morning, he would take a stroll in the open air; for strength of mind he knew could not exist without strength of body: after his walk, he would return home and engage in prayer and meditation. The only books he read were those the perusal of which promoted the growth of intelligence and good character, and the only persons he conversed with were those whose conversation had the same effect. On merely hearing the name of any good person, he would go and visit him, making no enquiries about his caste or condition in life. So keen was his intelligence that in conversation with anyone he would speak only on matters of real moment: he had no taste for gossip. If anybody spoke on subjects of but trifling importance, he succeeded by force of his intelligence in extracting the pith of the matter, as a fruit-extractor the pulp of the fruit. The steady growth of faith in God, of morality, and of a good understanding formed the burden of his meditations. By such consistent conduct as this, his disposition, his character and his whole conduct became more and more worthy of commendation.

Goodness can never be hid. The people in the village would say to each other: “Ah, Ramlall is the Prahlad of a family of Daityas[26].” In all their griefs and misfortunes he was ever to the front with his help. He did all he could think of to assist any in need of help, by his personal exertions on their behalf, whether with his purse or with his understanding. Old and young, they were all known to Ramlail, and were all his friends. If they heard him abused, it was as though a dart had pierced their ears; if they heard him praised, great was the rejoicing. The old women of the village would say to each other: “If we had such a child we should never let him out of our sight. Oh, what a store of merit must his mother have laid up to have got a son like this!” The young women, observing Ramlall’s beauty and good qualities, exclaimed in their hearts: “God grant that such a husband may fall to our lot!”

Ramlall’s good disposition and character were manifested in manifold ways, both at home and abroad. He never failed in any single particular of his duty towards each member of his home circle. His father, observing him, thought to himself;— “Ah, my younger son is becoming lax in his observances of Hindu religious customs! he does not keep the sacred mark on his forehead, nor use the customary vessels at his prayers, nor even the beads for the repetition of the sacred name of Hori[27]: and yet he does perform his devotions after his own manner, and is not addicted to vice. We may tell any number of lies: the boy, on the contrary, knows nothing but the truth. He is most devoted to his parents, yet never consents to what he thinks wrong, even at our urgent request. Now I find a good deal of duplicity necessary in my business: both truth and falsehood are requisite. How otherwise could I keep up the great festivals that I have constantly to be celebrating in my house, the Dol Jatra, the Durga Pujah and others? Now Matilall may be a wicked boy, but he keeps up his Hindu observances; besides, after all, I do not think he is so very bad; he is young yet, he must sow his wild oats.” Ramlall’s mother and sisters were deeply affected by his many good qualities: they rejoiced with the joy of those who out of dense darkness see light. Matilall’s evil behaviour had had a most distressing effect upon them: bowed down as they had been in shame at the evil reports they heard of him, they had known little ease of mind. Now again there was in their hearts, because of Ramlall’s good qualities, and their faces were lighted up with joy. At one time all the men-servants and maid-servants of the house, getting only abuse or blows from Matilall, had been in terror of their lives: now, softened by Ramlall’s gentle address and kind treatment, they paid all the greater attention to their work.

When Matilall and his companions, Haladhar and Gadadhar, saw this behaviour of Ramlall, they remarked to each other that the boy had gone silly,— must be cracked,— and said to the master of the house: “This brat should certainly be sent to a lunatic asylum: he is a mere child, yet his sole talk day and night is of virtue: it is disgusting to hear an old man’s words in the mouth of a child.” Others of Matilall’s companions would occasionally say:— “Mati Babu, you are in luck’s way: things don’t look promising for Ramlall: he will soon come to grief if he makes a parade of virtue like this: you will then get all the property, and there will be no obstacle to your complete enjoyment. Even if he does live, he will be little better than an idiot. But what can you expect? what says the proverb? ‘As the teacher so the taught.’ Could he find no other master in this wide world that he must get hold of some mantras from an Eastern Bengalee, and go wandering about parading his virtue before the world? If he does this much more, we will send him and his teacher about their business. The canting humbug! he goes about saying: ‘Ah, how happy I should be if my elder brother were to give up the society of his evil companions!’ ‘Ah, if my elder brother were only to frequent the society of Barada Babu, what a good thing it should be!’ Ha ha! Barada Babu indeed,— the dismal old blockhead, a very prince of prigs. Look out, Mati Babu: take care that you do not after all get under his influence and go to him? What, are we to go to school again? If he wishes, let him come to us and be taught: we are very hard up for a little amusement.”

Thakchacha was always hearing about Ramlall, and he began to think the matter over: the one aim of his life was to find a favourable opportunity for making a successful swoop or two on Baburam Babu’s property. So far, most of the suits-at-law had ended disastrously, and he had had no opportunity for such a stroke: yet he never failed to keep on baiting his ground before casting his nets. Ramlall however having become what he was, he could not expect any fish to fall into his net, for however skilfully it might be cast the boy would advise his father not to enter it. Thakchacha saw then that a great obstacle had presented itself in his way and he thus reflected: “The moon of hope must have sunk behind a cloud of despair, for it is no longer visible.” After profound deliberation, he observed one day to his employer;— “Babu Saheb, your youngest son’s behaviour has made me very anxious: I do not think he can be quite right in his mind. He is always angry with me and tells everybody that I have corrupted you: my heart is wounded when I hear this. Ah, Babu Saheb! this is not as it should be: if he speaks like this to me, he may one day speak harshly to you. The boy will doubtless become good and gentle in time, but now he is boorish and rude, and must be corrected; besides, so far as I can judge, you may lose all your property if this course is allowed.” A casual remark may very easily disturb the mind of a man who is naturally rather dense. As a boat in the hands of an unskilful steersman is tossed about in a storm, unable to make the shore, so a dull-gritted man is in almost constant perplexity, seeing only chaos around him: he can himself come to no decision on the merits of any subject. For one thing, poor Baburam Babu was naturally rather thick-headed, and for another, Thakchacha’s words were to him as the sacred Vedas: so he stood stupidly gazing about like a man in a maze, and after a while asked Thakchacha what plan he could suggest. That astute individual replied: “Your boy, sir, is not a wicked boy: it is Barada Babu that is the origin of all the mischief. Only get him out of the way, and the boy will be all right. Ah, Babu Saheb! the son of a Hindu should observe all the ordinances of his religion as a Hindu. A man has need of both good and bad qualities if he is to engage in the business of this life: the world is not all honest: what use would it be to me if I were the only upright man in it?”

Men always regard with approval, as the opinion of a really great mind, language that is in keeping with their own convictions. Thakchacha was well aware that he had only to talk about the observance of Hindu ceremonial, and the preservation of property, and his aim would be accomplished; and, as a matter of fact, it was by such talk that he achieved his end. When Baburam heard the advice Thakchacha gave, he acquiesced at once in it, remarking: “If this is your opinion, finish the matter off at once: I will supply you with any money you may want, but you must work out the plan yourself.”

There was a good deal of discussion of this kind about Ramlall. “Many sages, many saws,” says the proverb. Some said: “The boy is good in this respect:” others would reply: “But not good in this.” One critic complained: “He is deficient in one important quality, which makes all his other excellences go for nothing, just as when a speck of cow-dung has fallen into a vessel of milk, the whole is tainted.” Another retorted: “The boy is perfect.”

Thus time went on. At last it chanced that Baburam Babu’s eldest daughter fell dangerously ill. Her parents called in a number of physicians to see her. Matilall, needless to say, never once came near his sister, but went about saying that a speedy death was preferable to the life of a widow in a rich man’s house; and during the time of her illness, he only indulged himself the more. Ramlall on the other hand was unremitting in his attention: foregoing both food and sleep, and full of anxious thought, he exerted himself to the utmost for the girl’s recovery. But she did not recover, and as she was dying she put her hand on her younger brother’s head, saying: “Ah, brother Ram! if I die, and am born a girl in my next birth, God grant that I may have a brother like you. I cannot tell you what you have done for me. God make you as happy as you wish.” With these words, his sister breathed her last.

CHAPTER XIV.
THE FALSE CHARGE.

BOYS who are at all wild are not to be satisfied with ordinary amusements: they constantly require new and fresh sources of pleasure, and if they do not find what they want abroad, they will return and sit in melancholy brooding at home. Those that have uncles at home perhaps recover their lost spirits, for they can chaff and joke with them to their heart’s content: they will at least go so far as to jest about making arrangements for their last journey to the Ganges, on the ground that they are a burden to the family. But when such is not the case, they are bored to death, and regard the world with the eyes of a man who is sick of life[28]. Passionately devoted as they were to practical joking of all kinds, Matilall and his companions invented ever new pranks, and it was hard to foretell what would be their next. Their thirst for some form of amusement became more intense every day: one kind might occupy them for a day or two, but it soon palled upon them, and they suffered torments of ennui if nothing else turned up. Such was the way in which Matilall and his companions spent their days. In course of time, it became incumbent on each of them in turn to devise something new in the way of amusement.

So one day Haladhar wrapped Dolgovinda up in a quilt and, after instructing all his chums in their different parts, repaired to the house of Brojonath, the kabiraj. It was thick with smoke from the preparation of drugs: different operations were in progress: powders were being prepared, made up of a number of different ingredients; essential oils were being refined, and gold ground into powder. The kabiraj himself was just on the point of leaving his house, with a box of his drugs in one hand and a bottle of oil in the other, when Haladhar arrived and said to him: “Oh, sir, please come as quick as you can: a boy is very ill of fever in the house of a zemindar, and he seems to be in a very critical state: his life and your fame, you see, are both at stake: you will get undying honour if you restore him to health again. It is thought that he may get all right by the administration of some very powerful drug: if you can succeed in curing him, you will be richly rewarded.” Upon this, the kabiraj made all haste, and was soon at the bedside of the patient.

The young Babus, who were all present, called out: “Welcome, welcome, sir kabiraj, may you revive us all! Dolgovinda has been lying on his bed some fifteen days with this fever: his temperature is very high, and he puffers from terrible thirst: he gets no sleep at night, only tosses restlessly about. Please examine his pulse carefully, sir, and meanwhile refresh yourself by having a smoke.” Brojonath was a very old man, without much education: he was not very skilful even at his own trade, had no opinions of his own, and could do nothing on his own responsibility. In person he was emaciated, with no teeth, a harsh voice, and a heavy grey moustache, of which he was so enamoured that he was always stroking it. He sighed as he looked at the patient’s hand, and sat perfectly motionless. Haladhar then said to him: “Honoured sir, have you nothing to say?” The kabiraj without replying gazed intently on the face of the patient, who was glaring wildly about him, lolling his tongue out, and grinding his teeth. He also gave a tug at the kabiraj’s moustache: and as he moved away a little, the boy rolled about and straggled to get hold of the bottle of oil in his hand. The Babus then said: “Come tell us, sir, what is the matter?” The kabiraj replied: “The attack is a very severe one: there seems to be high fever and delirium. If I had only had news a little earlier, I might have managed to cure him: as it is, it would be impossible even for Shiva to do so.” As he spoke, the patient got hold of his bottle of oil, and rubbed a good handful of it over his body. The kabiraj seeing the visit was likely to cost him dear[29], hurriedly took the bottle away, corked it well, and got up to go. “Where are you going, sir?” They all cried. The kabiraj replied: “The delirium is gradually increasing: I do not think there is any further necessity for keeping the patient in the house: you should now exert yourselves to make his end a happy one by taking him to the Ganges to die[30].”

As soon as he heard this, the patient jumped up, and the kabiraj started back at the sight. The young Babus of Vaidyabati ran after him, and as the kabiraj, who had gone on a short distance, stopped dumbfounded and amazed, they began to hustle him, with shouts of “Hori Bol: Hori Bol:”, and one of them threw him over his shoulders, and started for the Ganges. Dolgovinda then came up to him, and said: “Aha my dear sir, you gave orders to have the patient taken to the Ganges: the doctor himself it is who is now being carried thither! I will myself perform the ceremony of putting you into the water, and of then throwing you on to the funeral pyre.” The views of the fickle are ever changing, and so a little later he said: “Will you send me to the Ganges again? Go, my dear friend! go to your home, and to your children, but before you go, you must give me that bottle of oil”. With these words, he snatched the bottle from the kabiraj, and all the young lunatics, smearing themselves over with the oil, leaped into the Ganges. The kabiraj became as one bereft of his senses when he saw all this, and thinking that he might breathe again if he could only get away, he increased his pace. Thereupon Haladhar, as he was swimming about, screamed out: “Ho there, respected kabiraj! I am getting more and more bilious every day: you must give me some of your powders to take: do not run away: if you do, your wife will have to remove her bracelet and be a widow.” The kabiraj threw down his box of drugs, and hurried home crying, “Alas! alas!”

In the month of Phalgun, as spring comes in, all the trees are coming out in new leaf, and the sweet odour of flowers is diffused around. Barada Babu’s dwelling-house was on the banks of the Ganges: some little distance in front of it was his favourite garden-house, and all round it a garden. Barada Babu used to sit every evening in the garden-house, to enjoy the fresh air and his own meditations, or to converse with any friends who might visit him there. Ramlall was always with him, and was made the confidant of his most secret thoughts, whereby he obtained much good advice. At every opportunity, he would question his preceptor minutely on the means of attaining to a knowledge of the Supreme Being, and to perfect purity of mind.

One day Ramlall remarked to Barada Babu: “Sir, I have a great longing to travel: staying here, it is a constant grief to me to listen to the bad language of my elder brother and the evil counsel of Thakchacha, but my love for my parents and for my sister makes me disinclined to stir from home. I cannot decide what to do.” Barada Babu replied;— “Much benefit is to be derived from travel: breadth of vision is not to be had without it: the mind is enlarged by the sight of different countries, and different people. Much knowledge too is acquired by a minute enquiry into the different customs of the people of different countries, into their habits, and the causes determining their condition, whether good or bad. Association moreover with all sorts of people, causes bitter prejudices to disappear and induces good feeling. If a man is educated only at home, his knowledge is derived from books only. Now education, association with good men, practical employment, and intercourse with all sorts of people, are all necessary to a man: it is by agencies such as this that the understanding becomes clear, and an impetus is given towards the moulding of a good character. But before he sets out on his travels, it is all important that a man should know the different matters he will require to investigate, for without this, travel will prove a mere aimless wandering about, like the circling round and round of an ox when threshing out the grain. I do not go so far as to say that no benefit is to be had from such travelling, that is not my meaning: some benefit or other there must be. But when a man on his travels is ignorant of the kind of enquiries he ought to make, and cannot make them, he does not derive the full benefit of his labour. Many Bengalees are fond of travelling about, but if you ask them for facts about the places they visit, how many of them can give you a sensible answer? This is not altogether their own fault, it is the result of their bringing-up. A good understanding is not to be had all at once from the sky, without some training in the art of observation, enquiry and reflection. In the education of children it is requisite that an opportunity should be given them of seeing models of a great variety of objects: as they look at all the pictures, they will compare one with another: that is to say, they will see that one object has a hand, another has no foot, that one has a peculiar mouth, another no tail; and by such comparison the faculties of observation and reflection will be brought into play and developed. After a time such comparisons will come easy to them; they will be able to reflect on the causes for the peculiarities of different objects, and will have no difficulty in perceiving the various classes into which they naturally fall. By instruction of this kind, assiduity in research is encouraged and the faculty of reasoning exercised. But in our country an education like this is hardly ever given, and as a natural consequence, our wits are muddled and run to waste: we have no instinctive perception of the essential and unessential features of any enquiry. When a question is under consideration, many of us have not even the requisite intelligence to know what kind of enquiries should be made in order that a conclusion may be arrived at; and it is no falsehood to say that the travels of a good many people are but idle and profitless. But considering the education you have had, I should imagine that travel would be of great advantage to you.”

“Now if I do go abroad” said Ramlall, “I shall have to stay for some time in places where there is society: and with what classes, and with what kinds of people, should I chiefly associate?”

“That is no easy question,” Barada Babu replied: “I must contrive though to give you some kind of an answer. In every rank in life there are people good and bad: any good people you may come across you may associate with; but you know by now how to recognise such: I need not tell you again. Association with Englishmen may make a man courageous, for they worship courage, and any Englishman committing a cowardly act is not admitted into good society. But it does not at all follow that a man is therefore virtuous because he happens to be courageous. Courage is very essential to everybody, I admit; but real courage is that which is the outcome of virtue. I have told you already and now tell you again, that you must always meditate on the Supreme Being, otherwise all that you see, or hear, or learn, will only have the effect of increasing your pride. One thing more: men often wish to do what they see others doing; the Bengalees especially, from association with Englishmen, have acquired a false superficial kind of Anglicism, and are filled with self-conceit in consequence; pride is the motive force in all they do. It will do you no harm to remember this.”

They were conversing together in this way when suddenly some police-officers rushed in from the west side of the garden and surrounded Barada Babu. He looked at them sharply, and asked them who they were and what their business with him was. They replied: “We are officers connected with the police: there is a warrant out against you on the charge of illegal confinement and assault, and you will have to appear before the Court of the English Magistrate of Hooghly; we shall have moreover to search your premises for proofs of the charge.” Ramlall rose up at these words, and when he had read the warrant, he shook with rage at the falsity of the charge, Barada Babu took his hand and made him sit down again, saying: “Do not put yourself out: let the matter be thoroughly well sifted. All sorts of strange accidents befall us on earth, but there is no need to be disturbed in mind at all when calamity comes: to be agitated in the presence of misfortune is the mark of an ignorant mind. Besides, I am conscious of my entire innocence of the crime I am accused of: what cause then have for fear? Still the order of the court must be attended to, so I shall put in an immediate appearance. Let the officers search my house, and see with their own eyes that there is no one concealed there.” The police-officers having received this order, searched everywhere but found nothing. Barada Babu then had a boat fetched, and made all his arrangements for his journey to Hooghly. Meanwhile by some good chance Beni Babu arrived at his house, so he set out on his journey to Hooghly, taking Beni and Ramlall with him. Both were somewhat anxious, but by his cheerful conversation on a variety of topics, he soon put them at their ease.