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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

THE CITY OFDREADFUL NIGHT

By.

RUDYARD KIPLINGWith Illustrations by

CHARLES D. FARRAND

ALEX. GROSSET & CO.I East Sixteenth St., New York

1899

35644

Copyright, 1899BY

ALEX. GROSSET & CO.

WOCOPUxit y5C"IV0,

MAY 6 -1899

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I.PAOE

A Real Live City, 5

CHAPTER n.The Reflections of a Savage,

. . . .14

CHAPTER III.The Council of the Gods, 35

CHAPTER IV.On the Banks of the Hugli, 37

CHAPTER V.With the Calcutta Police, 49

CHAPTER VI.The City of Dreadful Night, .... 58

CHAPTER VII.Deeper and Deeper Still 73

CHAPTER VIII.Concerning Lucia, 83

THE CITY OF DREADFUL NIGHT.

CHAPTER I.

A KEAL LIVE CITY.

We are all backwoodsmen and barbarians to-getherwe others dwelling beyond the Ditch,in the outer darkness of the Mofussil. Thereare no such things as commissioners and headsof departments in the world, and there is only-one city in India. Bombay is too green, toopretty, and too stragglesome ; and Madras diedever so long ago. Let us take off our hats to

Calcutta, the many-sided, the smoky, the mag-nificent, as we drive in over the Hugli Bridgein the dawn of a still February morning. Wehave left India behind us at Howrah Station,and now we enter foreign parts. No, not whollyforeign. Say rather too familiar.

All men of certain age know the feeling ofcaged irritationan illustration in the Graphic,a bar of music, or the light words of a friend

5

Zhc Cits of DreaDtul WghU

from home may set it ablazethat comes fromthe knowledge of our lost heritage of London.At home they, the other men, our equals, haveat their disposal all that town can supplytheroar of the streets, the lights, the music, thepleasant places, the millions of their own kind,

and a wilderness full of pretty, fresh-coloredEnglishwomen, theatres, and restaurants. Itis their right. They accept it as sucTi, and evenaffect to look upon it with contempt. And we,we have nothing except the few amusements thatwe painfully build up for ourselvesthe dolor-ous dissipations of gymkhanas where every oneknows everybody else, or the chastened intoxi-cation of dances where all engagements arebooked, in ink, ten days ahead, and whereeverybody's antecedents are as patent as his orher method of waltzing. We have been de-prived of our inheritance. The men at homeare enjoying it all, not knowing how fair andrich it is, and we at the most can only fly west-ward for a few months and gorge what, properlyspeaking, should take seven or eight or ten lux-urious years. That is the lost heritage of Lon-don ; and the knowledge of the forfeiture, wilfulor forced, comes to most men at times and sea-sons, and they get cross.

Calcutta holds out false hopes of some return.6

B IReal %ivc Citg^

The dense smoke hangs low, in the chill of themorning, over an ocean of roofs, and, as thecity wakes, there goes up to the smoke a deep,full-throated boom of life and motion and hu-manity. For this reason does he who sees Cal-cutta for the first time hang joyously out of theticca-gharri and sniff the smoke, and turn hisface toward the tumult, saying: "This is, atlast, some portion of my heritage returned tome. This is a city. There is life here, andthere should be all manner of pleasant thingsfor the having, across the river and under thesmoke. " When Leland, he who wrote the HansBreitmann Ballads, once desired to know thename of an austere, plug-hatted redskin of re-

pute, his answer, from the lips of a half-breed,was:

"He Injun. He big Injun. He heap bigInjun. He dam big heap Injun. He dammighty great big heap Injun. He Jones !

"

The litany is an expressive one, and exactlydescribes the first emotions of a wandering sav-age adrift in Calcutta. The eye has lost itssense of proportion, the focus has contracted

through overmuch residence in up-country sta;tionstwenty minutes' canter from hospital toparade-ground, you knowand the mind hasshrunk with the eye. Both say together, as

7

^be Cits or BreaDful niQbU

they take in tlie sweep of shipping above andbelow the Hugli Bridge: "Why, this is Lon-don! This is the docks. This is Imperial.This is worth coming across India to see ! "

Then a distinctly wicked idea takes posses-sion of the mind: "What a divinewhat aheavenly place to loot/ " This gives place to amuch worse devilthat of Conservatism. Itseems not only a wrong but a criminal thing toallow natives to have any voice in the controlof such a cityadorned, docked, wharfed,fronted and reclaimed by Englishmen, existingonly because England lives, and dependent forits life on England. All India knows of theCalcutta Municipality; but has any one thor-oughly investigated the Big Calcutta Stink?There is only one. Benares is fouler in pointof concentrated, pent-up muck, and there arelocal stenches in Peshawur which are strongerthan the B.C.S. j but, for diffused, soul-sicken-ing expansiveness, the reek of Calcutta beatsboth Benares and Peshawur. Bombay cloaksher stenches with a veneer of assafoetida andhuqa-tohsicco

; Calcutta is above pretence.There is no tracing back the Calcutta plague toany one source. It is faint, it is sickly, and itis indescribable; but Americans at the GreatEastern Hotel say that it is something like the

8

B TReal %ivc Citg*

smell of the Chinese quarter in San Francisco.It is certainly not an Indian smell. It resem-bles the essence of corruption that has rotted

for the second timethe clammy odor of blueslime. And there is no escape from it. Itblows across the maidan ; it comes in gusts intothe corridors of the Great Eastern Hotel ; whatthey are pleased to call the " Palaces of Chou-ringhi" carry it; it swirls round the BengalClub ; it pours out of by-streets with sickeningintensity, and the breeze of the morning is ladenwith it. It is first found, in spite of the fume ofthe engines, in Howrah Station. It seems to beworst in the little lanes at the back of Lai Bazarwhere the drinking-shops are, but it is nearlyas bad opposite Government House and in thePublic Ofl&ces. The thing is intermittent. Sixmoderately pure mouthfuls of air may be drawnwithout offence. Then comes the seventh waveand the queasiness of an uncultured stomach.If you live long enough in Calcutta you growused to it. The regular residents admit the dis-grace, but their answer is : " Wait till the windblows off the Salt Lakes where all the sewagegoes, and then you'll smell something." Thatis their defence! Small wonder that they con-sider Calcutta is a fit place for a permanent

Viceroy. Englishmen who can calmly extenu-9

Zbc Citg of BrcaOful MigbU

ate one shame by another are capable of askingfor anythingand expecting to get it.

If an up-country station holding three thou-

sand troops and twenty civilians owned such apossession as Calcutta does, the Deputy Com-missioner or the Cantonment Magistrate wouldhave all the natives off the board of manage-

ment or decently shovelled into the backgrounduntil the mess was abated. Then they mightcome on again and talk of " high-handed oppres-sion" as much as they liked. That stink, toan unprejudiced nose, damns Calcutta as a Cityof Kings. And, in spite of that stink, theyallow, they even encourage, natives to look after

the place! The damp, drainage-soaked soil issick with the teeming life of a hundred years,

and the Municipal Board list is choked with thenames of nativesmen of the breed born in andraised off this surfeited muck-heap ! They ownproperty, these amiable Aryans on the Municipal

and the Bengal Legislative Council. Launch aproposal to tax them on that property, and they

naturally howl. They also howl up-country,but there the halls for mass-meetings are few,

and the vernacular papers fewer, and with a

zubhardusti Secretary and a President whose

favor is worth the having and whose wrath is

undesirable, men are kept clean despite them-10

B IReal Xtve Cits,

selves, and may not poison their neighbors.Why, asks a savage, let them vote at all?They can put up with this filthiness. Theycannot have any feelings worth caring a rush

for. Let them live quietly and hide away theirmoney under our protection, while we tax themtill they know through their purses the measureof their neglect in the past, and when a little ofthe smell has been abolished, bring them backagain to talk and take the credit of enlighten-ment. The better classes own their broughamsand barouches ; the worse can shoulder an Eng-lishman into the kennel and talk to him as thoughhe were a khidmatgar. They can refer to anEnglish lady as an aurat ; they are permitted afreedomnot to put it too coarselyof speech

which, if used by an Englishman toward an Eng-lishman, would end in serious trouble. Theyare fenced and protected and made inviolate.Surely they might be content with all thosethings without entering into matters which theycannot, by the nature of their birth, under-stand.

Now, whether all this genial diatribe be theoutcome of an unbiased mind or the result firstof sickness caused by that ferocious stench, andsecondly of headache due to day-long smokingto drown the stench, is an open question. Any-

11

Zbc Citg ot DreaDful mtgbt.

way, Calcutta is a fearsome place for a man noteducated up to it.A word of advice to other barbarians. Do

not bring a north-country servant into Calcutta.He is sure to get into trouble, because he doesnot understand the customs of the city. APunjabi in this place for the first time esteemsit his bounden duty to go to the Ajaib-ghartheMuseum. Such an one has gone and is evennow returned very angry and troubled in thespirit. "I went to the Museum," says he," and no one gave me any gali. I went to themarket to buy my food, and then I sat upon aseat. There came a chaprissi who said: ' Goaway, I want to sit here. ' I said : ^ I am herefirst. ' He said : ^ I am a chaprissi ! nikaljao ! 'and he hit me. Now that sitting-place was opento all, so I hit him till he wept. He ran awayfor the Police, and I went away too, for the Po-lice here are all Sahibs. Can I have leave fromtwo o'clock to go and look for that chaprissi andhit him again? "

Behold the situation! An unknown city fullof smell that makes one long for rest and retire-ment, and a champing naukar, not yet six hoursin the stew, who has started a blood-feud withan unknown chaprissi and clamors to go forth tothe fray. General orders that, whatever may

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B IReal Xive Cits*

be said or done to him, he must not say or doanything in return lead to an eloquent harangueon the quality of izzat and the nature of " faceblackening." There is no izzat in Calcutta, andthis Awful Smell blackens the face of any Eng-lishman who sniffs it.

Alas! for the lost delusion of the heritage

that was to be restored. Let us sleep, let ussleep, and pray that Calcutta may be betterto-morrow.

At present it is remarkably like sleeping witha corpse.

13

CHAPTER II.THE REFLECTIONS OF A SAVAGE.

Morning brings counsel. Does Calcuttasmell so pestiferously after all? Heavy rainhas fallen in the night. She is newly-washed,and the clear sunlight shows her at her best.Where, oh where, in all this wilderness of life,shall a man go? ITewman and Co. publish athree-rupee guide which produces first despairand then fear in the mind of the reader. Letus drop Newman and Co. out of the topmostwindow of the Great Eastern, trusting to luckand the flight of the hours to evolve wondersand mysteries and amusements.The Great Eastern hums with life through all

its hundred rooms. Doors slam merrily, andall the nations of the earth run up and downthe staircases. This alone is refreshing, be-cause the passers bump you and ask you tostand aside. Fancy finding any place outside aLevee-room where Englishmen are crowded to-gether to this extent ! Fancy sitting down sev-enty strong to table d^hote and with a deafening

14

XLbc tRcUcctlons ot a Savage*

clatter of knives and forks! Fancy finding areal bar whence drinks may be obtained ! and,joy of joys, fancy stepping out of the hotel intothe arms of a live, white, helmeted, buttoned,

truncheoned Bobby ! A beautiful, burly Bobbyjust the sort of man who, seven thousandmiles away, staves off the stuttering witticism

of the three-o'clock-in-the-morning reveller bythe strong badged arm of authority. Whatwould happen if one spoke to this Bobby?Would he be offended? He is not offended.He is affable. He has to patrol the pavementin front of the Great Eastern and to see that thecrowding ticca-gharris do not jam. Toward apresumably respectable white he behaves as aman and a brother. There is no arrogance abouthim. And this is disappointing. Closer inspec-tion shows that he is not a real Bobby after all.He is a Municipal Police something and his uni-form is not correct; at least if they have notchanged the dress of the men at home. But nomatter. Later on we will inquire into the Cal-

cutta Bobby, because he is a white man, andhas to deal with some of the " toughest " folkthat ever set out of malice aforethought to paintJob Charnock's city vermillion. You must not,you cannot cross Old Court House Street with-out looking carefully to see that you stand no

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Zbc Cit^ ot BceaDfuI mfgbt.

chance of being run over. This is beautiful.There is a steady roar of traffic, cut every twominutes by the deeper roll of the trams. Thedriving is eccentric, not to say bad, but there

is the trafficmore than unsophisticated eyes

have beheld for a certain number of years. Itmeans business, it means money-making, itmeans crowded and hurrying life, and it getsinto the blood and makes it move. Here be bigshops with plate-glass frontsall displaying the

well-known names of firms that we savages only

correspond with through the V. P. P. and Par-cels Post. They are all here, as large as life,ready to supply anything you need if you onlycare to sign. Great is the fascination of being

able to obtain a thing on the spot without hav-

ing to write for a week and wait for a month,and then get something c[uite different. Nowonder pretty ladies, who live anywhere withina reasonable distance, come down to do theirshopping personally.

" Look here. If you want to be respectableyou musn't smoke in the streets. Nobody doesit. " This is advice kindly tendered by a friendin a black coat. There is no Levee or Lieuten-

ant-Governor in sight ; but he wears the frock-

coat because it is daylight, and he can be seen.He also refrains from smoking for the same rea-

16

Zbc IReflectlons of a Savage,

son. He admits that Providence built the openair to be smoked in, but he says that " it isn't thething." This man has a brougham, a remark-ably natty little pill-box with a curious wabbleabout the wheels. He steps into the broughamand puts ona top hat, a shiny black "plug."

There was a man up-country once who owneda top-hat. He leased it to amateur theatricalcompanies for some seasons until the nap woreoff. Then he threw it into a tree and wild beeshived in it. Men were wont to come and lookat the hat, in its palmy days, for the sake offeeling homesick. It interested all the station,and died with two seers of babul flower honeyin its bosom. But top-hats are not intended tobe worn in India. They are as sacred as homeletters and old rosebuds. The friend cannotsee this. He allows that if he stepped out ofhis brougham and walked about in the sunshinefor ten minutes he would get a bad headache.In half an hour he would probably catch sun-stroke. He allows all this, but he keeps to hishat and cannot see why a barbarian is moved toinextinguishable laughter at the sight. Every-

one who owns a brougham and many people whohire ticca-gharris keep top-hats and black frock-coats. The effect is curious, and at first fillsthe beholder with surprise.

2 17

Zbc Cits of BrcaDful IRigbt

And now, "let us see tlie handsome houseswhere the wealthy nobles dwell." Northerly-lies the great human jungle of the native city,stretching from Burra Bazar to Chitpore. Thatcan keep. Southerly is the maidan and Chou-ringhi. " If you get out into the centre of themaidan you will understand why Calcutta iscalled the City of Palaces." The travelledAmerican said so at the Great Eastern. Thereis a short tower, falsely called a "memorial,"standing in a waste of soft, sour green. Thatis as good a place to get to as any other. Nearhere the newly-landed waler is taught the wholeduty of the trap-horse and careers madly in abrake. Near here young Calcutta gets upon ahorse and is incontinently run away with. Nearhere hundreds of kine feed, close to the innu-merable trams and the whirl of traffic along theface of Chouringhi Eoad. The size of the mai-dan takes the heart out of anyone accustomedto the " gardens " of up-country, just as they sayNewmarket Heath cows a horse accustomed tomore shut-in course. The huge level is studdedwith brazen statues of eminent gentlemen rid-ing fretful horses on diabolically severe curbs.

The expanse dwarfs the statues, dwarfs every-thing except the frontage of the far-away Chou-ringhi Road. It is bigit is impressive. There

18

XLbc IRetlectlons of a Savage*

is no escaping the fact. They built houses inthe old days when the rupee was two shillingsand a penny. Those houses are three-storied,and ornamented with service-staircases likehouses in the Hills. They are also very closetogether, and they own garden walls of pukka-masonry pierced with a single gate. In theirshut-upness they are British. In their spacious-

ness they are Oriental, but those service-stair-

cases do not look healthy. We will form anamateur sanitary commission and call uponChouringhi.A first introduction to the Calcutta durwan is

not nice. If he is chewing pan, he does nottake the trouble to get rid of his quid. If he issitting on his charpoy chewing sugarcane, hedoes nob think it worth his while to rise. Hehas to be taught those things, and he cannotunderstand why he should be reproved. Clearlyhe is a survival of a played-out system. Provi-dence never intended that any native should bemade a concierge more insolent than any of theFrench variety. The people of Calcutta put anUria in a little lodge close to the gate of theirhouse, in order that loafers may be turned away,and the houses protected from theft. The nat-ural result is that the durwan treats everybodywhom he does not know as a loafer, has an in-

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XLbc Ctt^ of BreaDful Bigbt

timate and vendible knowledge of all the out-goings and incomings in that house, and con-trols, to a large extent, the nomination of thenaukar-log. They say that one of the estimableclass is now suing a bank for about three lakhsof rupees. Up-country, a Lieutenant-Governor'scharprassi has to work for thirty years before hecan retire on seventy thousand rupees of savings.The Calcutta durwan is a great institution. Thehead and front of his offence is that he will in-sist upon trying to talk English. How he pro-tects the houses Calcutta only knows. He canbe frightened out of his wits by severe speech,and is generally asleep in calling hours. If arough round of visits be any guide, three timesout of seven he is fragrant of drink. So muchfor the durwan. Now for the houses he guards.

Very pleasant is the sensation of being ush-ered into a pestiferously stablesome drawing-room. " Does this always happen? " No, " notunless you shut up the room for some time ; butif you open the jhilmills there are other smells.Tou see the stables and the servants' quartersare close too.'' People pay five hundred amonth for half-a-dozen rooms filled with attr ofthis kind. They make no complaint. Whenthey think the honor of the city is at stake they

say defiantly: "Yes, but you must remember20

XLbc IReflectione ot a Savage.

we're a metropolis. We are crowded here. Wehave no room. We aren't like your little sta-tions." Chouringhi is a stately place full ofsumptuous houses, but it is best to look at ithastily. Stop to consider for a moment whatthe cramped compounds, the black soaked soil,the netted intricacies of the service-staircases,

the packed stables, the seethment of humanlife round the durwans' lodges, and the curiousarrangement of little open drains means, andyou will call it a whited sepulchre.Men living in expensive tenements suffer from

chronic sore-throat, and will tell you cheerilythat "we've got typhoid in Calcutta now." Isthe pest ever out of it? Everything seems tobe built with a view to its comfort. It canlodge comfortably on roofs, climb along fromthe gutter-pipe to piazza, "or rise from sink toverandah and thence to the topmost story. ButCalcutta says that all is sound and produces fig-ures to prove it; at the same time admittingthat healthy cut flesh will not readily heal.

Further evidence may be dispensed with.Here come pouring down Park Street on the

maidan a rush of broughams, neat buggies, thelightest of gigs, trim office brownberrys, shin-ing victorias, and a sprinkling of veritable han-som cabs. In the broughams sit men in top-

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^be Cits of 2)reaDful migbt

hats. In the other carts, young men, all verymuch alike, and all immaculately turned out.A fresh stream from Chouringhi joins the ParkStreet detachment, and the two together streamaway across the maidan toward the businessquarter of the city. This is Calcutta going toofficethe civilians to the Government Build-ings and the young men to their firms and theirblocks and their wharves. Here one sees thatCalcutta has the best turn-out in the Empire.Horses and traps alike are enviably perfect, andmark the touchstone of civilization

the lampsare in the sockets. This is distinctly refreshing.Once more we will take off our hats to Calcutta,the well-appointed, the luxurious. The coun-try-bred is a rare beast here ; his place is taken

by the waler, and the waler, though a ruffian atheart, can be made to look like a gentleman.It would be indecorous as well as insane to ap-plaud the winking harness, the perfectly lac-quered panels, and the liveried saises. Theyshow well in the outwardly fair roads shadowedby the Palaces.How many sections of the complex society of

the place do the carts carry? Imprimis, theBengal Civilian who goes to Writers' Buildingsand sits in a perfect office and speaks flippantlyof " sending things into India, " meaning thereby

Zbc IRetlections ot a Savage.

the Supreme Government. He is a great per-son, and his mouth is full of promotion-and-appointment "shop." Generally he is referredto as a "rising man." Calcutta seems full of

"rising men." Secondly, the Government ofIndia man, who wears a familiar Simla face,rents a flat when he is not up in the Hills, andis rational on the subject of the drawbacks ofCalcutta. Thirdly, the man of the " firms, " the

pure non-official who fights under the banner ofone of the great houses of the City, or for his

own hand in a neat office, or dashes about CliveStreet in a brougham doing " share work " orsomething of the kind. He fears not " Bengal,

"

nor regards he " India." He swears impartiallyat both when their actions interfere with hisoperations. His " shop " is quite unintelligible.He is like the English city man with the chilloff, lives well and entertains hospitably. Inthe old days he was greater than he is now, butstill he bulks large. He is rational in so farthat he will help the abuse of the Municipality,but womanish in his insistence on the excellen-cies of Calcutta. Over and above these whoare hurrying to work are the various brigades,squads, and detachments of the other interests.But they are sets and not sections, and revolveround Belvedere, Government House, and Fort

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Zhc Cits ot Dreadful migbt

William. Simla and Darjeeling claim them inthe hot weather. Let them go. They weartop-hats and frock-coats.

It is time to escape from Chouringhi Eoadand get among the long-shore folk, who haveno prejudices against tobacco, and who all usepretty nearly the same sort of hat.

H

CHAPTEE III.

THE COUNCIL OF THE GODS.

He set up conclusions to the number of nine thou-sand seven hundred and sixty-four ... he went after-wards to the Sorbonne, where he maintained argumentagainst the theologians for the space of six weeks, fromfour o'clock in the morning till six in the evening, ex-cept for an interval of two hours to refresh themselvesand take their repasts, and at this were present thegreatest part of the lords of the court, the masters of

request, presidents, counsellors, those of the accompts,

secretaries, advocates, and others ; as also the sheriffsof the said town.Pantagruel.

"The Bengal Legislative Council is sittingnow. You will find it in an octagonal wing ofWriters' Buildings : straight across the maidan.It's worth seeing." "What are they sittingon?" "Municipal business. No end of a de-bate." So much for trying to keep low com-pany. The long-shore loafers must stand over.Without doubt this Council is going to hangsome one for the state of the City, and Sir Steu-art Bayley will be chief executioner. One doesnot come across Councils every day.

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XLbc Cfti? ot 2)reaDful mfgbt

Writers' Buildings are large. You can troublethe busy workers of half-a-dozen departmentsbefore you stumble upon the black-stained stair-case that leads to an upper chamber looking outover a populous street. Wild chuprassis blockthe way. The Councillor Sahibs are sitting,but anyone can enter. " To the right of the LatSahib's chair, and go quietly." Ill-manneredminion ! Does he expect the awe-stricken spec-tator to prance in with a jubilant warwhoop orturn Catherine-wheels round that sumptuous oc-tagonal room with the blue-domed roof? Thereare gilt capitals to the half pillars, and an Egyp-tian patterned lotus-stencil makes the wallsdecorously gay. A thick piled carpet coversall the floor, and must be delightful in the hotweather. On a black wooden throne, comfort-ably cushioned in green leather, sits Sir SteuartBayley. Ruler of Bengal. The rest are all greatmen, or else they would not be there. Not toknow them argues one's self unknown. There area dozen of them, and sit six-a-side at two slightlycurved lines of beautifully polished desks. ThusSir Steuart Bayley occupies the frog of a badlymade horse-shoe split at the toe. In front ofhim, at a table covered with books and pam-phlets and papers, toils a secretary. There isa seat for the Reporters, and that is all. The

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XTbe Council of tbe (3o&6

place enjoys a chastened gloom, and its veryatmosphere fills one with. awe. This is theheart of Bengal, and uncommonly well uphol-stered. If the work matches the first-class fur-niture, the inkpots, the carpet, and the resplen-dent ceiling, there will be something worthseeing. But where is the criminal who is to behanged for the stench that runs up and downWriters' Buildings staircases, for the rubbishheaps in the Chitpore Eoad, for the sickly savorof Chouringhi, for the dirty little tanks at theback of Belvedere, for the street full of small-pox, for the reeking gharri-stand outside theGreat Eastern, for the state of the stone anddirt pavements, for the condition of the gullies

of Shampooker, and for a hundred other things?"This, I submit, is an artificial scheme in

supersession of Nature's unit, the individual."

The speaker is a slight, spare native in a flathat-turban, and a black alpaca frock-coat. Helooks like a vakil to the boot-heels, and, withhis unvarying smile and regulated gesticula-tion, recalls memories of up-country courts.He never hesitates, is never at a loss for aword, and never in one sentence repeats him-self. He talks and talks and talks in a levelvoice, rising occasionally half an octave when apoint has to be driven home. Some of his pe-

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Zbc Cits ot 2)reaDful migbt.

riods sound very familiar. This, for instance,might be a sentence from the Mirror : " So muchfor the principle. Let us now examine how farit is supported by precedent." This sounds bad.When a fluent native is discoursing of " princi-ples" and "precedents," the chances are thathe will go on for some time. Moreover, whereis the criminal, and what is all this talk aboutabstractions? They want shovels, not senti-ments, in this part of the world.

A friendly whisper brings enlightenment:"They are plowing through the Calcutta Mu-nicipal Bill

plurality of votes you know ; hereare the papers." And so it is! A mass of mo-tions and amendments on matters relating toward votes. Is A to be allowed to give twovotes in one ward and one in another? Is sec-tion 10 to be omitted, and is one man to beallowed one vote and no more? How manyvotes does three hundred rupees' worth oflanded property carry? Is it better to kiss apost or throw it in the fire? Not a word aboutcarbolic acid and gangs of domes. The littleman in the black cJior/a revels in his subject.He is great on principles and precedents, andthe necessity of "popularizing our system."He fears that under certain circumstances " thestatus of the candidates will decline." He riots

2a

XLbc Council ot tbe oDs,

in "self-adjusting majorities," and the "healthyinfluence of the educated middle classes."For a practical answer to this, there steals

across the council chamber just one faint whiff.It is as though some one laughed low and bit-terly. But no man heeds. The Englishmenlook supremely bored, the native members starestolidly in front of them. Sir Steuart Bayley's

face is as set as the face of the Sphinx. For

these things he draws his pay, and his is a lowwage for heavy labor. But the speaker, nowadrift, is not altogether to be blamed. He isa Bengali, who has got before him just such asubject as his soul lovethan elaborate piece ofacademical reform leading no-whither. Here

is a quiet room full of pens and papers, andthere are men who must listen to him. Appar-ently there is no time limit to the speeches.

Can you wonder that he talks? He says "Isubmit " once every ninety seconds, varying theform with " I do submit. " " The popular elementin the electoral body should have prominence."Quite so. He quotes one John Stuart Mill toprove it. There steals over the listener a numb-ing sense of nightmare. He has heard all thisbefore somewhere

yea; even down to J. S.

Mill and the references to the " true interests ofthe ratepayers." He sees what is coming next.

XLhc ait^ of 2)rea&ful MigbU

Yes, there is the old Sabha Anjumaa journalis-tic formula"Western education is an exoticplant of recent importation." How on earthdid this man drag Western education into thisdiscussion? Who knows? Perhaps Sir SteuartBayley does. He seems to be listening. Theothers are looking at their watches. The spellof the level voice sinks the listener yet deeperinto a trance. He is haunted by the ghosts ofall the cant of all the political platforms of

Great Britain. He hears all the old, old vestryphrases, and once more he smells the smell.That is no dream. Western education is anexotic plant. 'It is the upas tree, and it is allour fault. We brought it out from Englandexactly as we brought out the ink bottles andthe patterns for the chairs. We planted it andit grewmonstrous as a banian. Now we arechoked by the roots of it spreading so thicklyin this fat soil of Bengal. The speaker contin-ues. Bit by bit. We builded this dome, visibleand invisible, the crown of Writers' Buildings,as we have built and peopled the buildings.Now we have gone too far to retreat, being " tiedand bound with the chain of our own sins. " Thespeech continues. We made that florid sentence.That torrent of verbiage is ours. We taughthim what was constitutional and what was un-

30

ZDc Council of tbe (5o^e,

constitutional in the days when Calcutta smelt.Calcutta smells still, but we must listen to allthat he has to say about the plurality of votesand the threshing of wind and the weaving ofropes of sand. It is our own fault absolutely.

The speech ends, and there rises a gray Eng-lishman in a black frock-coat. He looks astrong man, and a worldly. Surely he will say

:

" Yes, Lala Sahib, all this may be true talk, butthere's a burra krah smell in this place, andeverything must be safkaroed in a week, or theDeputy Commissioner will not take any noticeof you in durbar^ He says nothing of thekind. This is a Legislative Council, wherethey call each other "Honorable So-and-So's."The Englishman in the frock-coat begs all toremember that "we are discussing principles,and no consideration of the details ought to in-fluence the verdict on the principles." Is hethen like the rest? How does this strange thingcome about? Perhaps thesa so English officefittings are responsible for the warp. The Coun-cil Chamber might be a London Board-room.Perhaps after long years among the peos andpapers its occupants grow to think that it reallyis, and in this belief give resumes of the historyof Local Self-Government in England.The black frock-coat, emphasizing his points

31

Zbc Citg ot Dreadful IRigbt*

with his spectacle-case, is telling his friends howthe parish was first the unit of self-government.

He then explains how burgesses were elected,and in tones of deep fervor announces : " Com-missioners of Sewers are elected in the same

way." Whereunto all this lecture? Is he try-ing to run a motion through under cover of acloud of words, essaying the well-known "cut-tle-fish trick" of the West?He abandons England for a while, and now

we get a glimpse of the cloven hoof in a casualreference to Hindus and Mahomedans. TheHiudus will lose nothing by the complete estab-lishment of plurality of votes. They will havethe control of their own wards as they used tohave. So there is race-feeling, to be explained

away, even among these beautiful desks.Scratch the Council, and you come to the old,old trouble. The black frock-coat sits down,and a keen-eyed, black-bearded Englishmanrises with one hand in his pocket to explain hisviews on an alteration of the vote qualification.The idea of an amendment seems to have juststruck him. He hints that he will bring it for-ward later on. He is academical like the others,but not half so good a speaker. All this isdreary beyond words. Why do they talk andtalk about owners and occupiers and burgesses

32

Zbc Council ot tbe oDs,

in England and the growth of autonomous in-stitutions when the city, the great city, is herecrying out to be cleansed? What has Englandto do with Calcutta's evil, and why should Eng-lishmen be forced to wander through mazes ofunprofitable argument against men who cannotunderstand the iniquity of dirt?A pause follows the black-bearded man's

speech. Eises another native, a heavily-built

Babu, in a black gown and a strange head-dress.A snowy white strip of cloth is thrown jharun-wise over his shoulders. His voice is high, andnot always under control. He begins : " I willtry to be as brief as possible." This is omi-nous. By the way, in Council there seems tobe no necessity for a form of address. The ora-tors plunge in medias res, and only when theyare well launched throw an occasional "Sir"toward Sir Steuart Bayley, who sits with oneleg doubled under him and a dry pen in hishand. This speaker is no good. He talks, buthe says nothing, and he only knows where heis drifting to. He says : " We must rememberthat we are legislating for the Metropolis of In-dia, and therefore we should borrow our insti-tutions from large English towns, and not fromparochial institutions." If you think for a min-ute, that shows a large and healthy knowledge

3 33

Zbc Cits ot 2)rcaDful miQbt.

of tlie history of Local Self-Government. It

also reveals the attitude of Calcutta. If the

city thought less about itself as a metropolis

and more as a midden, its state would be better.The speaker talks patronizingly of "my friend,"alluding to the black frock-coat. Then he floun-ders afresh, and his voice gallops up the gamutas he declares, "and therefore that makes allthe difference." He hints vaguely at threats,something to do with the Hindus and the Ma-homedans, but what he means it is difficult todiscover. Here, however, is a sentence taken

verbatim. It is not likely to appear in this formin the Calcutta papers. The black frock-coathad said that if a wealthy native "had eightvotes to his credit, his vanity would prompt himto go to the polling-booth, because he would feelbetter than half-a-dozen gharri-wans or pettytraders." (Fancy allowing a gharri-wan tovote! He has yet to learn how to drive!)Hereon the gentleman with the white cloth:"Then the complaint is that influential voterswill not take the trouble to vote. In my hum-ble opinion, if that be so, adopt voting papers.

That is the way to meet them. In the samewayThe Calcutta Trades' Association-youabolish all plurality of votes: and that is theway to meet them." Lucid, is it not? Up flies

34

XTbe Council of the (3oD0.

the irresponsible voice, and delivers this state-ment: "In the election for the House of Com-mons plurality are allowed for persons havinginterest in different districts." Then hopeless,hopeless fog. It is a great pity that India ever

heard of anybody higher than the heads of theCivil Service. The country appeals from theChota to the Burra Sahib all too readily as it is.Once more a whiff. The gentleman gives a de-fiant jerk of his shoulder-cloth, and sits down.Then Sir Steuart Bayley : " The question be-

fore the Council is," etc. There is a ripple of" Ayes " and " Noes, " and the " Noes " have it,whatever it may be. The black-bearded gen-tleman springs his amendment about the votingqualifications. A large senator in a white waist-coat, and with a most genial smile, rises andproceeds to smash up the amendment. Can'tsee the use of it. Calls it in effect rubbish.

The black frock-coat rises to explain his friend'samendment, and incidentally makes a funny lit-tle slip. He is a knight, and his friend hasbeen newly knighted. He refers to him as" Mister." The black cho(/a, he who spoke firstof all, speaks again, and talks of the " sojornerwho comes here for a little time, and then leavesthe land." Well it is for the black choga thatthe sojourner does come, or there would be no

35

^be C(t^ ot DreaDful mghU

comfy places wherein to talk about tlie powerthat can be measured by wealth and the intel-lect " which, sir, I submit, cannot be so meas-ured." The amendment is lost, and trebly andquadruply lost is the listener. In the name ofsanity and to preserve the tattered shirt-tailsof a torn illusion, let us escape. This is theCalcutta Municipal Bill. They have been at itfor several Saturdays. Last Saturday Sir Steu-art Bayley pointed out that at their present ratethey would be about two years in getting itthrough. Now they will sit till dusk, unlessSir Steuart Bayley, who wants to see Lord Con-nemara off, puts up the black frock-coat to movean adjournment. It is not good to see a Gov-ernment close to. This leads to the formationof blatantly self-satisfied judgments, which maybe quite as wrong as the cramping system withwhich we have encompassed ourselves. And inthe streets outside Englishmen summarize thesituation brutally, thus : " The whole thing is afarce. Time is money to us. We can't stickout those everlasting speeches in the municipal-

ity. The natives choke us off, but we knowthat if things get too bad the Government willstep in and interfere, and so we worry alongsomehow." Meantime Calcutta continues to cryout for the bucket and the broom.

36

CHAPTER IV.

ON THE BANKS OF THE HUGLI.

The clocks of the city have struck two.Where can a man get food? Calcutta is notrich in respect of dainty accommodation. Youcan stay your stomach at Peliti's or Bonsard's,but their shops are not to be found in HastingStreet, or in the places where brokers fly to andfro in office-jauns, sweating and growing visiblyrich. There must be some sort of entertainmentwhere sailors congregate. "Honest BombayJack " supplies nothing but Burma cheroots andwhisky in liqueur-glasses, but in Lai Bazar, notfar from "The Sailors' Coffee-rooms," a boardgives bold advertisement that " officers and sea-men can find good quarters." In evidence arow of neat officers and seamen are sitting on abench by the " hotel " door smoking. There isan almost military likeness in their clothes.Perhaps "Honest Bombay Jack" only keepsone kind of felt hat and one brand of suit.When Jack of the mercantile marine is sober,he is very sober. When he is drunk he is

but37

XLbe am ot BreaDtul mgU.

ask the river police what a lean, mad Yankeecan do with his nails and teeth. These gen-tlemen smoking on the bench are impassivealmost as Eed Indians. Their attitudes are un-restrained, and they do not wear braces. Nor,it would appear from the bill of fare, are theyparticular as to what they eat when they attendtable d^hote. The fare is substantial and theregulation pegevery house has its own depthof peg if you will refrain from stopping Gany-medesomething to wonder at. Three fingersand a trifle over seems to be the use of the offi-cers and seamen who are talking so quietly inthe doorway. One sayshe has evidently fin-ished a long story" and so he shipped for fourpound ten with a first mate's certificate and all,and that was in a German barque." Anotherspits with conviction and says genially, withoutraising his voice : " That was a hell of a ship

;

who knows her? " No answer from the pan-ehayet, but a Dane or a German wants to knowwhether the Myra is "up" yet. A dry, red-haired man gives her exact position in the river

(How in the world can he know?)and the

probable hour of her arrival. The grave debatedrifts into a discussion of a recent river acci-

dent, whereby a big steamer was damaged, andhad to put back and discharge cargo. A burly

38

"^

Qn tbe 36tLnk6 of tbe Duglt

gentleman who is taking a constitutional downLai Bazar strolls up and says : " I tell you shefouled her own chain with her own forefoot.Hev you seen the plates?" "No." "Thenhow the can any like you saywhat it well was? " He passes on, havingdelivered his highly flavored opinion withoutheat or passion. No one seems to resent theexpletives.

Let us get down to the river and see thisstamp of men more thoroughly. Clark E-ussellhas told us that their lives are hard enough inall conscience. What are their pleasures anddiversions? The Port Of&ce, where live thegentlemen who make improvements in the Portof Calcutta, ought to supply information. Itstands large and fair, and built in an oriental-ized manner after the Italians at the corner of

Tairlie Place upon the great Strand Eoad, anda continual clamor of traffic by land and by seagoes up throughout the day and far into thenight against its windows. This is a place toenter more reverently than the Bengal Legisla-tive Council, for it houses the direction of the

uncertain Hugli down to the Sandheads, ownsenormous wealth, and spends huge sums on thefrontaging of river banks, the expansion of jet-ties, and the manufacture of docks costing two

39

Zbc Cits ot rea&ful IWlgbt

hundred lakhs of rupees. Two million tons ofsea-going shippage yearly find their way upand down the river by the guida,nce of the PortOf&ce, and the men of the Port Office know morethan it is good for men to hold in their heads.They can without reference to telegraphic bulle-tins give the position of all the big steamers,

coming up or going down, from the Hugli to thesea, day by day, with their tonnage, the namesof their captains, and the nature of their cargo.Looking out from the verandah of their officesover a lancer-regiment of masts, they can de-

clare truthfully the name of every ship within

eye-scope, with the day and hour when she willdepart.

In a room at the bottom of the building loungebig men, carefully dressed. Now there is atype of face which belongs almost exclusivelyto Bengal Cavalry officersmajors for choice.Everybody knows the bronzed, black-mous-tached, clear-speaking Native Cavalry officer.

He exists unnaturally in novels, and naturallyon the frontier. These men in the big room

have its cast of face so strongly marked thatone marvels what officers are doing by the river." Have they come to book passengers for home? "

"Those men! They're pilots. Some of themdraw between two and three thousand rupees a

40

n tbe asanftg ot tbe Ibu^lf.

month. They are responsible for half-a-millionpounds' worth of cargo sometimes." They cer-tainly are men, and they carry themselves assuch. They confer together by twos and threes,and appeal frequently to shipping lists.

^^ Isn't a pilot a man who always wears a pea-jacket and shouts through a speaking-trumpet? "" Well, you can ask those gentlemen if you like.You've got your notions from home pilots. Oursaren't that kind exactly. They are a picked ser-vice, as carefully weeded as the Indian Civil.Some of 'em have brothers in it, and some be-long to the old Indian army families." Butthey are not all equally well paid. The Cal-cutta papers sometimes echo the groans of thejunior pilots who are not allowed the handlingof ships over a certain tonnage. As it is yearlygrowing cheaper to build one big steamer thantwo little ones, these juniors are crowded out,and, while the seniors get their thousands, someof the youngsters make at the end of one monthexactly thirty rupees. This is a grievance withthem ; and it seems well-founded.

In the flats above the pilots' room are hushedand chapel-like offices, all sumptuously fitted,where Englishmen write and telephone and tele-graph, and deft Babus forever draw maps ofthe shifting Hugli. Any hope of understand-

41

XTbe (Ifti2 of BreaDful mtgbt

ing the work of tlie Port Commissioners is thor-ouglily dashed by being taken through the Portmaps of a quarter of a century past. Men haveplayed with the Hugli as children play with agutter-runnel, and, in return, the Hugli oncerose and played with men and ships till theStrand Road was littered with the raffle and thecarcasses of big ships. There are photos on thewalls of the cyclone of '64, when the Thundercame inland and sat upon an American barque,obstructing all the traffic. Very curious arethese photos, and almost impossible to believe.How can a big, strong steamer have her threemasts razed to deck level? How can a heavy,country boat be pitched on to the poop of ahigh-walled liner? and how can the side be bod-ily torn out of a ship? The photos say that allthese things are possible, and men aver that acyclone may come again and scatter the craftlike chaff. Outside the Port Office are the ex-port and import sheds, buildings that can holda ship's cargo a-piece, all standing on reclaimed

ground. Here be several strong smells, a massof railway lines, and a multitude of men. "Doyou see where that trolly is standing, behind thebig P. and 0. berth? In that place as nearly asmay be the Govindpur went down about twentyyears ago, and began to shift out ! " " But that

43

n tbe JBanfts ot tbe Ibu^ll,

is solid ground." "She sank there, and thenext tide made a scour-hole on one side of her.The returning tide knocked her into it. Thenthe mud made up behind her. Next tide thebusiness was repeatedalways the scour-holein the mud and the filling up behind her. Soshe rolled and was pushed out and out until shegot in the way of the shipping right out yonder,and we had to blow her up. When a ship sinksin mud or quicksand she regularly digs her owngrave and wriggles herself into it deeper anddeeper till she reaches moderately solid stuff.Then she sticks." Horrible idea, is it not, togo down and down with each tide into the foulHugli mud?

Close to the Port Offices is the ShippingOffice, where the captains engage their crews.The men must produce their discharges fromtheir last ships in the presence of the shippingmaster, or, as they call him, " The Deputy Ship-ping." He passes them as correct after havingsatisfied himself that they are not desertersfrom other ships, and they then sign articlesfor the voyage. This is the ceremony, begin-ning with the "dearly beloved" of the crew-hunting captain down to the "amazement" ofthe identified deserter. There is a dingy build-ing, next door to the Sailors' Home, at whose

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ZTbe Cite or 2)reaDful migbt.

gate stand the cast-ups of all tlie seas in allmanner of raiment. There are Seedee boys,Bombay serangs and Madras fishermen of thesalt villages, Malays who insist upon marryingnative women, grow jealous and run amok:Malay-Hindus, Hindu-Malay-whites, Burmese,Burma-whites, Burma-native-whites, Italianswith gold earrings and a thirst for gambling,Yankees of all the States, with Mulattoes andpure buck-niggers, red and rough Danes, Cin-galese, Cornish boys who seem fresh taken fromthe plough-tail, " corn-stalks " from colonial shipswhere they got four pound ten a month as sea-men, tun-bellied Germans, Cockney mates keep-ing a little aloof from the crowd and talking inknots together, unmistakable "Tommies" whohave tumbled into seafaring life by some mis-take, cockatoo-tufted Welshmen spitting andswearing like cats, broken-down loafers, gray-headed, penniless, and pitiful, swaggering boys,and very quiet men with gashes and cuts on theirfaces. It is an ethnological museum where allthe specimens are playing comedies and trage-dies. The head of it all is the " Deputy Ship-ping," and he sits, supported by an Englishpoliceman whose fists are knobby, in a greatChair of State. The " Deputy Shipping " knowsall the iniquity of the river-side, all the ships,

44

n tbe 3BanFi0 ot the IbugU.

all the captains, and a fair amount of the men.He is fenced off from the crowd by a strongwooden railing, behind which are gathered thosewho "stand and wait," the unemployed of themercantile marine. They have had their spreepoor devilsand now they will go to seaagain on as low a wage as three pound ten amonth, to fetch up at the end in some Shanghaistew or San Francisco hell. They have turnedtheir backs on the seductions of the Howrahboarding-houses and the delights of Colootolla.If Pate will, "Nightingales" will know themno more for a season, and their successors maypaint Collinga Bazar vermillion. But what cap-tain will take some of these battered, shattered

wrecks whose hands shake and whose eyes arered?

Enter suddenly a bearded captain, who hasmade his selection from the crowd on a previousday, and now wants to get his men passed. Heis not fastidious in his choice. His eleven seema tough lot for such a mild-eyed, civil-spokenman to manage. But the captain in the Ship-ping Office and the captain on the ship are twodifferent things. He brings his crew up to the"Deputy Shipping's" bar, and hands in theirgreasy, tattered discharges. But the heart ofthe " Deputy Shipping " is hot within him, be-

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^be Qit^ of BreaDful migbt

cause, two days ago, a Howrali crimp stole a^hole crew from a down-dropping ship, inso-much, that the captain had to come back andwhip up a new crew at one o'clock in the day.Evil will it be if the " Deputy Shipping " findsone of these bounty-jumpers in the chosen crewof the Blenkindoon, let us say.The " Deputy Shipping '' tells the story with

heat. '' I didn't know they did such things inCalcutta," says the captain. "Do such things!They'd steal the eye-teeth out of your headthere, Captain." He picks up a discharge andcalls for Michael Donelly, who is a loose-knit, vicious-looking Irish-American who chews." Stand up, man, stand up ! " Michael Donellywants to lean against the desk, and the Englishpoliceman won't have it. "What was yourlast ship?" ^^ Fairy Queen.^^ "When did youleave her?" " 'Bout 'leven days." "Captain'sname ? " " Elahy . " " That' 11 do. Next man :Jules Anderson." Jules Anderson is a Dane.His statements tally with the discharge-certifi-cate of the United States, as the Eagle attest-eth. He is passed and falls back. Slivey, theEnglishman, and David, a huge plum-colorednegro who ships as cook, are also passed. Thencomes Bassompra, a little Italian, who speaksEnglish. "What's your last ship?" '' Ferdi-

46

On tbc JBanfts ot tbe tuxQlU

nand,^' "No, after that?" "German barque."Bassompra does not look happy. "When didshe sail? " " About three weeks ago. " " What'sher name?" "J?a^Wee." "You deserted fromher? " " Yes, but she's left port. " The " Dep-uty Shipping " runs rapidly through a shipping-list, throws it down with a bang. " 'Twon't do.No German barque Haidee here for three months.How do I know you don't belong to the Jackson'screw? Cap'ain, I'm afraid you'll have to shipanother man. He must stand over. Take therest away and make 'em sign."The bead-eyed Bassompra seems to have lost

his chance of a voyage, and his case will be in-quired into. The captain departs with his menand they sign articles for the voyage, while the"Deputy Shipping" tells strange tales of thesailorman's life. " They'll quit a good ship forthe sake of a spree, and catch on again at threepound ten, and by Jove, they'll let their skip-pers pay 'em at ten rupees to the sovereign

poor beggars! As soon as the money's gonethey'll ship, but not before. Every one underrank of captain engages here. The competitionmakes first mates ship sometimes for five poundsor as low as four ten a month." (The gentle-man in the boarding-house was right, you see.

)

" A first mate' s wages are seven ten or eight,47

Zbc Citi2 ot 2)reaDtul mgbU

and foreign captains ship for twelve pounds amonth and bring their own small storesevery-thing, that is to say, except beef, peas, flour,

coffee, and molasses."These things are not pleasant to listen to

while the hungry-eyed men in the bad clotheslounge and scratch and loaf behind the railing.What comes to them in the end? They die, itseems, though that is not altogether strange.They die at sea in strange and horrible ways

;

they die, a few of them, in the Kintals, beinglost and suffocated in the great sink of Calcutta

;

they die in strange places by the waterside, andthe Hugli takes them away under the mooringchains and the buoys, and casts them up on thesands below, if the Eiver Police have missedthe capture. They sail the sea because theymust live; and there is no end to their toil.Very, very few find haven of any kind, and theearth, whose ways they do not understand, iscruel to them, when they walk upon it to drinkand be merry after the manner of beasts. Jackashore is a pretty thing when he is in a book orin the blue jacket of the Navy. MercantileJack is not so lovely. Later on, we will seewhere his " sprees " lead him.

48

FROM THIS EYRIE, IN THE WARM NIGHT, ONE HEARS THE HEARTOF CALCUTTA BEATING."

CHAPTER V.

WITH THE CALCUTTA POLICE.

"The City was of Night

perchance of Death,But certainly of Night.

"

The City of Dreadful NigM.

In the beginning, the Police were responsible.

They said in a patronizing way that, merely asa matter of convenience, they would prefer totake a wanderer round the great city themselves,sooner than let him contract a broken head onhis own account in the slums. They said thatthere were places and places where a white man,unsupported by the arm of the law, would berobbed and mobbed ; and that there were otherplaces where drunken seamen would make itvery unpleasant for him. There was a nightfixed for the patrol, but apologies were offeredbeforehand for the comparative insignificance ofthe tour.

"Come up to the fire lookout in the firstplace, and then you'll be able to see the city."This was at No. 22, Lai Bazar, which is the

4 49

Zhc Cit^ ot 2)rea)tul migbt

headquarters of the Calcutta Police, the centre

of the great web of telephone wires where Jus-tice sits all day and all night looking after onemillion people and a floating population of onehundred thousand. But her work shall be dealtwith later on. The fire lookout is a little sen-try-box on the top of the three-storied police

offices. Here a native watchman waits always,ready to give warning to the brigade below ifthe smoke rises by day or the flames by nightin any ward of the city. From this eyrie, inthe warm night, one hears the heart of Calcutta

beating. ^Northward, the city stretches awaythree long miles, with three more miles of sub-urbs beyond, to Dum-Dum and Barrackpore.The lamplit dusk on this side is full of noisesand shouts and smells. Close to the PoliceOffice, jovial mariners at the sailors' coffee-shopare roaring hymns. Southerly, the city's con-fused lights give place to the orderly lamp-rowsof the maidan and Chouringhi, where the re-spectabilities live and the Police have very littleto do. Prom the east goes up to the sky theclamor of Sealdah, the rumble of the trams, andthe voices of all Bow Bazar chaffering and mak-ing merry. Westward are the business quarters,hushed now, the lamps of the shipping on theriver, and the twinkling lights on the Howrah

50

'Witb tbe Calcutta police.

side. It is a wonderful sightthis Pisgah viewof a huge city resting after the labors of the day." Does the noise of traffic go on all through thehot weather? " " Of course. The hot monthsare the busiest in the year and money's tightest.You should see the brokers cutting about at thatseason. Calcutta canH stop, my dear sir."*^What happens then?" "Nothing happens;the death-rate goes up a little. That's all!"Even in February, the weather would, up-coun-try, be called muggy and stifling, but Calcuttais convinced that it is her cold season. Thenoises of the city grow perceptibly; it is thenight side of Calcutta waking up and goingabroad. Jack in the sailors' coffee-shop is sing-ing joyously: "Shall we gather at the Eiverthe beautiful, the beautiful, the Eiver?"What an incongruity there is about his selec-tions ! However, that it amuses before it shocks

the listeners, is not to be doubted. An Eng-lishman, far from his native land, is liable to be-come careless, and it would be remarkable if hedid otherwise in ill-smelling Calcutta. Thereis a clatter of hoofs in the courtyard below.Some of the Mounted Police have come in fromsomewhere or other out of the great darkness.A clog-dance of iron hoofs follows, and an Eng-lishman's voice is heard soothing an agitated

51

^be Cits of 2)reaDful miQbU

horse who seems to be standing on his hindlegs. Some of the Mounted Police are goingout into the great darkness. "What's on?""Walk-round at Government House. The Re-serve men are being formed up below. They'recalling the roll." The Reserve men are allEnglish, and big English at that. They formup and tramp out of the courtyard to line Gov-ernment Place, and see that Mrs. Lollipop'sbrougham does not get smashed up by SirdarChuckerbutty Bahadur's lumbering C-springbarouche with the two raw walers. Very mil-itary men are the Calcutta European Police intheir set-up, and he who knows their composi-tion knows some startling stories of gentlemen-rankers and the like. They are, despite thewearing climate they work in and the wearingwork they do, as fine five-score of Englishmenas you shall find east of Suez.

Listen for a moment from the fire lookout tothe voices of the night, and you will see whythey must be so. Two thousand sailors of fiftynationalities are adrift in Calcutta every Sun-

day, and of these perhaps two hundred are dis-tinctly the worse for liquor. There is a mildrow going on, even now, somewhere at the backof Bow Bazar, which at nightfall fills with sailor-men who have a wonderful gift of falli\ig foul

53

QClttb tbe Calcutta police*

of the native population. To keep the Queen'speace is of course only a small portion of Police

duty, but it is trying. The burly president ofthe lock-up for European drunksCalcutta cen-tral lock-up is worth seeingrejoices in asprained thumb just now, and has to do hiswork left-handed in consequence. But his lefthand is a marvellously persuasive one, and whenon duty his sleeves are turned up to the shoul-der that the jovial mariner may see that thereis no deception. The president's labors arehandicapped in that the road of sin to the lock-up runs through a grimy little gardenthe brickpaths are worn deep with the tread of manydrunken feetwhere a man can give a greatdeal of trouble by sticking his toes into theground and getting mixed up with the shrubs."A straight run in " would be much more con-venient both for the president and the drunk.Generally speakingand here Police experienceis pretty much the same all over the civilizedworlda woman drunk is a good deal worsethan a man drunk. She scratches and bites likea Chinaman and swears like several fiends.Strange people may be unearthed in the lock-ups. Here is a perfectly true story, not three

weeks old. A visitor, an unofficial one, wan-dered into the native side of the spacious ac-

53

Zbc Cits ot DreaDtul IFltgbt*

commodation provided for those who have goneor done wrong. A wild-eyed Babu rose fromthe fixed charpoy and said in the best of Eng-lish: "Good-morning, sir/' " (roocZ-morning;who are you, and what are you in for? " Thenthe Babu, in one breath : " I would have youknow that I do not go to prison as a criminalbut as a reformer. You've read the Vicar ofWakefield ? " " Ye-es. " " Well, / am the Vi-car of Bengalat least, that's what I call my-self. " The visitor collapsed. He had not nerveenough to continue the conversation. Then saidthe voice of the authority : " He's down in con-nection with a cheating case at Serampore. Maybe shamming. But he'll be looked to intime."The best place to hear about the Police is the

fire lookout. From that eyrie one can see howdifficult must be the work of control over thegreat, growling beast of a city. By all meanslet us abuse the Police, but let us see what thepoor wretches have to do with their three thou-sand natives and one hundred Englishmen.Prom Howrah and Bally and the other suburbsat least a hundred thousand people come in toCalcutta for the day and leave at night. AlsoChandernagore is handy for the fugitive law-breaker, who can enter in the evening and get

64

Mltb tbe Calcutta ipoUce*

away before the noon of the next day, havingmarked his house and broken into it.

" But how can the prevalent offence be house-breaking in a place like this ? " " Easily enough.When you've seen a little of the city you'll see,Natives sleep and lie about all over the place,and whole quarters are just so many rabbit-war-rens. Wait till you see the Machua Bazar.Well, besides the petty theft and burglary, wehave heavy cases of forgery and fraud, thatleave us with our wits pitted against a Ben-gali's. When a Bengali criminal is working afraud of the sort he loves, he is about the clever-est soul you could wish for. He gives us casesa year long to unravel. Then there are themurders in the low housesvery curious thingsthey are. You'll see the house where SheikhBabu was murdered presently, and you'll under-stand. The Burra Bazar and Jora Bagan sec-tions are the two worst ones for heavy cases;but ColootoUah is the most aggravating. There'sColootollah over yonderthat patch of darknessbeyond the lights. That section is full of tup-penny-ha'penny petty cases, that keep the menup all night and make 'em swear. You'll seeColootollah, and then perhaps you'll under-stand. Bamun Bustee is the quietest of all,and Lai Bazar and Bow Bazar, as you can see

55

Zbc Cit^ or BreaDful niQbU

for yourself, are tlie rowdiest. You've no no-

tion what the natives come to the thannahs for.A naukar will come in and want a summonsagainst his master for refusing him half-an-hour's chuti. I suppose it does seem rather rev-

olutionary to an up-country man, but they tryto do it here. Now wait a minute, before wego down into the city and see the Fire Brigadeturned out. Business is slack with them justnow, but you time 'em and see." An order isgiven, and a bell strikes softly thrice. Thereis an orderly rush of men, the click of a bolt, ared fire-engine, spitting and swearing with thesparks flying from the furnace, is dragged outof its shelter. A huge brake, which holds sup-plementary horses, men, and hatchets, follows,and a hose-cart is the third on the list. Themen push the heavy things about as though theywere pith toys. Five horses appear. Two areshot into the fire-engine, twomonsters these

into the brake, and the fifth, a powerful beast,warranted to trot fourteen miles an hour, backsinto the hose-cart shafts. The men clamber up,some one says softly, "All ready there," andwith an angry whistle the fire-engine, followedby the other two, flies out into Lai Bazar, thesparks trailing behind. Time1 min. 40 sees." They'll find out it's a false alarm, and come

56

mttb tbe Calcutta police.

back again in five minutes." "Why?" "Be-cause there will be no constables on the road togive 'em the direction of the fire, and becausethe driver wasn't told the ward of the outbreakwhen he went out ! " " Do you mean to saythat you can from this absurd pigeon-loft locatethe wards in the night-time?" "Of course:what would be the good of a lookout if theman couldn't tell where the fire was? " " Butit's all pitchy black, and the lights are so con-fusing."

"Ha! Ha! You'll be more confused in tenminutes. You'll have lost your way as younever lost it before. You're going to go roundBow Bazar section."

" And the Lord have mercy on ray soul !

"

Calcutta, the darker portion of it, does not lookan inviting place to dive into at night.

57

CHAPTER YI.

THE CITY OF DKEADFUL NIGHT.

"And since they cannot spend or use arightThe little time here given thetn in trust.

But lavish it in weary undelightOf foolish toil, and trouble, strife and lust

They naturally claimeth to inheritThe Everlasting Futurethat their merit

May have full scope. . . . As surely is most just." The City of Dreadful Night.

The difficulty is to prevent this account fromgrowing steadily unwholesome. But one cannotrake through a big city without encounteringmuck.The Police kept their word. In five short

minutes, as they had prophesied, their chargewas lost as he had never been lost before."Where are we now?" "Somewhere off theChitpore Eoad, but you wouldn't understand ifyou were told. Pollow now, and step prettymuch where we stepthere's a good deal offilth hereabouts."

The thick, greasy night shuts in everything.58

XLbc Citg of 5)reaDtul IFligbt.

We have gone beyond the ancestral houses ofthe Ghoses of the Boses, beyond the lamps, thesmells, and the crowd of Chitpore Eoad, andhave come to a great wilderness of packed housesjust such mysterious, conspiring tenements asDickens would have loved. There is no breathof breeze here, and the air is perceptibly warmer.There is little regularity in the drift, and theutmost niggardliness in the spacing of what, forwant of a better name, we must call the streets.If Calcutta keeps such luxuries as Commission-ers of Sewers and Paving, they die before theyreach this place. The air is heavy with a faint,sour stenchthe essence of long-neglected abom-inationsand it cannot escape from among thetall, three-storied houses. " This, my dear sir,is a perfectly respectable quarter as quarters go.

That house at the head of the alley, with theelaborate stucco-work round the top of the door,was built long ago by a celebrated midwife.Great people used to live here once. Now it'stheAha! Look out for that carriage." Abig mail-phaeton crashes out of the darknessand, recklessly driven, disappears. The won-der is how it ever got into this maze of narrowstreets, where nobody seems to be moving, andwhere the dull throbbing of the city's life onlycomes faintly and by snatches. "Now it's the

59

Zhc Cltg of Brea^ful mfgbt

what?" "St. Jolm's Wood of Calcuttaforthe rich Babus. That ' fitton ' belonged to oneof them." "Well it's not much of a placeto look at." "Don't judge by appearances.About here live the women who have beggaredkings. We aren't going to let you down intounadulterated vice all at once. You must seeit first with the gilding onand mind that rot-ten board.

"

Stand at the bottom of a lift and look up-ward. Then you will get both the size andthe design of the tiny courtyard round whichone of these big dark houses is built. The cen-tral square may be perhaps ten feet every way,but the balconies that run inside it overhang,

and seem to cut away half the available space.To reach the square a man must go round manycorners, down a covered-in way, and up anddown two or three baffling and confused steps.There are no lamps to guide, and the janitorsof the establishment seem to be compelled to

sleep in the passages. The central square, the2mtio or whatever it must be called, reeks withthe faint, sour smell which finds its way impar-tially into every room. " Now you will under-stand," say the Police kindly, as their charge

blunders, shin-first, into a well-dark windingstaircase, " that these are not the sort of places

60

# i.

A GLARE OF LIGHT ON THE STAIR-HEAD, A CLINK OF INNUMER-ABLE BANGLES, A RUSTLE OF MUCH FINE GAUZE, AND

THE DAINTY INIQUITY STANDS REVEALED."

XLbc Cits of DreaDful IFlfQbt

to visit alone." "Who wants to? Of all thedisgusting, inaccessible dens Holy Cupid,what's this?"A glare of light on the stair-head, a clink of

innumerable bangles, a rustle of much fine gauze,and the Dainty Iniquity stands revealed, blazingliterally blazingwith jewelry from head tofoot. Take one of the fairest miniatures thatthe Delhi painters draw, and multiply it by ten

;

throw in one of Angelica Kaufmann's best por-traits, and add anything that you can think offrom Beckford to Lalla Eookh, and you willstill fall short of the merits of that perfect face.

;

Por an instant, even the grim, professional grav-

ity of the Police is relaxed in the presence of

the Dainty Iniquity with the gems, who so pret-tily invites every one to be seated, and profferssuch refreshments as she conceives the palates

of the barbarians would prefer. Her Abigailsare only one degree less gorgeous than she.Half a lakh, or fifty thousand pounds' worth

it is easier to credit the latter statement thanthe formerare disposed upon her little body.Each hand carries five jewelled rings which areconnected by golden chains to a great jewelledboss of gold in the centre of the back of thehand. Ear-rings weighted with emeralds andpearls, diamond nose-rings, and how many other

61

Zhc Cit^ of BreaDful niQhU

hundred articles make up the list of adornments.English furniture of a gorgeous and gimcrackkind, unlimited chandeliers and a collection ofatrocious Continental printssomething, butnot altogether, like the glazed plaques on bon-

bon boxesare scattered about the house, andon every landinglet us trust this is a mistakelies, squats, or loafs a Bengali who can talkEnglish with unholy fluency. The recurrencesuggestsonly suggests, minda grim possi-bility of the affectation of excessive virtue byday, tempered with the sort of unwholesome en-joyment after duskthis loafing and lobbyingand chattering and smoking, and, unless the bot-tles lie, tippling among the foul-tongued hand-maidens of the Dainty Iniquity. How manymen follow this double, deleterious sort of life?

The Police are discreetly dumb." Now dooiH go talking about ^domiciliary vis-

its ' just because this one happens to be a prettywoman. We've got to know these creatures.They make the rich man and the poor spendtheir money; and when a man can't get moneyfor 'em honestly, he comes under our notice.Now do you see? If there was any domiciliary'visit' about it, the whole houseful would behidden past our finding as soon as we turned upin the courtyard. We're friendsto a certain

63

XLbc Citg ot H)reaDtul IRigbt*

extent." And, indeed, it seemed no difficultthing to be friends to any extent with the DaintyIniquity who was so surpassingly differentfrom all that experience taught of the beautyof the East. Here was the face from whicha man could write Lalla Rookhs by the dozen,and believe every work that he wrote. Herswas the beauty that Byron sang of when hewrote

"Eemember, if you come here alone, thechances are that you'll be clubbed, or stuck, or,anyhow, mobbed. You'll understand that thispart of the world is shut to Europeansabso-lutely. Mind the steps, and follow on." Thevision dies out in the smells and gross darknessof the night, in evil, time-rotten brickwork, andanother wilderness of shut-up houses, whereinit seems that people do continually and feeblystrum stringed instruments of a plaintive andwailsome nature.

Follows, after another plunge into a passageof a court-yard, and up a staircase, the appa-rifcion of a Eat Vice, in whom is no sort of ro-mance, nor beauty, but unlimited coarse humor.She too is studded with jewels, and her houseis even finer than the house of the other, andmore infested with the extraordinary men whospeak such good English and are so deferential

63

Z\)c Cits ot 2)reaDtul nighU

to the Police. The Fat Vice has been a greatleader of fashion in her day, and stripped a ze-mindar Raja to his last acreinsomuch that heended in the House of Correction for a theftcommitted for her sake. Native opinion has itthat she is a " monstrous well-preserved woman."

On this point, as on some others, the races willagree to differ.

The scene changes suddenly as a slide in amagic lantern. Dainty Iniquity and Fat Viceslide away on a roll of streets and alleys, eachmore squalid than its predecessor. We are" somewhere at the back of the Machua Bazar,

"

well in the heart of the city. There are nohouses herenothing but acres and acres, itseems, of foul wattle-and-dab huts, any one of

which would be a disgrace to a frontier village.The whole arrangement is a neatly contrivedgerm and fire trap, reflecting great credit uponthe Calcutta Municipality.

"What happens when these pigsties catchfire?" "They're built up again," say the Po-lice, as though this were the natural order ofthings. "Land is immensely valuable here."All the more reason, then, to turn several Haus-

manns loose into the city, with instructions tomake barracks for the population that cannotfind room in the huts and sleeps in the open

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XLU Citg ot BreaOtul mghU

ways, cherishing dogs and worse, much worse,in its unwashen bosom. "Here is a licensedcoffee-shop. This is where your naukers go foramusement and to see nautches." There is ahuge chappar shed, ingeniously ornamented withinsecure kerosene lamps, and crammed withgharriwans, khitmatgars, small store-keepers

and the like. Never a sign of a European.Why? "Because if an Englishman messedabout here, he'd get into trouble. Men don'tcome here unless they're drunk or have losttheir way." The gharrkvansthey have theprivilege of voting, have they not?look peace-ful enough as they squat on tables or crowd bythe doors to watch the nautch that is going for-ward. Five pitiful draggle-tails are huddledtogether on a bench under one of the lamps,while the sixth is squirming and shrieking be-fore the impassive crowd. She sings of love asunderstood by the Orientalthe love that driesthe heart and consumes the liver. In this place,the words that would look so well on paperhave an evil and ghastly significance. Thegharriwans stare or sup tumblers and cups of afilthy decoction, and the kunchenee howls withrenewed vigor in the presence of the Police.Where the Dainty Iniquity was hung with goldand gems, she is trapped with pewter and glass j

5 65

trbe C(t^ ot DceaDtul mt^bt.

and where there was heavy embroidery on theFat Vice's dress, defaced, stamped tinsel faith-fully reduplicates the pattern on the tawdryrobes of the kunchenee. So you see, if onecares to moralize, they are sisters of the sameclass.

Two or three men, blessed with uneasy con-sciences, have quietly slipped out of the coffee-shop into the mazes of the huts beyond. ThePolice laugh, and those nearest in the crowdlaugh applausively, as in duty bound. Perhapsthe rabbits grin uneasily when the ferret landsat the bottom of the burrow and begins to clearthe warren.

" The chandoo-sho-^s shut up at six, so you'llhave to see opium-smoking before dark someday. No, you won't, though." The detectivenose sniffs, and the detective body makes for ahalf-opened door of a hut whence floats the fra-grance of the black smoke. Those of the in-habitants who are able to stand promptly clearoutthey have no love for the Policeandthere remain only four men lying down and onestanding up. This latter has a pet mongoosecoiled round his neck. He speaks English flu-ently. Yes, he has no fear. It was a privatesmoking party and " No business to-night

show how you smoke opium." "Aha! You66

Zbc Cits of 2)reaDtul mfgbt

want to see. Very good, I show. Hiyal you"lie kicks a man on tlie floor"show howopium-smoking." The kickee grunts lazily andturns on his elbow. The mongoose, alwayskeeping to the man's neck, erects every hair ofits body like an angry cat, and chatters in itsowner's ear. The lamp for the opium-pipe isthe only one in the room, and lights a scene aswild as anything in the witches' revel; themongoose acting as the familiar spirit. A voicefrom the ground says, in tones of infinite weari-ness : " You take ajimy so "a long, long pause,and another kick from the man possessed of thedevilthe mongoose. " You take afim ? " Hetakes a pellet of the black, treacly stuff on the

end of a knitting-needle. "And light afim."He plunges the pellet into the night-light, whereit swells and fumes greasily. " And then youput it i]i your pipe." The smoking pellet isjammed into the tiny bowl of the thick, bamboo-stemmed pipe, and all speech ceases, oxceptthe unearthly noise of the mongoose. Theman on the ground is sucking at his pipe,and when the smoking pellet has ceased tosmoke will be half way to Nibhan. "Nowyou go," says the man with the mongoose."I am going smoke." The hut door closesupon a red-lit view of huddled legs and bodies,

67

Zbc Cltg of 2)reaDful IRfgbt,

and tlie man witli the mongoose sinking, sink-ing on to his knees, his head bowed forward,and the little hairy devil chattering on the napeof his neck.

After this the fetid night air seems almost

cool, for the hut is as hot as a furnace. " Seethe puhka cliandu shops in full blast to-mor-row. Now for Colootollah. Come throughthe huts. There is no decoration about thisvice."

The huts now gave place to houses very talland spacious and very dark. But for the nar-rowness of the streets we might have stumbledupon Chouringhi in the dark. An hour and ahalf has passed, and up to this time we havenot crossed our trail once. " You might knockabout the city for a night and never cross thesame line. EecoUect Calcutta isn't one of your

poky up-country cities of a lakh and a half ofpeople." "How long does it take to know itthen? " " About a lifetime, and even then someof the streets puzzle you." "How much hasthe head of a ward to know?" "Every housein his ward if he can, who owns it, what sortof character the inhabitants are, who are theirfriends, who go out and in, who loaf about theplace at night, and so on and so on." "And heknows all this by night as well as by day?"

68

Zbc Cft^ ot DceaDful mm*

" Of course. Why shouldn't he? " " No reasonin the world. Only it's pitchy black just now,and I'd like to see where this alley is going toend." "Eound the corner beyond that deadwall. There's a lamp there. Then you'll beable to see. " A shadow flits out of a gully anddisappears. "Who's that?" " Sergeant of Po-lice just to see where we're going in case of ac-cidents." Another shadow staggers into thedarkness. " Who's that? " Man from the fortor a sailor from the ships. I couldn't quitesee." The Police open a shut door in a highwall, and stumble unceremoniously among agang of women cooking their food. The flooris of beaten earth, the steps that lead into the

upper stories are unspeakably grimy, and theheat is the heat of April. The women risehastily, and the light of the bull's eyefor thePolice have now lighted a lantern in regular" rounds of London " fashionshows six blearedfacesone a half native, half Chinese one, andthe others Bengali. " There are no men here ! "

they cry. "The house is empty." Then theygrin and jabber and chew pan and spit, andhurry up the steps into the darkness. A rangeof three big rooms has been knocked into onehere, and there is some sort of arrangement ofmats. But an average country-bred is moiQ

XLbc Cltg ot BreaDful niQbU

sumptuously accommodated in an Englishman'sstable. A home horse would snort at the ac-commodation.

"Nice sort of place, isn't it? " say the Police,genially. " This is where the sailors get robbedand drunk." "They must be blind drunk be-fore they come." "NaNa! Na sailor menee

yah ! " chorus the women, catching at theone word they understand. " Arl gone ! " ThePolice take no notice, but tramp down the bigroom with the mat loose-boxes. A woman isshivering in one of these. "What's the mat-ter?" "Pever. Seek. Vary, vari/ seek."

She huddles herself into a heap on the charpoyand groans.A tiny, pitch-black closet opens out of the

long room, and into this the Police plunge."Hullo! What's here?" Down flashes thelantern, and a white hand with black nailscomes out of the gloom. Somebody is asleepor drunk in the cot. The ring of lantern lighttravels slowly up and down the body. "Asailor from the ships. He's got his dungareeson. He'll be robbed before the morning mostlikely." The man is sleeping like a little child,both arms thrown over his head, and he is notunhandsome. He is shoeless, and there arehuge holes in his stockings. He is a pure-

7Q

Zbc Cit^ ot 2)rcaDtul migbt

blooded white, and carries the flush of innocentsleep on his cheeks.

The light is turned off, and the Police de-part ; while the woman in the loose-box shivers,

and moans that she is "seek: vary, va7y seek."It is not surprising.

n

CHAPTEE VII.

DEEPER AND DEEPER STILL.

I built myself a lordly pleasure-house,Wherein at ease for aye to dwell

;

I said : " O Soul, make merry and carouse,Dear Soulfor all is well."

The Palace of Art.

" And where next? I don't like Colootollah.

"

The Police and their charge are standing in theinterminable waste of houses under the starlight." To the lowest sink of all, '' say the Police afterthe manner of Virgil when he took the Italianwith, the indigestion to look at the frozen sinners." And Where's that? " " Somewhere about here

;

but you wouldn't know if you were told. " Theylead and they lead and they lead, and they ceasenot from leading till they come to the last circleof the Infernoa long, long, winding, quietroad. " There you are

;you can see for your-

self."

But there is nothing to be seen. On one sideare houses

gaunt and dark, naked and devoidof furniture; on the other, low, mean stalls,

73

2)eeper anD 1S>ccpct Still,

lighted, and with shamelessly open doors,wherein women stand and lounge, and mutterand whisper one to another. There is a hushhere, or at least the busy silence of an officerof counting-house in working hours. One lookdown the street is sufficient. Lead on, gentle-men of the Calcutta Police. Let us escape fromthe lines of open doors, the flaring lamps within,the glimpses of the tawdry toilet-tables adornedwith little plaster dogs, glass balls from Christ-mas-trees, andfor religion must not be de-spised though women be fallen

pictures of the

saints and statuettes of the Virgin. The streetis a long one, and other streets, full of the samepitiful wares, branch off from it."Why are they so quiet? Why don't they

make a row and sing and shout, and so on?"" Why should they, poor devils?" say the Po-lice, and fall to telling tales of horror, of womendecoyed into ^jaZA^is and shot into this trap.Then other tales that shatter one's belief in allthings and folk of good repute. " How can youPolice have faith in humanity?"

" That's because you're seeing it all in a lumpfor the first time, and it's not nice that way.Makes a man jump rather, doesn't it? But,recollect, you've asked for the worst places, andyou can't complain." "Who's complaining?

73

Zbc Citg ot 2)reaDful niQhU

Bring on your atrocities. Isn't that a Europeanwoman at that door?" "Yes. Mrs. D

,

widow of a soldier, mother of seven children.""Nine, if you please, and good-evening to you,"shrills Mrs. D

,leaning against the door-

post, her arms folded on her bosom. She is arather pretty, slightly-made Eurasian, and what-ever shame she may have owned she has longsince cast behind her. A shapeless Burmo-native trot, with high cheek-bones and mouthlike a shark, calls Mrs. D "Mem-Sahib."The word jars unspeakably. Her life is a mat-ter between herself and her Maker, but in thatshethe widow of a soldier of the Queenhasstooped to this common foulness in the face ofthe city, she has offended against the whiterace. The Police fail to fall in with this right-eous indignation. Morethey laugh at itout of the wealth of their unholy knowledge." You're from up-country, and of course youdon't understand. There are any amount ofthat lot in the city." Then the secret of theinsolence of Calcutta is made plain. Smallwonder the natives fail to respect the Sahib,seeing what ^ they see and knowing what theyknow. In the good old days, the honorable thedirectors deported him or her who misbehavedgrossly, and the white man preserved his izzat,

U

Beeper anD Beeper SttlL

He may have been a ruffian, but he was a ruffianon a large scale. He did not sink in the pres-ence of the people. The natives are quite rightto take the wall of the Sahib who has been atgreat pains to prove that he is of the same fleshand blood.

All this time Mrs. D stands on the thres-hold of her room and looks upon the men withunabashed eyes. If the spirit of that Englishsoldier, who married her long ago by the formsof the English Church, be now flitting bat-wiseabove the roofs, how singularly pleased andproud it must be! Mrs. D is a lady witha story. She is not averse to telling it. " Whatwasahemthe case in which you wereer

hmnconcerned, Mrs. D ?" "They saidI'd poisoned my husband by putting somethinginto his drinking-water." This is interesting.How much modesty has this creature? Letus see. "Andah

did you?" "'Twasn'tproved, '* says Mrs. D with a laugh, a pleas-ant, lady-like laugh that does infinite credit toher education and upbringing. Worthy Mrs.D -! It would pay a novelista Frenchone let us sayto pick you oud of the stews andmake you talk.The Police move forward, into a region of

Mrs. D 's. This is horrible; but they are75

Zhc Citg ot 5)reaDful migbt.

used to it, and evidently consider indignationaffectation. Everywhere are tlie empty houses,and the babbling women in print gowns. Theclocks in the city are close upon midnight, butthe Police show no signs of stopping. Theyplunge hither and thither, like wreckers intothe surf; and each plunge brings up a sampleof misery, filth, and woe.

" Sheikh Babu was murdered jast here," theysay, pulling up in one of the most troublesomehouses in the ward. It would never do to ap-pear ignorant of the murder of Sheikh Babu."I only wonder that more aren't killed." Thehouses with their breakneck staircases, theirhundred corners, low roofs, hidden courtyardsand winding passages, seem specially built forcrime of every kind. A womanEurasian

rises to a sitting position on a board-charpoyand blinks sleepily at the Police. Then shethrows herself down with a grunt. "