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The explanation, as it seemed to him, came at the change of the moon, when he received orders to hold himself in readiness to "allay any possible excitement" among the Satpura Bhils, who were, to put it mildly, uneasy because a paternal Government had sent up against them a Mahratta State-educated vaccinator, with lancets, lymph, and an officially registered calf.
We know he is awake, but we do not know what he desires. Is it a sign for all the Bhils, or one that concerns the Satpura folk alone? Say one little word, Sahib, that I may carry it to the lines, and send on to our villages. Why does Jan Chinn ride out? Who has done wrong? Is it pestilence? Is it murrain? Will our children die? Is it a sword?
You never saw such a skin in your life." The Colonel tugged his moustache thought-fully. "Now, how the deuce," said he, "am I to include that in my report?" Indeed, the official version of the Bhils' anti-vaccination stampede said nothing about Lieutenant John Chinn, his godship. But Bukta knew, and the corps knew, and every Bhil in the Satpura hills knew.
Am I ever angry with my Bhils? I say angry words, and threaten many things. Thou knowest, Bukta. I have seen thee smile behind the hand. I know, and thou knowest. The Bhils are my children. I have said it many times." "Ay. We be thy children," said Bukta. "And no otherwise is it with Jan Chinn, my father's father. He would see the land he loved and the people once again. It is a good ghost, Bukta.
And now Bukta is zealous that John Chinn shall swiftly be wedded and impart his powers to a son; for if the Chinn succession fails, and the little Bhils are left to their own imaginings, there will be fresh trouble in the Satpuras. All supplies very bad and dear, and there are no facilities for even the smallest repairs. Sailing Directions.
It is supposed to be a clouded animal not stripy, but blotchy, like a tortoise-shell tom-cat. No end of a brute, it is, and a sure sign of war or pestilence or or something. There's a nice family legend for you." "What's the origin of it, d' you suppose?" said Chinn. "Ask the Satpura Bhils. Old Jan Chinn was a mighty hunter before the Lord.
The relation of the absent dhani, who spent the evening with us, told us the following: The Bhils are the descendants of one of the sons of Mahadeva, or Shiva, and of a fair woman, with blue eyes and a white face, whom he met in some forest on the other side of the Kalapani, "black waters," or ocean.
"Can ye find and follow it for me?" "By daylight if one comes with us, and, above all, stands near by." "I will stand close, and we will see to it that Jan Chinn does not ride any more." The Bhils shouted the last words again and again.
"I see that it is the truth," was the answer, in a shaking voice. "Jan Chinn goes abroad among the Satpuras, riding on the Clouded Tiger, ye say? Be it so. Therefore the sign of the wonder is for the Satpura Bhils only, and does not touch the Bhils who plough in the north and east, the Bhils of the Khandesh, or any others, except the Satpura Bhils, who, as we know, are wild and foolish."
All these Bhils looked as if they had tooth-ache, because of the odd way they have of arranging the ends of their white pagris. After them walked clerical Brahmans, with aromatic tapers in their hands and surrounded by the flitting battalion of nautches, who amused themselves all the way by graceful glissades and pas. They were followed by the lay Brahmans the "twice born."
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