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Updated: May 9, 2025
It is different with a Government official. He is hedged round by chuprassis who levy toll on the poor natives before they allow them to enter the presence of the Sahib. It is a scandal, but it seems impossible to stop it.
It is a very fine Embassy indeed palace, perhaps, you might almost call it, with a nice air of official dignity that comes from the Lion and the Unicorn in the front of the house above the entrance, and the little khaki clad native soldiers, mounted orderlies, and Red Chuprassis in groups about the grounds.
A look in at the Club for a game of billiards, more work, dinner, and, if we are not going to a dance or any frivolity, a quiet talk, a smoke, a few more papers gone through, bed, and the long Indian day is over. All day chuprassis, like attendant angels, flit in and out bearing piles of documents marked Urgent, which they heap on his writing-table. I begin greatly to dislike the sight of them.
As we drove off the children pursued us down the drive crying, "Don't go away. Stay with us always." At the station we were told that the train was two hours late, and Boggley thought it would be an excellent plan to spend the time calling on the Blackies, who live near; so, leaving Autolycus and the chuprassis with the luggage, we set out.
The last we saw of him was standing before the hotel door along with Bella and the two chuprassis bowing low and murmuring, "Salaam, Miss Sahib, salaam," while I, undignified to the last, knelt on the seat and wildly waved a handkerchief. The landing was crowded with people.
Then he raised one hand and brought it down on his gong. Instantly two stalwart, bronze giants, his chuprassis, entered the room and stood by the door. "Take this woman out, and keep her out," he said to them. "Never let her in again. She annoys me." The chuprassis put their hands to their foreheads, and then impassively approached the Englishwoman.
The weather is beginning to stoke-up, as Boggley calls it, and during the day the tent is insufferable. I can sit outside it in the early morning, but as the sun gets up Autolycus summons the chuprassis, and they carry my table and writing-materials to the verandah of the Guest House, which has a cool, not to say clammy and tomb-like, atmosphere. My chief trials are the insects.
Autolycus and the chuprassis take a great interest in teaching him manners. When I hold out a biscuit Autolycus says sternly, "Say salaam to the Miss Sahib," and the baby puts his small hand gravely to his forehead, bowing low with a "Talaam, Mees Tahib," then snaps up the prize. I shall miss my little companion. I wonder what will become of him little brown heir of the ages.
Reluctant to part with her new playmate she accompanied him to the door and, to the scandal of the stately chuprassis, stood at it to watch him drive away and to wave him a last goodbye as he looked back when the pony turned out of the gate. India is a land of lightning friendships between men and women.
Autolycus, looking very worried, is busied with the task of preparing the evening meal. One of the chuprassis, his gaudy uniform laid aside, and clad in a fragment of cotton, is sluicing himself with water and praying audibly. The dhobi is beating our clothes white on stones in the tank. In the village the women are grinding corn; the oxen are drawing water from the well.
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