"Patience And
Perseverance," Say The Wise, "Got A Wife For His Reverence." At Last He
Was Taken On Board, And Presently He Lay Down To Sleep.
His sooty
complexion, lank black hair, features in which appeared beaucoup de
finesse, that is to say, abundant rascality, an eternal smile and
treacherous eyes, his gold[FN#6] ring, dress
[P.35]of showy colours, fleshy stomach, fat legs, round back, and a
peculiar manner of frowning and fawning simultaneously, marked him an
Indian. When he awoke he introduced himself to me as Miyan Khudabakhsh
Namdar, a native of Lahore: he had carried on the trade of a shawl
merchant in London and Paris, where he had lived two years, and, after
a pilgrimage intended to purge away the sins of civilised lands, he had
settled at Cairo.
My second friend, Haji Wali, I will introduce to the reader in a future
chapter; and my two expeditions to Midian have brought him once more
into notice.[FN#7]
Long conversations in Persian and Hindustani abridged the tediousness
of the voyage, and when we arrived at Bulak, the polite Khudabakhsh
insisted upon my making his house my home. I was unwilling to accept
the man's civility, disliking his looks; but he advanced cogent reasons
for changing my mind. His servant cleared my luggage through the
custom-house, and a few minutes after our arrival I found myself in his
abode near the Azbakiyah Gardens, sitting in a cool Mashrabiyah[FN#8]
that gracefully projected over a garden, and sipping the favourite
glass of pomegranate syrup.
As the Wakalahs or Caravanserais were at that time full of pilgrims, I
remained with Khudabakhsh ten days or a fortnight. But at the end of
that time my patience was thoroughly exhausted. My host had become a
civilised man, who sat on chairs, who ate with a fork, who talked
European politics, and who had learned to admire, if not to understand,
liberty-liberal ideas! and was I not flying from such things? Besides
which, we English have a
[p.36]peculiar national quality, which the Indians, with their
characteristic acuteness, soon perceived, and described by an
opprobrious name. Observing our solitary habits, that we could not, and
would not, sit and talk and sip sherbet and smoke with them, they
called us "Jangli"-wild men, fresh caught in the jungle and sent to
rule over the land of Hind.[FN#9] Certainly nothing suits us less than
perpetual society, an utter want of solitude, when one cannot retire
into oneself an instant without being asked some puerile question by a
companion, or look into a book without a servant peering over one's
shoulder; when from the hour you rise to the time you rest, you must
ever be talking or listening, you must converse yourself to sleep in a
public dormitory, and give ear to your companions' snores and
mutterings at midnight.[FN#10]
The very essence of Oriental hospitality, however, is this family style
of reception, which costs your host neither coin nor trouble.
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