The Middlebury register and Addison County journal. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1883-1885, 1885-05-22
TRAINING NAUTCH GIRLS.
HOW INDIA's FAMOUS DANCERS
ARE TRAINED.
A Curious Estabii ,hmeut where the
Girls Are Housed and Receive

Leonowens occurs the following with re-
gard to the famous dancing girls of
India:
The Nautchnees's establishment was a
curious building surrounding by a high
wall. We entered through a gate, and
were at once conducted by a couple of
old women across a paved courtyard
planted all around with the mongree,
oleander, and tall red and white rose
trees. Passing this, we were introduced
into a great bare hall, with low seats
ranged around the walls, curtained all
along the farther end Of the room, into
which inner chambers seemed to open.
Here we took our places. One of the old
women staid by us, while the other went
OFF to our visit to the head
lady of the establishment.
The great slave markets which we
have all read so much about, where ten
der young girls are bought and sold as
if they were cattle, no longer exist in
British India, but the amount of traffic
of the kind that is still carried on every
where is incredible, although the fact is
vigorously denied by both the buyer and
the seller. In many cases these Nauch-
nees are not bought, but hired for a term
VI yOalo, lOl LlOuCy phlu hON y ChO Shi'
themselves, but to parents or friends. In
the course of time the parents die or
move away, and the girl after having
given her best days to her employers,
finds herself without money, friends or
social ties, and is glad enough to spend
tie remainder of her life in instructing
the younger members of the establish
ment of which, with the fidelity so nat
ural 10 Oriental women, she considers
herself a member, and, therefore, bound
for life, to protect its interests.
After q few minutes Saidah Bebee
came in to greet the Lady Kesineh. She
salaamed most deferentially to us and took
her place on the floor. She was a woman
of about fifty years and a native of AT
ghanistan, tall and finely formed.
She spoke of difficulty in pro-
curing respectable young girls to
fill the places of those who ran
away, were sold to certain rich admirers
for wives, or died. On my questioning
the old lady about the average life Of
the Nautchnees she could give me no
clear estimate, but intimated very de-
cidedly that they generally died young.
At my especial request we were shown
into the exercising room and almost over
the entire establishment. There were
over one hundred girls, of all ages and
shades of complexion, from dark brown
toa pale, delicate olive, going through
their exercise at the time. The hall was
composed of bamboo trellis-work, and
was light, spacious, and airy enough.
From the roof hung all sorts of gym
nastic apparatus, rude, but curious
ropes to which the girls chung as they
whirled around on tiptoe; wheels on
which they were made to walk in order
to learn q peculiar circular dance called
''chakranec' Qrom chalk" a wheeD ;
slip-knots into which they fastened one
arm or one leg. thus holding it motion
less while they exercised the other; cups,
catch, and heaps of fragile cords. with
which they spin round and round,
and if any Il of these snap
under too great a pressure they
are punished, though never very severely.
Altogether, it was a strange sight.
Most OF the girls from ten to fourteen
had nothing or but a short, tight gar
ment the older ones had tight short
sleeved bodices in addition to this gar
ment, and those under ten were naked.
They were all good looking; a few here
and there were beautiful. The delicate
and refined outline of their features, the
soft tint of their rich compilations, the
dreamy expression of their large, dark
quiet eyes, added to great symmetry of
form, made them strangely fascinating.
The teachers were all middle-aged
women, some of whom looked prematurely
old. The girls are taught to repeat poems
and plays, but no books are used.
The dormitories in this establishment
were bare rooms; the girls all slept on
mats or cushions on the floor. Each had
a lota, or drimking-cup, a little mirror,
and a native box in which to keep her
clothes. The more finished and accom-
plished Nautchnees had rooms to them
selves. I went into one of these. 1t was
matted and very simply furnished. A
tier of boxes in which her jewels and
robes were kept, a cot, a few brass lotas,
fans, coias, or holders, with some
tiny looking glasses ranged along the
wall-and this was all.
| inquired for the beautiful Nautchnee
who had interested me. Her name was
Khangee; she was a Soodahnee by birth.
The Soodahs are a military race or tribe
inhabiting parts of the province
of Clutch; they find their chief wealth
in the beauty of their daughters, and for
one of the Soolahnees a rich Mohamme-
dan will pay heavily. Rajahs, wealthy
Mohammedan merchants, and proprie-
tors of dancing girls often dispatch their
emissaries to Clutch, Kabool, Cashmere,
and Rajpootna in search of the beauti-
full women. The fame of the Cash
merriam and Soodah women has spread
far and wide, and often some beautiful
creature is picked up out of the novels
of Thur, Body or Cashmere, and trans
planted to the gorgeous pomp of a royal
harem The Rajpoots i%ntermarry with
the Soodah and Cashmerian women, and,
being naturally a handsome race, they
have preserved by this means that ply
steal beauty of which they are so justly
proud.
Very little was known of Khangee's
history beyond the fact that she was a
Soodahnee by birth. She was bought at
an early age from her parents, who were