Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-09-05
WAYS OF THtlhAT|VE
Philosophy and Business
Methods in Comparison.
THE LOTUS IN FLOWER
STRAWBERRIES AND CREAM IN A
WATER-BoRDERED GARDEN.
Charms Of Life In a Pretty Bunga-
low on the
"Bund."
THE LOTUS IN FLOWER
Written for The Evening Star.

Our munshi, Katrina Nand, has proved to
be most interesting person. He was edu-
Gated at the Church Mission High School,
but Is as devout a Hindoo one can find,
and, being of the Brahman or priest caste,
can do no work, SO he is forced, If he does
not become priest, to do something which
will not require manual labor. Katrina.
whom we always call munshi (teacher) and
who Is called by the natives Pundit, which
means that he Is an educated person, is not
a priest and wishes to become teacher
indeed, his one aim in life is to go to the
Lahore College, which he could easily do If
he could get the consent Of his father, as
the maharajah pays the expenses Of all
boys sent there from Kashmir, and there to
study Sanscrit and Arabic, when, with his
knowledge of Hindustanee and Persian, he
would be fitted to be professor Of oriental
languages. He certainly has great talent
as a teacher, and he knows English
very well indeed, would be a real acquisi-
ton for one of the American universities
He knows his languages scientifically and
takes deep interest in the construction
Of each. His manners are perfect, and he
is very broad-minded in regard to all 1e-
ligionS, but at the same time clings sturdily
to his own, which he dreams of reforming.
He tells us that the priests are very cor
rupt, and do nothing except for money;
that the books are read in Sanscr1t, which
Is iOl uilueiS toOu ny Ole III tWo VI SAASO
hundred, and that consequently the mass
of the people is totally ignorant of the pre-
cepts of their religion. There are numbers
Of superstiuons, of course, passed Gown
from father to son, but he tells US that
the educated Hindoo of Kashmir worships
god, either Brahma, Vishnu or SILVA:
that he begins his prayer by an invocation
to Ganeesh, the elephant-headed god, who
is the son Of SILVA, and Is the god OF good
luck" If he does, not the prayer VIII
not be heard, and that of all the hundreds
of minor gods, which correspond to the
saints in the Roman Catholic Church, each
has his elephant household god, which he
may choose himself. He also says that all
the sacred stones or sacred places to which
pilgrimages are made, and which are wor-
SHIPPED by the ignorant as gods, are in
reality only meant for reminders of better
things, hating places for reflection, as 1t
were. ft
For Good Luck.
Their superstitions are, of course, count
less. and one which rather appeals to us
is that in wearing in a little box or silver
tube around the neck bit of paper with
a prayer by one of the priests written on
1t one guards oneself against misfortune.
Katrina is very anxious to have US wear
such prayers during our further Journey
ings, and I rather like the idea. Why not
wear it? 1t is much the same thing as
having a four-leaf clover in bracelet or
good luck" The caste marks of the
Brahmans, we are told, are made Of pow
dered flowers mixed with sandalwood OIL,
the flowers giving the color, and each
caste mark differs only In It's composition.
We asked the munshi one, day how he, as
a fatalist, could believe in prayer or petit
ton, and he answered.. Every cart has
two wheels. huzoor, is it not so?'' We
could not deny that, and he went on, And
no cart can go on one wheel, that Is of a.
truth. Then take it that our destiny is as
the cart, one wheel being the will of God
and the other the will of man, does not
that explain itself?" If it did not at least
it was a nice argument. His English is so
nearly perfect that we were surprised when
he, on being asked by us the meaning of
the verb sakta Ito be able) answered, Its
meaning, madam, is to can" Also when
we asked him the meaning Of rangrez Ike
kohl (dye house, he answered, "Dyery."
And why should it not be dyery when a
bake house is bakery? He loves his peo
pie, but thinks them unciviized, and said
with scorn that a Kashmiri would, rather
than have his son leave Kashmir in order
to study or for any other purpose, have
him sit about the streets doing nothing.
and, indeed, the Kashmir as class is per-
fectly willing to do his fathers bidding in
that respect. Chatar Singh, an educated
kashmiri, who is supposed to keep the
boatmen In order and have an eye to the
general comfort of the stranger in the val
ley, told US that, rather than work Kash- |
miri would pay out of his starvation pow
erty another man to do his work for him,
and that once during a famine here, the
rice having fallen short, he had found
work at annas day a cents) for ma
tive who he knew needed it badly but that
after one day the man had paid another
coolie out of his few remaining annas the
sum of annaS a day to take his place |
while he sat on the ground in the sun and
did nothing. unless it was starve.
A Four-Cent Job
ba ~ 5au cd
ried half mile or more for us-bazaar
purchases-and as the usual coolie with his |
basket was not to be found we accosted a
young boy of sixteen or Whereabouts and
offered him 2 pice Ga cent?, the usual wage |
He refused it smilingy and said he would |
do it for annaS, which, we were in a |
great hurry, we gave him. He felt of our
purchase, which was some native cotton
cloth for dish towels, weighing about two
pounds, and all unwrapped and then called
another youth and they shared the very
light weight, as they did the cents. Beds
are evidently not used very much in Kash-
mir, for on giving an old bed to one of our
boatmen we were salaamed politely and
the man said: "HuZoor, that bed to me
not good is. He Is much too cold to sleep
in l will take but to look at, huzoor not
to sleep upon" If their broken English ia
funny to us what must our dreadful Hin
dustanee be to them? The other day we
were engaged in ordering some extra rush
mats, winch we wished to have especially
fresh and clean, and we said in severe
tones "Chataye behotf malta aur pur-
vana' the oldest and dirtiest of matting).
and the very unclean and lightly clothed
native nodded with perfectly solemn coun-
tenance and said, "Atcha, huzoor'' (aIl
right, highness, or your hOnor).
The Lotus Bloom.
The lotus has at last come into flower!
We have looked eagerly for weeks at the
huge leaves which sometimes as big as
a tea table, lying fiat oution the water, but
found no sign of buds forfa long time, and
then for another long time only the green
tightly closed bud five or six inches in
length. but at last much to, our joy, they
have gently unfolded and shown us their
color. such an enchanting Color too. a
lovely rose pink. The flower. when open is
bigger than the largest dinner plate and is
like an enormous but very delicate water
lily, but it is the half open bud one most
often sees, big, but daintily tinted and
making an exquisite picture beside its beau
tiful green leaf. We, during our last week
on the Dial Lake, spent all afternoons in
padding about among the rushes In our