The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1904-03-27

EVERYBODY has heard of caste in
H. India, but few foreigners realize what
caste. really means. The village sweep
er, who always belongs to the pariah
class may not enter the house of any
other villager
He dare not go to the public well for
a drink lest he contaminate it. IL he
is thirsty he must stand afar off and
wall dolefully until somebody takes
pity on him and brings water to him.
The village has highly organized
social life, and in many ways it is dis
tinctly socialistic The blacksmith the
barber, the shoemaker, the sweeper
and other laborers and artisans are
all public servants. Each receives so
much per annum from each villager,
the sum usually varying according. to
the wealth of the Individual.
Nobody dreams of paying laundry
bills. He pays the equivalent of II
cents a year to the washerman, and
gives him handful of food now and
again, besides other perquisites at
weddings, births and other festivals.
This seems small pay for years
washing, but the dhoby has another
valuable privilege. He and his family
can wear the clothes given them to
wash, and nobody dreams of objecting.
Thus they are always gayly clad-one
week in the borrowed plu1nes of Ram
Lal the next in those of Jhaman Singh.
Everything goes on in the village as
it has gone on for a thousand years or
more. There are many remote villages
in India in which no European has
ever set foot, and in few of them are
white men seen from one years end to
the other
The potter makes his pots as he did
in the days of Omar khayyam. His
simple machine has remained unal-
tered for two thousand years, and he
has not the slightest desire to improve
it. If his tools are poor his skill is
remarkable.
Mild and Simple Potters.
The potters are simple, meek folk.
They never quarrel, and do not even
insist on payment for their goods if
their customer DULLES them. LAS SIM
pie as a potter" and LAS mild as a
potter are common sayings.
1t is curious how every mans char
acter III India seems to be determined
| by his occupation. Bricklayers are al
ways active and energetic, swineherds
lazy and immoral, shoemakers poor,
| ignorant and despised, goldsmiths
clever and plausible rogues, and black
smiths gossips of the first water.
Carpenters have usually a turn to
poetry, and many of the greatest poets
| of India have come from their class.
But the village does not sgely upon such
amateur talent. 1t always supports a
professional poet of its own.
/ Poetry jS inQr9iOn0 in the Hln0OO
nature Even the schoolboys are
| taught to recfte and compose poems
| before they can spell words of three
syllables, and the very beggars solicit
aims with harps in their hands and
| songs upon their lips.
Like most poets elsewhere, the vii
| lage bard is usually poor man, but he
| is never in actual need. When he wants
| a meal he bitches up his Pegasus and
goes to some rich villager-a goldsmith
! or bazaar man-with new poem IN
praise of the patrons wife or house.
He is always rewarded with as much
| food as he can eat, and, perhaps, a
| few annas as well. He has no trouble
with publishers, no weary waiting to
| see his books in print. Whenever any
thing happens in the village, he is al
ways on hand with few appropriate
| verses, and always welcome.
y
among neighboring. villages as to the
merits of their respective poets, and at
| certain festivals during the year they
assemble for literary tournament.
Poets Have Soft Snap.
| Every Hindoo rajah or zamindar
| (rieh land owner) keeps his own
| laureate, to whom he sometimes gives
! large estates and rents or taxes of
whole villages. Altogether, the poets
! lines are cast in pleasant places in
India.
These village bards let their fancy
run riot in a bewildering maze of
| Oriental imagery, and there is no limit
| to their capacity for fiattery. This is
| the kind Of poems they compose for
lsthe rustic Romeo who wants to charm
| the ear of his we'll beloved:
ooh, Lali! thou art sweeter than the
| honey and more graceful than the
deer; faint and die for thy love!
..Oh. thou dove! Oh, thou swan. In