A BETEL SELLER OF DELHI.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1396, 23 March 1912, Page 10

A BETEL SELLER OF DELHI.

THE SHADOW, OP THE MIGHTY. In all her long life—she was fifty-five years of age and n great-grandmother— she had not known such a dav in Delhi. Whatever ono might think of the English, and she had heard many versions, they were certainly' tiio cause of many rupees being spent. Such a flow of money .was unheard of. It was like the many waters which swept through the gutters' after tho long wait for ruin in the year she "burned" (cremated) four of her children. Hu! tho plague: it was a quick olnld-t.hief! She lifted her worn bronze face lowords the place whence the chief noiso eamc. "Hi, you there! descendant of kings in tho garment of servants!" sho called out in Hindustani to a native schoolboy in European duck clothes, "why all this tongue-wagging?" ''Peace, woman!" answered the lad. "Nay, 3'ou whoso feet shall presently be blistered, why should I 'pence' when no man holds his tongue:" She held out a betel leaf containing its smear of lime and a piece of nut, and tho boy left tho fringe of tho great crowd pressing towards the Durbar ground, and drew near to where sho was seated on tho ground by the wayside. "Mother," ho began, taking tho leaf, "it is the King-Emperor " "What lies!" she interrupted. '"Tis a woman, the Great White Queen, by name Victoria. There is poison on thnt leaf for false lips."

"Silence, woman." "Bo silent thou, rogue! Give me back my betel-nut."

"Peace, I say!" cried tho boy. "Have I not been to school? 'Tis a man, tho grandchild of her you speak of, who is dead, by name George."

"So, my child? I'orgive an old woman able to be thrico thy mother. What of this man?"

"Man? Bo careful, you! Ho is tho King-Emperor." "Child, I am too old to care who he be. What says he?"

"That this Delhi is to bo the chief city in India," answered tlie lad.

"'This' Delhi! What nonsense is this? Is there another Delhi? As for its being made the chief city, what news is that? It has ever been so."

"That Deliii shallgrovr fat," added the lad, "and that all tho rich whito men, servants of the; King-Emperor, shall como hither from Calcutta."

"Who talks of Calcutta? Did my daughters not 'burn' their sons there boforo thou wert born?"

"Woman, put a rein on thy tongue. They will bring money, even as to-day, and will build great places, and my father, along with countless other men, will lay the stones." "Ah! that will bo good for theo and thoso like thee. Would that this George -this—"

"King-Emperor," prompted the little Hindu.

"King-Emperor had come sooner.' My son, go and cry out for joy with tho rest, lest he alter his will. . . ."

From timo to time others on tho fringe of tho crowd took a limed betel-pepper leaf and its piece of areca nut from her, and tossed down a pico in payment. Whenever her customer paused to roll up his sweetmeat she asked further news, and eacli confirmed what tho boy had told her, that Delhi was to bo the chief city of the laud. Chief city! These wonderful whito peoplo might next think of exalting tho gods. How would thcy do it? Perhaps by placing their sacred images on tho tops of tho new buildings all were chattering about.. How pleased everyone seemed!

She unfastened a small bag from her girdle, and poured from it on to a small platter a few handfnls of half-boiled rice and scmo spices, which she mixed together and ato with her fingers. As she finished her meal a rickshaw coolio bought her l :«st lx>tol leaf.

An old woman, withered, all the life dried out of her, with wisp of hair spread over her neck to shield the spot the sun had strangely burned that day, stumbled along the parched white road, from which the declining sun's rays still struck up as from a mirror. Hosts of people from the Duvbar pressed homeward round her. She turned down a side-path into a native village, and ontcred a hut on tho skirt of a patch of jungle. A coolie received her at the door. "Mother, the-King-Emperor—' "My son, yes, Delhi " Tho coolie caught her as she fell away, and laid her on the ground in the corner of the lint. —C. K. Fallas, in the "Manchester Guardian."