all on one floor. At the entrance stood the smiling
dhorasani, my host’s better half as some people thought,
ready to do honours at the head of a well -appointed
tiffin table, an invitation I politely declined, however,
not wishing to spoil my dinner, and enjoyed a good
rest instead.
During the very first night I spent at Pore, I
experienced the disadvantage of a thatched roof, for
rats came in by the dozen, and seemed to make
themselves quite at home in my room. At one time
they had a grand steeple-chase overhead, and one or
two fell upon my mosquito curtains; at another, hide
and seek was evidently their game, whilst some more
hungry than their playful brethren began to gnaw at
my hoots, which I found in the morning more or less
the worse for their appetites and sharp teeth. There
was little sleep to be had under such circumstances,
but by the first appearance of dawn my entertainers
suddenly disappeared, and I determined to make up
for lost tim e ; however, living in the jungle means
early rising, for as soon as nature wakes there are
thousands of birds ready with their morning song.
I well remember the Plaintive or Hawk-Cookoo, one
of the earliest birds, who in time became simply
detestable to me owing to his peculiar whining tune, consisting
of the notes of nearly an octave from treble to
bass ; or as Mr. V. Ball has it in his “ Jungle Life,”
the reiteration of its chromatic scale of seven or eight
notes uttered in a monotonous adagio strain, then
suddenly breaking off ready to repeat it at short
intervals. After one has heard him several times,
and always with the same melancholy effect, one feels
inclined to rush out gun in hand, but our friend
probably retires cookoo-fashion into the hollow of a
tree, for he can never be caught.
Presently a loud gong or bell is sounded in the compound
calling the coolies to work, and now all around
is alive. The cattle and sheep are let out of the sheds,
and are driven off to pasture; the dhorasani from the back
verandah superintends the milking of cows; the search
for eggs, which- the snake is supposed to be immoderately
fond of, but here the latter has been found to be
a biped ; the feeding of the poultry, and giving an eye
to the grooming and feeding of the horses, as the
natives are apt to abstract the gram for their own
curry. In the meantime the coolies approach in strings
by various routes from hill and valley, headed by their
maistry, whose business it is to see that none sham
sickness or run off. There they are, men, women, and
children, mostly scantily and poorly dressed. There
are, however, exceptions, as, for instance, the so-called
“ locals,” who have their permanent lines, or group of