From the four ends of the principality they came, the veiled
candidates; from the north, the east, the south and west. They came in
marvelous palanquins, in curtained howdahs, on camels, in splendid
bullock carts. Many a rupee resolved itself into new-bought finery,
upon the vague chance of getting it back with compound interest.
What was most unusual, they came without pedigree or dowry, this being
Ramabai's idea; though, in truth, Umballa objected at first to the lack
of dowry. He had expected to inherit this dowry. He gave way to
Ramabai because he did not care to have Ramabai suspect what his inner
thoughts were. Let the fool Ramabai pick out his chestnuts for him.
Umballa laughed in his voluminous sleeve.
Some one of these matrimonially inclined houris the colonel would have
to select; if he refused, then should Ramabai do the selecting. More,
he would marry the fortunate woman by proxy. There was no possible
loophole for the colonel.
The populace was charmed, enchanted, as it always is over a new
excitement. Much as they individually despised Umballa, collectively
they admired his ingenuity in devising fresh amusements. Extra feast
days came one after another. The Oriental dislikes work; and any one
who could invent means of avoiding it was worthy of gratitude. So,
then, the populace fell in with Umballa's scheme agreeably. The bhang
and betel and toddy sellers did a fine business during the festival of
Rama.
There was merrymaking in the streets, day and night. The temples and
mosques were filled to overflowing. Musicians with reeds and tom-toms
paraded the bazaars. In nearly every square the Nautch girl danced, or
the juggler plied his trade, or there was a mongoose-cobra fight (the
cobra, of course, bereft of its fangs), and fakirs grew mango trees out
of nothing. There was a flurry in the slave mart, too.
The troops swaggered about, overbearing. They were soon to get their
pay. The gold and silver were rotting in the treasury. Why leave it
there, since gold and silver were minted to be spent?
There were elephant fights in the reconstructed arena; tigers attacked
wild boars, who fought with enormous razor-like tusks, as swift and
deadly as any Malay kris. The half forgotten ceremony of feeding the
wild pig before sundown each day was given life again. And drove after
drove came in from the jungles for the grain, which was distributed
from a platform. And wild peacocks followed the pigs. A wonderful
sight it was to see several thousand pigs come trotting in, each drove
headed by its fighting boar. When the old fellows met there was
carnage; squealing and grunting, they fought. The peacocks shrilled
and hopped from back to back for such grain as fell upon the bristly
backs of the pigs. Here and there a white peacock would be snared, or
a boar whose tusks promised a battle royal with some leopard or tiger.