A Yankee in the Far East Part 18

This Royalty act is all right here in India, but you want to know where to draw the line when it affects your pocketbook with nothing to show for it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Of course I don't," I came back at him. "You stung me the last trip across India"]

The man saw I was wise, grinned, and issued me a second-cla.s.s ticket, and third-cla.s.s for my servant; and the evening of that same day saw me starting for the railroad station in another victoria, Lal and the driver up front, footman on behind, the lord my duke (meaning me) in the "tonneau" with bedding, grips, steamer trunk, camera, coats, etc., etc., all royally placed in the same vehicle.

When a traveler starts out from Calcutta to take the train for a night's journey, if it don't look as if he was breaking up housekeeping and going somewhere, I've never asked for bacon and eggs in the woolly West and heard the s.h.i.+rt-sleeved waiter yell: "Two clucks and a grunt," and then collect more for the viands than it costs to be moved across the second city in the British Empire in royal entourage.

XXVIII

ONE WINK, SIXTEEN CENTS, AND ROYALTY

The seasoned traveler in India, planning a night's journey, don't arrive at a station a minute or two before his train leaves, as we do in plebeian America. Rush and hurry should form no part of Royal journeys.

It isn't dignified.

You should get there at least half an hour before the train starts, especially if you are playing Royalty on a second-cla.s.s ticket.

As your equipage draws up to the station your footman alights and swings open the carriage door, your guide descends from the driver's seat and summons low-caste va.s.sals who load your impedimenta on their heads.

The cavalcade starts with you bringing up the rear.

You find the station-master, the string of your menials now following on behind.

Locate your station-master, or at least an official who will answer the same purpose, and tip him a wink, not forgetting to accompany it with half a rupee, and tell him you want a car for Benares.

This man is a Hindu who can write but can't read--I am quite certain he can't read.

He leads "Master" with his string of retainers to a car of four compartments, four berths in each compartment, the berths running with the train, with a toilet room for each compartment. He opens a door.

Lal tells the string of porters to put "Master's" baggage into the compartment--no matter how much, put it all in, boxes, bags, bedding and trunks.

Then this functionary who has been the recipient of a wink _and_ half a rupee (don't forget the coin when working the combination), who can write but who cannot read, fills in a placard which is hanging outside the compartment. This placard, before the recipient of the wink and half rupee begins to toy with it, is a blank which reads:

Lower Right Berth reserved for ---- Upper Right Berth reserved for ---- Lower Left Berth reserved for ---- Upper Left Berth reserved for ----

[Ill.u.s.tration: Lal tells the string of porters to put "Master's"

baggage into the compartment--no matter how much, put it all in, boxes, bags, bedding, and trunks]

This official who has received a wink _and_ half a rupee--never, never forget the half rupee, because half a rupee is sixteen cents--fills in the blanks on the placard which now, in its completed state, reads:

Lower Right Berth reserved for Mr. Allen.

Upper Right Berth reserved for Mr. Jones.

Lower Left Berth reserved for Mr. White.

Upper Left Berth reserved for Mr. Brown.

He hangs up the placard outside of the compartment, wishes "Master" a pleasant journey up to Benares, and closes the door.

Lal starts the electric fan, makes "Master's" bed, lays out "Master's"

pajamas, and arranges "Master's" belongings promiscuously over Jones', White's and Brown's berths--Lal, a seasoned guide, is onto his job.

These last-named gentlemen get left--yes, sir, they get left. The train pulls out before they get around, and I am deprived of the pleasure of their company.

But if there is one place where a fellow can dispense with company it's on a hot night's run in a railroad carriage through India.

It's when I step out of the car at Benares the next morning that I learned that the fellow back in Calcutta couldn't read, for, blessed if the outside of that compartment I have occupied all night isn't labeled No. 1 instead of No. 2.

But that really makes no difference.

The compartment labeled No. 2, when you get inside, is just like compartment labeled No. 1, on the other side of the part.i.tion in the same car.

I conscientiously told that fellow I held a second-cla.s.s ticket, and if he _could_ read, Royalty is so cheap in Calcutta that you can buy a whole night of it with sixteen cents, and the number on the outside of the car, and the price charged for it, is all the difference between Royalty and Plebeian in India--and Plebeians have the laugh on Royalty--they have always had it on them for that matter.

XXIX

THE ENGLISHMAN AND MARK TWAIN'S JOKE, "THAT'S HOW THEY WASH IN INDIA"

In my home town I was once asked to give a travel talk in a large stone church, the occasion being a rally for the Christian Endeavor Society.

It had been announced that there would be no charge for admission; furthermore, it had been thoroughly advertised that the young ladies of the church would furnish a delectable spread to the audience in the church parlors just as soon as I got through talking.

The town turned out _en ma.s.se_.

As the parson was leading me to the rostrum, the lights went out and there was Egyptian darkness.

After an anxious wait of five minutes, it being a hard stunt to get such a fine audience together in the cla.s.sic, intellectual center in which I live, even with a chromo offer, the parson, fearing it would leave, made a little speech in the direction where he hoped the audience was--he couldn't see it--it was an act of faith.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The town turned out _en ma.s.se_ to hear me talk]

He begged our good people to be patient under the trying circ.u.mstances, explained that the burned-out fuse would soon be replaced, that an electrician was even now on his way to the church, and told them that a good thing was in store for them--he a.s.sured them, "Mr. Allen is still with us."

Five more minutes pa.s.sed and darkness still brooded.

Again the parson gave the audience, which he hoped was still there, the same little speech, a.s.suring them again, "Mr. Allen is still with us--there's a good thing coming."

At the end of fifteen minutes he repeated it again, a.s.suring them a good thing was coming--the coffee began to boil in the church kitchen, the aroma floating through the auditorium--the lights came on and there hadn't one guilty man escaped. The audience was still there.

Kind reader, you'd never guess what _I_ was thinking about during that trying fifteen minutes.

Well, I was trying to think of an appropriate story to open my speech with, to ill.u.s.trate the situation--something about where the lights went out.

I thought, and _thought_, and THOUGHT, but could not fetch it, but the next morning I thought of a corker--I am descended from the English.