INDIRA AND OTHER STORIES
consume small plants, roots and all. They are so fond of small plants that they grow them in enclosed places, which they call 'fields' or 'gardens'. One man is not allowed to graze in another man's enclosure.
That they eat fruits, roots, creepers, shrubs, is now an established fact, but I am not able to assert with any certainty that they eat grass. I have never seen any man eat grass. But on this subject I have some doubt. White men and the richer black men carefully prepare plots of grass known as 'lawns.' It is probable that the grass in them is intended for food. Indeed I once overheard a black man say, "The country is going to the dogs;—all Sahebs and other big men are idly eating grass."[1] It may therefore be assumed with some approach to certainty that the upper classes of men do eat grass.
When men lose their temper, they ask, 'Do you think I eat grass!'[2] Now it is one of the
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