pride of it should keep us absolutely stainless. Because we have no respect for any being higher than ourselves, therefore we must respect ourselves.’
There were some leather shops in the neighbourhood kept by Muhammadans. The uncle and nephew bestirred themselves with great zeal in doing good to these Muhammadans and their untouchable leather workers!’[1] This made Harimohan beside himself with indignation. Since he knew that any appeal to Scriptures, or to tradition, would have no effect upon these two renegades, he complained to his brother concerning the wasting of his patrimony.
‘When my expenditure,’ his brother answered, ‘comes up to the amount you have spent upon your full-fed Brahman priests, we shall be quits.’
One day Harimohan’s people were surprised to find that a preparation was going on in Jagamohan’s quarters for a grand feast. The cooks and waiters were all Mussulmans. Harimohan called for his son, and said to him angrily:
‘I hear that you are going to give a feast to all your reverend friends, the leather workers.’
- ↑ As leather is made from the hides of dead animals, those who work in leather are regarded as unclean by orthodox Hindus. Only the very lowest castes are tanners.
