a good deal of excuse for broad language in this particular broad country. And here my hulwais pitch, and we always have a Brahman and a Mussulman abdar, for there's nothing thirstier than a native crowd. The sweetmeat stall is very prettily got up; and there is a roulette-table where you can put in pice for sweets. I fitted the stall and keep it tidy, and the hulwai finds himself, helps to pack, and pays me ten rupees a month.
Last of all, there is a stage for theatrical performances; but we only give these regularly when pitched near big towns. You see, when night comes on at country melas there's always cooking to be done; and the crowds settle fiat in little groups round bits of fires. Then you hear the throbbing of the tom-tom for an hour or so, then the chorus of the jackals, but by ten o'clock they are usually still —except in hot weather, when the drums go on unceasingly all night.
My plan is to keep up a steady stream of people all day long-in at the turnstile, and out at one large exit. This is guarded in turn by three chuprassees, two Purbias—brothers—and a big Cashmeeree; all three first-rate single-stick players and wrestlers. The Cashmeeree, though soft as a chicken in disposition, is the best man of the three; and once at Allahabad I backed him against an English soldier who was a Cornishman. Some people insinuated that I had squared the soldier, but I did nothing of the sort. He was not in regular training and the Cashmeeree wore him down and played with him for three quarters of an hour; and then threw him a clean four-square fall. You should have heard the roar the crowd made—and every soul of those thousands had paid his anna! But unless there's a local favourite, which often happens, or a neighbouring Raja with a taste for wrestling, I don't encourage it much; for a wrestling-bout is a longer business than a Scotch Church service or a Shakspeare tragedy.
In our line of business the outside is just as important as the inside, if you want to pull the people in; and my front would do credit to any fair in England. My bullock-carts are contrived to join up to make a parade-stand; and behind them we hoist painted cloths as big as the mainsail of a man-of-war. We always pitch facing the north, and arrange our canvas so as to keep a patch of shade in front. "The Mirror of Two
