CANARESE COOLIES. 135 



bass ; or as Mr. V. Ball has it in his " Jungle Life," 

 the reiteration of its chromatic scale of seven or eight 

 notes uttered in a monotonous adagio strain, then 

 suddenly breaking off ready to repeat it at short 

 intervals. After one has heard him several times, 

 and always with the same melancholy effect, one feels 

 inclined to rush out gun in hand, but our friend 

 probably retires cookoo-fashion into the hollow of a 

 tree, for he can never be caught. 



Presently a loud gong or bell is sounded in the com- 

 pound calling the coolies to work, and now all around 

 is alive. The cattle and sheep are let out of the sheds, 

 and are drivenoff to pasture; the dhorasani from the back 

 verandah superintends the milking of cows ; the search 

 for eggs, which the snake is supposed to be immode- 

 rately fond of, but here the latter has been found to be 

 a biped ; the feeding of the poultry, and giving an eye 

 to the grooming and feeding of the horses, as the 

 natives are apt to abstract the gram for their own 

 curry. In the meantime the coolies approach in strings 

 by various routes from hill and valley, headed by their 

 maistry, whose business it is to see that none sham 

 sickness or run off. There they are, men, women, and 

 children, mostly scantily and poorly dressed. There 

 are, however, exceptions, as, for instance, the so-called 

 " locals," who have their permanent lines, or group of 



