LXVII 



It is related of a naturally reticent but observant old 

 tar, who had definitely returned to his native village 

 from many trips to foreign shores, that on being asked to 

 give his assembled friends some account of the manners 

 and customs of a certain savage tribe in one of the rarely 

 visited islands of the south Pacific, he shifted his quid to 

 the starboard side of his mouth, and, after considerable 

 preliminary humming and hawing, gave vent to four 

 words : " Manners, none ; customs, nasty." In like fashion 

 I propose to tell you — but at somewhat more length — 

 about the riders of a land which, in comparison with those 

 we have recently visited together, has no riders. 



India is not a land of horsemen. How can you expect 

 a man who for sole garb wraps a dirty piece of cotton 

 cloth about his loins, wears ear, finger, and toe rings, and 

 ties up his long black hair in a Psyche knot, to be a 

 horseman ? Our American Indian, whose full dress is 

 sometimes a paper collar and a pair of cavalry spurs, 

 shows at least a natural tendency to equestrianism ; not 

 so the pathetic-eyed Hindoo. Practically, over the entire 

 extent of the Indian peninsula, the animal which the cow- 

 boy picturesquely classifies as a beef -critter is (to speak 

 Celtically) the horse of the country. The bullock does 

 everything for the Hindoo as the ass does everything for 

 the denizen of Egypt or Syria. He is as universal in his 

 capacity to help man in his struggle for existence as 

 the little burro of Mexico ; and when he is not sacred he 



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