Who broke that plate? When was that glass cracked? Alas! why do the
sahebs marry such women?"

Old Ramjee then withdraws his beeree from his mouth and sheds light
on the subject. "You see, in England there are very few women, for
which reason it is that so many sahebs remain unmarried. So when a
saheb goes home to his country for a wife, he must take what he can
get."

"It is a question of destiny," says Lalla, "with them and with us.
My first wife, who can tell how meek she was? She never opened her
mouth. My present wife is such a sheitan that a man cannot live
under the same roof with her. I have sent her to her country ten
times, but what is the use? Will she stay there? The flavour has
all gone out of my life."

And they all make noises expressive of sympathy.

The Butler being commander-in-chief of the household forces, I find
one quality to be indispensable in him, and that is what the natives
call hookoomut, the faculty of so commanding that other men obey. He
has to control a sneaking mussaul, an obstinate hamal, a quarrelsome,
or perhaps a drunken cook, a wicked dog-boy, a proud coachman, and a
few turbulent ghorawallas, while he must conciliate, or outwit, the
opposition headed by the ayah. If he cannot do this there will be
factions, seditions, open mutiny, ending in appeals to you, to which
if you give ear, you will foster all manner of intrigue, and put a
premium on lies and hypocrisy; and it will be strange if you do not
end by punishing the innocent and filling the guilty with unholy joy.
In this country there is only one way of dealing with the squabbles