After all, I think we could put up with the Hamal if only he would
not try to think. This is his crowning vice. In vain I try to
impress upon him that I engaged him to obey orders, and would rather
do the thinking myself. Every now and then, at some particular phase
of the moon, he sets his intellect in operations and the consequences
are, as the Brahmin boy described the result of his examination,
"appalling." It was our Hamal's duty to fill the filter, and at a
time when the water was very bad, orders were given that it should be
boiled before being filtered. One day, my wife saw the Hamal in the
act of filling the filter, and it occurred to her to warn him to let
the water cool first, lest he might crack the filter. "Oh yes," said
he, "I thought of that. After boiling the water, I cool it down by
mixing an equal quantity of cold water with it, and then I put it
into the filter."

In Bombay, since hard times set in, the offices of Hamal and mussaul
have got a little mixed, and a man will show you characters
testifying that he has served in both capacities. Such a man is,
properly speaking, simply a mussaul who has tried to do the Hamal's
work. The cleaner of furniture and the lighter of lamps and washer
of plates and dishes cannot change places or be combined. I have
read that the making of one English pin employs nine men, but it is a
vain boast. The rudiments of division of labour are not understood
in Europe. In this country every trade is a breed. Rama is by birth
a cleaner of furniture. This kind of employment came into the
country with our rule, so that the domestic Hamal, who is an offshoot
of the palkee hamal, or "bearer," has not had time to become what
fanciers would call a permanent strain, and you will find that you
can convert Rama into a chupprasse, a malee, or even a ghorawalla,