but into a mussaul never. He is a shoodra, sprung from the feet of
Brahma, and the Brahman, who sprung from the head of the same figure,
despises him, but not with that depth of contempt with which he
himself despises the mussaul, who is an outcast, and sprang from
nowhere in particular. He cannot conceive that thirty generations of
washing could purify the descendants of Mukkun so that he might touch
them and not be unclean. You, his master, rank theoretically with
Mukkun, and he will neither touch your meats nor the plate off which
you have eaten them. He will keep your house clean, and even perform
some personal services, for he has a liberal mind, and is there not
also a toolsee plant in a pot on a kind of earthen altar in front of
his hut, before which he performs purificatory ceremonies every
morning? And does he not bathe after leaving your presence before he
eats? If you pass by the clean place where he is about to cook his
food in the morning, you will see a large pot of water on the fire.
When this gets warm--for Rama is not a Spartan--he will stand on a
smooth stone, as sparingly clad as it is possible to be, and pour the
water on his head, polishing himself vigorously as it runs down his
limbs; then, after dressing his long hair and tying it in a knot on
the top of his head, he will sit down to eat, in a place by himself,
with the feeling that he has warded off defilement from that which
goeth in at his mouth. That which goeth out of his mouth gives him
no concern.



THE BODY-GUARDS