practised eye. I have seen an unjust Jemadar who might have walked
with Sir John Falstaff.


Falstaff: My honest lads, I will tell you what I am about.

Pistol: Two yards, and more.



THAT DHOBIE!



I am an amateur philosopher and amuse myself detecting essence
beneath semblance and tracing the same principle running through
things the outward aspect of which is widely different. I have
studied the Dhobie in this spirit and find him to be nothing else
than an example of the abnormal development, under favourable
conditions, of a disposition which is not only common to humanity,
but pervades the whole animal kingdom. A puppy rending slippers, a
child tearing up its picture books, a mungoose killing twenty
chickens to feed on one, a freethinker demolishing ancient
superstitions, what are they all but Dhobies in embryo? Destruction
is so much easier than construction, and so much more rapid and
abundant in its visible results, that the devastator feels a jubilant
joy in his work, of which the tardy builder knows nothing. As the
lightning scorns the oak, as the fire triumphs over the venerable
pile, as the swollen river scoffs at the P. W. D., while arch after
arch tumbles into its gurgling whirlpools, so the Dhobie, dashing