these haughty Mohammedans, from the
bare-legged, barefooted, cringing, crouching creatures you see
farther south. It would seem impossible for these men to stoop
for any purpose, but the Bengalese, the Hindustani and the rest
of the population of the southern provinces, do everything on
the ground. They never use chairs or benches, but always squat
upon the floor, and all their work is done upon the ground.
Carpenters have no benches, and if they plane a board they place
it upon the earth before them and hold it fast with their feet.
The blacksmith has his anvil on the floor; the goldsmith, the
tailor and even the printer use the floor for benches, and it
is the desk of the letter writer and the bookkeeper.

It looks queer to see a printer squatting before a case of type,
and even queerer to see a person writing a letter with a block
of paper spread out before him on the ground. But that is the
Hindu custom. You find it everywhere throughout India, just as
you will find everybody, men, women and children, carrying their
loads, no matter how light or how heavy, upon their heads. If an
errand boy is sent from a shop with a parcel he never touches it
with his hands, but invariably carries it on top of his turban.
One morning I counted seven young chaps with "shining morning
faces" on their way to school, everyone of them with his books
and slate upon his head. The masons' helpers, who are mostly
women, carry bricks and mortar upon their heads instead of in
hods on their shoulders, and it is remarkable what heavy loads
their spines will support. At the railway stations the luggage
and freight is carried the same way. The necks and backs of the
natives are developed at a very early age. If a porter can get
assistance to hoist it to the top of his head he will stagger
along under any burden all right. I have seen eight men under
a grand piano and two men under a big American roller top desk,
and in Calcutta, where one of the street railway companies was
extending its tracks, I saw the workmen carry the rails upon
their heads.

XXII

THE ARMY IN INDIA

The regular army in India is maintained at an average strength
of 200,000 men. The actual number of names upon the pay rolls on
the 31st of December, 1904, was 203,114. This includes several
thousand non-fighting men, a signal corps, a number of officers
engaged in semi-civil or semi-military duties, those on staff
detail and those on leave of absence. The followin