Indians, and they are
inclined to use it on trivial occasions. As telegrams have to be
transmitted in English, I am familiar with the nature of those sent to
rustic Indians, because those that come to Yerandawana always find
their way to the Mission bungalow to be interpreted. Amongst the more
well-to-do Indians a death is now almost always announced by
telegraph. It is a new and impressive way of showing respect to the
deceased, and makes it appear that he was in his lifetime an important
person. In cases of sickness telegrams are despatched here and there
to relations, summoning them urgently and at once, before there has
been time to ascertain whether the sickness is really serious or not.
Relations hurry off from long distances at great expense (how they get
the money is in some cases a mystery), and arrive perhaps to find the
sick person walking about. Christians under similar circumstances act
with just as much hasty precipitation as other Indians.

A most absurd instance of the abuse of the use of the telegraph
happened to one of our Christian women. She got a telegram to the
effect that her son was going to be hanged on the following Thursday,
and that she must come at once. The woman brought the telegram to the
Mission-house in the utmost consternation and distress. The son being
rather a "ne'er-do-weel," his having got into some scrape was not
improbable; but that he should have committed murder, and been tried
and sentenced without anybody hearing of it seemed impossible. A
telegram was sent to the governor of the gaol where the lad was
supposed to be. A reply was promptly returned saying that there was no
prisoner of that name in the gaol. The whole thing proved to be an
absurd attempt on the part of the lad himself to get his mother to
come to the place where he was living. To have merely telegraphed that
he was ill might not have had the desired effect, but the appalling
contents of the false telegram he thought were bound to be effective.
The inevitable distress of his mother he does not appear to have taken
into account at all.

Telegrams are also used as a means of putting on the screw in case of
a debt, or perhaps as a means of extorting money falsely. "Send Rs. 20
at once"--"Bring Rs. 5 without fail to-morrow"--such have been some of
the village telegrams. The contents of a telegram soon become public
property, because a small crowd always accompanies its recipient when
he comes to have it read. Th