The softer methods lay one open to harder suspicions. Not long ago there was trouble among my shirts. I fancied buttons grew on neck-bands. Kadir Baksh and the _durzie_ encouraged me in the belief. When the lead-coloured linen (they cannot wash, by the way, in this stronghold of infidels) shed its buttons I cast about for a means of renewal. There was a housemaid, and she was not very ugly, and I thought she could sew. I knew I could not. Therefore I strove to ingratiate myself with her, believing that a little interest, combined with a little capital, would fix those buttons more firmly than anything else. Subsequently, and after an interval--the buttons were dropping like autumn leaves--I kissed her. The buttons were attached at once. So, unluckily, was the housemaid, for I gathered that she looked forward to a lifetime of shirt-sewing in an official capacity, and my Revenue Board contemplated no additional establishment. My shirts are buttonsome, but my character is blasted. Oh, I wish I had Kadir Baksh! This is only the first instalment of my troubles. The heathen in these parts do not understand me; so if you will allow I will come to you for sympathy from time to time. I am a child of calamity. FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 29: "Turnovers," Vol. VIII.] THE NEW DISPENSATION--II[30] Writing of Kadir Baksh so wrought up my feelings that I could not rest till I had at least made an attempt to get a _budli_ of some sort. The black man is essential to my comfort. I fancied I might in this city of barbarism catch a brokendown native strayed from his home and friends, who would be my friend and humble pardner--the sort of man, y' know, who would sleep on a rug somewhere near my chambers (I have forty things to tell you about chambers, but they come later), and generally look after my things. In the intervals of labour I would talk to him in his own tongue, and we would go abroad together and explore London. Do you know the Albert Docks? The British-India steamers go thence to the sunshine. They sometimes leave a lascar or two on the wharf, and, in fact, the general tone of the population thereabouts is brown and umber. I was in no case to be particular. Anything dusky would do for me, so long as it could talk Hindustani and sew buttons. I went to the docks and walked about generally among the railway lines and packing-cases, till I found a man selling tooth-combs, which is not a paying trade. He was ragged even to furriness, and very unwashed. But he came from the East. "What are you?" I said, and the look of the missionary that steals over me in moments of agitation deluded that tooth-comb man into answering, "Sar, I am native ki-li-sti-an," but he put five more syllables into the last word. There is no Christianity in the docks worth a tooth-comb. "I don't want your beliefs. I want your _jat_," said I. "I am Tamil," said he, "and my name is Ramasawmy."