I met Mr. Gokhale many times again—in Poona itself, Surat, Bombay, and London—and his reasonable and open-hearted personality will often re-appear in this record. But to myself I still picture him on that Diwali evening in the refectory where the Servants of India were gathered round him, together with friends from both the main Parties of the time. In concession to my outlandish habits, I was allowed a table, chair, and spoon at dinner. But the sons of the country sat on boards level with the floor, their backs against the walls, and in front of each of us was laid half a plantain or banana leaf, neatly studded round the edge with little piles of rice, beans and other seeds, flavours, sauces and other condiments, together with thin wheaten cakes. Which when we had eaten, and drunk clean water from round brazen vessels such as all Indians carry when they walk, we washed up by burning the plantain leaves, rinsed our hands, and continued the discussion over pomegranate seeds, orange cloves, and pan-leaves concealing beetel-nut and various spice. Serene, modest, definite in aim and in knowledge, he continued to discourse with us, until the full moon rolled westward, and under her obscure silence I returned to the city of the plague, where the oil lamps were now extinguished, and the children asleep. FOOTNOTES: [8] See Introduction, p. 25. [9] See Introduction, p. 17. [10] Introduction, p. 22. [11] Introduction, p. 6. [12] Introduction, p. 28. CHAPTER II RATS AND MEN The bubonic plague, as I said, had been known in India for only eleven years, but from the first the common people had noticed its connection with rats. The sight of a dead rat in a house spread terror, and when rats crept out upon the floors, regardless of man, and lay panting to death, it was early recognized that the plague was at hand. The unlearned observed these warnings, but no one detected their full significance, and for many years the pestilence was attributed to bad water or overcrowded and insanitary houses.