Each occupant of the room has been provided with a tiny glass of weak opium-water from the large China jar on the landlord’s desk, paying a pice per glass for the beverage.  Some drink one glass, some two, some three or more; but as a rule the “kasumba” drinker confines himself to two glasses, being ashamed to own even to a brother “Tiryaki” the real quantity of the drug consumed by him:  while a few, strengthened by prolonged habit, pay somewhat more than the ordinary price for a thicker and stronger dilution.  When the glasses are empty the company calls for desert; for the opium-drinker must always have his “kharbhanjan” or bitter taste remover; and the landlord straightway produces sweets, fruit, parched grain, or sago-gruel known as “khir” according to the taste of his customers.  Hardly has dessert ended when an elderly Mahomedan in shabby garb falls out of the group and clearing his throat to attract attention commences to recite a flowery prelude in verse.  He is the “Dastan-Shah,” own brother (professionally) of the “Sammar” or story-teller of Arabia and the “Shayir” of Persia and Cairo:  and his stories, which he delivers in a quaint sing-song fashion, richly interspersed with quotations from the poets of Persia, are usually culled from the immortal “Thousand and one Nights” or are concerned with the exploits and adventures of one of the great heroes of Islam.  Amir-Hamza for example is a favourite subject of the imaginative eastern story-teller.  Amir-Hamza according to Professor Dryasdust died before the Prophet, but according to the Troubadours of Islam was the hero of a thousand stirring deeds by flood and field and by the might of his right hand converted to the Faith the Davs and the Peris of Mount Kaf (the Caucasus).  You will hear, if you care to, of his resourceful and trusty squire Umar Ayyar, owner of the magic “zambil” or satchel which could contain everything, and master of a rude wit, similar to that of Sancho Panza, which serves as an agreeable contrast to the somewhat ponderous chivalry of the knight-errant of Islam.

* * * * *

Thus the Dastan-Shah whiles away time until about 8 p.m. when the club breaks up and the faded Aspasia helps her fractious Pericles down the rotten staircase and out into the night.  Ere the company departs each member subscribes a pice for the story-teller, who in this way earns about forty pice a day, no inconsiderable income in truth for the mere retail of second-hand fables:  and then with a word of peace to the landlord the men troop slowly forth to their homes.  As we pass down the rotten staircase, lit this time for our benefit with a moribund cocoanut oil lamp, we mark the Maratha labourer still sleeping heavily in his niche, dreaming perhaps amid the heavy odours of the house of the fresh wind-swept uplands of his Deccan home.

IX.

THE GANESH CAVES.