And as his wealth increased, his person increased with it and his appearance became more imposing, so that he was regarded everywhere with the highest respect and esteem.  He was, moreover, a very religious man and charitable beyond most.  By early risers he might be seen in his garden seeking out the nests of ants and giving them, with his own hands, their daily dole of rice.  It was his benevolent thoughtfulness which had supplied drinking troughs for the flocks of pigeons that continually plundered the stores of the other grain merchants.  He had also established a pinjrapole for aged, sickly and ownerless animals of all kinds.  To this he required all his tenants to send their bullocks when they became unfit for work, and he sold them new cattle, good and strong, at prices fixed by himself.  If any of his old debtors, when reduced to beggary, came to his door for alms, they were never sent away without a handful of rice or a copper coin.  He kept a bag of the smallest copper coins always at hand for such purposes.

Beharilal had a fine house, designed by himself and surrounded by a vast garden stocked with mangoes, guavas, custard apples, oranges and other fruit trees, and made beautiful and fragrant with all manner of flowers.  The cool shade drew together birds of many kinds from the dry plains of the surrounding country, and it pleased Beharilal to think that they also were recipients of his bounty and that the benefits which he conferred on them would certainly be entered to the credit of his account with Heaven.

Some he fed, such as the crows, which flocked about the back door, like a convocation of Christian padres, in the morning and afternoon, when the ladies of his family gave out their portion of boiled rice and ghee.  The pigeons also came together in hundreds in an open space under the shade of a noble peepul tree, where grain was thrown out for them at three o’clock every day; and among them were many chattering sparrows and not a few green parrots, which walked quaintly among the bustling pigeons, their long tails moving from side to side like the pointer of the scale on which the Bunia weighed his rupees.  This resemblance struck him as he reclined against the fat red cushion in his verandah summing up his gains.  There were other birds which would not eat his food, but found abundance, suited to their respective castes, among the shrubs and trees that he had planted.  Mynas walked eagerly on the lawns looking for grasshoppers, glittering sunbirds hovered over the flowers, thrusting their slender bills into each nectar-laden blossom, bulbuls twittered among the mulberries and the koel made the shady banian tree resound with its melodious notes.