Chapters 3 and 4 Summary

After leaving the European Club, Flory walks a block to the house of his close friend, Dr. Veraswami. Veraswami's house's garden adjoins the clubhouse lawns; his house's back faces the roadway, the front points at the hospital. Mrs. Veraswami, an ardent and pious Hindu, hears Flory's call and immediately hides herself from his presence. Veraswami greets Flory and invites him inside. Veraswami is a plump, small, energetic, and eagerly garrulous Indian. He has a bubbling voice, fuzzy hair, and wears spectacles. Veraswami earnestly adores English culture and genuinely feels that the native peoples of India and Burma are literally inferior peoples, himself apparently included. Flory enters the house, reclines in a deck chair, and accepts cigarettes and English alcohol from his guest.

They then embark on what is obviously a ritualized but lengthy and favorite argument. Flory's thesis is that the...