Page:Life in India or Madras, the Neilgherries, and Calcutta.djvu/93

Rh and bolted doors. The owners, if up, are dreamily squatting on their hams, cleaning their teeth, scraping their tongues with silver scrapers, or chatting with neighbours. The scavengers, a poor degraded caste, are busy with long wooden hoes, removing from the gutters the accumulated filth of the preceding day. There are no sidewalks, and man and beast go on their several errands together in the middle of the street. Cows going to pasture, donkeys bringing grain, men and boys, buffaloes, dogs, and peons jog quietly along in one track.

But the sun is up, and no sooner up than powerful. Turning back, we meet a long array, some going to the river for their morning duties, others starting for their business. The last lazy householder has been thawed out of his public bedroom, and the streets assume an air of life. The bazaar men are opening their shops, and in the lot over the way the creaking of the castor-oil mill has commenced. As the oxen move slowly round and round with the cross-beam, the great pestle grates out harsh music, and grinding the beans against the wooden mortar, expresses the oil. Castor-oil, as well as cocoanut-oil, is here used for burning in lamps. The priest is at work adorn-