Page:Malabari, Behramji M. - Gujarat and the Gujaratis (1882).djvu/152

136 and well scented. This faultlessly white being walks as if he were a basket of newly-laid eggs. He seems to be in dread of progress, of the very motion of life. Sloth is his idea of the fashionable. His limbs move very cautiously and very slowly, as if at every stage there were concealed Sir Richard Temple to chaff him about his "blue blood." He hates action of any kind. He hugs indolence, rejoices in its company, and revels in its seductive bosom. When, once in six months, he is required to attend to a little public business, he helplessly turns to his steward and asks, broken-hearted, "Oh! what's to do again?" as if only an hour ago he had done some tremendous deed of heroism for his country! The Shett sits down with a grimace, stands up with a yawn, salutes with an ogle or with a rather original parting of lips, which process he flatters himself is a smile. He is sensitively nervous about his health. He will not get out of his carriage till a few minutes after it has stopped; this is to avoid any internal agitation which might follow a hasty descent. He cannot go to sleep without a stout cotton pillow tied round his "food-bag." Except in