Page:The People of India — a series of photographic illustrations, with descriptive letterpress, of the races and tribes of Hindustan Vol 4.djvu/59

Rh retail sales, the prices of which are so closely watched by the people, are comparatively very small. There is no trader more closely watched by the people than the Bunnea; and in times of dearness of provisions or positive famine, he is an object of perpetual suspicion, and perhaps has his shop "looted" when distress comes to a head. Sometimes, when enriched by retail trade, the Bunnea becomes a sahukar, mahajmi, or banker, and gives up "the shop;" but this is rare. However large a fortune a real Bunnea may have made, he still keeps on " the shop," as his original source of "luck," and is not ashamed of "his father's calling." Bunneas are Bunneas only; few go into other professions or trades, and, though some have picked up education enough to serve as clerks, they have not ambition enough to rise, except to wealth; as to education, it is of small account. Every member of the craft can "write and read, and cast accounts"—after a fashion; and he can keep his books—also after a fashion, and that not a good one. For the most part, indeed, they are very illiterate, and care to know only what they must know.

As a class they are not esteemed, indeed, held in much contempt, which they bear meekly. As shopkeepers they receive much abuse, and are used to it; nor is it a very unusual thing to see one of them suddenly throw down his turban, leap into the street, and bawl furiously at the ill usage he has sustained from a customer; which, after all, may have resulted from his attempts to cheat. But the wrongs of Bunneas receive little consolation from the bystanders, whose sympathies are with the indignant buyer; and in turn the Bunnea can lord it over some one who needs money or credit for food. Thus Bunneas in general have no spirit; they are cringing, and often very mean, as if they feel themselves to be of a degraded class. In caste, however, they occupy a respectable place, and are very particular as to religious observances, and are often very charitable. No wandering mendicant, be he who he may, ever begs without receiving a handful, or, at least, a pinch of flour or pulse. Many of them are Vaisyas, or of the third class in Hindooism, and the remainder of the fourth. They marry exclusively in their own castes, and their wives are very useful to them, and for the most part good women—though Bunneas are not esteemed good husbands—quite able to attend to the shop, if their husbands are absent at fairs or markets, or on local business. There is rarely more than one, and widows of the Sudra Bunneas are not debarred from a second marriage if they please. In the higher ranks they were famed in old times for becoming suttee with their deceased lords; but that is impossible now. Bunneas are obliged to trust much to Brahmins for performance of religious rites; and they have great faith in lucky or unlucky days, founded upon the expounding of the state of the planets by Brahmin astrologers. In most large towns they have a guild and a dean of guild, and many disputes are settled by the body; but they are not unfrequently extremely litigious, resorting to the courts on every conceivable and inconceivable