Part Four

Calcutta and Chandernagore

1907 ­ 1910

Satirical Poem Published in 1907

Reflections of Srinath Paul, Rai Bahadoor,

on the Present Discontents

(The Address of a Perspiring Chairman Rendered

Faithfully into the Ordinary English Vernacular.)

Councillors, friends, Rai Bahadoors and others,

Gentlemen all, my bold and moderate brothers!

This Conference's revolutionary course

(By revolution, sirs, I mean of course

The year's,  —  not anything wicked and Extremist;)

Has brought us here, and like a skilful chemist

Mixed well together our victorious batches

Bearing triumphant scars and famous scratches

Of a year's desperate fight. Behold, the glooms

Are over! See, our conquering Suren comes!

Dream not that when I talk of scars and fighting,

I really mean King Edward to go smiting

And bundle dear Sir Andrew out of Ind.

Nothing, nothing like that is in the wind.

Ah no! what has not Britain done for us?

Were we not savage, naked, barbarous?

Has she not snatched and raised us from the mire?

Taught us to dress, eat, talk, write, sneeze, perspire,

Like Europeans, giving civilisation

To this poor ignorant degraded nation?

Was not our India full of cuts and knocks?

'Twas Britain saved us from those hideous shocks.

No matter if our poor of hunger die,

Us she gave peace and ease and property.

Were't not for Clive, Dalhousie, Curzon, all,

You never would have heard of Srinath Paul.

But is this then good cause we should not meet,

Kiss their benevolent and booted feet,

Remonstrate mildly, praise and pray and cry,

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"Have sympathy, great Minto, or we die"?

If he'll not hear, let then our humble oration

Travel with Gokhale to the British nation.

To be industrious, prayerful, tearful, meek

Is the sole end for which we meet this week.

Yet are there men, misunderstanding whites,

Who much misconstrue these our holy rites

Deeming it a bad criminal consultation

How best to free  —  O horrid thought!  —  our nation,

And send the English packing bag and baggage,

Polo and hockey stick, each scrap of luggage.

They think we are rank and file and proletariat

Fit to be throttled with the hangman's lariat.

Fie, sirs! that we should be confused with the mob,

We who with Viceroys and great men hobnob!

To be mistook,  —  Oh faugh! for the mere people,

Things that eat common food and water tipple,

Mere men, mere flesh and blood!  —  we, the elect,

The aristocracy of intellect

To be thus levelled with the stinking crowd!

No, sirs, I dare pronounce it very loud,

We are the sober, moderate wise men, needing

Scope only to be famed for light and leading,

Full of co-operative amorous loyalty

To Minto, Morley and Britannic Royalty.

O some there are impatient and too wild,

To that Curzonian lash unreconciled,

Repudiate with violence unchancy

Our gospel proud of futile mendicancy.

Strange that they can't perceive the utility

And nobleness of absolute futility!

O sirs, be moderate, patient, persevering;

Shun, shun the extremists and their horrid sneering.

O sirs, from loyalty budge not an inch;

What if your masters love your throats to pinch?

It's pure affection. Even if they kick,

Is that sufficient reason to feel sick?

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No, though they thrash and cudgel, kick and beat,

Cling like the devil to their sacred feet!

Where are we? Is this the French Revolution

Infects our sacred Ind with its pollution?

Is Minto Louis? Kitchener Duke Broglie?

Away, away with revolutionary folly!

What, is this France or Russia? Are we men,

Servitude to reject and bonds disdain?

No, we are loyal, good religious dogs,

Born for delightful kicks and pleasant shogs.

It is a canine gospel that I preach.

Be dogs, be dogs, and learn to love the switch.

Whatever the result, be loyal still

To Minto, Morley and their mighty will.

Be loyal still, my prosperous countrymen,

Nor heed the moaning of the million's pain.

For serfdom in our very bones is bred,

And our religion teaches us to dread,  —

Shivaji's creed and Pratap's though it be,  —

More than the very devil disloyalty.

O constitutionally agitate your tails

And see whether that agitation fails.

The course of true love never did run smooth!

Morley will still relent,  —  that gracious youth.

Beg for new Legislative Councils, sirs,

Or any blessed thing your mind prefers.

The Shah's agreeable, why not the British?

Then there's Mysore  —  Great Scott! I feel quite skittish.

Local self-government we'll beg that's now

A farce,  —  (I'm getting quite extreme, I vow!)

And many other things. Prayers let us patter;

Whether we get them or not, can't really matter.

But one thing let me tell you, countrymen,

That clubs a boon and blessing are to men,

Where white with black and black can mix with white

And share a particoloured deep delight.

Great thanks we owe then, loyalists, to "Max",

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Who his capacious brain the first did tax.

Behold the great result! Apollo Paean!

The holy club, the Indo-European!

Approach, approach the holy precincts, come

And chat with Risley of affairs at home;

With Fraser arm-in-arm like friends we'll walk,

To Luson and to Lee familiarly talk.

Mind! trousers and a hat. They keep good whiskey

And we shall feel particularly frisky.

As for Comilla, it was sad and bad,

But Minto's sympathy o'er that fell raid

Dropped like the gentle dew from heaven to heal;

No longer for our injured kin we feel.

And now think not of politics too much.

Three days or four is quite enough for such.

Much better done to store substantial honey

Of commerce, taste the joys that roll in money.

Be rich, my friends! who cares then to be free

In hard uncomfortable liberty?

Of boycott talk but not of Swaraj, sirs,

And if of independence you'ld discourse,

Let it of economic independence be.

For that the law proscribes no penalty,

Nor will your gentle hearts grow faint and sick

At shadow of the fell policeman's stick.

What folly to disturb our comfort fatty

And cudgelled be with regulation lathi?

Such the reflections, sirs  —  Well, let it drop.

Don't hiss so much, dear friends! for here I stop.

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