William Henry Gladstone - "The Hawarden Visitors' Hand Book"

Anonymous - "The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume I"

Woods Hutchinson - "A Handbook of Health"

Anonymous - "The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume II"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

The Great Amulet

M >> Maud Diver >> The Great Amulet




Such absorbing reflections made him so neglectful of his hostess, that
the little lady's spasmodic efforts to enliven him with spiced snippets
of gossip--more than one item of which had emanated from
himself--fizzled out dismally, long before the meal was over; and it
was with an audible sigh of relief that she glanced across at Mrs
Desmond, and got upon her feet with as much dignity as a cushion, a
plump figure, and cramped limbs would allow.

"What? You do not desert us?" Quita asked, as Desmond offered her his
arm.

"No--I do not desert you!" He spoke lightly, but significance lurked
in his tone. "The Rajah and his suite are waiting to receive us in the
Durbar Hall, and unless you object to my cigar, or send me to the
right-about, I claim you as my prisoner of war for the evening!"

"_A la bonheur_! Smoke as much as you please. You will not need to
tie a thread round my ankle, I promise you. Why didn't I get to know
you sooner?"

"Perhaps because you discovered metal more attractive?"

The light thrust drew blood. She flushed, and laughed uneasily.

"A palpable hit! I might retaliate with a coal of fire in the shape of
a compliment. But you don't deserve it. Anyway, let's make up for
lost time now. I have a feeling that we shall be good friends,
only . . . ."

"Only--what?"

"Mrs Desmond may disapprove of me."

"You'd not say that if you knew her better," he answered, warmly. "She
isn't one of your good women who make a hobby of disapproval."

"That's a mercy! It is the pet vice of the virtuous; and Mrs Mayhew
deals in it largely. No doubt it keeps her happy, and makes her feel
superior; and I wouldn't rob my worst enemy of such a heavenly
sensation! I'm sorry for her to-night, though. She hates natives
almost as much as Colonel Mayhew loves them; and I'm afraid she's not
envying herself; nor will poor Elsie, if Captain Lenox makes _her_ a
prisoner of war for the evening! He hardly vouchsafed her half a dozen
words through dinner."

"Lenox is no conversationalist," Desmond answered, looking straight
before him. "But he is a splendid fellow--worth fifty of your
drawing-room acrobats."

"You like him so much, then?"

"I do more than that. I admire him."

"You are an enthusiast!"

The shadow of change in her tone did not escape him.

"Is that also one of the vices you detest?"

"But, no! I gave you credit for more discernment. Enthusiasts and
idealists are the salt of the earth. That's why I want to know more of
_you_. There! In spite of myself I have crowned you with a coal of
fire after all! Now, please introduce me to our resplendent Rajah
Sahib. I am going to make him talk. Colonel Mayhew has dared me to
succeed!"

They entered the Durbar Hall as she spoke--a long room overloaded with
gilt furniture, gilt-framed mirrors, and the inevitable chandeliers and
musical boxes that are the insignia of semi-civilised opulence
throughout India. No self-respecting Maharajah, or Rana, or Nawab
would dream of living in a Palace devoid of either.

Rajah Govind Singh and his four companions stood together by a
marble-topped table, laughing and whispering over a book filled with
photographs of music-hall celebrities, while beside it a spurious
album, whose heart was a musical box, tinkled an age-old air from "Les
Cloches" with maddening precision. At the far end of the room a native
conjurer had established himself, and was already performing
indefatigably for the benefit of no one in particular.

The group by the table showed a medley of colour quite in keeping with
the flash and glitter of the whole. Over spotless shirts and trousers
the boys wore brilliant silk _chogas_[1] cunningly patterned with gold
wire, and surmounted by turbans of palest primrose, orange, and green.
But Govind Singh, by divine right of Rajahdom, eclipsed the rest.
Beneath his scarlet coat gleamed a waistcoat of woven gold, and the
jewelled buckle of his Rajput _chuprass_.[2] Three strings of pearls
formed a close collar at his throat, and in front of his sea-green
turban a heron's plume sprang from a cluster of brilliants. The faces
of all were no darker than ripe wheat; for your high-caste hill-man
never takes colour, like his brother of the plains.

They had long since eaten their own simple dinner, in the scantiest
clothing, and in a solemn silence, squatting on a bare mud floor. For
to the Hindu a meal is a sacred ceremony, and the Sahib's idiosyncrasy
for making merry over his food can only be accepted as part and parcel
of his bewildering lack of sense and dignity in regard to the conduct
of life.

During a long minority this boy had been zealously inoculated with
Western knowledge and Western points of view; and with the deceptive
pliancy of the Oriental he had smilingly submitted to the process. But
deep down in the unplumbed heart of him he waited for the good day when
he would be rid of these well-meaning interlopers,--tireless as their
own fire-carriages,--who troubled the still waters of life and talked
so vigorously about nothing in particular; when he would be free to
forget cricket and polo and futile efforts to cleanse the State from
intrigue; free to sit down in peace and grow fat, unhindered by the
senseless machinations of the outer world.

And in the heart of Govind Singh you have a fair epitome of the great
heart of India herself: aloof, long-suffering, illogical to a degree
inconceivable by Western minds; ready to lavish deep-hearted devotion
upon individual Nicholsons and Lawrences when they come her way; yet,
for all her surface submission and progress, not an inch nearer to
racial sympathy, or to the inner significance of English life and
character than she was fifty years ago.

But, in the meanwhile, our concern is with a minor Maharajah, and his
passion for musical boxes.

At the Resident's approach, the laughter and whispering ceased; and the
four boys endured with impassive politeness the mysterious rite of
introduction. The tinkling album gave Quita her cue. She insisted on
hearing its entire repertoire, which was mercifully limited; and her
natural ease of manner, her knack of plunging whole-heartedly into the
subject of the moment, soon put Govind Singh's shyness to flight. He
deserted monosyllables for clipped, hurried sentences, jerked out with
an odd mixture of nervousness and self-satisfaction. Quita flashed a
smile at Desmond, who stood sentry at her elbow, in seeming ignorance
of the fact that Garth was making tentative attempts to usurp his place.

"You must show me some of the others, Rajah Sahib," she declared, as
the complacent album clicked into silence, "and when I go home to
England I will hunt you up a new kind to add to your collection!"

The boy's eyes lost their look of lazy indifference; a gleam of superb
teeth illumined his face.

"An upright grand is the last trifling addition to it, Miss Maurice,"
Colonel Mayhew informed her, "but the Rajah was a little disappointed
when he found that it couldn't be set going by the turning of a key."

"I am liking the big noise--the big _tamasha_," the young monarch
explained in all gravity. "And I think that one is too much price for
a box that will do nothing unless somebody knows to make it speak."

"Mrs Desmond can make it speak for you, Rajah Sahib," Colonel Mayhew
suggested; and the boy turned upon her with shy eagerness.

"Can you really do a tune?" he asked.

"Several tunes!" she answered, smiling. "A big noise, if you like."

"Oh, that is very good business. Thanks awfully."

He spoke the slang phrases, picked up from Bathurst, with mechanical
precision; and Honor, still smiling, went over to the piano--a
flamboyant instrument of rosewood and gold. After a second of
hesitation Lenox followed, opened it for her, and resting a hand on the
gilt back of her chair, bent down to speak to her before she began to
play. The suggestion of intimacy in his attitude was not lost on
Quita, who saw it all, without glancing in their direction. Her lips
tightened; and she started slightly when Desmond spoke to her.

"Will you go round the musical boxes with me?" he asked, in an
undertone that bordered on tenderness. For he saw that something in
her suffered, whether it were pride or love.

"But yes--by all means," she answered, with a lift of her head which
suggested to Desmond a jerk on the curb-chain. In moving off together
they passed close to Garth. But Quita, who was abstractedly opening
and closing her fan, did not seem aware of his presence; and he stood
looking after them--nonplussed and inwardly blaspheming. He did not
hold the key to this new phase of the situation.

Mrs Mayhew--noting his detachment from the Palace group, and quite
needlessly alarmed lest politeness should impel him to return to
her--sought out a strategic seat near the piano; though in truth Honor
Desmond's masterly rendering of Chopin's heroic polonaise was, for her,
no more than a complicated tumult of sound without sense, and her wrapt
expression resulted from the fact that she was debating whether her
_durzi_ could possibly reproduce at sight the subtle simplicity of Mrs
Desmond's evening gown. For she had sons growing up at home--this
insignificant woman, whose plump proportions and bird-like eyes had
earned her the nickname of "the Button Quail"; and even a good
appointment did not annul the vagaries of the rupee, which was behaving
peculiarly ill just then. In the intervals of imaginary dressmaking,
she was enjoying shrewd speculations as to the nature and extent of the
budding "affair" between the two at the piano; for her small mind clung
tenaciously to the Noah's Ark view of life. Also it seemed that
Elsie's own "little affair" was assuming quite a promising aspect.
Personally, she disliked the man, but his talent was undeniable. She
supposed he must be making money by it; and he was quite clearly making
a right-of-way into her daughter's heart.

They had drifted apart from the rest without need of spoken suggestion;
and now, under cover of Honor's music, which produced a tendency to
gravitate towards the piano, the man grew bolder.

"There is moonlight out in the courtyard," he said, very low; and he
tried, without success, to look into her eyes. "_Que dites-vous_?
Shall we go?"

She did not answer at once. A new spirit of boldness was awake in her,
urging her to take hold of her golden hour with both hands, nothing
doubting. But the man, even when he charmed her most, failed to
inspire her trust. And while she stood hesitating, his gaze never left
her face.

"Are you thinking it would scandalise _la petite mere_?"

"It might. She is easily scandalised!"

"But you would like to come?"

"Yes--I would like to come."

"_Eh bien_--that is enough."

"Is it?"

She looked up at him now with those great, truthful eyes of hers, which
he found oddly disconcerting at times.

"Enough for me, at all events!" he answered boldly. "Come!"

And she came.

The flagged quadrangle, walled in with darkness and worn with the tread
of numberless women's feet, showed silver-grey in the light of a moon
nearing the full; and above it, in a square patch of sky, stars
sparkled with a veiled radiance like diamonds caught in a film of
gossamer. As Elsie emerged from the shadow of the verandah, she had a
sense of stepping into an unreal world, and the Palace walls, shutting
out the familiar contours of earth, strengthened the illusion. The
night seemed the accomplice of her mood, in league with her own
exquisite sensibility; a night created for sheltering tenderness.

Michael Maurice, divining her sensations with the uncanny accuracy of
his type, pressed a little closer to her as they walked, so that now
and again, as if by chance, his arm brushed her own, and each contact
quickened her happy commotion of heart and pulse. They came upon a
rough stone bench, and he paused.

"It is pleasanter to sit, _n'est-ce pas_?"

"Yes. But we mustn't sit long."

"Mustn't we? How does one measure time on such a night as this? By
the beating of hearts, or by the pulsations of stars?"

She laughed softly.

"How foolish you are!"

"It is good to be foolish at the right time, and with the right person!
Wisdom is the death's-head at the feast of life. But we are going to
shut her outside the door for a whole week--you and I."

The strangely sweet magic of those linked pronouns stirred Elsie as
never before; though the sound of them had pleased her once, not a
little, on the lips of Kenneth Malcolm. Bud she answered lightly, as
women will, when they feel barriers giving way.

"I never knew I had agreed to anything so desperate!"

He had laid his arm along the back of the seat; so that his hand was
within an inch of her shoulder. He moved it closer.

"You have done more than that without knowing it--_petite amie_," he
said, yielding himself, as always, to the witchery of the moment. "It
is your doing that I have achieved an inspired picture. It is your
doing that I want this week in Arcadia to be an idyll we shall neither
of us forget--an idyll of sunlight, moonshine, and blessed freedom from
_les convenances_. No past--no future--only the present; and in it two
spirits tuned to one key. That is the secret of perfect enjoyment."

She shook her head.

"I don't quite understand. It sounds too fantastic. The past and the
future are there always. One can't get rid of them."

"But one can shut the door on them when they threaten to disturb the
present, which is the great reality after all."

"Can one? You seem to have a talent for shutting doors!"

"A convenient talent; worth cultivating! You may take my word for it."

Something in the statement or its manner of utterance jarred, ever so
slightly,--threatened to break the charm that held her.

"Dangerously convenient," she murmured, in gentle reproof.

"Little Puritan! What a narrow track you walk upon. Hardly room on it
for two abreast. Is there?"

The last words were almost a whisper. He pressed nearer, bringing his
face close to hers. At the same moment she felt a light touch on her
shoulder, and drawing back to escape the disturbing eloquence of his
eyes, she discovered the presence of his encircling arm. The discovery
brought her to her feet--flushed, palpitating, aquiver with anger at
this first shadow of insult to her maidenhood.

"Will you take me in again, please?" she said quietly, and the request
savoured of command. For her gentle nature was founded on a rock; and
a very little below the unresisting surface one came upon adamant, pure
and simple. But the unabashed Frenchman caught one of her hands, and
crushed it against his lips.

"_Petite amie_--forgive me! I was overbold. I am not fit to touch the
hem of your dress. But one is only flesh and blood; and you . . . say
you are not angry with me, in your heart . . . ."

She drew her hand away decisively; and with unconscious cruelty rubbed
the back of it against her dress, as if to remove a stain.

"I am angry--I have a right to be angry," she answered in the same
toneless voice. "And if you will not come in with me, I shall go
alone."

He rose then; and they crossed the enchanted courtyard together--a
clear foot of space between them.

The brilliance of the Durbar Hall smote the girl painfully. It was as
though the light had power to penetrate and reveal her hidden
perturbation. Without looking up, she felt her mother's eyes upon her;
and the wild-rose tint of her cheeks deepened under their scrutiny.
But she avoided meeting them, and, going straight to her father,
slipped a small hand under his arm. She felt indefinably in need of
protection, not only from the man, whose kiss had moved her more than
he guessed, but from herself, and the new emotions quickening at her
heart; and in all times of trouble she turned spontaneously to her
father. He was the true parent of her spirit; and, but for the
matter-of-fact, half-condescending devotion of three boys at home, Mrs
Mayhew might, at times, have felt left out in the cold.

"Enjoying yourself, little girl?" the father asked, smiling down at her.

"Yes, of course, dear--ever so much," she replied, with brave
untruthfulness; and the lie must have been forgiven her in heaven.

But the veil of enchantment was rent; and no needle of earth has ever
been ground fine enough to draw its frayed edges together.



[1] Long loose coats.

[2] Cross-belt.




CHAPTER X.

"Woman, I grope to find you; but I cannot,
O, is there no way to you, and no path,--
No winding path!"
--S. Phillips.


And the good folk of Chumba,--men, women, and children,--were early
astir on this June day, in whose fiery lap lay hid the luck of the
State for the coming year.

The stone streets of the little town, so steep as to be cut out, here
and there, into a rough semblance of steps, were alive with quickly
moving figures, in holiday attire: which, in the East, is a true
outward and visible sign of its wearer's inward and spiritual sense of
festivity.

Open shop fronts and quaintly carven balconies were noisy with shrill
voices. Every self-respecting house was plastered with fresh mud;
every window and doorway garlanded with marigold and jasmine buds;
every brain, absorbed in the paramount speculation, as to how the
sacrificial buffalo would behave.

At three o'clock, under a blazing sun, the Rajah set out, enthroned on
his State elephant, whose silver howdah and gala trappings formed a
fitting pedestal for the red and gold magnificence of the young prince
himself. Two ropes of pearls hung down to his waist: a huge uncut
emerald made a vivid incident of green upon his gilded chest: and the
diamond aigrette, surmounting his turban of palest green muslin,
flashed and quivered in the sunshine, like living fire. The Resident,
in immaculate grey suit and tall white helmet, sat beside him in the
awkwardly swaying howdah with an admirable air of comfort and
unconcern; and their triumphal progress was enlivened by the brazen
cheerfulness of trumpets and trombones, the melancholy squeal of
bagpipes, and the ear-piercing shriek of native instruments; while,
through all, and above all, and under all, the throbbing of innumerable
tom-toms suggested the heart-beats of the mighty crowd made audible.

Journeying thus, along the unshadowed road that overhangs the river,
they came at length to the promontory itself. Here, beneath the huge
State _shamianah_, gaily coloured Kashmir rugs were spread, for Govind
Singh and his court: while curtained enclosures, set at duly decorous
distance, concealed the women-folk, who had been conveyed thither under
close cover much earlier in the day.

Through the surging chattering crowd,--which fell back right and left
before their quietly determined advance,--the Residency party made
their way in to the partial shade of the _shamianah_, wherein chairs
had been set for the English guests; four on either side of the Palace
group.

It was a very dignified Elsie who slid to the ground before Maurice
could get to her, and carefully avoided his reproachful gaze. But he
followed her into the tent, and took his seat beside her unrebuked.
The trifling incident of the night before had increased not merely her
charm but her value in his eyes. If this were not the 'real thing,' he
reflected, in a virtuous glow of self-approval, then surely there could
be no reality on earth.

At this moment he became aware that Garth and Mrs Desmond were
established in the two neighbouring chairs. His surprise at this
unexpected conjunction showed so plainly in his face that Honor,
meeting his glance, responded with dimplings of sheer enjoyment before
devoting herself to the entertainment of her victim.

Desmond, in pursuance of a policy which at least saved Lenox from the
sharpest sting of all, had managed to ride close behind Quita and
Garth; and being nimbler in dismounting than the older man, had
successfully usurped his privilege of lifting her from the saddle. She
herself, though not a little puzzled as to the meaning of it all, was
beginning to relish the humour of the game; and as Desmond escorted her
into the tent, she turned upon him a smile of unabashed amusement.

"This is flattering! I appear to have made a conquest of _Monsieur le
Capitaine_!"

"And for once appearances are not deceitful," he capped her straight.

"How enchantingly direct you are! But at this rate Mrs Desmond really
_will_ disapprove. . ."

"No fear! Mrs Desmond is enjoying it quite as much as I am!"

She divined a hidden meaning in his words: but merely lifted her
eyebrows and shoulders in characteristic fashion.

"Well--it she doesn't object, I am sure I don't!"

"Nor I, by any means. . . . Come this way."

He led her across the tent, having noted and admired his wife's skilful
bit of strategy: and Lenox instinctively took the same direction.

Quita chose the chair farthest from the Palace group; and in a few
moments, she knew that her husband was standing close behind her. It
was the first time he had deliberately approached her since their
encounter at the ball: and the silent tribute, so characteristic of the
man, elated her with a renewed sense of power over a personality
immeasurably stronger than her own. It was like bringing down big game
after the mild diversion of shooting pheasants. But he had spent the
whole morning in the verandah with Honor Desmond; and the remembrance
still rankled. Upset her equanimity as he might, the spirit of
surrender was still far from her.

At his approach Desmond made a slight movement, as if to rise; but the
other shook his head. It was enough to be thus close to her, to feel
that speech was possible, yet not compulsory. All of which Desmond was
quick to understand.

"Look, . . look . . ." Quita whispered suddenly, leaning towards him.
"They are forcing that poor brute to the edge. He has been in before.
Colonel Mayhew told me. He knows; . . . he is afraid. Oh, _mon Dieu_,
how horrible! . . . He is over!"

A mighty shout from the assembled thousands, who stood ten and twenty
deep along the banks, confirmed her words. The shuddering victim had
been forced over the ten-foot drop; and for a few breathless moments,
was lost in the green swirling water. A second shout,--unanimous, as
from one Gargantuan throat,--heralded the reappearance of the flat
black head, with its dilated nostrils held well above the blinding
wreaths of foam. Tossed mercilessly from boulder to boulder, the stout
swimmer neared the first big rapid; and a moment later was swept, an
unresisting log, into its treacherous clutches. Out of it he plunged,
still swimming valiantly; and, despite the opposing force of the
current, made a bold dash for one of the few possible landings on the
town bank. But the people, foreseeing the attempt from long
experience, were gathered at this particular danger-point in
overwhelming numbers; with the result that the unhappy beast was fairly
hustled back into the boiling stream.

Here the second rapid claimed him; and excitement became intense; for
the fate of a year hung trembling in the balance. There was no
shouting now; but a breathless expectant silence. Only the
river,--full of sound and fury,--babbled unceasingly to the majestic
sky.

The moment of uncertainty was short as it was tense. Once more the
brave black head appeared, a blot on the foam-flecked surface, no
longer battling, with dilated nostrils, against fearful odds; but lying
sideways, inert . . . lifeless; . . . and a prolonged outburst of
shouting, clapping, and huzzaing informed the echoing hills that the
great spirit of rivers and streams had accepted the sacrifice; that the
luck of the State was established for twelve good months to come.

"Poor beast, poor plucky beast!" Quita murmured rebelliously. Her
sympathies had been strangely stirred; and an unbidden moisture clouded
her eyes. In that hapless drowned buffalo she beheld, not a mere dead
animal, but one victim the more to the eternal law of sacrifice;--the
law that makes one man's suffering the price of another man's
gain;--the law that lies at the root of half the tragedy of the world.
"How happy they all are!" she went on. "That Rajah boy is delighted.
They have no imaginations these people. So much the better for them!"

By now the _shamianah_ hummed with talk and laughter and congratulation
on the outcome of the _Mela_. Every one had risen; and Desmond turned
with the rest to add his quota to the polite speeches that were the
order of the moment.

But Quita, still intent upon the stirring scene without, moved forward
a little space to obtain a better view of the river and the crowd.
Lenox followed her; and with a start she became aware that he was
standing almost at her elbow; though still a little behind her, so that
she must turn if she wanted to see his face.

"Are you wishing you could put some of that on canvas?" he asked in a
voice that he vainly strove to render natural.

"Yes. It would be such a triumphant riot of colour. But I'm afraid it
would look crude and impossible in any frame except the frame of an
Indian sky."

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