not; for dust is a bad conductor of heat, and what gamin is there — pure-minded, a gamin nomine dignus — that would not rather turn thirty somersaults in a dust-bin than three on a pavement? Why, my “compound”[1] alone would tempt to an eternity of tumbling. And yet no Hindoo of my acquaintance has even offered to stand on his head! Can it be that there is no ready means of causing annoyance? What! Is there not that same dust? Would not any gamin, unless lost to all sense of emulation and self-respect, rejoice in kicking up dust if he saw the remotest glimpse of even the chance of molesting anybody? Again, why do not little Hindoos throw stones about? Because there is nothing to throw at? Hah! Put one vulture down in Islington, and mark the instant result. Nothing to throw at? Mehercule! Any member of a large family will remember the tumultuous uprising and stair-shaking exit of the junior olive-twigs if even a wagtail came into the garden. A cat on the lawn was convulsions. Imagine, then, those same impetuous juniors surrounded by blue-jays, bee-eaters, and gray squirrels! And yet the young Hindoo sees an easy mark for any of the stones lying at his feet, and passes on. Perhaps it is something in the shape of the stones? The argument is plausible; for Indian stones, it is true, are of hideous shapes, angular and unprovocative. The fingers do not itch to throw them. But European gamins will throw brick in scraggy and uncompromising sections, rebarbatif and volcanic in appearance, — at, when other targets fail, a curbstone. A London gamin would heave his grandmother, if he
- ↑ A word of vexed derivation, but meaning in India (and Batavia, I believe) the precincts of a dwelling-house, — premises, in fact. — P. R.
