hither and thither, bringing brushwood near; the first stoker pitches to the second, the second to the third, and he feeds the flaming, smoking, coruscating volcano. “ Yallah! ” (Keep it up) exclaims the monk-foreman. “Burn the devil’s creed,” cries one. “Burn hell,” cries another. And thus jesting in earnest, mightily working and enduring, they burn the mountains into lime, they make the very rocks yield somewhat.—Strength and blessings, brothers.
After the usual inquiry of whence and whither, his monkship offers the snuffbox.
“No? roll you, then, a cigarette,” taking out a plush pouch containing a mixture of the choicest native roots.
These, we were told, are grown on the monastery’s estate. We speak of the cocoon products of the season.
“Beshrew the mulberries!” exclaims the monk. “We are turning all our estates into fruit orchards and orangeries. The cultivation of the silkworm is in itself an abomination. And while its income today is not as much as it was ten years ago, the expenditure has risen twofold. America is ruining our agriculture; and soon, I suppose, we have to send to China for labourers. Why, those who do not emigrate demand twice as much today for half the work they used to do five years ago; and those who return from America strut about like country gentlemen deploring the barrenness of their native soil.”
And one subject leading to another, for our monk is a glib talker, we come to the cheese-makers, the goatherds. “Even these honest rustics,” says he, “are becoming sophisticated ( mafsudin ). Their cheese is no longer what it was, nor is their faith. For Civilisation, passing by their huts in some shape or other, whispers in their ears something about cleverness and adulteration. And mistaking the one for the other, they abstract the butter from the milk and leave the verdigris in the utensils.