JANUARY 1828 – Leap Year – I before mentioned we had accomplished one-third of our way to heaven, by planting an avenue; we now performed another portion of the journey, by sinking a well. As soon as the work was completed, the servants lighted it up with numerous little lamps, and strewed flowers upon its margin, to bring a blessing upon the newly-raised water. From Hissar we received six cows and a bull, very handsome animals, with remarkably fine humps, such as are sold in England under the denomination of buffalo humps, which are, in reality, the humps of Indian cows and oxen.
Tame buffaloes are numerous at Prāg. The milk is strong, and not generally used for making butter, but is made into ghee (clarified butter), useful for culinary purposes. Some most beautiful Barbary goats arrived with the cows; they were spotted brown and white or black and white and almost as beautiful as deer. The Bengali goats yield a much larger portion of milk. I had also a Jumnapār goat, an enormous fellow, with very broad, long, thin, and silky ears, as soft as velvet. The Jumnapār are the best adapted for marching. Unless they can go into the jungle and browse, they become thin and lose their milk. These goats, bred on the banks of the Jumna, thence called ‘Jumnapār’, are remarkably fine, and of a large size.
We had a Doomba ram at Prāg. The Doomba sheep are difficult to keep alive in this climate. Their enormous tails are reckoned delicacies; the lambs are particularly fine flavoured.
January – Our garden was now in good order; we had vegetables in abundance, marrowfat peas as fine as in England, and the water-cresses, planted close to the new well, were pearls beyond price. Allahabad is famous for the growth of the finest carrots in India. At this time of the year we gave our horses twelve seer each daily; it kept them in high health, and French-polished their coats. The geraniums grew luxuriantly during this delightful time; and I could be out in the garden all day, when protected by an enormous chatr, carried by a bearer. The up-country chatr is a very large umbrella, in shape like a large flat mushroom, covered with doubled cloth, with a deep circle of fringe. Great people have them made of silk, and highly ornamented. The pole is very long, and it is full employment for one man to carry the chatr properly.
The oleander (kaner), the beautiful sweet-scented oleander, was in profusion – deep red, pure white, pink, and variegated, with single and double blossoms. I rooted up many clusters of this beautiful shrub in the grounds, fearing the horses and cows might eat the leaves, which are poisonous. Hindu women, when tormented by jealousy, have recourse to this poison for self-destruction.
The Ice-pits
January 22nd – My husband has the management of the ice concern this year. It is now in full work, the weather bitterly cold, and we are making ice by evaporation almost every night. I may here remark, the work continued until the 19th of February, when the pit was closed with 3000 mann – a mann is about 80lb. weight. There are two ice-pits; over each a house is erected; the walls, built of mud, are low, thick, and circular; the roof is thickly thatched; there is only one entrance, by a small door, which, when closed, is defended from the sun and air by a jhamp, or framework of bamboo covered with straw.
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It is amusing to see the old ābdār who has charge of the ice concern, walking up and down of an evening, watching the weather, and calculating if there be a chance of making ice. This is a grand point to decide, as the expense of filling the pans is great, and not to be incurred without a fair prospect of a crop of ice (barf) the next morning. He looks in the wind’s eye, and if the breeze be fresh, and likely to increase, the old man draws his warm garment around him, and returning to his own habitation – a hut close to the pits – resigns himself to fate and his hubble-bubble. But should there be a crisp frosty feeling in the air, he prepares for action at about six or seven o’clock, by beating a tom-tom (a native hand-drum), a signal well known to the coolies in the bazaar, who hasten to the pits. By the aid of the little cup fastened to the long sticks, they fill all the rukābees with the water from the jars in the pathway. Many hundred coolies, men, women, and children, are thus employed until every little pan is filled.
If the night be frosty, without wind, the ice will form perhaps an inch and a half in thickness in the pans. If a breeze should blow, it will often prevent the freezing of the water, except in those parts of the grounds that are sheltered from the wind.
About three o’clock the ābdār, carefully muffled in some yards of English red or yellow broad cloth, would be seen emerging from his hut; and if the formation of ice was sufficiently thick, his tom-tom was heard, and the shivering coolies would collect, wrapped up in black bazaar blankets, and shaking with cold. Sometimes it was extremely difficult to rouse them to their work, and the increased noise of the tom-toms – discordant native instruments – disturbed us and our neighbours with the pleasing notice of more ice for the pits. Each cooly, armed with a spud, knocked the ice out of the little pans into a basket, which having filled, he placed it on his head, ran with it to the icehouse, and threw it down the great pit.
When all the pans had been emptied, the people assembled around the old ābdār, who kept an account of the number at work on a roll of paper or a book. From a great bag full of pice (copper coins) and cowrie-shells, he paid each man his hire.
~~Begums, Thugs And White Mughals- The Journals Of Fanny Parkes -Ed- William Dalrymple
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