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On our way back from the Marble Rocks we saw Muddun-Mahal, another
mysterious curio; it is a house built--no one knows by whom, or
with what purpose--on a huge boulder. This stone is probably some
kind of relative to the cromlechs of the Celtic Druids. It shakes
at the least touch, together with the house and the people who feel
curious to see inside it. Of course we had this curiosity, and
our noses remained safe only thanks to the Babu, Narayan and the
Takur, who took as great care of us as if they had been nurses,
and we their babies.
Natives of India are truly a wonderful people. However unsteady
the thing may be, they are sure to walk on it, and sit on it, with
the greatest comfort. They think nothing of sitting whole hours
on the top of a post--maybe a little thicker than an ordinary
telegraph post. They also feel perfectly safe with their toes
twisted round a thin branch and their bodies resting on nothing,
as if they were crows perched on a telegraph wire.
"Salam, sahib!" said I once to an ancient, naked Hindu of a low
caste, seated in the above described fashion. "Are you comfortable,
uncle? And are you not afraid of falling down?"
"Why should I fall?" seriously answered the "uncle," expectorating
a red fountain--an unavoidable result of betel-chewing. "I do not
breathe, mam-sahib!"
"What do you mean? A man cannot do without breathing!" exclaimed I,
a good deal astonished by this wonderful bit of information.
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