no one ever cleans out the cages, or takes any steps to prevent the condition of
the captives from being such as would disgrace that of a wild beast in a small
travelling menagerie. The space between the floor and the ground, and the
interval which separates the cells from the surrounding fence, is one seething,
living mass of stinking putrefaction. Here in the tropics, under a brazen sun, all
unclean things turn to putrid filthy life within the hour; and in a native gaol the
atmosphere is heavy with the fumes and rottenness of the offal of years, and the
reeking pungency of offal that is new. No ventilation can penetrate into the fetid
airless cells, nor could the veriest hurricane purge the odours bred by such
surroundings.
This then was the wretched life to which Talib was now condemned; nor did his
agonies end here, for the gnawing pangs of hunger were added to his pains. He
was handed over to the gentle care of the Pĕr-tanda or Executioner—an official
who, in the Unprotected States, unites the kindly office of life-taker and torturer,
with the hardly more humane post of gaoler. This man, like all his fellows, had
been chosen for his physical strength, and his indifference to the sight of pain;
and the calling, which he had pursued for years, had rendered the natural ferocity
of his character abnormally brutal. He was, moreover, an Oriental official,—a
class of worthies who require more supervision to restrain them from thieving,
than do even the Chinese coolies in a gold mine, where the precious metal winks
at one in the flickering candle-light. Needless to say, no attempt of any kind was
made by the higher State officials to control the action of the Pĕr-tanda. During
the months of the year in which the river was accessible to native crafts, he had
the right to collect dues of rice and fish from all boats approaching the coast; but,
during the close season of the north-east monsoon, no allowance of any kind was
made to him for the board of the prisoners in his charge. Under these
circumstances, perhaps, he was not greatly to blame if he perverted to his own
use, and sold to all comers, the collections which he made during the open
season, so that his household might not be without rice and raiment, during the
dreary months when the hatches were down for the monsoon. Naturally, death,
from slow and lingering starvation, was not an altogether uncommon incident in
these dens of captivity, and one of Talib's first experiences was to witness the
last agonies of a fellow prisoner in an adjoining cage. Talib himself was fed by a
girl, who had been his sweetheart before his trouble fell upon him; and, though
the pangs of hunger could not be completely allayed by the slender doles, which
she daily saved from her own ration of rice and fish, he was not, for the time,
exposed to actual danger of death from want.