all spat. They spat on
principle. The spittoons were on the staircases, in each bedroom--yea,
and in chambers even more sacred than these. They chased one into
retirement, but they blossomed in chiefest splendour round the Bar, and
they were all used, every reeking one of 'em. Just before I began to
feel deathly sick, another reporter grappled me. What he wanted to know
was the precise area of India in square miles. I referred him to
Whittaker. He had never heard of Whittaker. He wanted it from my own
mouth, and I would not tell him. Then he swerved off, like the other
man, to details of journalism in our own country. I ventured to suggest
that the interior economy of a paper most concerned the people who
worked it. "That's the very thing that interests us," he said. "Have you
got reporters anything like our reporters on Indian news papers?" "We
have not," I said, and suppressed the "thank God" rising to my lips.
"_Why_ haven't you?" said he. "Because they would die," I said. It was
exactly like talking to a child--a very rude little child. He would
begin almost every sentence with: "Now tell me something about India,"
and would turn aimlessly from one question to another without the least
continuity. I was not angry, but keenly interested. The man was a
revelation to me. To his questions I returned answers mendacious and
evasive. After all, it really did not matter what I said. He could not
understand. I can only hope and pray that none of the readers of the
_Pioneer_ will ever see that portentous interview. The man made me out
to be an idiot several sizes more drivelling than my destiny intended,
and the rankness of his ignorance managed to distort the few poor facts
with which I supplied him into large and elaborate lies. Then thought I:
"The matter of American journalism shall be looked into later on. At
present I will enjoy myself."

No man rose to tell me what were the lions of the place. No one
volunteered any sort of conveyance. I was absolutely alone in this big
city of white folk. By instinct I sought refreshment and came upon a
bar-room, full of bad Salon pictures, in which men with hats on the
backs of their heads were wolfing food from a counter. It was the
institution of the "Free Lunch" that I had struck. You paid for a drink
and got as much as you wanted to eat. For something less than a rupee a
day a man can feed himself sumptuously in San Francisco, even though he
be bankrupt. Remember this if ever you