e lead on to a
position of responsibility and corresponding prosperity, he will often
throw up his work and sacrifice all his prospects on account of some
trifling rebuke or imaginary slight.

The marks of unfinished projects to be seen all over India point to a
want of depth of purpose. Interest and zeal has abated before the work
is complete, or it was entered upon thoughtlessly without having
counted the cost. It does not seem to cause the Indian any compunction
that an undertaking was begun but never finished. Nor is the partly
built house going to ruin because incomplete, or the well useless
because it has not been sunk deep enough, an eyesore to him. Even his
inveterate want of tidiness indicates a careless mind. Rubbish of all
sorts lying around or within his house, even if it be of a most
unsavoury nature, so that its presence forces itself upon attention,
does not distress him.

Inveterate unpunctuality, and the general absence of a sense of
responsibility concerning the value of time, is another indication of
shallowness of mind. Days and weeks are allowed to drift away with
nothing done, even amongst those who are supposed to be men of
business. Petty vanity is also a mark of a shallow nature, and there
are few heathen Indians who do not boast about attainments and
possessions and exploits, and make unblushing statements which perhaps
have not a vestige of truth in them. The reality of Indian affection
as far as it goes, but its want of depth, has been already touched
upon.

What ought to be firmness of character is apt to take the form of a
vein of quiet obstinacy, which is latent in almost all Indians. With
many it is not generally aggressive in character, and shows itself in
matters of no great importance. It is necessary, for the sake of
peace, to allow Indian servants to do certain things in their own
way. You explain how you prefer to have a thing done and you give your
reasons, and the butler or gardener will apparently agree, and they
will do it for a few days according to your wish; but as soon as they
think that you have forgotten, they will return to their own custom.
And if you were to tell them twenty times, they would twenty times
take the same course.

With Indian children a conflict of opinion is to be avoided if
possible, because, even with them, if the spirit of obstinacy is
aroused it may easily lead on to serious complications. An Indian lad,
if he gets his back up, becomes from the