half a dozen special friends may call and garland
him, but there will be no general demonstration, unless there are some
English people on the spot to suggest it as being the proper thing to
do.

Mistakes made in the effort to speak a difficult Eastern language are
inevitable. But the new-comer is not aware of certain subtle dangers
which exist, quite apart from mispronunciation, or wrong tenses and
genders, or words misapplied. To use the singular number instead of
the plural in speaking to an Indian, except of the lowest rank, is
considered by him as an act of great rudeness. In speaking to children
the singular number is always used, and very intimate friends use it
in speaking to each other. High-caste Hindus use it in speaking to
low-caste people, in order to emphasise their own superior position.
Missionaries generally begin to exercise their conversational powers
in the vernacular by trying to say a few words to the boys of the
mission. And as their efforts are generally welcomed by the boys in a
kindly and encouraging spirit, the missionary waxes bold and begins to
converse with the elder members of his flock, or even with dignified
outsiders, with sometimes unfortunate results, because he uses
unblushingly, but unknowingly, the singular number which he grew
familiar with in his conversations with the boys.

"Where art thou going?" I said to one of the senior members of the
congregation--proud to be able to address him in Marathi. "You speak
like a Brahmin," was his reply. At the time I took this to be fulsome
praise of my pronunciation, and it was not till long afterwards, as I
recalled his words, that I understood that he meant that I was
addressing him in the contemptuous way in which Brahmins speak to
their inferiors. A lady worker, after struggling bravely with the
intricacies of Marathi, said that at last she felt encouraged when,
after conversing with some Indian women, she heard one of them say,
"She speaks like a Hindu." Fortunately, or unfortunately, she did not
understand the real meaning of the remark.

Indians do not readily understand or appreciate the half-jocose way in
which Englishmen are wont to show friendliness to others. I saw at a
railway station some rather venerable Christians from a village
mission seeing off a young missionary. The new-comer was trying to be
"hail-fellow-well-met" with these members of his congregation,
smacking them on the back and laughing a good deal, and calling