Baby is debarred from the society of his compatriots. His father is
cramped and frozen with the chill cares of office; his mother is
deadened by the gloomy routine of economy and fashion; custom lies
upon her with a weight heavy as frost and deep almost as life; the
fountains of natural fancy and mirth are frozen over; so Baby lisps
his dawn paeans in soft Oriental accents, wakening harmonious echoes
amongst those impulsive and impressionable children of Nature that
masque themselves in the black slough of Bearers and Ayahs; and Baby
blubbers in Hindustani.
These Ayah and Bearer people sit with Baby in the verandah on a little
carpet; broken toys and withered flowers lie around. They croon to
Baby some old-world _katabaukalesis_, while beauty, born of murmuring
sound, passes into Baby's eyes. The squirrel sits chirruping
familiarly on the edge of the verandah with his tail in the air and
some uncracked pericarp in his uplifted hands, the kite circles aloft
and whistles a shrill and mournful note, the sparrows chatter, the
crow clears his throat, the minas scream discordantly, and Baby's
soft, receptive nature thus absorbs an Indian language.
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