The Memoirs of Bābur 932.13.5

932.13.5

Hindūstān is a country of few charms. Its people have no good looks; of social intercourse, paying and receiving visits there is none; of genius and capacity none; of manners none; in handicraft and work there is no form or symmetry, method or quality; there are no good horses, no good dogs, no grapes, musk-melons or first-rate fruits, no ice or cold water, no good bread or cooked food in the _bāzārs_, no Hot-baths, no Colleges, no candles, torches or candlesticks. In place of candle and torch they have a great dirty gang they call lamp-men (_diwatī_), who in the left hand hold a smallish wooden tripod to one corner of which a thing like the top of a candlestick is fixed, having a wick in it about as thick as the thumb. In the right hand they hold a gourd, through a narrow slit made in which, oil is let trickle in a thin thread when the wick needs it. Great people keep a hundred or two of these lamp-men. This is the Hindūstān substitute for lamps and candlesticks! If their rulers and begs have work at night needing candles, these dirty lamp-men bring these lamps, go close up and [Sidenote: Fol. 291.] there stand. Except their large rivers and their standing-waters which flow in ravines or hollows (there are no waters). There are no running-waters in their gardens or residences (_`imāratlār_).[1912] These residences have no charm, air (_hawā_), regularity or symmetry.