WEDDING GIFT.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 117, 19 May 1936, Page 17

WEDDING GIFT.

H H. RANBIR SINGH, Rajah of Sitapur, paced up and down his ' study, telling his private secretary what he thought of him. He was a young man, pleasant and good-natured; he did not often indulge in outbursts of temper, but when he did the wise effaced themselves if possible, preferably in advance. The private secretary, however, had no option in the matter on this occasion. He had brought it upon himself. "You have no ideas in your head at all!" said the Rajah in a passion of exasperation. "You suggest impossible presents—pearls, diamonds, emeralds — what do you take Sitapur for? "We are not rich as this country counts wealth; any of the gifts from the Maharajas who have chosen to send jewels would make our best attempts look ridiculous. Y»u suggest some heirloom out of the treasury —half India will be sending the same sort of thing; valuable enough, but old-fashioned, obsolete, uninspired. "Then when I tell you this, you can suggest nothing more reasonable than an elephant or a tiger! Is that a fitting present for the son of the king-emperor on his wedding day? I ask you! "And has it occurred to you," pursued the Rajah, "that the last air mail which could possibly get Sitapur's gift to Buckingham Palace in time for the 29th goes in less than 24 hours ? "Less than 24 hours! Something's got to be done in that time," said the Rajah, and left the worried private secretary to think it over, and went to see whether by any chance the .Rani had been inspired by some sudden brilliant idea in the hour or so that had elapsed since he saw her last; but she had.not. • • • • She was full of sympathy, but that was no more use than the two or three perfectly futile suggestions she had managed to think out; and although the Rajah in despair sought the aid of his Ministers, not one was any better qualified to help him. And the 24 hours were flying past. They flew; they passed; they were gone; and the air mail with them; but it bore no wedding gift from Hits. Highness the Rajah of Sitapur to His Royal Highness the Duke of Kent. Ranbir Singh sighed as he leaned over his balcony into the clear freshness of the morning, after a night completely sleepless, and looked out into the palace gardens, dew-wet and shadowy still, very sweet in that early freshness. Below him, near a yasman bush a young girl kneeled, weaving a garland of flowers; she was so intent upon her task that she heeded nothing save her own busy fingers. She was Kamla, daughter of the Rani's flower-woman, and she Was making the daily flower-necklace, which it is the flower-woman's duty to present each morning to her royal mistress. A flower-woman's is an honourable profession, and Ivamla had lately been given a place among the Rani's ladies-in-waiting. She was like a flower herself, and very beautiful. The Rajah looked down at her and envied her freedom from care.

As he watched idly, his thoughts very far away, a young inan camo across the grass and halted at Kamla's 6ide. He was tall and comply, with a pleasant, frank face, and the dreamy eyes of a scholar; but he looked unhappy. The Rajah fancied he had seen him before, and guessed him a minor member of his palace staff. The girl looked shyly up at the young man, and the young man looked at the girl, with his eyes betraying him utterly. "How beautifully you are making that garland, Kamla," ho said. "You have even more skill than your mother." "Do you like it?" the girl said; she glanced at him modestly from behind her long lashes. "It is lovely," the young man said; he spoke with sudden, passionate wistfulne6s. "It looks like a wedding garland. Il only it were for our wedding, Kauil^!" The Rajah said softly: "My God!" and stepped back from the balcony. For the miracle had happened, and what he sought had been vouchsafed him. In all India there is no more honourable gift, nor one more expressive of loyalty between subject and ruler, or friend and friend, than the immemorial one of the sehra—the flower garland. It is made of flowers, intricately woven; it may be enriched to any extent with gold and jewel, but its integral value is the same whether thus adorned or not; and the wedding garland must bear attached to it the poem of wedding greetings which shares the name of sehra, and the composing of which calls for a high degree of skill. It is a gift that a king may give, and that an emperor's son may worthily accept.

[ The Rajah left balcony and garden and the lovers and went to tell the ißani. She was swung between delight and doubt. The Rajah was full of delight, and had no doubts at all. "But who will make it?" the Rani said. "My flower-woman used to be truly wonderful, but she is beginning to lose her skill these days; she is no longer young."

(SHORT STORY.)

(By DEWAN SHARAR.)

"Her daughter appears to have inherited, it," said the Rajah. "She shall make the garland." "But who will write the poem?" said the Rani. "You gave Munshi-Mehr three months leave of absence,." Munshi Mehr was the Rajah's Durbar poet. "He can be sent for," said the Rajah. "But how will you get the sehra to England in time?" said the Rani. "The last air- mail you should have caught with it went this, morning." "I have thought of even that," 6aid the Rajah. "Captain Stuart is in Karachi. That famous English airman who's just made the flight from England in record time—4B hours, I can make arrangements with him." "But who will present the sehra to the Prince 1" said the Rani. "To make the gift complete the giver himself should present it," said the Rajah. "I myself will go with Captain Stuart." The Rajah sent a telegram to his Durbar poet, recalling him summarily; gave orders to Kamla to begin her task on the morning of the 20th, since a sehra of such elaborate workmanship could not take less than two days in the making. But when the day drew to its. close, bringing with it no word from Munshi Mehr, Ranbir Singh and his wife looked at each other with a look that said more than words. "That's settled it. He hasn't got the wire, and even if he did and started back now, he wouldn't get the Sehra written in time," said the Rajah. "What will you do?" asked the Rani. "Offer 500 rupees for the best sehra submitted between now and the 26th," said the Rajah. "Major Khamna" (Major Khamna was the private secretary) "can have the job of reading them. Wo shall probably get something quite good that way, and perhaps even a probable successor to Munshi Mehr when the time comes for him to retire." Ho sent for the private secretary and bade him attend to the matter there and then; and settled down to await the arrival of Captain Stuart. He had been much too optimistic. True, within a very sligrt while, sehras were pouring from every quarter of Sitapur; one would hardly have thought so small a State could harbour so large a number of poets. Unfortunately their efforts were of an almost uniform inferiority, varied by occasional lapses into abyssmal bathos. After two days of this the Rajah was almost in despair, and the private secretary beyond it. The 25tli arrived; it brought Captain Stuart; it saw the garland completed, an exquisite thing of scented nargis flowers and the blossoms of the yasman bush, mingled with pearls and interwoven with threads and lace of precious metals —a delicate masterpiece. Just then the Rani entered. "I have just been talking with Kamla," she 6aid tentatively. "Slio tells me that young Cliaran Das has also written a sehra." "I don't doubt it. If he hadn't he'd be the only one of his kind in the State," said the Rajah. "But so far," said the Rani, "being rather shy, he has hesitated to submit it. I have it here. I made Kamla give mo a copy," said the Rani. "I'll read it to you." She read well, and with expression; she had a gentle, sympathetic voice and the gift of giving the words full value; but »it was not merely her rendering of young Charan Das' sehra that made the Rajah sit up with sudden attention, his eyes bright, and slightly incredulous, as it ho feared lest the quality of the opening stanzas were too good to be maintained throughout the whole fifteen. "The gods be thanked!" said the Rajah from his heart, and, a moment later, "This man is a poet!" "He is a young clerk breaking his heart Uecause he sees no chance of marrying the girl he loves," said the Rani. "Ho shall have his promotion," said the Rajah. "I will make him an aide-de-camp for the time being; and later on, when old Munshi Mehr retires in due course, young Charan Das shall take his place as Durbar poet. He's earned it if ever a man did." The Rani, standing with a newspaper in her hand by her open lattice window, reading tho account of the Royal wedding presents, smiled to herself with quiet' pride. "A high compliment was paid to His Royal Highness by lI.H. the Rajah of Sitapur, who fiew from India in order to present his gift to the Prince in person—a sehra or Indian wedding garland; made of Indian flowers, beautifully wrought and emblematic of the deepest loyalty and friendship ..." At the far end of the garden Cliaran and Kamla stood with hands locked in hands beside the scented Yasman bush, silent with happiness, looking continually into one another's eyes; two young lovers on the eve of their betrothal.

A bodle was a Scottish copper coin worth two Scots pennies, or one-sixth of an English penny. It is thought to have been so called after Bothwell, a mint-master, but this has never been proved.