The Pathans
Introduction:
Ghani Khan was born in Hashtnagar in 1914. He is widely considered the best pashto language poet of the 20th century and stands on a par with Khushal Khan Khattak and Rehman Baba. He was the son of the Red-Shirt Leader, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, aka Bacha Khan and The Frontier Gandhi. His wife Roshan came from a parsi family and was the daughter of Nawab Rustam Jang. The couple had three children, two daughters, Shandana and Zareen, and a son, Faridun.
He went to study at Rabindranath Tagore’s Shanti Niketan Art Academy and developed a liking for painting and sculpture. He visited England, and studied sugar technology in the United States, after which he returned and started working at the Takht Bhai Sugar Mills in 1933. Largely owing to his father’s influence, he was also involved in politics, supporting the cause of the pathans of NWFP. He was arrested by the Government of Pakistan in 1948 – although he had given up politics by then – and remained in prison till 1954, visiting various jails all over the country. It was during these years that he wrote his poem collection Da Panjray Chaghaar, and considered it the best work of his life. Aside from a few poems of his youth and early manhood, Ghani Khan’s poetry, like his temperament, is anti-political. His other two poem collections are: Panoos and Palwashay. He also wrote The Pathans, a short book in English prose, published in 1958, which like his sculptures and paintings, does not compare well to his poetry, keeping in mind that he is arguably the greatest pashto language poet. He died in March 1996.
The singular distinction of his poetry – aside from his obvious poetic genius – is a profound blend of knowledge about his native and foreign cultures, and the psychological, sensual, and religious aspects of life.
The Pathans
The most difficult part of writing is to know where to begin, just as the most difficult part of speaking is to know where to stop. Nothing is more irritating than a blank sheet of paper staring stupidly into your face when you are bursting to write but cannot make up your mind how to set about it.
I want to talk about the Pathans, the people I love, which makes may task harder than ever. I want you to love them as I do. But the Pathan is not easy to love. He takes a lot of knowing. His is a most complicated simplicity. I want to bring him down from the peaks of Khyber and the fields of Hashtnager face to face with you in his torn clothes and grass shoes, his eyes full of manliness, laughter and the devil, and his head full of a childish and noble pride - the chief camouflage he uses to hide his poverty and want. Yes, I want to bring him to you and make him talk to you - of his struggle and his dreams, of love and feuds, his field and his watch-tower, his new rifle and his old wife.
The undertaking, you will admit, is difficult. No wonder I did not know where to begin. But I have a scheme. I shall make him sing his love-songs to you, so that you may feel the throb of his heart. He will tell you a Pathan fairy tale so that you may listen to what he tells his child. He will tell you a story of an incident in his village so that you may see how he lives. He will talk to you about the moon so that you may know how he loves. He will talk to you about his customs so that you may understand his laws. He will talk of dacoities, raids and duels so that you may know the power that drives him. He will talk to you of priests and magic and charms so that you may know the darkness in his heart. He will talk to you of life and death and right and wrong, and I hope by that time you will know him and after you get to know him I shall butt in and try to talk about him, of his relation to you and his connection with your future. For whether you like it or not he is your neighbour. And on the most unfortunate side of your house - the side that faces Russia. You must know him because Russia will have a lot to say about the shape of things to come. They will come to the Pathan before they come to you.
May I then introduce you to your neighbour! He has a fine turban and intriguing trousers. Let’s have a look at him. But before we do that we might as well know something of his race and his origin.
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History of The Pathans
Most people look at his nose and say he is a Jew. Because they cannot link him with anyone else, they say he is one of the lost tribes. His Islamic faith, and its inevitable influence on his life and manners, give a certain plausibility to this impression. Yet the basic principles that rule him no matter who the King is are more Spartan than Jewish.
I have been very curious about his origin. The oldest writer I could consult about him is that charming old humbug, Herodotus, who believed all that he heard, and wrote all that he believed, he refers to the Pathan’s part of the world as Bectia, and says it is inhabited by a small dark people who deal in gold and spices. He goes on to say that this gold is collected at great risk of life in the desert from ants as big as dogs who bring it out from the bowels of the earth. The sun in this gold field is too hot for any animal except the camel. So when the ants, who are supposed to indulge in road and town- building only at night, retire from the sun into their holes, the Bectians rush in on their camels and collect the gold and gallop back to get out of the home of those man-eating ants before sunset. Many of them, says the kindly Herodotus, are killed but some get away with the precious metal.
This proves many things:
(1) That the Bectians were not as good warriors as the Greeks but they were better liars.
(2) That the world had a system of trade rights and monopoly even in the time of Alexander.
(3) That this is the only argument in favour of the theory that then the Pathans might have been Jews.
(4) That dear old Herodotus is perfectly truthful and has therefore recorded the greatest number of lies.
The world has always had clever liars and saintly Herodotuses who believed them.
It also proves that the people who now inhabit the vague Bectia of Herodotus (he is poor in geography - all gossips are and the old Greek is a delightful old gossip - with a solemnity that makes you laugh and a skin that makes you wonder) are neither small nor dark nor clever monopoly traders. On the contrary they are big and fair and straight and look upon murder as a much more respectable pastime than trade.
Apparently some friends of Herodotus settled along the rivers and valleys of the Bectians, acquired their lovely girls for wives and talked to their children about war and courage, death and glory. For, the Pathan will forgive you anything if you do it bravely enough. His villages have Greek names. His tribes have Greek customs. Like the Greek he is a great poet and a great warrior. Like the Greeks almost all his wars are over women.
The Pathans have no written history but they have thousands of ruins where the carved stones tell their story to anyone who would care to listen.
The oldest relics you see are of a distinctly pre-Greek period. They are the same in conception and style as those of the United Provinces or Orissa, e.g.the features of dolls and gods (two things that humanity has a way of mixing up) are most unlike those of the Pathans of today.
But when we come to the Buddhist and the Greco-Buddhist period the features of the dolls and Buddhas and kings and saints take the likeness of those of the Pathans of today. The great ferocity of the Pathan might well be a reaction to a rather long dose of Buddhist non-violence.
Racially he is clearly Greek, crossed with something. What that something was I do not know. Nor would I worry about it any further. What he was five thousand years ago does not matter.
It is also obvious that he was a Buddhist before he became a Muslim, and that he was a Hindu before he became a Buddhist. I do not know what sort of a Buddhist he was in spite of the thousand of images of Buddha that he made. For he is a good shot, and a bad soldier. He is too independent to make the ideal follower of any prophet, so probably he was a good sculptor and a poor Buddhist.
Whatever he might be, he is not a Jew, for where will you find a Jew who will tell his child about war and courage, death and glory! He is perhaps a mixture of every race that came to India from the heart of Asia “the Persian, the Greek, the Mongol and the Turk.
Each race has contributed something to his virtues and vices, looks and beliefs, religion and love-songs. His temperament, like his clothes, is picturesque and elegant. He loves fighting but hates to be a soldier. He loves music but has a great contempt for the musician. He is kind and gentle but hates to show it. He has strange principles and peculiar notions. He is hot-blooded and hot-headed and poor and proud, if that is what you call a Jew, then he is certainly a Jew, nose and all.
The best course would be to forget how it all started and look upon what he really is today. Neither a Jew nor a Greek, but a temperamental neighbour who might become a loving friend, or a deadly enemy. He knows no happy medium; that is his greatest virtue and his greatest drawback.
Folk Songs of The Pathans:
The folk “songs of a nation are its spiritual self-portraits, provided the race is primitive enough to be honest. It is easy to be honest in feeling - one cannot help it -but extremely difficult to be so in the expression of it, specially as men become civilised. When custom begins to dictate to instinct, when the eyes look more at the listeners than at the face of the beloved, that is the time when convention overcomes music, ethics overcome passion, and desire is substituted for love. So if you find the Pathan folk-songs too brutal and naked and direct, do not forget that he lives a straight and primitive life in a lonely valley or a small village, and is too busy worrying about the next thing to shoot, to find time to be civilized.
Let us go to his valley in Dir. There he is - walking towards us, of medium height and sensitive build. He has long locks, neatly oiled and combed, wrapped in a red silk, kerchief which is twisted round the head like the crown of I Caesar. He wears a flower in his hair and collyrium in his eye. His lips are dyed red with walnut bark. He carries his sitar in his hand and his rifle at his shoulder. You would think he is very effeminate until you looked at his eyes. They are clear, manly and bold. They do not know fear, and won’t live long enough to know death. He pays the most lavish price for these made up eyes and painted lips. This son of the bravest tribe of the Pathans never takes cover in a fight and always laughs and sings when he is frightened. He will soon die fighting, a man as brave and strong and hand some as he, for he knows only how to love and laugh and fight and nothing else. He is taught nothing else. Let us listen to his song:
0 the flowers are lined in your hair And your eyes, 0 my beloved, Are like the flowers of Narcissus 0 my priceless rare treasure, 0 my life, 0 my soul, 0 my little mountain poppy, You are my morning star, You the flower on the slope, You the white snow on the peak, Your laughter is the waterfall, Your whispers the evening breeze 0 my branch of apple-bloosom, Who spilt moonlight in your eyes? 0 my little butterfly Come and live in my heart.
And down from the field by the riverside comes the clear sweet voice of a girl which says, apparently to the trees in her father’s field:
0 my lover, build a hut On the peak of Ilium, And I will come dancing to it Like a golden partridge.
That is how it starts. Then the boy goes and tells someone to tell his parents. And suppose everyone agrees and everything is all right, which it seldom is, then the mother fixes a date to fetch the golden partridge. The girls of the boy’s family are on the way in their best clothes, and an overdose of make-up in honour of the bride. Two white hands with henna-red palms strike up the cymbal, the giggles subside, and the song begins:
0 the groom is tall as a pine And the bride is a bush of roses, On her head is a golden shawl, On her chin is a beauty spot;
And then they get married and live happily together for they know that they will not be long together.
One day he goes out, and never comes back. He has laughed his way into a bullet that was fired by another of his own blood and race. His wife inherits from him a moment of joy, two sons and a lifetime of sorrow. She hangs up his rifle and sitar for his sons. She learns to hide her tears when she hears a love-song in the evening. She worships her elder son because he looks like his father and the younger one because he smiles like him. When she sits by the fire in the evening and looks at the eyes of her children and then at the empty space beside them she thinks of him who is not there. ‘What was our father like?” the boys ask. She cannot tell them that he was a great doctor, or a philosopher or a priest. She says he was a great man and a great fighter and she sings to them the song that was made about that fight, the fight in which the Malaizais beat the Alizais, the fight in which their father died with his three brothers and five cousins.
It was a cursed day, bleak and cold,
It was the last day of spring
When Hakim Khan and his heroes bold
Conquered the fort of the Alizai king.
A messenger came
And rushed through the tribe, From village to village,
From house to house,
And called to fight
And glory and death
The men and youths
Of Malaizais
And men picked up
Their guns,
And wives pleaded
And mother cried
And men looked at
Their children play,
And ground their teeth
And swore and sighed.
And brother looked
At brothers eyes
To see he felt
The same-
The wives wept,
The mothers cried,
The men
They rode away.
And little children
With little cries
And little hearts
And little hands,
Asked for their fathers,
Uncles and friends,
And made their mothers cry the more-
How can a child understand!
The men went through the valley Hazzaro
And up the peak of Naroke,
They sang of laughter and tomorrow
And covered death in a little joke.
The king of the Alizais
Bent and kissed His only son,
His only Child. He loved the name
He bore and blessed
And he was brave
And strong and wild
“I will tame the proud
And kill the strong
For I am stronger
And prouder.
I will crush those devils,
Those foolish fools
With cunning and
Gunpowder.”
The men of Malaizais
Laughed at death
And laughed at kings
And marched and sang,
And thought of Heaven
And Hell and houris
And springs and flowers
And butterflies,
The said Allah
Is good and sweet
To him who laughs
And sings and dies.”
They said, “The cowards
Weep and work
But fighters go
To Paradise.”
And Hakim Khan
Sat on his horse, And said, “0 sons
Of heroes past,
The day of
Weighing manliness,
That day has come
At last.
“The day that you
Must prove that you
Are born of fire
And truth -
The day that you
Must give your blood
And dreams and life
And youth.
Ah, sing the song.
And pluck the string
And pray for Hakim Khan,
Who lived and sang
And loved and died
And won the name Shahi Mardan,
He led his men
And took the fort
Midst blood and
Thunder and cries.
He killed the king
And burnt the town
And married
His fourteen wives.
And seven hundred funerals went,
And each a friend,
And each man,
And seven hundred
Children ran
To see and love and leave
The man
Who brought them
Song and laughter,
To think of life
And song and death,
To know the ever
Ever after.
The Pathan has a tender heart but tries to hide it under a rough and gruff exterior. He is too good a fighter to leave his weakest part uncovered. “Don’t be so sweet.” he says, “that people may swallow you up nor so bitter that people may spit you out.” so he covers his sweetness with bitterness, self-preservation pure and simple. His violent nature, strong body and tender heart make a very unstable combination for living but and ideal one for poetry and colour. He keeps a rough face because he does not want you to see his soft eyes. He would rather you thought he was a rogue than let you see him weep his eyes out for his wife.
His father and mother try to inure him to the hardness of their own lives! “The eyes of the dove are lovely,” they tell him, “but the air is made for the hawk. So cover your dove-like eyes and grow claws.” He becomes a hawk. But sometimes in the evening he forgets life and its hardship and begins to coo like a dove.
0 the flowers with human beauty,
0 the eyes full of soft light,
And lips that intoxicate,
0 the lips that madden.
Oh Allah! You gave beauty
The light and song of Your being,
And gave my beloved in place of laughter
A garden of white and red flowers,
You gave
Love the strength of the ocean
And the heart of king,
Why did You give music the sound, the colour
And the soothing softness of prayer?
And You gave me a world of sorrows and longings
And filled my heart with tenderness,
Ecstasy and wonder,
And then gave her dreamy eyes
Full of beauty and comfort,
Sometimes flooded with moonlight,
Sometimes shaded with the evening dusk,
Sometimes brimming with hopes and dreams,
Compassionate and loving, kind and proud,
0 Allah of Hell and Judgment and Pain,
0 Allah of curling locks and pure pearls and purer song,
Oh Allah of love and beauty and youth and madness,
0 Allah of the love of the butterfly and the dreams
of the flower,
0 Maker of the narcissus, the poppy and the rose,
0 Maker of Nasim, and kisses and music,
Why did You make from Beauty
This city of dust?
And why did You give the beloved
The light and song of Your Being?
Poor Pathan! he cannot understand what his priest tells him in the light of what his heart tells me.
I have given you the meaning of his folk songs but not their rhythm and flow, their most important elements. You cannot understand a folk song by reading it, you must hear and see it. You cannot understand velvet from a description of it. You must touch it with your fingers and rub it against your cheek in order to know the deep and subtle shades of softness and go to make it. Therefore if you really want to hear and know a Pathan folk-song, go to the bank of one of his many rivers, preferably in the evening when the girls go to fetch their water and the youths hover around to get their daily dose of hope and longing, the only wine the Pathan drinks.
I promised you folk-songs and gave you a very amateurish ordinary love-story instead, that is primitive enough to end in marriage and children. I am sorry but that Is just like a Pathan. He cannot think of love without I marriage. If he does, he pays for it with his life and therefore all his love poetry is about those who dared it.
Society all the world over will hound you for breaking a convention and worship you for daring to do so. Man has a way of worshipping the Breaker of Idols while posing as a great devotee of the temple.
The Pathan may shoot the lover of his daughter but he will sing to the glory of love. A strange attitude, you will admit. No stranger than yours when you would hang a thief and admire a merchant. Man has a way of hanging Christ and asking Pilate to dinner. But whenever he wants to sing it is of Christ, not of Pilate. There are no love-songs about the law. No poet has ever dedicated a song to the mother of his ten children.
The Pathan feels just the same as you. He cannot afford that expensive luxury, the prison, but he can afford a cartridge. The feeling is the same in both cases - only his expression is stronger because he is stronger and poorer. He cannot give Pilate a “gin Rickety,” so he gives him a bite of melon, that is all. But when he sings of love his eyes grow soft and dreamy as yours do, for love and dreams are as universal as measles and fairies.
An Incident:
The evenings in the Peshawar valley in the winter are long and dark and intimate. They are cold and bleak and full of whispers. Therefore one loves to sit by a log fire look into the flames and mix up dreams with realities. It was a cold winter night and I was sitting by a crackling fire alone as usual. I heard the quick step of my dear old friend, Murtaza Khan outside. “Where are you, friend,” he shouted from fifty yards. “Come in, come in,” I shouted back and opened the door for him. His two bodyguards saluted me and went away to join mine and Murtaza stepped in. He was slim and of more than medium height. He had a long head a large forehead and a dimpled chin. What you noticed at once was his thin determined mouth. Shrewd suspicious eyes, a very lumpy intellectual head and the revolver slung round his shoulder. His clothes were not very clean and his hands were brutal and dirty. You would never think of letting him into your room, but I opened the door and my heart to him, because I knew him and his father knew my father and his grandfather my grandfather.
He was the eldest child of a proud Khan and had to defend that pride at a very early age when he shot another Khan, who had insulted his old father. He became an outlaw at the age of fifteen, was caught when he was thirty and for fourteen years sampled the torture of Indian jails. On his release, he joined the Nationalist movement and went to jail again and was a notorious prisoner, for he was too weak for and too old for hard labour. So he did what he pleased and caused many headaches to his jailers, and nervous breakdowns to their deputies. He walked in and settled down by the fire. I took the opposite chair. “Commander,” I said, “how is life?” We always called him “commander” because he was a Red Shirt (Khudai Khidmatgar) Commander in 1930. He looked long into the fire and said he was growing too old to know about life. I looked at his suspicious eyes. They were dreamy and straight. They had accepted me as a friend and had dropped their suspicion. So I ventured the question that I had always wanted to ask: “Murtaza, what made you kill your best friend, Atta, just before you were caught?” He looked deeply into my eyes to reassure himself, then looked back into the fire and said, “It was my uncle, the one I hated and still do. You see, I had been and outlaw for twelve years. I had a band of brave followers who robbed people on the roads and in the villages and brought me their booty, because I insured them against starvation and lack of ammunition. I was therefore the pet of my ambitious uncle. He feasted me and supported me and I intimidated his powerful rivals for him. I added to his importance in the eyes of the English rulers, and to his striking power in the minds of the other Khans. I did not know this till too late. I thought he loved me for my sake, because I was his flesh and blood, the son of his brother, and I returned that love and generosity with sincere respect and devotion.
“One evening he sent for me. Out of my hide-out in the bitter cold I went to the warmth of my grandmother’s hearth. He came - my uncle - and related a long story of how Atta had conspired with his enemies to murder him. He held my feet and wept. He implored me to save him and the family honour. I hated his tears and his clinging hands and refused. Then my aunt joined in. She did not cringe or weep but looked at me with deep sorrowful eyes and asked if I would stand by and see my father’s brother killed. ‘He is old and grey, she said, and you are young and strong. Do you owe nothing to the family that brought you into the world and gave you its name and prestige’? ‘Your father Abdullah, never shirked a nasty job. He was born a Khan and lived like a Khan and died like a Khan’. That finished me. I promised to do it”. “How?” I asked, for Atta was a notorious outlaw, brave and unscrupulous, heartless and daring. He had escaped the law of the Government as successfully as he had escaped the law of the people. I had always hated Atta, in spite of his fine looks and the stories of superhuman daring that were told about him, because he had killed a dear old man, the father of one of my school friends.
I was too young to know then that the dear kind old man, owed a debt of blood from the days of his youth. He sowed in youth and Atta grew up to make him reap in his old age. For the blood of a Pathan cannot be paid for except with blood. There are some things that he holds dearer than his own life, and there are many more that he holds dearer than anyone else’s life. This dear old man was young, and reckless once had trampled under foot the rights of some weaklings. But the weaklings produced Atta. He grew up. He saw his mother hang down her head in shame, he saw his brothers look at the ground when certain things and people were mentioned. He understood that he must kill the dear old man or hang down his head in shame like his mother and look at the ground like his brothers. He was too young, too handsome and too strong for shame. So he picked up his gun and blasted that shame out of this world and thus established his right to be taken notice of and respected. But I hated him for it. Because I did not know the history of the old man. I only knew his grey beard and kindness, only the kind beautiful wife in his house and not the circumstances that led to her being his life. All men admire an outlaw, and if he is brave and handsome, they are likely to forgive him anything. Atta was handsome and undoubtedly brave. The old condemned him, but the young idolised him. Then one day he was found dead near my grandfather’s watermill. The whole village flocked to see him. So did I. I was only twelve years old then. As soon as he was dead, people remembered all his crimes and gave the place of honour to Murtaza who had killed him. So did I. Murtaza had avenged the murder of my dear friend’s father and I loved him for it.
I saw him soon after in chains. Several platoons of police, reinforced by thousands of villagers, had surrounded him. He had fought all right, eight men against the world.
When his ammunition was exhausted he had dropped his rifles into a well and given himself up to the police in daylight. He did n6t dare give himself and his party up at night for the police would have shot him; they were bribed by his enemies.
I saw him first when he was in chains, with his head bandaged where a bullet had grazed his forehead. He was marched into the village with his outlaws behind him. He was full of laughter and insolence. He ordered cold drinks for his captors, all the police force. He smiled, cut jokes and laughed and jeered. I was proud to tell the other village boys that he was a distant cousin of mine. They led him away to the sub-divisional jail. The British tried him, who had killed a murderer, and sentenced him to twenty years hard labour.
I met him many years later when he had served his term in jail and I mine in a high school and an American college. We became great friends. I found his stories of death and murder and dacoity as fascinating as he found my stories of sky-scrapers and co-education and French girls and Spanish boys. “How did you manage to kill Atta?” I asked. “It was easy enough,” he replied. “You see, he was a born killer. He had many scores to settle in the village. He was always asking me to help him shoot someone. Well for once I agreed. We started from our hide-out at about three in the morning to shoot one of his many victims. He had no servants, he could not afford them. I had three. I had asked one of them to shoot him when I gave the signal. We walked in single file, as is the usual habit of outlaws, until we reached your flour mill. There I signalled to the servant and walked away from the group on the pretence of making myself comfortable. Atta was explaining to the servants how they must shoot some poor wretch that he hated. I had gone a few steps only when I heard the shot. I turned back and saw another servant repeat it. Atta dropped and we bolted and ran for five miles through fields and ditches until we reached my hide-out.
“But why did you run? o’ 1 asked. “Surely no one was following you.”
“We were running from the dead man,” he replied with a shiver. “I wanted to put the world between him and me but I have never succeeded. He is always with me, I never saw him dead. He is always with me, the living Atta. He talks and laughs, bravely and recklessly.” “Were you afraid of him?” I inquired. “You see, my friend,” he said coldly, “I have never feared anything except death by disease, when you linger and cough and sneeze and are a nuisance to your dear and near ones. But an outlaw is always afraid. There are too many enemies who will pay for his death and too many good reasons to justify it. I was not afraid of Atta. I did not trust him. If he could kill my uncle he could kill me and when you have to choose between your neck and another’s you always choose the other’s. Anyway I hated it and I hated my uncle for making it impossible for me to do otherwise.” He shivered and a look of agony came into his brown eyes. “I tried to shoot that uncle of mine to pay for it, but I could not. I was caught and sentenced and when I came out I joined the Red Shirts and became non-violent. So that my uncle had a long life and I a sad conscience.”
He smiled bitterly and shrugged his shoulders. Any-way he was going to kill my uncle if I had not killed him first. But come, my friend,” He said, “play us a tune.”
I picked up the sitar and played a sad sorrowful tune and we both looked at the flames and said no more. There was no need to. I knew; I too was a Pathan.
I had always found Murtaza fascinating. This thin lipped friend of mine was a myth. He was a notorious outlaw and he was a Red Shirt. “Non-violence,” I asked, “how was it, how could it ever be your creed?” He looked up. “You see, I was a little saint for those four years. I made an effort, I tried to live up to my dreams instead of my desires. It was great, it was a miracle. I refused fortunes for a hope and spared lovely girls because they trusted me and looked up to me. You cannot help loving those that love you and you cannot hurt those that trust you. I tried to live up to what the people thought I was. Then the moment ended. I dropped down from the clouds into my own world of desire and envy and lust, and have wallowed in it ever since.
“It is hard to be a saint and a Khan at the same time. I became a good Khan. It was easier and more natural, for men are evil and must be punished. Saints forfeit the power of punishing. Law is the essence of life and a saint is a lawbreaker as much as a dacoit. Only it is harder to be a saint. I chose the easier path and settled down to be a man, bad and selfish. I found my blood warmer than my brain, and customs harder to break than hearts, and ideals harder to live up to than life.
“Nature is merciless and does not indulge in ideals. Life is hard and plain and rugged. The dove is lovely to look at and coos soothingly, but the hawk and his claws are more alive. I chose to be a hawk because I was born one. And if the doves do not like it they, can lump it. For the world is not full of butterflies, and the golden eagle is respected more than the humming bird.” I looked at his thin lips and agreed. Murtaza had been a hunted outlaw too long to understand doves and sunsets and rainbows.
A Fairy Tale
In the days of old there was a handsome young prince who ruled the many tribes of Khaloon as all his forefathers had done before him. He was married to the most beautiful princess on earth. She was gentle and delicate like the perfume of a rose-bud. Her body was frail and her lips were small. She had long, slim, helpless fingers and a deep soothing soft voice. But what made her the most beautiful princess on earth were her eyes. They were large and luminous; the moods of her soul and the colours of her world passed through them in a continuous dance, graceful and warm. Now their shadow would deepen to a hundred deep purples, reds and golds, and the prince felt as when he listened to the soft notes of a sad, distant melody. Now the light in them would burst forth silvery, bright and warm, and the prince felt life and hope and love burst forth from somewhere in his heart and spread all over the world.
By the will of Allah it came to pass that one day when the prince got up and looked at his beloved, he discovered a dullness in her eyes. As the days passed the dullness increased, in spite of the many herbs and lotions that the court Hakims prescribed. All the tribes of Khaloon were sad and sorrowful.
The prince called an assembly of his wisest counselors and asked their advice. “Heaven born,” said Omar the Poet, “all light is fated to go beyond the sphere of our vision. It does not go out, but goes back to the light it came from. Like a note of music it must flow to silence. That flow is its shape. That going to silence is its life. Therefore do not be sorrowful, 0 Prince, but grateful that you were favoured with the sound of a song that was the very heaven in sweetness, that you worshipped in the light of a spark that was greater than the moon and the sun. And now take the colour from your dreams, the light from your heart and pour it into the eyes of the princess and let your memory give shape to the melodies that come forth from them”.
“Slop and nonsense,” said Khaleel the Wise, “fiddlesticks and make-believe! Heaven-born, my prince, be wise and practical. The world is full of beautiful girls with shining eyes. I will bring you a bevy from the valley of Shameem who will turn your house into a firely garden on a summer night”.
But behold! The prince was furious at this and caught hold of KhaleeFs beard and nearly pulled it all out. For the old man’s beard was not as strong as his wisdom. Then the prince recovered himself and ordered him out of the palace and Khaleel shuffled out, a sad old man. But he remembered the saying of his wise father, who had told him, “My son only a fool will advise the lover.” He felt wise for having discovered he was a fool and became happy because he felt he was wiser. He chuckled and chuckled and went home to sleep and snored wise snores and dreamet foolish dreams.
Behold, there was a great and heavy silence in the palace. At last it was broken by Rahman the Seer. “My beloved prince,” said he in his deep rich voice, “heed my words because it is not I who speak. In the mountains beyond the river to the east of Khaloon lives a man whom the world calls a beggar. But he has in his heart a pool of something that will cure any ailment, for it has conquered time and death. Go find him, 0 prince ask for the magic liquid and put a drop in each eye of your princess. They will shine lovelier, brighter and dreamier then ever”.
The prince smiled with joy and hope and all the wise men heaved a sigh of relief and told one another what a truly great seer Rahman was, and, absent mindedly stroked their long beards. So by the grace of Allah the prince collected all his people and dogs and hunters and Hakims and searched and searched until they found the beggarman. “What have you in your heart? ” asked the prince. “Love and laughter,” laughed the beggarman.
“Could you give me two drops of it for my princess? the prince asked.
“Yes,” laughed the beggarman, “if you would pay the price for it, 0 Prince.” “Name it, 0 beggar,” said the prince.
“Your kingdom for the drop of laughter and your pride for the drop of love,” laughed the beggarman.
“Hm”, said the prince frowning. “My kindgom indeed! Beggarman, this kingdom has been given to me by the great allah who very mercifully has also given me some powers with it. Since you have been so unloving to your prince and so stingy to your princess, I deem you unfit to hold such a treasure and confiscate the whole lot in the name of the law and the people.” So saying he put the beggarman in irons and brought him to his palace and threw him into a dungeon.
The next morning when the door of the dungeon was opened, behold, by the grace of Allah, what did they see but a heap of rags and skin and bones. ? The beggarman had gone and taken his love and laughter with him. On the wall he had written a message for the prince.
“0, my great prince, that which is under your law I leave behind for your law to deal with.”
When the prince saw this he was very angry for he was never defeated before. He was very angry with his wise men and pulled out all their beards. He was very angry with the princess because it was for her sake that he was defeated, and he said, “Blast her eyes.” Then he sent for Khaleel the Wise and started with him to the valley of shameem with fine horses, musicians, hawks and greyhounds, and forgot his one defeat in the many blissful victories in the valley of Shameem.
But the poor little princess, she is nearly blind.
Customs of The Pathans :
When a law is bred into the
very fibre of a race it becomes a custom and persists long after the need is gone and the occasion forgotten. For man gives to his children not only the shape of his own nose and the cranks in his character, he also teaches them his fears and forebodings, his songs and curses. He moulds his child as nearly as he can to his own shape. The civilised man does it through his schools and books, the press and platform. He is not ashamed to use a little gunpowder and occasionally the hanging block to drive home some of his points. Civilisation is a continuous surrender of individual perfections to mass imperfection. Civilisation is not built on the songs of Don Juans but on the solid and pious resolutions of respectable middle-aged old husbands. That is why it is so poor in laughter. Each generation inherits a load of complications, adds to it and then passses it on to the next generation ; the load of laws and beliefs increases from age to age until the feet that have to carry it grow too weak for it. Then the crash comes. A culture dies. The worn-out runner drops out of the race. Those with stronger legs and lighter loads race forward.
Customs are subtle chains with which the primitive man tries to keep intact the pattern of his society. They are his school and radio, prime minister and preacher. You make a law and keep a good supply of gunpowder and men to help your weak brothers uphold it. He made a custom and invented magic and the devil to keep watch and ward for him. There is absolutely no difference between your law and his custom in object and purpose. Your wise judges wear the same serious expression as his high priest; indeed they even wear his costume. Your laws are as stupid to him as his customs are to you. You can tie a knot in a silk thread as well as you can in thick rope. He used a thin simple thread and you used a complicated thick rope. He did not need the thick rope any more than he had any necessity for your elaborate city drainage system. The interesting point is the knot. It is the same in both cases. Some say it was tied by fools to strangle the wise. Some say it was tied by the wise to help the fools. Be that as it may, the knot is there. A pathetic and heroic effort on the part of man to instil into his child’s eyes his dreams and fears and follies.
You call it law and keep it in big hooks. He calls it custom and keeps it in his wife’s treasure chest. You have to be either a judge or a criminal to know your law. He knows his customs before he knows how to eat. It is bred in him. It is mixed in his bones and works in his liver. He does not have to go to a learned man in a wig to know the law against which he sinned. He knows it as soon as he does it. He is his own judge and jailer. His ancestors have seen to it that it is so.
Now let us examine a few Pathan customs and try to see what they are driving at. For customs are the only tools with which primitive man carves the shape of his culture. It is a stroke of the brush in the hands of man the artist. It is not a stroke of lightning. It has a purpose, a will and a definite meaning, however awkward the shape. Let us take one of his most violent customs, which prescribes death for elopement or adultery. This ancient principle is active and living in the blood of the Pathan even today. It reacts violently when it clashes with the loose and generous ethics of the British-made law. The Pathan will shoot the seducer of his sister and walk proudly to the British-made gallows for it. The law is made for the cold English sister and the detached English brother. The Pathan is short of girls and generous of emotions. He must breed well if he is to breed fighters. The potential mother of the man of tomorrow is the greatest treasure of the tribe and is guarded jealously.
This primitive custom is also useful for weeding out the over-sexed. It is a subtle system of selective breeding. But does the Pathan realise any of these things when he lifts his rifle to shoot the culprit? He does not. He is mad with anger. He must shoot, there is no alternative. If he does not, his neighbours will look down upon him, his father will sneer at him, his sister will avoid his eyes, his wife will be insolent and his friends will cut him dead. It is easier to be misunderstood by a judge who does not speak his language and be hanged by a law that does not understand his life. He does his duty by his people. He will play true to his blood even if he breaks his heart and neck in the bargain. He will walk to the gallows with proud steps with his hands covered with the blood of his wife or sister. And the admiring eyes of his people will follow him as they always do those who pay with their life for a principle. “Hero,” shout the Pathans. “Murderer,” says the judge. And I have never been able to find out who is right.
This very custom when given a chance to act alone works perfectly. In the tribal area where nearly four million people live without law courts, policemen, judges and hangmen, you seldom hear of adultery or murder. Elopements are rare. For the risk is great and the price heavy for rare lips and beautiful eyes. If the culprits get married, the hunt is slackened; the boy is made to pay damages in the form of giving away two or three girls to the family from which he stole one. But he won’t live long if he deceives her or deserts her. The whole tribe of the girl will hunt him down and his own will refuse to protect him. Custom does not allow protection to the breakers of custom. He stands alone and must pay the price. Even his friends will avoid the funeral. It is hard and brutal, but it works. After all you cannot use a dog leash to tame a wolf.
There is another point. The Pathan has no hospitals or doctors. And it is established that the most horrible diseases are given by men to women and women to men. Syphilis, for example. The Pathan knew no cure for it, so he took the most drastic preventive measure. Death to him who dares to risk the health of his tribe. It is treachery and sabotage which you also punish with death. The knot is the same though the thread is different.
The Pathan has thousands of customs - for death, birth, marriage, love, hate and war. To try to count them or even to attempt a very sketchy portrait of their purpose and function is impossible. They are neither good nor bad, for they depend on time, place and circumstance. But this can be said about all of them, that they are an attempt to hold and preserve a standard of value and way of life that has given the world a great fighter and a poor soldier. For many of the customs of the Pathans are older than their Greek soldier-fathers. But they also have many customs and traditions which give a picture of the system of thinking and living that produced the wild Alexander and his conquering army. When the Pathan is a child his mother tells him, “the coward dies but his shrieks live long after,” and so he learns not to shriek. He is shown dozens of things dearer than life so that he will not mind either dying or killing. He is forbidden colourful clothes or exotic music, for they weaken the arm and soften the eye. He is taught to look at the hawk and forget the nightingale. He is asked to kill his beloved to save the soul of her children. It is a perpetual surrender - an eternal giving up of man to man and to their wise follies.
You and I do the same every day. In this age of vote and democracy Don Juan is hopelessly outnumbered. The respectable, the wise, and the aged make the laws and customs to mould to a pattern the youth and rebellion of life. An artist mingles many strokes and shades to create an impression, a musician many tunes to create a single song. The colour that does not mix, the note that is out of harmony, must go though the going be hard.
Customs and laws save man from what is too good for him and from what is too bad for him. They maintain a standard and knock out those who are too big for it. His customs are as good as your laws and as bad. Both are intolerant of rebels and both depend for their growth on those who are big enough to break them. Such is life.
Poems of The Pathans:
Moonbeam’s Silence
When silence is overcome by love, it turns into a song,
When a song becomes obstinate it turns into noise,
When a thought is sure of itself it turns into a word,
When a word feels like dancing it turns into music,
And when music goes a-dreaming it turns into silence,
Silence is the beginning. Silence the end
Fate
Fate may be likened to the keys on a musical instrument:
They arrest the ‘hum’ of a string and give it variety, life, form and feeling,
Like the crystal that takes the white light of the sun and
breaks it into myriad shades and colours.
Life without fate is like a sound without notes -
Monotony is eternity,
Wisdom and Love
Wisdom can travel only two steps
Beyond it, it is lost in wonder
In beauty is that proof of your being
That brightens the eyes of the heart
Where are you - How are you - Where is your abode
Here your story becomes complicated
Otherwise, however difficult a problem
With quiet thought it is slowly solved
Wisdom, and proof and thought and imagination
Build the strong Fort of trust.
The clean sweet water of hope
Makes the path of life go through flowers.
In every thing there is design and balance and count
Shape and colour and strength and function
The hand of the master is clearly visible
In every atom of the universe
Everything is held in a balance
Created and designed with thought.
The stars, the sun and light and air
Everyone is held in his hand
That is all the journey the mind can travel
All its tricks and logic and craft and wisdom
But if you want a doll to amuse and divert you
Then there is the dome, and here the pulpit.
Thought and beauty, the beloved and “khumar”
Can recreate a ruined world
Wisdom - a prisoner in “limit” and “balance”
Beyond it, it is lost and wonders.
Saki
In the hand of the Saki are wines One of laughter one of tears.
I am holding an Empty cup Hoping for your generosity
0 Saki give me which ever you like But give it to me with a smile
1 am a madman and care nothing For tears or laughter
But, Oh, please don’t send me away thirsty From the win chouse of your love
Notes: All these poems are from the works of Lewanae Falsafi. You have never heard of him. Neither have most of the Pathans. He is a young Pathan poet who has published nothing though he has written much.
Priest, Magic and Charms Ltd
Meher, my tenant, was not handsome to look at. He had green eyes set in a broad Mongolian face, which was dark and pock-marked. He had powerful shoulders and a deep chest. His limbs were magnificent, his strength like a-bulTs but he had a way of looking at things through them comer of his shifty eyes that always succeeded in irritating| and annoying me. He was the best farmer and the biggest thief in my village. As the Khan of a Pathan village who, besides his many other portfolios, is in charge of law and order also, Meher and I did not like each other. He hated the customs and laws of our society as much as I did. Only he always had the pleasure of breaking them and I the duty of drilling them into his thick obstinate head. For cruel and oppressive as the customs and laws are, they are the only binding force of our culture. A strong horse needs thick ropes to save him and the world from its mischievous youth and destructive strength. I had to break in this youthful’ stallion to the law of his race and he hated it. So did 1 because I am neither a prophet nor a general. I am a poet ^ would much rather see a stallion rear and buck and gallop and jump with the grace and joy of youth than tie him in 2 stable and make him chew to order.
Anyway, Meher escaped that doom; he died of typhoid. When I went to see him he was in the last stages. His gigantic body had refused to melt or surrender but his eyes were tired.
His family was in despair. They had tried all the] doctors I had recommended one after another, and paid- dear money for coloured and smelly things in bottles. Thief his mother had looked with panic-stricken eyes at the heroic struggle of his body and shouted: “Black Magic. Why, look, his body is big as a mountain and yet he is overcome!” She told her old husband, “If it were a disease, one of these big doctors would have known it and given him the right medicine. They could not because it is not a disease. It is black magic”. “Woman’s talk,” said the old man to his son Usman, who was standing frowning nearby. “Listen to him, said the old woman.”He sits with his educated Khans and consequently does not believe in prayers and charms, but don’t you remember, Umar had the same kind of trouble which no one could cure until they brought the “Shah Sahi of Fairies.” He found the evil charm and saved his life by the grace of Allah and kind spirit of his Master’s. It took a long time but he is still alive. Don’t you remember? You and your Khans can say what you like. But it works. He is saving people every day in all the villages.” Usman assented with his head.” Let us try it. There is no harm. We won’t discontinue his English medicine, and give the Shah Sahib a chance also. You never know it might save Meher.” “All right get him,” said the old man. “And a curse on your mother for her sharp tongue.” And as he found it rather uncomfortable to stay at home after this, he went to his field grumbling and muttering.
Usman went away and returned in the evening with Shah Sahib. The whole thing was a secret from me, because I held rather strong views on magic and it is a dangerous risk for a magician to be within easy reach of my hands. I had expressed on several occasions a great longing to close my fingers around Shah Shahib’s greasy throat and ask him to use all his magic to wriggle out of them.
For, the magician, the priest and the charmer are the greatest enemies of man. They pour darkness into the soul and deaden intelligence. They stunt his growth and fight against knowledge because they flourish on ignorance. They steal not only the hard-earned money of the poor, but also their brains. They lead him into darkness in the name of light and make him worship the devil in the name of God. They carry the bacteria of rot and stupidity and infect the mind. They are the national plague No. 1. Being a very conscientious Director of Health of my little village, I wanted to meet Shahji.
Shahji is a slim little man. There is a look of genteel breeding and refinement about his face. His delicate grey beard is neatly combed. His long grey locks are oiled and curly. He wears the white turban of the priest and is dressed in dignified white robes to suggest purity. He is serious, mysterious and prophetically calm and composed.
As soon as he approached the village, all the farmers rose respectfully, for he traced his descent to a famous saint. He went straight into the Zenana where Meher was twitching in agony surrounded by women. Shah Sahib is always happy among women, they are sympathetic; they understand. He looked at Meher’s eyes. He frowned and mumbled something. “Ah! ” he said. There was sensation all round. The women opened their eyes wide and waited. Shah Sahib looked at Meher and noted the young age and the powerful body, so he said “Ah !” again and then finally, “It is a girl.” Great sensation. Meher’s mother was satisfied and felt proud. “Did I not tell you it was some evil woman who loved my handsome big Meher.” All the old women looked sharply at the young and unmarried ones, which made them feel hot and confused.
Shah Sahib sat down, produced a book full of charts and magic formulae, took out a plain sheet of paper and started drawing, writing, reciting and calculating.
His face was serious and his brows remained knit for a long dramatic period. Then he woke up with a look of joy in his face and turned to Meher’s mother who had been holding her breath all this time. “Mother, I think we shall be able to find the evil charm. Pray for our success, mother.” He turned to Usman, “Come, my boy, pick up a hoe,” and marched out, leaving the old women howling their prayers to heaven.
Usman went with him alone. The crowd was asked to stay behind. Usman was made to dig one place for a foot or so, while the priest searched the earth with his fingers. The charm did not appear. Shahji looked dismayed. Usman’s Ifalth wavered. Shahji pointed to another spot and asked him Ito dig. After he had dug for about ten minutes, Shahji got up |from the othe pit and began to look for another spot. Usman He looked hurt and angry. He dug away I from lost more faith furiously. Shah Sahib came back sadly and motioned him to stop. Feigning a sad surprise at his own failure, he said, “Well, I don’t understand it. Usman, you search the dug-up earth this time, while I try to find another place. Curse the evil girl!”
As Usman turned up the earth he came upon a tin bottle about three inches long (a convenient size for the pocket as well as the palm). “Holy Father,” he shouted, “here it is.” His eyes were blazing. He had recovered his faith. He signalled to the villagers and shouted to his brothers. They all came rushing and surrounded them. Shah Sahib took off the lid from the bottle. Inside was a neatly made cloth doll. He pulled it out, and examined it. “Oh, cursed woman,” he said,” poor Meher, look at these pins stuck into the charmed doll. Each one is like a sword in Meher’s side.” Great sensation. Even Meher’s father was dumb with amazement. The news was broken to the women. They were fully mystified and overjoyed. Shahji removed the pins and burnt the doll in their presence. He mumbled prayers from the Holy Quran and blew them into Meher’s face and after blessing I the crowd and threatening dire revenge on the unknown girl, I took his leave. Meher’s mother touched his feet and kissed his hands with thankful tears streaming down her fact.
After he had gone out, she shouted to Usman to serve Shah Sahib tea and cream, and come back. While, Shah Sahib was basking in the warmth of the villagers respect and admiration, Usman went to his mother. She took out a bundle of dirty old notes, their only family saving of vears of toil. “Give it to Shah Sahib as a thanks giving.” “But mother” protested Usman, “this will buy us a good bullock.” “Is a bullock better than Meher?” she snapped scornfully. Usman was subdued. He went out, took Shah Sahib aside and pushed the notes into his hands with humble apologies. Shah Sahib accepted them graciously and said that he really would not dream of taking payment for his services, but the charm would not work unless the thanksgiving money was paid.
He came back, wrote another charm to be tied around Meher’s head and left for his village in the tender care of several devoted villagers.
Meher died the next morning. I paid his funeral expenses. His father borrowed from me to pay the priests who said prayers over the grave. He sold his bullocks to pay for the food which his friends and relations ate when they came to condole.
I am still looking for Shah Sahib. If one of these days you hear that Ghani Khan is charged for murder, you will know I have met him.
بېرته شاته