they had taken all her ornaments, which were only of silver, killed her, and hid the corpse among the flags of the Krishnaságara. I need scarcely say, that at this confession, the crowd, almost maddened with rage, poured such a hailstorm of blows, kicks, and cuffs, upon the culprits, that they were almost within an inch of their lives. But the question was—what was to be done to them? They could not be handed over to the police, for that would have put both Padma Pál and the zamindár into a scrape, for having burnt the corpse without the knowledge and permission of the police. The zamindár resolved to expel the murderers from the village, warning them, that if they returned to the village, they would be handed over to the police, and hanged. There and then the miscreants were expelled from the village, accompanied with a whirlwind of abuse, and a hailstorm of brickbats and old shoes. Thanks to the easy virtue of the village constable, the higher police authorities never got a scent of this affair.

CHAPTER XXV.

THE VILLAGE MARKET.

Some, burthened with their homely ware,
Journey to village hát or fair.

H. H. Wilson.

Háts, that is markets, whether held weekly or twice in the week, are a very useful institution; they not only supply with the necessaries of life the inhabitants of those little hamlets in which there are no shops, but also promote social intercourse between people of different villages. The hát of Kánchanpur, as the reader knows already, was held on Tuesdays and Saturdays on a plain in the south-west corner of the village. It was not a large one compared with the monstrous háts held in other parts of the country, especially in Eastern Bengal, still it was a pretty good one, being attended by between two and three hundred people. There were no sheds of any kind erected in it, so that if a shower came on, the hát would be dispersed-the only protection against rain being a few trees on the spot, especially that gigantic banyan tree of which we have already spoken. On market days almost every family in the village sent one of its members to the hát to buy whatever was needed. Kálamánik and Govinda both regularly went to hát, but with different objects. Kálamánik went to sell, whereas our hero went to buy. It was customary with Badan to hoard up in the marái (granary) a quantity of paddy sufficient to supply

all the members of the family with food from one harvest to another; and if there happened to be a surplus, it was converted into rice and sold in the village hát, especially when rice became dear; and sometimes Kálamánik bought rice in distant háts and sold it at an advantage in the hát of his own village. It was not much that he had to sell, usually two sacks of rice on the back of a bullock. Govinda went to buy for the family a few necessary articles which, though procurable in the village shops, were sold at lower prices in the háț. The two weekly markets were not called the market of Tuesday and the market of Saturday; they were almost always named according to the number of days which elapsed between one market day and another. Thus the market of Tuesday was called the market of three, because three clear days intervened between that day and the following Saturday; and the market of Saturday was called the market of two, because there are only two days intervening between that day and the following Tuesday. Usually more things are sold in a market of three than in a market of two, as people lay in more provisions on the former occasion than on the latter.

Let my reader accompany Govinda to a hát of three. Scarcely have you come to the outskirts of the village when your ears are regaled with the buzz, as it were, of many millions of bees, wafted through the surrounding groves of mango, and the long avenues of the asvatha and the tamarind. The buzz increases in loudness as you proceed, and it becomes quite deafening when you are fairly on the scene of action. For a good, varied, and rich noise commend us to a village hát. The noise of a mob on Trafalgar Square, or on the boulevards of Paris,

is nothing to it. A London or a Paris mob may have in it a larger number of people than most háṭs in Bengal, but all who make up that mob do not speak at the same time; whereas in a village hát every one, without exception, whether he be a buyer or a seller, is, at the same moment of time, speaking in an assembly of some hundreds at the top of his voice.

The first thing you notice as you enter the hát is a large number of red-looking bran-new hánḍis (cooking-pots) and earthen vessels of all sorts and shapes, both on your right and on your left: those have been brought from a neighbouring village, and are sure to have a good sale, as there is not a single potter at Kánchanpur. The sellers of goods have formed themselves into five long rows or streets, most of whom are squatting on the bare ground, a few on gunny bags spread upon the earth, and fewer still on low wooden stools; while the articles for sale are put out, according to their nature, either on the ground, or in gunny bags, or in baskets. One row you see entirely filled with greens and vegetables, the names of which it were endless to mention; for of greens the people of Bengal eat an infinite variety, excepting only those which are either poisonous or noxious in any other way: and as to other vegetables their name is legion. Greens and vegetables, indeed, require to be numerous, as Bengalis are thorough vegetarians; the only animal food they use being milk, clarified butter, and fish. Amongst the vegetables exposed for sale you notice some curious ones. A woman here has in her basket bright-red radishes, each about three feet long; a man there has pumpkins and gourds of monstrous

size; a third has that wonderfully rich and nutritious fruit, though somewhat disagreeable to the taste, called kántál or jack fruit, each of which weighs forty pounds avoirdupois. But what in the name of wonder is that curious looking fruit, resembling a huge boa-constrictor, and measuring about two yards in length? It is the chichingá, or snake-gourd, the Trichosanthes anguina of botanists. One of these snake-gourds is amply sufficient to furnish a large family with breakfast and dinner when made into curry and eaten along with boiled rice. A stranger looking at the long array of greens and vegetables might mistake that part of the hát for an agricultural show, if he did not know that they constituted the chief food of the people.

The second row consists of grocers and confectioners, and infinitely varied are the articles exposed for sale in that range. You have a hundred sorts of spices, spices for cooking, for pán, and for other purposes; of sweetmeats you have every variety, from the humble muḍki and páțáli to the delicate khájá-the king of the tribe. This row is frequented chiefly by the village boys-and both the pedagogues of the village give their boys half-school on market-days-who with one pice (somewhat less than a halfpenny) in each one's waist-I cannot say pocket, for a genuine village Bengali boy having no pocket, keeps little sums of money wrapped in the folds of his dhuti around the waist-are standing before the confectioners, and debating in their minds what sweetmeat they should select. Nor is the debate an idle one; for with a halfpenny a boy may get a large quantity of muḍki or phuṭkalái, a good number of kadmás, or a considerable bit of páțáli.