Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 496

PROOFS OF FOOLISHNESS
455
V
of justice), and request the authorities to settle our dispute
As this advice seemed sensible enough, they all agreed to
adopt
it.
They could not have arrived at the choultry at a more
opportune moment. The authorities of the village of
Dharmapuri, consisting of Brahmins and others, were
and as there was no other
just then all assembled there
;
important case to be settled that day, they at once pro-
ceeded with the hearing of the cause of the strangers, who
were asked to explain the facts of their case.
One of the four thereupon advanced into the middle of
the assembly and related, without omitting the slightest
detail, all that had happened in connexion with the greeting
of the soldier
and
ambiguous
his
reply.
On
hearing the details of the case the whole court burst
The president, who was a man of
into fits of laughter.
humorous disposition, was delighted at having found so
favourable an opportunity of amusing himself. Assuming,
therefore, a grave demeanour and ordering every one to
As you are
keep silent, he thus addressed the suitors
strangers and quite unknown in this town, it is impossible
that the point at issue, namely, who is the greatest fool,
can be proved by the evidence of witnesses. There is only
one way that I can see in which you can enlighten your
judges.
Let each of you in his turn disclose to us some
incident of his life on which he considers he can best establish
After hearing you all in turn,
his claim to egregious folly.
we can then decide as to which of the four has a right to
superiority in this respect, and which of you can in con-
sequence claim for himself exclusively the soldier's greet-
'
:
ing.'
All the suitors having agreed to this proposal, one of the
Brahmins obtained permission to speak, and addressed the
assembly as follows
I am very poorly clad, as you
doubtless see, and my ragged condition does not date from
I will tell you how I came to be so shabbily attired.
to-day.
Many years ago a rich merchant of our neighbourhood, who
was always very charitable towards Brahmins, presented
me with two pieces of the finest cloth that had ever been
:
—
'
1
Most Indian villages even to this day possess a chavadi or
where the village authorities meet and dispense justice. Ed.
choultry.