मेरा आजीवन कारावास / माझी जन्मठेप (स्वातंत्र्यवीर सावरकर - काले पानी का ऐतिहासिक संस्मरण)

Instead was the rider belabouring his mule under the stride. Two or three minutes had thus gone and the Pathan, while the slaps were stall hot in his face, begged of his opponent to halt. "Enough, enough, my man, enough, I beg of you, enough." These were the words that trembled on his laps, so done up was he by the hard drubbing that the Madrasi had given him. But this exasperated him still more. Showering abuse for abuse, the prisoner rained fisticuffs on the head of the Pathan. It was the dialect that had made confusion worse confounded. The Pathan had said in Hindusthani-Maph karo-pardon me. The Madrasi caught only the first letter of it Ma, which in Tamil meant mother He took it as the most insulting abuse that one man can utter to another. And so he attached the Pathan all the more vehemently, never understanding that the fellow was all along begging for mercy. "Ma", "Ma", replied the prisoner, and at every repetition felled him with bludgeoning blows. At last the inevitable had happened. The petty officer had arrived, the crowd rushed on the scene, and the combatants were separated. The Madrasi kept on gibbering-saheb-hum-tum-mar-with gesticulations, which Indicated that if the Pathan were to take the complaint to the gaoler, he will not stop short of throttling him. The Pathan is constitutionally a bully and a coward; the threat of the Madrasi, one better than him, completely unnerved him. Again he had broken the law himself, for he had left his post on the top-floor, and gone down into the crowd to purloin a coconut That must go against him. So he ended the quarrel there, and, adjusting his dishevelled hair and turban returned to his place on the top-floor of my building. So was his greed satisfied. For three or more of the sweet coconuts, he had received blow after blow on his mouth and had to swallow them quietly.

"What's the matter? Why this hulloballoo?" I asked him. The warder replied haughtily, as if I had not witnessed the scene, "O, Sir, there was a man there, the rascal that he is, who wanted to steal the curd-milk- coconut". I gave him a sound thrashing." "Well done". I answered, "a thief, and, at that, one who would thieve again, and also in prison! He deserved what he got". The Pathan and myself knew well who the thief was, and who gave the thrashing.

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End of Chapter VIII