A drive through the city to the Jagdish Temple, old and new palaces, the Royal Stables and Coach House, and the Gangore Ghat. Here were women cleaning their brass containers and then filling them water. They filtered the water by simply pouring it through a dirty rag into the vessel. They used a dirty rag as a pad for their heads and then carried two large brass containers on top – one above the other and each filled with water. To see the women lift a large brass vase filled with water and place it on their heads and then stoop down and lift another filled with water and place it on top of the other vase and walk gracefully away would make a good turn for the vaudeville stage. We threw in food for the fish and tortoises and saw them fight for it – big fish and immense tortoises; no fishing allowed. Then a visit to Khas Oddi, or the pigs’ feeding place. A sight to be remembered – every day for the past sixty years 300lb of Indian corn has been thrown to the wild pigs. A weird shout from the old keeper brings hundreds of these long snouted beasts from the hills and jungle and they scramble and fight for the food. The peacocks and pigeons are also there, waiting for a chance to get their share. Two coolies carry bags of corn into the arena and scatter it wide apart. The screams and grunts and the dust all combine to make a most interesting spectacle. The Maharana of Udaipur has several palaces in Udaipur and many shooting boxes. The palaces are wonderful in parts but Udaipur has no modern sanitation and the streets are dirty, narrow and dusty. The natives are in pure Indian costume – good looking, smiling and happy. The palaces are always being repaired and extended and we saw men, women and girls polishing slabs of marble and chipping black and white stone to make a floor for the New Palace. They have been building this palace for the last 26 years and have only half finished, but they can build – carve and do inlaid work. Time does not count here, no Trade Union rate of pay.
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