Memories of Malbari

As a boy, a copy of Parsi Lustre on Indian Soil stood on my father’s desk. He used to urge me to read it but the irreverent me never did, except the page on social reformer Behramji Malbari. That was because my mother was a great friend of his daughter Dolly who lived near Regal cinema. The antique shop Philips was on the ground floor. I used to visit her with my mother. Her teas were a delight specially for an ever hungry, little boy. She knew large parts of the English poet Mathew Arnold’s, Sorab and Rustom by heart and while reciting it, when she reached the sad part she would stop because I would be in tears.
I vividly remember the story she told me, as to how her father found the descendants of the Mogul emperor begging in the streets of Delhi and how he wrote a petition to the then viceroy which began with a Gujrati couplet, the first verse was as follows:
"Raja Rana ackde sana?
Su shata per kudka mare?
Shata suka ghas barabar,
Bari as pass bare;
Chakravati Maharaj chaliya,
Kal chakrani ferri ae
Saga dithame Shah Alamna
Bhik magta shereya.”
(Why do kings and emperors think so much of themselves?
On what grounds do they show off?
Pride is like dry grass, it burns,
And burns everything around it.
Chakravati Maharaj has gone,
With yesterday’s circle of time.
The descendants of Shah Alam,
Are begging in the streets of Delhi.)
Dolly said her father got them a house to stay and a decent monthly stipend. You could see that she worshipped her father, she never married and when I knew her she was a frail, middle aged lady, very kind to a young boy. I used to look forward to those visits. When Malbari died, King George V wired the viceroy: "Please convey to the family of Malbari the sincere regret with which the Queen and I have heard of the death of our old friend. His death will be a loss to the country.” Dr HIRJI S. ADENWALLA
Trichur