For some absurd reason their weight on his shoulders was nothing to their weight on his poor mind . His neck ached under it of nights . ` Thine is a sickness uncommon in youth these days : since young folk have given up tending their betters . The remedy is sleep , and certain drugs , ' said the Sahiba ; and he was glad to give himself up to the blankness that half menaced and half soothed him . She brewed drinks , in some mysterious Asiatic equivalent to the still-room -- drenches that smelt pestilently and tasted worse . She stood over Kim till they went down , and inquired exhaustively after they had come up . She laid a taboo upon the forecourt , and enforced it by means of an armed man . It is true he was seventy odd , that his scabbarded sword ceased at the hilt ; but he represented the authority of the Sahiba , and loaded wains , chattering servants , calves , dogs , hens , and the like , fetched a wide compass by those parts . Best of all , when the body was cleared , she cut out from the mass of poor relations that crowded the back of the buildings -- house-hold dogs , we name them -- a cousin 's widow , skilled in what Europeans , who know nothing about it , call massage . And the two of them , laying him east and west , that the mysterious earth-currents which thrill the clay of our bodies might help and not hinder , took him to pieces all one long afternoon -- bone by bone , muscle by muscle , ligament by ligament , and lastly , nerve by nerve . Kneaded to irresponsible pulp , half hypnotized by the perpetual flick and readjustment of the uneasy chudders that veiled their eyes , Kim slid ten thousand miles into slumber -- thirty-six hours of it -- sleep that soaked like rain after drought . Then she fed him , and the house spun to her clamour . She caused fowls to be slain ; she sent for vegetables , and the sober , slow-thinking gardener , nigh as old as she , sweated for it ; she took spices , and milk , and onion , with little fish from the brooks -- anon limes for sherbets , fat quails from the pits , then chicken-livers upon a skewer , with sliced ginger between . ' I have seen something of this world , ' she said over the crowded trays , ` and there are but two sorts of women in it -- those who take the strength out of a man and those who put it back . Once I was that one , and now I am this . Nay -- do not play the priestling with me . Mine was but a jest . If it does not hold good now , it will when thou takest the road again . Cousin , ' -- this to the poor relation , never wearied of extolling her patroness 's charity -- ` he is getting a bloom on the skin of a new-curried horse . Our work is like polishing jewels to be thrown to a dance-girl -- eh ? '
XXXXX sat up and smiled .
Europeans Kim chudders clamour days drugs earth-currents forecourt hours still-room