Sea of Poppies (87 page)

taliyamar (*Roebuck)
: Neel mistook this word to mean ‘bow-wave' but was glad to be corrected: ‘Roebuck explains that this is the Laskari for “cut-water”, derived from the Portuguese
talhamar
. I remember having always heard the word spoken by lascars who were looking down from the bowsprit. Hence my error: I mistook the effect for the object.'

tamancha
: ‘Roebuck confirms that this was, as I remember, the common Laskari word for a lesser firearm.'

tapori
: From the
Jack-Chits
: ‘This was the lascar's word for the wooden bowl out of which he ate – the equivalent of the English seaman's “kid”. These were made of the plainest hollowed wood, and were bought in great numbers from bumboats. Apart from this there was also the metal
khwancha
– a large tray on which they ate together.'

+tatty (*The Glossary)
: ‘Such was the term for a screen made of khus-khus grass. Although the word is perfectly respectable, being derived from the tamil
vettiveru
(from which
vetiver
), its resemblance to a common Hind. word for a certain bodily product tended to create misunderstandings. A story is told of a formidable
BeeBee
who issued a peremptory
hookum
to a timid
chuckeroo
: “Boy! Drop a
tatty
!
Jildee
!” The unfortunate lad was
gubbrowed
half out of his wits and complied with such celerity that the
BeeBee
was put utterly to rout.

‘To further complicate matters, those who were responsible for the maintenance of these screens were known, in certain households, as
tattygars
. Unfortunate indeed was the
kismet
of the
khidmatgars
who were thus designated, and it was no easy matter to fill these positions. It was because of such misunderstandings, perhaps, that this word is gradually yielding to its Hind. synonym
khus-khus
.'

+teapoy
: See
charpoy
.

teek (*The Barney-Book)
: ‘According to the
Barneymen
, the Hind.
thik
became in its English avatar “exact, close, precise.”'

+tical
: A silver coin equal to a rupee.

tickytaw boys/tickytock boys (*The Glossary)
: ‘These ghastly attempts at onomatopoeia were once the terms of reference for players of the tabla.'

+tiff, to
: ‘Ironic indeed that India should be the last refuge of this fine North Country English word, meaning to take refreshments (from which
tiffin
, lunch etc)'.

tiffin
: See above.

+tindal
: See
lascar
.

+topas/topass
: Neel would have been astonished by the
Oracle
's gloss of this word: ‘A person of mixed Black
and Portuguese descent; often applied to a soldier, or a ship's scavenger or bath-attendant, who is of this class.' See
lascar
.

trikat (*Roebuck)
: See
dol
.

tuckiah / tuckier (*The Glossary)
: ‘Sir Henry claims that this common Hind. word for “pillow” or “bolster” is often used in the same sense as
ashram
. I am baffled by this, I must confess.'

+ tumasher / tamasha / tomashaw / tomascia
: Being a contrarian, Neel had a particular fondness for the seventeenth-century English usage of this word, in which it was spelled
tomashaw
or even
tomascia
, and had the sense of ‘spectacle' or ‘show', being sometimes thus applied also to rituals. He deplored the gradual debasement of the word, whereby it ‘can now scarcely be told apart from a petty
gollmaul
.'

tumlet (*The Glossary)
: ‘Is it possible that this Hind. corruption of “tumbler” will reenter the English language and, like the notorious cuckoo, eject its parent from its nest? Would that it could be so!'

tuncaw (*The Glossary)
: ‘The mystery of English turned this Hind. for “salary”,
tankha
, into an almost derogatory term, used mainly for servant's wages.'

+turban
: See
seersucker
.

turnee (*Roebuck)
: ‘This (as also
tarni
and
tanni)
, were the lascars' abbreviations of the word “attorney”, and it was applied always to English supercargoes.
Phaltu-tanni
, however, was their word for the Flemish horse, a very curious element of a ship's tackle.'

udlee-budlee
: See
shoke
.

upper-roger (*The Glossary, *The Barney-Book)
: ‘A corruption of Skt.
yuva-raja
, “young king”, says Sir Henry, to which the
Barneymen
add, apropos nothing, that the Nawab Siraj-uddowlah was similarly known to British wordy-wallahs as Sir Roger Dowler.'

+vakeel
: Lawyer, pleader. ‘One of the oldest
mysteries
of the courtroom, reputed to be a denizen of the English language since the early seventeenth century.'

+vetiver
: See
tatty
.

+wanderoo
: See
bandar
. In the margins of this a nameless relative has written: ‘In the jungles of English, only a little less antique than
vakeel
, dating back to the 1680s, according to
Oracle
.'

woolock (*The Glossary)
: ‘Boats of this name were often to be seen on the Hooghly, but I recall neither size nor any details of their construction.'

wordy-wallah (*The Glossary)
: This phrase, from Hind.
vardi-wala
, was
used in English to mean ‘wearer of a uniform'. Those especially gifted in this regard were known as
wordy-majors
(or
woordy-majors
). Neel's usage of these terms bore no resemblance to their proper definition.

zubben/zubán
: ‘Of this word,' writes Neel, ‘I can find no evidence in any of my dictionaries. But I know I have heard it often used, and if it does not exist, it should, for no other expression could so accurately describe the subject of the
Chrestomathy
.'

^Φ
Whether this abbreviation refers to a specific language (Hindi?/Urdu?/Hindusthani?) or merely to all things Indian has long been a subject of controversy within the family. Suffice it to say that the matter can never be satisfactorily resolved since Neel only ever used this contracted form.

^α
It needs here to be explained that the word
Glossary
, whenever it occurs in the
Chrestomathy
, is a reference to an authority that was, for Neel's purposes, one of the few to be empowered with the right to award certificates of migration into English: to wit, Sir Henry Yule and A. C. Burnell's
Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymological, Historical, Geographical and Discursive
. Neel appears to have acquired a copy of this famous dictionary when it first began to circulate among a privileged few, in the 1880s, before it came to be known by the name
Hobson-Jobson
. Although his personal copy has never been found, there can be no doubt that the frequent references to ‘Sir Henry' in the
Chres tomathy
are directed always towards Sir Henry Yule – just as ‘
the Glossary
,' in his usage, stands always for the dictionary for which that great lexicographer was chiefly responsible.

^β
The name
Roebuck
, when it occurs in the
Chrestomathy
, is a reference always to Lt. Thomas Roebuck's pioneering work of lexicography:
An English and Hindostanee Naval Dictionary of Technical Terms and Sea Phrases and also the Various Words of Command Given in Working a Ship, &C. with Many Sentences of Great Use at Sea; to which Is Prefixed a Short Grammar of the Hindostanee Language
. First printed in Calcutta, this lexicon was reprinted in London in 1813 by the booksellers to the Hon. East India Company: Black, Parry & Co. of Leadenhall Street. Neel once described it as the most important glossary of the nineteenth century – because as he put it, ‘in its lack, the age of sail would have been becalmed in a kalmariya, with sahibs and lascars mouthing incomprehensible nothings at each other.' It is certainly true that this modest word-list was to have an influence that probably far exceeded Lt. Roebuck's expectations. Seven decades after its publication it was revised by the Rev. George Small, and reissued by W. H. Allen & Co. under the title:
A Laskari Dictionary or Anglo-Indian Vocabulary of Nautical Terms and Phrases in English and Hindustani
(in 1882): this latter edition was available well into the twentieth century. The
Laskari Dictionary
was Neel's favourite lexicon and his use of it was so frequent that he appears to have developed a sense of personal familiarity with the author.

^χ
The phrase
Barney-Book
, when it occurs in the
Chrestomathy
, is always in reference to Albert Barrère and Charles Leland's
Dictionary of Slang, Jargon & Cant
, which was yet another of Neel's girmit-granting authorities. He possessed a well-worn copy of the edition published by the Ballantyne Press in 1889. His choice of shorthand for this work appears to be a reference to Barrère and Leland's tracing of
barney
to the gypsy word for ‘mob' or ‘crowd'. This in turn, they adduced to be, in one of those wild leaps of speculation for which they were justly famous, a derivation from the Hind.
bharna
– ‘to fill' or ‘increase'.

^δ
The reference here is to Admiral W. H. Smyth's
Sailor's Word-Book
. Neel possessed several copies of the edition that was printed in London in 1876 by Blackie. He held this work in a respect that verged on reverence and when the words ‘
the Admiral
' appear in the
Chrestomathy
, reference is always to Admiral Smyth and his famous lexicon.

^ε
‘
The Linkister
', when it appears in the
Chrestomathy
, is always in reference to Charles Leland and his
Pidgin English Sing-Song: Or Songs and Stories in the China-English Dialect; with a Vocabulary
. Charles Leland was, of course, one of the most prodigious lexicographers of the nineteenth century and he was another of Neel's girmit-granting authorities. But being himself a master of the South China Pidgin, Neel appears to have disapproved, or disagreed, with it in some respects: hence the somewhat disparaging name.