Page:MKGandhi patriot.djvu/129

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heavily on the Indians. The Passive Resisters were divided into two classes—the Hindus, to most of whom all animal food is under religious proscription, and the Mohammedans, who are permitted to use it if it has been ritually killed. To both of these, the fat supplied by the prison authorities was an abomination, and since it was cooked with the crushed mealies, they preferred to content themselves with rice, which was served only at mid-day—and starve rather than take the food which had been defiled. Those who were responsible for this prison-diet were implored to substitute ghee for animal fat, as had been done in Johannesburg, but without success. Only after an interview with the Director of Prisons, and petitions and newpaper letters, was anything done, and then, as though in irony, the animal fat was withdrawn, without any ghee being supplied. And this is the position to-day.[1]

There is no perception of the immense distance which separate the Indian from the Kaffir in the scale of civilization. To the average Colonial, they are all "niggers" alike. But to those who think, this Ambulance Corps, tenderly ministering to the

  1. This defect has since been modified by recent regulation. L. W. R.