returned and learnt this, he told his wife that he also would perform
the ceremonies in his house, so they set to work and were employed
in cooking rice and vegetables far into the night; and Karam Gosain
came down to see what preparations Dharmu was making in his honour,
and he watched from the back of the house.

Just then Dharmu strained off the water from the cooked rice and threw
it out of the window, and it fell on Karam Gosain and scalded him, and
as the flies and insects worried the wound, Karam Gosain went off to
the Ganges and buried himself in the middle of the stream. As he had
thus offended Karam Gosain, all Dharmu's undertakings failed and he
fell into deep poverty, and had not even enough to eat, so he had to
take service with his brother Karmu. When the time for transplanting
the rice came, Dharmu used to plough and dig the ditches and mend the
gaps along with the day labourers. Karmu told him not to work himself
but act as overseer of the other labourers, and the labourers also told
him that it was not suitable for him to work as a labourer himself,
but Dharmu said that he must earn his wages and insisted on working;
and in the same way Dharmu's wife might have acted as overseer of
the women, but she was ashamed not to work too.

One day they were transplanting the rice and Karmu brought out
breakfast for the labourers; he told Dharmu and his wife to wash their
hands and come and eat; but they answered that they belonged to the
household and that the hired labourers should be fed first, so the
labourers ate and they ate up all the rice and there was nothing left
for Dharmu and his wife. When the midday meal was brought the same
thing happened, Dharmu and his wife got nothing; but they hoped that
it would be made up to them when the wages were paid, and worked
on fasting. At evening when they came to pay the wages in kind,