How we cite our quotes: (Chapter. Paragraph)
Quote #7
'Wah! That work is done. May the boy be better for it; and Huneefa is surely a mistress of dawut. Help haul her aside, Babu. Do not be afraid.'
'How am I to fear the absolutely non-existent?' said Hurree Babu, talking English to reassure himself. It is an awful thing still to dread the magic that you contemptuously investigate—to collect folk-lore for the Royal Society with a lively belief in all Powers of Darkness. (10.102-3)
Kipling sets up the Babu as caught between two loyalties: He expresses an intellectual attachment to English science, since he collects folklore for the Royal Society; but at the same time, he feels a great loyalty to local beliefs in "all Powers of Darkness"—in other words, to the content of that folklore he is supposedly collecting for social scientific analysis.
Quote #8
The lama turned to Kim, and all the loving old soul of him looked out through his narrow eyes.
'To heal the sick is to acquire merit; but first one gets knowledge. That was wisely done, O Friend of all the World.'
'I was made wise by thee, Holy One,' said Kim, forgetting the little play just ended; forgetting St Xavier's; forgetting his white blood; forgetting even the Great Game as he stooped, Mohammedan-fashion, to touch his master's feet in the dust of the Jain temple. 'My teaching I owe to thee. I have eaten thy bread three years. My time is finished. I am loosed from the schools. I come to thee.' (11.46-8)
We have to love Kim's loyalty to the lama and to his quest for the River of the Arrow, in spite of all of the distractions—including a formal education and his goal to become a player in the Great Game—that might make him forget about his old friend. Kipling emphasizes loyalty between people as the highest proof of humanity and morality: when the lama asks if Kim has ever wanted to leave him behind, Kim answers proudly, "I am not a dog or a snake to bite when I have learned to love" (15.21).
(But, we do want to say: we are stunned at that brief line in this passage about Kim "forgetting his white blood" here, as though, if he remembered his white blood, he could not treat the lama with exactly the same degree of love and loyalty that he does otherwise. Again, race is a constant theme in this book, appearing on nearly every page, even at moments that don't seem otherwise to be about race.)
Quote #9
'Not he. He is wearied, and I forgot, being a grandmother. (None but a grandmother should ever oversee a child. Mothers are only fit for bearing.) Tomorrow, when he sees how my daughter's son is grown, he will write the charm. Then, too, he can judge of the new hakim's drugs.' (12.80)
We admit that this is a small point to bring up, but the Kulu woman's disloyal way of talking about her own daughter freaks us out a little. Maybe we are taking this a little too personally, and we're glad that the Kulu woman loves her grandsons so much, but really—doesn't she feel any concern or respect for her poor daughter? Why does she think her daughter is only good for having children, and not for raising them?