begaree (*Roebuck): 'So, according to Lt. Roebuck, were the lascars accustomed to speak of those of their number who had been shanghaiied or impressed into service. Could it be that the word is a curious crossing of the English "beggar" and the Bengali bhikari (of the same meaning) and the Hind. bekari, "unemployed"?'
+begum: See BeeBee.
beparee (*The Glossary): Neel believed that this Hind. word for 'trader', like seth, had found its way into English because the extraordinary proliferation of the meanings of banyan had rendered the word unusable in its originary sense.
beteechoot (*The Glossary): For the import of this expression see banchoot/barnshoot, but bearing in mind that it substitutes betee, daughter, for bahin, sister. 'Sir Henry illustrates his definition of this term with some extremely apt quotations, among them the following: "1638: L'on nous monstra à une demy lieue de la ville un sepulchre, qu'ils apellentBety-chuit, c'est à dire la vergogne de la fille decouverte" [Mandelsle, Paris, 1659].'
bhandari (*Roebuck): 'This is the name that lascars use for cooks or storekeepers. I imagine that it may well be their word for "quartermaster" as well'. This sentence is taken from the most unusual of Neel's notes – a set of jottings scribbled on the verso side of few playing cards. From the tiny handwriting, no less than the liberal splashes of seawater, it would appear that these notes were compiled in the course of a voyage on which paper was not easily obtained. Within the family these notes are known as the Jack-Chits, after the first of the cards to be found (a knave of clubs). Generally speaking the chits are Neel's earliest attempt to make sense of the shipboard dialect of the lascars: at the time of their writing he does not appear to have known of the existence of the Laskari Dictionary, but on acquiring a copy of Roebuck's lexicon, he immediately acknowledged the superiority of that great lexicographer's work and discontinued his own attempts to decode this dialect, which were undeniably of an unscientific and anecdotal nature. The chits are not wholly without interest, however; for example, this excerpt from the eight and nine of spades: 'To set sail is to find oneself foundering not just in a new element, but also in an unknown ocean of words. When one listens to the speech of sailors, no matter whether they be speaking English or Hind. one is always at sea: not for nothing is the English argot of sail known as a "sea-language", for it has long slipped its moorings from the English one learns in books. The same could be said of the ties that bind the tongues of Hind. to the jargon of the lascars: why, just the other day, we heard the tindals of our ship racing about on deck, shouting in the greatest agitation – hathee-soond! hatheesoond! That an "elephant's trunk" had been sighted at sea seemed miraculous to all present and we went hurrying up to bear witness to this extraordinary visitation – but only to be disappointed, for the excitement of our lascar friends was occasioned by nothing more miraculous than a distant column of water, raised by a whirlwind. Evidently this phenomenon, known in English as a "water-spout", has in their eyes the appearance of an elephant's trunk. Nor was this the only time that day that I was to be deceived by the fancifulness of their usages. Later, while taking the air near the stern, I heard a lascar imploring another to puckrow his nar. I confess I was startled: for although it is no uncommon thing to hear a lascar speaking casually of the appendage of masculinity, it is unusual nonetheless to hear them referring to that organ in such high Sanskritic language. My surprise must have caused me to betray my presence, for they looked at me and began to laugh. Do you know what we are speaking of? one of them said to me. Placed on my mettle, I replied in a fashion that I thought would amply demonstrate my ship-learning. Why indeed I do know what you are speaking of, I said: it is the thing that is known as a "jewel-block" in English. At this they laughed even harder and said no, a jewel-block was a dasturhanja in Laskari, while the thing they had been speaking of was a rudder-bolt known to the Angrez as a "pintle". I was tempted to inform them that the great William Shakespeare himself had used that word -pintle – in exactly the same sense as our Hind. nar. On consideration, however, I thought it best to refrain from divulging this piece of information. My shoke for the words of the greatest of dramatists had already gained for me the reputation of being an incorrigible "Spout-Billy", and offensive as this sobriquet was, I could not help reflecting that to be known as a "Billy-Soond" would be worse still'.
+ bheesty / bheestie / beasty / bhishti: 'The mysteries of water-carrying, the instrument of which trade was the mussuck. In the south, according to Sir Henry, the terms are tunny-catcher or tunnyketchi.'
bichawna/bichana (*The Glossary): 'Bedding or bed, from which bichawnadar, or "bed-maker", an expression that must be used with some care because of the possibility of innuendo.'
bichawnadar: See above.
bilayuti (*The Glossary): 'Strange that we should have become accustomed to using a version of the Turkish/Arabic wilayat to refer to England; even stranger that the English should adapt it to their own use as blatty. In its bilayutee form it was often attached, as Sir Henry correctly notes, to foreign and exotic things (hence bilayati baingan for "tomato"). Sir Henry was however gravely in error on another such compound, namely bilayuteepawnee. Although he correctly glosses this as "soda-water", he is wrong in his contention that the people of Hind. believed bilayutee-pawnee could confer great strength to the human body by reason of its gaseous bubbles. As I remember the matter, our wonder was occasioned not by the power of the bubbles as they were imbibed, but rather by the explosive detonations with which they were expelled.'
biscobra (*The Glossary): Neel took issue with Sir Henry's suggestion that this was the name of some kind of venomous lizard. 'Here is another example of a beautiful marriage of the eastern and western lexicons. The word "cobra" comes of course from a Portuguese contraction of a Latin root meaning "serpent". "Bis", on the other hand, is certainly a derivative of the Bengali word for poison, which has been absorbed into English as bish, although with the sense of a "blunder" or "mistake". It is impossible that such a term could be applied to a lizard, no matter how vengeful. In my opinion, it is none other than an English colloquialism for the hamadryad or King Cobra.'
+bish: See above.
b'longi/blongi (*The Linkister[6]): 'Frequently mistaken as a contraction of the English "belong", this word is actually an elegant and economical copula, doing duty for the verb "to be" in all its many forms. Imagine then the embarrassment of the gri ffin who pointed to his wife's dog and said: "Gudda blongi wife-o massa."'
[6] 'The Linkister', when it appears in the