rudyard kipling

Lispeth
Mp3 134
from Plain Tales from the Hills
(1886)

Look, you have cast out1 Love! What Gods are these
You bid2 me please?
The Three in One, the One in Three? Not so!
2 To my own Gods I go.
It may be they shall give me greater ease3
Than your cold Christ and tangled4 Trinities.
UNIT 5. THE AGE OF INDUSTRIALISATION

The Convert.

She was the daughter of Sonoo, a Hill-man of the Himalayas, and Jadéh his
wife. One year their maize failed, and two bears spent the night in their only
10 opium poppy-field5 just above the Sutlej Valley on the Kotgarh side; so, next
season, they turned Christian, and brought their baby to the Mission to be
baptized.The Kotgarh Chaplain6 christened her Elizabeth, and ‘Lispeth’ is the
Hill or pahari7 pronunciation.
Later, cholera came into the Kotgarh Valley and carried off Sonoo and Jadéh,
and Lispeth became half servant, half companion, to the wife of the then
Chaplain of Kotgarh.This was after the reign of the Moravian missionaries in
that place, but before Kotgarh had quite forgotten her title of ‘Mistress of the
Northern Hills’.
Whether Christianity improved Lispeth, or whether the Gods of her own
20 people would have done as much for her under any circumstances, I do not
know; but she grew very lovely. When a Hill-girl grows lovely, she is worth
travelling8 fifty miles over bad ground to look upon. Lispeth had a Greek
face — one of those faces people paint so often, and see so seldom9. She was
of a pale, ivory colour, and, for her race, extremely tall. Also, she possessed
eyes that were wonderful; and, had she not been dressed in the abominable
print-cloths affected by Missions10, you would, meeting her on the hillside
unexpectedly, have thought her the original Diana of the Romans11 going out
to slay12.
Lispeth took to Christianity readily, and did not abandon it when she
30 reached womanhood, as do some Hill-girls. Her own people hated her because
she had, they said, become a white woman13 and washed herself daily; and the
Chaplain’s wife did not know what to do with her. One cannot ask a stately14

1. cast out: thrown away (buttato via). 9. seldom: rarely (raramente).

2. bid: here ‘ask’ (chiedi). 10. print-cloths affected by Missions: material with
3. ease: peace of mind (conforto, sollievo). stamped designs adopted by Missions (tessuti stampati
4. tangled: confused, complicated (aggrovigliate, ingarbugliate). adoperati dalle Missioni).
5. opium poppy-field: piece of land with red flowered plants 11. Diana of the Romans: Goddess of the hunt (Diana, la
from which opium is obtained (campo di papaveri da oppio). dèa romana della caccia).
6. Chaplain: a priest (cappellano). 12. slay: kill (uccidere).
7. pahari: range of languages and dialects spoken by 13. white woman: European women in colonial India.
people from the Himalayan foothills of India. 14. stately: refined and impressive (signorile).
8. she is worth travelling: she is good enough for you to
travel (merita un viaggio).
 goddess, five foot ten in her shoes, to clean plates and dishes. She played with
the Chaplain’s children and took classes in the Sunday School, and read all the
books in the house, and grew more and more beautiful, like the Princesses in
fairy tales.The Chaplain’s wife said that the girl ought to take service in Simla
as a nurse or something ‘genteel’. But Lispeth did not want to take service.
She was very happy where she was.
When travellers — there were not many in those years — came in to Kotgarh,
40 Lispeth used to lock herself15 into her own room for fear they might take her
away to Simla, or out into the unknown world.
One day, a few months after she was seventeen years old, Lispeth went
out for a walk. She did not walk in the manner of English ladies — a mile 3
and a half out, with a carriage-ride back again. She covered between twenty
and thirty miles in her little constitutionals16, all about and about, between

RUDYARD KIPLING
Kotgarh and Narkanda.This time she came back at full dusk17, stepping down
the breakneck18 descent into Kotgarh with something heavy in her arms.
The Chaplain’s wife was dozing19 in the drawing-room20 when Lispeth came
in breathing heavily and very exhausted with her burden21. Lispeth put it
50 down on the sofa, and said simply, ‘This is my husband. I found him on the
Bagi Road. He has hurt himself. We will nurse him, and when he is well, your
husband shall marry him to me.’
This was the first mention Lispeth had ever made of her matrimonial
views, and the Chaplain’s wife shrieked22 with horror. However, the man on
the sofa needed attention first. He was a young Englishman, and his head had
been cut to the bone by something jagged23. Lispeth said she had found him
down the hillside, and had brought him in. He was breathing queerly24 and
was unconscious.
He was put to bed and tended25 by the Chaplain, who knew something of
60 medicine, and Lispeth waited outside the door in case she could be useful.
She explained to the Chaplain that this was the man she meant to marry, and
the Chaplain and his wife lectured her severely on the impropriety of her
conduct. Lispeth listened quietly, and repeated her first proposition. It takes
a great deal of Christianity to wipe out26 uncivilized Eastern instincts, such as
falling in love at first sight. Lispeth, having found the man she worshipped27,
did not see why she should keep silent as to her28 choice. She had no intention
of being sent away, either. She was going to nurse that Englishman until he
was well enough to marry her. That was her programme.
After a fortnight of slight fever and inflammation,the Englishman recovered
70 coherence and thanked the Chaplain and his wife, and Lispeth — especially
Lispeth — for their kindness. He was a traveller in the East, he said — they
never talked about ‘globe-trotters’29 in those days, when the P. & O. fleet30 was

15. used to lock herself: close herself (si chiudeva a chiave).
16. constitutionals: regular walks you do to keep healthy
(passeggiate).
17. dusk: the time just before it gets dark (crepuscolo).
18. breakneck: dangerous (pericolosa).
19. dozing: sleeping lightly (sonnecchiando).
20. drawing-room: room where guests are received (salotto).
21. her burden: the heavy thing she was carrying (il suo fardello).
22. shrieked: screamed (strillò).
23. jagged: with an irregular edge (frastagliato).
24. queerly: strangely (stranamente).
25. tended: taken care of (curato).
26. wipe out: here ‘completely remove’ (cancellare).
27. worshipped: here ‘adored’ (adorava).
28. as to her: about her (riguardo alla sua).
29. globe-trotters: a person who habitually travels around
the world (giramondo).
30. P. & O. fleet: ships belonging to The Peninsular and
Oriental Steamship Line, the main shipping line for
travelling to India, which became a major commercial
and passenger operator.
 young and small — and had come from Dehra Dun to hunt for plants and
butterflies among the Simla hills. No one at Simla, therefore, knew anything
about him. He fancied31 that he must have fallen over the cliff32 while reaching
out for a fern33 on a rotten34 tree-trunk, and that his coolies35 must have stolen
his baggage and fled36. He thought he would go back to Simla when he was a
little stronger. He desired no more mountaineering.
He made small haste37 to go away, and recovered his strength slowly. Lispeth
80 objected to being advised either by the Chaplain or his wife. Therefore the
latter38 spoke to the Englishman, and told him how matters stood in Lispeth’s
heart. He laughed a good deal, and said it was very pretty and romantic, but,
4 as he was engaged39 to a girl at Home, he fancied that nothing would happen.
Certainly he would behave with discretion. He did that. Still, he found it very
pleasant to talk to Lispeth, and walk with Lispeth, and say nice things to her,
UNIT 5. THE AGE OF INDUSTRIALISATION

and call her pet names40 while he was getting strong enough to go away. It
meant nothing at all to him, and everything in the world to Lispeth. She was
very happy while the fortnight lasted, because she had found a man to love.
Being a savage41 by birth, she took no trouble to hide her feelings, and the
90 Englishman was amused. When he went away, Lispeth walked with him, up
the Hill as far as Narkanda, very troubled and very miserable. The Chaplain’s
wife, being a good Christian and disliking anything in the shape of fuss42
or scandal — Lispeth was beyond her management entirely — had told the
Englishman to tell Lispeth that he was coming back to marry her. ‘She is
but a child, you know, and, I fear, at heart a heathen43,’ said the Chaplain’s
wife. So all the twelve miles up the hill the Englishman, with his arm around
Lispeth’s waist, was assuring the girl that he would come back and marry
her; and Lispeth made him promise over and over again. She wept on the
Narkanda Ridge till he had passed out of sight along the Muttiani path.
100 Then she dried her tears and went in to Kotgarh again, and said to the
Chaplain’s wife, ‘He will come back and marry me. He has gone to his own
people to tell them so.’ And the Chaplain’s wife soothed44 Lispeth and said,
‘He will come back.’ At the end of two months, Lispeth grew impatient, and
was told that the Englishman had gone over the seas to England. She knew
where England was, because she had read little geography primers; but, of
course, she had no conception of the nature of the sea, being a Hill-girl. There
was an old puzzle-map of the World in the house. Lispeth had played with it
when she was a child. She unearthed it again, and put it together of evenings,
and cried to herself, and tried to imagine where her Englishman was. As she
110 had no ideas of distance or steamboats, her notions were somewhat wild.
It would not have made the least difference had she been perfectly correct,
for the Englishman had no intention of coming back to marry a Hill-girl. He

31. He fancied: He imagined (Supponeva che).
32. cliff: a high, perpendicular face of rock, precipice (rupe).
33. fern: a flowerless plant (felce).
34. rotten: decomposed (marcio).
35. coolies: an old-fashioned offensive term for ‘an Asian
labourer’.
36. fled: ran away (fuggirono).
37. He made small haste: He didn’t hurry (Non ebbe fretta).
38. the latter: the second (quest’ultima).
39. was engaged: he had promised to marry (era fidanzato).
40. pet names: names used to express affection (nomignoli,
vezzeggiativi).
41. savage: primitive, uncivilised person (selvaggia,
primitiva).
42. anything in the shape of fuss: any kind of trouble (fare
tanto chiasso per nulla).
43. heathen: not a Christian (pagana).
44. soothed: calmed (calmò).
 forgot all about her by the time he was butterfly-hunting in Assam. He wrote
a book on the East afterwards. Lispeth’s name did not appear.
At the end of three months, Lispeth made daily pilgrimage to Narkanda to
see if her Englishman was coming along the road. It gave her comfort, and
the Chaplain’s wife, finding her happier thought that she was getting over
her ‘barbarous and most indelicate folly’.A little later the walks ceased to help
Lispeth, and her temper grew very bad. The Chaplain’s wife thought this a
120 profitable time to let her know the real state of affairs — that the Englishman
had only promised his love to keep her quiet — that he had never meant
anything, and that it was wrong and improper of Lispeth to think of marriage
with an Englishman, who was of a superior clay45, besides being promised 5
in marriage to a girl of his own people. Lispeth said that all this was clearly
impossible because he had said he loved her, and the Chaplain’s wife had,

RUDYARD KIPLING
with her own lips, asserted that the Englishman was coming back.
‘How can what he and you said be untrue?’ asked Lispeth.
‘We said it as an excuse to keep you quiet, child,’ said the Chaplain’s wife.
‘Then you have lied to me,’ said Lispeth, ‘you and he?’
130 The Chaplain’s wife bowed46 her head, and said nothing. Lispeth was silent
too for a little time; then she went out down the valley, and returned in the
dress of a Hill-girl — infamously47 dirty, but without the nose-stud48 and ear-
rings. She had her hair braided into the long pigtail49, helped out with black
thread50, that Hill-women wear.
‘I am going back to my own people,’ said she. ‘You have killed Lispeth.There
is only left old Jadéh’s daughter — the daughter of a pahari and the servant of
Tarka Devi51. You are all liars, you English.’
By the time that the Chaplain’s wife had recovered from the shock of the
announcement that Lispeth had ’verted52 to her mother’s Gods the girl had
140 gone; and she never came back.
She took to her own unclean people savagely, as if to make up the arrears53
of the life she had stepped out of; and, in a little time, she married a wood-
cutter who beat her after the manner of paharis, and her beauty faded54 soon.
‘There is no law whereby you can account for the vagaries55 of the heathen,’
said the Chaplain’s wife, ‘and I believe that Lispeth was always at heart an
infidel.’ Seeing she had been taken into the Church of England at the mature
age of five weeks, this statement does not do credit to the Chaplain’s wife.
Lispeth was a very old woman when she died. She always had a perfect
command of English, and when she was sufficiently drunk could sometimes
150 be induced to tell the story of her first love-affair.
It was hard then to realize that the bleared56,wrinkled57 creature,exactly like
a wisp of charred rag58, could ever have been ‘Lispeth of the Kotgarh Mission’.

45. clay: here ‘material’ (stoffa). 52. ’verted: converted.

46. bowed: lowered (abbassò).
47. infamously: here ‘terribly’ (estremamente).
48. nose-stud: circular piece for nasal septum piercing
(dischetto per piercing al setto nasale).
49. braided into the long pigtail: a hairstyle (con delle trecce
raccolte in una coda di cavallo).
50. thread: fine cord (filo).
51. Tarka Devi: the goddess of the Dawn (la dèa dell’alba).
53. to make up the arrears: to compensate for the lost
years (per compensare gli anni persi).
54. faded: disappeared (appassì, svanì).
55. vagaries: extravagant or erratic actions (capricci).
56. bleared: with dim eyes (con la vista annebbiata).
57. wrinkled: marked by age lines (rugosa).
58. a wisp of charred rag: a fragment of burnt cloth
(un frammento di straccio carbonizzato).
 UNDERSTAND CONTENT Put the main events of the story in the correct order, 1-16.
4
☐ a. After more than three months, the Chaplain’s wife tells Lispeth the man is not coming
back.
☐ b. Lispeth becomes the Chaplain’s wife’s servant/companion.
☐ c. Lispeth goes out for a long walk.
☐ d. Lispeth grows into a very beautiful young woman.
☐ e. Lispeth has fallen in love at first sight and declares that she is going to marry the young
man.
☐ f. Lispeth is angry at having been lied to and goes back to her own people.
☐1 g. Lispeth is baptised a Christian.
6 ☐ h. Lispeth is rejected by her own people because she has become too much like a white
woman.
☐ i. Lispeth is very sad but the Chaplain’s wife reassures her he will come back.
UNIT 5. THE AGE OF INDUSTRIALISATION

☐
16 j. Lispeth marries a violent man and loses her beauty. She turns to drink and grows old, still
remembering the young man she loved.
☐ k. Lispeth returns carrying a young man.
☐ l. Lispeth shows the young man how much she loves him and he enjoys flirting with her.
☐ m. Lispeth’s mother and father die of cholera.
☐ n. The Chaplain’s wife tells the young man about Lispeth’s feelings for him and learns he is
already engaged ‘at home’, in Britain.
☐ o. The young man leaves, falsely promising to come back to marry Lispeth. The Chaplain’s
wife aids him in this deceit.
☐ p. The young man slowly recovers from his injuries.

ANALYSE STORY STRUCTURE

5
A. Which events are part of the introduction, the development and the conclusion of the story?
B. Which are the two key events which trigger crucial changes in Lispeth’s life? When do they
occur?
C. In which parts of the story is fictional time expanded and in which is it contracted? Why does
the author do this?

EXAMINE NARRATIVE TECHNIQUE AND NARRATOR'S TONE

6
A. What kind of narrator does the story have? Circle the appropriate words and phrases.
a. first person / third person
b. omniscient / non-omniscient
c. obtrusive / non-obtrusive
d. with a partial / an impartial point of view
B. Read the following extracts from the story and decide if the narrator’s tone is straightforward
or ironic.

Whether Christianity improved Lispeth, or whether the gods of her own people would have
done as much for her under any circumstances, I do not know; but she grew very lovely.
She did not walk in the manner of English ladies — a mile and a half out, and a ride back again.
She covered between twenty and thirty miles in her little constitutionals, all about and about,
between Kotgarh and Narkunda.
It takes a great deal of Christianity to wipe out uncivilized Eastern instincts, such as falling in
love at first sight.
Certainly he would behave with discretion. He did that. Still he found it very pleasant to talk to
 Lispeth, and walk with Lispeth, and say nice things to her, and call her pet names while he was
getting strong enough to go away.
Being a savage by birth, she took no trouble to hide her feelings, and the Englishman was
amused.
The Chaplain’s wife, being a good Christian and disliking anything in the shape of fuss or
scandal […], had told the Englishman to tell Lispeth that he was coming back to marry her. “She is
but a child, you know, and, I fear, at heart a heathen,” said the Chaplain’s wife.

C. Who / What is the target of the narrator’s irony, Lispeth and her behaviour or the Chaplain’s
wife, her culture and religion?
7

DRAW CONCLUSIONS

RUDYARD KIPLING
7
Through the content of the story and its partial, obtrusive narrator and the ironic tone, the author
puts across his themes and a strong message.
Read these two paragraphs about theme and message in Lispeth and fill in the gaps.

Christian intercultural Christianity pessimism Convert prejudices cyclical reader

differences savage

Theme
Although a general theme of the short story Lispeth can be cultural . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . and the
misunderstandings that can occur when cultures clash, many of its themes go beyond specific
cultural contexts and stimulate the . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . to think about wider issues. The theme
of lying, for example, pervades the story. Lispeth is ironically described as . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . for being
incapable of being dishonest about her feelings, while the Chaplain’s wife is described as a good
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . for telling the young man to lie to Lispeth.
This latter example introduces another theme, the role of religion and, in particular, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ,
in colonial societies. This theme is explicitly introduced in the epigram at the start of the story,
quoted by ‘The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ’, and it remains a driving force behind the Chaplain’s wife’s self-
justification (as well as colonialism’s self-justification).

Message
Kipling’s message is not an optimistic one. He suggests that the . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . and standard
behaviours of the British provide insurmountable obstacles to interracial and . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
understanding. The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . nature of the story in which Lispeth returns to her original
culture after declaring “You have killed Lispeth” underlines Kipling’s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . regarding
his contemporaries and his criticism of the hypocrisies of colonial society.