NCERT Textbook: A Pair of Mustachios | Class 11 English Woven Words - Humanities/Arts PDF Download

 Page 1


10 Woven Words
A Pair of Mustachios
Mulk Raj Anand
F F F F F Guess the meaning of these expressions from the context
nouveau riche commercial bourgeoise
blue blood the bluff of a rascal
asked sourly goods and chattels
There are various kinds of mustachios worn in my country
to mark the boundaries between the various classes of
people. Outsiders may think it stupid to lay down, or rather
to raise, lines of demarcation of this kind, but we are
notorious in the whole world for sticking to our queer old
conventions, prides and prejudices, even as the Chinese or
the Americans or, for that matter, the English… And, at
any rate, some people may think it easier and more
convenient to wear permanent boundary-lines, like
mustachios, which only need a smear of grease to keep
them bright and shiny, rather than to wear frock coats,
striped trousers and top hats, which constantly need to be
laundered and dry-cleaned, and the maintenance of which
is already leading to the bankruptcy of the European ruling
classes. With them clothes make the man but, to us,
mustachios make the man. So we prefer the various styles
of mustachios to mark the differences between the classes.
And very unique and poetical symbols they are too.
For instance, there is the famous lion moustache, the
fearsome upstanding symbol of that great order of
resplendent rajas, maharajas, nawabs and English army
generals who are so well known for their devotion to the
King Emperor. Then there is the tiger moustache, the
uncanny, several-pointed moustache worn by the
unbending, unchanging survivals from the ranks of the
2024-25
Page 2


10 Woven Words
A Pair of Mustachios
Mulk Raj Anand
F F F F F Guess the meaning of these expressions from the context
nouveau riche commercial bourgeoise
blue blood the bluff of a rascal
asked sourly goods and chattels
There are various kinds of mustachios worn in my country
to mark the boundaries between the various classes of
people. Outsiders may think it stupid to lay down, or rather
to raise, lines of demarcation of this kind, but we are
notorious in the whole world for sticking to our queer old
conventions, prides and prejudices, even as the Chinese or
the Americans or, for that matter, the English… And, at
any rate, some people may think it easier and more
convenient to wear permanent boundary-lines, like
mustachios, which only need a smear of grease to keep
them bright and shiny, rather than to wear frock coats,
striped trousers and top hats, which constantly need to be
laundered and dry-cleaned, and the maintenance of which
is already leading to the bankruptcy of the European ruling
classes. With them clothes make the man but, to us,
mustachios make the man. So we prefer the various styles
of mustachios to mark the differences between the classes.
And very unique and poetical symbols they are too.
For instance, there is the famous lion moustache, the
fearsome upstanding symbol of that great order of
resplendent rajas, maharajas, nawabs and English army
generals who are so well known for their devotion to the
King Emperor. Then there is the tiger moustache, the
uncanny, several-pointed moustache worn by the
unbending, unchanging survivals from the ranks of the
2024-25
A Pair of Mustachios 11
feudal gentry who have nothing left but pride in their
greatness and a few mementoes of past glory, scrolls of
honour granted by the former emperors, a few gold trinkets,
heirlooms and bits of land. Next there is the goat
moustache—a rather unsure brand, worn by the nouveau
riche, the new commercial bourgeoisie and the shopkeeper
class who somehow don’t belong—an indifferent, thin little
line of a moustache, worn so that its tips can be turned up
or down as the occasion demands—a show of power to some
coolie or humility to a prosperous client. There is the Charlie
Chaplin moustache worn by the lower middle class, by
clerks and professional men, a kind of half-and-half affair,
deliberately designed as a compromise between the
traditional full moustache and the clean-shaven Curzon
cut of the sahibs like them to keep mustachios at all. There
is the sheep moustache of the coolies and the lower orders,
the mouse moustache of the peasants, and so on.
In fact, there are endless styles of mustachios, all
appropriate to the wearers and indicative of the various
orders, as rigorously adhered to as if they had all been
patented by the Government of India or had been sanctioned
by special appointment with His Majesty, the King, or Her
Majesty, the Queen. And any poaching on the style of one
class by members of another is resented, and the rising
ratio of murders in my country is interpreted by certain
authorities as being indicative of the increasing jealousy
with which each class is guarding its rights and privileges
in regard to the mark of the mustachio.
Of course, the analysis of the expert is rather too
abstract and not all the murders can be traced to this
cause but, certainly, it is true that the preferences of the
people in regard to their mustachios are causing a lot of
trouble in our parts.
For instance, there was a rumpus in my own village
the other day about a pair of mustachios.
It so happened that Seth Ramanand, the grocer and
moneylender, who had been doing well out of the recent
fall in the price of wheat by buying up whole crops cheap
from the hard-pressed peasants and then selling them at
higher prices, took it into his head to twist the goat
2024-25
Page 3


10 Woven Words
A Pair of Mustachios
Mulk Raj Anand
F F F F F Guess the meaning of these expressions from the context
nouveau riche commercial bourgeoise
blue blood the bluff of a rascal
asked sourly goods and chattels
There are various kinds of mustachios worn in my country
to mark the boundaries between the various classes of
people. Outsiders may think it stupid to lay down, or rather
to raise, lines of demarcation of this kind, but we are
notorious in the whole world for sticking to our queer old
conventions, prides and prejudices, even as the Chinese or
the Americans or, for that matter, the English… And, at
any rate, some people may think it easier and more
convenient to wear permanent boundary-lines, like
mustachios, which only need a smear of grease to keep
them bright and shiny, rather than to wear frock coats,
striped trousers and top hats, which constantly need to be
laundered and dry-cleaned, and the maintenance of which
is already leading to the bankruptcy of the European ruling
classes. With them clothes make the man but, to us,
mustachios make the man. So we prefer the various styles
of mustachios to mark the differences between the classes.
And very unique and poetical symbols they are too.
For instance, there is the famous lion moustache, the
fearsome upstanding symbol of that great order of
resplendent rajas, maharajas, nawabs and English army
generals who are so well known for their devotion to the
King Emperor. Then there is the tiger moustache, the
uncanny, several-pointed moustache worn by the
unbending, unchanging survivals from the ranks of the
2024-25
A Pair of Mustachios 11
feudal gentry who have nothing left but pride in their
greatness and a few mementoes of past glory, scrolls of
honour granted by the former emperors, a few gold trinkets,
heirlooms and bits of land. Next there is the goat
moustache—a rather unsure brand, worn by the nouveau
riche, the new commercial bourgeoisie and the shopkeeper
class who somehow don’t belong—an indifferent, thin little
line of a moustache, worn so that its tips can be turned up
or down as the occasion demands—a show of power to some
coolie or humility to a prosperous client. There is the Charlie
Chaplin moustache worn by the lower middle class, by
clerks and professional men, a kind of half-and-half affair,
deliberately designed as a compromise between the
traditional full moustache and the clean-shaven Curzon
cut of the sahibs like them to keep mustachios at all. There
is the sheep moustache of the coolies and the lower orders,
the mouse moustache of the peasants, and so on.
In fact, there are endless styles of mustachios, all
appropriate to the wearers and indicative of the various
orders, as rigorously adhered to as if they had all been
patented by the Government of India or had been sanctioned
by special appointment with His Majesty, the King, or Her
Majesty, the Queen. And any poaching on the style of one
class by members of another is resented, and the rising
ratio of murders in my country is interpreted by certain
authorities as being indicative of the increasing jealousy
with which each class is guarding its rights and privileges
in regard to the mark of the mustachio.
Of course, the analysis of the expert is rather too
abstract and not all the murders can be traced to this
cause but, certainly, it is true that the preferences of the
people in regard to their mustachios are causing a lot of
trouble in our parts.
For instance, there was a rumpus in my own village
the other day about a pair of mustachios.
It so happened that Seth Ramanand, the grocer and
moneylender, who had been doing well out of the recent
fall in the price of wheat by buying up whole crops cheap
from the hard-pressed peasants and then selling them at
higher prices, took it into his head to twist the goat
2024-25
12 Woven Words
moustache, integral to his order and position in society, at
the tips, so that it looked nearly like a tiger moustache.
Nobody seemed to mind very much because most of
the mouse-moustached peasants in our village are beholden
to the local moneylender, either because they owe him
interest on a loan, or an instalment on a mortgage of
jewellery or land. Besides, the Seth had been careful enough
to twist his moustache so that it seemed nearly, though
not quite, like a tiger moustache.
But there lives in the vicinity of our village, in an old
dilapidated Moghul style house, a mussulman named Khan
Azam Khan, who claims descent from an ancient Afghan
family whose heads were noblemen and councillors in the
court of the great Moghuls. Khan Azam Khan, a tall, middle-
aged man, is a handsome and dignified person, and he
wears a tiger moustache and remains adorned with the
faded remnants of a gold-brocaded waistcoat, though he
hasn’t even a patch of land left.
Some people, notably the landlord of our village and
the moneylender, maliciously say that he is an impostor,
and that all his talk about his blue blood is merely the
bluff of a rascal. Others, like the priest of the temple,
concede that his ancestors were certainly attached to the
Court of the Great Moghuls, but as sweepers. The landlord,
the moneylender and the priest are manifestly jealous of
anyone’s long ancestry, however, because they have all risen
from nothing—and it is obvious from the stately ruins
around Khan Azam Khan what grace was once his and his
forefathers. Only Khan Azam Khan’s pride is greatly in
excess of his present possessions and he is inordinately
jealous of his old privileges and rather foolish and
headstrong in safeguarding every sacred brick of his
tottering house against vandalism.
Khan Azam Khan happened to go to the moneylender’s
shop to pawn his wife’s gold nose-ring one morning and he
noticed the upturning tendency of the hair on Ramanand’s
upper lip which made the moneylender’s goat moustache
look almost like his own tiger moustache.
‘Since when have the lentil-eating shopkeepers become
noblemen?’ he asked sourly.
2024-25
Page 4


10 Woven Words
A Pair of Mustachios
Mulk Raj Anand
F F F F F Guess the meaning of these expressions from the context
nouveau riche commercial bourgeoise
blue blood the bluff of a rascal
asked sourly goods and chattels
There are various kinds of mustachios worn in my country
to mark the boundaries between the various classes of
people. Outsiders may think it stupid to lay down, or rather
to raise, lines of demarcation of this kind, but we are
notorious in the whole world for sticking to our queer old
conventions, prides and prejudices, even as the Chinese or
the Americans or, for that matter, the English… And, at
any rate, some people may think it easier and more
convenient to wear permanent boundary-lines, like
mustachios, which only need a smear of grease to keep
them bright and shiny, rather than to wear frock coats,
striped trousers and top hats, which constantly need to be
laundered and dry-cleaned, and the maintenance of which
is already leading to the bankruptcy of the European ruling
classes. With them clothes make the man but, to us,
mustachios make the man. So we prefer the various styles
of mustachios to mark the differences between the classes.
And very unique and poetical symbols they are too.
For instance, there is the famous lion moustache, the
fearsome upstanding symbol of that great order of
resplendent rajas, maharajas, nawabs and English army
generals who are so well known for their devotion to the
King Emperor. Then there is the tiger moustache, the
uncanny, several-pointed moustache worn by the
unbending, unchanging survivals from the ranks of the
2024-25
A Pair of Mustachios 11
feudal gentry who have nothing left but pride in their
greatness and a few mementoes of past glory, scrolls of
honour granted by the former emperors, a few gold trinkets,
heirlooms and bits of land. Next there is the goat
moustache—a rather unsure brand, worn by the nouveau
riche, the new commercial bourgeoisie and the shopkeeper
class who somehow don’t belong—an indifferent, thin little
line of a moustache, worn so that its tips can be turned up
or down as the occasion demands—a show of power to some
coolie or humility to a prosperous client. There is the Charlie
Chaplin moustache worn by the lower middle class, by
clerks and professional men, a kind of half-and-half affair,
deliberately designed as a compromise between the
traditional full moustache and the clean-shaven Curzon
cut of the sahibs like them to keep mustachios at all. There
is the sheep moustache of the coolies and the lower orders,
the mouse moustache of the peasants, and so on.
In fact, there are endless styles of mustachios, all
appropriate to the wearers and indicative of the various
orders, as rigorously adhered to as if they had all been
patented by the Government of India or had been sanctioned
by special appointment with His Majesty, the King, or Her
Majesty, the Queen. And any poaching on the style of one
class by members of another is resented, and the rising
ratio of murders in my country is interpreted by certain
authorities as being indicative of the increasing jealousy
with which each class is guarding its rights and privileges
in regard to the mark of the mustachio.
Of course, the analysis of the expert is rather too
abstract and not all the murders can be traced to this
cause but, certainly, it is true that the preferences of the
people in regard to their mustachios are causing a lot of
trouble in our parts.
For instance, there was a rumpus in my own village
the other day about a pair of mustachios.
It so happened that Seth Ramanand, the grocer and
moneylender, who had been doing well out of the recent
fall in the price of wheat by buying up whole crops cheap
from the hard-pressed peasants and then selling them at
higher prices, took it into his head to twist the goat
2024-25
12 Woven Words
moustache, integral to his order and position in society, at
the tips, so that it looked nearly like a tiger moustache.
Nobody seemed to mind very much because most of
the mouse-moustached peasants in our village are beholden
to the local moneylender, either because they owe him
interest on a loan, or an instalment on a mortgage of
jewellery or land. Besides, the Seth had been careful enough
to twist his moustache so that it seemed nearly, though
not quite, like a tiger moustache.
But there lives in the vicinity of our village, in an old
dilapidated Moghul style house, a mussulman named Khan
Azam Khan, who claims descent from an ancient Afghan
family whose heads were noblemen and councillors in the
court of the great Moghuls. Khan Azam Khan, a tall, middle-
aged man, is a handsome and dignified person, and he
wears a tiger moustache and remains adorned with the
faded remnants of a gold-brocaded waistcoat, though he
hasn’t even a patch of land left.
Some people, notably the landlord of our village and
the moneylender, maliciously say that he is an impostor,
and that all his talk about his blue blood is merely the
bluff of a rascal. Others, like the priest of the temple,
concede that his ancestors were certainly attached to the
Court of the Great Moghuls, but as sweepers. The landlord,
the moneylender and the priest are manifestly jealous of
anyone’s long ancestry, however, because they have all risen
from nothing—and it is obvious from the stately ruins
around Khan Azam Khan what grace was once his and his
forefathers. Only Khan Azam Khan’s pride is greatly in
excess of his present possessions and he is inordinately
jealous of his old privileges and rather foolish and
headstrong in safeguarding every sacred brick of his
tottering house against vandalism.
Khan Azam Khan happened to go to the moneylender’s
shop to pawn his wife’s gold nose-ring one morning and he
noticed the upturning tendency of the hair on Ramanand’s
upper lip which made the moneylender’s goat moustache
look almost like his own tiger moustache.
‘Since when have the lentil-eating shopkeepers become
noblemen?’ he asked sourly.
2024-25
A Pair of Mustachios 13
‘I don’t know what you mean, Khan’, Ramanand
answered.
‘You know  what I mean, seed of a donkey!’ said the
Khan. Look at the way you have turned the tips of your
moustache upwards. It almost looks like my tiger
moustache. Turn the tips down to the style proper to the
goat that you are! Fancy the airs of people nowadays!’
‘Oh, Khan, don’t get so excited,’ said the moneylender,
who was nothing if he was not amenable, having built up
his business on the maxim that the customer is always
right.
‘I tell you, turn the tip of your moustache down if you
value your life!’ raged Khan Azam Khan.
‘If that is all the trouble, here you are’, said Ramanand,
brushing one end of his moustache with his oily hand so
that it dropped like a dead fly. ‘Come, show me the trinkets.
How much do you want for them?’
Now that Khan Azam Khan’s pride was appeased, he
was like soft wax in the merchant’s sure hand. His need,
and the need of his family, for food, was great and he humbly
accepted the value which the moneylender put on his wife’s
nose-ring.
But as he was departing, after negotiating his business,
he noticed that though one end of the moneylender’s moustache
had come down at his behest, the other end was still up.
2024-25
Page 5


10 Woven Words
A Pair of Mustachios
Mulk Raj Anand
F F F F F Guess the meaning of these expressions from the context
nouveau riche commercial bourgeoise
blue blood the bluff of a rascal
asked sourly goods and chattels
There are various kinds of mustachios worn in my country
to mark the boundaries between the various classes of
people. Outsiders may think it stupid to lay down, or rather
to raise, lines of demarcation of this kind, but we are
notorious in the whole world for sticking to our queer old
conventions, prides and prejudices, even as the Chinese or
the Americans or, for that matter, the English… And, at
any rate, some people may think it easier and more
convenient to wear permanent boundary-lines, like
mustachios, which only need a smear of grease to keep
them bright and shiny, rather than to wear frock coats,
striped trousers and top hats, which constantly need to be
laundered and dry-cleaned, and the maintenance of which
is already leading to the bankruptcy of the European ruling
classes. With them clothes make the man but, to us,
mustachios make the man. So we prefer the various styles
of mustachios to mark the differences between the classes.
And very unique and poetical symbols they are too.
For instance, there is the famous lion moustache, the
fearsome upstanding symbol of that great order of
resplendent rajas, maharajas, nawabs and English army
generals who are so well known for their devotion to the
King Emperor. Then there is the tiger moustache, the
uncanny, several-pointed moustache worn by the
unbending, unchanging survivals from the ranks of the
2024-25
A Pair of Mustachios 11
feudal gentry who have nothing left but pride in their
greatness and a few mementoes of past glory, scrolls of
honour granted by the former emperors, a few gold trinkets,
heirlooms and bits of land. Next there is the goat
moustache—a rather unsure brand, worn by the nouveau
riche, the new commercial bourgeoisie and the shopkeeper
class who somehow don’t belong—an indifferent, thin little
line of a moustache, worn so that its tips can be turned up
or down as the occasion demands—a show of power to some
coolie or humility to a prosperous client. There is the Charlie
Chaplin moustache worn by the lower middle class, by
clerks and professional men, a kind of half-and-half affair,
deliberately designed as a compromise between the
traditional full moustache and the clean-shaven Curzon
cut of the sahibs like them to keep mustachios at all. There
is the sheep moustache of the coolies and the lower orders,
the mouse moustache of the peasants, and so on.
In fact, there are endless styles of mustachios, all
appropriate to the wearers and indicative of the various
orders, as rigorously adhered to as if they had all been
patented by the Government of India or had been sanctioned
by special appointment with His Majesty, the King, or Her
Majesty, the Queen. And any poaching on the style of one
class by members of another is resented, and the rising
ratio of murders in my country is interpreted by certain
authorities as being indicative of the increasing jealousy
with which each class is guarding its rights and privileges
in regard to the mark of the mustachio.
Of course, the analysis of the expert is rather too
abstract and not all the murders can be traced to this
cause but, certainly, it is true that the preferences of the
people in regard to their mustachios are causing a lot of
trouble in our parts.
For instance, there was a rumpus in my own village
the other day about a pair of mustachios.
It so happened that Seth Ramanand, the grocer and
moneylender, who had been doing well out of the recent
fall in the price of wheat by buying up whole crops cheap
from the hard-pressed peasants and then selling them at
higher prices, took it into his head to twist the goat
2024-25
12 Woven Words
moustache, integral to his order and position in society, at
the tips, so that it looked nearly like a tiger moustache.
Nobody seemed to mind very much because most of
the mouse-moustached peasants in our village are beholden
to the local moneylender, either because they owe him
interest on a loan, or an instalment on a mortgage of
jewellery or land. Besides, the Seth had been careful enough
to twist his moustache so that it seemed nearly, though
not quite, like a tiger moustache.
But there lives in the vicinity of our village, in an old
dilapidated Moghul style house, a mussulman named Khan
Azam Khan, who claims descent from an ancient Afghan
family whose heads were noblemen and councillors in the
court of the great Moghuls. Khan Azam Khan, a tall, middle-
aged man, is a handsome and dignified person, and he
wears a tiger moustache and remains adorned with the
faded remnants of a gold-brocaded waistcoat, though he
hasn’t even a patch of land left.
Some people, notably the landlord of our village and
the moneylender, maliciously say that he is an impostor,
and that all his talk about his blue blood is merely the
bluff of a rascal. Others, like the priest of the temple,
concede that his ancestors were certainly attached to the
Court of the Great Moghuls, but as sweepers. The landlord,
the moneylender and the priest are manifestly jealous of
anyone’s long ancestry, however, because they have all risen
from nothing—and it is obvious from the stately ruins
around Khan Azam Khan what grace was once his and his
forefathers. Only Khan Azam Khan’s pride is greatly in
excess of his present possessions and he is inordinately
jealous of his old privileges and rather foolish and
headstrong in safeguarding every sacred brick of his
tottering house against vandalism.
Khan Azam Khan happened to go to the moneylender’s
shop to pawn his wife’s gold nose-ring one morning and he
noticed the upturning tendency of the hair on Ramanand’s
upper lip which made the moneylender’s goat moustache
look almost like his own tiger moustache.
‘Since when have the lentil-eating shopkeepers become
noblemen?’ he asked sourly.
2024-25
A Pair of Mustachios 13
‘I don’t know what you mean, Khan’, Ramanand
answered.
‘You know  what I mean, seed of a donkey!’ said the
Khan. Look at the way you have turned the tips of your
moustache upwards. It almost looks like my tiger
moustache. Turn the tips down to the style proper to the
goat that you are! Fancy the airs of people nowadays!’
‘Oh, Khan, don’t get so excited,’ said the moneylender,
who was nothing if he was not amenable, having built up
his business on the maxim that the customer is always
right.
‘I tell you, turn the tip of your moustache down if you
value your life!’ raged Khan Azam Khan.
‘If that is all the trouble, here you are’, said Ramanand,
brushing one end of his moustache with his oily hand so
that it dropped like a dead fly. ‘Come, show me the trinkets.
How much do you want for them?’
Now that Khan Azam Khan’s pride was appeased, he
was like soft wax in the merchant’s sure hand. His need,
and the need of his family, for food, was great and he humbly
accepted the value which the moneylender put on his wife’s
nose-ring.
But as he was departing, after negotiating his business,
he noticed that though one end of the moneylender’s moustache
had come down at his behest, the other end was still up.
2024-25
14 Woven Words
‘A strange trick you have played on me, you swine,’ the
Khan said.
‘I have paid you the best value for your trinket, Khan,
that any moneylender will pay in these parts,’ he said,
‘especially in these days when the sarkars of the whole
world are threatening to go off the gold standard.’
‘It has nothing to do with the trinket,’ said Azam Khan,
‘but one end of your moustache is still up like my tiger
moustache though you have brought down the other to
your proper goat’s style. Bring that other end down also so
that there is no aping by your moustache of mine.’
‘Now Khan,’ said the moneylender, ‘I humbled myself
because you are doing business with me. You can’t expect
me to become a mere worm just because you have pawned
a trinket with me. If you were pledging some more expensive
jewellery I might consider obliging you a little more. Anyhow,
my humble milk-skimmer doesn’t look a bit like your valiant
tiger moustache.’
‘Bring that tip down!’ Khan Azam Khan roared, for, the
more he had looked at the moneylender’s moustache the
more the still upturned tip seemed to him like an effort at
an imitation of his own.
‘Now, be sensible, Khan,’ the moneylender said, waving
his hand with an imperturbable calm.
‘I tell you, turn that tip down or I shall wring your
neck,’ said the Khan.
‘All right, the next time you come to do business with
me, I shall bring that tip down,’ answered the moneylender
cunningly.
‘That is fair,’ said Chaudhary Chottu Ram, the landlord
of the village, who was sitting under the tree opposite.
‘To be sure! To be sure!’ some peasants chimed in
sheepishly.
Khan Azam Khan managed to control his murderous
impulses and walked away. But he could not quell his
pride, the pride of generations of his ancestors who had
worn the tiger moustache as a mark of their high position.
To see the symbol of his honour imitated by a
moneylender—this was too much for him. He went home
and fetched a necklace which had come down to his family
2024-25