This does not seem like a fancy Indus river steamer. It is after the heyday of the Indus steamer business that actually never really displaced the boatmen's traffic along the Indus and other river systems in Punjab, UP and Sindh.
There are few intimations of relations between Europeans and Indians on postcards – or other media for that matter – making this postcard a startling exception. “Stay quiet about it,” says the sweeper in Hindu-Urdu. “Sure,” replies the soldier.
Hobson Jobson (1903) the great dictionary of Indian words in English, defines "Dhoby, Dobie s. A washerman; H. dhobi [from dhona, Skt. [Sanskrit] dhav, 'to wash.'] In colloquial Anglo-Indian use all over India. A common H. [Hindustani] proverb runs:
A 1945 calendar postcard by the Anglo-Indian animator and cartoonist Merton Lacey featuring Allied troops in India fighting the Japanese in Indo-China during World War II.
![[Lord and Lady Curzon, Kashmir Gate]](https://www.paperjewels.org/sites/default/files/styles/square_thumbnail/public/slides/darbar-1903_0.jpg?itok=DLBIllxC "[Lord and Lady Curzon, Kashmir Gate]")
[Original pre-printed caption] King Edward was today proclaimed Emperor of India. Lord Curzon, whose photograph and that of his wife are shown here, represented the King.
![Phatani [Pathan] Dancing Girls](https://www.paperjewels.org/sites/default/files/styles/square_thumbnail/public/slides/pathan-dancers_0.jpg?itok=brZPDF7- "Phatani [Pathan] Dancing Girls")
An annual tradition in Peshawar in the early part of the 20th century and probably well beforehand, Peshwar's nautch women would dance through the streets watched and cheered by thousands of onlookers.
Illustrated postcards actually came to Mumbai at an inauspicious moment.
The word "Pariah" owes its origin to the Pariah caste of the Hindu society of India.
Moorli Dhur & Sons, at Ambala, a railway junction 130 miles away from Lahore, dominated the Punjab postcard market by 1910. Perhaps because of its distribution clout, it published a humorous series on different aspects of life for colonial foot
These kinds of offensive postcards seem to have been part of series by both Higginbotham's and their main competitor in South India, Spencer & Co.
