Sais

THE DUTIES OF THE SAIS OR GROOM. […] Now, if the good house-mother's proudest boast is that not even "the cattle within her gate" fail to feel her kindly care, she will often find it necessary to take an active part in teaching the sais his duty, and seeing that the horses receive proper attention. […] The old plan of a sais and a grass-cutter to each horse is a thing of the past, and the number of saises or grooms should have reference merely to the amount of harnessing and out-work necessary during the day.

Not one of them [horse dealers] will venture a horse, he is about to sell, in the stables of the intended purchaser, unless attended by one of his own syces, or grooms, who both knows and is known by the animal. If the horse be very old, or naturally dull, the syce takes care to ply him with spices and other stimulants; and if vicious, opium, and other anodynes are given; so that the horse is absolutely in a state of disguise.

4th Troop 1st Brigade—3 rank and file, 1 syce, 17 horses, killed; […]

Then all trace of him was lost, until a sais met me on Simla Mall with this extraordinary note:— […]

But apart from the story of the havildar, my own syce, a hillman who attends my pony, has actually seen two ghosts, with one of whom he held a long conversation.

Dinner, dinner, dinner … but when he returned to the house for it, Mahmoud Ali had drifted away in his turn, to speak to his sais.

The horse also, as if it had its own premonitions, refused to get on to those rickety planks, though the rest of the party had negotiated them safely. The sais (horse attendant), who had no such anxieties, crossed ahead of us and struggled for some minutes to drag the poor frightened animal, with myself on its back, across the chasm.

What is this wonderful job you have, to throw away your education for? Instructor is it? You're a syce in a stableyard! Is this all you care for all that I've done for you?