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Photography in museums

May I suggest you read the following Wikipedia rules and advice about museum photography?:

• Museum and interior photography
• Museum photography

Cheers, पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 11:08, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

That is nonsense, added by one user in two edits of 2008: first and second. How do they become legal just because one Wikipedian has written them? Where is the proof? I will soon put a dubious tag on that rule. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:26, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Sarnath is not just a museum, but also a site museum, a historic place. We can't break the rules. On a tour of the Vatican we can't leap over a barrier and take a picture of the Pope eating lunch and put it on Wikipedia. I will put a disputed tag on that Wikipedia rule. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:49, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

For you information, it seems photography in the Museum has been allowed for some time now [1] I think it might be a consequence of this.पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 11:59, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Not for some time, but only very recently, if it has; ASI has not lifted it for all sites. I was in Sarnath in 1987 or 88 and again in 2017. It was not allowed then. The picture you are spamming was taken in 1991 it claims and uploaded in 2011. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:10, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

If you read what I have posted, you will see that the new rules probably came into effect in July 2018, and the only exceptions are the Taj Mahal, the Ajanta caves and Leh Palace in Jammu and Kashmir (also). As for the 2011 photograph, it is fully covered by Wikipedia Commons rules regarding museum house rules (provided above). You are free to try to challenge these rules, but AFAIK, this has been a 12-year-long standing rule on Commons. In the meantime of course, you are supposed to respect the rules. पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 12:20, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Strongly agree with Pat, and the policies, on this. If the image does show a model somewhere else, that's a different matter, but I don't think that's the case. The railing shows it's not "small", in normal terms. Btw my own "illegal" (and very poor) photos of the Tara Brooch have been the best on WP, and indeed the internet, for many years. They were rebuilding & had it in a small sideroom, where I found only the display case and an American with a large camera and tripod. Imo, when they put things on stamps and banknotes, not to mention the national flag, they should release a decent free pic. Johnbod (talk) 12:49, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

I respect your opinion, Johnbod, but where is a solid source that says this is legal? Some Wikipedian added it many years ago. I don't see a source. All I have seen on the web are opinions. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:07, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

There will be one somewhere - it is US law that applies here. In English law, taking such a photo comes under the law of trespass rather than anything to do with copyright (for an old object), and once you are out of the building there is nothing they can do. Note that most of our photos of Italian cultural heritage breach their crazy and totally unenforced laws on the subject, which Commons long age decided to ignore. Johnbod (talk) 13:23, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

You have a long history of spamming dubious images on WP, not to mention sockpuppetry foor all of which you have excuses. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:30, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Have a good day, Fowler&fowler. पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 12:31, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Kurta

No no I'm not done with you, @पाटलिपुत्र: You have already been warned twice, once for writing "an actual Indian" on Talk:India, you were served with an ARBIPA notice on your talk page. Please tell us what you meant by "an actual Indian?" The model in question is our son. The kurta is from Lucknow. What do you mean by personality rights warnings? He is an adult now. Would you like to see a consent form? You write India is a Hindu majority country and that a church should not be in a picture. Another admin has said that could be sanctionable. Please tell us where that is written in the Constitution of India or WP Country rules that we should only show Hindu shrines. Look at your own record of copying and pasting, relentlessly, on Wikipedia. You have confused a little model of the Sarnath capital in the National Museum in Delhi with the actual capital in Sarnath where photography is not allowed, and as usual, you are spanning an illegal picture of that on Wikipedia. Please read and reread: Talk:Neolithic#PLOS_citation_and_image_spamming and read the comments of Johnbod, Drmies, and AD Monroe III about your handiwork. You've been investigated for sockpuppetry. You have three sockpuppets: User:Beads and reels, User:Priyadasi and User:Tillya Tepe gold; there are two more User:神风, User:Tahar Jelun are also your accounts by your own admission (see here) which you wanted to be removed. Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/पाटलिपुत्र/Archiveand never really answered the question @Ms Sarah Welch: posed there again and again. Always trying to fly just under the radar you are. Sarah Welch said about you, "you have added, "artwork to create POV-y history in a range of articles." Enough is enough. The discussion will be in November. By the way, no one other than you is asking that question. LearnIndology stopped after he asked a number of Wikipedian; and Prolix said to me that he understood. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:34, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

So... you are adding an image of your own son in the Feature Article India, without any discussion with other editors, and you are defending it adamantly claiming this is the result of a consensus? Very impressive, Fowler&fowler. पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 12:48, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

That picture has been on WP for 13 years; it has been the main picture in the Kurta page, which I wrote. There were no illustrations available. There still are not. Please don't shunt garbage. Have you written anything? Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:51, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

@Johnbod: What do you mean by, "If the image does show a model somewhere else, that's a different matter?" Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:02, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

You said "You have confused a little model of the Sarnath capital in the National Museum in Delhi with the actual capital in Sarnath where photography is not allowed". As I say above, I doubt this is right - the railing in the photo suggests the full height of c. 7 ft. Johnbod (talk) 13:26, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

That was in reference to another picture: File:Sarnath pillar capital of Ashoka.jpg, which is in the National Museum in New Delhi, much smaller, and displayed against a wall; you can see the shadows. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:38, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Ok sure - if you are pretty certain you should add this to the Commons file. Johnbod (talk) 13:40, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Well, it says in the Flickr file that Pat has referenced for his upload. Will correct on Commons. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:48, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Your recent editing history shows that you are currently engaged in an edit war; that means that you are repeatedly changing content back to how you think it should be, when you have seen that other editors disagree. To resolve the content dispute, please do not revert or change the edits of others when you are reverted. Instead of reverting, please use the talk page to work toward making a version that represents consensus among editors. The best practice at this stage is to discuss, not edit-war. See the bold, revert, discuss cycle for how this is done. If discussions reach an impasse, you can then post a request for help at a relevant noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases, you may wish to request temporary page protection.

Being involved in an edit war can result in you being blocked from editing—especially if you violate the three-revert rule, which states that an editor must not perform more than three reverts on a single page within a 24-hour period. Undoing another editor's work—whether in whole or in part, whether involving the same or different material each time—counts as a revert. Also keep in mind that while violating the three-revert rule often leads to a block, you can still be blocked for edit warring—even if you do not violate the three-revert rule—should your behavior indicate that you intend to continue reverting repeatedly. पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 13:18, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Yeah yeah yeah. Wait till I pick apart all the nonsense you have added in Mauryan empire, Mauryan art, Ashoka, etc. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:25, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

You have been going against Wikipedia Commons rules by removing that image, and you have been edit warring with Johnbod [2] as well. Do not blame others for correcting your own inappropriate editing. An editor of your caliber and intelligence should be wise enough to recognize when he is in the wrong. पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 13:41, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Don't worry about me, but stop with that xenophobic ("an actual Indian") and Hindu majoritarian nonsense (the picture of the Church) you are relentlessly pursuing on Talk:India. If you continue, especially another time you mention"Hindu gargabe," which you continue to misinterpret, and for which you were already warned by an admin, I will personally take you to ANI. Believe me, ou will not have seen the "caliber and intelligence" that I will bring to bear there. So, again, stop with that nonsense on Talk:India. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:57, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

And stop making threats, that should really be beneath you. पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 14:04, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Not a threat, just the plain truth. If you continue to make xenophobic and Hindu majoritarian comments on Talk:India, I will take you to ANI. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:14, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

My comments are absolutely not xenophobic, and asking for a proper representation of Hinduism, which you have apparently been suppressing systematically in that article, is the normal thing to do when describing a country with an 80% Hindu population, like it or not. Have a good day Fowler&fowler पाटलिपुत्र Pat (talk) 14:24, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

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A kitten for you!

Boasting or not, managing articles for 13 years is praiseworthy. This kitten will help you out

Fylindfotberserk (talk) 16:54, 10 September 2020 (UTC)

@Fylindfotberserk: Thank you! Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:59, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

Manilal Dwivedi

Hi Fowler. Sorry to bother you again. I know you are super busy right now. I am waiting for your response at Manilal Dwivedi. If you could engage in it, It would be grate help for article. Thanks. --Gazal world (talk) 11:39, 15 September 2020 (UTC)

Sidney Greenbaum

Put this on my talk page but then thought maybe I should have put it on yours, not sure how it's supposed to work. Here is the relevant quote from the DNB:

"Greenbaum was a very private, intensely lonely, and in some respects tragic person, generous to his friends but awkward in female company and quite lacking in social graces. Unusually for an Orthodox Jew, he never married. He was at his best when entertaining family and colleagues. While drinking a glass of whisky and smoking a cigar he would sit in his favourite chair, talking to his guests. Towards the end of his life he suffered increasingly from ill health.

In 1990 Greenbaum resigned the Quain chair at University College following his conviction in London of a number of charges of sexual assault on young boys. He was able to continue directing the Survey of English Usage. On 28 May 1996, while delivering a lecture at Moscow University, he died of heart failure."

Do let me know if you want me to post the pdf of the whole article anywhere. Also very happy to forego anonymity in the interest of establishing bona fides if that helps.

Erithrocyte (talk) 20:31, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

@Erithrocyte: No need to forego anonymity, but please give me a few days. Please don't add the sentences back into the article. The ODNB articles are usually quite long. I will need to determine due weight in this instance even if this is true, and also find a proper hard news source. It would be surprising if this were in the ODNB but never reported in the press. So, please hold on. I will also ask some people more expert in these matters than I. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:37, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for your response. I have spoken to one of the co-authors of the DNB article this evening who confirms that: "in spite of Greenbaum having made two public court appearances, no newspaper ever reported his conviction". He further commented: "this was very typical in England in the 1990s, because there often was a desire not to rock the establishment boat and it was often seen as somewhat distasteful to discuss paedophilia". He would also be willing to be contacted about this and I can supply an email address and other contact details if needed.

Erithrocyte (talk) 20:46, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

OK, thanks @Erithrocyte: So please give me until early next week if you can. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:58, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. This is not to harass, but just to add an additional source that's just come to my attention:

Pages 408-9 of the second edition of Professor Geoffrey Alderman's book Modern British Jewry (OUP, 1998):

BEGINS Perhaps most dramatic, and sad, is the irrefutable evidence of the sexual abuse of Jewish children. Norwood Child Care has reported annual increases in the instances of child abuse brought to its attention.[1] It is true that these increases may simply reflect greater public awareness but, if so, the implication must be that the problem is of longer standing than some had optimistically supposed. It is within the orthodox communities that the problem is at its most intractable, partly because extraordinary steps are taken to conceal its existence. In 1991 a near-riot occurred in Stamford Hill, north London, after it had emerged that a sectarian orthodox family had reported to the police allegations of child abuse against two sectarian orthodox men.[2] The previous year (August 1990), the eminent scholar of the English language, and Jews’ College alumnus, Professor Sidney Greenbaum (1929 – 1996) had pleaded guilty at Hendon Magistrate’s Court to three charges of indecent assault on young boys; his elegantly crafted obituary in the Jewish Chronicle made no mention of this recorded and verifiable fact.[3]

[1] Baker, The Jewish Woman in Contemporary Society, 181.

[2] JC, 5 July 1991, 18; 2 August, 1, 5, 36; 9 August, 6; The Times, 12 August 1991, 6; JT, 15 August 1991, 6. One of the defendants was acquitted, the other was convicted of indecent assault and gaoled, but released on appeal.

[3] JC, 14 June 1996, 25. At the time of his disgrace Greenbaum held the prestigious Quain Chair of English Language & Literature at University College London. He was, it transpired, a long-time abuser, whose paedophile activities were well-known within his circle of orthodox friends in north London. In October 1996 the JC reported the case of the Reverend Anthony Dee, formerly minister to Jewish congregations in Portsmouth and Belfast, who later pleaded guilty to ten charges of indecent assault on young girls and a boy: JC, 18 Oct. 1996, 60; 24 Jan. 1997, 1-2; Belfast Newsletter, 18 Jan. 1997, 5.

Erithrocyte (talk) 21:59, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for your help and for taking the time to research this to put in the change. I understand the reasons for the meticulous care and quotation marks around the quotes from the ONDB, and it's great to have the truth up in any form. I wonder if you'd have time - and interest - in helping me work out what sources I'd need to get this in as a plain statement of fact? I'm pretty sure that I can get whatever sources would be required with a bit of time and effort and - as you may have guessed - it's something I'm personally motivated to see addressed. And I'm very aware there are victims out there who don't have the ability, emotionally or otherwise, to do this.

If you're aware of the Jimmy Saville case, you'll know how common it was at the time for both institutions and the media to be involved in cover-ups - or something similar, a sort of "let's just not talk about this" which means there are no hard news sources from the time and any discussion at all will be hard to find, but I expect I can prompt new journalistic pieces if that's what's needed, or look into finding the original court documents and getting them put online.

It occurs to me also that as the UK is now fairly committed to exposing cover-ups of historic child sexual abuse, it would be very useful for there to be an easily accessible online register of these cases that victims can point to and say: "this happened to me, it's here for anyone to see". That's not a Wikipedia issue, but something I'm intending to pursue.

Erithrocyte (talk) 18:47, 20 September 2020 (UTC)

@Erithrocyte: Thanks for you patience. I've done a pretty thorough search of the sources; I've talked to people on Wikipedia more knowledgeable about policy than I; the bottom line is that the ODNB article, of five-page length, is pretty much the only acceptable WP:RS, and that devotes one sentence to the topic.

It is remarkable that in his Times Higher Ed Supplement article of 2015 published a full decade after the ODNB entry, Geoffrey X, one of the ODNB co-authors, does not mention Greenbaum by name. Whether this was his choice or the THES's condition, I can't say, but that article is of no value to Wikipedia (for which extraordinary claims require extraordinary precision). I deeply sympathize with your concern for the victims, but I think you do understand that absent the sources, our hands are tied.

As for what is reliable in WP, I think a news report or retrospective—but not an opinion piece, blog, column or letter to the editor—in an internationally known newspaper (The Times, Guardian, Independent, Irish Times, NYTimes, ...) or special-topic supplements (such as THES or the Chronicle of Higher Education) but not a small-market newspaper or newsletter, would be a good start. I have to note though that if those sources had references, I would have seen them by now. Publicly available records of the judgments are usually no good as they are considered WP:Primary sources; the judgment has to be reported in the press, or a book, etc, to be reliable. To claim in addition that there was a cover-up would require several such sources clearly stating the same. This is the predicament here. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:32, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for your thoughts here, they're very helpful. I am pretty sure I can work on this and sort it out. It might take a year or two, but it's the sort of case that the British media really ought to be talking about, and I think I'm in a position to work to make this happen. For one thing, it continues to be very relevant and always timely to ensure the British media understand the role played by "just not really doing journalism about a distasteful subject" and "just upholding old establishment positions" has contributed to eg Greenbaum's extensive academic career being remembered 25 years after his death but not his sexual assaults. And there must be many more such cases out there.

So, watch this space. As ever, entirely willing to say who I am, but I think it'll become evident in time.

Oh, question: am I free to insert a suitable reference when I have one, or should I come and discuss that with you first?

Erithrocyte (talk) 20:06, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

Checking in

Hi — Gazal world asked me to take another look at Manilal Dwivedi. I see there’s a discussion of adding some background material about the Indian educational system at the time, and reading through it I can see the relevance, though I wonder if perhaps it’s a bit long. However, I can’t judge its accuracy and I don’t have access to the sources you cited in the article Gazal world is drawing from.

I see you’re taking a break until some time in October in order to work on some non-WP writing. Do you know if or when you might be able to return to Manilal? Gazal world has asked me to take another look, but if you think you’ll be able to get back to it in the next month or so I think that would be better for the article, otherwise I’ll be copy editing material I’m not able to judge the correctness of. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:14, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Hello @Mike Christie: Sorry I forgot as usual. OK. I'll take a look in the next few days. I might be only able to weed the garden a little, not plant anything new. Thanks for posting. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:29, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

No worries; if you think you can get to it in late October when your other obligations lighten up, that’s fine too. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:00, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

I'll take a stab at it now; otherwise, I might forget again.  :) Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:04, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

October 2020

This is regarding the happenings on Sanskrit page. The action started with your large deletion of text on the page [diff]. While I was perplexed by such a large deletion without any WP:CONSENSUS in the same sense of frustration that you expressed [talkpage], I posted the vandalism template on your user page. Sorry I was unaware about the WP:DTTR rule. Besides on a side point, what do you intend to achieve at the end state on the Sanskrit page? Is your intent of editing [diff] to delete all references of India or Indian Subcontinent or Ancient Indian Subcontinent on the Sanskrit page? If that is so what would be the position of over a dozen Indic languages which have over 70% influence from Sanskrit vocabulary, phonology, morphology, and grammar - would they in your opinion become South Asian languages and not Indic languages? Sanskrit hymns and recitals are chanted every day by millions of Indians. This hymn from Vedas has been viewed by over 40 million people [youtube]. What would happen to the faith of the millions who believe Sanskrit as their language used in rituals? I am interested to know what is your desired outcome on Sanskrit page. Jaykul72 (talk) 08:11, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Please discuss the content issues at Talk:Sanskrit. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:13, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Your map of the Kashmir Region and the boundary line between Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Kashmir

Hi, Fowler&fowler,

I was glad to see your revised version of the CIA map Kashmir Region. Will you be revising that map again anytime soon to change North-West Frontier Province to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa? If you will, you might also move the words Ladakh and (union territory) a little further to the right to place them more in the center of that territory and to better separate the words (union territory) from the name Jammu and Kashmir.

I have a question about the present territorial extent of AJK's Neelum District to which I hope you can provide an answer or, if not, perhaps direct me to someone who can. On maps that are presently available on the Internet, I have noticed two different territorial configurations for the Neelum District. The difference lies in just how far eastward that district extends. Since the map that is presently shown on the AJK government web site shows the Neelum District with a lesser eastward extent than other maps on the Internet, it raises the question as to whether the easternmost portion of that district may have been detached at some point in time and added to the Astore District of Gilgit-Baltistan. That easternmost area includes the villages Kamri, Minimarg, and Domel and the lakes Crystal Lake and Rainbow Lake. On some web sites, those five features are described as being located in the Neelum District of AJK, but on other web sites, they are, instead, described as being located in the Astore District of Gilgit-Baltistan. If the easternmost portion of the Neelum District was, in fact, detached from that district and added to the Astore District of Gilgit-Baltistan some years ago, I would very much like to know just when and why that particular change was made.

Atelerixia (talk) 06:05, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

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संस्कृतम्

त्वं हि वद - अनुस्वारस्य प्रयोगः कथं भविष्यति? — Preceding unsigned comment added by संस्कृतम् (talk • contribs) 20:49, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

Please see Dandin's example's from Apte's Dictionary. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:50, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

See also Kav. तदेतद्वाङ्कयं भूयः संस्कृतं प्राकृतं तथा । अपभ्रंशश्व मिश्रञ्चेत्याङ्गराय्र्याश्वतुर्विधम् Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:57, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

Here, in the example given by you "संस्कृतं प्राकृतं तथा", the word संस्कृतं is followed by a consonant sound प. Hence the Anuswara appears as such. That is correct (in that sentence). {Similarly, in this sentence, the word प्राकृतं is also followed by a consonant sound त. Answara symbol is used as such}. But, when the word comes alone, it should be written as संस्कृतम् (Same rule for प्राकृतम् also) only. Further, if a vowel sound follows the word, then also it should be written as a wording ending with -म् only. For example, in the sentence "संस्कृतम् अतिप्राचीना भाषा।" the word संस्कृतम् is to be written as such, since it is followed by vowel sound अ. And in the sentence "संस्कृतं भारतस्य प्राचीनतमा भाषा।" the word is written as संस्कृतं as the word is followed by a consonant भ. For better understanding, please go through the Anuswara rules of Sanskrit and the rules for using Devanagari script for writing Sanskrit. {While learning the rules, you may keep in mind that Devanagari is not only used to write Sanskrit (means, you can't apply the rules of Hindi, Marathi, Konkani etc.. as such for writing Sanskrit) and, as you know, Sanskrit is not only written in Devanagari script. [Even the name Dandin referred by you will appear as दण्डी only (i.e., in nominative form, without final -n in the word-root) when it is used in Sanskrit as a name. धन्यव्यादः -संस्कृतम् (talk) 04:12, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

It is past my bedtime, so I'll be brief. Thanks for the great explanation. I have a question though. If such are the rules, varying with whether a vowel or consonant follows, then there must be a slight difference in the pronunciation of संस्कृतं and संस्कृतम् | What is the difference? Thanks. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:40, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Yes. There are. When anuswara is followed by a consonant, its pronunciation changes slightly according to the 'varga' of the consonant. In Sanskrit, we call these categories of consonants as Vargiya Vyanjanas (classified consonants). I can't explain everything here. Please try to find out yourselves through some Svadhyaya Pustakas (self-study books). Large number of sources are available in the internet for Sanskrit Svadhyaya (self-study). We request you to correct the word to संस्कृतम् at the earliest. You are also requested to refer to कल्पद्रुमः for more details. Most of the Sanskrit-English dictionaries use only the word-root due to the large number of possible derivatives for each word in Sanskrit. (English people, who learn Sanskrit using the dictionaries with word-roots always thinks that the word-roots are the general form of the word in speech or writing. But, actually, they are not. In speech or in writing, the word-roots will not appear as such). You may find out the nominative cases of all the word-roots through some Siddharupa texts. Whatever you say, whether you agree it or not, the short name of Sanskrit Language (संस्कृतभाषा) in Sanskrit Language is संस्कृतम् only (in the nominative case). Not संस्कृत-(the word संस्कृत- is incomplete without -तः -ता or -तम्). However, in the samstapadas, it can comes as संस्कृत- as in संस्कृतगङ्गा, संस्कृतरसाः, संस्कृतभाषा). To conclude, संस्कृतम्, क्ली, (सं + कृ + क्तः।) - पाणिन्यादिकृतव्याकरणसूत्रेण उपेत उपगतो लक्षणोपेतः साधुशब्दः। संस्कृतम् इति देववाणी। संस्कृतम् अस्माकं मातृभाषा। संस्कृतं जयतु। धन्यव्यादः --संस्कृतम् (talk) 09:53, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for your post. I see the तं and तम् endings changing in light of the letter following. I can also see that the standalone should probably be तम् but I remain troubled that in the dictionary of V. S. Apte (one of the great lexicographers of Sanskrit and late professor at Ferguson College Poona) the standalone is तं, not तम् (See here: -तं Refined or highly polished language ... the Sanskrit language etc" Why do you think he has chosen तं? I am asking out of curiosity, not to disrespect your wisdom. The self-help books are unfortunately useless for Wikipedia citing purposes, though they have already helped me (for which you have my thanks). That is my dilemma here. As for the adjectival use, we are talking about a dead or extinct language, no matter what the current ideology is about its reconstruction. The earliest reference is in the Sundarkand of Valmikis Ramayan which I now reference in the lead sentence. It is Hanuman brooding and he uses "sanskritaam vaacham." Before that time (ca 500 to 100 BCE there was no reference to "sanskrit"; there is none in Panini) the standalone doesn't appear until 700–800 CE, and the native speakers are gone by 1350 CE. So the adjectival use is clearly of greater importance than the nominative historically. I have to put something there. I can put "sanskrit vaach" or some version you think is correct, but the attributive verb/adjective has precedence here historically. Please help me with what combination form to use. Tthanks for your help. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:03, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

British Raj flags

Sir my senior in charge User:NS Dibyojyoti is retired now but he told me to left you a message on the article. The raj has flag but not that red ensign flag. We could probably provide star of india and UK flag in order to secure it. So I'm edited that please see it and review it.🇮🇳DRCNSINDIA (talk) 11:43, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

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Help me

I have been trying to make changes in Udal of Mahoba, Alha and Banaphar since few days, but obviously English administrators cannot understand Hindi language, that's why I need help of any administrator who understands hindi language. So can you please help me. If you can than please see my reliable sources for making changes in Talk:Udal of Mahoba Sumit banaphar (talk) 18:29, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Stopping now

Sorry, just saw your message ... stopping now ... hope I didn't make a worse mess ... left a message on talk of one other thing that needs to be fixed (an inline citation). Bst, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:04, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

PS, don't hesitate to revert me if needed ... SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:05, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

The fault is mine. I shouldn't have left such a mess. Will clean up. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:07, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Sandy, I've fixed it I think. Today is about all I have in terms of WP work. Thanks for taking the time to notice the incredible tangle I had made. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 22:48, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

My pleasure; go enjoy your time off! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:36, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Talk:Kashmir

Hi, I learnt that you are going for a vaccation. Well enjoy your days and best of luck. But before you go, please point us to a direction at Talk:Kashmir as during your leave its going to be a mess again.  MehrajMir (talk) 12:00, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

@Mehrajmir13: Your geography and climate sections are good beginnings. They need better sources, but you can add them (and an under-construction-section tag to them) you could also add flora and fauna, economy, agriculture, sections but adequately sourced. I will say something about sources in a minute. Try to keep the other sections, especially the history and demography as they are; otherwise, the Hindu/India majoritarian POV promoters (who these days come in the strangest of WP avatars such as Pakistani, Afghan, and Iranian (!) will have a field day)

Now to the sources. As this is an India-Pakistan issue, it is best to stick to what I call "third-party scholarly sources." I rummage them in my Google Books search by restricting in the following fashion (say for flora, fauna, and biodiversity): "kashmir region " "flora " OR "fauna" OR "biodiversity" inpublisher:"university press" | inpublisher:"MIT" | inpublisher:"Academic Press" | inpublisher:"Springer" | inpublisher:"Routledge" | inpublisher:"Macmillan" | inpublisher:"Elsevier" | inpublisher:"Wiley" | inpublisher:"Sage" | inpublisher:"Blackwell" | inpublisher:"Pergamon"

I restrict further to the 21st-century and "preview available. In the first draft, I keep out Indian and Pakistani publishers and newspapers (however scholarly they might be and that includes OUP India and OUP Pakistan) If that does not give enough sources, I would change "Kashmir region" to "Kashmir" keeping the other variables the same. There are also IUCN, Mammal Species of the World, ..., but I generally avoid using journal articles at this stage. All the best, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:17, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

I also avoid newspapers in the first cut. Eventually when I do add them, I restrict to the "third-party international" ones described here. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:26, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

• Thank you for your valuable comment and advise. I do not have to and will not touch those history and demography sections. Wish you a happy and good days ahead.  MehrajMir (talk) 05:43, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Honan Chapel

Hi Fowler, if you get a chance would appreciate your eyes on this, which is at FAC. Feedback and insight gratefully appreciated. Ceoil (talk) 20:51, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

@Ceoil: I love the picture in the lead, an early 20th-century chapel being photobombed by the early 21st-century in the form of a drone. Reminds me of my cozy college chapel. When everyone has had their say, I'll say something, if my comments are needed by then. Thanks for asking. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:38, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

@Ceoil: After much thought, I've decided to take time off from WP. I will be gone until mid-February 2021. I had attempted to take a partial vacation earlier to do some writing unrelated to WP, but that did not work out too well. So this time the vacation is absolute.  :( Your Honan Chapel article looks great. I'm sure it will sail through. All the best, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:14, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Good for you. Hopefully the writing is creative rather than technical or providing copy. Either way I imagine you hunkered over a typewriter, empty cig boxes thrown about, agonising over every goddamn syllable. Anyways, godspeed and talk in the future my friend. Ceoil (talk) 20:08, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

@Ceoil: I love your description, my friend. I've dusted off the Hemingway on the shelves. Nearly a dozen they are. Hunkered over I certainly am, but every now and then stand up and write in his custom. And we have cats as he did, though not quite in his abundance. A distant aspiration, inspiration, a North Star he was, but is now looming larger. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:42, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Need helping with editing

Hi! We've interacted before regarding edited content on the "women in india" wikipedia page. I'm hear to ask for your help regarding WP:NOR. Is there a way to use original research without violating any rules? Let me knowKrao212 (talk) 03:13, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

@Krao212: Fowler&fowler is on a break till January. But, unfortunately, there is no way of adding original research to an article. Wikipedia reports research done by others (in peer reviewed or other reliable sources but doesn't do the research itself. This is partly because there is no way to judge the quality of the research and partly because, by definition, an encyclopedia is a tertiary source and merely summarizes existing research. Best. --RegentsPark (comment) 22:32, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

When @RegentsPark: speaks, people listen. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:52, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

PS I'm gone until mid-February 2021. Thanks, RP! Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:52, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

I want to allow the vector alternative of the CIA Kashmir map

I have gone through the edit history of Ladakh and saw that you said in an edit summary that only the CIA Kashmir map (File:Kashmir Region November 2019.jpg) is allowed per consensus among India, Pakistan and China WikiProjects. But I want to use the vector alternative (File:Kashmir map.svg) of the map that I have updated and made multiple locator maps from it. But where to form consensus for this? --Soumya-8974 ^talk _contribs ^subpages 06:42, 21 November 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, the CIA map is a physical map, showing the physiographic texture which your map does not. Yours is not as detailed. I am on vacation until mid-February 2021. Very sorry, but no can do. My last post in response. I should warn you that all Kashmir-related pages are under an ARBCOM discretionary sanction and 1RR restriction. You should not be edit-warring, nor attempting a "compromise" as a backdoor entry for your map. Please self-revert, unless you are looking to be penalized. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:59, 21 November 2020 (UTC)

The consensus was on WT:INDIA. You will need to rummage the archives. It is best not to disbelieve a competent seasoned editor. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:02, 21 November 2020 (UTC)

ArbCom 2020 Elections voter message

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ANI

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you. 2A01:4C8:416:6187:4933:9BCE:4121:FCB1 (talk) 16:00, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

I love all the kitty and creature photos on your talk page! I'm having a bleck day today, not feeling too well, and they brought me smiles today.

Missvain (talk) 16:55, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much @Missvain: for posting and brightening our day. Animals and plants both great and small—our neighbors in the tree of life—are our saving grace. I have no doubt about this. I hope you feel better very soon. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 17:11, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

India and good faith

Fowler, I understand the frustration, and have clashed elsewhere with Femke and Emsmile on exactly the same topic, but they are on Talk:India in good faith. I feel it would be productive and conducive to the conversation to remove, at the very least, that last part of your post. There are other editors around, and plenty of time to edit and fix the India article later if need be. Certainly, the India talk page is not where I would want to spend my vacation. Best, CMD (talk) 11:20, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

Will do. Thanks. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:26, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

India and FAR...

As an aside, I have nothing to do with FAR - I have enough with FAC and TFA. -- Ealdgyth (talk) 14:09, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

I did have a suspicion that I was erring. Will correct. Thanks. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:48, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

No real need, just wanted to make things clear. I'm not fussed. -- Ealdgyth (talk) 15:02, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 1, 2020

I had marked Apathy's hatching date on my desk calendar. On the night before the goslings were due to arrive, when I made my rounds before going to bed, I looked in on her. She hissed, as usual, and ran her neck out. When I shone my light at her, two tiny green heads were visible, thrusting their way through her feathers. The goslings were here—a few hours ahead of schedule. My heart leapt up. Outside in the barnyard, both ganders stood vigil. They knew very well what was up: ganders take an enormous interest in family affairs and are deeply impressed by the miracle of the egg-that-becomes-goose. I shut the door against them and went to bed.

From E. B. White, "Geese," in Essays of E. B. White, New York: Harper & Row, 1971. Copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:07, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

"Jammu and Kashmir area" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Jammu and Kashmir area. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 December 2#Jammu and Kashmir area until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. Soumya-8974 (he) ^talk _contribs ^subpages 08:21, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 2, 2020

"... The other three are gifties that Mrs. Campbell and myself would be blithe of your acceptance. The first which is round, will likely please ye best at the first off-go; but, O Davie, laddie, it's but a drop of water in the sea; it'll help you but a step, and vanish like the morning. The second, which is flat and square and written upon, will stand by you through life like a good staff for the road, and a good pillow for your head in sickness. And as for the last which is cubical, that'll see you, it's my prayerful wish, into a better land."

With that he got upon his feet, took off his hat, and prayed a little while aloud, and in affecting terms, for a young man setting out into the world; then suddenly took me in his arms and embraced me very hard; then held me at arm's length, looking at me with his face all working with sorrow; and then whipped about, and crying good-bye to me, set off backward by the way that we had come ...

And I sat down on the boulder the good man had just left, and opened the parcel to see the nature of my gifts. That which he had called cubical, I had never had much doubt of; sure enough it was a little Bible, to carry in a plaidneuk. That which he had called round, I found to be a shilling piece; and the third, which was to help me so wonderfully both in health and sickness all the days of my life was a little piece of coarse yellow paper, written upon thus in red ink:—

'TO MAKE LILLY OF THE VALLEY WATER.Take the flowers of lilly of the valley and distil them in sack, and drink a spoonful or two as there is occasion. It restores speech to those that have the dumb palsey. It is good against the Gout; it comforts the heart and strengthens the memory; and the flowers put into a Glasse, close stopt, and set into ane hill of ants for a month, then take it out, and you will find a liquor which comes from the flowers which keep in a vial; it is good, ill or well, and whether man or woman.'

And then in the minister's own hand was added:

'Likewise for sprains, rub it in; and for the cholic, a great spooneful in the hour.'

To be sure, I laughed over this; but it was rather tremulous laughter; and I was glad to get my bundle on my staff's end and set out over the ford and up the hill upon the farther side; till, just as I came on the green drove-road running wide through the heather, I took my last look of Kirk Essendean, the trees about the manse, and the big rowans in the kirkyard where my father and mother lay.

From Robert Louis Stevenson, Kidnapped, serialized in Young Folks, 1 May–31 July 1886. Copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:23, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 3, 2020

I took a long walk north of the town, out into the pastures where the land was so rough that it had never been ploughed up, and the long red grass of early times still grew shaggy over the draws and hillocks. Out there I felt at home again. Overhead the sky was that indescribable blue of autumn; bright and shadowless, hard as enamel. To the south I could see the dun-shaded river bluffs that used to look so big to me, and all about stretched drying cornfields, of the pale-gold color I remembered so well. Russian thistles were blowing across the uplands and piling against the wire fences like barricades. Along the cattle-paths the plumes of goldenrod were already fading into sun-warmed velvet, grey with gold threads in it. I had escaped from the curious depression that hangs over little towns, and my mind was full of pleasant things; ...

As I wandered over those rough pastures, I had the good luck to stumble upon a bit of the first road that went from Black Hawk out to the north country; to my grandfather's farm, and on to the Shimerdas' and to the Norwegian settlement. Everywhere else it had been ploughed under when the highways were surveyed; this half-mile or so within the pasture fence was all that was left of that old road which used to run like a wild thing across the open prairie, clinging to the high places and circling and doubling like a rabbit before hounds.

On the level land the tracks had almost disappeared — were mere shadings in the grass, and a stranger would not have noticed them. But wherever the road had crossed a draw, it was easy to find. The rains had made channels of the wheel-ruts and washed them so deeply that the sod had never healed over them. They looked like gashes torn by a grizzly's claws, on the slopes where the farm-wagons used to lurch up out of the hollows with a pull that brought curling muscles on the smooth hips of the horses. I sat down and watched the haystacks turn rosy in the slanting sunlight.

From Willa Cather, My Ántonia, Boston, Mass: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1918, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:23, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 4, 2020

I dreamed I was standing on a pier in a shadowy group of unescorted children who may or may not have been waiting to be evacuated. The pier was down in Port Newark, but the Port Newark of some fifty years ago, where I had been taken by my father and my Uncle Ed to see the ships anchored in the bay that opened in the distance to the Statue of Liberty and the Atlantic. It was always a surprise to me, as a small child, to be reminded that Newark was a coastal city, since the port was beyond the swamplands, on the far side of the new Newark airstrip and remote from life in the neighborhoods. To be taken down to the harbor and on to the wharves to look up at the ships and out beyond to the bay was to be put in touch momentarily with a geographical vastness that you couldn't imagine while playing stoop ball with your little pals on our cozy, clannish street of two-and-a-half-family houses.

In the dream, a boat, a medium-size, heavily armored, battle-gray boat, some sort of old American warship stripped of its armaments and wholly disabled, floated imperceptibly toward the shore. I was expecting my father to be on the ship, somehow to be among the crew, but there was no life on board and no sign anywhere of anyone in command. The dead-silent picture, a portrait of the aftermath of a disaster, was frightening and eerie: a ghostly hulk of a ship, cleared by some catastrophe of all living things, aiming toward the shore with only the current to guide it, and we on the pier who may or may not have been children gathered together to be evacuated. The mood was heartbreaking in exactly the same way it had been when I was twelve and, only weeks before the triumph of V-E Day, President Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemorrhage. Draped in black bunting, the train moving F.D.R.'s casket up from Washington to Hyde Park had passed with lumbering solemnity through the bereaved crowd squeezed in beside the tracks downtown—during those silent seconds on its journey north, consecrating even workaday Newark. Ultimately the dream became unbearable and I woke up, despondent and frightened and sad—whereupon I understood that it wasn't that my father was aboard the ship but that my father was the ship. ...

To have dreamed of my father's death on the eve of (his) second MRI wasn't at all remarkable, nor, really, was the incarnation that the dream had worked upon his body. I lay in bed till it was light, thinking of all the family history compressed into that snippet of silent dream-film: just about every major theme of his life was encapsulated there, everything of significance to both of us, starting with his immigrant parents' transatlantic crossing in steerage, extending to his grueling campaign to get ahead, the battle to make good against the many obstructive forces—as a poor boy robbed of serious schooling, as a Jewish working man in the Gentile insurance colossus—and ending with his transformation, by the brain tumor, into an enfeebled wreck.

The defunct warship drifting blindly into shore ... this is not a picture of my father, at the end of his life, that my wide-awake mind, with its resistance to plaintive metaphor and poetized analogy, was ever likely to have licensed.

From Philip Roth, Patrimony, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:02, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

User notice

It says "I will be gone until mid-February 2021. I will not be logging in at all during this time." given your recent plethora of edits, isn't it worth updating this to reflect reality? The Rambling Man (Hands! Face! Space!!!!) 23:34, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Its an aspiration rather than claim, TRB. We've all been there, he said close to midnight on a Sunday. Ceoil (talk) 23:44, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Not a helpful post, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:34, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

Ditto. The Rambling Man (Hands! Face! Space!!!!) 08:30, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

Its probably ok if you are being unfairly besmirched to come out and defend yourself. I see a recent, baseless, an/i. It happens. But still, unpaid,un tanked, who does Flower own anybody on his talk page...you, why? I think live and let live. Ceoil (talk) 01:39, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

I have no idea what you're trying to say, but the point was that a number of editors come to F&F for help and the notice was misleading. The Rambling Man (Hands! Face! Space!!!!) 08:07, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

TRM, wasn't trying to get at you in last post; even tough the best of intentions were there when the notice was posted, he seemed to have had to come back for a bit in re a sock attack and a frivolous AN/I complaint. Coincidently, the sock targeted me also. Ceoil (talk) 15:47, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

No worries, I knew you were assuming good faith. The Rambling Man (Hands! Face! Space!!!!) 15:49, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 5, 2020

By this time, the peacock had gathered its courage and was beginning to move slowly, with little swaying and jerking motions, into the kitchen. Its head was erect but at an angle, its red eyes fixed on us. Its crest, a little sprig of feathers, stood a few inches over its head. Plumes rose from its tail. The bird stopped a few feet away from the table and looked us over.

"They don't call them birds of paradise for nothing," Bud said.

Fran didn't look up. She was giving all her attention to the baby. She'd begun to patty-cake with it, which pleased the baby somewhat. I mean, at least the thing had stopped fussing. She brought it up to her neck and whispered something into its ear.

"Now," she said, "don't tell anyone what I said."

The baby stared at her with its pop eyes. Then it reached and got itself a baby handful of Fran's blond hair. The peacock stepped closer to the table. None of us said anything. We just sat still. Baby Harold saw the bird. It let go of Fran's hair and stood up on her lap. It pointed its fat fingers at the bird. It jumped up and down and made noises.

The peacock walked quickly around the table and went for the baby. It ran its long neck across the baby's legs. It pushed its beak under the baby's pajama top and shook its stiff neck back and forth. The baby laughed and kicked its feet. Scooting onto its back, the baby worked its way over Fran's knees and down onto the floor. The peacock kept pushing against the baby, as if it was a game they were playing. Fran held the baby against her legs while the baby strained forward.

"I just don't believe this," she said.

"That peacock is crazy, that's what," Bud said. "Damn bird doesn't know it's a bird, that's its major trouble."

Olla grinned and showed her teeth again. She looked over at Bud. Bud pushed his chair away from the table and nodded.

...

Bud picked up the baby and swung him over his head until Harold shrieked. The peacock ruffled its feathers and watched.

Fran shook her head again. She smoothed out her dress where the baby had been. Olla picked up her fork and was working at some lima beans on her plate.

Bud shifted the baby onto his hip and said, "There's pie and coffee yet."

That evening at Bud and Olla's was special. I knew it was special. That evening I felt good about almost everything in my life. I couldn't wait to be alone with Fran to talk to her about what I was feeling. I made a wish that evening. Sitting there at the table, I closed my eyes for a minute and thought hard. What I wished for was that I'd never forget or otherwise let go of that evening. That's one wish of mine that came true. And it was bad luck for me that it did. But, of course, I couldn't know that then.

"What are you thinking about, Jack?" Bud said to me.

"I'm just thinking, " I said. I grinned at him.

"A penny," Olla said.

I just grinned some more and shook my head.

From Raymond Carver, "Feathers," Atlantic Monthly, 1982, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:27, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 6, 2020

I was one day sitting upstairs, as usual, hearing the children their English lessons, and at the same time turning a silk dress for madame, when she came sauntering into the room with that absorbed air, and brow of hard thought she sometimes wore, which made her look so little genial. Dropping into a seat opposite mine, she remained some minutes silent. Désirée, the eldest girl, was reading to me some little essay of Mrs. Barbauld's, and I was making her translate currently from English to French as she proceeded, by way of ascertaining that she comprehended what she read: madame listened.

Presently without preface or prelude, she said, almost in the tone of one making an accusation, "Meess, in England you were a governess."

"No madame," said I smiling, "you are mistaken."

"Is this your first essay at teaching—this attempt with my children?"

I assured her it was. Again she became silent; but looking up, as I took a pin from the cushion, I found myself an object of study: she held me under her eye; she seemed turning me round in her thoughts—measuring my fitness for a purpose, weighing my value in a plan. Madame had ere this, scrutinized all I had, and I believe she esteemed herself cognizant of much that I was; but from that day, for the space of about a fortnight, she tried me by new tests. She listened at the nursery door when I was shut in with the children; she followed me at a cautious distance when I walked out with them, stealing within ear-shot whenever the trees of park or boulevard afforded a sufficient screen: a strict preliminary process having thus been observed, she made a move forward.

One morning, coming on me abruptly, and with the semblance of hurry, she said she found herself placed in a little dilemma. Mr. Wilson, the English master, had failed to come at this hour; she feared he was ill; the pupils were waiting in classe; there was no one to give a lesson; should I, for once, object to giving a short dictation exercise, just that the pupils might not have to say they missed their English lesson?

"In classe, madame?" I asked.

"Yes, in classe: in the second division."

"Where there are sixty pupils," said I; for I knew the number, and with my usual base habit of cowardice, I shrunk into my sloth, like a snail into its shell, and alleged incapacity and impracticability as a pretext to escape action. If left to myself, I should infallibly have let this chance slip. Inadventurous, unstirred by impulses of practical ambition, I was capable of sitting twenty years teaching infants the hornbook, turning silk dresses, and making children's frocks. Not that my true contentment dignified this infatuated resignation: my work had neither charm for my taste, nor hold on my interest; but ... the negation of suffering was the nearest approach to happiness I expected to know. ...

"Come," said madame, as I stooped more busily than ever over the cutting out of a child's pinafore, "leave that work."

"But Fifine wants it, madame."

"Fifine must want it, then, for I want you."

And as Madame Beck did really want and was resolved to have me—as she had long been dissatisfied with the English master, with his shortcomings in punctuality, and his careless method of tuition—as too, she did not lack resolution and practical activity, whether I lacked them or not—she without more ado, made me relinquish thimble and needle; my hand was taken into hers, and I was conducted down stairs.

From Charlotte Brontë, Villette, London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1853, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:51, 6 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 7, 2020

USS Arizona burning after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941

I took out my knife, opened it, wiped off the blade and pared off the dirty outside surface of the cheese. Gavuzzi handed me the basin of macaroni.

"Start in to eat, Tenente."

"No," I said. "Put it on the floor. We'll all eat."

"There are no forks."

"What the hell," I said in English.

I cut the cheese into pieces and laid them on the macaroni.

"Sit down to it," I said. They sat down and waited. I put thumb and fingers into the macaroni and lifted. A mass loosened.

"Lift it high, Tenente."

I lifted it to arm's length and the strands cleared. I lowered it into the mouth, sucked and snapped in the ends, and chewed, then took a bite of the cheese, chewed, and then a drink of the wine ...

They were all eating, holding their chins close over the basin, tipping their heads back, sucking in the ends. I took another mouthful and some cheese and a rinse of wine. Something landed outside that shook the earth.

"Four hundred twenty or minnenwerfer," Gavuzzi said.

"There aren't any four hundred twenties in the mountains," I said ...

We went on eating. There was a cough, a noise like a railway engine starting and then an explosion that shook the earth again.

"This isn't a deep dugout," Passini said.

"That was a big trench mortar."

"Yes, sir."

I ate the end of my piece of cheese and took a swallow of the wine. Through the other noise I heard a cough, then came the chuh-chuh-chuh-chuh — then there was a flash, as when a blast-furnace door is swung open, and a roar that started white and went red and on and on in a rushing wind.

From Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms, New York: Scribner, 1929, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:01, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 9, 2020

Annie and Paul and Arthur loved winter evenings, when it was not wet. They stayed indoors till the colliers were all gone home, till it was thick dark, and the street would be deserted. Then they tied their scarves around their necks, for they scorned overcoats, as all the colliers' children did, and went out. The entry was very dark, and at the end the whole great night opened out, in a hollow, with a little tangle of lights below where Minton pit lay, and another far away opposite for Selby. The farthest tiny lights seemed to stretch out the darkness for ever. The children looked anxiously down the road at the one lamp-post, which stood at the end of the field path. If the little, luminous space were deserted, the two boys felt genuine desolation. They stood with their hands in their pockets under the lamp, turning their backs on the night, quite miserable, watching the dark houses. Suddenly a pinafore under a short skirt was seen, and a long-legged girl came flying up.

"Where's Billy Pillins an' your Annie an' Eddie Dakin?"

"I don't know."

But it did not matter so much—there were three now. They set up a game round the lamp-post, till the others rushed up, yelling. Then the play went fast and furious.

There was only this one lamp-post. Behind was the scoop of darkness, as if all the night was there. In front, another wide, dark way opened over the hill brow. Occasionally somebody came out of this way and went into the field down the path. In a dozen yards the night swallowed them. The children played on. ...

Mrs Morel, going into her parlour, would hear the children singing away:

"My shoes are made of Spanish leather
My socks are made of silk
I wear a ring on every finger
I wash myself in milk."

They sounded so perfectly absorbed in the game as their voices came out of the night, that they had the feel of wild creatures singing. It stirred the mother, and she understood when they came in at eight o'clock, ruddy, with brilliant eyes, and quick, passionate speech.

They all loved the Scargill Street house for its openness, for the great scallop of the world it had in view. On summer evenings the women would stand against the field fence, gossiping, facing the west, watching the sunsets flare quickly out, till the Derbyshire hills ridged across the crimson far away, like the black crest of a newt.

From D. H. Lawrence, Sons and Lovers, London: Gerald Duckworth and Company Ltd, 1913, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:43, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 10, 2020

Perhaps it was because teaching came naturally to Mr Stelling, that he set about it with that uniformity of method and independence of circumstances, which distinguish the actions of animals understood to be under the immediate teachings of nature. Mr Broderip's amiable beaver, as that charming naturalist tells us, busied himself as earnestly in constructing a dam, in a room up three pair of stairs in London, as if he had been laying his foundation in a stream or lake in Upper Canada. It was "Binny's" function to build: the absence of water or of possible progeny was an accident for which he was not accountable. With the same unerring instinct Mr Stelling set to work at his natural method of instilling the Eton Grammar and Euclid into the mind of Tom Tulliver. This, he considered, was the only basis of solid instruction: all other means of education were mere charlatanism, and could produce nothing better than smatterers. Fixed on this firm basis, a man might observe the display of various or special knowledge made by irregularly educated people with a pitying smile: all that sort of thing was very well, but it was impossible these people could form sound opinions. In holding this conviction Mr Stelling was not biased, as some tutors have been, by the excessive accuracy or extent of this own scholarship; and as to his views about Euclid, no opinion could have been freer than personal partiality. Mr Stelling was very far from being led astray by enthusiasm, either religious or intellectual; on the other hand he had no secret belief that everything was humbug. He thought religion was a very excellent thing, and Aristotle's great authority, and deaneries and prebends useful institutions, and Great Britain the providential bulwark of Protestantism, and faith in the unseen a great support to afflicted minds: he believed in all these things, as a Swiss hotel-keeper believes in the beauty of the scenery around him, and in the pleasure it gives to artistic visitors ...

He very soon set down poor Tom as a thoroughly stupid lad; for though by hard labour he could get particular declensions into his brain, any thing so abstract as the relation between cases and terminations could by no means get such a lodgment there as to enable him to recognize a chance genitive or dative. This struck Mr. Stelling as something more than natural stupidity; he suspected obstinacy, or, at any rate, indifference, and lectured Tom severely on his want of thorough application. “You feel no interest in what you're doing, sir,” Mr. Stelling would say, and the reproach was painfully true. Tom had never found any difficulty in discerning a pointer from a setter when once he had been told the distinction, and his perceptive powers were not at all deficient. I fancy they were quite as strong as those of the Rev. Mr. Stelling; for Tom could predict with accuracy what number of horses were cantering behind him, he could throw a stone right into the centre of a given ripple, he could guess to a fraction how many lengths of his stick it would take to reach across the playground, and could draw almost perfect squares on his slate without any measurement. But Mr. Stelling took no note of these things: he only observed that Tom's faculties failed him before the abstractions hideously symbolized to him in the pages of the Eton Grammar, and that he was in a state bordering on idiocy with regard to the demonstration that two given triangles must be equal—though he could discern with great promptitude and certainty the fact that they were equal. Whence Mr. Stelling concluded that Tom's brain, being peculiarly impervious to etymology and demonstrations, was peculiarly in need of being ploughed and harrowed by these patent implements ...

From George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss, Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1860, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:38, 10 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 13, 2020

Her mother's knuckles were her knuckles, her mother's veins were her veins, her mother's lap was her second heaven, her mother's forehead a copybook onto which she traced A B C D, her mother's body was a recess that she would wander inside forever and ever, a sepulcher growing deeper and deeper. When she saw other people, especially her pretty older sister, she would simply wave from that safe place, she would not budge, she would not be lured out. Her father took a hatchet to her mother and threatened that he would split open the head of her. The child watched through the kitchen window, because this debacle took place on a hillock under the three beech trees where the clothesline stretched, then sagged. The mother had been hanging four sheets that morning, two off each bed.

... the mother said that if he did so, there was a place for him. That place was the lunatic asylum. It was twenty or thirty miles away, a big gray edifice, men and women lumped in together, some in straitjackets, some in padded cells, some blindfolded because of having sacks thrown over their heads, some strapped across the chest to quell and impede them. ... Her father did not go there. He went off on a batter and then went to a monastery, and then was brought home and shook in the bed chair for five days, eating bread and milk and asking who would convey him over the fields, until he saw his yearlings, and when no one volunteered to, it fell to her because she was the youngest. Over in the fields he patted the yearlings and said soppy things that he'd never say indoors, or to a human, and he cried and said he'd never touch a drop again, and there was a dribble on his pewter-brown mustache that was the remains of the mush he had been eating, and the yearling herself became fidgety and fretful as if she might bolt ...

The girl and her mother took walks on Sundays—strolls, picked blackberries, consulted them for worms, made preserve, and slept side by side, entwined like twigs of trees or the ends of the sugar tongs. When she wakened and found that her mother had got up and was already mixing meals for the hens or stirabout for the young pigs, she hurried down, carrying her clothes under her arm, ... Always an egg for breakfast. An egg a day and she would grow strong. Her mother never ate an egg but topped the girl's egg and fed her it off the tarnished eggy spoon and gave her little sups of tea with which to wash down. She had her own mug, red enamel and with not a chip. The girl kept looking back as she went down the drive for school, and as time went on, she mastered the knack of walking backward to be able to look all the longer, look at the aproned figure waving or holding up a potato pounder or colander, of whatever happened to be in her hand.

From Edna O'Brien, "A Rose in the Heart of New York," The New Yorker, 1978, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:10, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

Kashmiris

Can you have a look at this? Also these changes. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 16:35, 20 December 2020 (UTC)

Best wishes for the holidays

		Season's Greetings
		Wishing you and yours a Happy Holiday Season, and all best wishes for the New Year! Adoration of the Magi (Jan Mostaert) is my Wiki-Christmas card to all for this year. Johnbod (talk) 12:11, 19 December 2020 (UTC)

Thank you @Johnbod: for the holiday wishes. Beautiful picture, just beautiful. But then that is only to be expected from you.

We used to do a creche and a Christmas village with On30 gauge, but this year has been different.

Our dear friend of 14 years, of the cool and limpid green eyes of my user page, said goodbye to us today, said goodbye after surgeries, interventions, and changing medicines, preferring not to wait for the scheduled euthanasia, preferring instead to feel the torment of the physical exit with grace—in my lap—physically reduced but stoic until the end. As an atheist of some indeterminate Darwinian variety, all I could find myself doing was singing her favorite song, again and again.

Thanks again for the wishes, and the same to you and yours. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 00:24, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 24, 2020

The world of dew is
A world of dew, yet even
So, yet even so ...

Kobayashi Issa (1763–1847), copied by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 17:43, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

Greetings of the season

I Am Half-Sick of Shadows, Said the Lady of Shalott		Happy holidays
		Dear F&f, For you and all your loved ones, "Let there be mercy". Wishing you health, peace and happiness this holiday season and in the coming year. I am sorry about your beloved cat, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:48, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Thank you SandyG. Thank you and the same to you and yours. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 05:57, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas and a Prosperous 2021!

Hello Fowler&fowler, may you be surrounded by peace, success and happiness on this seasonal occasion. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Sending you heartfelt and warm greetings for Christmas and New Year 2021. Happy editing, Fylindfotberserk (talk) 11:01, 25 December 2020 (UTC) Spread the love by adding {{subst:Seasonal Greetings}} to other user talk pages.

Thanks Fylindfotberserk, and the same to you and yours. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:11, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Natalis soli invicto!

		Natalis soli invicto!
		Wishing you and yours a Happy Holiday Season, from the horse and bishop person. May the year ahead be productive and distraction-free. Ealdgyth (talk) 14:48, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Thank you Ealdgyth, and the same to you and yours. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:11, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 25, 2020

When we got the ham home, my mother immediately stripped off the white paper and the string in the middle of our chipped white-enameled kitchen table. There it lay, exuding heavenly perfumes—proud arrogant and regal. It had a dark, smoked, leathery skin, which my mother carefully peeled off with her sharpened bread knife. Then the old man, the only one who could lift the ham without straining a gut, placed it in the big dark-blue oval pot that was used only for hams. My mother then covered the ham with water, and pushed it onto the big burner and turned up the gas until it boiled. It just sat there on the stove and bubbled away for nearly two hours, filling the house with a smell that was so luscious, so powerful as to have erotic overtones. The old man paced back and forth, occasionally lifting the lid and prodding the ham with a fork, inhaling deeply. The ham frenzy was upon him.

From Jean Shepherd, Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories, New York: Doubleday, 1969, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:37, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Best wishes for the holidays

		Season's Greetings
		Seasons greetings. Hope you and yours are safe and well during this rather bleak period, though I think we will get through it. Best Ceoil (talk) 02:29, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Thank you Ceoil, and the same to you and Liz. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:06, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Notice of edit warring noticeboard discussion

Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion involving you at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring regarding a possible violation of Wikipedia's policy on edit warring. The thread is Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring#User:Fowler&fowler reported by User:Kautilya3 (Result: ). Thank you. Kautilya3 (talk) 01:47, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

F&f, if you are on a break until February ... you should be on a break until February. The look on this AN3 is not a good one. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:41, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the reminder. I'm sorry. Will return to the break after one more reduction on India. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:46, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

You don't need to reply to this. Upon thinking why I ended up on an unheard-of stub to make a stand, I think I might have been acting out. I've probably been traumatized more by the recent tragedy—trivial though it might sound to others—than my psychodynamic experience has given me the wisdom for. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 17:24, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

I will respond, because that was my concern. You really do need your time off, for your own well-being. Best regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:29, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 30, 2020

Oft on a plat of rising ground,
I hear the far-off curfew sound,
Over some wide-watered shore,
Swinging slow with sullen roar;
Or if the air will not permit,
Some still removèd place will fit,
Where glowing embers through the room
Teach light to counterfeit a gloom,
Far from all resort of mirth,
Save the cricket on the hearth,
Or the bellman's drowsy charm,
To bless the doors from nightly harm:
Or let my lamp at midnight hour,
Be seen in some high lonely tower,
Where I may oft outwatch the Bear,
With thrice great Hermes, or unsphere
The spirit of Plato to unfold
What worlds, or what vast regions hold
The immortal mind hath forsook
Her mansion in this fleshly nook:
And of those Daemons that are found
In fire, air, flood, or under ground

From John Milton, Il penseroso in Odes, Pastorals, and Masques (General Editor: J. B. Broadbent), Cambridge Milton for Schools and Colleges, Cambridge University Press, 1975, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:15, 30 December 2020 (UTC)

Picture December 31, 2020

William Butler Yeats relaxed on holiday. AN/I what?

I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread;
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.

When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire a-flame,
But something rustled on the floor,
And someone called me by my name:
It had become a glimmering girl
With apple blossoms in her hair
Who called me by my name and ran
And faded through the brightening air.

Though I am old with wandering
Through hollow lands and hilly lands,
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands;
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done,
The silver apples of the moon,
The golden apples of the sun.

From W. B. Yeats, The Song of Wandering Aengus, 1899, copied out by Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:04, 30 December 2020 (UTC)

Happy New Year 2021

Hi Fowler&fowler, hope you would be fine, Wishing you Happy New Year 2021. :)
I'm following your work on Wikipedia since I started editing on Wikipedia and I greatly revere your work in bringing neutrality in South Asian space on Wikipedia especially in a highly contentious zone of India-Pakistan. I saw some of your observations regarding the current situation of the topic on an RfC on Allama Iqbal's article a couple of months ago and then in a recent AN3 report involving you. I got to agree with you over this and seen many other editors giving similar observations, notes and complaints. I'll not name anyone but you well know about those editors and it is now impression all over. I also faced a similar situation at a military conflict article to which I'm topic banned(don't know whether it is right to mention it or not since it may be coming under that ban but since I'm just giving a passing mention and not discussing so I hope it will not) because I couldn't tackle the dispute well since I'm just a novice editor and was not well aware with technicalities of such disputes. There's another thing that you said in AN3 that there are some editors who pose as someone else and do edits which I also believe is the case. The promotion of cultural irredentism in this topic is the case since early times of Wikipedia and you are well aware of the case that led to form WP:ARBIPA. They outnumber us and we fail to counter and are exhausted, tired is also a very precise observation.
Anyhow I wanted to commend you for your work in bringing neutrality to the topic and I hope you will continue doing this. Again wishing you New Year 2021, hope you have a great year and decade ahead. Thanks and regards! USaamo ^(t@lk) 17:17, 31 December 2020 (UTC)