When a nursing infant was merely crawling on his knees at our house, the proud and haughty people of Lucknow used to bow down in prostration before him.

In this couplet, the poet proudly recalls the peerless stature and literary pedigree of his homeland, contrasting it with Lucknow's elite. He suggests that even when a nursing child crawled on its knees in his household or city, the proudest nobles and scholars of Lucknow would bow before it in sheer reverence. It is a striking hyperbole born of the historic cultural rivalry between Delhi and Lucknow, capturing how deeply ingrained poetic and cultural superiority was felt to be.