The Old World and Its Ways

In this museum one can learn more of the various races of India, of their dress, implements and weapons, more of the animal and insect life, more of India's mineral wealth, more of her woods, stones and marbles, more of her agricultural products and manufactures than he can in weeks of travel. He sees here mounted specimens of bug and butterfly, bird, fish and beast. It is the very Mecca of the student and we saw a number of groups thus engaged. Among the insects there are several which illustrate the mimicry of nature to a marvelous degree. Some are like dried grass, some like moss and some like leaves. The most remarkable of these is the leaf insect which can scarcely be detected from a leaf even after it has been pointed out. There is a mountain grouse which turns white in the winter, and in some countries a hare which undergoes the same change. In Ceylon there are crabs with legs like pieces of coral and a color closely resembling the sand upon which they crawl, but the leaf insect surpasses them all. Not only is its color identical with the leaf, but its body and wings are veined and ribbed like a leaf; even rust spots could be found on some of them. We could hardly have believed our own eyes had we not seen some of these insects alive and some of the young just hatched.

The botanical garden, while not equal in variety or beauty to the gardens at Buitenzorg and Kandy, has one object of growing interest, viz., a gigantic banyan tree. This tree is nearly a century and a half old and shades a spot of ground almost a thousand feet in circumference. Great arms run out from the parent trunk and these are supported by four hundred and sixty-four ærial roots or minor trunks, some of which are several feet in diameter. Seen from a distance the tree presents a very symmetrical appearance, and, as it is still growing, it is likely to become, if it is not already, the largest tree in the world.

The zoological garden contains some excellent specimens. We were especially interested in the Bengal tigers, in a red-nosed African mandrill (which looks like a cross between a hog and an ape), and in the monkeys. Three of the latter belong to the shouting variety – at least, they do shout. When the attendant gives the cue, they set up such a chorus of ear-splitting yells as one seldom hears. The echoing and re-echoing makes a din before which the noise of a football game seems tame. While not a football enthusiast, I venture the suggestion that an American team would do well to secure the assistance of these rooters, for they could work up the necessary enthusiasm on short notice and with a great saving to the throats of the students.

On the streets of Calcutta one sees Indian life in all its forms. The coolies wear the lightest possible clothing and carry enormous burdens on their heads. I saw eight of them hurrying down the street at a fast walk bearing a grand piano on their heads. In another place one man carried a large Saratoga trunk on his head down the hotel stairs. He had to have assistance in lifting and lowering it, but when it was once balanced on his head he marched off with it with apparent ease. The coolie women also carry burdens upon their heads, water jars being their specialty. Two and even three of these, one on top of another, are sometimes carried in this way. The brass water pot is, by the way, never out of sight in India; it is to be seen everywhere, and the scouring of these pots seems to give employment for leisure moments.

While much carrying is done on the head and on the pole, carts of all kinds are numerous. The water buffalo is to be found in India, but he divides the honors with the Indian bullock as a beast of burden. The Indian bullock is a mild-eyed beast, usually white or light in color, and has a hump on the shoulders which seems to be made expressly for the yoke. There is a small variety of the bullock, which is used for drawing passenger carts, and some of these are so fast that they are entered in trotting races.

The merchants of India are a shrewd and persistent class. They press their wares upon one at the hotels and in their shops, and the purchaser never knows whether he is buying at a bargain or paying two or three prices. It is not at all uncommon for the dealer to begin negotiations with the assertion that he has but one price and that his conscience will not allow him to ask more than a fair price, and conclude by selling at a twenty-five or fifty per cent discount. It may be that natives are treated differently, but the foreigner is likely to be charged "what the traffic will bear."

You can not judge of the value of a merchant's stock by the size or appearance of his store. He may have a little booth open in front, with no show windows, but when he begins to bring out his trunks and bundles, he may exhibit jewelry worth a hundred thousand dollars, or rich embroideries worth their weight in gold. The merchant sits cross-legged on the floor and spreads out the wares which his attendants bring, beguiling you the while with stories of Lord So and So's purchase, or Lady What's Her Name's order, or of a check for thousands handed him by an American millionaire.

The native buildings are, as a rule, neither beautiful nor cleanly. The little shops that open on the street exhibit food and vegetables arranged in heaps, the vendor apparently indifferent to dust and flies. The houses are generally of adobe, plastered with mud and without floors. In the warmer sections of the country they are built of matting and bamboo. The rich Indians live in substantial homes with high ceilings, tile floors and spacious verandas, but these are very few compared with the mass of the poor.

The Indian women of the higher classes are in seclusion all the time. They seldom leave their homes and when they do venture out they travel in covered chairs or closed carriages. This custom was brought into India by the Mohammedan conquerors, but it has been generally adopted by Hindu society. There is a growing sentiment among the educated Hindus against this practice, so burdensome to woman, but custom yields slowly to new ideas. At Calcutta we met several Indian ladies of high social rank who, in their home life, have felt the influence of western ideas and who have to some extent lessened the rigors of the zenana (seclusion). Two of these ladies, – one a princess – were daughters of the famous Keshub Chunder Sen, the great Hindu reformer, whose writing made a profound impression on the religious thought of the world. In the group was also a daughter-in-law of Mr. Sen's, a brilliant woman who was left the widow of a native prince at the age of thirteen and who recently shocked the orthodox Hindus by a second marriage. I mention these ladies because they represent the highest type of Indian womanhood, and it would be difficult to find in any country, in a group of the same size, more beauty, culture and refinement.

The principal article of feminine dress is the sarai, a long strip of cotton or silk, part of which is wrapped about the body to form a skirt, while the rest is draped over the head and shoulders in graceful folds. This garment lends itself to ornamentation and is usually embroidered along the edges, sometimes with silver and gold. We have not found in our travels a more becoming and attractive costume.

The dress of the men is so varied that description is impossible. One form of dress resembles the Roman toga. Many wear trousers made by mysterious windings and foldings of a long strip of cloth, others wear loose pantaloons. The coats are as multiform, a long, close-fitting one being the most popular. But the hat is the article to which most care is given. While the fez is popular, it is not so conspicuous as the turban. The latter is to be seen in all colors, shapes and styles. Some of the educated Indians have adopted the European dress, but the change in costume has not been rapid.

Calcutta is one of the educational centers of India, and one finds in the city many of the leaders of thought, educational and political. The University of Calcutta grants degrees and affiliates to itself the colleges whose students are preparing for the university examinations. Besides the university there are medical, law and technical schools which draw young men from the entire country. The position taken by Lord Curzon in the matter of higher education aroused so much opposition among the native population that an association was formed two years ago for the purpose of raising money to defray the expenses of students desiring to study abroad. Last year fourteen students were selected and sent to different countries. This year forty-four are going, and I had the pleasure of meeting these at a public reception given them at the town hall.

This meeting interested me very much. It was opened with a prayer by Editor Sen, of the Indian Mirror, a liberal Hindu, and it was such a prayer as might have been offered in any American church. It was so brief that I quote it in full:

"We thank Thee, O God, that by Thy blessing those young men whom we sent abroad for study last year are doing their work well and have by Thy grace been kept in the right path. We are now met to bid farewell to a much larger number of our youths, who are shortly leaving these shores for study in distant foreign lands. We ask Thy abundant blessing on them, and we humbly beseech Thee to protect them in their travels by sea and land and to bring them all safely to their respective destinations. May they be diligent in their studies, obedient to their teachers, grateful to those by whose help they are being sent abroad, and blameless in their conduct. May the love and fear of God rule their hearts, and may they return to us and to those nearest and dearest to them in due course crowned with full success and filled with an earnest desire to labor for the good of their country and their poorer brethren. We commend them to Thy gracious keeping as we now bid them a hearty farewell, and beseech Thee to help us all to live and work for the glory of Thy name and the good of our fellow men now and always."

Most of the students were going to Japan – one of the many indications of that country's increasing influence in the Orient – some were going to England and a few to America. Those bound for America called upon me later at the hotel, and I found them an earnest and ambitious group. They had, as all the Indians whom we met seemed to have, a high opinion of our country and spoke with enthusiasm of the benefits which they hoped to derive from their stay in the United States. These, and other students with whom I came in contact, impressed me as exceedingly patriotic and anxious to turn their information and their ability to the advantage of their country.

In Calcutta there are a number of Indians, who have won prominence in various spheres of activity. Editor Sen, to whom I have already referred, is one of the most influential of the native editors and writers; Editor Banerjee, of the Bengalee, is both a writer and an orator, and the editor of the Patrika has made his paper an exponent of advanced political thought. The Tagore family has furnished several men prominent in religious, literary and official life; education has found a patron in the Roy family, and Dr. Bose has won more than a national reputation in science.

Those who visit Calcutta can not afford to miss the side trip to Darjeeling, a summer resort perched upon the foothills of the Himalayas. The journey is rather fatiguing – three hours to the Ganges, then an all night ride to the foot of the range and then an eight hour climb on a two-foot gauge up the mountain side, but it amply repays the effort. We count this experience among the richest that we have enjoyed. The city of Darjeeling is about seven thousand feet above the sea, and the sides of the Himalayas are so steep at this point that it is only fifty miles down the zig-zag little railroad to the plain where the elevation is but two or three hundred feet. I do not know where one can find more of the grand and picturesque in the same distance than on this narrow gauge that threads its way up the rocky sides of this most stupendous of mountain ranges.

Darjeeling is so near Thibet, Nepal, Sikkim and Bhutan that one finds here a motley variety of types and sees something of the native life of the forbidden land that stretches along the northern border of India. The mountain tribes are sturdier in build, coarser in feature and lighter in color than the people of the lowlands, and we saw some types that strongly resembled the American Indian.

But to return to the mountains themselves; the view from Darjeeling is unsurpassed. The Kinchinjunga Peaks rise to a height of 28,156 feet above the sea, or nearly twice as high as Pike's Peak, and though forty-five miles distant, are clear and distinct. The summits, seen above the clouds, seem to have no terrestrial base, but hang as if suspended in mid air. The best view is obtained from Tiger Hill, six miles from Darjeeling and two thousand feet higher. We made this trip one morning, rising at three o'clock, and reaching the observation point a little before sunrise. I wish I were able to convey to the reader the impression made upon us.

While all about us was yet in darkness, the snowy robe which clothes the upper twelve thousand feet of the range, caught a tint of pearl from the first rays of the sun, and, as we watched, the orb of day, rising like a ruby globe from a lake of dark blue mist, gilded peak after peak until at last we saw Mt. Everest, earth's loftiest point, one hundred and twenty miles away and nearly a thousand feet higher than Kinchinjunga. We saw the shadows fleeing from the light like hunted culprits and hiding in the deep ravines, and we marked the triumph of the dawn as it swept down the valleys.

How puny seem the works of man when brought into comparison with majestic nature! His groves, what pigmies when measured against the virgin forest! His noblest temples, how insignificant when contrasted with the masonry of the hills! What canvas can imitate the dawn and sunset! What inlaid work can match the mosaics of the mountains!

Is it blind chance that gives these glimpses of the sublime? And was it blind chance that clustered vast reservoirs about inaccessible summits and stored water to refresh the thirsty plains through hidden veins and surface streams?

No wonder man from the beginning of history has turned to the heights for inspiration, for here is the spirit awed by the infinite and here one sees both the mystery of creation and the manifestations of the Father's loving kindness. Here man finds a witness, unimpeachable though silent, to the omnipotence, the omniscience and the goodness of God.

CHAPTER XXIII.

HINDU INDIA

Before beginning the trip through the interior, a paragraph must be given to Indian travel. There are no Pullman sleepers in this country, and the tourist must carry his bedding with him. Night trains have compartments containing broad seats which can be used as couches and hanging shelves upon which one may lie. The traveler carries his own blanket, pillow, sheet, towels, soap, etc., and occasionally has to rely on these at hotels as well as on the trains. The cars are entered from the side, and one must take his chance of waking at the right station, for there is no official to give him warning. In India it is customary for foreigners to take an Indian servant with them who acts as an interpreter and looks after the baggage – and looking after the baggage is no easy task in this part of the British empire. After we had made one short trip without assistance we were glad to yield to the custom, and Goolab, a Calcutta Mussulman, proved himself an invaluable aid in dealing with the baggage coolies, whose language we could not understand and whose charges vary from the legal rate as the minimum to three or four times that if the tourist shows himself a novice at the business.

The hotels of India are declared by the guide books to be bad, and one does not feel like disputing these authorities after having made the trip. I do not mean to say that there is no difference between them, for in several places we found comfortable rooms and in some places palatable food. Everywhere we were so interested in what we saw that we could endure almost any kind of accommodations, but at one place the fare was so unsatisfactory that we were reduced to eggs and toast. Goolab, overhearing some mutterings of discontent, took it upon himself to report in the hope of securing some improvement, and the clerk asked me for particulars. I told him that I had not intended to make any complaint, but that as he was good enough to inquire, I would say that we did not like the cooking; that the crackers were sometimes mouse-eaten and that we found worms in the cabbage. He thought that the mice were inexcusable, but, as if the question disposed of the matter, asked: "The worm was dead, wasn't it?" I was compelled to admit that it was.

Leaving Calcutta, we sought the ancient city of Benares, which bears the distinction of being the center of Hinduism. In fact, it has been the religious capital of India for two thousand years or more.

At Sarnath, just outside Benares, stands the first Buddhist pagoda, said to have been erected nearly five hundred years before the beginning of the Christian era to commemorate a spot in the deer park where Buddha taught his disciples. Recent excavations near there have brought to light one of the Asoka pillars which, though unfortunately broken, still bears testimony to the skill of the sculptor as well as to the zeal of the great Buddhist king. But these ruins are all that is left of Buddhism in this vicinity, where Buddha lived and taught and where his doctrines were once triumphant, or Hinduism has virtually rooted out Buddhism, adopting, it is said, the device of making him one of the incarnations of their own god.

At Benares one sees idolatry in its grossest and most repulsive forms, and it is therefore as interesting to-day to the student of the world's great religions as to the devoted Hindu who travels hundreds of miles over dusty roads to bathe in the Ganges, whose waters he considers sacred. Benares is built upon the north bank of the Ganges, and it is estimated that each year it is visited by a million pilgrims. When more than three hundred miles from the city, we saw the caravan of one of the Maharaja (Maharaja is the title borne by native princes) on its way to the river. There were five elephants, a dozen camels and twenty or thirty bull carts, besides numerous pack animals and horses. The trip could not be made in much less than two months, and all this for the sake of a bath in the waters of the sacred river.

The bank of the Ganges is lined for a long distance with bathing ghats (as the steps leading to the river are called), and at one point there is a burning ghat, where the bodies of the dead are cremated. Cremation is universal among the Hindus, sandalwood being used where the relatives can afford it. Taking a boat, as is customary, we rowed up and down the river in the early morning, and such a sight! Down the steps as far as the eye could reach came the bathers, men, women and children, and up the steps went a constant stream of those who had finished their ablutions. Most of them carried upon their heads water pots of shining brass, and some carried bundles of wearing apparel. The bathing is done leisurely as if according to ritual, with frequent dippings; water is poured out to the sun and prayers are said. The lame, the halt and the blind are there, some picking their way with painful step, others assisted by friends. Here, a leper sought healing in the stream; near him a man with a emaciated form mixed his medicine with the holy water, and not far off a fakir with matted hair prayed beneath his big umbrella. On one of the piers a young man was cultivating psychic power by standing on one leg while he told his beads with his face toward the sun.

Dressing and undressing is a simple matter with the mass of the people. Men and women emerging from the water throw a clean robe around themselves, and then unloosing the wet garment, wring it out and are ready to depart. Those who bring water pots fill them from the stream, out of which they have recently come, and carry them away as if some divinity protected the water from pollution. As the river contains countless dead and receives the filth of the city as well as the flowers cast into it by worshipers, it requires a strong faith to believe it free from lurking disease and seeds of pestilence.

When we reached the burning ghat, we found one body on the funeral pyre and another soaking in the water as a preparation for burning. So highly is the Ganges revered that aged people are brought there that they may die, if possible, in the water. While we were watching, a third body was prepared for the burning, and it was so limp that death could not have occurred long before. While the flames were consuming those three corpses, we saw coming down the steps a man carrying the body of a child, apparently about two years old, wrapped in a piece of thin cotton cloth. (The children of the poor are buried in the stream because of the cost of wood.) The man bore his lifeless burden to a little barge and made the corpse fast to a heavy stone slab. The boatman then pushed out from the shore, and when the middle of the stream was reached the man in charge of the body dropped it overboard, and the burial was over.

No one has seen India until he has seen the Ganges; no one has seen the Ganges until he has seen it at Benares; and no one who has seen the Ganges at Benares will ever forget it.

In the suburbs of the city stands the Durga Temple, better known as the Monkey Temple, because it is the home of a large family of monkeys, which are regarded as sacred. Photographs of the temple present rather an attractive appearance, but the original is anything but beautiful, and the monkeys and general filth of the place deprive it of all appearance of a place of worship.

The Golden Temple, however, is the one most visited by tourists, and it would be difficult to picture a less inviting place. The buildings are old and greasy, and the narrow streets are filled with images and thronged with beggars. One finds his interest in missionary work quickened if he wanders through these streets and sees the offering of incense to the elephant god and the monkey god, and to images innumerable. The air is heavy with perfume and the odor of decaying flowers, and one jostles against the sacred bulls as he threads his way through the crowd. We have not seen in any other land such evidences of superstition, such effort to ward off evil spirits and to conciliate idols. The educated Hindus, and there are many learned men among the Hindus, regard these idols as only visible representations of an invisible God, but the masses seem to look no farther than the ugly images before which they bow.

It was a relief to find near this dark pool of idolatry an institution of learning, recently founded, which promises to be a purifying spring. I refer to the Central Hindu College, of which Mrs. Annie Besant, the well known theosophist, is the head. Although the school is but seven years old, it already includes a valuable group of buildings and has some five hundred students. Among the professors are several Englishmen who serve without compensation, finding sufficient reward in the consciousness of service.

Next to Benares Allahabad is the most important Hindu center. The city is on the Ganges, at its junction with the Jumna, one of its longest branches. There is an old tradition that another river, flowing underground, empties into the Ganges at this point, and the place is referred to as the junction of the three rivers. The great Mogul Akbar built a splendid fort where the Ganges and the Jumna meet, and probably on this account Allahabad is the capital of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. Within the walls of the fort there is another of the Asoka pillars, a very well preserved one, forty-nine feet high and bearing numerous inscriptions, among which are the famous edicts of Asoka, issued in 240 B. C., against the taking of life. Within the fort in a subterranean room is another object of interest, the Akhshai Bar or undecaying banyan tree. As this tree is described by a Chinese pilgrim of the seventh century, it is either of remarkable antiquity or has been renewed from time to time.

The religious importance of Allahabad is largely due to a fair which is held there every year and which on every twelfth year becomes a national event. It is called the Mela, and last January brought to the city a crowd estimated at from one and a half to three millions. This every-twelfth-year fair brings together not only the devout Hindus, who come as a matter of religious duty, and innumerable traders, who at such times find a market for their wares, but it draws large numbers of fakirs (pronounced fah-keers, with the accent upon the last syllable) or holy men. They wear full beards and long hair and no clothing except the breech cloth. They put ashes and even manure upon their heads, and their hair and whiskers are matted and discolored. These men are supposed to have raised themselves to a high spiritual state by asceticism and self-punishment. They undergo all sorts of hardships, such as hanging over a fire, holding up the arm until it withers, and sitting upon a bed of spikes. We saw many fakirs at Benares and Allahabad and some elsewhere (for they are scattered over the whole country), and at the latter place one accommodated us by taking his seat upon the spikes.