by Fanny Parkes
A young bullock was standing in the stable today by the side of three horses. A snake bit the animal, and it died in a few minutes. The horses escaped – and so did the snake, much to my sorrow.
July 19th – The other evening Major P— was with us when Rām Din, a favourite Hindu servant, brought into the room a piece of cotton cloth containing Rs 150 tightly tied up in it; the man placed it on the table by my side, and retired. Major P—, who thought the cloth looked dirty, took it up and saying ‘Oh the vile rupees!’ let it drop upon the ground between his chair and mine. We took tea and I retired to rest, entirely forgetting the bag of rupees. When I looked for it the following morning, of course it had disappeared. By the advice of the jamadār of the office we sent for a gosāin, a holy personage, who lived in a most remarkable temple on the ruins of an old well by the side of the Jumna, close to our house. The gosāin came. He collected the Hindus together, and made pooja. Having anointed a sacred piece of wood (acacia arabica or babool) with oil and turmeric and placed it in a hut, he closed the door; and coming forth, said: ‘To show you that I am able to point out the thief, I have now left a gold ring in front of the idol in that house; go in and worship, every man of you. Each man must put his hand upon the idol. Let one amongst you take the ring, I will point out the man.’
The Hindus looked at him with reverence; they all separately entered the dwelling, and did as they were ordered. The jamadār performed the same ceremony, although he was a Musulmān. On their appearing before the gosāin, he desired them all to show their hands, and having examined them with much attention, he exclaimed, looking at the hands of the jamadār, ‘You are the thief!’ The man held up his hands to heaven, exclaiming, ‘God is great, and you are a wonderful man!’ A Musulmān did not believe in your power; your words are words of truth; I took the ring, here it is: if it be your pleasure you can, doubtless, point out the man who stole the rupees.’
The gosāin then told the people, that unless the money were forthcoming the next day, he would come and point out the thief. That evening the jamadār roamed around the house, calling out in the most dismal voice imaginable ‘You had better put back the rupees, you had better put back the rupees.’ The police came, and wished to carry off Rām Din to prison, because he was the servant who had put the money by my side. The man looked at me. ‘Is it your will? I am a Rajpoot, and shall lose caste; I have served you faithfully, I am present.’
‘Who will be security that you will not run away?’ said the barkandāz. I replied, ‘I will be his security: Rām Din will remain with us, and when the magistrate sends for him, I will answer for it he will be present.’ The man’s eyes filled with tears: it was the greatest compliment I could pay him: he made a deep salam, saying, ‘Memsāhib! Memsāhib!’ in an agitated and grateful tone. The next morning the jamadār informed me that a bag was on the top of the wardrobe in my dressing-room, and none of the servants would touch it. I went to the spot, and desired Rām Din to take it down.
‘This is the cloth that contained the rupees,’ said the man, ‘and it has never been opened; I know it by a peculiar knot that I always tie.’ He opened the bag, and found the whole of the money.
We had reason to believe one of the under-bearers committed the theft. The Hindus have such faith in their gosāins, and their influence over them is so great, they dare not do otherwise than as they are ordered by the holy men. I got back the £15, and gave £4 to those who had exerted themselves to find it.
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THE DIVER WHO THINKS ON THE JAWS OF THE CROCODILE WILL NEVER GATHER PRECIOUS PEARLS.
CHAPTER XII
SKETCHES OF ALLAHABAD
THE LAMP BURNS NOT BEFORE THE BLACK SNAKE
Which, like the Burmese idols, is supposed to carry a bright jewel in its head
OCTOBER 1829 – Snakes are very numerous in our garden; the cobra de capello, and the black snake, whose bite is just as mortal. This morning I turned over some tiles with my foot when a cobra I had disturbed glided into the centre of the heap, where we killed him.
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Several were in the stable and henhouse. A snake-charmer came, who offered to fascinate and catch the snakes for me at one rupee a head. He caught one, for which I gave him a rupee; but as I had it killed, he never returned – the charm was broken. It was a tame fangless snake, which he had tried to pass off as the wild one.
We killed three scorpions in the dining-room, of rather large dimensions. Our friend and neighbour had much compassion on frogs. Many an enormous bullfrog he rescued alive from the jaws of the snakes he killed in his garden. The poor frogs lost their defender on his return to England, and we an excellent friend.
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October 29th – We drove to the Parade-ground, to view the celebration of the Rām Leela festival. Rām the warrior god is particularly revered by the sipahīs. An annual tamāshā is held in his honour, and that of Seeta his consort. A figure of Rawan the giant, as large as a windmill, was erected on the Parade-ground: the interior of the monster was filled with fireworks. This giant was destroyed by Rām. All sorts of games are played by the sipahīs, on the Parade. Mock fights and wrestling matches take place, and fireworks are let off. Two young natives, about ten or twelve years old, are often attired to represent Rām and Seeta; and men with long tails figure as the army of monkeys, headed by their leader Hanumān.
On dit, that the children who personate Rām and Seeta, the handsomest they can select, never live more than a year after the festival. For this I vouch not – it is said they are poisoned.
One ceremony was very remarkable: each native regiment took out its colours and made pooja to the standards, offering them sweetmeats, flowers, rice and pān, as they do to a god! At Cawnpore I saw the men of the third cavalry riding round the image of the giant, with their colours flying, after having made pooja to them.
At the conclusion of the tamāshā, the figure of Rawan is blown up by the conqueror Rām.
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Rāj Ghat is on the banks of the Ganges, about a mile and a half above the Fort of Allahabad, and the village of Daraganj extends along the side of the Mahratta Bund above for some distance. To the right of the spot where travellers land on coming from Benares is a fine building, called a dhrumsālā, or place to distribute alms; it is dedicated to a form of Māhadēo, which stands in the shiwālā, or little temple, above: the form of this octagonal temple, as well as that of a similar one, which stands at the other side of the building, is very beautiful. On the left are the remains of a very large and curious old well.
After sketching this dhrumsālā, we ascended the bank to Daraganj, to see the inner court, and found it filled with elephants, tattoos, cows, and natives. It is used as a sarāe, or abode for travellers. I saw there a most beautiful and exceedingly small gynee (a dwarf cow), with two bars of silver round each of her little legs; she looked so pretty, and was quite tame. Through the doorways of this court you look into the little octagonal temples, and, through their arches, on a fine expanse of the Ganges which flows below.
You cannot roam in India as in Europe, or go into places crowded with natives, without a gentleman; they think it so incorrect and so marvellous, that they collect in crowds to see a memsāhib who is indecent enough to appear unveiled. A riding-habit and hat, also, creates much surprise in unfrequented bazaars, where such a thing is a novelty.
We proceeded through the basti (village) on foot, and up a dirty alley, through which I could scarcely pass, to the Temple of Hanumān, the black-faced and deified monkey, and found there an enormous image of the god painted red and white, and made either of mud or stone. A great number of worshippers were present. The bearers hold Hanumān in the greatest reverence.
In another apartment were forty or fifty large and small figures, representing Rām and Seeta his consort, with his brother Lutchnlan, Hanumān, and all his army of monkeys. Seeta was carried off by the giant Ravana, Hanumān fought for and restored her to Rām, therefore they are worshipped together.
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These figures were decorated with coloured cloth and tinsel, much in the same manner in which the saints are clothed in the churches in France. I had never but once before seen idols in India, tricked out after this fashion. Many lamps were burning before the shrine. We were allowed to behold them from the door, but not to enter the apartment.
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At this time the plain in front of the fort, by the avenue on the side of the Jumna, was exceedingly picturesque. It was covered by an encampment awaiting the arrival of the Governor-General. There were assembled two hundred elephants, one thousand camels, horses and hackeries, servants and natives without number. A double set of new tents for the Governor-General were pitched on the plain; the tents which were new the year before, and which cost a lac, having been discarded. These new tents, the elephants, camels, horses, and thousands of servants, will cost the Company more than half batta saves in the course of a year.
News has just arrived that the Directors have rendered all this encampment useless, by sending orders to Lord William Bentinck not to proceed up the country at their expense; in consequence Lord William has discharged the people. I am glad they are going away. Last night a friend of ours, who is in tents in our grounds, had his gun and dressing-case stolen, no doubt by thieves from the encampment.
December 20th – The ashes of a rajah were brought to Prāg this morning to be thrown into the Ganges at the holy junction; they were accompanied by the servants of the rajah, bearing presents to be given, as is the custom, to the Brahmans, amongst which were two remarkably fine Persian horses. One of these horses, a flea-bitten grey from Bokhara, was bought by us from the Brahman to whom it had been presented. On Christmas Day my husband gave me this horse, making my own particular riding-stud amount to a fair number – Mootee, Black Poney, Trelawney, Bokhāra. Are ladies in England as fond of their horses as I am? They cannot make pets of them in that country as we can in India.
December 25th – How many presents I received this day – and such odd ones – the Bokhara grey, a sketch of Lord William Bentinck, Martin’s Deluge, a proof-print, a bag of walnuts, a diamond ring, a hill-shawl, two jars of jam, and two bottles of hill-honey! All farewell gifts from friends bound to England. We spent the evening around the horseshoe-table, the coal fire blazing brightly as we cracked the hill-walnuts and enjoyed the society of our friends. Of all the offerings of that day, the most welcome was a packet of letters from the beloved and absent ones in England. ‘A letter is half an interview.’
CHAPTER XIII
REMOVAL TO CAWNPORE – CONFESSIONS OF A THUG
WHAT VARIETY OF HERBS SOEVER ARE SHUFFLED TOGETHER IN A DISH, YET THE WHOLE MASS IS SWALLOWED UP IN ONE NAME OF SALLET. IN LIKE MANNER I WILL MAKE A HODGE-PODGE OF DIFFERING ARTICLES.
JANUARY 1830 – The failure of Messrs Palmer and Co., early in this month, caused the greatest consternation in India, and fell most severely on the widows and orphans of military men, who, having left their little portions in Palmer’s house, had returned to England.
January 9th – My husband gave over charge of his office to Mr N—, who had returned from the Cape, and we began to speculate as to our destiny.
March 1st – My husband, having applied to remain up the country, was informed he might proceed to Cawnpore as acting-collector for eight months, on condition that he consented to give up the deputation-allowance to which he was entitled by the rules of the Civil Service. The conditions were hard, although offered as a personal favour, and were accepted in preference to returning to Calcutta.
Cawnpore, 150 miles from Allahabad, and 50 from Lucknow, a large station, is on a bleak, dreary, sandy, dusty, treeless plain, cut into ravines by torrents of rain; if possible, the place is considered hotter than Prāg.
Like the patriarchs of old we travelled with our flocks and herds or, rather, we sent them on in advance, and followed dāk.
March 27th – We quitted Allahabad, and drove the first stage to Alamchand, where we were kindly received by friends. At this place I first remarked the mowa tree (Bassia longifolia).
The fruit was falling and the natives were collecting it to make bazaar srāb (ardent spirits). The fruit, which is white, only falls during the daytime; when dried, it is given to cows as cheap food – from it the butter takes a fine yellow colour.
In the evening we proceeded dāk, and arrived the next morning at the house of the judge of Fatehpur. Just before entering his compound I stopped my palanquin, and desired a bearer to draw me a lota full of water from a well at the road side. The man took the brass vessel, which was fastened to a very long string, and threw it into the well; then drawing it up, he poured the contents on the ground, saying, ‘A thuggee has been committed, you cannot drink that water. Did you not hear the lota – bump – bump upon a dead body in the well?’ I reported the circumstance on my arrival, and not having before heard of the Thugs, was very much interested in the following account of The Confessions of a Thug. These fellows, it appears, roam about the country in gangs strangling people for their money; it is their only employment. During the three weeks of my stay at Futtehpore, the bodies of three men were found in the neighbouring wells – thugged – that is, strangled. Some years ago the Thugs were in great force, but they were well looked after by the police, and a thuggee was seldom committed: within a few months they have become very daring, especially around Cawnpore, Humeerpore, and Fatehpur.
A Kutcherry or Kachahrī
A copy of The Confessions of a Thug, from a circular dated August, 1829, was sent by the Governor-General to the judges of the different stations on this subject. The reason for the Governor-General sending this circular to all the judges and magistrates, was to induce them to be on the alert after Thugs, in consequence of a party of them having been seized up the country by Captain Borthwick, four of whom turned evidence against the others. They were examined separately, and their confessions compared.
The following is the confession and statement of the principal witness:
‘My father was a cultivator of land in Buraicha and other neighbouring villages, and I followed the same occupation until I entered my thirtieth year, when I joined the Thugs, with whom I have been more or less connected ever since, a period of upwards of thirty years.
‘During this time, however, I have not accompanied them on every excursion; but, on the contrary, for intervals of two, three, and even six years, have remained at home and earned a subsistence by cultivating land, so that I have been engaged in only six predatory excursions: four under a leader, since dead, called Oo-dey Singh, and two under my present chief and fellow-prisoner, Mokhun Jemadar.
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‘Oo-dey Singh, my former leader was, at the period of my joining his gang, beyond the prime of life, although, at the same time, active and enterprising; but gradually becoming unfit for the exertion required of him by his situation, and his son Roman being seized with other Thugs and cast into prison at Jubbalpore, he abandoned his former course of life and shortly after died.
‘At the time I was serving under Oo-dey Singh, tranquillity had not been established throughout the country, and our excursions were neither carried to so great a distance, nor were they so lucrative or certain as they have since been; for in those days travellers, particularly those possessed of much property, seldom ventured from one place to another unless in large parties, or under a strong escort; and we ourselves held the Pindaries and other armed plunderers in as much dread as other travellers.
‘About three months after I had joined Mokhun’s gang, which consisted of forty men, we set out from Bundelkand for the Dekkan, this was in the month of Phalgun, 1883 (about March, 1826). We proceeded by regular stages, and crossed the Narbada at the Chepanair Ghāt, where we fell in with Chotee Jamadār (a Brahman), who joined us with his gang, the strength of which was about the same as our own.
‘We then continued our course towards Mallygaow, and at Thokur, near that cantonment, celebrated the Hooly; after which we resumed our route and reach
ed Mallygaow, where we struck off by the Nassuk road, intending to turn from Nassuk to Poona and Aurangabad.
‘After proceeding a coss or two on this road we met a relation of Mokhun’s, belonging to Oomrao and Ruttyram’s gangs, who informed us that these two leaders with their gangs were near at hand on the Poona road, engaged in the pursuit of some angriahs with treasure. It was proposed that Mokhun should join them with some of his men, in order to be entitled to a share of the spoil. Mokhun at first thought of going himself, but recollecting that Oomrao and himself were not on good terms, he sent twenty-five men with Chotee Jamadar. On the day following we heard the business was effected, and that they intended to proceed with Oomrao and Ruttyram to Bhoorampore, at which place they requested us to meet them. We accordingly proceeded to that quarter, and found Chotee Jemadar and his party at Bhoorampore, Oomrao and Ruttyram having returned to their homes.
‘Here we learnt that the angriahs had been attacked and murdered near Koker (the place where we had celebrated the Hooly), and that no less a sum than Rs 22,000 was found on their persons in gold, bullion, mohurs and pootlies. Of this Rs 6000 had been received as the share of our two gangs, and was disposed of in the following manner.
‘Mokhun received one-third for himself and his gang, a third was given to Chotee Jamadar for himself and his gang, and the remainder was reserved for the mutual expenses of the two gangs. Mokhun and Chotee despatched the two-thirds above mentioned to their homes that sent by the latter reached its destination safely; but one of Mokhun’s men in charge of our share having got drunk at Jansy, blabbed that he was a Thug and returning with others with a large amount of treasure; he was consequently seized by the sirdār of the place, and the money taken from him. We now quitted Bhoorampore, and proceeded to Aurangabad but, meeting with little or no success, we returned by Dhoolia and Bhopāl to Bundelkand, and reached our several homes before the rains set in. Our next excursion was towards Gujerat, but in this nothing occurred worthy of note.