Birds of Passage

by Henrietta Clive

  The girls will I am afraid lose their bloom before you see them and be quite brown. I shall be black, much more so than any of the Herberts at Powis Castle.

  Adieu.

  Many loves to you.

  Ever, my dear Lord, yours very affectionately

  H. A. C.

  August 30th, Henrietta’s journal

  Came to Pylney. It is a pretty place and cultivated with a considerable river passing near it. There are two hills near. On one of which there is a famous pagoda dedicated to Soobramanee concerning which there are many stories told and too long for me to insert here. I passed the day in a bungalow built by Colonel Oliver. It was very hot and the glare very disagreeable.

  In the evening I went through the village to see a pagoda dedicated to Soobramanee It was very large; the ornaments better carved than these places usually are. There was a long passage or hall supported by pillars and covered with stone across which were hung garlands of flowers and a variety of lamps on each side leading to the holy place where the god was placed. Flowers were offered to him by being put on the altar at his feet and lights (I suppose fifteen in a pyramidal form) were waved before him. Then a lesser light, one in a glass dish, after which a bell was rung and some prayers recited and then flowers were brought and put round my neck. It is remarkably pretty altogether and I was much pleased with it. I believe it was the god Soobramanee as there are many offerings of slippers on the roof of the entrance.

  August 30th, Pylney, Henrietta to Lord Clive

  This morning to my great joy and surprise I received the enclosed letters, which I send to you directly. I wish my brother had not occasion for Harrogate though I have no doubt it will do him good. General St John with his wife are good people. She is one of Lord Craven’s sisters and a very good little woman. I shall be glad to see him and hear how my dear boys look, shall not you? Captain Brown has a long account of your old regiment, which he seems charmed with. I have not had time to hear it yet. We are in a more Christian-like place than for these two days, but it is hot and sitting in a bungalow built by Colonel Oliver. All well and merry.

  You will be sorry to hear by your uncle’s letter of the death of poor old Sophie. I hope she is the only friend I shall lose by my absence and am very sorry for it.

  We halt tomorrow. The roads are heavy for the animals and we have five days march afterwards before the next halting day. God bless you. I am glad to find that Edward grows and Robert improves. I hope we shall see those good souls. Have you ever written to them? Some very fine mountain limes are just brought. I have desired some trees for you. They are larger than any lemons I have seen except in Italy.

  Adieu. Many loves to you.

  Ever my dear lord, yours very affectionately

  H. A. C.

  The letter from Edward to you came with the others enclosed by General St John.

  August 31st, Henrietta’s journal

  I went to the top of the hill to the most distant pagoda. The ascent is tolerable easy having steps cut in the rock. There are some little choultries on the way and some lesser pagodas. One pagoda is to the giant who watches Soobramanee where there are slippers brought as offerings. The pagoda itself is not near so large as that I had seen last night. They brought me flowers and a filthy mixture composed of oil and jasmine with which the people rub their throats.

  There is at the door of the most holy place a guard or champion in a sort of armour and with horsehair in a bunch on his head. Behind his girdle is a large piece of brass with two heads of the same hanging down before him, a sword drawn and a cloth thrown round him. If the holy place should ever be in danger of being taken, it is to be put in a bag and thrown down from it. On the way down I saw several fakeers with their hair matted and of a great length twisted round on the top of their heads and thought it was some ornament. They were dirty figures. There was an old man who had elephantiasis, the first I ever saw. It is a most shocking disorder.

  In the evening I went round the tank. It is considerably raised and deepened and is now fourteen feet in the deepest part and being a good deal above the land on the other side. It is convenient for watering it and generally produces three crops. I went afterwards to a pagoda, but it was not so handsome as that on the preceding night. The road to that on the hill was illuminated and the pagoda itself, which had a very pretty effect, the lamps being placed on each side of the way or rather there are holes made in the rock in which the oil is put.

  August 31st, Pylney, Henrietta to Lady Douglas

  My dear Lady Douglas – I have had at last the pleasure of receiving two packets of letters from England and that doubly by having letters from every soul I have particularly wished to hear. You are a delightful person to write to me wherever there is an opportunity and I have letters from all Dalkeith house, which makes me quite happy. I assure you that sort of comfortable correspondence is, I really think, the great luxury in the East. I like to know how every body is going on and how the world is peopled by your nephews and nieces … To the greatest degree I can perfectly enter into all your lives. I think very often of you and all your offspring. It is now two years since I landed upon this sandy shore. In two more I trust I shall be in a better place but I do not yet know any time when I am likely to be so happy. I wrote to you in April from Ryacottah where I had travelled, not with seven leagued boots but with elephants and camels like an Eastern Damsel with all possible dignity.

  From thence I proceeded to Bangalore, which is the only place upon this Eastern Earth worthy to be called a country. The air is so wholesome and delightful that I felt it cold and shut the doors. It was not like a cold fog, which prevails in the Carnatic, but like an autumn day in England. When I lived in Tipu’s palace near three months and rejoiced that I was not one of his wives who had only two rooms, one within the other with a very small window in one and without any in the other. They sat and ate betel in miserable confinement with the happy prospect of being sent for by him and perhaps to have their necks dislocated if such was his pleasure. These fair ladies were never allowed to speak to him unless he asked them a question or began the conversation. They were reminded when they went into his apartment by the old women who attended them that they must be silent. Some they say had ventured to speak and that without hesitation he has had them instantly destroyed. Think of the blessing of being the wife to that great Potentate on such terms. He was not magnificent even in regard to their dress. He gave them very small jewels of little value and if not great occasions they were not to be dressed. The jewels were always returned again to him. He had ordered the inhabitants to quit Bangalore after it was taken by Lord Cornwallis and that the fort should be destroyed which were nearly done. I had an excellent garden with alleys of cypress trees and the only sweet roses in India.

  From thence I proceeded to Seringapatam and saw all the marks of horror of the siege and storm, which has given me a pretty idea of fortification, a new accomplishment. I am sure it must be my own fault if this is not the case as it was most learnedly explained to me. I saw Haidar’s and Tipu’s widows. Some were handsome but still nothing like the beauties in the Arabian Nights nor no pearls like pigeon’s eggs. Some of them thought it necessary to cry, but I did not see many real tears except in the true wife who was neither young nor handsome, but she really seemed to feel concern. Yet in fact, except the pleasure of seeing him and the chance of being hung and destroyed, their situation is exactly as it was in his lifetime. They have more certain provision and all their little wishes gratified. It is really more like a convent than anything I ever saw. The real wife is the head and chief. They are all married but those only are called the real wives on whose marriage there was great rejoicing and ceremonies, which cost one or two hundred thousand pagodas. Therefore it is not convenient to have many of these ladies. His daughters are fine little girls and very like the pictures of Tipu.

  After all these affairs I went to Mysore. The little Rajah is six years old and a nice little boy with a most sensible interesting coun
tenance. His grandmother is as short and as fat as any human creature can be that is to move upon the face of the earth. She looks very well for her age – sixty years – and has the appearance of much sense. These people are really interesting and it is wonderful that after being confined between thirty and forty years she should be restored and that, through Tipu, who wished to annihilate the throne and name of Mysore, this little boy should live and that he should now sit upon the ivory throne on which his ancestors and predecessors sat 700 years ago. It is impossible not to moralise upon the decrees of providence on such an occasion and on the uncertainty of all human affairs. I shall always think of the two days I passed at Mysore with interest and shall care more about the affairs of India than I ever did from having beheld these two persons.

  Since that I have descended the Guzelhutty Pass which is something like a Scotch or Welsh mountain, a very great compliment to it I assure you. One of the people attending my baggage was carried off by a tyger the evening before I arrived. Some of my belongings heard it growl and Charlotte is quite persuaded she saw its tail. I assure you the consternation was extreme. Everybody had a horrible tale to tell. But the poor man was really devoured and two other bodies were found half eaten just by the side of the road. This was really travelling in the East.

  I have been at Coimbatoor and in unfrequented woods in search of teak and other strange trees. Many I have discovered that are quite new descriptions. I shall have some seeds. When I return to Madras I think I shall be able to send you some pretty creepers for the little hot house. When I meet with a beauty, the Collector or somebody promises to get the seeds. I have really found one or two plants that are very sweet and not known. I sincerely hope that your journeys may all do as much good to your family as mine has done to my girls. They grow tall and not too thin. I think of England very often and with what pleasure I shall see it again.

  Thanks to you for the Darbish muslin from Mrs Fleming at Glasgow. I have not yet seen it, but I hear it is at the capital where I cannot arrive before the 18th or 20th October as I go to Trichinopoly and Tranquebar. I believe I am thought a strange restless animal. A black woman never moves and the white ones in this country are not much more active. Besides I descend from my dignity and walk upon my own feet at every place where I take up my abode.

  This was written in a breath and having reposed and read your last letters once more I shall begin again and having finished the East talk a little more of the North and some of its good productions for instance the person you certainly do not love a little who I must call as you do ‘Car’. I am charmed to hear she delights in drawing and composing. It is what my perfect old Mrs Byres always said the most lasting and the most gratifying of the arts that if you sung or played like Orpheus it soon passed, but that a drawing was a lasting amusement to yourself and your friends. It is what I should have like to have done if I had ever been able and I am sorry that at present I see very little disposition in either of my girls to draw at all either man or beast – It was once my great hobby horse. Here I have not power to do such things …

  How I should like to be put down this minute and hear the readings and see the drawing in your sitting room and all the comforts thereunto belonging, as the greatest part of my life is passed in thinking how to keep my two blessed girls in health and to do as much as I can for their improvement. I feel how much pleasure you must have in seeing yours of more different ages prosper before you. I should like to see them again. The little plaything cannot know me but the more ancient I think will remember me whenever I am so happy as to return to my own country. The account of yourself and proceedings delights me. There is nothing more pleasant to me than to follow any person for whom I am interested. I have seen you in my mind’s eye through your journey and only wish I could do it with my real eye as well as my mental. The story you tell me of your neighbour’s infatuation diverts me much. There seems a great deal of that sort of infatuation in London and nothing but ladies leaving their spouses. Don’t you think the world is not so good as they were in the days of your and of our youth and that instead of mending they grow worse? Without any vanity I do really believe that your daughters and mine are and will be the most innocent that have been or will be in the world to which I do as really believe that many people do not attend sufficiently to that essential part of education that accomplishments have been usually more attended to than more spiritual things.

  Pray remember that every relation of your movements and of your doings is delightful to me that I see you all merry at Bothwell and Dalkeith … and that there is nothing I wish for much more than to remain in all your remembrances. May all good attend you.

  Most sincere wishes.

  Yours

  H. A. Clive

  Pylney, where I have been to see a famous pagoda and caught cold from garlands of wettish flowers that the priests put round my neck after they had been offered to God Soobramanee. The stories of the pagodas are really very entertaining.

  September 1st, Henrietta’s journal

  Came to Darapooram. It is in a very sandy dusty situation and very hot. Mr Hurdis is building a house, which will be very uncomfortable in a short time. He showed me some coins late found about thirty miles from hence, most undoubtedly Roman and gave me several of them. In the evening I walked to his new Brahmin’s village and saw some timber from the Annamallee Woods, forty feet long and two feet square brought by bullocks at the expense of sixty rupees each.

  September 1st, Darapooram, Henrietta to Lord Clive

  You will receive in about eight or ten days some lime and lemon trees which as the fruit was uncommonly fine I desired William Hurdis to send you and by the tappal. You will receive the fruit itself as a specimen. I have just seen some boughs of the cinnamon trees from the hills: wild. The leaves are very large and strong and the cinnamon taken off by the country people without knowing how or when it ought to be done. It is not so strong as the best from Ceylon. There were some fine pepper vines and some other boughs of which the fruit will be sent to you as it is new to me: medicinal and used in dyeing. I have some specimens – two – of a sort of redwood but not near so beautiful as that I sent you from Ryacottah. There is sandalwood, but not so fine as some you will have from Seringapatam nor near so large.

  We had a long march today of seventeen miles. It is very hot but we are well. I hear you are very gay and giving balls, but you do not trouble yourself with writing. Your last letter was dated the 10th August. Did I tell you I have had a letter from Captain Malcolm before he arrived at Sheraz? I keep it till we meet. This is an ugly dreary place with little cultivation or trees and a hot wind blowing the dust – Adieu. We hear from William Thomas that the ships do not sail till October. Is it true? And is there any October fleet? Besides pray let me know because of my letters. I see Lord Wellesley has £200,000 from the Company. Is it true? Are any other governors to have anything? I think they ought.

  Adieu. Ever, my dear Lord,

  yours very affectionately

  H. A. C.

  September 3rd, Chinna Darapooram, Henrietta to Lord Clive

  We are just come here and the change of weather has been very great within these two days. Yesterday the thermometer was at 94. Much hotter than you are at Madras. I trust that we shall soon get into a cooler climate. I have three times passed the river by which your timber must be floated if it goes in that way. It is now only knee deep … I have not desired any trees of the other woods till I show them to you. The heat has not oppressed us much. As you may suppose my next letter will be from Caroor where we shall halt a day. William Hurdis says that some fine timber used to come down the Godavery and Kistrah to Madras. Teak particularly.

  Adieu. Many loves to you.

  Ever, my dear Lord. yours very affectionately

  H. A. C.

  September 4th, Pallipalum, Henrietta’s journal

  It was pleasanter than it had been for some days. I took a long walk in search of stones and found many crystals with which the country
abounds. They say that they increase the fertility, which may be on the same reason that stones are put round greenhouse plants to present the cooperation of the moisture in the ground. The appearance was improved though the country was not pretty but rocky and wild. There is a rapid though narrow river close by the tents, which contributed to make them comfortable.

  September 5th, Henrietta’s journal

  Came to Caroor. It is a deserted place and Mr Hurdis has little hopes of its improving from going out of the great roads. I went to some rooms built over a choultry … It was extremely hot and oppressive. Several polygars came to make their salaam and two widows of that of Rangherry, about which there is a disputed suspicion. There has been much iniquity, bribery, and treachery respecting their poor people. The sons or I believe the nephews of the late polygar and real heirs were not arrived. The ladies suffered much for a long time, but Mr Hurdis refused to let the boys come as polygars in that would have been organising to their claim, which he did not then know, would be proved to the government.

  In the evening I went round the fort. There was a magnificent choultry round the pagoda dedicated to the destroying power. But, it was destroyed by Major Birsema when he was with Col Fullarton and I understand very unnecessarily. It is a very great pity. It was built of granite and much better done than the figures in pagodas are usually. I slept in the tent and breakfasted the next morning in the fort.