HUMAN ORDURE EATEN BY EAST INDIAN FANATICS.
Speaking of the remnants of the Hindu sect of the Aghozis, an English writer observes:—
“In proof of their indifference to worldly objects they eat and drink whatever is given to them, even ordure and carrion. They smear their bodies also with excrement, and carry it about with them in a wooden cup, or skull, either to swallow it, if by so doing they can get a few pice, or to throw it upon the persons or into the houses of those who refuse to comply with their demands.”—(“Religious Sects of the Hindus,” in “Asiatic Researches,” vol. xvii. p. 205, Calcutta, India, 1832.)
Another writer confirms the above. The Abbé Dubois says that the Gurus, or Indian priests, sometimes, as a mark of favor, present to their disciples “the water in which they had washed their feet, which is preserved and sometimes drunk by those who receive it” (Dubois, “People of India,” London, 1817, p. 64). This practice, he tells us, is general among the sectaries of Siva, and is not uncommon with many of the Vishnuites in regard to their vashtuma. “Neither is it the most disgusting of the practices that prevail in that sect of fanatics, as they are under the reproach of eating as a hallowed morsel the very ordure that proceeds from their Gurus, and swallowing the water with which they have rinsed their mouths or washed their faces, with many other practices equally revolting to nature” (idem, p. 71).
Again, on page 331, Dubois alludes to the Gymnosophists “or naked Samyasis of India ... eating human excrement, without showing the slightest symptom of disgust.”
As bearing not unremotely upon this point, the author wishes to say that in his personal notes and memoranda can be found references to one of the medicine-men of the Sioux who assured his admirers that everything about him was “medicine,” even his excrement, which could be transmuted into copper cartridges.
“I was informed that vast numbers of Shordrus drank the water in which a Brahmin has dipped his foot, and abstain from food in the morning till this ceremony be over. Some persons do this every day.... Persons may be seen carrying a small quantity of water in a cup and entreating the first Brahmin they see to put his toe in it.... Some persons keep water thus sanctified in their houses.”—(Ward, quoted by Southey in his “Commonplace Book,” London, 1849, 2d series, p. 521.)
VIII.
THE ORDURE OF THE GRAND LAMA OF THIBET.
That the same disgusting veneration was accorded the person of the Grand Lama of Thibet, was once generally believed. Maltebrun asserts it in positive terms: “It is a certain fact that the refuse excreted from his body is collected with sacred solicitude, to be employed as amulets and infallible antidotes to disease.”
And, quoting from Pallas, book 1, p. 212, he adds: “Il est hors de doute que le contenu de sa chaise percée est dévotement recueilli; les parties solides sont distribuées comme des amulettes qu’on porte au cou; le liquide est pris intérieurement comme une médécine infaillible.”—(Maltebrun, Universal Geography, article “Thibet,” vol. ii. lib. 45, American edition, Philadelphia, 1832.)
The Abbé Huc denies this assertion: “The Talé Lama is venerated by the Thibetans and the Mongols like a divinity. The influence he exercises over the Buddhist population is truly astonishing; but still it is going too far to say that his excrements are carefully collected and made into amulets, which devotees inclose in pouches and carry around their necks.”—(Huc, “Travels in Tartary, Thibet, and China,” London, 1849, vol. ii. p. 198.)