FOOTNOTES:
[A] The Conservatoire de Musique et de Déclamation lyrique is a municipal and governmental institution in the French capital, founded for the gratuitous instruction of youth of both sexes in singing, music and declamation. It accommodates six hundred pupils, and has a library of eight thousand volumes.
[B] A cant name among the French for the claque.
THE SONG-WIND.
I stand in a climate of spring,
Overblown by a wind from the South,
With joy unspeakable thrilled,
Ineffable song in my mouth;
For the wind is a breeze of delight,
And its blowing is rhythmic and fleet;
It comes from the heart of the South.
Oh, the South wind, the song-wind is sweet!
It comes like the breath of a dream
Blown through the still regions of sleep;
It comes from the islands of love,
Lying midmost the tropical deep;
It has the fresh smell of sea-grass,
It is woven of coolness and heat,
Fruit-flavored and burdened with spice.
Oh, the South wind, the song-wind is sweet!
It stirs the high tops of the trees,
With greenness and fragrance o'erfraught,
Through which the swift sun-glories glance
Like flashes of wonderful thought;
It touches the rose till it burns
Like love in a heart made complete;
It kisses the world into flower.
Oh, the South wind, the song-wind is sweet!
A breath of all ages it is,
From Teos, and Lesbos, and Ind;
Through the years, like a shuttle of gold,
Runs the wonder of song on the wind—
The wonder of flute and of lyre,
A music made mellow and meet
For Sappho, the princess of song.
Oh, the South wind, the song-wind is sweet!
O Sappho! O love-laden soul!
A thrill in the rushes there is,
And the sea breaks into loud song
That throbs with the pulse of the breeze;
And singers, remembering thee,
Cast their crowns and their lyres at their feet,
For the South wind rewakens thy song.
Oh, the South wind, the song-wind is sweet!
It blows with a rustle of palms
And a sound of the laurel and bay,
Far voices and clapping of hands,
Like applause at the end of a play:
It strengthens the poet like wine,
And clothes him from head unto feet
In the power and glory of life.
Oh, the South wind, the song-wind is sweet!
It lifts the gold hair of a girl
Till it shines in the sun like a flame,
It flows through the locks of a man
Toiling hard at his song and his fame;
It is heavy with music of birds;
It has whispers no lips can repeat:
The angels float by on its tide.
Oh, the South wind, the song-wind is sweet!
Ah, world! while the South wind prevails—
With flowers and rushes and streams,
Intrude not a sound of thy wheels,
But leave me alone with my dreams—
My reveries born of this breeze;
And my life, though lowly it be,
Will be happier far than a king's
If the South wind, the song-wind kiss me!
James Maurice Thompson.
NORTHWARD TO HIGH ASIA.
From Calcutta my route was northward to Thibet, to reach, if possible, its capital city of Lhassa, residence of the Grand Lama of the Booddhists—the pontifical sovereign of Eastern Asia. My journey thither was planned by the way of Sikkim, and thence through the Cholah Pass in the Himalaya range. I was most anxious to reach a city so interestingly described by the Abbé Huc nearly thirty years ago, and to learn something further about the present condition and prospects of the "Snowy Region of the North" and the lofty table-lands of Central Asia, so seldom visited by European travelers.
The cars of the East Indian Railway carry one in a single night 220 miles to the town of Sahibgunge and the banks of the Ganges. The first sight of the sacred river excited in me but little enthusiasm. It was about a mile in width, shallow and very muddy, with a swift current and dreary sandy banks, where huge crocodiles were basking in the sun. Its religious character among the Hindoos is well known. Though highly esteemed from its source to its mouth, there are some particular places more eminently sacred than others—as Benares, Allahabad and Hurdwar—and to these pilgrims resort from great distances to perform their ablutions and carry off water to be used in future ceremonies. The Ganges water is also valued for its supposed medicinal properties, and in the British courts of justice witnesses of the Brahmanical faith are sworn upon it.
Having been ferried across the sacred flood, I journeyed onward in what is termed a shigram—simply a large palanquin on wheels drawn by two horses. As I reclined at length upon its cushion-covered bottom, I could see that the country through which we passed was an immense plain, and a clump of bamboos or an occasional palm alone hinted at an Oriental and a tropical landscape. The trees were mostly banians, peepuls and mangoes, and there were many large fields of rice and corn. The native huts were made of bamboo reeds and mud, with straw-thatched roofs. A view of their interiors was of course forbidden me on account of that cursed system of caste which prevails from Peshawur to Rangoon and from Cashmere and Thibet to Cape Cormorin and Ceylon. The road was macadamized and shaded by rows of immense trees. The tricky and balky horses (Mongol ponies) delayed us considerably, but it was very amusing to see the methods employed to coax or coerce them. A groom held in his hand a piece of bamboo about two feet in length, at the extremity of which was fastened a strong looped horsehair cord, which was twisted around the ear of a fractious beast, and a very little power applied a few paces in advance generally removed all scruples as to its progress. Horses who would not back into the shafts were assisted by a rope secured round a hind leg, and one who would not start forward was suddenly persuaded to change its mind through a similar combination of rope and pressure applied to a fore leg. Often one native would take a wheel, others would push from behind, some would lift one of the fore feet of the obstinate brutes, a few would take their heads, and then, after much alternate fondling and beating, off we would go at a very break-neck speed for perhaps a mile, when the horses would quiet down into an easy trot for the remainder of the stage.
About twelve o'clock on the first night a very provoking yet amusing incident happened. I had some time previously covered myself with my blankets and closed the sliding doors of the vehicle, as it was a bitter cold night, and had been enjoying a sound sleep, when, waking suddenly, I found the shigram standing in the middle of the road, but without either horses, coachman or groom. I had heard that such an event will occasionally happen in Indian dak-posting and so endeavored not to be disconcerted. Alighting from the shigram, I walked toward a fire which was just discernible through the trees, and found my missing coachman taking a comfortable smoke and a quiet chat with half a dozen bullock-drivers, friends of his, who were camping there for the night. I approached the social group with the feelings of a ghoul, shook my fists in the coachman's face and talked exceedingly loud, making free use of all the bad words in Bengalee of which my then limited vocabulary would admit, placing particular emphasis upon the scathing soour ("pig") and the withering gudha ("fool")—epithets more dreaded by the Hindoos than the most profane oaths. The man jabbered something in his native tongue, about as intelligible to me as if spoken in the language of the Bechuanas of South Africa or in that of our Sioux Indians. Returning to the shigram, I quietly prepared myself to await the issue. But the effects of my furious philippic had been complete, and in less than ten minutes the ponies were harnessed and we were again on our way.
In the morning I stopped at a dak-bungalow for breakfast. The word dak means post or stage, and the bungalows are inns for the accommodation of post-travelers built by government at distances of about twenty miles apart. They are of one story, and usually contain some half dozen apartments for sitting, dining and sleeping, besides dressing- and bath-rooms. These bungalows are under the direction of a khansamah, or native butler, who hires a small corps of servants to attend the wants of travelers. If you bring provisions, the khansamah will have them cooked for you, or he will supply you with a limited bill of fare, charging for each dish according to an official scale with which every bungalow is furnished. Any traveler can obtain rooms in a dak-bungalow during twenty-four hours, for which he must pay one rupee (fifty cents), and no one can claim shelter for more than this period should the bungalow be full or should other travelers arrive.
On the afternoon of the following day we reached the foot of the hills and the terminus of the shigram travel. The Himalayas in view were bold and sharp in outline, and densely wooded to their very tops, and my route lay directly over the nearer range, which was something more than a mile in height. You may ascend the foot-hills by palanquin or pony. For the former, previous application is necessary, as relays of bearers must be arranged on the road. There are eight bearers, four of whom carry you at a time. They have two movements—a sharp trot, and a long even step as a rest from the regular gait—but neither is very enjoyable to the occupant of the palanquin after a few hours' trial. They relieve each other every half mile. The stages are about eight miles in length, at the end of each of which an entire new set of bearers is obtained. On comparatively good and level roads these bearers will average four miles an hour: in ascending or descending steep mountains the rate of speed is of course somewhat less. I chose a mountain-pony, a wiry and vicious little fellow, and engaged a coolie to carry my baggage to a village thirty miles distant for the grand recompense of one rupee.
Soon after starting I met people of both sexes who were neither Hindoos nor Mohammedans, but bore a strong resemblance to the Chinese. The men were short, stout and muscular, and their faces wore a stolid and almost stupid look, which was not at all improved by their long black hair or by their filthy garments and persons. The women, however, were rather good-looking, not concealing the face as in the plains. These people were natives of Nepaul and Bhotan, independent states of India. After a ride of five or six miles I passed a terai, a great jungle infested by tigers and elephants; so at least my companion, a devout follower of the Prophet, informed me. This terai consisted of rank grass fifteen feet in height, thick underbrush and some few huge trees; and so dense was it that a passage could only be made with an axe. It is always advisable to pass through such places during the daytime. At Kurseong there was a good hotel, the Clarendon, kept by an old New Yorker, who told me he had left America fifteen years before, and during that period had traveled all over the world, had made a great deal of money in Western Africa in the palm-oil trade, and had finally "settled down" (or rather up) in India. He started the first tea-plantation in the Himalayas, and is reported to be worth at present more than a million rupees.
The coolie, a Nepaulese, carried my baggage up the mountains at a sharp trot, and reached the hotel but two hours after my own arrival. It was a wonderful exhibition of strength and endurance. The distance was thirty miles and the weight of the burden nearly eighty pounds. The hill-tribes, breathing a cool and invigorating air, are alone equal to such displays of vigor and endurance. Some time afterward, in going to Simla in the Western Himalayas, I employed coolies who were possessed of the same wonderful stamina as these Nepaulese. They were splendid-looking men, shorty but thick-set and very muscular, with olive-brown skins, piercing black eyes, long glossy hair and regular and handsome features. One of this class of men (Hindoo hill-tribes) will carry thirty seers (sixty pounds) upon his back, or twenty-five seers upon his head, up the hills for fifty miles, without rest or food, in twenty-four hours; his charge for which is but one rupee—a special instance of the astonishingly cheap labor of all India.
The road ran the whole distance on the face of almost perpendicular hills, and for the greater part of the way was guarded by a low wall on the dangerous side. The scenery was most grand, and I already felt well repaid for the arduous journey from Calcutta. Some views were, however, rather frightful. Imagine a ride on the very brink of a precipice thirty-five hundred feet in depth, with the hills rising abruptly on the other hand twenty-five hundred feet in height above you. The tops of the distant and lofty mountains were all hidden in the clouds, but the scenery of the valleys beneath one's feet was very beautiful. The immense fields of tea planted in rectangular rows, the dark-green and dense foliage of the forests, with here a planter's dwelling or a factory glistening in the morning's sun, and there perhaps a little silvery waterfall or a bubbling brook, and great black shadows cast by the clouds, made a truly impressive picture. And yet, though already on hills more than a mile in height, I had only gained this altitude in order to obtain glimpses of much higher and grander mountains, nearly a hundred miles distant.
Just before reaching Darjeeling there is a military cantonment, where some troops are stationed for the active duty of protecting Her Majesty's northern Indian boundaries. The officers' residences and the barracks are situated on the top and upon the precipitous sides of a small hill, and bridle-paths wind between, and flower-gardens and ornamental trees are to be seen grouped about each dwelling. Darjeeling is distant about three hundred and fifty miles almost due north from Calcutta, of which it is regarded as the sanitarium, though, owing to the hardships of the journey from that city, the more distant Simla is quite as often resorted to by the invalided officials, merchants and troops of Hindostan. The feasibility of building a railroad to Darjeeling has long been discussed, and it appears that the engineering difficulties, though great, can nevertheless be overcome; but no active steps have as yet been taken toward the attainment of so desirable an object. The European residents of the town of Darjeeling number about fifty, and there are perhaps four times as many tea-planters in the surrounding country.
The next day being Sunday, and the day on which marketable supplies are brought into town for the whole week, the proprietor of my hotel took me to see the bazaar. It much resembled others visited in and near Calcutta, but I was surprised at the variety of European vegetables offered for sale: there were peas, onions, potatoes, squashes, lettuce, radishes, turnips and many kinds of grain, including that peculiarly Yankee "institooshun" pop-corn. The bazaar was held out of doors in a public square, with a few shops of dry goods around, and a most terrible din arose from the motley crowd there assembled. In one place a number of soldiers from the cantonments were bidding on some glassware offered at auction, and in another mothers of families and khansamahs were bustling about engaging their necessary household supplies. Here was a wretched beggar, with a grotesque mask on his face, dancing before some of the merchants, who gave him a few potatoes in exchange for his contortions. The people embraced Hindoos, Mohammedans, Bhoteeas, Nepaulese and Sikkimites, and presented every variety of dress and figure, having seemingly but one feature or possession in common, and that was a very prominent display of unclean skin and raiment. The Nepaulese women wore bracelets and necklaces of Indian coins, besides silver anklets, finger- and nose-rings, gold earrings and beads, and each had also suspended from her neck a silver snuff-box. These boxes were three or four inches square, made of the purest metal, and handsomely carved and embossed.
At Darjeeling I learned that my plan of traveling to Lhassa was not feasible—that the Talé Lama ("sea of wisdom") and the great palace, and a city whose three productions, according to Chinese travelers, are lamas, women and dogs—many of whose streets are lined with houses built of ox and rams' horns; and a people whose mode of salutation is by uncovering the head, thrusting out the tongue and scratching the right ear, and whose manner of disposal of their dead is by cutting the corpses in pieces and giving them to "sacred dogs," raised and nurtured in convents for the express purpose—would have to be known only through the reports of others. The Thibetan traders in Darjeeling reported that the Pugla Diwan of Sikkim had become a great man in Thibet, and had seized everything en route from Lhassa during the year, and, having stored all in huge warehouses, would allow nothing to pass into Sikkim and Bengal. Previous travelers and missionaries had all of them entered the country in the disguise of priests or of Chinese or Mogul traders, having a knowledge of the Thibetan or some allied language; and even then so greatly fearing detection as to be unable to learn very much of the condition and capabilities of the land or the habits and usages of the people. That foreigners should be so rigorously excluded from Thibet is doubtless owing to Chinese influence—to the fear and jealousy of British power and possession in the East, the southern boundaries being rigorously guarded by a cordon of Chinese garrison-stations on the highlands of the Himalayas.
I might approach nearer, or perhaps ascend the great mountain Kanchinjinga, which is about fifty miles distant from Darjeeling, though there are no roads over or around the intervening hills, and the journey would have to be undertaken on foot, and tents, provisions and a large retinue of servants would be necessary. And then, at best, but the snow-limit or a little higher could be reached (hardly two-thirds the distance to the summit), and therefore the interest of the trip would scarcely compensate for its hardships. Instead of this, the proprietor of the hotel proposed a little excursion on horseback into Sikkim, the country of the Lepchas. It is ten or twelve miles to the bottom of the valley, and the road (or rather bridle-path) winds around the hills forward and back, but constantly descending, until at length the Rungeed River is reached. Some of the precipices were frightful to look over, and I clutched the reins tightly, braced myself in the saddle, and almost held my breath as the pony trotted quietly along a path three feet in width and often lying at an angle of 45°; but there was no danger, unless it might perhaps be from the sliding away of part of the road, since the ponies are mountain-bred and very sure-footed. The views were extremely grand, and the distances from peak to peak so immense that the mind was almost lost to detail. Much of the land is cleared of forest trees and covered with tea-plants: cinchona also is cultivated, and with great success.
The Rungeed is a small mountain-torrent, a branch of the Peesta, which latter empties its waters into the great Brahmapootra ("son of Brahma"). It serves as a boundary-line between Bengal and Sikkim. Crossing this stream at a height of about thirty feet, there is a bamboo-cane suspension bridge three hundred feet in length, which was built entirely by the natives. It is intended for foot-passengers, and will safely support a dozen people at a time. It consists of sixteen bamboo canes, of the size of the finger, on either side. The bottom is formed of three very large stems of bamboo, and a sort of wickerwork extends from these upward to the supporting canes, which are about six feet from side to side, and may in crossing just be grasped by the hands. The bridge has a peculiar oscillating motion, which increases so much at the centre, together with an up-and-down movement, that, with a sight of the fiercely rushing water beneath, the traveler's head is apt to become giddy.
Crossing to the other side, I met in the forests an English gentleman, who informed me he was just returning from a two weeks' tour through Sikkim. It was Colonel Manwaring of H. M.'s Indian army, who was engaged in compiling under government orders a dictionary of the Lepcha tongue. Salutations over, Briton like, he pressed me at once to drink, asked if I would try a native beer, and upon my assenting ordered a quantity of chi (a drink made of fermented millet) from a hut near at hand. It proved a nutritious and exhilarating though not intoxicating beverage, and we drank it à la Sikkimite, warm, through a reed a foot in length and from a joint of bamboo holding perhaps a couple of quarts. The colonel informed me that the Lepcha language is very copious, expressive and beautiful, abounding largely in metaphor. The number of words is very extraordinary, and requires a person to be something of a geologist, botanist and zoologist—in short, to understand very many of the sciences and not a few of the arts—in order to learn perfectly this curious tongue. His labors among the people he described as very trying and discouraging. He had been employed upon the dictionary more than three years, and it was not nearly completed. We rode slowly up the hills, and reached the inn late in the evening.
I had waited nearly a week for a clear day on which to view the highest mountain-peaks in the world, and had almost despaired of success when on the last morning of my stay, upon looking from my window at daybreak, I saw that although the valleys and sides of some of the hills were covered with clouds and fog, still a lofty peak near Darjeeling showed its face distinctly and for the first time during my visit. Remembering that this mountain was over two miles in height, perhaps Mount Kanchinjinga might be in sight, but I hardly dared entertain the thought. It was my last chance, for I intended to return to the plains in the afternoon; so, jumping into my clothes, pulling on my hat and snatching up my field-glass, I walked, or rather ran, to the other side of the hill for an unobstructed view. Suddenly turning a sharp bend in the road, I saw through the trees a clearly-defined, substantial-looking cloud—was it a cloud, though?—and rushing forward a dozen paces, lo and behold! one of the highest mountain-summits on the globe stood unveiled before me! I confess never in my travels to have experienced like sensations of awe and reverence. My eyes involuntarily filled with tears, and I stood completely lost in wonder and admiration.
It was early morning. The sun had newly risen, though not yet visible, and threw a flood of rosy light upon the gigantic snow-tipped pinnacles, causing them to glisten like polished white marble. The valley below, four or five thousand feet deep, was filled with an ocean of silvery clouds, which majestically rolled and rose upon the forest-clad sides of the great mountains as far as the limit of perpetual snow; and from this fleecy mass as a border towered aloft against an azure-hued sky the magnificent form of Kanchinjinga. For miles in each direction the thickly-wooded sub-hills were in sight, but all interest centred in the never-by-man-trodden peak before and above me. A dread and awful silence seemed to pervade the air, and the total absence of life or motion lent an almost supernatural glamour to the scene. For nearly two hours I sat as one entranced, until the sun gently lifted the clouds from the valleys, and as with a silver-wrought screen shut off from my eyes the most impressive sight they ever beheld. During this marvelous exhibition the "littleness of man" had been made very painfully lucid. Yet, perhaps, there is nothing so calculated to raise the thoughts, enlarge the mind or purify the heart as the contemplation of the sublime and beautiful in Nature.
Kanchinjinga, properly speaking, consists of three peaks, which are sharp, serrated, precipitous, and apparently composed of solid rock from the snow-limit to the summit. Its immense height is not thoroughly appreciated by the traveler for two causes—its great distance (fifty miles "as the crow flies"), and the fact that the point of observation is itself one-fourth the height of the mountain. Had I risen earlier and ridden to Mount Senchal, fifteen hundred feet above Darjeeling, I might have obtained a view of Mount Everest, which is nearly thirty thousand feet in perpendicular height above the sea (about five and a half miles), and is the supremest point upon our globe, while Mount Kanchinjinga, which until quite recently was supposed to be the higher of the two, is found to be of about eight hundred feet less altitude. Mount Everest is a single peak, a cone, and appears like a small white tent above the clouds, but in grandeur and sublimity it is excelled by Kanchinjinga. Well do the Himalaya Mountains bear out the meaning of their name—the "abode of snow"—for on their southern slopes in some places the snow-line descends to fourteen thousand feet. The mean elevation of this remarkable range is double that of the Alps, and many of its passes to the elevated table-lands of Central Asia are higher than the summit of Mont Blanc. Huge glaciers of smooth ice, though none so vast as those of the Alps, are numerous in parts of this stupendous mountain-chain, and even descend from the regions of perpetual snow to eleven thousand feet. Though the Andes of South America present a mountain-system twice the length of the Himalayas, still in respect to altitude the former are much surpassed by the latter. Mount Dwalaghiri in Nepaul is of nearly the same height as Kanchinjinga: then, there are two peaks which attain twenty-six thousand feet; four about twenty-four thousand feet; and over twenty that reach an elevation exceeding twenty thousand feet!
Leaving Darjeeling, I visited one of the large tea-gardens near the terai at the foot of the hills. The best of land may be purchased at ten rupees per acre, and an average-sized plantation embraces about two hundred acres. The prospective garden must be cleared of its forest and jungle, which is an arduous task, but when once it is in order one native can properly cultivate an acre. The best teas are raised upon the tops of the hills, upward of seven thousand feet above the sea-level. Good tea can only be grown under two conditions: these are moisture and heat, and hence the southern slopes of the Himalayas are admirably adapted to its cultivation, for during the middle of the day the sun is warm, and at night there are very copious dews. The laborers employed are all natives, and one or two Europeans only are necessary to superintend the largest plantation. The indigenous tea-plant was first discovered in Assam (the north-eastern district of Bengal) in the year 1830. From there it was introduced into Cachar and Darjeeling, and from these places into the hills in the north-western part of Hindostan. In 1850 the English government founded plantations in the Kangra Valley, about one hundred and twenty miles from Lahore, on the borders of Cashmere, which proved so successful that many were soon established in various other localities. Cinchona (Cinchona calisaya) also succeeds well upon the hills, and is being extensively grown, as, owing to the prevalence of fevers of all kinds, quinine is in great demand throughout India.
Reaching the Ganges again without accident or noteworthy event, I traveled on westward up its rich valley, and soon entered upon the great plain of Hindostan (embracing an area of half a million square miles), which, though nearly treeless, contains some of the most fertile soil on the globe. There were clusters of huts and dilapidated mosques at short intervals, and the natives might be seen at work in the fields with their antiquated wooden ploughs, the bent limbs of trees, or engaged in cutting paddy (rice in the husk), or hoeing poppy-plants, or digging little drains. Wherever we met them they would stop work, drop everything, and gaze at the railway train, which seemed to them apparently as strange a sight as if it had just dropped down from the clouds.
In Hindostan, land is owned either by government or by the native rajahs and nawabs. That belonging to the former is leased to a class of people called zemindars (the word means "landholder," "landkeeper"), and they sublet it to another class styled ryots (the "husbandmen," "peasants"), who are the real tillers of the soil. A well-to-do zemindar will rent two thousand acres of land, for which he pays about four annas (twelve cents) an acre. The hardships of the ryots are great—they are treated like slaves, and can barely make a subsistence—but among the zemindars are numbered some of the wealthiest men in the country: one, for instance, owns fifty square miles of fertile land, all wrung from the labor of the poor peasants. Formerly these zemindars were merely the superintendents of the land, but latterly they have been declared its hereditary proprietors, and the before fluctuating dues of government have under a permanent settlement been unalterably fixed in perpetuity.
As we rolled along, on both sides of the railroad as far as the eye could see were immense fields of wheat and barley, paddy, tobacco, mustard, the castor-oil plant, millet, maize, the poppy, indigo and sugar-cane. Wheat and barley are not sown broadcast as with us, but in drills a few inches apart: both grains are consumed in the country—little or none is exported. The paddy resembles rye or wheat when growing, the rice-kernels being contained in husks at the top of the spires. The plant requires a wet loamy soil (such as is best offered in Cambodia and Siam, the former being styled "the Asiatic storehouse of rice"), and there is but one crop in the year. The mustard-plants which we saw were about two feet in height, and bore small yellow flowers as crests. The oil and the table article of commerce are made by grinding the seeds in mills constructed for the purpose. The castor-oil plant is a green and succulent shoot about six feet in height, with white flowers hanging in bunches like hops. Maize is never fed to cattle as in America, but is all consumed by the poorer classes of natives. But most interesting were the poppy-plants. These are raised in oblong patches of ground surrounded by low mud walls for retaining the water which is essential to their growth. The plants are quite small, with green leaves at the base, from which rise tall stalks with bulb-like tops, the pod of the flower. At the proper season, when ripe, incisions are made in these bulbs—simple scratches—by drawing two needles across them toward evening, and the juice, which exudes during the night, is scraped off in the morning and collected in shells. This operation is performed upon all sides of the bulb, and then the juice is sent in earthenware jars to Bankipore to be manufactured into opium by drying in the sun and various other processes. When quite prepared it is pressed into balls, boxed and exported to China, to the great emolument of the British Indian government, in whose hands the trade is a monopoly (it deriving one-twelfth of its entire income from this traffic alone), and to the fearful moral and physical degradation of the Chinese.
Patna is one of the oldest cities in India. It extends for a mile and a half along the south bank of the Ganges, which is here five miles in width in the rainy season. It consists properly of but a single street eight miles in length and thirty feet in width, with numerous short byways. Patna contains about two hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants, and was formerly a place of such considerable trade that the English, French, Dutch and Danes had factories here, though few European merchants remain at the present day. I found the streets crowded with gayly-dressed, vivacious Mohammedans and Hindoos and solemn, gruff-looking Afghans. Some were on foot; some on horseback, astride splendid horses brought from the Deccan; many rode in eckas, a few in baillies—two varieties of native vehicle. The dwellings in the city, built of mud with tiled roofs, were mostly but one story in height. In those of two stories the lower is rented as a shop to the merchants (or used as such by the owners), and in the upper the family dwells, as is customary in our cities. The stores were of all denominations, but the manufactures were principally of cotton goods and earthenware, which latter is made in feeble imitation of European crockery. The smell of the curry and ghee (clarified butter) in some shops was intensely disagreeable, and the numerous shelves of metai (sweets compounded of sugar, butter and flour, and of which the natives are very fond) looked anything but inviting to a gora-log (a fair-complexioned person). It is generally supposed that the Hindoos never use intoxicating beverages, but I passed several liquor-shops and saw three or four men drunk in the streets. The drink in general request is the fermented juice of the taul or Indian palm tree, which, though mild and soft to the palate, is yet very acrid and baneful to the stomach.
There is an old granary in Patna, a large beehive-shaped structure of brick and plaster, at a guess two hundred feet in diameter by one hundred feet in height and twelve feet in thickness. Two stair-cases of one hundred and fifty steps each wind upward to its summit on either side, giving the building from a distance the appearance of a huge brick cork-screw. These steps were intended to be used for carrying up the grain, the building being filled through a small aperture at the top, and up them Shah Maharaj, the present premier of Nepaul, is said once to have ridden his pony—a most daring feat of horsemanship and nerve. On one side were two large stone tablets with inscriptions—the one in Persian, the other in English. They simply stated that the granary was erected in 1786 as part of a general plan ordered by the governor-general and council of India for the perpetual prevention of famine. It has never yet, however, been filled with grain, but has been employed as a military magazine. From the summit a fine view of the surrounding country is to be had, comprising plains and forests, stately bungalows and flowery "compounds," vegetable gardens, native huts, and in the distance the sacred Ganges, with its stony bed more than half exposed.
Formerly, famines were not infrequent in Hindostan, which was owing to an insufficient fall of rain at the proper season and consequent failure of the crops. One occurred in the year 1770, in which thirty millions of people are said to have perished in the valley of the Ganges. This Patna granary was doubtless one of a number which it was intended should be built throughout the country and filled with grain in times of plenty to supply the people in case of famine, like those in the cities of ancient Egypt which Joseph filled with corn in the seven years of plenteousness and opened in the seven years of dearth, when "famine waxed sore in the land." But the building of the Ganges Canal and the railroads have rendered it almost impossible that a widespread calamitous famine should again occur in this section of India—the former by providing a more thorough system of irrigation, and the latter by affording means for the rapid and easy transportation of food from one province to another. The extent of the recent famine has been grossly exaggerated. Had certain public works—the construction of railroads and other sources of communication and of canals for the irrigation of the rice-fields—which the government contemplated prior to the outbreak of the distress, been completed, probably no reckless, sensational reports of "a disaster which had no parallel in the history of human misery" would have reached our ears.
In the long street already mentioned as extending from Bankipore to Patna is situated the government opium manufactory and warehouse. March and April are the months in which opium is made: at the time of my visit it was being packed and prepared for shipment to China. The various buildings are of brick, and the grounds are surrounded by a high wall. Entering one of the gates, I passed a Sepoy sentinel, and a little farther on some stone barracks. I then entered one of the largest buildings, and found about a hundred natives, with a European superintendent, busily engaged in weighing and packing the drug. The juice of the poppy-plant is brought in by the farmers from the surrounding country in stone jars, and has the appearance of thick tar. It is placed in large tanks, well worked up, and then dried in the sun. Next, cases are made about six inches in diameter, resembling cannon-balls, of alternate layers of thin poppy-leaves, of the poppy-flowers and of the liquid juice, and these are an inch in thickness. The whole interior is then filled with the viscous fluid, and the balls are placed to dry in earthenware cups upon immense shelves with which many entire buildings are filled. The balls weighed two seers (four pounds), and were worth thirty-two rupees (sixteen dollars) each. They were packed in long wooden boxes with thin partitions, rolled in poppy-leaves. There were forty balls in a box, which was worth when filled twelve hundred and eighty rupees or six hundred and forty dollars. About three thousand natives were employed in this manufactory.
From Patna I went on to Benares, the Mecca of Hindooism, where for the space of two weeks I was royally fêted by Maharajah Isuree Pershod, chief of the four great castes of the Hindoos.
Frank Vincent, Jr.