Through India and Burmah with pen and brush

by A. Hugh Fisher

Here and there towards the first part of the journey were a few acres of cultivated ground mostly given to paddy, and in one place there was a plantation of fruit trees now snowy with blossom. Most of the way, however, was through a rough tract of jungle with large trees in places and miles of tall rough grass sometimes ten and even twenty feet high. We passed bullock-carts bringing heavy loads of broken wood, and once I saw an ox lie down on the sand under the yoke it found too hard to bear. We passed two men carrying between them in a cloth a huge python which they took out to show me—a creature twice the length of a man.

All the while, far beyond the forest on the other side of the river, mountains were in sight, pale and ethereal in the heat of the afternoon. I passed many ant-hills—ridged grey peaks of mud under which snakes often lie. At one moment a flight of green parrots would rise from near trees and cross the road screaming—at another I would see a crowd of monkeys golden in the sunlight swinging in the slender upper branches. There were cork trees with masses of tiny pink blossoms, and one kind of tree, as large as an English oak, known as the "flame of the forest," was covered with big five-petalled scarlet flowers.

It was getting ominously late and the shadows lengthened every minute. At last the tumtum driver declared that he could not drive over the rocky way to the village. I left him by some great trees on the roadside, and to lead me to the holy places I waylaid a boy whom I drove before me hurrying in a race with the sun—my servant following at his usual decorous pace. I think it was another mile before passing quite a number of large solid brick and stone Darmsalas (or pilgrims' rest-houses) and a small bazaar, I came out on a wide stretch of rounded boulders along the side of the river. The hills now rose from quite near the farther bank and the scene was very beautiful indeed. The water rushed along, rippling over shallows and racing through narrower channels bluer than ever.

There were no temples of any architectural pretensions, and it became evident to me that the importance of Rakhykash did not lie in its buildings at all, but in the worshipping places of the Sikhs. Along and above the shore, I came at intervals to paled enclosures within which a large and devout crowd of people sat listening to a priest who was seated beneath a thatched gable-shaped cover on wooden upright posts. The largest of these was at the head of a path made of smooth white boulders which stretched a furlong from the water's edge. At the opening to the loose tall fence were many shoes. Leaving mine with the rest, I stood for a moment at the entrance, looking inquiring permission to one of the priests. The men were grouped round the front and sides of the thatched cover, and receiving welcome I entered and sat among them on a reed mat like the rest. At one side were a crowd of women farther away than the men, all in white robes which covered their heads like white hoods lovely in the soft warm glow of the setting sun.

The thatched shelter is called the Kuteah. The Padre or chief priest sat just in front of the thatched opening and round him Gristis or minor priests, one of whom was speaking. When he had finished, the women all rose and went out in long single file. The sun had just set. Beyond were the mountains and infinite space. The sound of the river came faintly over the great expanse of stones.

Most of the turbaned priests were in woollen robes or togas of a colour between saffron and salmon pink. The thatched hut of long grass was, I should have said, facing the river so that the high priest looked towards it. The pilgrims and other people were in white or other colours and a few in black blankets. Just in front of the priests were four musicians, with grey clothes and white turbans, the ones nearest me with two tom-toms and the farther one with a kind of viol. They were now singing to their music words of the Granth. The viol player was blind and made grimaces as he sang; all had black beards. One Gristi, who had in front of him the holy book itself folded in a cloth on a book-rest, presently stopped the singers and sent a man to say they were all pleased to see me among them. He told me that they do not make temples but worship only the words of the Granth, and that the musicians were singing some of these words. These men all looked clean and healthy. Most of their faces were refined—some of them noble.

Slowly the light faded and when I came away the last thing I saw of that place was the splendid landscape—the river flowing under solemn hills and stars coming out. I do not suppose I shall ever see nearer to the source of the Ganges.

Darkness had fallen before I again found the tumtum. The driver was sitting with some other men who were preparing food at a fire under the trees. An elephant was supping on a heap of green branches which had been thrown down for him close by.

When we started to come back we had no lamp but borrowed a lantern a little later from a camp outside Rakhykash under promise of return by coolie next day.