Grave in the tide the Brahmin stands,
And folds his cord or twists his hands,
And tells his beads, and all unheard
Mutters a solemn mystic word
With reverence the Sudra dips,
And fervently the current sips,
That to his humbler hope conveys
A future life of happier days.
But chief do India's simple daughters
Assemble in these hallowed waters,
With vase of classic model laden
Like Grecian girl or Tuscan maiden,
Collecting thus their urns to fill
From gushing fount or trickling rill,
And still with pious fervour they
To Gunga veneration pay
And with pretenceless rite prefer,
The wishes of their hearts to her
The maid or matron, as she throws
Champae or lotus, Bel or rose,
Or sends the quivering light afloat
In shallow cup or paper boat,
Prays for a parent's peace and wealth
Prays for a child's success and health,
For a fond husband breathes a prayer,
For progeny their loves to share,
For what of good on earth is given
To lowly life, or hoped in heaven,
H.H.W.
On seeing Miss Carshore's criticism I referred the subject to an intelligent Hindu friend from whom I received the following answer:--
My dear Sir,
The Beara, strictly speaking, is a Mahomedan festival. Some of
the lower orders of the Hindus of the NW Provinces, who have
borrowed many of their customs from the Mahomedans, celebrate
the Beara. But it is not observed by the Hindus of Bengal, who
have a festival of their own, similar to the Beara. It takes
place on the evening of the Saraswati Poojah, when a small
piece of the bark of the Plantain Tree is fitted out with all
the necessary accompaniments of a boat, and is launched in a
private tank with a lamp. The custom is confined to the women
who follow it in their own house or in the same neighbourhood.
It is called the Sooa Dooa Breta.
Yours truly,
Mrs. Carshore it would seem is partly right and partly wrong. She is right in calling the Beara a Moslem Festival. It is so; but we have the testimony of Horace Hayman Wilson to the fact that Hindu maids and matrons also launch their lamps upon the river. My Hindu friend acknowledges that his countrymen in the North West Provinces have borrowed many of their customs from the Mahomedans, and though he is not aware of it, it may yet be the case, that some of the Hindus of Bengal, as elsewhere, have done the same, and that they set lamps afloat upon the stream to discover by their continued burning or sudden extinction the fate of some absent friend or lover. I find very few Natives who are able to give me any exact and positive information concerning their own national customs. In their explanations of such matters they differ in the most extraordinary manner amongst themselves. Two most respectable and intelligent Native gentlemen who were proposing to lay out their grounds under my directions, told me that I must not cut down a single cocoa-nut tree, as it would be dreadful sacrilege-- equal to cutting the throats of seven brahmins! Another equally respectable and intelligent Native friend, when I mentioned the fact, threw himself back in his chair to give vent to a hearty laugh. When he had recovered himself a little from this risible convulsion he observed that his father and his grandfather had cut down cocoa-nut trees in considerable numbers without the slightest remorse or fear. And yet again, I afterwards heard that one of the richest Hindu families in Calcutta, rather than suffer so sacred an object to be injured, piously submit to a very serious inconvenience occasioned by a cocoa-nut tree standing in the centre of the carriage road that leads to the portico of their large town palace. I am told that there are other sacred trees which must not be removed by the hands of Hindus of inferior caste, though in this case there is a way of getting over the difficulty, for it is allowable or even meritorious to make presents of these trees to Brahmins, who cut them down for their own fire-wood. But the cocoa-nut tree is said to be too sacred even for the axe of a Brahmin.
I have been running away again from my subject;--I was discoursing upon May-day in England. The season there is still a lovely and a merry one, though the most picturesque and romantic of its ancient observances, now live but in the memory of the "oldest inhabitants," or on the page of history.[055]
See where, amidst the sun and showers,
The Lady of the vernal hours,
Sweet May, comes forth again with all her flowers.
Barry Cornwall.
The May-pole on these days is rarely seen to rise up in English towns with its proper floral decorations[056]. In remote rural districts a solitary May-pole is still, however, occasionally discovered. "A May- pole," says Washington Irving, "gave a glow to my feelings and spread a charm over the country for the rest of the day: and as I traversed a part of the fair plains of Cheshire, and the beautiful borders of Wales and looked from among swelling hills down a long green valley, through which the Deva wound its wizard stream, my imagination turned all into a perfect Arcadia. One can readily imagine what a gay scene old London must have been when the doors were decked with hawthorn; and Robin Hood, Friar Tuck, Maid Marian, Morris dancers, and all the other fantastic dancers and revellers were performing their antics about the May-pole in every part of the city. I value every custom which tends to infuse poetical feeling into the common people, and to sweeten and soften the rudeness of rustic manners without destroying their simplicity."