The evening was very fine; my companion, as well as myself, enjoyed rambling about and exploring such queer, curious, and out-of-the-way places.
A DHRUMSĀLĀ BĒNE MĀHADĒO GHĀT.
We descended to the side of the Ganges, and walked on until we came to the Ghāt of Bene-Māhadēo which is represented in the sketch, where there is another dhrumsālā. This building is also dedicated to Shivŭ; the mystical symbol is in the small temple above. Under the arches in the lower part, by the side of the Ganges, is an enormous figure of Ganeshŭ; many worshippers were present, who were pouring oil and Ganges water over the image, with rice and flowers, and hanging chaplets of flowers around his neck. The idol was dripping with oil.
Above the god, over the arch, three long thin bamboos were stuck up, each bearing the red flag of a fakīr, adding greatly to the picturesque beauty of the scene. These flags denoted that three holy men had there taken up their abode for a time. This temple is very picturesque, and the fine trees around it add to its beauty.
We ascended the banks, and entered the dhrumsālā. It fronts the Ganges, and a high wall around the other three sides separates it from the bazār. We entered by a gateway of three arches. The court in the interior contained three long buildings supported on arches, and two octagonal temples, one at each end. The front facing the Ganges had no wall, being built on the edge of a high cliff. In the arched building to the right, in which were many apartments, we found a number of devotees singing and making a great religious noise with small brazen cymbals.
ADANSONIA DIGITATA.
Dec. 5th.—The gunpowder agency at Papamhow has been done away with by the government, and our friend has quitted us for England. I must not take leave of Papamhow without mentioning the remarkable trees in the grounds. The natives call them veläitee imlee. They are enormous trees, natives of Africa. Adansonia digitata, from Michel Adanson, a French botanist. M. G. Mollien thus speaks of this tree—the boabab, Ethiopian sour-gourd, or monkeys’-meat tree—in his travels in Africa: “This was the first time that I saw the boabab, that enormous tree which has been described by Adanson, and which bears his name ‘Adansonia.’ I measured one, and found it to be forty feet in circumference. This majestic mass is the only monument of antiquity to be met with in Africa. To the negroes the boabab is perhaps the most valuable of vegetables. Its leaves are used for leaven, its bark furnishes indestructible cordage, and the bees form their hives in the cavities of its trunk. The negroes, too, often shelter themselves from storms in its time-worn caverns. The boabab is indisputably the monarch of African trees.” It is also called monkeys’-bread. Several measured by Adanson were from sixty-five to seventy-eight feet in circumference, but not extraordinarily high. The bark furnishes a coarse thread, used in Africa for cloth and ropes; the small leaves are used as bread in times of scarcity, and the large for covering their houses, or, by burning, for the manufacture of soap.
ADANSONIA DIGITATA.