The natives cannot understand why Europeans cut off the tails of their horses, and consider it a disgusting and absurd practice. An officer in the artillery related a story of having sold an old Persian horse, with a tail sweeping the ground, to a friend at Fathīghar. When the sā’īs returned, Captain A⸺ asked him how the horse was liked, and if he was well. “Ahi, Sāhib!” said the sā’īs, “I had no sooner delivered him up than they cut off his tail, and the poor old horse was of such high caste that he could not bear such an indignity, and next morning he died of shame!” “Sharmandī ho mar-gayā.” The English may be a very civilized nation, but this cutting off the tails of their horses, nicking the bone, and scoring fish alive, savour somewhat of barbarism: all that can be urged in its defence is, it is the custom (dastūr).
The natives are extremely superstitious, and delight in incantations. “God save you, uncle!” is the address of a Hindoo to a goblin, of which he is afraid, to prevent its hurting him[8].
Her Highness the Bāiza Bā’ī, having heard of the great fame of my cabinet of curiosities, requested some tigers’ claws for the Gaja Rājā. I wrote to a friend in Assam, who sent me a quart of tigers’ claws! regretting he was unable to procure more. If you kill a tiger, the servants steal his claws as quickly as possible to send to their wives to make into charms, which both the women and children wear around their necks. They avert the evil eye and keep off maladies. The Gaja Rājā was pleased at having procured the claws, and her horse’s neck was adorned with some five-and-twenty ornaments or more strung together, each made like the one appended to the chain in the sketch; it must have been valuable, being formed of pure gold.
The charm, No. 1 in the sketch, I had made by my own workman in the bazār, in solid silver, a copy from a necklace worn by the wife of one of my servants Dilmīr Khān. “Not one, but seventy misfortunes it keeps off[9].” The tiger’s claws are tipped and set in silver; the back opens with a hinge, and the Jadu-ke-Bāt, a written charm, is therein concealed, the efficacy of which, added to the claws, ensures certain prosperity to the possessor, and averts the evil eye. No lady in India can wear any thing so valueless as silver, of which the ornaments made for her servants are composed. Whether Musalmānī or Hindoo, the women are delighted with the claws of the tiger. When an amulet, in form like No. 2 in the sketch, is made for a child, two of the teeth of the crocodile are put into it in lieu of tigers’ claws. To-day a child in the Fort met its death by accident. The natives say, “How could it be lucky when it wore no charm to protect it?” Baghnā is the name for the amulet consisting of the teeth and claws of a tiger, which are hung round the neck of a grown-up person or of a child.
The Prophet forbids the use of certain amulets, saying, “Verily, spells, and tying to the necks of children the nails of tearing animals, and the thread which is tied round a wife’s neck, to make her husband love her, are all of the way of the polytheists.”
“It is the custom in Hindoostan to keep a monkey in or near a stable, to guard the horses from the influence of evil eyes. In Persia, the animal so retained is a hog; and in some parts of England, a goat is considered a necessary appendage to a stable, though, possibly, from some other equally fanciful motive.”
The owl is considered an unlucky bird. “One-eyed men have a vein extra[10];” and are supposed to be more knowing than others. And I have before mentioned that an opinion prevails in wild and mountainous parts of India, that the spirit of a man destroyed by a tiger sometimes rides upon his head, and guides him from his pursuers.
I have never seen it done in India, but I have heard from very good authority, that there are men who profess to be able to tame the most vicious horse by whispering into his ear; a man will go up to a violent animal, whisper to it, and the creature will become tranquil. Catlin, in his account of the North American Indians, says: “After having caught a wild horse with a lasso, the Indian gradually advances until he is able to place his hand on the animal’s nose, and over its eyes, and at length to breathe in its nostrils; when it soon becomes docile and conquered, so that he has little else to do than to remove the hobbles from its feet, and lead or ride it into camp.” And in another part of the work, Catlin says: “I have often, in concurrence with a known custom of the country, held my hands over the eyes of the calf, and breathed a few strong breaths into its nostrils; after which I have, with my hunting companions, rode several miles into our encampment, with the little prisoner busily following the heels of my horse the whole way, as closely and as affectionately as its instinct would attach it to the company of its dam! This is one of the most extraordinary things I have met with in this wild country; and although I had often heard of it, and felt unable exactly to believe it, I am now willing to bear testimony to the fact, from the numerous instances I have witnessed since I came into the country.”
In explanation of the coin, marked No. 9, in the plate entitled “[Superstitions of the Natives],” I must give an extract from the letter of a friend:—
“To entertain that amenity so requisite for the obtaining a note from you, I send, under the seal wherewith I seal my letter, ‘a little money,’ as a first instalment. The form of the coin is meant to be octagonal; that form is more evident on those that are larger. Now for the coin’s explanation: It bears the seal of Rajah Gowrinath Singh, who succeeded his father Luckhishingh, in Assam, 1780; he was of a hot temper, and a liberal. After reigning five years, he was expelled by Bhurrethi Moran Rajah of Bengmoran. Gowrinath Singh fled to Gowhatty, and having got the Company to take his part, Captain Wallis was sent with an armed force to reinstate him on the throne; this was performed, but at the cost of incredible destruction of towns, villages, cultivation, and all that sort of thing. Since those days, Assam has been a jungle. Finding Rungpore, his capital, depopulated, Gowrinath caused a palace to be built on the banks of the Deshoi, where he lived in tranquillity ten years; the place became populous, and though the palace has fallen into ruins, it still exists as a town, under the name of Deshoi Khote. Gowrinath Singh died in 1795, having reigned in Assam fifteen years. I will send you his inscription, which is in part only on the coin enclosed; but I must get it from my learned Pundit. Other and older coins are found, both of gold and silver, but of no baser metal; copper appears to have been unknown for that purpose.”