1844, Nov. 5th.—At noon we moored off the Civil station of Bhagulpūr. The river-side has been very picturesque the whole distance from Colgong. Procured mutton, fowls, yams, &c., from the bazār; and purchased some pieces of silk and some imitation Scotch plaid, that was brought for sale to the budgerow. Accompanied the Judge to see the new church, the building of which he superintends; saw the monument which was erected in honour of Mr. Cleveland, of the Civil Service, by the Zamīndars, and was told, that at the other end of the station is another monument erected to him by the Government. He brought the Hill people into subjection, by whom he was styled the “Father of their Country.” Bhagulpūr is eighteen miles above Colgong; it is two hundred and sixty-eight miles by land from Calcutta,—by water, from the same place, three hundred and forty-eight miles in the rains, and six hundred and thirty-six in the dry season,—and the dāk runs in two days and a quarter. Steamers take nine and a half or eleven days to arrive here. A light kind of silk, called tasar, is sold in this bazār, also, shot silks of various colours, useful for razāīs and native wear, and a kind of cloth called bāftas. Here are a few Hill rangers and a sepahī station.
6th.—A pleasant and cool sail, the wind being fair at times; lugāoed off a sandbank. But few insects, there being no trees near us.
7th.—To-day, to my sorrow, I was unable to pay the Rock and Temple of Janghīra a visit, in consequence of the deep stream being on the other side the river; still, I was near enough to sketch it,—and very pretty and picturesque is its situation. It is twenty-five miles above Bhagulpūr; the rocky point on which the old ruined mosque stands, close to Janghīra, with the mountains beyond, would form a good subject for a picture. Just above the rock we met a large fleet of pinnaces, budgerows, and country boats, of all sorts and sizes, conveying the Buffs from Allahabad to Calcutta, for embarkation for England; I counted sixty-four vessels. On account of their coming down with the stream the sight was not as picturesque as it would have been had they been going up the river. All vessels put up very small low masts and scarcely any sail when going with the stream, on account of its extreme velocity; but ascending the river they carry very high masts, and an overpowering quantity of sail. The last time I saw the Buffs was at a ball they gave at Meerut,—a farewell on going to Afghanistān.
The weather is now most agreeable, delightfully cool,—a sharp, clear, pure air; we use a pankha at dinner-time, hung from the ceiling of the cabin, but do not require it during the rest of the day; the nights are cold. We have moored; and the poor goats, who for three days have been on a barren sandbank of an evening, have now a fine field of urur (cytisus cajan) to browse upon. The people have cut some, and the goats will therefore be happy to-morrow; this is a theft, but allowable on the banks of the river, because a less rent is paid for land subject to the visits of depredators from the Ganges.
8th.—A large white house on the hill at Monghir is visible. I was charmed with the scene when I went on deck at half-past seven this morning: the river in this part is extremely broad and very shallow, with a stream running like a mill-sluice; a fair wind was blowing, and we were in the midst of about five hundred vessels, which had been detained there in consequence of the force of the stream. With this fine wind, however, they all set sail; the lighter vessels with great difficulty passed the bad part of the river, the larger and heavier craft got up to a certain point, and beyond that they could not proceed, but one by one lowered their sails, and fell back on a sandbank, where they lay all in a row, like a line of soldiers. I amused myself with watching the vessels as they came up to the testing point, and went forward triumphantly, or fell back into the line of the hopeless. The cook-boat, with our assistance, was brought up with great difficulty; the budgerow bravely made way against the fierce current; the woolāk, unable to stem the stream, fell back, took some other passage, and parted company. Late at night we anchored on one of those fine, hard, cool, clean sandbanks; the sand is mixed with such a quantity of mica (talc), that at night, by the light of a candle, it shines as if sprinkled with silver-dust. We expected to have reached Monghir to-day, but the winding of the river and the force of the stream have prevented us.
9th.—Arrived at Monghir. The river-side was covered with boats of all sorts as thickly planted as possible: the bazār extends all along the edge of the river, and some good houses belonging to the gentlemen at the station are on the higher ground; the churchyard is beyond, and the Old Fort at the point. The moment we anchored we were assailed with hundreds of beggars; their clamour and cries were most annoying, they were a complete pest,—driving them away was useless. The people selling pistols, necklaces, bathing-chairs, baskets, toys, shoes, &c., raised such a hubbub, it was disgusting; we had all the Venetians shut on that side, and the people had the impudence to get down into the water and peep through them; the chaprasīs drove them off, but they were back again the next minute like a swarm of bees.
I may here insert a paragraph I saw in the papers:—
“The Asiatic Society has obtained an aërolite, or a mass of meteoric iron, found imbedded in the soil on the top of the Kurruckpore Hills, near Monghyr, which had been exhumed and worshipped by the natives for many years. It is a block, weighing about 160lbs., of a somewhat conical, oviform, disk shape, standing on a sort of foot, and slightly truncated at both ends; it contains iron, nickel, cobalt, chromium, silica, alumina, and traces of arsenic and selenium.”
10th.—The next day we started. The Fort is a good object from this side, but, on turning the corner, how much was I charmed to see the most picturesque cluster of bairāgī temples imaginable! The maths are surrounded by fine trees, the ruined bastion of the old fort juts out into the river, and has fragments of rock at its base. The high spires of the white temples seen among the trees, the slender bamboos with their bright red or white flags, and a sort of Hindū altar in front, are beautifully grouped. On a large stone in the river, just in front of the temples, shaded from the sun by an immense chatr (umbrella) made of straw, sat two Hindū priests, who were a picture in themselves; upright at their side was a very high thin bamboo, crowned with the branch of some holy tree, from which a lota was suspended in the air. The whole was reflected in the Ganges, and the vessels and distant land finished the picture. It came upon me by surprise: had I known of the temples that were hidden from my view by the bastion of the fort, I should have walked there the evening before. The “Directory” tells you of the articles in the bazār, but omits these gems of oriental beauty, which are invaluable to a lover of the picturesque. Beyond this stretch the walls of the old fort, which are of very great extent, and the view of Monghir is good from this part of the Ganges. Mr. D⸺ told us, that in coming up the river during the last rains, the current at Colgong was terrific; on the left bank was a whirlpool that set directly on the rocks, and it would have been certain destruction to any boat attempting that passage; and on the right bank was another whirlpool, of such force, that, in tracking to a certain point, the dandīs jumped into the river, and fixed a hawser to prevent the vessel being carried round and round by the current, and dashed upon the rocks; with care this passage was navigable, but the other was not to be attempted. From this gentleman’s house on the hill at Monghir the view across the river was bounded by the horizon, as at sea, the waters were so high and the expanse so great.