Memoirs of a griffin

by Francis John Bellew

Kurruck Shah, I learnt from my young friend, who was a bit of an antiquary, was the name of another peer of remarkable sanctity, who lies buried near the town of Currah; his durgah or shrine, which we visited, is situated in the midst of an extensive paved court, nearly encompassed by shabby whitewashed buildings, shaded by two or three gigantic trees, some of the arms of which were leaning for support on the buildings they had so long shaded, like parents claiming in age the support of their children—their natural props. It has, we were told, an establishment of peerzadas, or attendant priests, and land attached for their support, the supply of oil for the lamps, &c.

I could never learn clearly or positively the cause of so vast a congregation of tombs as this neighbourhood exhibits, many square miles being covered with them; but my companion was told by villagers whom he questioned on the subject, that they covered the remains of the slain who fell in a great battle. As, however, the dates on the tombs are of various periods, this must have been the hardest fought battle on record—or the process of interment singularly slow.

Joking apart, to trust to the on dits and traditions of untutored peasants in any country is far more likely to lead to error than to enlighten, in nine cases out of ten.

Having much enjoyed my three days’ halt at Currah, I once more pursued my onward course, my hospitable host sending down to my boat a profusion of butter, fresh bread, and vegetables, for my voyage, with a piece of mutton, on the integrity of which he told me I might confidently rely: this was, at all events, puffing it in a proper manner.

I found the country between Currah and Cawnpore to contain nothing particularly remarkable; groves, ghauts, mud-built towns, ravines, and sand-banks constituted its leading features. On one of the latter, one fine cold evening, I performed the funeral obsequies of the one-eyed bull-dog, who had been long in a declining state; the climate evidently did not agree with his constitution, and he slowly sunk under its effects. The interment was conducted by Nuncoo Matar, and Teazer, now constituting the sum total of my kennel, stood by whilst his companion Sully was receiving those last attentions at our hands.

At Cawnpore I put up with the major, who, the reader may remember, was one of our passengers in the Rottenbeam Castle. He was a most worthy, gentlemanly fellow, as great a griffin as myself, though likely to continue so to the end of the chapter, for two very good reasons: one, because he had passed that age after which, as I have before stated, in an early part of these memoirs, the process of accommodation to Indian habits becomes an exceedingly difficult one; and secondly, because he had the honour to belong to one of H.M.’s regiments, in which it must be sufficiently obvious, without my troubling the reader or myself with an elaborate explanation, that a knowledge of Indian manners, language, and customs is not so likely to be acquired as in a sepoy corps, where a European is brought into constant contact with the natives.

The major, who was accustomed to the best society of England, had a considerable admixture of the exquisite in his composition; but it sat so easily upon him he did not know it, and being natural, was consequently agreeable.

I would not have it inferred, exactly, that I think all things which are genuine must necessarily please, but that nature is always a redeeming feature, and when associated with what is in itself excellent, it constitutes the master-charm.

The major gave me a room in his bungalow, to which I soon had all my valuables transferred from the bolio. The same day the manjee came up to make his salaam, and demand the balance of what was due to him for his boat. He was accompanied by his sable crew, jolly fellows, who had carried me on their shoulders over many a nullah, and plunged many a time and oft in the Ganges for me, to pick up a bird.

There they were, “four-and-twenty blackbirds all in a row,” in the major’s verandah, squatted on their hams, and dressed in their best attire. Every face had become familiar to me; I knew most of their names, their peculiar fortes, from the purloiner en passant of kuddoos[^[51]] and cucumbers, the thief in ordinary to the mess, to the instructor of the paroquets, and the cook to the crew, and associated one or more of their names with almost every sporting adventure or exploit in which I had been engaged on my way up—a long four months’ trip.