Eight Lectures on India

by Halford John Mackinder

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The Kashmir Gate, Delhi.| East of Delhi, running almost due southward, is the river Jumna, crossed by the great bridge of the East Indian Railway, which carries the main line from Delhi through the United Provinces and Bengal to Calcutta. West of the city is the last spur of the Aravalli hills, the famous Ridge of Delhi, striking northeastward. The city lies between the Ridge and the Jumna. It may be divided into three parts. To the north is the European quarter. In the centre is Shahjahanabad, or modern Delhi, entered from the north by the Kashmir Gate. Between Shahjahanabad and the river is the Fort. The Jama Masjid (Great Mosque) stands in the centre of Shahjahanabad, and the Kalan Masjid (Black Mosque) is about half a mile further south. Passing out of the modern city southward by the Delhi Gate we enter Firozabad, or ancient Delhi, the capital of the earlier Mogul rulers. Further still to the south are even more ancient ruins.

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Jama Masjid, Delhi.| |8.
View from halfway up a Minaret, Jama Masjid.| |9.
View from top of Minaret, looking south.| |10.
The Same, looking northeast.| |11.
Kalan Masjid, Delhi.| Let us begin our sight-seeing in the centre of the modern city, at the Jama Masjid, a great building of marble and sandstone. Its principal treasures are a hair of Muhammad, and some of his handwriting. Here is a view of the mosque from the balcony of a neighbouring house. Let us go up one of the minarets and look over the city. This is a view taken from a little gallery half way up. To the left is seen part of the large central dome of the mosque, and to the right the top of one of the columns which rise on either side of the main archway. Beyond, far below, can be seen part of the city. Next we have a view, due southward, from the top of the minaret. The Kalan Masjid is just visible in the foreground, but a smoke haze obscures the more distant part of the town. We turn round and look northeastward over the Fort. Notice on the ground the shadow of the other minaret of the mosque. In the distance can be seen the Jumna, and crossing it the great bridge of the East Indian Railway. Here we have a closer view of the Kalan Masjid, or Black Mosque, built in the original style of the mosques of Arabia with many small solid domes, unadorned by carving. It has a sombre appearance. We see in front one of these domes, and behind it the tops of two others.

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The Lahore Gate, Delhi Fort.| |13.
The Delhi Gate, Delhi Fort.| |14.
The Pearl Mosque, Delhi Fort.| |15.
The Hall of Public Audience, Delhi Fort.| |16.
The Orpheus Panel.| The chief glory of Delhi is, however, the Fort, and the group of palace buildings within its precincts. It is approached through the Lahore Gate, of which we have here a view. This gate is in the middle of the west side of the Fort. Along the east side flows the River Jumna. In the southern face there is another great gateway, the Delhi Gate, with a grey stone elephant on either side of the entry. Within the Fort, is the Moti Masjid, or Pearl Mosque, built by Aurangzeb, of white and grey marble. The finest of the buildings of the Fort is, however, the great Hall of Public Audience, the Diwan-i-Am. There is a raised recess, in the wall of this hall, where formerly stood the famous Peacock Throne of Aurangzeb, made of solid gold inlaid with diamonds, rubies, and emeralds, and backed by two peacocks set thick with gems. This throne was carried off when the Persians under Nadir Shah sacked the city in 1739, and massacred most of its inhabitants. Above the entry to the recess of the Peacock Throne are a number of panels about nine inches high and six inches broad, made of inlaid stones. Here is a photograph of one of them. Some of these panels were injured, but, thanks to Lord Curzon, an expert artist from Florence has recently restored them and made new ones in the spirit of the earlier to fill the vacant spaces.

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The Hall of Private Audience, Delhi Fort.| We pass next to the innermost court of the Fort-palace, the Hall of Private Audience, the Diwan-i-Khas, ninety feet long and seventy feet broad, built of white marble with many inlaid flowers of jewels. Beneath the cornice runs the famous inscription: “If there is a Paradise upon earth it is this, it is this.” Here we see one of the graceful arches, and beyond in the distance the towers of the Pearl Mosque, already described.

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Mausoleum of Humayun, Delhi.| To see old Delhi we must drive from the modern city either by the Delhi Gate in the south wall of the Fort or by the Ajmer Gate in the southeast corner of the city wall, past great dome-topped temples, most of them in ruins, until a few miles out, not far from the trunk road leading from Delhi to Agra, we come to the Mausoleum of Humayun, of which we have here a view. The design, as will be realised presently, is very similar to that of the Taj Mahal at Agra, but the Mausoleum is the older building. Notice the terraced platform on which it stands. It is built of red sandstone and marble. Beneath the platform, and approached by a long dark passage, is the vault where Humayun is buried. Around the Mausoleum are a number of old ruins, and the debris and cactus remind one of Pagan in Burma, which we saw in the second lecture.

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The Kutab Minar and Iron Pillar, Delhi.| We resume our drive, past ruined tombs and walls, and at last, about eleven miles south of Delhi, we come to the buildings of the Kutab Minar, where are some of the few remains of the Hindu period now visible in the neighbourhood, though the mass of the work is of Muhammadan date. The Kutab was begun at the end of the 12th century, on the site of an ancient Hindu temple destroyed by the Musulmans. The famous Iron Pillar stands in front of the mosque. It is one of the most remarkable of all the antiquities of India, for it consists of a solid mass of wrought iron, weighing probably more than six tons, and measuring some 24 feet in height, with an average diameter of a little over a foot. At the base is an inscription in Sanskrit, from which it appears that its probable date is the fourth century, A.D. This inscription runs thus: “As long as I stand so long shall the Hindu kingdom endure.” The Kutab mosque is the Moslem reply to this. The wrought iron of the Pillar has an almost bluish colour when seen against the warm sunlit red sandstone of the great Kutab Tower. In this photograph a man has climbed to the top of the Pillar, and stands there as though a statue, giving us the scale of the monument.

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The Lat of Asoka, the Ridge, Delhi.| Now let us visit the district to north of the modern city, of deep interest in connection with the Mutiny. On the Ridge top, between the Flagstaff Tower towards its northeastern end and the Mutiny Memorial further south, is another curious pillar, this one of stone, called the Lat of Asoka. At its base is the following modern inscription:

“This pillar was originally erected at Meerut in the third century B.C. by King Asoka. It was removed thence, and set up in the Koshuk Shikar Palace by the Emperor Firuz Shah in A.D. 1356, but was thrown down and broken into five pieces by the explosion of a powder magazine A.D. 1713-1719. It was restored and set up in this place by the British Government A.D. 1867.”

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The Flagstaff Tower, the Ridge, Delhi.| We will walk past the various memorials of the Mutiny struggle. Here is the Flagstaff Tower, in which were gathered at the outbreak of danger the women and children of the British garrison anxiously looking for relief from Meerut. But the relief did not come, and Delhi was stormed and captured by the mutineers. The refugees in the Flagstaff Tower were compelled to fly for their lives to Karnal, on the road to the Punjab, where gradually British troops and loyal natives were assembled. The British returned to the Ridge, and for two months the siege of the city was pressed, but unsuccessfully. A brigade and a siege train then arrived from the Punjab, commanded by General Nicholson. The struggle continued for yet another month. Our troops were not in sufficient force to surround and starve the city, and it was therefore necessary to bombard and storm the defences. Slowly the British won their way into the town, though with terrible loss. General Nicholson was himself wounded in one of the assaults, and died a week later. At last, on the 20th September, the Fort was taken, and next day the rebel King of Delhi was captured at Humayun’s Tomb, and was exiled to Rangoon. Two of his sons were shot in front of the Delhi Gate. The terrible nature of this siege may be realised from the fact that of the ten thousand British and loyal native troops who took part in it nearly four thousand were killed and wounded. Here is the statue of General Nicholson in the park named after him, just south of the cemetery, outside the Kashmir Gate, where he is buried. On the Ridge itself is the Mutiny Memorial, unfortunately not a very beautiful building.

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General Nicholson’s Statue, Delhi.| |23.
The Mutiny Memorial, the Ridge, Delhi.|