Night was falling when we descended at Puri. The station, as part of a system abhorred of the gods of Hind, stood in the open country, a full two miles from the sacred city. Not even the inhabitants of Benares are more fanatical than those of Puri. Natives coming upon us in the darkness along the road of sacrifice sprang aside in terror, and shrieked a long-drawn “sahib hai!” to warn others to beware our polluting touch. In the bazaars, many a merchant cried out in anger when we approached his tumble-down shop; and only with much wheedling could we draw one of them forth into the street to sell us sweetmeats and fruits. Half the shacks were devoted to the sale of dude, which is to say, milk—of bullocks and goats, of course, for the udders of the sacred cow may not be violated. We paused at one to purchase. A vicious-faced youth took our pice gingerly and filled two vessels much like flowerpots. I emptied my own and stepped forward to replace it on the worm-eaten board that served as counter. The youth sprang at me with a scream of rage and fear, and, before the pot had touched the counter, Marten knocked it out of my hand and shattered it to bits on the cobblestones, then smashed his own beside it. The two pice I had paid for the milk included the price of the vessel, great quantities of which are made of the red clay of neighboring pits. The crash of pottery that startled the silence of the night at frequent intervals were signs, not of some sad accident, as I had supposed, but that a drinker had finished his dude. The miserable, uneven streets were paved in fragments of broken pots.
There was not a native hut in Puri that we could enter, much less sleep in, and, our evening meal finished en marche, we returned to the station and asked permission of the Eurasian agent to occupy two of the wicker chairs in the waiting-room. He refused, not only because it was against the rules, which didn’t matter, but because he was sure to be found out if he disobeyed them. He knew of better quarters, however, and directed us accordingly. We stumbled off through the railway yards and came upon the first-class coach he had mentioned, on a deserted side track. It was the best “hotel” of our Indian trip. The car was built on the lines of the American Pullman, with great couches upholstered in soft leather. There were burnished lamps that we could light with impunity when the heavy curtains had been drawn, several large mirrors, and running water. Small wonder if we slept late next morning and found it necessary to reconnoiter a bit, for the sake of the station master’s reputation, before making our exit.
The great road of Puri, over which the massive Juggernaut car is drawn once a year
The inventive genius of the Hindu has bedecked the dwelling of god Juggernaut with that extravagance of barbaric splendor beloved of the Oriental. Admittance is denied the sahib, but without is much to be seen. The temple rises in seven domes, one above each of four stone stairways deep-worn by centuries of pilgrim feet and knees, and three within the crumbling, time-eaten wall. They are domes, though, only in general outline. The Hindu strives for bizarre effects in his architecture; he dreads, above all, plain surfaces. The smaller domes rise en perron like the terraced vineyards of the Alps, the steps half hidden under glittering ornamentations,—hideous-faced gods of many arms, repulsive distortions of sacred animals, haggard, misshapen gargoyles. Above them towers Juggernaut’s throne room, resembling a cucumber stood on end and suggesting that its builder, starting with the dome as his original conception, was loath to bring his creation to completion, and pushed his walls onward and upward to a dizzy height, to end at last abruptly in a flat cupola. Mayhap his despotic master had doomed him to that fate which has so often befallen successful architects in the Orient, of losing his hands when his masterpiece was completed.
Everywhere the temple bears witness to the ravages of time. The splendors of earlier days are faded and crumbling; there hovers over all not so much an air of neglect as of the inability of these groveling, British-ruled descendants of the talented creators to arrest the decay, an acknowledgment that the days of such constructions and the Hindus of such days are passé.
Pilgrims swarm in Puri at all seasons. Our way through the narrow streets was often barred by shrieking processions; a hundred pious families had pitched their tents at the edge of the great road. But it is in the month of July, when the bloodthirsty god makes his annual excursion to a smaller temple two miles distant, that untold multitudes pour in upon the wretched hamlet. The car, weighing many tons, is set up outside the temple, and Juggernaut, amid the clamor of barbaric rites, is placed on his throne therein. Hordes of natives eager to “acquire merit” surge round the chariot, screaming and struggling in the frenzy of fanaticism for a place at the long ropes, and, to the accompaniment of weird incantations, the procession starts. The great road, scene in bygone centuries of uncounted human sacrifices, stretches away straight and level to the smaller temple. It is the most generous roadway in India, fully a furlong wide, in reality a great plain, covered with withered grass where the tramp of many feet has not worn it bare. A thousand naked bodies, burnished by the blazing sunlight, strain like demons at the ropes. As one falls, a hundred others surge forward to fight for his place. The aged peasant to whom this pilgrimage has dissipated the meager earnings of a lifetime, returns to his native village with inner assurance of the favor of the gods in his next existence if he can force his way through the rabble for one weak tug.
But the ponderous car moves slowly. A scanty rice diet is not conducive to great physical strength, and the massive wheels cut deep into the sandy plain. The ruts of the last journey, made nine months before, were by no means obliterated at the time of our visit. Short as is the distance between the two temples, the passing oftentimes endures a week; and the struggle for places decreases day by day as those who have performed their act of devotion turn homeward. The last fanatics drop out one by one. The ropes lose their tautness and sag of their own weight. A scanty remnant of the multitude gives a few “dry pulls”; and the grim-visaged god completes his journey behind bands of coolies hired for the occasion.
They sacrifice no more to Juggernaut. John Bull has scowled on the custom. But the American superintendent of the mission hospital among the trees at the roadside bore witness that the insatiate monster has still a goodly quota of victims; for annually the plague breaks out among the superstitious, devitalized pilgrims and leaves hundreds to die on the flat, sandy coast like fish tossed ashore.
He who has journeyed through this strange land will be slow ever after to look upon animals as devoid of intelligence and the power to reason. Encircling the temple, we chanced upon one of her sacred bulls setting forth on his morning rounds through the thatch-roofed bazaars that make up the town of Puri. He was a sleek, plump beast, with short, stumpy horns and a hump, as harmless, apparently, as a child’s pet poodle. We kept him company, for, strange to say, the fanatics, who had all but mobbed us for setting foot on the flagging before a temple gate, offered no protest when we petted this most reverenced of animals. He was too near the gods no doubt to be polluted even by a sahib touch.