Before America was discovered by Columbus men here had strange ideas about the shape of the world. Men in India had thought of that too, long before anyone in Britain did, and this is the picture of the world they made for themselves.
They saw a beautiful large lotus flower held up on the back of an elephant, in the midst of seven seas. One sea was of salt water and another of fresh, and these two were the only ones that were at all like the seas of earth. One of the others was a sticky sea, for the waves that broke on its shores were of sugar-cane juice. Another was clear and sparkling with dancing waves of wine. Then there was an oily sea of melted butter, a flat sea of curds, and a beautiful white sea of milk. But no one had looked at these strange seas, nor had anyone seen the great elephant that held the lotus flower on his back. Only the flower itself at the centre of all was seen or known. India to the south, and the other lands to the north, the east, and the west of the Himalayas, formed the petals of the world lotus, and at its centre amongst the great snow mountains the god Siva sat on his throne on Mount Meru.
ON PILGRIMAGE TO THE MOUNTAIN
There is one special mountain there, to which pilgrims go, and they hold it as sacred as if it really were the ancient Mount Meru. It rises from a grassy plain, and a deep ravine cuts it off from the other mountains. High up it is covered with snow, but towards the foot great cliffs of rock stand out bluish purple against the whiteness, in bands round the mountain. Near the base there is a broad dark band made by a very high cliff, and the priests point this out to pilgrims. “See,” they say, “the mark of the ropes of the demon who tried to drag away the throne of Siva.”
And the pilgrim gazes with awestruck eyes, for he sees not only the marks of the demon’s rope, but also, in the narrower bands higher up the mountain, the coils of the serpent that he has often seen in his images of Siva; and, in the ragged edges of the snow-clad peaks and the icicles that hang from the glaciers, he sees the matted hair of the god. He is tired and weary, for it is months since he left his home in the plains. First he marched through tangled jungle, through grass three times as tall as himself, and under great cane stalks and feathery bamboo trees. In these early stages of his walk he sang and shouted to frighten away the heavy sleepy bear, and to scare the quick-limbed panther that might be resting on any overhanging branch. Then he climbed up through forests of dark cedar and pine, with the white flowers of the magnolia, and the wealth of rhododendrons bright against the dark tree stems. On and on he went into the cold grey passes where his fear of wild beasts was lost in the fear of the spirits of the mountains, and he walked in silence and awe lest avalanche or storm should prove to him their anger. For he felt that he was indeed amongst the homes of the gods. Each moment as he mounted higher new snow-clad peaks rose before him, and those he had already seen seemed higher and greater. His heart was filled with the dream of a rich land somewhere amongst these glittering heights to which his soul might go after death, if only his pilgrimage should win him merit. So, as the sun sent flashes of light across the snowy peaks, the weary man plucked up courage and stepped out more bravely, till at length through a last ravine he saw the hoary head of the mountain he sought, and as he saw it he tore from his threadbare loin-cloth a little rag to tie to a bit of scrub. Other rags hung there, for many pilgrims when they reached that spot had been so poor that they had nothing left to offer at the sacred bush except a bit of the cloth they wore. And so he added another, and left the rags to flutter there in the cold winds of that high land, while he hastened on to finish his pilgrimage, and walk round the sacred mountain.
Other places are sacred besides this mountain that stands for Mount Meru, the centre of the world lotus. Each rock and stream has its spirit, and everywhere amongst the mountains there are shrines and temples and far-off holy places to which pilgrims go in their endless search for rest. Through all the land of India the mountains of the north are held sacred, and often the eyes of men who will never be able to reach them as pilgrims look longingly towards those homes of the gods.
CHAPTER II
THE STORY OF THE GANGES
Very long ago, though the mountains stood at the world’s centre, and India lay at their feet, there was no Ganges river, and the plains lay bare and fruitless. The god Siva then lived on the top of a high mountain, and spent his time in thought. Up over his head above the mountains the Princess Ganga lived free as the wind. She was the daughter of King Himalaya, and the air nymph Menaka, and so her home was in the air among the heights.
At that time there lived a very wise man on earth, and, as he looked at the burning plains of India, and thought of the air princess, he said to himself, “If she would only give up her freedom and become a river, how she could enrich and purify the earth.” And when he had thought this out, he began to pray to the god Siva to send Ganga to earth. Siva granted his request, and the Princess floated down to earth. She touched it first at the mountain top where the god sat, but he caught her in the tangled masses of his hair, and for ages she could not escape from them, so the wise man could not see the answer to his prayer. But long long afterwards, she broke away from her prison on the mountain top, and flowed down under the glacier ice, and over the bare grey rocks. She made her way through the ravines, and the great pine woods sprang up as she flowed. Rhododendrons grew on the banks at her coming, and at the foot of the mountains the jungle stretched down to be nourished by her waters. But it was out on the open plain that the Princess Ganga really showed her power. There, fields of wheat and rice and poppies and lentils grew up wherever she flowed, and wherever the streams that joined her from the mountains made their way to reach her. Groups of fruit trees and bamboos grew too, and men came to settle in villages beside them till the plain of the Ganges became a great, bright, busy place with herds of buffaloes watched by little boys, with oxen yoked to the plough, and other oxen carrying the precious river water to pour it on fields that were far from the banks.