I stood on the Chandi Chauk, the principal street of Delhi, while a holiday procession passed. It took many hours—days, on certain occasions—for the hundreds of thousands of people from that section to squeeze their way through the street, and every coping, balcony, roof and window above the street contained as many human beings as the space would admit, all dressed in gaudy cloth. High-caste Indians, dressed in silks and velvets, rode in handsome carriages, drawn, in some instances, by snow-white horses; lower-caste citizens rode in traps, with seating space on the sides, and drawn by donkeys and oxen; throngs of barefooted, serious-faced natives mingled among these, walking; further down the emblazoned street could be seen a brown head appearing above the people, oxen and horses—a camel, between high shafts, drawing a high-wheeled wagon, the occupants being concealed by a large closed box, like a van; this contained Mohammedan women. Hundreds of low palanquins, their dark curtains extending from the roof down the four sides, borne on poles, between which were two men at each end, flitted in and out of the narrow streets; these also contained Mohammedan women. The big Afghan, or Kabuli, with his baggy apparel and full beard, also mingled in the procession. Taboots, a fantastic design of mosque and pagoda, the framework made of poles and covered with bright-colored paper, lavishly decorated with tinsel and gaudy ornaments, passed by, drawn by devotees of the Moslem faith. Blare, grotesqueness, weird music from strange instruments, together with the air of melancholy, induced by the beating of the Oriental tomtoms—all very strange indeed. Holidays often last a week, and some even extend to ten days.
Army officers relate interesting stories of that country. For nearly a century elephants had been used to move army transports. The food of the elephants was large cakes made of wheat, and a dozen was a meal. The mahout, or cook, might take a portion of the flour from the apportioned quantity and keep it for his own use. Before eating the cakes, the elephant lifted this food on his trunk; if the cakes were short of his regular portion, he would set the food down and would not touch it. A white officer, inspecting the animals at feeding-time, seeing that the elephant did not look sick, would weigh the food, and in every instance the scales verified the elephant's refusing to eat because he had been cheated.
Types of Indian Soldiers.
The Sikh.
The Goorkha.
See page [311].
Indian women often cooked the cakes for elephants in a mud fireplace, and the big beast would sidle to where his food was being prepared. The basket for the woman's baby to rest in was made of twigs, and a bent bamboo pole served as a handle to the Indian "cradle." The Indian mother would slip the handle over the elephant's trunk, and the to-and-fro motion of the beast would rock, or lull, the baby to sleep while the mother cooked the elephant's meal.
House rent in Delhi is higher than in New York City. The rents were increased a hundred per cent. when it was decided to remove the capital from Calcutta.
A number of European stores were found in the capital. Drug stores do the best business in India, as well as in Africa.