The very great interest which Hindoo females feel in the periodical return of this grand festival, is known to every one who is at all conversant with the existing state of things in this country. In the numerous districts and villages of Bengal inaugural preparations are made for the celebration of this anniversary rite precisely from the day on which the Juggernauth car is drawn in Assar, from the date of the festival of Ruth Jattra, that is for about four months before the date of the Doorga Poojah. While the koomar, or the image maker, is engaged in making the Bamboo frame-work for the images, the women in the villages devote their time to cleaning and storing the rice, paddy, different kinds of pulse, cocoanuts, and other products of the farm, all which are required for the service of the goddess. Ten times a day they will go to the temple to see what the Koomar is doing. Not capable of writing, nor having any idea of 'Letts' Diaries,' they note down in their minds the daily progress of work, and feel an ineffable pleasure in communicating the glad tidings to each other. When day by day the straw forms are converted into clay figures, and they are for the first time plastered over with chalk and then painted with variegated colors, the hearts of the females leap with joy, and again when the completed images are being decorated with dack ornaments or tinsel ware, their exhilaration knows no bounds. In the fulness of anxiety, the mistress of the house directing her attention to what more is yet wanted for the due completion of the Poojah, rebukes the master for his apparent neglect somewhat in the following manner: "Where is the dome sujah, (basketware)? Where is the koomar sujah, (pottery)? Where are the spices and clothes? Where are the sidoorchupry and sundry other things for the Barandalla?" Adding that there is no time to be lost, the Poojah is near at hand. The husband acquiescing in what the wife says assures her that everything shall be procured by Saturday or Sunday next.
On the first day of the new moon, when every Hindoo in the city becomes more or less busy on account of his official, domestic and religious engagements, the lady of the house is chiefly occupied with making suitable arrangements for tutwa or presents, first to her son-in-law and then to her other relatives, a subject on which I shall have to say a few words in its proper place. On the eve of the sixth day of the new moon, when the grand Poojah may be said to commence, the females, consigning all their past sorrows to oblivion, feel a sort of elasticity, hopefulness and confidence which almost involuntarily draw forth from the depths of their hearts, feelings of joy and ecstacy. Even a virgin widow, whose grief is yet fresh, forgets her miseries for awhile, and cheerfully mingles in the jubilee. She forms part and parcel of the domestic sisterhood, and for the five days of her life at least, her settled sadness gives way to pleasing sensations, and though forbidden by a cruel priesthood to lend her hand to the ceremonial, she nevertheless goes up to the goddess and prays in a devotional spirit for a better future. Amidst such a scene of universal hilarity, supplemented by a confident hope of eternal beatitude, it is quite natural that Hindoo females, socially divorced from every other innocent amusement, should feel a deep, sincere and intense interest in such a national festival which possesses the two fold advantages of a religious ceremony and a social demonstration. None but the most callous hearted can remain indifferent. Men, women and children, believers and unbelievers, are alike overcome by the force of this religious anniversary. The females go to the temple at all hours of the day, and feast their eyes upon the captivating figure of mighty Doorga and her glorious satellites. Nor do they stare at her with a vacant mind; each has her grievance to represent, her wish to express; prayer in a fervent spirit is offered to the goddess for the redress of the one and the consummation of the other. Should a son die prematurely, should a husband suffer from any difficulty, should a son-in-law be not true to his wife, should a daughter be doomed to widowhood, the females wrestle hard in prayer for relief and amelioration. On the fourth or Bijoya day, when the image is to be consigned to the river, one takes away a bit of the consecrated urghy[67]; a second, the khappurer sara, or the sacrificial earthen plate; a third, the crushed betel; a fourth, the sacred billaw leaves, and so on; each forms a sacred trust, and all are preserved with the greatest possible care, as the priceless heirloom of a benignant goddess.
Having briefly described the main features of this religious festival, I will now endeavour to give a short account of the other circumstances connected with it. In the house of a Brahmin, Khichree, rice, dhall, fish and vegetable curries, together with sweetmeats and sour milk, are given to the guests, chiefly in the day time during the three Pooja days. Many Hindoos, whose religious scruples will not allow them to kill a goat themselves, generally go to the house of a Brahmin—but not without an eight anna piece or a Rupee—to satisfy their carnivorous appetite during the Poojah. It is very creditable to the women of the sacerdotal class that three or four of them undertake the duty of the cuisine, and feed from six to eight hundred persons for three days successively. As fish is not acceptable to Doorga, neither cooked goat's and sheep's flesh, a separate kitchen is set apart for the purpose of cooking meat of sacrificed animals. Brahmin women, as a rule, cook remarkably well. Their long experience in the culinary art, their habitual cleanliness, their undivided attention to their duty, and above all, the religious awe with which they prepare food for the goddess, give quite a relish to every thing they make. Nor is this all. Their devotion and earnestness is so great that they cannot be persuaded to eat any thing until all the guests are fully satisfied, and what is still more commendable, they look to no other reward for their trouble than the fancied approbation of the goddess, and the satisfaction of the guests. It is not before nine o'clock at night that they become disengaged, after which they bathe again, change clothes, say their prayers to the goddess, and then think of appeasing their hunger. Simple and unartificial as they naturally are, they, being mostly widows, are quite content with habishi unno, which was of yore the food of the Hindoo rishis or saints. It consists of autob rice, or rice from unboiled paddy, green plantain and dhall, all boiled in the same pot. Of course a large quantity of ghee is added to it, and at the time of eating milk is taken. These Brahmin women are, indeed, mistresses of the culinary art, if the bill of fare is not long, yet the dishes they make are generally very palatable. The truth is, they practically follow the trite saying, "what is worth doing at all, is worth doing well." Their simple recipes always produce appetising and wholesome dishes, they are thrifty housewives. It must be admitted that simplicity is not meanness, nor thriftiness a fault.
In the house of a Kayasta or Sudra, whose female members, it must be observed, are generally more indolently inclined, and whose style of living is consequently more luxurious, the food offered to the guests consists chiefly of different kinds of sweetmeats, fruits, loochees, vegetable curries, &c. Four or five days before the Poojah begins, professional Brahmin sweetmeat-makers are employed to make the necessary arrangements at home, the principal ingredients required being flour, soojee, chattoo, (gram fried and powdered) safeyda (pounded rice) sugar, spices, almonds, raisins, &c. Not a soul is permitted, not even the master of the house, to touch and much less taste these articles[68] before they are religiously offered to the goddess in the first instance and afterwards to the Brahmins. In these "feast days" of the Poojah in and about Calcutta, where nearly five hundred pratimas or images are set up, every respectable Hindoo, as has been observed before, is previously provided at home with an adequate supply of all the necessaries and luxuries of life that would last about a month or so, it being considered unpropitious then to be wanting in any store, save fruit and fish. This accounts for a general disinclination on the part of the well-to-do Baboos to partake of any ordinary entertainment when visiting the goddess at a friend's house, but to the Brahmins and the poverty-stricken classes this is a glorious opportunity for "gorging." The despicable practice to which I have alluded elsewhere of carrying a portion of the jalpan (food) home is largely resorted to on this occasion. It is certainly a relic of barbarism, which the growing good sense of the people ought to eschew.
The night of the ninth day of the increase of the moon is a grand night in Bengal. It is the nabamee ratree, and modesty is put to the blush by the revelry of the hour. The houses of the rich become as bright as the day, costly chandeliers, hanging lamps and wall lights burning with gas, brilliantly illuminate the whole mansion, while the walls of the Boytuckhana or sitting room are profusely adorned with English and French paintings and engravings, exhibiting certainly not the best specimens of artistic skill, but singularly calculated to extort the plaudits of the illiterate, because engravings and pictures are the books of the unlearned, who are more easily impressed through the eye than the ear. All the rooms and antechambers are frequently furnished in European style. Splendid Brussels or Agra carpets are spread on the floors of the rooms, a few of which, as if by way of contrast, have the ordinary white cloth spread on them. Nor are hanging Punkhas wanting. In one of the spacious halls sits the Baboo of the house, surrounded by courtiers pandering to his vanity. Indolently reclining on a bolster, and leisurely smoking his álbollah with a long winding nal or pipe, half dizzy from the effects of last night's revelry, he feels loath to speak much. Like an opium eater, he falls into a siesta, whilst the Punkah is moving incessantly. If an orthodox Hindoo, freed from the besetting vice of drinking, and awake to all that is going on around him, before him are placed the Dacca silver filagree worked atterdan and golappass, as well as the pandan with lots of spices and betel in it. On entering the room, the olfactory nerves of a visitor are sure to be regaled with fragrant odours. At intervals rose water is sprinkled on the bodies of the guests, and weak spiced tobacco is served them every fifteen minutes, the current topics of the day forming the subject of conversation. All this is surely vain ostentation and superfluity. So far the arrangements and reception of friends are essentially oriental, the manner of sitting, the mode of conversation, and the way in which otto of roses, rose water and betel are given to guests are Mahomedan and Hindoo-like, but there is something beyond this; here orthodoxy is virtually proscribed and heterodoxy practically proclaimed. While the officiating priests and the female devotees are offering their prayers to the presiding goddess, the Baboo, a liberal Hindoo, longs to retire to his private room, perhaps on the third storey, at the entrance of which a guard is placed to keep off unwelcome visitors, that he might partake of refreshments supplied by an English Purveying Establishment with a few select friends. The room is furnished after European fashion, chairs, tables, sofas, cheffoniers, cheval glass, sideboard, pictures, glass and silver and plated ware, knives, forks and spoons, and I know not what more, are all arranged in proper order, and friends of congenial tastes have free access. First class wines and viands, such as Giesler's champagne, Heatly's Port and Sherry, Exshaw's Brandy No. I, Crabbie's Ginger wine, Bass's best bottled beer, soda water, lemonade, ice, Huntley and Palmer's mixed biscuits, manilla cigars, cakes and fruits in heaps, poloway, kurma, kupta, kallya, roast fowl, cutlets, mutton chop and fowl curry,[69] are at your service, and an English visitor is not an unwelcome guest. Loochee, Sundesh mittoye, burfi, rasagullah, sittavog, &c., the ordinary food of the Hindoos on festive days, are at a discount. The Great Eastern Hotel Company should be thankful for the large orders which the Hindoo aristocracy of Calcutta and its suburbs favor them with during this grand festival. The taste for the English style of living is not a plant of recent growth. It has been germinating since the days of John Company, when India merchantmen enjoyed the monopoly of the foreign trade of the country, when the highest authorities of the land had no religious scruples as Christians to be present at a Hindoo festival, when, in fact, Hindoo millionaires were wont to indulge in lavish expenditure[70] for the purpose of pleasing their new European masters. Leaving aside the dignity and gravity of the clerical profession for a while, the Reverend Mr. Ward was induced out of curiosity to pay a visit to the palatial mansion of the Shoba Bazar Rajahs of Calcutta on the last night of the Poojah.
"In the year 1806," says he, "I was present at the worship of this goddess, as performed at the house of Rajah Rajkishnu at Calcutta. The buildings where the festival was held were on four sides, leaving an area in the middle. The room to the east contained wine, English sweetmeats, &c., for the entertainment of English guests, with a native Portuguese or two to wait on the visitors. In the opposite room was placed the image, with vast heaps of all kinds of offerings before it. In the two side rooms, were the native guests, and in the area groups of Hindoo dancing women, finely dressed, singing, and dancing with sleepy steps, surrounded with Europeans who were sitting on chairs and couches. One or two groups of Mussulman-men singers entertained the company at intervals with Hindoosthanee songs, and ludicrous tricks. Before two o'clock the place was cleared of the dancing girls, and of all the Europeans except ourselves, and almost all the lights were extinguished, except in front of the goddess,—when the doors of the area were thrown open, and a vast crowd of natives rushed in, almost treading one upon another, among whom were the vocal singers, having on long caps like sugar loaves. The area might be about fifty cubits long and thirty wide. When the crowd had sat down, they were so wedged together as to present the appearance of a solid pavement of heads, a small space only being left immediately before the image for the motions of the singers, who all stood up. Four sets of singers were present on this occasion, the first consisting of Brahmins, (Huru Thacoor), the next of bankers, (Bhuvanundu), the next of boeshnuvus, (Nitaee), and the last of weavers, (Lukshmee), who entertained their guests with filthy songs and danced in indecent attitudes before the goddess, holding up their hands, turning round, putting forward their heads towards the image, every now and then bending their bodies, and almost tearing their throats with their vociferations. The whole scene produced on my mind sensations of the greatest horror. The dress of the singers, their indecent gestures, the abominable nature of the songs, (especially khayoor) the horrid din of their miserable drum, the lateness of the hour, the darkness of the place, with the reflection that I was standing in an idol temple, and that this immense multitude of rational and immortal creatures, capable of superior joys, were in the very act of worship, perpetrating a crime of high treason against the God of heaven, while they themselves believed they were performing an act of merit, excited ideas and feelings in my mind which time can never obliterate. I would have given in this place a specimen of the songs sung before the image, but found them so full of broad obscenity that I could not copy a single line. All those actions which a sense of decency keeps out of the most indecent English songs, are here detailed, sung, and laughed at, without the least sense of shame. A poor ballad singer in England would be sent to the house of correction, and flogged, for performing the meritorious actions of these wretched idolaters.[71] The singing is continued for three days from two o'clock in the morning till nine."
It is a noteworthy fact that in those days when Bengal was in the zenith of its prosperity and splendour, the Governor-General, the members of the Council, the judges of the Supreme Court, and distinguished officers and merchants, did not think it derogatory to their dignity, or at all calculated to compromise their character as Christians, to honor the Rajahs with their presence during this festival, but since the days of Daniel Wilson, the highly venerated Lord Bishop of Calcutta, who must have expressed his strong disapprobation of this practice, these great men have ceased to attend. At present but a few young officers, captains of ships in the port and East Indians may be seen to go to these nautches, and as a necessary consequence of this withdrawal of countenance, the outward splendour of the festival has of late considerably diminished. Seeing the apparent approval of idolatrous ceremonies by some Europeans, a conscientious Christian once exclaimed: "I am not ashamed to confess that I fear more for the continuance of the British power in India, from the encouragement which Englishmen have given to the idolatry of the Hindoos, than from any other quarter whatever."[72]
As regards the other amusements at this popular festival, a few words about the Indian nautch (dancing) girls may not be out of place here. These women have no social status, their principles are as loose as their character is immoral. They are brought up to this disreputable profession from their infancy. They have no husbands, and many of them are never married. The Native Princes, and chiefs, rich zemindars and persons in affluent circumstances, the capacity of whose intellect is as stinted as its culture is scanty, have been their great patrons. Devoid of a taste for reading and writing, they managed to drive the ennui of their lives by the songs of these dancing girls. Great were the rewards which they sometimes received at the hands of the Native kings in their palmy days. When a Principality groaned under extravagance and financial embarrassment, these bewitching girls were entertained at considerable expense to drown the cares of state-craft and king-craft. Even the most astute prince was not free from this courtly profligacy. Though these girls often basked in the sunshine of royal favor, yet there was not a single Jenny Lind among them either in grace or accomplishment. As regards their income, a girl has been known to refuse ten thousand Rupees for performing three nights at the Nazim's Court. When Rajah Rajkissen of Sobha Bazar, the Singhee family of Jorasanko, and the Dey family of Simla, celebrated these Poojahs with great pomp, dancing girls of repute were retained a month previous to the festival at great cost, varying from 500 to 1000 Rupees each for three nights. Now that those prosperous days are gone by, and the big English officials do not condescend to attend the nautch, the amount has been reduced to fifty Rupees or a little more. Their general attire and gestures, as well as the nature and tendency of their songs, are by no means unexceptionable. These auxiliaries to sensual gratification, combined with the allurements of Bacchus, even in the presence of a deity, are the least of all fitted to animate or quicken devotional feelings and prayerful thoughts.
Theatrical performances from the popular dramas of the Indian poets, and amateur jattras, pantomimical exhibitions, also contribute largely to the amusement of the people. The old Bidday Soonder, Maunvunjun, Dukha Juggo, and others of a similar character are still relished by pleasure-seekers and holiday-makers. It is, however, one of the healthy signs of the times that native gentlemen of histrionic taste have recently got up amateur performances, which bear a somewhat close approximation to the English tragedies and comedies.