PLATE XIV. BENARES.
An elderly Brahmin comes down to a jetty and squats on his heels. His head is shaved, with the exception of a tuft on the crown. He dips his head in the river, scoops some water up and rinses his mouth with it. He calls on Ganges, daughter of Vishnu, and prays her to take away his sins, the impurity of his birth, and to protect him throughout his life. Then, after repeating the twenty-four names of Vishnu, he stands up and calls out the sacred syllable "Om," which includes Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva. Lastly he invokes the earth, air, sky, sun, moon, and stars, and pours water over his head.
The rim of the rising sun is seen above the jungle on the right bank of the Ganges. Its appearance is saluted by all the thousands of pious pilgrims, who sprinkle water with their hands in the direction of the sun, wading out into the long shallow margin of the river. The old Brahmin has squatted down again and performs the most incomprehensible movements with his hands and fingers. He holds them in different positions, puts them up to the top of his head, his eyes, forehead, nose, and breast, to indicate the 108 different manifestations of Vishnu. If he forgets a single one of these gestures, all his worship is in vain. The same ceremony has to be repeated in the afternoon and evening, and in the intervals the devout Brahmin has other religious duties to perform in the temples.
Here an old man lies stretched out on a bed of rags. He is so thin that his skin hangs loosely over his ribs, and though his body is brown, his beard is snow-white. He has come to Benares to die beside the holy Ganges, which flows from the foot of Vishnu. There stands a man in the prime of life, but a leper, eaten away with sores. He has come to Benares to seek healing in the waters of life. Here, again, is a young woman, who trips gracefully down the stone steps bearing a water jug on her head. She wades into the river until the water comes up to her waist; then she drinks from her hand, sprinkles water towards the sun, pours water over her hair, fills her pitcher, and goes slowly up again, while the holy Ganges water drips from the red wrap which is wound round her body. And all the other thousands who greet the sun with oblation of water from the sacred river are convinced that he who makes a pilgrimage to Benares and dies within the city walls obtains forgiveness for all his sins.
Like the Buddhists, the Hindus believe in the transmigration of souls. A Hindu's soul must pass through more than eight million animal forms, and for all the sins he has committed in the earlier forms of his existence, he must suffer in the later. Therefore he makes offerings to the gods that he may soon be released from this eternal wandering and attain the heaven of the faithful. In the endless chain of existence this short morning hour of prayer on the banks of the Ganges is but a second compared to eternity.
In the evening, when the hottest hours of the day are past, let us again take a boat and drift down slowly past the stone steps and jetties of Benares. Noiseless, muddy, and grey the sacred river streams along its bed. What quantities of reeking impurities there are in this water of salvation! Whole bundles of crushed and evil-smelling marigolds, refuse, rags and bits, bubbles and scum, float on its surface.
Down a steep lane a funeral procession approaches the bank at a quick pace. The strains of anything but melodious music disturb the quiet of the evening, and the noise of drums is echoed from the walls of the pagodas. The corpse is borne on a bier covered with a white sheet, and men of the caste of body-burners arrange it on the pyre, a pile of wood stacked up by the waterside. Then they set fire to the dry shavings, and the wood pile crackles. Thick clouds of smoke rise up and the smell of burned flesh is borne on the breeze.
The body-burners have been sparing of fuel, however, and when the heap of wood has burned down to ashes, the half-consumed and blackened corpse still remains among the embers, and is then thrown out into the river.