THE CAMEL IN INDIA.
At Benares one sees idolatry in its grossest and most repulsive forms, and it is therefore as interesting to-day to the student of the world's great religions as to the devoted Hindu who travels hundreds of miles over dusty roads to bathe in the Ganges, whose waters he considers sacred. Benares is built upon the north bank of the Ganges, and it is estimated that each year it is visited by a million pilgrims. When more than three hundred miles from the city, we saw the caravan of one of the Maharaja (Maharaja is the title borne by native princes) on its way to the river. There were five elephants, a dozen camels and twenty or thirty bull carts, besides numerous pack animals and horses. The trip could not be made in much less than two months, and all this for the sake of a bath in the waters of the sacred river.
CULTIVATING PSYCHIC POWER ON SPIKES AT BENARES, INDIA.
The bank of the Ganges is lined for a long distance with bathing ghats (as the steps leading to the river are called), and at one point there is a burning ghat, where the bodies of the dead are cremated. Cremation is universal among the Hindus, sandalwood being used where the relatives can afford it. Taking a boat, as is customary, we rowed up and down the river in the early morning, and such a sight! Down the steps as far as the eye could reach came the bathers, men, women and children, and up the steps went a constant stream of those who had finished their ablutions. Most of them carried upon their heads water pots of shining brass, and some carried bundles of wearing apparel. The bathing is done leisurely as if according to ritual, with frequent dippings; water is poured out to the sun and prayers are said. The lame, the halt and the blind are there, some picking their way with painful step, others assisted by friends. Here, a leper sought healing in the stream; near him a man with a emaciated form mixed his medicine with the holy water, and not far off a fakir with matted hair prayed beneath his big umbrella. On one of the piers a young man was cultivating psychic power by standing on one leg while he told his beads with his face toward the sun.
Dressing and undressing is a simple matter with the mass of the people. Men and women emerging from the water throw a clean robe around themselves, and then unloosing the wet garment, wring it out and are ready to depart. Those who bring water pots fill them from the stream, out of which they have recently come, and carry them away as if some divinity protected the water from pollution. As the river contains countless dead and receives the filth of the city as well as the flowers cast into it by worshipers, it requires a strong faith to believe it free from lurking disease and seeds of pestilence.
BATHING GHAT ON THE GANGES.