Ek-powa Ghat -- Sandstones -- Shahgunj -- Table-land, elevation, etc.
-- Gum-arabic -- Mango -- Fair -- Aquatic plants -- Rujubbund --
Storm -- False sunset and sunrise -- Bind hills -- Mirzapore --
Manufactures, imports, etc. -- Climate of -- Thuggee -- Chunar --
Benares -- Mosque -- Observatory -- Sar-nath -- Ghazeepore --
Rose-gardens -- Manufactory of Attar -- Lord Cornwallis' tomb --
Ganges, scenery and natural history of -- Pelicans -- Vegetation --
Insects -- Dinapore -- Patna -- Opium godowns and manufacture --
Mudar, white and purple -- Monghyr islets -- Hot Springs of Setakoond
-- Alluvium of Ganges -- Rocks of Sultun-gunj -- Bhaugulpore --
Temples of Mt. Manden -- Coles and native tribes -- Bhaugulpore
rangers -- Horticultural gardens.
On the 3rd of March I bade farewell to Mr. Williams and his kind
party, and rode over a plain to the village of Markunda, at the foot
of the Ghat. There the country becomes very rocky and wooded, and a
stream is crossed, which runs over a flat bed of limestone, cracked
into the appearance of a tesselated pavement. For many miles there is
no pass over the Kymore range, except this, significantly called
"Ek-powa-Ghat" (one-foot Ghat). It is evidently a _fault,_ or
shifting of the rocks, producing so broken a cliff as to admit of a
path winding over the shattered crags. On either side, the precipices
are extremely steep, of horizontally stratified rocks, continued in
an unbroken line, and the views across the plain and Soane valley,
over which the sun was now setting, were superb. At the summit we
entered on a dead flat plain or table-land, with no hills, except
along the brim of the broad valley we had left, where are some
curious broad pyramids, formed of slabs of sandstone arranged in
steps. By dark we reached the village of Roump (alt. 1090 feet),
beyond the top of the pass.
On the next day I proceeded on a small, fast, and wofully
high-trotting elephant, to Shahgunj, where I enjoyed Mr. Felle's
hospitality for a few days. The country here, though elevated, is,
from the nature of the soil and formation, much more fertile than
what I had left. Water is abundant, both in tanks and wells, and
rice-fields, broad and productive, cover the ground; while groves of
tamarinds and mangos, now loaded with blossoms, occur at
every village.
It is very singular that the elevation of this table-land (1100 feet
at Shahgunj) should coincide with that of the granite range of Upper
Bengal, where crossed by the grand trunk road, though they have no
feature but the presence of alluvium in common. Scarce a hillock
varies the surface here, and the agricultural produce of the two is
widely different. Here the flat ledges of sandstone retain the
moisture, and give rise to none of those impetuous torrents which
sweep it off the inclined beds of gneiss, or splintered quartz.
Nor is there here any of the effloresced salts so forbidding to
vegetation where they occur. Wherever the alluvium is deep on these
hills, neither _Catechu, Olibanum, Butea, Terminalia, Diospyros,_
dwarf-palm, or any of those plants are to be met with, which abound
wherever the rock is superficial, and irrespectively of its
mineral characters.
The gum-arabic _Acacia_ is abundant here, though not seen below,
and very rare to the eastward of this meridian, for I saw but little
of it in Behar. It is a plant partial to a dry climate, and rather
prefers a good soil. In its distribution it in some degree follows
the range of the camel, which is its constant companion over
thousands of leagues. In the valley of the Ganges I was told that
neither the animal nor plant flourish east of the Soane, where I
experienced a marked change in the humidity of the atmosphere on my
passage down the Ganges. It was a circumstance I was interested in,
having first met with the camel at Teneriffe and the Cape Verd
Islands, the westernmost limit of its distribution; imported thither,
however, as it now is into Australia, where, though there is no
_Acacia Arabica,_ four hundred other species of the genus
are known.
The mango, which is certainly _the_ fruit of India, (as the
pine-apple is of the Eastern Islands, and the orange of the West,)
was now blossoming, and a superb sight. The young leaves are
purplish-green, and form a curious contrast to the deep lurid hue of
the older foliage; especially when the tree is (which often occurs)
dimidiate, one half the green, and the other the red shades of
colours; when in full blossom, all forms a mass of yellow, diffusing
a fragrance rather too strong and peculiar to be pleasant.
We passed a village where a large fair was being held, and singularly
familiar its arrangements were to my early associations. The women
and children are the prime customers; for the latter
whirl-you-go-rounds, toys, and sweetmeats were destined; to tempt the
former, little booths of gay ornaments, patches for the forehead,
ear-rings of quaint shapes, bugles and beads. Here as at home, I
remarked that the vendors of these superfluities occupy the
approaches to this Vanity-Fair. As, throughout the East, the trades
are congregated into particular quarters of the cities, so here the
itinerants grouped themselves into little bazaars for each class of
commodity. Whilst I was engaged in purchasing a few articles of
native workmanship, my elephant made an attack on a sweetmeat stall,
demolishing a magnificent erection of barley-sugar, before his
proceedings could be put a stop to.
Mr. Felle's bungalow (whose garden smiled with roses in this
wilderness) was surrounded by a moat (fed by a spring), which was
full of aquatic plants, _Nymphaea, Damasonium, Villarsia cristata,
Aponogeton,_ three species of _Potamogeton,_ two of _Naias, Chara_
and _Zannichellia_ (the two latter indifferently, and often together,
used in the refinement of sugar). In a large tank hard by, wholly fed
by rain water, I observed only the _Villarsia Indica,_ no
_Aponogeton, Nymphaea,_ or _Dammonium,_ nor did these occur in any of
the other tanks I examined, which were otherwise well peopled with
plants. This may not be owing to the quality of the water so much as
to its varying quantity in the tank.
All around here, as at Roump, is a dead flat, except towards the
crest of the ghats which overhang the valley of the Soane, and there
the sandstone rock rises by steps into low hills. During a ride to a
natural tank amongst these rocky elevations, I passed from the
alluvium to the sandstone, and at once met with all the prevailing
plants of the granite, gneiss, limestone and hornstone rocks
previously examined, and which I have enumerated too often to require
recapitulation; a convincing proof that the mechanical properties and
not the chemical constitution of the rocks regulate the distribution
of these plants.
Rujubbund (the pleasant spot), is a small tarn, or more properly the
expanded bed of a stream, art having aided nature in its formation:
it is edged by rocks and cliffs fringed with the usual trees of the
neighbourhood; it is a wild and pretty spot, not unlike some
birch-bordered pool in the mountains of Wales or Scotland,
sequestered and picturesque. It was dark before I got back, with
heavy clouds and vivid lightning approaching from the south-west.
The day had been very hot (3 p.m., 90 degrees), and the evening the
same; but the barometer did not foretell the coming tempest, which
broke with fury at 7 p.m., blowing open the doors, and accompanied
with vivid lightning and heavy thunder, close by and all round,
though no rain fell.
In the clear dry mornings of these regions, a curious optical
phenomena may be observed, of a _sunrise_ in the _west,_ and _sunset_
in the _east._ In either case, bright and well-defined beams rise to
the zenith, often crossing to the opposite horizon. It is a beautiful
feature in the firmament, and equally visible whether the horizon be
cloudy or clear, the white beams being projected indifferently
against a dark vapour or the blue serene. The zodiacal light shines
from an hour or two after sunset till midnight, with singular
brightness, almost equalling the milky way.
_March_ 7.-Left Shahgunj for Mirzapore, following the road to
Goorawal, over a dead alluvial flat without a feature to remark.
Turning north from that village, the country undulates, exposing the
rocky nucleus, and presenting the usual concomitant vegetation.
Occasionally park-like views occurred, which, where diversified by
the rocky valleys, resemble much the noble scenery of the Forest of
Dean on the borders of Wales; the _Mahowa_ especially
representing the oak, with its spreading and often gnarled branches.
Many of the exposed slabs of sandstone are beautifully waved on the
surface with the _ripple-mark_ impression.
Amowee, where I arrived at 9 p.m., is on an open grassy flat, about
fifteen miles from the Ganges, which is seen from the neighbourhood,
flowing among trees, with the white houses, domes, and temples of
Mirzapore scattered around, and high above which the dust-clouds were
coursing along the horizon.
Mr. Money, the magistrate of Mirzapore, kindly sent a mounted
messenger to meet me here, who had vast trouble in getting bearers
for my palkee. In it I proceeded the next day to Mirzapore,
descending a steep ghat of the Bind hills by an excellent road, to
the level plains of the Ganges. Unlike the Dunwah pass, this is
wholly barren. At the foot the sun was intensely hot, the roads
alternately rocky and dusty, the villages thronged with a widely
different looking race from those of the hills, and the whole air of
the outskirts, on a sultry afternoon, far from agreeable.
Mirzapore is a straggling town, said to contain 100,000 inhabitants.
It flanks the river, and is built on an undulating alluvial bank,
full of kunker, elevated 360 feet above the sea, and from 50 to 80
above the present level of the river. The vicinity of the Ganges and
its green bank, and the numbers of fine trees around, render it a
pleasing, though not a fine town. It presents the usual Asiatic
contrast of squalor and gaudiness; consisting of large squares and
broad streets, interspersed with acres of low huts and groves of
trees. It is celebrated for its manufactory of carpets, which are
admirable in appearance, and, save in durability, equal to the
English. Indigo seed from Bundelkund is also a most extensive article
of commerce, the best coming from the Doab. For cotton, lac, sugar,
and saltpetre, it is one of the greatest marts in India. The articles
of native manufacture are brass washing and cooking utensils, and
stone deities worked out of the sandstone.
There is little native vegetation, the country being covered with
cultivation and extensive groves of mango, and occasionally of guava.
English vegetables are abundant and excellent, and the strawberries,
which ripen in March, rival the European fruit in size, but hardly
in flavour.
During the few days spent at Mirzapore with my kind friend, Mr. C.
Hamilton, I was surprised to find the temperature of the day cooler
by nearly 4 degrees than that of the hills above, or of the upper
part of the Soane valley; while on the other hand the nights were
decidedly warmer. The dewpoint again was even lower in proportion,
(72 degrees) and the climate consequently drier. The atmosphere was
extremely dry and electrical, the hair constantly crackling when
combed. Further west, where the climate becomes still drier, the
electricity of the air is even greater. Mr. Griffith mentions in his
journal that in filling barometer tubes in Affghanistan, he
constantly experienced a shock.
Here I had the pleasure of meeting Lieutenant Ward, one of the
suppressors of Thuggee (_Thuggee,_ in Hindostan, signifies a
deceiver; fraud, not open force, being employed). This gentleman
kindly showed me the approvers or king's evidence of his
establishment, belonging to those three classes of human scourges,
the Thug, Dakoit, and Poisoner. Of these the first was the Thug, a
mild-looking man, who had been born and bred to the profession: he
had committed many murders, saw no harm in them, and felt neither
shame nor remorse. His organs of observation and destructiveness were
large, and the cerebellum small. He explained to me how the gang
waylay the unwary traveller, enter into conversation with him, and
have him suddenly seized, when the superior throws his own linen
girdle round the victim's neck and strangles him, pressing the
knuckles against the spine. Taking off his own, he passed it round my
arm, and showed me the turn as coolly as a sailor once taught me the
_hangman's knot._ The Thug is of any caste, and from any part
of India. The profession have particular stations, which they
generally select for murder, throwing the body of their victim into
a well.
The Dakoit (_dakhee,_ a robber) belongs to a class who rob in
gangs, but never commit murder--arson and housebreaking also forming
part of their profession. These are all high-class Rajpoots,
originally from Guzerat; who, on being conquered, vowed vengeance on
mankind. They speak both Hindostanee and the otherwise extinct
Guzerat language; this is guttural in the extreme, and very singular
in sound. They are a very remarkable people, found throughout India,
and called by various names; their women dress peculiarly, and are
utterly devoid of modesty. The man I examined was a short, square,
but far from powerful Nepalese, with high arched eyebrows, and no
organs of observation. These people are great cowards.
The Poisoners all belong to one caste, of Pasie, or dealers in toddy:
they go singly or in gangs, haunting the travellers' resting-places,
where they drop half a rupee weight of pounded or whole _Datura_
seeds into his food, producing a twenty-hours' intoxication, during
which he is robbed, and left to recover or sink under the stupifying
effects of the narcotic. He told me that the _Datura_ seed is
gathered without ceremony, and at any time, place, or age of the
plant. He was a dirty, ill-conditioned looking fellow, with no bumps
behind his ears, or prominence of eyebrow region, but a remarkable
cerebellum.
Though now all but extinct (except in Cuttack), through ten or
fifteen years of unceasing vigilance on the part of Government, and
incredible activity and acuteness in the officers employed, the Thugs
were formerly a wonderfully numerous body, who abstained from their
vocation solely in the immediate neighbourhood of their own villages;
which, however, were not exempt from the visits of other Thugs; so
that, as Major Sleeman says,--"The annually returning tide of murder
swept unsparingly over the whole face of India, from the Sutlej to
the sea-coast, and from the Himalaya to Cape Comorin. One narrow
district alone was free, the Concan, beyond the ghats, whither they
never penetrated." In Bengal, river Thugs replace the travelling
practitioner. Candeish and Rohilkund alone harboured no Thugs as
residents, but they were nevertheless haunted by the gangs.
Their origin is uncertain, but supposed to be very ancient, soon
after the Mahommedan conquest. They now claim a divine original, and
are supposed to have supernatural powers, and to be the emissaries of
the divinity, like the wolf, the tiger, and the bear. It is only
lately that they have swarmed so prodigiously,--seven original gangs
having migrated from Delhi to the Gangetic provinces about 200 years
ago, and from these all the rest have sprung. Many belong to the most
amiable, intelligent, and respectable classes of the lower and even
middle ranks: they love their profession, regard murder as sport, and
are never haunted with dreams, or troubled with pangs of conscience
during hours of solitude, or in the last moments of life. The victim
is an acceptable sacrifice to the goddess Davee, who by some classes
is supposed to eat the lifeless body, and thus save her votaries the
necessity of concealing it.
They are extremely superstitious, always consulting omens, such as
the direction in which a hare or jackall crosses the road; and even
far more trivial circumstances will determine the fate of a dozen of
people, and perhaps of an immense treasure. All worship the pickaxe,
which is symbolical of their profession, and an oath sworn on it
binds closer than on the Koran. The consecration of this weapon is a
most elaborate ceremony, and takes place only under certain trees.
They rise through various grades: the lowest are scouts; the second,
sextons; the third are holders of the victims' hands; the highest,
stranglers.
Though all agree in never practising cruelty, or robbing previous to
murder, never allowing any but infants to escape (and these are
trained to Thuggee), and never leaving a trace of such goods as may
be identified, there are several variations in their mode of
conducting operations; some tribes spare certain castes, others none:
murder of woman is against all rules; but the practice crept into
certain gangs, and this it is which led to their discountenance by
the goddess Davee, and the consequent downfall of the system.
Davee, they say, allowed the British to punish them, because a
certain gang had murdered the mothers to obtain their daughters to be
sold to prostitution.
Major Sleeman has constructed a map demonstrating the number of
"Bails," or regular stations for committing murder, in the kingdom of
Oude alone, which is 170 miles long by 100 broad, and in which are
274, which are regarded by the Thug with as much satisfaction and
interest as a game preserve is in England: nor are these "bails" less
numerous in other parts of India. Of twenty assassins who were
examined, one frankly confessed to having been engaged in 931
murders, and the least guilty of the number to 24. Sometimes 150
persons collected into one gang, and their profits have often been
immense, the murder of six persons on one occasion yielding 82,000
rupees; upwards of 8000 pounds.
Of the various facilities for keeping up the system, the most
prominent are, the practice amongst the natives of travelling before
dawn, of travellers mixing freely together, and taking their meals by
the way-side instead of in villages; in the very Bails, in fact, to
which they are inveigled by the Thug in the shape of a
fellow-traveller; money remittances are also usually made by
disguised travellers, whose treasure is exposed at the custom-houses,
and, worst of all, the bankers will never own to the losses they
sustain, which, as a visitation of God, would, if avenged, lead, they
think, to future, and perhaps heavier punishment. Had the Thugs
destroyed Englishmen, they would quickly have been put down; but the
system being invariably practised on a class of people acknowledging
the finger of the Deity in its execution, its glaring enormities were
long in rousing the attention of the Indian Government.
A few examples of the activity exercised by the suppressors may be
interesting. They act wholly through the information given by
approvers, who are simply king's evidences. Of 600 Thugs engaged in
the murder of 64 people, and the plunder of nearly 20,000 pounds, all
except seventy were captured in ten years, though separated into six
gangs, and their operations continued from 1826 to 1830:
the last party was taken in 1836. And again, between the years 1826
and 1835, 1562 Thugs were seized, of whom 382 were hanged, and 909
transported; so that now it is but seldom these wretches are ever
heard of.
To show the extent of their operations I shall quote an anecdote from
Sleeman's Reports (to which I am indebted for most of the above
information). He states that he was for three years in charge of a
district on the Nerbudda, and considered himself acquainted with
every circumstance that occurred in the neighbourhood; yet, during
that time, 100 people were murdered and buried within less than a
quarter of a mile of his own residence!
Two hundred and fifty boats full of river Thugs, in crews of fifteen,
infested the Ganges between Benares and Calcutta, during five months
of every year, under pretence of conveying pilgrims. Travellers along
the banks were tracked, and offered a passage, which if refused in
the first boat was probably accepted in some other. At a given signal
the crews rushed in, doubled up the decoyed victim, broke his back,
and threw him into the river, where floating corpses are too numerous
to elicit even an exclamation.
At Mirzapore I engaged a boat to carry me down the river to
Bhagulpore, whence I was to proceed to the Sikkim-Himalaya.
The vessel, which, though slow and very shabby, had the advantage of
being cooler and more commodious than the handsomer craft.
Its appearance was not unlike that of a floating haystack, or
thatched cottage: its length was forty feet, and breadth fifteen, and
it drew a foot and a half of water: the deck, on which a kind of
house, neatly framed of matting, was erected, was but a little above
the water's edge. My portion of this floating residence was lined
with a kind of reed-work formed of long culms of _Saccharum._
The crew and captain consisted of six naked Hindoos, one of whom
steered by the huge rudder, sitting on a bamboo-stage astern; the
others pulled four oars in the very bows opposite my door, or tracked
the boat along the riverbank.
In my room (for cabin I cannot call it) stood my palkee, fitted as a
bed, with mosquito curtains; a chair and table. On one side were
placed all my papers and plants, under arrangement to go home; on the
other, my provisions, rice, sugar, curry-powder, a preserved ham, and
cheese, etc. Around hung telescope, botanical box, dark lantern,
barometer, and thermometer, etc., etc. Our position was often
_ashore,_ and, Hindoo-like, on the lee-shore, going bump, bump,
bump, so that I could hardly write. I considered myself fortunate in
having to take this slow conveyance down, it enabling me to write and
arrange all day long.
I left on the 15th of March, and in the afternoon of the same day
passed Chunar.* [The first station at which Henry Martyn laboured in
India.] This is a tabular mass of sandstone, projecting into the
river, and the eastern termination of the Kymore range. There is not
a rock between this and the Himalaya, and barely a stone all the way
down the Ganges, till the granite and gneiss rocks of the Behar range
are again met with. The current of the Ganges is here very strong,
and its breadth much lessened: the river runs between high banks of
alluvium, containing much kunker. At Benares it expands into a broad
stream, with a current which during the rains is said to flow eight
miles an hour, when the waters rise 43 feet. The fall hence is 300
feet to its junction with the Hooghly, viz., one foot to every mile.
My observations made that from Mirzapore to Benares considerably
greater.
Benares is the Athens of India. The variety of buildings along the
bank is incredible. There are temples of every shape in all stages of
completion and dilapidation, and at all angles of inclination; for
the banks give way so much that many of these edifices are fearfully
out of the perpendicular.
The famed mosque, built by Aurungzebe on the site of a Hindoo temple,
is remarkable for its two octagonal minarets, 232 feet above the
Ganges. The view from it over the town, especially of the European
Resident's quarter, is fine; but the building itself is deficient in
beauty or ornament: it commands the muddy river with its thousands of
boats, its waters peopled with swimmers and bathers, who spring in
from the many temples, water-terraces, and ghats on the city side:
opposite is a great sandy plain. The town below looks a mass of poor,
square, flat-roofed houses, of which 12,000 are brick, and 16,000 mud
and thatch, through the crowd of which, and of small temples, the eye
wanders in vain for some attractive feature or evidence of the
wealth, the devotion, the science, or the grandeur of a city
celebrated throughout the East for all these attributes. Green
parrots and pigeons people the air.
The general appearance of an oriental town is always more or less
ruinous; and here the eye is fatigued with bricks and crumbling
edifices, and the ear with prayer-bells. The bright meadows and green
trees which adorn the European Resident's dwelling, some four miles
back from the river, alone relieve the monotony of the scene.
The streets are so narrow that it is difficult to ride a horse
through them; and the houses are often six stories high, with
galleries crossing above from house to house. These tall, gaunt
edifices sometimes give place to clumps of cottages, and a mass of
dusty ruins, the unsavoury retreats of vermin and filth, where the
_Calotropis arborea_ generally spreads its white branches and
glaucous leaves--a dusty plant. Here, too, enormous spiders' webs
hang from the crumbling walls, choked also with dust, and resembling
curtains of coarse muslin, being often some yards across, and not
arranged in radii and arcs, but spun like weaver's woofs.
Paintings, remarkable only for their hideous proportions and want of
perspective, are daubed in vermilion, ochre, and indigo.
The elephant, camel, and porpoise of the Ganges, dog, shepherd,
peacock, and horse, are especially frequent, and so is a running
pattern of a hand spread open, with a blood-red spot on the palm.
A still less elegant but frequent object is the fuel, which is
composed of the manure collected on the roads of the city, moulded
into flat cakes, and stuck by the women on the walls to dry,
retaining the sign-manual of the artist in the impressed form of her
outspread hand. The cognizance of the Rajah, two fish chained
together, appears over the gates of public buildings.
The hundreds of temples and shrines throughout the city are its most
remarkable feature: sacred bulls, and lingams of all sizes, strewed
with flowers and grains of rice meet the eye at every turn; and the
city's boast is the possession of one million idols, which, of one
kind and another, I can well believe. The great Hindoo festival of
the _Holi_ was now celebrating, and the city more than
ordinarily crowded; throwing red powder (lac and flour), with
rose-water, is the great diversion at a festival more childish by far
than a carnival.
Through the kindness of Mr. Reade (the Commissioner), I obtained
admission to the Bishishar-Kumardil, the "holiest of holies." It was
a small, low, stone building, daubed with red inside, and swarming
with stone images of Brahminee bulls, and various disgusting emblems.
A fat old Brahmin, naked to the waist, took me in, but allowed no
followers; and what with my ignorance of his phraseology, the clang
of bells and din of voices, I gained but little information.
Some fine bells from Nepal were evidently the lion of the temple.
I emerged, adorned with a chaplet of magnolia flowers, and with my
hands full of _Calotropis_ and _Nyctanthes_ blossoms.
It was a horrid place for noise, smell, and sights. Thence I went to
a holy well, rendered sacred because Siva, when stepping from the
Himalaya to Ceylon, accidentally let a medicine chest fall into it.
The natives frequent it with little basins or baskets of rice, sugar,
etc., dropping in a little of each while they mutter prayers.
Illustration -- EQUATORIAL-SUNDIAL
The observatory at Benares, and those at Delhi, Matra on the Jumna,
and Oujein, were built by Jey-Sing, Rajah of Jayanagar, upwards of
200 years ago; his skill in mathematical science was so well known,
that the Emperor Mahommed Shah employed him to reform the calendar.
Mr. Hunter, in the "Asiatic Researches," gives a translation of the
lucubrations of this really enlightened man, as contained in the
introduction to his own almanac.
Illustration -- EQUINOCTIAL SUN-DIAL.
Of the more important instruments I took sketches; No. 1, is the
Naree-wila, or Equatorial dial; No. 2, the Semrat-yunta, or
Equinoctial dial; No. 3, an Equatorial, probably a Kranti-urit, or
Azimuth circle.* [Hunter, in As Soc. Researches, 177 (Calcutta); Sir
R. Barker in Phil. Trans., lxvii. 608 (1777); J. L. Williams, Phil.
Trans., lxxxiii. 45 (1793).] Jey-Sing's genius and love of science
seem, according to Hunter, to have descended to some of his family,
who died early in this century, when "Urania fled before the
brazen-fronted Mars, and the best of the observatories, that of
Oujein, was turned into an arsenal and cannon foundry."
Illustration -- BRASS AZIMUTH CIRCLE
The observatory is still the most interesting object in Benares,
though it is now dirty and ruinous, and the great stone instruments
are rapidly crumbling away. The building is square, with a central
court and flat roof, round which the astrolabes, etc. are arranged.
A half naked Astronomer-Royal, with a large sore on his stomach, took
me round--he was a pitiful object, and told me he was very hungry.
The observatory is nominally supported by the Rajah of Jeypore, who
doles out a too scanty pittance to his scientific corps.
In the afternoon Mr. Reade drove me to the Sar-nath, a singular
Boodhist temple, a cylindrical mass of brickwork, faced with stone,
the scrolls on which were very beautiful, and as sharp as if freshly
cut: it is surmounted by a tall dome, and is altogether about seventy
or a hundred feet high. Of the Boodh figures only one remains, the
others having been used by a recent magistrate of Benares in
repairing a bridge over the Goomtee! From this place the Boodhist
monuments, Hindoo temple, Mussulman mosque, and English church, were
all embraced in one _coup d'oeil._ On our return, we drove past
many enormous mounds of earth and brick-work, the vestiges of Old
Benares, but whether once continued to the present city or not is
unknown. Remains are abundant, eighteen feet below the site of the
present city.
Benares is the Mecca of the Hindoos, and the number of pilgrims who
visit it is incalculable. Casi (its ancient name, signifying
splendid), is alleged to be no part of this world, which rests on
eternity, whereas Benares is perched on a prong of Siva's trident,
and is hence beyond the reach of earthquakes.* [Probably an allusion
to the infrequency of these phenomena in this meridian; they being
common both in Eastern Bengal, and in Western India beyond the
Ganges.] Originally built of gold, the sins of the inhabitants were
punished by its transmutation into stone, and latterly into mud and
thatch: whoever enters it, and especially visits its principal idol
(Siva fossilised) is secure of heaven.
On the 18th I left Benares for Ghazepore, a pretty town situated on
the north bank of the river, celebrated for its manufacture of
rose-water, the tomb of Lord Cornwallis, and a site of the Company's
stud. The Rose gardens surround the town: they are fields, with low
bushes of the plant grown in rows, red with blossoms in the morning,
all of which are, however, plucked long before midday. The petals are
put into clay stills, with twice their weight of water, and the
produce exposed to the fresh air, for a night, in open vessels.
The unskimmed water affords the best, and it is often twice and even
oftener distilled; but the fluid deteriorates by too much
distillation. The Attar is skimmed from the exposed pans, and sells
at 10 pounds the rupee weight, to make which 20,000 flowers are
required. It is frequently adulterated with sandal-wood oil.
Lord Cornwallis' mausoleum is a handsome building, modelled by
Flaxman after the Sybil's Temple. The allegorical designs of Hindoos
and sorrowing soldiers with reversed arms, which decorate two sides
of the enclosed tomb, though perhaps as good as can be, are under any
treatment unclassical and uncouth. The simple laurel and oak-leaf
chaplets on the alternating faces are far more suitable
and suggestive.
_March_ 21.--I left Ghazepore and dropped down the Ganges; the
general features of which are soon described. A strong current four
or five miles broad, of muddy water, flows between a precipitous bank
of alluvium or sand on one side, and a flat shelving one of sand or
more rarely mud, on the other. Sand-banks are frequent in the river,
especially where the great affluents debouche; and there generally
are formed vast expanses of sand, small "Saharas," studded with
stalking pillars of sand, raised seventy or eighty feet high by gusts
of wind, erect, stately, grave-looking columns, all shaft, with
neither basement nor capital, the genii of the "Arabian Nights."
The river is always dotted with boats of all shapes, mine being
perhaps of the most common description; the great square, Yankee-like
steamers, towing their accommodation-boats (as the passengers'
floating hotels are called), are the rarest. Trees are few on the
banks, except near villages, and there is hardly a palm to be seen
above Patna. Towns are unfrequent, such as there are being mere
collections of huts, with the ghat and boats at the bottom of the
bank; and at a respectful distance from the bazaar, stand the neat
bungalows of the European residents, with their smiling gardens,
hedgings and fencings, and loitering servants at the door. A rotting
charpoy (or bedstead) on the banks is a common sight, the "_sola
reliquia_" of some poor Hindoo, who departs this life by the side
of the stream, to which his body is afterwards committed.
Shoals of small goggled-eyed fish are seen, that spring clear out of
the water; and are preyed upon by terns and other birds; a few
insects skim the surface; turtle and porpoises tumble along, all
forming a very busy contrast to the lazy alligator, sunning his green
and scaly back near the shore, with his ichthyosaurian snout raised
high above the water. Birds are numerous, especially early and late
in the day. Along the silent shore the hungry Pariah dog may be seen
tearing his meal from some stranded corpse, whilst the adjutant-bird,
with his head sunk on his body and one leg tucked up, patiently
awaits his turn. At night the beautiful Brahminee geese alight, one
by one, and seek total solitude; ever since having disturbed a god in
his slumbers, these birds are fated to pass the night in single
blessedness. The gulls and terns, again, roost in flocks, as do the
wild geese and pelicans,--the latter, however, not till after making
a hearty and very noisy supper. These birds congregate by the sides
of pools, and beat the water with violence, so as to scare the fish,
which thus become an easy prey; a fact which was, I believe, first
indicated by Pallas, during his residence on the banks of the Caspian
Sea. Shells are scarce, and consist of a few small bivalves; their
comparative absence is probably due to the paucity of limestone in
the mountains whence the many feeders flow. The sand is pure white
and small-grained, with fragments of hornblende and mica, the latter
varying in abundance as a feeder is near or far away. Pink sand* [I
have seen the same garnet sand covering the bottom of the Himalayan
torrents, where it is the produce of disintegrated gneiss, and whence
it is transported to the Ganges.] of garnets is very common, and
deposited in layers interstratified with the white quartz sand.
Worm-marks, ripple-marks, and the footsteps of alligators, birds and
beasts, abound in the wet sand. The vegetation of the banks consists
of annuals which find no permanent resting-place. Along the sandy
shores the ever-present plants are mostly English, as Dock, a
_Nasturtium, Ranunculus sceleratus, Fumitory, Juncus bufonius,_,
Common Vervain, _Gnaphalium luteo-album,_ and very frequently
_Veronica Anagallise._ On the alluvium grow the same, mixed with
Tamarisk, _Acacia Arabica,_ and a few other bushes.
Withered grass abounds; and wheat, dhal (_Cajanus_) and gram
(_Cicer arietinum_), _Carthamus,_ vetches, and rice are the
staple products of the country. Bushes are few, except the
universally prevalent Adhatoda and _Calotropis._ Trees, also,
are rare, and of stunted growth; Figs, the _Artocarpus_ and some
_Leguminosa_ prevail most. I saw but two kinds of palm, the
fan-palm, and _Phoenix_: the latter is characteristic of the
driest locality. Then, for the animal creation, men, women, and
children abound, both on the banks, and plying up and down the
Ganges. The humped cow (of which the ox is used for draught) is
common. Camels I occasionally observed, and more rarely the elephant;
poneys, goats, and dogs muster strong. Porpoises and alligators
infest the river, even above Benares. Flies and mosquitos are
terrible pests; and so are the odious flying-bugs,* [Large
Hemipterlus insects, of the genus _Derecteryx._] which insinuate
themselves between one's skin and clothes, diffusing a dreadful
odour, which is increased by any attempt to touch or remove them.
In the evening it was impossible to keep insects out of the boat, or
to hinder their putting the lights out; and of these the most
intolerable was the abovementioned flying-bug. Saucy crickets, too,
swarm, and spring up at one's face, whilst mosquitos maintain a
constant guerilla warfare, trying to the patience no less than to the
nerves. Thick webs of the gossamer spider float across the river
during the heat of the day, as coarse as fine thread, and being
inhaled keep tickling the nose and lips.
On the 18th, the morning commenced with a dust-storm, the horizon was
about 20 yards off, and ashy white with clouds of sand; the trees
were scarcely visible, and everything in my boat was covered with a
fine coat of impalpable powder, collected from the boundless alluvial
plains through which the Ganges flows. Trees were scarcely
discernible, and so dry was the wind that drops of water vanished
like magic. Neither ferns, mosses, nor lichens grow along the banks
of the Ganges, they cannot survive the transition from parching like
this to the three months' floods at midsummer, when the country is
for miles under water.
_March_ 23.--Passed the mouth of the Soane, a vast expanse of
sand dotted with droves of camels; and soon after, the wide-spread
spits of sand along the north bank announced the mouth of the Gogra,
one of the vastest of the many Himalayan affluents of the Ganges.
On the 25th of March I reached Dinapore, a large military station,
sufficiently insalubrious, particularly for European troops, the
barracks being so misplaced that the inmates are suffocated: the
buildings run east and west instead of north and south, and therefore
lose all the breeze in the hottest weather. From this place I sent
the boat down to Patna, and proceeded thither by land to the house of
Dr. Irvine, an old acquaintance and botanist, from whom I received a
most kind welcome. On the road, Bengal forms of vegetation, to which
I had been for three months a stranger, reappeared; likewise groves
of fan and toddy palms, which are both very rare higher up the river;
clumps of large bamboo, orange, _Acacia Sissoo, Melia, Guatteria
longifolia, Spondias mangifera, Odina, Euphorbia pentagona,
neriifolia_ and _trigona,_ were common road-side plants.
In the gardens, Papaw, _Croton, Jatropha, Buddleia, Cookia,_
Loquat, Litchi, Longan, all kinds of the orange tribe, and the
cocoa-nut, some from their presence, and many from their profusion,
indicated a decided change of climate, a receding from the desert
north-west of India, and its dry winds, and an approach to the damper
regions of the many-mouthed Ganges.
My main object at Patna being to see the opium Godowns (stores), I
waited on Dr. Corbett, the Assistant-Agent, who kindly explained
everything to me, and to whose obliging attentions I am much indebted.
The E.I. Company grant licences for the cultivation of the poppy, and
contract for all the produce at certain rates, varying with the
quality. No opium can be grown without this licence, and an advance
equal to about two-thirds of the value of the produce is made to the
grower. This produce is made over to district collectors, who
approximately fix the worth of the contents of each jar, and forward
it to Patna, where rewards are given for the best samples, and the
worst are condemned without payment; but all is turned to some
account in the reduction of the drug to a state fit for market.
The poppy flowers in the end of January and beginning of February,
and the capsules are sliced in February and March with a little
instrument like a saw, made of three iron plates with jagged edges,
tied together. The cultivation is very carefully conducted, nor are
there any very apparent means of improving this branch of commerce
and revenue. During the N.W., or dry winds, the best opium is
procured, the worst during the moist, or E. and N.E., when the drug
imbibes moisture, and a watery bad solution of opium collects in
cavities of its substance, and is called Passewa, according to the
absence of which the opium is generally prized.
At the end of March the opium jars arrive at the stores by water and
by land, and continue accumulating for some weeks. Every jar is
labelled and stowed in a proper place, separately tested with extreme
accuracy, and valued. When the whole quantity has been received, the
contents of all the jars are thrown into great vats, occupying a very
large building, whence the mass is distributed, to be made up into
balls for the markets. This operation is carried on in a long paved
room, where every man is ticketed, and many overseers are stationed
to see that the work is properly conducted. Each workman sits on a
stool, with a double stage and a tray before him. On the top stage is
a tin basin, containing opium sufficient for three balls; in the
lower another basin, holding water: in the tray stands a brass
hemispherical cup, in which the ball is worked. To the man's right
hand is another tray, with two compartments, one containing thin
pancakes of poppy petals pressed together, the other a cupful of
sticky opium-water, made from refuse opium. The man takes the brass
cup, and places a pancake at the bottom, smears it with opium-water,
and with many plies of the pancakes makes a coat for the opium. Of
this he takes about one-third of the mass before him, puts it inside
the petals, and agglutinates many other coats over it: the balls are
then again weighed, and reduced or increased to a certain weight if
necessary. At the day's end, each man takes his work to a rack with
numbered compartments, and deposits it in that which answers to his
own number, thence the balls (each being put in a clay cup) are
carried to an enormous drying-room, where they are exposed in tiers,
and constantly examined and turned, to prevent their being attacked
by weevils, which are very prevalent during moist winds, little boys
creeping along the racks all day long for this purpose. When dry, the
balls are packed in two layers of six each in chests, with the
stalks, dried leaves, and capsules of the plant, and sent down to
Calcutta. A little opium is prepared of very fine quality for the
Government Hospitals, and some for general sale in India; but the
proportion is trifling, and such is made up into square cakes. A good
workman will prepare from thirty to fifty balls a day, the total
produce being 10,000 to 12,000 a day; during one working season
1,353,000 balls are manufactured for the Chinese market alone.
The poppy-petal _pancakes,_ each about a foot radius, are made
in the fields by women, by the simple operation of pressing the fresh
petals together. They are brought in large baskets, and purchased at
the commencement of the season. The liquor with which the pancakes
are agglutinated together by the ball-maker, and worked into the
ball, is merely inspissated opium-water, the opium for which is
derived from the condemned opium, (Passewa,) the washing of the
utensils, and of the workmen, every one of whom is nightly laved
before he leaves the establishment, and the water is inspissated.
Thus not a particle of opium is lost. To encourage the farmers, the
refuse stalks, leaves, and heads are bought up, to pack the balls
with; but this is far from an economical plan, for it is difficult to
keep the refuse from damp and insects.
A powerful smell of opium pervaded these vast buildings, which Dr.
Corbett* [I am greatly indebted to Mr. Oldfield, the Opium Agent, and
to Dr. Corbett, for a complete set of specimens, implements, and
drawings, illustrating the cultivation and manufacture of Opium.
They are exhibited in the Kew Museum of Economic Botany.] assured me
did not affect himself or the assistants. The men work ten hours a
day, becoming sleepy in the afternoon; but this is only natural in
the hot season: they are rather liable to eruptive diseases, possibly
engendered by the nature of their occupation.
Even the best East Indian opium is inferior to the Turkish, and owing
to peculiarities of climate, will probably always be so. It never
yields more than five per cent. of morphia, whence its inferiority,
but is as good in other respects, and even richer in narcotine.
The care and attention devoted to every department of collecting,
testing, manipulating, and packing, is quite extraordinary; and the
result has been an impulse to the trade, beyond what was anticipated.
The natives have been quick at apprehending and supplying the wants
of the market, and now there are more demands for licences to grow
opium than can be granted. All the opium eaten in India is given out
with a permit to licensed dealers, and the drug is so adulterated
before it reaches the retailers in the bazaars, that it does not
contain one-thirtieth part of the intoxicating power that it did
when pure.
Patna is the stronghold of Mahommedanism, and from its central
position, its command of the Ganges, and its proximity to Nepal
(which latter has been aptly compared to a drawn dagger, pointed at
the heart of India), it is an important place. For this reason there
are always a European and several Native Regiments stationed there.
In the neighbourbood there is little to be seen, and the highly
cultivated flat country is unfavourable to native vegetation.
The _mudar_ plant (_Calotropis_) was abundant here, but I
found that its properties and nomenclature were far from settled
points. On the banks of the Ganges, the larger, white-flowered,
sub-arboreous species prevailed; in the interior, and along my whole
previous route, the smaller purple-flowered kind only was seen.
Mr. Davis, of Rotas, was in the habit of using the medicine
copiously, and vouched for the cure of eighty cases, chiefly of
leprosy, by the _white mudar,_ gathered on the Ganges, whilst
the purple of Rotas and the neighbourhood was quite inert:
Dr. Irvine, again, used the purple only, and found the white inert.
The European and native doctors, who knew the two plants, all gave
the preference to the white; except Dr. Irvine, whose experience over
various parts of India is entitled to great weight.
_March_ 29.--Dropped down the river, experiencing a succession
of east and north-east winds during the whole remainder of the
voyage. These winds are very prevalent throughout the month of March,
and they rendered the passage in my sluggish boat sufficiently
tedious. In other respects I had but little bad weather to complain
of: only one shower of rain occurred, and but few storms of thunder
and lightning. The stream is very strong, and its action on the
sand-banks conspicuous. All night I used to hear the falling cliffs
precipitated with a dull heavy splash into the water,--a pretty
spectacle in the day-time, when the whirling current is seen to carry
a cloud of white dust, like smoke, along its course.
The Curruckpore hills, the northern boundary of the gneiss and
granite range of Paras-nath, are seen first in the distance, and then
throwing out low loosely timbered spurs towards the river; but no
rock or hill comes close to the banks till near Monghyr, where two
islets of rock rise out of the bed of the river. They are of
stratified quartz, dipping, at a high angle, to the south-east; and,
as far as I could observe, quite barren, each crowned with a little
temple. The swarm of boats from below Patna to this place was
quite incredible.
_April_ 1.--Arrived at Monghyr, by far the prettiest town I had
seen on the river, backed by a long range of wooded hills,--detached
outliers of which rise in the very town. The banks are steep, and
they appear more so owing to the fortifications, which are extensive.
A number of large, white, two-storied houses, some very imposing, and
perched on rounded or conical hills, give a European aspect to
the place.
Monghyr is celebrated for its iron manufactures, especially of
muskets, in which respect it is the Birmingham of Bengal. Generally
speaking, these weapons are poor, though stamped with the first
English names. A native workman will, however, if time and sufficient
reward be given, turn out a first rate fowling-piece. The inhabitants
are reported to be sad drunkards, and the abundance of toddy-palms
was quite remarkable. The latter, (here the _Phoenix sylvestris,)
I never saw wild, but it is considered to be so in N.W. India; it is
still a doubtful point whether it is the same as the African species.
In the morning of the following day I went to the hot springs of
Seeta-koond (wells of Seeta), a few miles south of the town.
Illustration -- MONGHYR ON THE GANGES, WITH THE CURROCKPORE HILLS IN
THE DISTANCE.
The hills are hornstone and quartz, stratified and dipping southerly
with a very high angle; they are very barren, and evidently identical
with those on the south bank of the Soane; skirting, in both cases,
the granite and gneiss range of Paras-nath. The alluvium on the banks
of the Ganges is obviously an aqueous deposit subsequent to the
elevation of these hills, and is perfectly plane up to their bases.
The river has its course through the alluvium, like the Soane.
The depth of the former is in many places upwards of 100 feet, and
the kunker pebbles it contains are often disposed in parallel
undulating bands. It nowhere contains sand pebbles or fossils;
concretions of lime (kunker) alone interrupting its uniform
consistence. It attains its greatest thickness in the valleys of the
Ganges and the Soane, gradually sloping up to the Himalaya and
Curruckpore hills on either flank. It is, however, well developed on
the Kymore and Paras-nath hills, 1200 to 1500 feet above the Ganges
valley, and I have no doubt was deposited in very deep water, when
the relative positions of these mountains to the Ganges and Soane
valleys were the same that they are now. Like every other part of the
surface of India, it has suffered much from denudation, especially on
the above-named mountains, and around their bases, where various
rocks protrude through it. Along the Ganges again, its surface is an
unbroken level between Chunar and the rocks of Monghyr. The origin of
its component mineral matter must be sought in the denudation of the
Himalayas within a very recent geological period. The contrast
between the fertility of the alluvium and the sterility of the
protruded quartzy rocks is very striking, cultivation running up to
these fields of stones, and suddenly stopping.
Unlike the Soorujkoond hot-springs, those of Seetakoond rise in a
plain, and were once covered by a handsome temple. All the water is
collected in a tank, some yards square, with steps leading down to
it. The water, which is clear and tasteless (temp. 104 degrees), is
so pure as to be exported copiously, and the Monghyr manufactory of
soda-water presents the anomaly of owing its purity to Seeta's
ablutions.
On my passage down the river I passed the picturesque rocks of
Sultangunj; they are similar to those of Monghyr, but very much
larger and loftier. One, a round-headed mass, stands on the bank,
capped with a triple-domed Mahommedan tomb, palms, and figs.
The other, which is far more striking, rises isolated in the bed of
the river, and is crowned with a Hindoo temple, its pyramidal cone
surmounted with a curious pile of weathercocks, and two little
banners. The current of the Ganges is here very strong, and runs in
deep black eddies between the rocks.
Though now perhaps eighty or a hundred yards from the shore, the
islet must have been recently a peninsula, for it retains a portion
of the once connecting bank of alluvium, in the form of a short
flat-topped cliff, about thirty feet above the water. Some curious
looking sculptures on the rocks are said to represent Naragur (or
Vishnu), Suree and Sirooj; but to me they were quite unintelligible.
The temple is dedicated to Naragur, and inhabited by Fakirs; it is
the most holy on the Ganges.
_April_ 5.--I arrived at Bhagulpore, and took up my quarters
with my friend Dr. Grant, till he should arrange my dawk for Sikkim.
The town has been supposed to be the much-sought Palibothra, and a
dirty stream hard by (the Chundum), the Eranoboas; but Mr. Ravenshaw
has now brought all existing proofs to bear on Patna and the Soane.
It is, like most hilly places in India, S. of the Himalaya, the seat
of much Jain worship; and the temples on Mount Manden,* [For the
following information about Bhagulpore and its neighbourhood, I am
indebted chiefly to Col. Francklin's essay in the Asiatic Researches;
and the late Major Napleton and Mr. Pontet.] a few miles off, are
said to have been 540 in number. At the assumed summer-palaces of the
kings of Palibothra the ground is covered with agates, brought from
the neighbouring hills, which were, in a rough state, let into the
walls of the buildings. These agates perfectly resemble the Soane
pebbles, and they assist in the identification of these flanking
hills with those of the latter river.
Again, near the hills, the features of interest are very numerous.
The neighbouring mountains of Curruckpore, which are a portion of the
Rajmahal and Paras-nath range, are peopled by tribes representing the
earliest races of India, prior to the invasion of young Rama, prince
of Oude, who, according to the legend, spread Brahminism with his
conquests, and won the hand of King Jannuk's daughter, Seeta, by
bending her father's bow. These people are called Coles, a
middle-sized, strong, very dark, and black-haired race, with thick
lips: they have no vocation but collecting iron from the soil, which
occurs abundantly in nodules. They eat flesh, whether that of animals
killed by themselves, or of those which have died a natural death,
and mix with Hindoos, but not with Mussulmen. There are other tribes,
vestiges of the Tamulian race, differing somewhat in their rites from
these, and approaching, in their habits, more to Hindoos; but all are
timorous and retiring.
The hill-rangers, or Bhagulpore-rangers, are all natives of the
Rajmahal hills, and form a local corps maintained by the Company for
the protection of the district. For many years these people were
engaged in predatory excursions, which, owing to the nature of the
country, were checked with great difficulty. The plan was therefore
conceived, by an active magistrate in the district, of embodying a
portion into a military force, for the protection of the country from
invasions of their own tribes; and this scheme has answered perfectly.
To me the most interesting object in Bhagulpore was the Horticultural
Gardens, whose origin and flourishing condition are due to the
activity and enterprise of the late Major Napleton, commander of the
hill-rangers. The site is good, consisting of fifteen acres, that
were, four years ago, an indigo field, but form now a smiling garden.
About fifty men are employed; and the number of seeds and vegetables
annually distributed is very great. Of trees the most conspicuous are
the tamarind, _Tecoma jasminoides, Erythrina, Adansonia,
Bombax,_ teak, banyan, peepul, _Sissoo, Casuarina, Terminalia,
Melia, Bauhinia._ Of introduced species English and Chinese flat
peaches (pruned to the centre to let the sun in), Mangos of various
sorts, _Eugenia Jambos,_ various Anonas, Litchi, Loquat and
Longan, oranges, _Sapodilla_; apple, pear, both succeeding
tolerably; various Cabool and Persian varieties of fruit-trees; figs,
grapes, guava, apricots, and jujube. The grapes looked extremely
well, but they require great skill and care in the management.
They form a long covered walk, with a row of plantains on the W.
side, to diminish the effects of the hot winds, but even with this
screen, the fruit on that side are inferior to that on the opposite
trellis. Easterly winds, again, being moist, blight these and other
plants, by favouring the abundant increase of insects, and causing
the leaves to curl and fall off; and against this evil there is no
remedy. With a clear sky the mischief is not great; under a cloudy
one the prevalence of such winds is fatal to the crop. The white ant
sometimes attacks the stems, and is best checked by washing the roots
with limewater, yellow arsenic, or tobacco-water. Numerous Cerealia,
and the varieties of cotton, sugar-cane, etc. all thrive extremely
well; so do many of our English vegetables. Cabbages, peas, and beans
are much injured by the caterpillars of a _Pontia,_ like our
English "White;" raspberries, currants, and gooseberries will not
grow at all.
The seeds were all deposited in bottles, and hung round the walls of
a large airy apartment; and for cleanliness and excellence of kind
they would bear comparison with the best seedsman's collection in
London. Of English garden vegetables, and varieties of the Indian
Cerealia, and leguminous plants, Indian corn, millets, rice, etc.,
the collections for distribution were extensive.
The manufacture of economic products is not neglected. Excellent
coffee is grown; and arrow-root, equal to the best West Indian, is
prepared, at 18s. 6d. per bottle of twenty-four ounces, about a
fourth of the price of that article in Calcutta.
In most respects the establishment is a model of what such
institutions ought to be in India; not only of real practical value,
in affording a good and cheap supply of the best culinary and other
vegetables that the climate can produce, but as showing to what
departments efforts are best directed. Such gardens diffuse a taste
for the most healthy employments, and offer an elegant resource for
the many unoccupied hours which the Englishman in India finds upon
his hands. They are also schools of gardening; and a simple
inspection of what has been done at Bhagulpore is a valuable lesson
to any person about to establish a private garden of his own.
I often heard complaints made of the seeds distributed from these
gardens not vegetating freely in other parts of India, and it is not
to be expected that they should retain their vitality unimpaired
through an Indian rainy season; but on the other hand I almost
invariably found that the planting and tending had been left to the
uncontrolled management of native gardeners, who with a certain
amount of skill in handicraft are, from habits and prejudices,
singularly unfit for the superintendence of a garden.