With a shrill whistle and a clanging of her engine bell, the train
for Calcutta pulled into the station at M----. "Coolie, coolie!"
with a decided accent on the second syllable, came the well-known
call as scantily-clothed men, falling in beside the train, ran from
the end of the platform to the station entrance, with hands upon the
first and second-class carriage doors, lest other coolies might get
the jobs of carrying the heavy trunks and earn the anna or two anna
bits that they might have had.
With a cloth about the loins for decency's sake and a turban on the
head as a pad for heavy boxes, otherwise naked, the brown coolie
took possession of the upper class compartments and in a minute or
so scores of them were filing away through the station with heads
laden with trunks, boxes, hat-boxes, rolls of bedding, lunch-baskets,
baskets of fruit, and every conceivable sort of parcel that an
Anglo-Indian or a tourist carries with him in the compartment of an
Indian train; for, although luggage vans are run on these trains, the
charge for excess luggage is so great that people crowd as much under
the seats, on the seats, and over the seats as possible. As an
individual rarely travels with less than ten parcels the platform
swarmed with carriers.
While the first and second class passengers in topis and linen suits
were thus being taken out of their carriages and a fresh lot, also
in topis and linen, were being put in, in no undue haste, for all
Indian trains stop fifteen minutes everywhere; while that end of the
platform, therefore, was in comparative calm, the other end where
the third-class carriages stood was in an uproar.
Railroad travel is cheaper nowhere in the world than in India. The
traveller can ride in a compartment for twelve persons by day, six
by night, on leather cushions, with toilet conveniences including
even a shower bath at close hand, for the matter of one cent a mile;
or he can pay about two cents a mile and ride on cushions a little
softer, with a trifle more floor space for stacking his bird-cages
and bandboxes and with furnishings a little glossier--first class;
or he can have a ride for almost nothing, if he will be content to
herd with the natives in a coach with wooden seats, a coach that
accommodates from twenty to fifty, the number depending on the
packing.
Since the fare is so small and since the Hindu religion, as also
the Mohammedan, teaches the efficacy of pilgrimages, the people now
make their pilgrimages, as far as possible and wherever possible, by
train. Their religions have thus so accustomed the natives to the
trains that they seem to be always travelling. The richer ones may
go first or second class. But the majority of them go third and,
since the first person in gets the best seat in these third-class
cars while others crowd in as long as there is an inch to spare,
there is a mad scramble for first, second, third, fourth, and fifth
place at the third-class carriage doors.
So it was as the Calcutta train pulled into M----. Men with bundles
and women with babies, more bundles, water jars, and bags of food
swarmed into the third-class coaches. In a remarkably short time,
however, the people who had wanted to get off were gone with their
bundles, trailing women, and dangling children, and the lot going
towards Calcutta had stowed away inside the carriages, on top of
each other or anywhere that they could, their bundles, their
clinging women, and their crying children; and still there were
several minutes before time for the train to pull out. Then the
through passengers, since, as the newcomers were settled, their own
seats were secure, could get out upon the platform. A bearded
Mohammedan with flowing robes and turbaned head, spreading a mat on
the platform beside the car and slipping out of his shoes, knelt
three times and said his prayers towards Mecca, unmindful of the
crowd around him. At the hydrant a good Hindu carefully washed out
his mouth preparatory to partaking of his noonday meal; while men of
all castes walked up and down beside the cars, resting their cramped
limbs. From the car windows many a braceleted arm reached out a
brass water jar to be filled by the Mohammedan water-carrier. And at
other windows Hindu women waited for the Hindu water-carrier to fill
their jars so that they might have water for the journey.
The sweetmeat venders were unusually busy, for it was just about
noon and Indian sweets are to native Indians really a staple article
of diet instead of a confection as in other countries. They are made
of wholesome food stuffs; sometimes they are shaped like pretzels;
sometimes, rolled into balls; sometimes, chopped into flakes. But
all kinds are well liked and the boy, passing along the trainside
with the flat basket of sweets upon his head, just in range of the
carriage windows, was kept busy dealing out his wares until he had a
light load left and a hand full of coppers. The baskets of the
pretty green pan were also many packages lighter when the gong on
the platform sounded.
At the sound of the gong the through passengers scrambled back into
their places; all but the Mohammedan faithful, who, having
deliberately slipped his feet back into his shoes, carefully folded
up his prayer mat, and with no loss of dignity climbed slowly into
his compartment.
The guard raised his hand.
The train started.
But in the ladies' compartment of the third class the confusion
continued after the start, for three naked babies were climbing over
their mothers and crying; an old woman was rummaging over her
treasures which had been tied up in a white cloth and raising a wild
lamentation because she had lost an anna; and two young beauties in
gay saris, with jangling bracelets, clanking anklets, and flashing
necklaces, were chewing pan very vigorously and chattering in shrill
voices, displaying as they did so mouths most beautifully reddened
with the pan juice and teeth most artistically blackened by the same
delicacy.
But after a short time the babies, either satisfied with their
natural diet or at least appeased with cold chapatis or bits of
sweets handed out by tired mothers, became quiet. The old woman,
exhausted by her unavailing search and grief, was reduced to a quiet
mumbling and a hopeless picking at her bundle. And the two young
women became less noisy in a close comparing of jewels. There was
enough of calm, therefore, so that the travellers could get a
glimpse of each other and see what sort of company each was in.
It was a motley crowd and one that broke many of the laws of caste.
It showed plainly how much the railroad is doing to rid India of
that curse. In one corner sat a Brahmin woman, distinguishable by
the refined features of her class rather than the caste mark upon
her forehead, but too poor for the greater privacy of a second
compartment. Next to her, a proximity which would have broken her
caste at one time, sat a Chumar woman. Next was a lady with the
white head-cloth and one-coloured sari of the Parsi. And beside the
Parsi was a tiny high caste girl, most bejewelled and bedecked,
wearing the necklace which showed that although she was but eight or
nine years old she was married. Evidently the child-wife was taking
the journey with her mother-in-law, for the woman next beyond her,
apparently of the same caste, would occasionally jerk the little
girl into her seat and scold her roundly when she ventured to lean
over to look out of the window.
When the train approached a way-station, the blinds were drawn
quickly lest a man should look upon the women within, for, although
none of them were keeping purdah strictly, still most of these women
were careful in public not to subject themselves unduly to the
glances of men.
As the blinds were lifted after the train left the first small
station, the light disclosed, huddled into a far corner seat, a
young woman wrapped in the coarsest of white garments, with scarcely
an ornament upon her body and no caste mark upon her forehead. Her
face was shaded by the sari which she had drawn close over her head,
but out of the shadow peered a pair of sad, wistful eyes. Her face
was thin and her hands, which clasped tightly upon her lap a
carefully wrapped bundle, were thin and rough as if with toil. Her
eyes were anxiously examining the faces in the carriage. At every
unusual noise or sudden jolt, they would look frightened and she
would clasp still more closely the bundle in her lap. It was a
bundle about eighteen inches long, tied and double knotted most
carefully in a piece of coarse but clean white cloth. The girl's
white sari was also as clean as most Indian white clothes ever look,
washed in dirty water and dried on the ground as they are. She was
evidently on some important journey and, as evidently, for the first
time on a train. The bundle which she carried would not have been
noticeable among such a myriad of bundles as the carriage held, had
she not guarded it so closely, and, when any one changed a seat or
passed by her, shielded it with her arms.
After comparative peace had reigned a little while, the frightened
look left the young woman's eyes and, untying one corner of the
bundle, which opening showed still another wrapping within, she drew
out a cold chapati and ate it slowly as if to make it last a long
time. As she ate, her eyes met those of a sociable looking, old,
gray-haired woman, evidently of low caste, who, sitting opposite
between two high caste women, was apparently longing to talk to some
one. As their eyes met, the older woman leaned across the aisle and
said to the young girl in Hindustani:
"Where are you going?"
The girl looked alarmed, as the question was addressed her, but
answered timidly, "To Benares. Are you going there?"
"No, but I am going almost as far as that. You see I have been ayah
to master's little boy and they moved away and now they have sent
for me to come and I am going to be his ayah again." The old woman's
face beamed as she chattered. "I might have gone long ago when they
went, for they always called me a fine ayah and always praised me to
all of their guests, but when they moved away to Allahabad I did not
want to leave my family. But my boy went off to the city
and--and--my little girl died; so now I am glad to go." Her eyes had
filled with tears as she said that her little girl had died and at
the words the young woman involuntarily clutched at the bundle in
her lap.
Just then the Brahmin woman in the corner opposite got up to arrange
her dress and moved about in the aisle so that the conversation was
interrupted. And the two women got no further chance to talk until
the train pulled into a station and some of the passengers getting
out gave the old lady an opportunity to slip into the seat beside
the girl.
"Where are you from?" she asked, resuming the conversation at once.
"From C----," the girl answered.
"Are you a sweeper?" the old lady continued her catechism. "Do you
work at it?" she went on without waiting for an answer. "There is
lots of money in that work, isn't there? I never had to work at it,
you know."
The young girl looked at her frankly. "I don't think so. I got two
annas a day."
"Oh, my! I get ten rupees a month!"
The girl opened her eyes in surprise. "And what do you do?" she
questioned in return.
"I am an ayah, I told you. All I have to do is to take care of the
little boy. He is a dear, good boy. I dress him in the morning and
give him his breakfast and watch him at play. I get his tiffin and
then put him to sleep. After he wakes up I dress him all up fine and
take him out in the compound in the carriage and usually his mother
walks with us a little and then I give him an early supper and put
him to bed and sit in the room with him until his mother comes
up-stairs. Wouldn't you like to do that? It just isn't work at all
and yet I get ten rupees a month for it."
"Oh, I would like to! But I'd never get a chance to do that," the
girl said sadly.
"Were you ever in a sahib's house?" the old woman ambled on, seeing
that the girl was really interested and impressed. "It is a great,
big place, as big as that station almost," and the old woman pointed
out to a station at which they were just stopping.
"My husband used to go to one sometimes," said the girl, and,
clutching at her bundle, her face grew sad again.
"You are a widow?" asked the other, although she must have known
from the girl's dress that she was.
"Yes, my husband has been dead two years." She paused a moment and
then as if she could restrain herself no longer, as if the flood of
her speech had been loosened, she went on rapidly in a low but
intense tone. "Yes, for two years he has been dead. He was not sick
long. I was but a girl. I did not know very much about it except
that he was sick and that they made offerings to the gods and did
all they could to cure him. But one day my mother-in-law came to me
and called me terrible names and told me that if my husband died I
would be to blame and that awful things would happen to me. She
frightened me terribly and told me that I must not let him die. So I
crept away to the temple. I had no offering to make except as I
stole a handful of rice in the bazaar and took that. I prayed and
prayed. At one temple the priests said that they would cure him for
ten rupees but I had no money and I was afraid to go and tell my
mother-in-law. A priest at another shrine said that a little Ganges
water might help my husband and, as I turned away in despair, for I
did not know where the Ganges was, I heard him say to a man standing
there, 'When I die I am going to the Ganges and die there so that my
bones may be thrown into the river and Mother Gunga may hold them
upon her bosom; then shall I be forever happy.' But I had done all I
could by my prayers and so I crept back home to find my
husband--dead.--But I remembered what the priest had said.
"My mother-in-law beat me. She took my jewels away from me. She
shaved my head and drove me from the house. But I got work as a
sweeper and for two years I have swept up the scrapings in the
streets and made fuel cakes. I never went back to my husband's
home."
Her story told, to which the old woman had listened with sympathy,
the girl covered her face with her sari and, clasping her bundle in
her arms, sat silent, shaking occasionally as with sobs.
Finally the other woman put her hand upon the girl's arm to soothe
her. "What are you going to Benares for?" she asked.
"I am going to Benares," was the only answer the girl made.
Most of the women had left the carriage by this time and night was
coming on. The old lady leaned over to the window and peered out
through the semi-darkness.
"There is the Ganges River--Holy Mother Gunga!" she cried.
The girl started up and eagerly looked from the window, too. "Is
that the Ganges River?" she asked and looked and looked until the
last gleam of the water was lost as the train sped on.
"What are you going to Benares for?" the old woman asked again.
"I am going to Benares," the girl answered again with a frightened
stare, clutching her bundle.
As there were but few passengers left, the two women soon lay down
at full length on the hard benches and went to sleep. But the girl
did not use her bundle for a pillow as her companion had suggested
but lay with it in her arms.
Before the sun was up the next morning, the younger woman was awake
and staring out with frightened eyes as the train ran through a
country entirely strange to her. And when the old woman woke up and
announced that soon she must be getting off, the girl's fear seemed
to increase.
"Is the Ganges River near here, too?" she asked.
"Why, I think so," the old woman replied and her statement was
confirmed by another woman in the next seat.
"Then I'll get off here with you," announced the girl with a
brighter look. "If the Ganges River is here, this place should do as
well as Benares, I think."
The older woman looked astonished but offered no objections to the
girl's sudden change of plan.
In a few minutes the train stopped at Allahabad and again arose the
mad confusion of a large railway station at train time. But the old
woman got out safely, followed closely by the girl, holding her
bundle tightly in her arms.
They stepped aside from the crowd and the old woman looked at the
younger in curiosity as to what she would do here in Allahabad. The
appearance of the latter had suddenly changed. Her face was eager
and her eyes were bright.
"Take me to the Ganges River quickly," she demanded, "for I must
throw these into the sacred river," and she held out her bundle.
"What is in it?" asked the old lady, eyeing the strange bundle with
a frightened look such as the girl herself had worn until the
excitement of being near her goal had driven it from her face.
"I must throw them into the Ganges River," repeated the girl. "They
are my husband's bones," she whispered eagerly, lowering her voice.
"When they burned his body I crept along and after all had left I
picked them out of the pile of ashes and here they are!" she
exclaimed triumphantly. "For two years I have kept them near me day
and night and saved all my money to come to Benares to throw them
into the Ganges River that I might be forgiven for his death and
that he might have life and happiness as the priest said. But if the
Ganges River is here, surely this place will do as well as Benares.
I am so tired! I am so tired of being a cursed woman!" she sobbed,
her excitement giving way to tears. "I want to be happy. Take me to
the Ganges River!"
The old woman's expression had turned from fright to astonishment as
she heard what the bundle contained; but at the girl's sobs her face
grew sweet with a motherly tenderness. She turned away as if to
think, murmuring to herself, "The memsahib will surely forgive me if
I come a little late. She would like to have me help this poor
child, I know, and perhaps she might make her an ayah like me if I
take her with me. That would make the girl happy, indeed. Yes, I
will help her."
Then she turned back to the girl. Tenderly taking her free hand, for
one still tightly clasped the precious bundle, the old woman said,
"Come, we will find the way to the sacred river."
Quickly the two went down the platform, now somewhat thinned of the
earlier crowd, and passed through the station gate, the old woman
still holding the girl's hand and the girl still tightly holding the
bundle which was to be the price of life and happiness to her.