Produced by Ruth Hart
[Note: for this online edition I have moved the Table of Contents to
the beginning of the text and added three asterisks to mark breaks
between sections. I have also made the following spelling
changes: latitute to latitude and mountain ash berberis to mountain
ash berberries]
THE HEART OF NATURE
OR
THE QUEST FOR NATURAL BEAUTY
BY SIR FRANCIS YOUNGHUSBAND
K.C.S.I., K.C.I.E.
PRESIDENT OF THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY
AUTHOR OF "THE HEART OF A CONTINENT"
LONDON
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET
1921
CONTENTS
Preface ix-x
Introduction xv-xxviii
PART I
Chapter I. The Sikkim Himalaya. The sacred Ganges--A beneficent
power--Beauty of the plains--First sight of the Himalaya 3-12
Chapter II. The Teesta Valley. Mystery of the forest--The gorges
--Sequestered glens 13-19
Chapter III. The Forest. Butterflies--Ferns--Orchids--Flower
friends--Rhododendrons--Temperate vegetation--Primulas--Artic
vegetation--The range of vegetation 20-37
Chapter IV. The Denizens of the Forest. Butterflies--Moths--Birds
--Reptiles--Mammals--Animal beauty--Primitive man--Higher races
38-54
Chapter V. The Sum Impression. Two views of Nature--Variety of
life--Intensity of life--The battle of life--Adaptation and selection
--Purposiveness--Purposeful structures--Interdependence--Organising
Activity--Gradation--Care of offspring--the Activity not mechanical
but Spiritual--Nature's end--a Common aspiration 55-85
Chapter VI. Kinchinjunga. The foothills--Darjiling--A vision of the
mountain--Full view--Mountain grandeur--Dawn on the mountain
--Sunset on the mountain 86-99
Chapter VII. High Solitudes. Kashmir--Barren mountains--Dazzling
peaks--Purity of beauty 100-108
Chapter VIII. The Heavens. Desert sunsets--Tibetan sunsets--The
stars--The whole universe our home--A Heavenly Presence 109-120
Chapter IX. Home Beauty. One's own country--Woman's beauty
--Love and beauty--Their Divine Source--Wedding--Divine union
--The Inmost Heart of Nature 121-134
Chapter X. The Nature of Nature. A spiritual background--Purpose
in Nature--Higher beings--No confining plan--Immanent Spirit
--Collective personality--England a Person--Nature a Person--Moved
by an ideal--The ideal in plants--The ideal in animals--The ideal in
the world 135-160
Chapter XI. Nature's Ideal. Battling with physical Nature--Battling
with man--In tune with Nature--At the heart of the Universe is
Love--Divine fellowship is Nature's Ideal 161-171
Chapter XII. The Heart of Nature. Picturing the Ideal--The Ideal
Man--Man and woman--Perfecting the Ideal--Discipline necessary
--Leadership--Nature's method--Our own responsibility--The
lovability of nature--God at the Heart of Nature 172-192
PART II
Natural Beauty and Geography
Presidential Address to the Royal Geographical Society 195-216
An Address to the Union Society of University College, London
217-235
PREFACE
The value of Knowledge and Character is duly impressed upon us.
Of the value of Freedom we are told so much that we have come to
regard it as an end in itself instead of only a means, or necessary
condition. But Beauty we are half-inclined to connect with the
effeminate. Poetry, Music, and Literature are under suspicion with
the average English schoolboy, whose love of manliness he will
share with nothing else. Yet love of Beauty persists in spite of all
discouragement, and will not be suppressed. Natural Beauty,
especially, insists on a place in our affections, derived originally
from Love, and essentially and inseparably connected with it,
Natural Beauty acknowledges supremacy to Love alone. And it
deserves our generous recognition, for it is wholesome and
refreshing for our souls.
The acute observation and telling description of Natural Beauty is at
least as necessary for the enjoyment of life as the pursuit of Natural
Science to which so much attention is paid. For the concern of the
former is the character, and of the latter only the cause of natural
phenomena; and of the two, character is the more important. It is,
indeed, high time that we Englishmen were more awake than we are
to the value of Natural Beauty. For we are born lovers of Nature,
and no more poetic race than ourselves exists. Our country at its best,
on an early summer day, is the loveliest little home in all the world.
And we go out from this island home of ours to every land. We have
unrivalled opportunities, therefore, of seeing innumerable types of
natural objects. By observing Nature in so many different aspects,
and by comparing our impressions with one another, we ought to
understand Nature better than any other race. And by entering more
readily into communion with her we, better than others, should
realise the Beauty she possesses.
I am conscious of having myself made most inadequate use of the
splendid opportunities my travels afforded me of seeing the Beauty
of Nature. So I am all the more anxious that those following after
me should not, by like omission, commit the same sin against
themselves and against our country. We owe it to ourselves and to
mankind to give full rein to our instinctive love of Natural Beauty,
and to train and refine every inclination and capacity we have for
appreciating it till we are able to see all those finer glories of which
we now discern only the first faint glow.
And if any other country excel us in appreciation, then it behoves us
to brace ourselves up to emulate and surpass that country, and learn
how to understand Nature better and see more Beauty. For in love of
Natural Beauty, and in capacity for communicating that love,
England ought to be preeminent. She above every other country
should come nearest to the Heart of Nature.
F. E. Y.
_June,_ 1921.
INTRODUCTION
Town children let loose in a meadow dash with shouts of joy to
pluck the nearest flowers. They ravenously pick handfuls and
armfuls as if they could never have enough. They are exactly like
animals in the desert rushing to water. They are satisfying a great
thirst in their souls--the thirst for Beauty. Some of us remember, too,
our first sight of snowy mountains in the Alps or in the Himalaya.
We recall how our spirits _leaped_ to meet the mountains, how we
gasped in wonder and greedily feasted our eyes on the glorious
spectacle. In such cases as these there is something in the natural
object that appeals to something in us. Something in us rushes out to
meet the something in the natural object. A responsive chord is
struck. A relationship is established. We and the natural object come
into harmony with one another. We have recognised in the flower,
the mountain, the landscape, something that is the same as what is in
ourselves. We fall in love with the natural object. A marriage takes
place. Our soul is wedded to the soul of the natural object. And at
the very moment of wedding Beauty is born. It springs from Love,
just as Love itself originally sprang from the wedding of primitive
man and woman.
In this process all will depend upon the mood. If we are not in the
mood for it, we are unreceptive of Nature's impressions, and we are
irresponsive. We do not come into touch with Nature. Consequently
we see no Beauty. But if we are in a sensitive and receptive mood, if
our minds are not preoccupied, and if our soul is open to the
impressions which Nature is ever raining on it, then we respond to
Nature's appeal. We feel ourselves in tune with her. We come into
communion with her, and we see Beauty.
If we are ourselves feeling sad and sorrowful when we look out on
Nature, and there all should happen to be bright and gay, we shall
feel out of harmony with Nature, we shall not feel in touch with her,
and we shall not see Beauty.
On the other hand, when we are in a glad and overflowing mood we
shall be extraordinarily responsive to Nature's appeal, and see
Beauty in a rugged, leafless oak tree or a poor old woman at the
corner of some mean street. And if when we are in such a mood
Nature happens to be at her best and brightest, as on some spring
morning, the Beauty we shall then see will be overpowering, and we
shall scarcely be able to contain ourselves for ecstasy of joy.
We shall have discovered an identity between what is in Nature and
what is in us. In looking on Nature, we shall have been introduced
into a Presence, greater than ourselves but like ourselves, which stirs
in us this which we feel. When we see Beauty in Nature we are
discovering that Nature is not merely a body, but _has_ or _is_ a
soul. And the joy we feel is produced by the satisfaction our soul
feels in coming into touch and harmony with this soul of Nature.
Our soul is recognising samenesses between what is in it and what is
in the soul of Nature, and feels joy in the recognition.
And the instinct of fellowship with our kind impels us to
communicate to others what we ourselves have felt. We want to tell
others what we have seen and what we have experienced.
We long, too, to share the joy which others also must have felt in
contemplating Nature. We want especially to know and feel what
those with far more sensitive souls than our own--the great poets,
painters, and musicians--have felt. So we communicate our feelings
to others; and we communicate with others, either personally or
through their books or pictures or music, so that we may find out
from them what more to look for, and may know better how to look
for it. By so doing, our souls become more sensitive to the
impressions of Nature, and we are better able to express those
impressions. Our power of vision increases. Our soul's eye acquires
a keener insight and sees deeper into the soul of Nature. We are able
to enter more into the spirit of Nature, and the spirit of Nature is able
to enter more into us. We arrive at a completer understanding
between ourselves and Nature, are more in harmony with her, and
consequently see more Beauty.
We see, indeed, what Nature really is. We see the reality behind the
appearance--the content within the outward form. We are not for the
moment concerned with the _cause_ but with the _character_ of
Nature. We see the "I" behind the outward manifestation and
representation. And if we have sympathy and understanding enough
and are able truly to enter into the soul of Nature, we shall see the
real "I" behind the common everyday "I"--just as the few who
intimately know some great man see the real man behind the man
who appears in the public eye--the real Beaconsfield or Kitchener
behind the Beaconsfield or Kitchener of the daily press. And, as we
see more of this real "I" in Nature and are better able to get in touch
and harmony with her, so shall we see greater Beauty in Nature.
If we have petty, meagre souls we shall find little in common with
the great soul of Nature, and consequently see only shallow Beauty.
If we have great souls we shall have more in common and see more
Beauty. But to arrive at a full understanding of the real Nature we
must observe her from every point of view and see her in all her
aspects. Only so shall we be able to understand her real self and see
her full Beauty. And her aspects and the points of view from which
we may observe them change so incessantly that the greatest of us
falters. The more we see of Nature, the more we find there is to
understand. And the more we understand Nature and commune with
her, the more Beauty do we find there is to see. So to arrive at a
complete understanding of Nature and see all her Beauty is beyond
the capacity of us finite men.
Yet we are impelled to go on striving to see all we can. And in the
following pages an attempt is made to show how, more Beauty in
Nature may be discovered.
Often in the Himalaya I have watched an eagle circling overhead. I
have sat on the mountain-side and watched it sail majestically along
in graceful curves and circles, and with perfect ease and poise. Far
above the earth it would range, and seemingly without exertion glide
easily over tracts that we poor men could only enter by prodigious
effort. Captivated by its grace of motion, and jealous of its freedom,
I would for hours watch it. And this eagle I knew, from the height
and distance from which it would swoop down on its prey, to be
possessed of eyesight of unrivalled keenness in addition to its
capacity for movement.
So this bird had opportunities such as no human being--not even an
airman--has of seeing the earth and what is on it. At will it could
glide over the loftiest mountain ranges. At will it could sail above
the loveliest valleys. At will it could perch upon any chosen point
and observe things at close range. In a single day this one eagle
might have seen the finest natural scenery in the world--the highest
mountain, the most varied forest, thickly populated plains and bare,
open plains, peoples, animals, birds, insects, trees, flowers, all of the
most varied description. In one day, and in the ordinary course of its
customary circlings and sailings, it might have seen what men come
from the ends of the Earth to view, and are content if they see only a
hundredth part of what the eagle sees every day.
From its mountain eerie in Upper Sikkim it might have seen the rose
of dawn flushing the snowy summits of Kinchinjunga, and far away
Mount Everest. And soaring aloft, the eagle might have looked out
over the populous plains of India and seen, like silver streaks, the
rivers flowing down from the Himalaya to join in the far distance
the mighty Mother Ganges. Then its eye might have ranged over the
vast forest which clothes in dense green mantle the plain at the foot
of the mountains from Nepal to Bhutan and Assam, and from the
plain spreads up on the mountain-sides themselves and reaches to
the very borders of eternal snow. Over this vast forest with its
treasures of tree and plant, animal and insect life, tropical, temperate,
and alpine, the eagle might have soared; and then, passing over the
Himalayan watershed, have looked down upon the treeless, open,
undulating, almost uninhabited plain of Tibet, and in the distance
seen the great Brahmaputra River, which, circling round Bhutan,
cuts clean through the Himalaya and, turning westward, also joins
the Ganges.
In the whole world no more wonderful natural scenery is to be found.
And the eagle with no unusual effort could see it all in a single day,
and see it with a distinctness of sight no man could equal. But keen
though its eyesight was and wide though its range, the eagle in all
that beautiful region would see not a single beauty. Neither in the
sunrise, nor in the snowy mountains, nor in the luxuriant tropical
forest, nor in the flowers, the birds, the butterflies, nor in the people
and animals, nor in the cataracts and precipices would it see any
beauty whatever. The mountain would be to it a mere outline, the
forests a patch of green, the rivers streaks of white, the animals just
possible items of food. The eagle would see much, but it would see
no beauty.
Perhaps we shall understand why it is that the eagle with these
unbounded opportunities sees no beauty if we consider the case of a
little midge buzzing round a man's body. The midge is roughly in
about the same relation to the body of a man that the eagle is to the
body of the Earth. The midge in its hoverings sees vast tracts of the
human body; sees the features--the nose, the eye, the mouth; sees the
trunk and the limbs and the head. But even in the most beautiful of
men it would see no beauty. And it would see no beauty because it
would have no soul to understand expression. It might be hovering
round the features of a man when the smile on his lips and the
exaltation in his eyes were expressive of the highest ecstasy of soul,
but the midge would see no beauty in those features because it had
not the soul to enter into the soul of the man and understand the
expression on his face. All the little shades and gradations and tones
and lights in the features of the man would be quite meaningless to
the midge because it would know nothing of the man's soul, of
which the features and the changes and variations in them were the
outward manifestation. The midge would know nothing of the
reality of the man which lay hidden behind the appearance.
It is the same with the eagle in respect to natural features as it is with
the midge in respect to the features of the man. The eagle sees only
the bare outward appearance of Nature, and sees no meaning in her
features. It has no soul to enter into the soul of Nature and
understand what the natural features are expressing. The delicate
lights and shades and changes on the face of Nature have no
meaning for it. It sees the bare appearance. It sees nothing of the
reality behind the appearance. It has no soul to wed to the soul of
Nature. It therefore sees no beauty.
But now supposing that among all the midges that buzz about a man
there happened to be an artist-midge with exceeding sensitiveness of
soul, one which was able to recognise a fundamental identity of life
between it and the man, one which was able to recognise
samenesses of feelings and emotions and aspirations, and by
recognition of the samenesses between it and the man enter into the
very life and soul of the man, then that midge would be able to
understand all the varying expressions on the face of the man, and
by understanding those expressions see their beauty.
We cannot expect an eagle in a similar way to have that
sensitiveness of soul which would enable it to enter into the soul of
Nature, understand Nature, and so see its Beauty. But what we
cannot expect of the eagle we can expect of man. We can expect an
Artist to appear who will be to the Earth what the artist-midge was
to the man.
Man does to some extent enter into the soul of Nature. He has
_some_ understanding of Nature. He sees Beauty; and whenever he
sees Beauty in Nature he is in touch with the soul of Nature. Even
ordinary men see some of the Beauty of Nature and have some
feeling of kinship with her. They have something in common
between their soul and the soul of Nature. They have the sense of
more in common between them and Nature than a midge has
between it and a man.
And in a delicately sensitive man such as an artist--painter, poet, or
musician--this sense of kinship with Nature is highly developed. In
regard to his relationship with Nature he is like the finely sensitive
and cultured artist-midge would be in regard to a man--the midge
who, through understanding the inner soul and character of the man,
was able to read the expression on his features and see their beauty.
What we ordinary men have to do, and what we especially want
those gifted with unusually sensitive souls to do, is to bear in mind
the difficulties which the midge has in understanding us and in
seeing any beauty in us, and the way in which it would have to train
and cultivate its faculties before it could ever hope to understand the
expression on our features--to bear this in mind, and then to take
ourselves in hand and develop the soul within us till it is fine enough
and great enough to enter into the great soul of Nature.
The sense of Beauty we all possess in some slight degree is in itself
a proof that behind the outward appearance of Nature there is a
spiritual reality--an "I"--just as behind the outward appearance of the
man which the artist-midge sees there is the "I" of the man. And by
cultivating this sense--that is, by training and developing our
capacity to see deeper into the heart of Nature, see more significance
and meaning in each shade and change of her features, and read
more understandingly what is going on deep within her soul--we
shall enable ourselves to see a fuller and richer Natural Beauty.
So we look forward to the appearance among us of a great Artist
who, born with an exceptionally sensitive soul, will deliberately
heighten and intensify this sensitiveness, learn what others have
experienced, compare notes with them, and train himself to detect
the significance of every slightest indication which Nature gives of
the workings of the soul within her; and then, recognising the
sameness between his own feelings and the feelings of Nature, will
fall deeply in love with her, give himself up utterly to her, marry her,
and in their marriage give birth to Beauty of surpassing richness and
intensity.
What we await, then, is an Artist with a soul worthy of being
wedded to Nature. Puny, shallow artists will not be able to see much
more of Nature than a midge sees of a man. What we want is a man
with the physique, the abounding health and spirits, the fine intellect,
the poetic power and imagination, the love of animals and his
fellow-men, the skill, fitness, and gay courage of a Julian Grenfell.
We want a man with the opportunities he had of mixing from
childhood in London and in country houses with every grade and
condition of men, with statesmen, soldiers, men of art, hunting men,
racing men, schoolboys, undergraduates, literary men, gamekeepers,
old family retainers--every kind and sort of human being. We want a
man of such qualifications combined with the qualifications of a
Darwin--with his love of natural history, his power of close and
accurate observation, his genius for drawing right inferences from
what he observed, his wide knowledge of Nature in her many
manifestations, his sympathetic touch with every plant and animal,
and his warm, affectionate nature in all human intercourse.
We want, in fact, a Naturalist-Artist--a combination of Julian
Grenfell and Darwin. And this is no outrageously impossible, but a
very likely and fitting combination. For Julian Grenfell wrote great
poetry even in the trenches in Flanders between the two battles of
Ypres. And with his love of country life, shooting, fishing, and
hunting, his inclination might very easily have been directed
towards natural history. If it had been and the opportunity had
offered, we might have had the very type of Naturalist-Artist we are
now awaiting. He would have had the physical fitness and capacity
to endure hardships which are required for travel in parts of the
Earth where the Natural Beauty is finest, and he would have had, too,
the sensitiveness of soul to receive impressions and the power of
expressing himself so that others might share with him the
impressions he had felt. If after passing through the earlier stages of
shooting and hunting birds and animals he had come to the more
profitable stage of observing them, and had devoted to the
observation of their habits and ways of life the same skill and
acumen which he had shown in hunting them, he might, with his
innate and genuine love of animals, very well have become a great
naturalist as well as what he was--a great sportsman and a writer of
great poetry.
It is for the advent of such Naturalist-Artist that we wait. But we
have to prepare the way for him and do our share in helping to
produce him. And this will now be my endeavour, for it so happens
that I have been blessed with opportunities--some of my own
making, some provided for me--of seeing Nature on a larger scale
and under more varied aspects than falls to the lot of most men. I am
ashamed when I reflect how little use I have made of those
opportunities--how little I was prepared and trained to make the
most of them. But this at least I can do: I can point out to the coming
Artist those parts of the world where he is likely to see the Beauty of
Nature most fully, and in greatest variety.
With this end in view I shall begin with the Sikkim Himalaya, over
which the eagle flew, because it contains within a small area a
veritable compendium of Nature. Rising directly out of the plains of
India, practically within the tropics, these mountains rise far above
the limits of perpetual snow. Their base is covered with luxuriant
vegetation of a truly tropical character, and this vegetation extends
through all the ranges from tropical to temperate and arctic. The
animal, bird, and insect life does the same. And here also are to be
found representative men of every clime. Similarly does the natural
scenery vary from plain to highest mountain. There are roaring
torrents and wide, placid rivers. The Sikkim Himalaya, looking
down on the plains of India on the one side and the steppes of Tibet
on the other, is the most suitable place I know for a study of Natural
Beauty.
But there are beauties in Kashmir and in the great Karakoram
Mountains behind Kashmir which are not found in Sikkim. And
there are beauties in the Desert which are not found in either Sikkim
or Kashmir. So I must take the Artist to these regions also.
And I choose Sikkim and Kashmir because these are easily
accessible regions to which men with a thirst for Beauty can return
again and again, till they are saturated with the atmosphere and have
imbibed the true spirit of the region--till they have realised how
much these natural features express sentiments which they, too, are
wanting to express--their aspirations for the highest and purest, their
longing for repose, their delight in warmth and affection, or
whatever their sentiment might be. Thousands of Englishmen,
cultured Indians, and travellers from all over the world, visit the
Himalaya every year--some for sport, some for health, some for
social enjoyment. Amongst these may be our Naturalist-Artist who
year after year, drawn to Sikkim and Kashmir by his love of Natural
Beauty, would learn to know Nature in the wonderfully varied
aspects under which she is to be seen in those favoured regions, who
would come into ever-deepening communion with her, would yearly
see more Beauty in her, and would communicate to us the
enjoyment he had felt.
But Natural Beauty includes within its scope a great deal more than
only natural scenery. It includes the beauty of all natural
objects--men and women as well as mountains, animals, and plants. So these
also the Artist will have to keep within his purview. And his love of
Nature, and consequently his capacity for seeing Natural Beauty,
will be all the surer if he uses his head as well as his heart in
forming his final conception of her--that is to say, his final for the
moment, as no man ever has or _can_ come to a literally final
conception of Nature. So the Artist will pause now and then to test
his view of Nature in the light of pure reason. For he will be well
enough aware that neither Love nor Beauty can be perfect unless it
be irradiated with Truth, and the three he will ever strive to keep
together.
PART I
THE HEART OF NATURE
CHAPTER I
THE SIKKIM HIMALAYA
The Sikkim Himalaya is a region first brought prominently into
notice by the writings of Sir Joseph Hooker, the great naturalist, who
visited it in 1848. It lies immediately to the east of Nepal, and can
now be reached by a railway which ascends the outer range to
Darjiling. It is drained by the Teesta River, up the main valley of
which a railway runs for a short distance. The region is therefore
easily accessible. For the purposes of this book it may be taken to
include the flat open forest and grass-covered tract known as the
Terai, immediately at the base of the mountain. This is only a few
hundreds of feet above sea-level, so that from there to the summit of
the Himalaya there is a rise of nearly 28,000 feet in about seventy
miles. The lower part is in the 26th degree of latitude, so that the
heat is tropical. And as the region comes within the sweep of the
monsoon from the Bay of Bengal, there is not only great heat in the
plains and lower valleys, but great moisture as well. The
mountain-sides are in consequence clothed with a luxuriant vegetation.
To enter this wonderful region the traveller has first to cross the
Ganges--the sacred river of the Hindus. Great rivers have about
them a fascination all their own. They produce in us a sense of
everlastingness and irresistibility. The Ganges, more than a mile
wide, comes sweeping along in deep majestic flood from the far
distance to the far distance, on and on unendingly, from all time to
all time, and in such depth and volume that nothing human can
withstand it. In the dry season, when it is low and the sun is shining,
it is placid and benign with a bright and smiling countenance.
Stately temples, set amidst sacred groves and graceful palms, lighten
the banks. On the broad steps of the bathing ghats are assembled
crowds of pious worshippers in clothes of every brilliant hue. The
river has an aspect of kindliness and geniality and life-givingness.
Its waters and rich silt have brought plenty to many a barren acre,
and the dwellers on its banks know well that it issues from the holy
Himalaya.
But the Ganges is not always in this gracious mood, and does not
always wear this kindly aspect. In the rainy season it is a thing of
terror. Overhead black, thundery clouds sweep on for days and
weeks together towards the mountains. There is not a glimpse of sun.
The rain descends as a deluge. The river is still further swollen by
the melting of the snow on the Himalaya, and now comes swirling
along in dark and angry mood, rising higher and higher in its banks,
eating into them, and threatening to overtop them and carry death
and destruction far and wide. Men no longer go down to meet it.
They shrink back from it. They uneasily watch it till the fulness of
its strength is spent and it has returned to its normal beneficent
aspect.
No wonder such a river is regarded as sacred. To the more primitive
people it is literally a living person--and a person who may be
propitiated, a person who may do them harm if they annoy him, and
do them good if they make themselves agreeable to him and furnish
him with what he wants. To the cultured Hindus it is an object of the
deepest reverence. If they can bathe in its waters their sins are
washed away. If after death their ashes can be cast on its broad
bosom, they will be secure of everlasting bliss. From perhaps the
earliest days of our race, for some hundreds of thousands of years,
men may have lived upon its banks. For it was in the forests beside
great rivers, in a warm and even climate, that primitive men must
have lived. They would have launched their canoes upon its waters,
and used it as their only pathway of communication with one
another. And always they would have looked upon it with mingled
awe and affection. Besides the sun it would have been the one great
natural object which would attract their attention. Insensibly the
sight of that ever-rolling flood must have deeply affected them.
They must have come to love it as they beheld it through the greater
part of the year. The sight of its destructive power may have made
them recoil for a time in fear and awe. But this would be forgotten
as the flood subsided, and the river was again smooth and smiling
and passing peacefully along before them.
So men do not run away from it. They gather to it. They build great
cities on its banks, and come from great distances to see it. They
perform pilgrimages every year in thousands to the spot where it
issues from the Himalaya. And they penetrate even to its source far
back and high up in the mountains.
To the most enlightened, also, the Ganges should be an object of
reverence for its antiquity, for its future, and for its power. From the
surface of the Bay of Bengal the sun's rays have drawn particles of
water into the atmosphere. Currents in the air have carried them for
hundreds of miles over the sea and over the plains of Bengal, till the
chill of the Himalaya Mountains has caused them to condense and
fall in snow and rain. But some have been carried farther. They have
been transported right over the Himalaya at a height of at least
20,000 feet, till they have finally fallen in Tibet. It is a striking fact
that some of the water in the Ganges is from rivers in Tibet which
have cut their way clean through the mighty range of the Himalaya.
The Arun River, for example, rises in Tibet and cuts through the
Himalaya by a deep gorge in the region between Mount Everest and
Kinchinjunga. These rivers are, indeed, much older than the
mountains. They were running their course before the Himalaya
were upheaved, and they kept wearing out a channel for themselves
as the mountains rose and slowly over-towered them.
Reverence, therefore, is due to the Ganges on account of its vast
antiquity. Reverence also is due because it will flow on like now for
hundreds of thousands and perhaps for millions of years to come.
Round and round in never-ceasing cycle the water is drawn up from
the ocean, is carried along in the clouds, descends upon the
mountains, and gathers in the Ganges to flow once more into the sea.
The Ganges may gradually change its course as it eats into first one
bank and then the other. But it will flow on and on and on for as far
into the future as the human eye can ken.
And its power, so terrifying to primitive man--even to us at times
--will become more and more a power for good. Already great canals
have been taken from its main stream and its tributaries, and
millions of acres have been irrigated by its water, thus helping to
bring to birth great crops of wheat and rice, cotton, sugar-cane, and
oil-seeds. Schemes for utilising the water-power in its fall through
the mountains by converting it into electric power are in
contemplation, so that railways may be run by it and power for great
industries be furnished. Once more, too, the course of the river may
become a line of communication as sea-planes are used to fly from
town to town and alight upon its surface.
So as we come to know the river in its deepest significance, our
impression of its everlastingness and its irresistible power remains.
But our sense of fear diminishes. We feel that the river is ready to
co-operate with us. That it is capable of being taken in hand and led.
That its power is not essentially destructive but beneficent. That
there is in it almost inexhaustible capacity for helping plant and
beast and man. And that it is a friend and anxious to help us.
The Hindus have been right all along in worshipping it. Their
worship, with tropical luxuriance, may have developed to
extravagant lengths. But the instinct which promoted this worship
was perfectly sound. The river bears within its breast great
life-giving properties, and in worshipping the river the Hindus were
half-consciously expressing their sense of dependence on these
life-giving properties, and of affection and gratitude to the river for the
benefits it conferred. Mere fear of its destructive character--fear
alone--would not produce the desire for worship. They did and do
fear the river, but behind the fear is a feeling that it _can_ be
propitiated, that it _can_ be induced to help man and does not want
to thwart him. And here they were perfectly right. We are at last
learning the way by which this may be done, and now see clearly
what the Hindus only vaguely felt, that the heart of the river is right
enough--that once it is tamed and trained it can bring untold good to
man.
This the Artist will readily discern. He will enter into the spirit of
the river. He will read its true character. Refusing to be terrorised by
its more tremendous moods, he will exult in its might, and see in it a
potent agency for good. In these ways the river will make its appeal
to him; and responding to the appeal, the Artist will see great Beauty
in the river and describe that Beauty to us.
* * *
Beyond the river, before we reach the mountain, we have to pass
over absolutely level cultivated plains, without a single eminence in
sight. To most they would appear dull, monotonous, uninteresting.
There is no horizon to which the eye can wander and find
satisfaction in remote distance. There is no hill to which to raise our
eyes and our souls with them. The outlook is confined within the
narrowest limits. Palm trees, banyan trees, houses, walled gardens,
everywhere restrict it. The fields are small, the trees and houses
numerous. Nothing distant is to be seen. To the European the
prospect is depressing. But to the Bengali it is his very life. These
densely inhabited plains are his home. They have, therefore, all the
attraction which familiar scenes in which men have grown up from
childhood always have. A Bengali prefers them to high mountains.
He loves the sight of the brilliant emerald rice-fields, of the tall
feathery palms, of the shady banyan trees, of the flaming poinsettias,
the bright marigolds, cannas and bougainvillea, the many-coloured
crotons and calladiums, the sweet-scented jasmine, oranges,
tuberoses, and gardenia; and the gaudy jays, the swiftly darting
parrots, and the playful squirrels. He loves, too, the bathing-pools,
and the patient oxen, and the cool, sequestered gardens. And he
loves these things for their very nearness. His attention is not
distracted to distant horizons and inaccessible heights. All is close to
the eye and easily visible. His world may be small, but it is all
within reach. He can know well each tree and flower, each bird and
animal. It is not a wide and varied life. But it is an intense and very
vivid life; and to the Bengali, on that account, more preferable. And
if it is confined it is at least confined in the open air, and in a climate
of perpetual summer.
* * *
Beyond this highly cultivated and thickly populated part, and still in
the plains, we come to a wild jungle country which stretches up to
the foothills, and is swampy, pestilential, and swarming with every
kind of biting insect. It is a nasty country to travel through. But it
has its interests. There grow here remarkable grasses, with tall
straight shoots gracefully bending over at the top from the weight of
their feathery heads; and so high are these gigantic grasses that they
often reach above the head of a man on an elephant. The areas
covered by them are practically impenetrable to men on foot, and
there is a mysterious feel about this region, for it is the haunt of
rhinoceros, tigers, and boars. In passing through it we have an
uneasy feeling that almost anything may appear on the instant, and
that once we were on foot and away from the path we would be
irretrievably lost--drowned in a sea of waving grass.
From this sea of grass rise patches of forest and single trees. The
most prevalent is the Sal tree _(Shorea robusta),_ a magnificent
gregarious tree with a tall straight stem and thick glossy foliage. But
the most conspicuous in March and April is the Dak tree _(Butea
frondosa),_ an ungainly tree, but remarkable for its deep rich scarlet
flowers, like gigantic sweet-peas but of a thick velvety texture.
These flowers blossom before the leaves appear, and when the tree
is in full bloom it looks like a veritable flame in the forest.
Another beautiful tree which is found in this lower part is the
_Acacia catechu,_ known in Northern India as the Khair tree, and
found all about the foothills of the Himalaya. Not tall and stately,
but rather contorted and ample like the oak, it has a graceful feathery
foliage and a kindly inviting nature.
* * *
Proceeding over these level plains, which as we approach the
mountains are covered with dense forest, stagnant morasses, and
trim tea-gardens, we one morning awake to find that over the
horizon to the north hangs a long cloud-like strip, white suffused
with pink--level on its lower edge but with the upper edge irregular
in outline. No one who had not seen snow mountains before would
suppose for a moment that that strip could be a line of mountain
summits. For there is not a trace of any connection with the earth.
Between it and the earth is nothing but blue haze. And it is so high
above the horizon that it seems incredible that any such connection
could exist. Yet no one who _had_ seen snow mountains could
doubt for an instant that that rose-flushed strip of white was the
Himalaya. For it possesses two unmistakable characteristics which
distinguish it from any cloud. Firstly, the lower edge is absolutely
straight and horizontal: it is exactly parallel with the horizon.
Secondly, the upper edge is jagged, and the outline of the jaggedness
cuts clean and perfectly defined against the intense blue of the sky.
No one who knows mountains could doubt that this line was the
Himalaya, yet every time we see it afresh we marvel more. We
know for certain that those sharp edges _are_ the summits of
mountains whose base is on this solid earth. Yet, however sure we
may be of that fact, we do not cease to wonder. And as we gaze
upon that line of snowy summits no more--indeed, less--intrinsically
beautiful than many a cloud, yet unspeakably more significant, we
are curiously elated. Something in us leaps to meet the mountains.
And we cannot keep our eyes away. We seem lifted up, and feel
higher possibilities within ourselves and within the world than we
had ever known before. As we travel onward we strain to keep the
mountains continually in sight, for we cannot bear to leave them.
We feel better men for having seen them, and for the remainder of
our days we would keep them in continuing remembrance.
* * *
As we come closer under the mountains the base emerges from the
haze and the line of snowy peaks disappears behind the nearer outer
ranges. Then we come to these ranges themselves, which rise with
considerable abruptness out of the level plains with very little
intermediate modulation of form, and we find them densely clothed
in forest--true, rich, luxuriant, tropical forest with all the delights of
glistening foliage, graceful ferns and palms, glorious orchids, and
brilliant butterflies.