MOHAMMEDAN INDIA.
Strictly speaking, the term, Mohammedan India, could only be
applied to those frontier districts in which the Mohammedans have
a preponderating influence, but the Mohammedan emperors left such
conspicuous monuments of their reign in Lucknow, Delhi and Agra that
it does not violate the proprieties to thus describe this section.
The Mohammedans themselves have laid virtual claim to this territory
by the establishment of their chief college at Aligahr, nearly
equidistant from Agra and Delhi, and their claim is still further
strengthened by the fact that while they have not a majority, they
have a very large percentage of the population of both of the last
named cities.
In approaching this section of India from the east, the tourist
passes through Cawnpore, made memorable by the massacre of the
British residents during the mutiny of 1857. The recollection of the
mutiny is still fresh in the minds of the British officials, and
numerous monuments have been reared to the bravery of the besieged
garrisons.
At Calcutta one is shown a black piece of pavement which covers a
part of the Black Hole of Calcutta (the rest of the hole is now
covered by a building) where in 1756 one hundred and forty-six
human beings were forced to spend the night and from which only
twenty-three escaped alive. The hole was twenty-two by fourteen
feet and only sixteen or eighteen feet in height, and the awful
sufferings of those who perished there are commemorated by an
obelisk which stands near by.
But the cruelty practiced at the time of the mutiny far more
stirred the English heart, and as the uprising was more extensive,
several cities contain memorials. Of these the most beautiful is
at Cawnpore, and is called "The Angel of the Resurrection." It is
made of white marble and represents an angel with hands crossed and
each holding a palm. It stands upon an elevated mound in a beautiful
park, and is enclosed by a stone screen. It was the gift of Lord and
Lady Canning and bears the following inscription: "Sacred to the
perpetual memory of a great company of Christian people, chiefly
women and children, who near this spot were cruelly murdered by the
followers of the rebel Nana Dhundu Pant, of Bithur, and cast, the
dying with the dead, into the well below, on the 15th day of July,
1857."
There is also at Cawnpore, in another park, a stately memorial
church, the inner walls of which are lined with tablets containing
the names of British soldiers who lost their lives during the mutiny.
Lucknow is not far from Cawnpore, and here, too, the mutiny has left
its scars and monuments. The Lucknow residency, now an ivy mantled
ruin, was the scene of the great siege that lasted from the first of
July, 1857, to the seventeenth of November. At the beginning there
were within the walls nine hundred British troops and officers,
one hundred and fifty volunteers, seven hundred native troops, six
hundred women and children and seven hundred non-combatant natives;
total, about three thousand. When relief came but one thousand
remained. The night before the arrival of Sir Colin Campbell with
reinforcements, one of the besieged, a Scotch girl, dreamed of the
coming of relief, and her dream gave rise to the song so familiar a
generation ago, "The Campbells Are Coming."[5]
[5] I have heard that the song was of earlier origin.
[Illustration: ANGEL OF THE RESURRECTION.]
There are in Lucknow a number of tombs, mosques and buildings
that gave us our first glimpse of the architecture of the Mogul
emperors--great domes, gigantic gateways and graceful minarets,
stately columns and vaulted galleries. The most interesting of the
buildings, Imambarah, built by Asaf-ud-daulah, contains a great
hall more than a hundred and fifty feet long and about fifty feet
in breadth and height. On one side of the court is a private mosque
and on the other a group of apartments built around a well as a
protection against the summer's heat. From the top of the Imambarah
one obtains an excellent view of Lucknow and its surroundings.
At Aligarh I found a great educational institution which must be
taken into consideration in estimating the future of Mohammedanism
in India. It was founded in 1877, largely through the influence and
liberality of Sir Syed Ahmed, who until his death in 1898 devoted
himself entirely to its development. He was a large-minded man
and full of zeal for the enlightenment of his co-religionists. He
recognized the low intellectual standard of the Mohammedan Indians,
and the controlling purpose of his life was to assist in their
improvement. At first, his educational enterprise met with a cold
reception at the hands of the leaders of his church. Emissaries
were even sent from Mecca to assassinate him, but, nothing daunted,
he pursued his plans until the church authorities recognized the
importance of the school.
As the Mohammedans are numerically weaker than the Hindus and unable
to cope with them in intellectual contests, Sir Syed opposed the
national congress proposition which the Hindus have long urged and
the Aligarh school became conspicuous for its pro-British leanings
on this question. This may account in part for the interest taken in
it by the colonial government. (The Central Hindu College at Benares
refuses government aid and is, therefore, more independent.) But
since the death of Sir Syed the congress idea is growing among the
students of Aligarh.
[Illustration: THE HON. MY JUSTICE BADRUDDIN TYABJI--AN INDIAN
JUDGE--BOMBAY.]
Aligarh College now has an enrollment of seven hundred and four,
more than a hundred of whom are law students. It has an English
Cambridge graduate for president and several English professors.
I might add that England, like America, has sent many teachers to
India, and that they are engaged in work, the importance of which
can not be overestimated. I had the pleasure of meeting those
connected with St. John's College at Agra as well as those at
Aligarh.
[Illustration: RUINS OF THE RESIDENCY--LUCKNOW, INDIA]
[Illustration: PEARL MOSQUE AT DELHI]
Delhi is one of India's most ancient cities. When the Aryans came
down from the northwest and conquered the aboriginal tribes, they
founded a city which they called Indrapat, just south of the present
site of Delhi. How old it is no one knows, for the names of its
founders have been forgotten, its records, if it had any, have been
destroyed, and its streets are winding footpaths which one follows
with difficulty. Every wave of invasion that has swept down from the
north or west has passed over Indrapat, and its stones would tell a
thrilling story if they could but speak. The city has been rebuilt
again and again, the last time about three hundred years ago, but it
has little to exhibit now but its antiquity. There is a massive city
wall with huge gates, there are tumble-down buildings occupied by
a few people and some goats, and there is a stone library building
erected hundreds of years before Carnegie was born, but the glory of
Indrapat has departed. Not far from Indrapat is the splendid tomb of
Humayun and another of the Asoka pillars.
Eleven miles south of the present Delhi is what is called old
Delhi (Delhi seems to have had a movable site) immortalized by the
famous Kutab Minar, or tower, erected near the close of the twelfth
century by one of the earliest Mohammedan conquerors after the
capture of Delhi. The tower--a tower of victory--is two hundred
and thirty-eight feet in height, forty-seven feet in diameter at
the base and nine at the top. It has been described as one of the
architectural wonders of the world, and it certainly gives one a
profound respect for the mind that planned it. There are so many
mausoleums and mosques scattered over the plains around Delhi that
space forbids particular description.
[Illustration: GOKALE--PROMINENT INDIAN REFORMER.]
Within a century after the death of Mohammed the Moslems made an
attack upon India, but it was five hundred years later before they
became masters of the great peninsula. Then for five hundred more
it was the scene of conflict between rival Moslems until Timur
(Tamerlan, the Tartar) plundered it and drenched it with blood.
In all these wars Delhi was the strategic point, the natural
capital of the north. After Timur, came his descendant of the sixth
generation, Babar, who consolidated the Indian empire by bravery,
tact and wisdom. He is the first of the great Mogul rulers, but he
was so occupied with the extension of his sovereignty that he was
compelled to leave the development of the empire to his descendants.
His grandson, Akbar, built three great forts, one at Allahabad, to
which reference has been made in another article, another at Agra,
which he made his capital, and the third at Atok, still farther
north. He also built Fatepur Sikri about twenty miles from Agra.
This was to be his home, and here on a sandstone ridge overlooking
the plain he reared a group of buildings which even now, though
deserted for two centuries, attracts tourists from all over the
world. While the material employed is red sandstone, the buildings
are models of beauty as well as strength, and the minute and
elaborate carvings are masterpieces in their line.
[Illustration: A POOL AT LUCKNOW--INDIA]
[Illustration: MOHAMMEDANS AT PRAYER.]
The fort built by Akbar at Agra, while not proof against modern
missiles, was impregnable in its day and still bears testimony to
the constructive genius of the second of the Moguls.
Six miles from Agra at Sikandra stands the magnificent tomb which
Akbar built and where he rests. It is constructed of red sandstone
and is part Buddhist and part Saracenic in design. The base is three
hundred and twenty feet square and its four retreating galleries
terminate in a roofless court of white marble in which stands a
marble casket surrounded by screens of marble most exquisitely
carved. Special interest is felt in the tomb because one of its
ornaments was the famous Kohinoor diamond, the largest in the
world. It had come down to Akbar from his grandfather, who in turn
secured it from the Rajputs. The diamond was carried away by Persian
conquerors, and later was returned to India only to be transferred
to Queen Victoria.
But if Akbar surpassed his grandfather as a builder, he was in turn
surpassed by his grandson, Shah Jehan. This emperor, the last of the
three great Moguls, who began his career by murdering two brothers
and two cousins whose rivalry he feared, and who closed his career
a prisoner of his rebellious son, has linked his name with some of
the most beautiful structures ever conceived by the mind of man. At
Agra within the walls of his grandfather's fort, he built the Pearl
Mosque which has been described as "the purest, loveliest house
of prayer in existence." It is constructed of milk white marble
and combines strength, simplicity and grace. He also built the Gem
Mosque at Delhi.
[Illustration: KLANJIBAN GANGULI, SUPT. INSTRUCTION.]
The fort at Delhi was built by Shah Jehan, and if its resemblance
to the fort at Agra deprives him of credit for originality, that
argument can not be raised against the palace within, for this is
unrivaled among palaces. The marble baths, the jeweled bed chambers,
the pillared halls, the graceful porticoes--all these abound in rich
profusion. But it was upon the great hall of Private Audience that
he lavished taste and wealth. The floor is of polished marble,
the pillars and the arched ceiling of polished marble inlaid with
precious stones, so set as to form figures and flowers. Each square
inch of it speaks of patient toil and skill, and the whole blends
harmoniously. For this magnificent audience room he designed a
throne fit for the chamber in which it stood. "It was called the
peacock throne because it was guarded by two peacocks with expanded
tails ornamented with jewels that reproduced the natural colors of
the bird. The throne itself was made of gold, inlaid with diamonds,
rubies and emeralds. Over it was a canopy of gold festooned with
pearls supported by twelve pillars, all emblazoned with gems. On
either side stood the Oriental emblem of royalty, an umbrella, each
handle eight feet high and of solid gold, studded with diamonds,
the covers being of crimson velvet crusted and fringed with
magnificent pearls." Thus it was described. It was too tempting a
prize for greedy conquerors to leave undisturbed, and was carried
off some centuries ago by a Persian, Nadir Shah. Shah Jehan, after
contemplating this audience chamber and throne, had inscribed
upon the wall in Persian characters a verse which has been freely
translated to read:
"If on earth be an Eden of bliss,
It is this, it is this, it is this."
And yet, in view of his sad fate there seems as much irony in the
lines as there was in the delicately poised scales of justice which
he had inlaid on one of the walls of his palace after he had put his
relatives out of the way.
But of all the works of art that can be traced to his genius,
nothing compares with the tomb, the Taj Mahal, which he reared in
honor of the best-loved of his wives, Numtaj Mahal, "the chosen of
the palace." This building, unique among buildings and alone in its
class, has been described so often that I know not how to speak
of it without employing language already hackneyed. When I was a
student at college I heard a lecturer describe this wonderful tomb,
and it was one of the objective points in our visit to India. Since
I first heard of it I had read so much of it and had received such
glowing accounts from those who had seen it, that I feared lest
the expectations aroused might be disappointed. We reached Agra
toward midnight, and, as the moon was waning, drove at once to the
Taj that we might see it under the most favorable conditions, for
in the opinion of many it is most beautiful by moonlight. There is
something fascinating in the view which it thus presents, and we
feasted our eyes upon it. Shrouded in the mellow light, the veins of
the marble and the stains of more than two and a half centuries
are invisible, and it stands forth like an apparition. We visited
it again in the daytime, and yet again, and found that the sunlight
increased rather than diminished its grandeur. I am bringing an
alabaster miniature home with me, but I am conscious that the
Taj must be seen full size and silhouetted against the sky to be
appreciated.
[Illustration: TAJ MAHAL, AGRA.]
Imagine a garden with flowers and lawn, walks and marble water
basins and fountains; in this garden build a platform of white
marble eighteen feet high and three hundred feet square, with an
ornamented minaret one hundred and thirty-seven feet high at each
corner; in the center of this platform rear a building one hundred
and eighty feet square and a hundred feet high, with its corners
beveled off and, like the sides, recessed into bays; surmount it
with a large central dome and four smaller ones; cover it inside and
out with inlaid work of many colored marbles and carvings of amazing
delicacy; beneath the central dome place two marble cenotaphs,
inlaid with precious stones, the tombs of Shah Jehan and his wife,
and enclose them in exquisitely carved marble screens--imagine all
this, if you can, and then your conception of this world-famed
structure will fall far below the Taj Mahal itself. It is, indeed,
"a dream in marble." And yet, when one looks upon it and then
surveys the poverty and ignorance of the women who live within its
shadow, he is tempted to ask whether the builder of the Taj might
not have honored his wife more had the six million dollars invested
in this tomb been expended on the elevation of womanhood. The
contrast between this artistic pile and the miserable tenements of
the people about it robs the structure of half its charms.