WITH THE CALCUTTA POLICE.
“The City was of Night--perchance of Death,
But certainly of Night.”
--_The City of Dreadful Night._
In the beginning, the Police were responsible. They said in a
patronizing way that, merely as a matter of convenience, they would
prefer to take a wanderer round the great city themselves, sooner than
let him contract a broken head on his own account in the slums. They
said that there were places and places where a white man, unsupported by
the arm of the law, would be robbed and mobbed; and that there were
other places where drunken seamen would make it very unpleasant for him.
There was a night fixed for the patrol, but apologies were offered
beforehand for the comparative insignificance of the tour.
“Come up to the fire lookout in the first place, and then you’ll be able
to see the city.” This was at No. 22, Lal Bazar, which is the
headquarters of the Calcutta Police, the centre of the great web of
telephone wires where Justice sits all day and all night looking after
one million people and a floating population of one hundred thousand.
But her work shall be dealt with later on. The fire lookout is a little
sentry-box on the top of the three-storied police offices. Here a native
watchman waits always, ready to give warning to the brigade below if the
smoke rises by day or the flames by night in any ward of the city. From
this eyrie, in the warm night, one hears the heart of Calcutta beating.
Northward, the city stretches away three long miles, with three more
miles of suburbs beyond, to Dum-Dum and Barrackpore. The lamplit dusk on
this side is full of noises and shouts and smells. Close to the Police
Office, jovial mariners at the sailors’ coffee-shop are roaring hymns.
Southerly, the city’s confused lights give place to the orderly
lamp-rows of the _maidan_ and Chouringhi, where the respectabilities
live and the Police have very little to do. From the east goes up to the
sky the clamor of Sealdah, the rumble of the trams, and the voices of
all Bow Bazar chaffering and making merry. Westward are the business
quarters, hushed now, the lamps of the shipping on the river, and the
twinkling lights on the Howrah side. It is a wonderful sight--this
Pisgah view of a huge city resting after the labors of the day. “Does
the noise of traffic go on all through the hot weather?” “Of course. The
hot months are the busiest in the year and money’s tightest. You should
see the brokers cutting about at that season. Calcutta _can’t_ stop, my
dear sir.” “What happens then?” “Nothing happens; the death-rate goes up
a little. That’s all!” Even in February, the weather would, up-country,
be called muggy and stifling, but Calcutta is convinced that it is her
cold season. The noises of the city grow perceptibly; it is the night
side of Calcutta waking up and going abroad. Jack in the sailors’
coffee-shop is singing joyously: “Shall we gather at the River-the
beautiful, the beautiful, the River?” What an incongruity there is about
his selections! However, that it amuses before it shocks the listeners,
is not to be doubted. An Englishman, far from his native land, is liable
to become careless, and it would be remarkable if he did otherwise in
ill-smelling Calcutta. There is a clatter of hoofs in the courtyard
below. Some of the Mounted Police have come in from somewhere or other
out of the great darkness. A clog-dance of iron hoofs follows, and an
Englishman’s voice is heard soothing an agitated horse who seems to be
standing on his hind legs. Some of the Mounted Police are going out into
the great darkness. “What’s on?” “Walk-round at Government House. The
Reserve men are being formed up below. They’re calling the roll.” The
Reserve men are all English, and big English at that. They form up and
tramp out of the courtyard to line Government Place, and see that Mrs.
Lollipop’s brougham does not get smashed up by Sirdar Chuckerbutty
Bahadur’s lumbering C-spring barouche with the two raw walers. Very
military men are the Calcutta European Police in their set-up, and he
who knows their composition knows some startling stories of
gentlemen-rankers and the like. They are, despite the wearing climate
they work in and the wearing work they do, as fine five-score of
Englishmen as you shall find east of Suez.
Listen for a moment from the fire lookout to the voices of the night,
and you will see why they must be so. Two thousand sailors of fifty
nationalities are adrift in Calcutta every Sunday, and of these perhaps
two hundred are distinctly the worse for liquor. There is a mild row
going on, even now, somewhere at the back of Bow Bazar, which at
nightfall fills with sailormen who have a wonderful gift of falling
foul of the native population. To keep the Queen’s peace is of course
only a small portion of Police duty, but it is trying. The burly
president of the lock-up for European drunks-Calcutta central lock-up is
worth seeing-rejoices in a sprained thumb just now, and has to do his
work left-handed in consequence. But his left hand is a marvellously
persuasive one, and when on duty his sleeves are turned up to the
shoulder that the jovial mariner may see that there is no deception. The
president’s labors are handicapped in that the road of sin to the
lock-up runs through a grimy little garden-the brick paths are worn deep
with the tread of many drunken feet-where a man can give a great deal of
trouble by sticking his toes into the ground and getting mixed up with
the shrubs. “A straight run in” would be much more convenient both for
the president and the drunk. Generally speaking--and here Police
experience is pretty much the same all over the civilized world-a woman
drunk is a good deal worse than a man drunk. She scratches and bites
like a Chinaman and swears like several fiends. Strange people may be
unearthed in the lock-ups. Here is a perfectly true story, not three
weeks old. A visitor, an unofficial one, wandered into the native side
of the spacious accommodation provided for those who have gone or done
wrong. A wild-eyed Babu rose from the fixed charpoy and said in the best
of English: “Good-morning, sir.” “_Good_-morning; who are you, and what
are you in for?” Then the Babu, in one breath: “I would have you know
that I do not go to prison as a criminal but as a reformer. You’ve read
the _Vicar of Wakefield_?” “Ye-es.” “Well, _I_ am the Vicar of Bengal-at
least, that’s what I call myself.” The visitor collapsed. He had not
nerve enough to continue the conversation. Then said the voice of the
authority: “He’s down in connection with a cheating case at Serampore.
May be shamming. But he’ll be looked to in time.”
The best place to hear about the Police is the fire lookout. From that
eyrie one can see how difficult must be the work of control over the
great, growling beast of a city. By all means let us abuse the Police,
but let us see what the poor wretches have to do with their three
thousand natives and one hundred Englishmen. From Howrah and Bally and
the other suburbs at least a hundred thousand people come in to Calcutta
for the day and leave at night. Also Chandernagore is handy for the
fugitive law-breaker, who can enter in the evening and get away before
the noon of the next day, having marked his house and broken into it.
“But how can the prevalent offence be housebreaking in a place like
this?” “Easily enough. When you’ve seen a little of the city you’ll see.
Natives sleep and lie about all over the place, and whole quarters are
just so many rabbit-warrens. Wait till you see the Machua Bazar. Well,
besides the petty theft and burglary, we have heavy cases of forgery and
fraud, that leave us with our wits pitted against a Bengali’s. When a
Bengali criminal is working a fraud of the sort he loves, he is _about_
the cleverest soul you could wish for. He gives us cases a year long to
unravel. Then there are the murders in the low houses--very curious
things they are. You’ll see the house where Sheikh Babu was murdered
presently, and you’ll understand. The Burra Bazar and Jora Bagan
sections are the two worst ones for heavy cases; but Colootollah is the
most aggravating. There’s Colootollah over yonder--that patch of
darkness beyond the lights. That section is full of tuppenny-ha’penny
petty cases, that keep the men up all night and make ’em swear. You’ll
see Colootollah, and then perhaps you’ll understand. Bamun Bustee is the
quietest of all, and Lal Bazar and Bow Bazar, as you can see for
yourself, are the rowdiest. You’ve no notion what the natives come to
the _thannahs_ for. A _naukar_ will come in and want a summons against
his master for refusing him half-an-hour’s _chuti_. I suppose it _does_
seem rather revolutionary to an up-country man, but they try to do it
here. Now wait a minute, before we go down into the city and see the
Fire Brigade turned out. Business is slack with them just now, but you
time ’em and see.” An order is given, and a bell strikes softly thrice.
There is an orderly rush of men, the click of a bolt, a red fire-engine,
spitting and swearing with the sparks flying from the furnace, is
dragged out of its shelter. A huge brake, which holds supplementary
hoses, men, and hatchets, follows, and a hose-cart is the third on the
list. The men push the heavy things about as though they were pith toys.
Five horses appear. Two are shot into the fire-engine, two--monsters
these--into the brake, and the fifth, a powerful beast, warranted to
trot fourteen miles an hour, backs into the hose-cart shafts. The men
clamber up, some one says softly, “All ready there,” and with an angry
whistle the fire-engine, followed by the other two, flies out into Lal
Bazar, the sparks trailing behind. Time--1 min. 40 secs. “They’ll find
out it’s a false alarm, and come back again in five minutes.” “Why?”
“Because there will be no constables on the road to give ’em the
direction of the fire, and because the driver wasn’t told the ward of
the outbreak when he went out!” “Do you mean to say that you can from
this absurd pigeon-loft locate the wards in the night-time?” “Of course:
what would be the good of a lookout if the man couldn’t tell where the
fire was?” “But it’s all pitchy black, and the lights are so confusing.”
“Ha! Ha! You’ll be more confused in ten minutes. You’ll have lost your
way as you never lost it before. You’re going to go round Bow Bazar
section.”
“And the Lord have mercy on my soul!” Calcutta, the darker portion of
it, does not look an inviting place to dive into at night.