RESIDENCE IN CALCUTTA.
1824—Advantages and Disadvantages—Interest never
sleeps—Barrackpore—Cairipoor—The Fakir—The
Menagerie—Hyena—Change of residence to Chowringhee road—Mouse
and Spotted Deer—Bengallee Goats—Lotteries—Trial by Rice—The
Toolsee—Epidemic Fever—Burmese War—Major Sale—Haileybury—The
Hooqŭ—Dr. Kitchener—Death of Lord Byron—Early
Marriages—Pleasures of the Cold Season—Indian Hospitality—Knack
of Fortune-making lost.
_January_, 1824.—The advantages of a residence in Calcutta are these: you
are under the eye of the Government, not likely to be overlooked, and
are ready for any appointment falling vacant; you get the latest news
from England, and have the best medical attendance. On the other hand,
you have to pay high house-rent; the necessary expenses are great; and
the temptations to squander away money in gratifying your fancies more
numerous than in the Mofussil.
A friend, now high in the Civil Service, contracted, on his arrival
here about eighteen years ago, a debt of 15,000 rupees, about 1500_l._
or 1800_l._ Interest was then at twelve per cent. To give security, he
insured his life, which, with his agent’s commission of one per cent,
made the sum total of interest sixteen per cent. After paying the
original debt five times, he hoped his agents upon the last payment would
not suffer the interest to continue accumulating. He received for answer,
“that interest never slept, it was awake night and day;” and he is now
employed in saving enough to settle the balance.
I wish much that those who exclaim against our extravagances here, knew
how essential to a man’s comfort, to his quiet, and to his health it
is, to have every thing good about him—a good house, good furniture,
good carriages, good horses, good wine for his friends, good humour;
good servants and a good quantity of them, good credit, and a good
appointment: they would then be less virulent in their philippics against
oriental extravagance.
_15th._—The Governor-general has a country residence, with a fine park,
at Barrackpore; during the races the Calcutta world assemble there: we
went over for a week; it was delightful to be again in the country. Lady
Amherst rendered the Government-house gay with quadrilles and displays
of fireworks; but I most enjoyed a party we made to see the ruins of an
ancient fort, near Cairipoor, belonging to the Rajah of Burdwan, about
five miles from Barrackpore, and thought them beautiful.
The road was very bad, therefore I quitted the buggy and mounted an
elephant for the first time, feeling half-frightened but very much
pleased. I ascended by a ladder placed against the side of the kneeling
elephant; when he rose up, it was like a house making unto itself legs
and walking therewith.
We went straight across the country, over hedges and ditches, and through
the cultivated fields, the elephant with his great feet crushing down the
corn, which certainly did not “rise elastic from his airy tread.” The
fields are divided by ridges of earth like those in salterns at home;
these ridges are narrow, and in general, to prevent injury to the crops,
the mahout guides the elephant along the ridge: it is curious to observe
how firmly he treads on the narrow raised path.
By the side of the road was a remarkable object:—
“The appearance of a fakir is his petition in itself[18].” In a small
hole in the earth lay a fakir, or religious mendicant; the fragment of a
straw mat was over him, and a bit of cloth covered his loins. He was very
ill and quite helpless, the most worn emaciated being I ever beheld; he
had lain in that hole day and night for five years, and refused to live
in a village; his only comfort, a small fire of charcoal, was kindled
near his head during the night. Having been forcibly deprived of the
property he possessed in the upper provinces, he came to Calcutta to seek
redress, but being unsuccessful, he had, in despair, betaken himself
to that hole in the earth. An old woman was kindling the fire; it is a
marvel the jackals do not put an end to his misery. The natives say, “It
is his pleasure to be there, what can _we_ do?” and they pass on with
their usual indifference: the hole was just big enough for his body, in a
cold swampy soil.
There is a menagerie in the park at Barrackpore, in which are some
remarkably fine tigers and Cheetahs. My ayha requested to be allowed to
go with me, particularly wishing to see an hyena. While she was looking
at the beast, I said, “Why did you wish to see an hyena?” Laughing and
crying hysterically, she answered, “My husband and I were asleep, our
child was between us, an hyena stole the child, and ran off with it
to the jungle; we roused the villagers, who pursued the beast; when
they returned, they brought me half the mangled body of my infant
daughter,—that is why I wished to see an hyena.”
Before we quitted Calcutta, we placed the plate in a large iron treasure
chest. A friend, during his absence from home, having left his plate in
a large oaken chest, clamped with iron, found, on his return, that the
bearers had set fire to the chest to get at the plate, being unable to
open it, and had melted the greater part of the silver!
It appears as if the plan of communicating with India by steam-boats will
not end in smoke: a very large bonus has been voted to the first _regular
company_ who bring it about, and the sum is so considerable, that I have
no doubt some will be bold enough to attempt it.
In Calcutta, as in every place, it is difficult to suit yourself with a
residence. Our first house was very ill defended from the hot winds; the
situation of the second we thought low and swampy, and the cause of fever
in our household. My husband having quitted college, was gazetted to an
appointment in Calcutta, and we again changed our residence for one in
Chowringhee road.
Prince Jamh o Deen, hearing me express a wish to see what was considered
a good nāch, invited me to one. I could not, however, admire the dancing;
some of the airs the women sang were very pretty.
Calcutta was gay in those days, parties numerous at the Government-house,
and dinners and fancy balls amongst the inhabitants.
A friend sent me a mouse deer, which I keep in a cage in the verandah; it
is a curious and most delicate little animal, but not so pretty as the
young pet fawns running about the compound (grounds) with the spotted
deer. The cows’ milk generally sold in Calcutta is poor, that of goats is
principally used: a good Bengallee goat, when in full milk, will give a
quart every morning; they are small-sized, short-legged, and well-bred.
The servants milk the goats near the window of the morning room, and
bring the bowl full and foaming to the breakfast-table.
_Feb. 27th._—My husband put into one of the smaller lotteries in
Calcutta, and won thirteen and a half tickets, each worth 100 rupees: he
sent them to his agents, with the exception of one, which he presented
to me. My ticket came up a prize of 5000 rupees. The next day we bought
a fine high caste grey Arab, whom we called Orelio, and a pair of grey
Persian horses.
_Feb. 28th._—TRIAL BY RICE.—The other day some friends dined with us: my
husband left his watch on the drawing-room table when we went to dinner:
the watch was stolen, the theft was immediately discovered, and we sent
to the police. The moonshee assembled all who were present, took down
their names, and appointed that day seven days for a trial by rice,
unless, during the time, the watch should be restored, stolen property
being often replaced from the dread the natives entertain of the ordeal
by rice. On the appointed day the police moonshee returned, and the
servants, whom he had ordered to appear fasting, were summoned before
him, and by his desire were seated on the ground in a row.
The natives have great faith in the square akbarābādee rupee, which
they prefer to, and use on such occasions in lieu of, the circular
rupee. In the plate entitled “Superstitions of the Natives,” No. 5, is a
representation of this coin.
The moonshee, having soaked 2lbs. weight of rice in cold water, carefully
dried it in the sun: he then weighed rice equal to the weight of the
square rupee in a pair of scales, and, calling one of the servants to
him, made him take a solemn oath that he had not taken the watch, did not
know who had taken it, where it was, or any thing about it or the person
who stole it. When the oath had been taken, the moonshee put the weighed
rice into the man’s hand to hold during the time every servant in the
room was served in like manner. There were thirty-five present. When each
had taken the oath, and received the rice in his hand, they all sat down
on the ground, and a bit of plantain leaf was placed before each person.
The moonshee then said,—
“Some person or persons amongst you have taken a false oath; God is in
the midst of us; let every man put his portion of rice into his mouth,
and having chewed it, let him spit it out upon the plantain leaf before
him; he who is the thief, or knows aught concerning the theft, from his
mouth it shall come forth as dry as it was put in; from the mouths of
those who are innocent, it will come forth wet and well chewed.”
Every man chewed his rice, and spat it out like so much milk and water,
with the exception of three persons, from whose months it came forth as
_dry_ and as fine as powder. Of these men, one had secreted two-thirds of
the rice, hoping to chew the smaller quantity, but all to no purpose; it
came _perfectly dry_ from his mouth, from the effect of fear, although it
was ground to dust. The moonshee said, “Those are the guilty men, one of
them will probably inform against the others;” and he carried them off
to the police. It is a fact, that a person under great alarm will find
it utterly impossible to chew and put forth rice in a moistened state,
whilst one who fears not will find it as impossible to chew and to spit
it out perfectly dry and ground to dust. An harkāra, in the service
of one of our guests, was one of the men whom the moonshee pronounced
guilty; about a fortnight before, a silver saucepan had been stolen from
his master’s house, by one of his own servants. Against another, one
of our own men, we have gained some very suspicious intelligence, and
although we never expect the watch to be restored, we shall get rid of
the thieves. So much for the ordeal by rice, in which I have firm faith.
_May 4th._—The weather is tremendously hot. A gentleman came in
yesterday, and said, “this room is delightful, it is cold as a well;”
we have discovered, however, that it is infested below with rats and
musk-rats, three or four of which my little Scotch terrier kills daily;
the latter make him foam at the mouth with disgust. My little dog Crab,
you are the most delightful Scotch terrier that ever came to seek his
fortune in the East!
Some friends have sent to us for garden-seeds. But, oh! observe
how nature is degenerated in this country—they have sent alone for
vegetable-seeds—the feast of roses being here thought inferior to the
feast of marrowfat peas!
THE TOOLSEE.
An European in Calcutta sees very little of the religious ceremonies of
the Hindoos. Among the most remarkable is the worship of the toolsee,
in honour of a religious female, who requested Vishnoo to allow her to
become his wife. Lukshmee, the goddess of beauty, and wife of Vishnoo,
cursed the woman on account of the pious request she had preferred to
her lord, and changed her into a toolsee plant. Vishnoo, influenced by
his own feelings, and in consideration of the religious austerities long
practised by the enamoured devotee, made her a promise that he would
assume the form of the shalgramŭ, and always continue with her. The
Hindoos, therefore, keep one leaf of the toolsee under and another upon
the shalgramŭ.—See Fig. 5, in the plate entitled “The Thug’s Dice.”
“The sweet basil is known by its two leaves[19].” Throughout a certain
month they suspend a lota (earthen vessel) over the toolsee filled with
water, and let the water drop upon it through a small hole. The Hindoo,
in the sketch “Pooja of the Toolsee,” is engaged in this worship,
perhaps reading the Purana, in which a fable relates the metamorphosis
of the nymph Toolsee into the shrub which has since borne her name.
The whole plant has a purplish hue approaching to _black_, and thence,
perhaps, like the large _black bee_ of this country, it is held sacred to
Krishna, in whose person Vishnoo himself appeared on earth.
[Illustration: PŪJA OF THE TULSĪ.
فاني پارکس]
The Hindoos venerate three kinds of toolsee—the kala (_ocimum sanctum_),
purple-stalked basil; the small-leaved toolsee; and the suffaid toolsee,
white basil or Indian tea. The leaves of the latter are used by those in
India who cannot afford the tea of China; they are highly aromatic. The
Hindoos have faith in their power to cure diseases, and use them with
incantations to dispel the poison of serpents.
This plant is held in estimation by the Mussulmāns as well as the
Hindoos. It is recorded of the prophet that he said: “Hásan and Húsain
are the best young princes of paradise. Verily, Hásan and Húsain are my
two sweet basils in the world.”
At Benares I saw, on the side of the Ganges, a number of pillars hollowed
at the top, in which the Hindoos had deposited earth and had planted the
toolsee; some devotees were walking round these pillars, pouring water on
the sacred plant and making sālām. My bearers at Prag had a toolsee in
front of their house, under a peepul tree; I have seen them continually
make the altar of earth on which it was placed perfectly clean around
it with water and cow-dung; and of an evening they lighted a little
chirāgh (small lamp) before it. If one of these sacred plants die, it
is committed in due form to Gunga-jee: and when a person is brought to
die by the side of the sacred river, a branch of the toolsee, the shrub
goddess, is planted near the dying man’s head.
The shalgramŭ is black, hollow, and nearly round; it is found in the
Gunduk river, and is considered a representation of Vishnoo; each
should have twenty-one marks upon it, similar to those on his body. The
shalgramŭ is the only stone which is naturally divine; all the other
stones worshipped are rendered sacred by incantations.
A pan of water is suspended over this stone during the hottest month in
the year, exactly in the same manner as over the toolsee in the sketch;
and during the same month another pan is placed under the stone, in which
the water is caught, and drunk in the evening as sanctified.
Ward mentions that some persons, when ill, employ a Brahmin to present
single leaves of the toolsee sprinkled with red powder to the shalgramŭ,
repeating incantations. A hundred thousand leaves are sometimes
presented. It is said that the sick gradually recover as each additional
leaf is offered. When a Hindoo is at the point of death, a Brahmin shows
him the marks of the shalgramŭ, of which the sight is supposed to insure
the soul a safe passage to the heaven of Vishnoo. When an Hindoo takes
an oath, he places a sprig of toolsee on a brass lota, filled with the
sacred water of the Ganges, and swears by Gunga-jee[20]. If a small part
of the pebble god be broken, it is committed to the river. I bought
several of these stones from a Brahmin at the great Mela at Prag. I gave
two old Delhi gold mohurs to a native jeweller, to make into an ornament
for the forehead after a native pattern. My jemmadār took the mohurs,
and, rubbing them on a shalgramŭ, gave it to me to keep, in order to
compare the purity of the gold on its return when fashioned, with that of
the red gold I had given the man to melt. In making fine jewellery the
natives put one-fourth alloy; they cannot work gold so impure as that
used by English jewellers, and contemptuously compare it to copper.
In the plate entitled “The Thug’s Dice,” Fig. 6 represents the shalgramŭ,
shalgram, or salagrama; it is a small heavy black circular stone, rather
flattened on one side, with the _cornu Ammonis_ strongly marked upon it.
Fig. 5 is one covered by the leaves of the kala toolsee, purple-stalked
basil.
No. 7 is still heavier, perfectly black and smooth, without any marks.
This was the touchstone, and a little gold still remaining upon it.
“Gold is known by the touchstone, and a man by living with him[21].”
“Some salagrams are perforated in one or more places by worms, or, as
the Hindoos believe, by VISHNŬ in the shape of a reptile; some are
supposed to represent his gracious incarnation, but when they border a
little in colour on the violet they denote a vindictive _avatār_, such
as _Narasinga_, when no man of ordinary nerve dares keep them in his
house. The possessor of a salagrama preserves it in clean cloth; it is
frequently perfumed and bathed; and the water thereby acquiring virtue,
is drunk, and prized for its sin-expelling property.”
The shalgrams, which are in my possession, are of exactly the shape and
size represented in the sketch.
_July 17th._—On this day, having discovered a young friend ill in the
Writer’s Buildings, we brought him to our house. Two days afterwards I
was seized with the fever, from which I did not recover for thirteen
days. My husband nursed me with great care, until he fell ill himself,
and eleven of our servants were laid up with the same disorder.
The people in Calcutta have all had it; I suppose, out of the whole
population, European and native, not two hundred persons have escaped;
and what is singular, it has not occasioned one death amongst the adult.
I was so well and strong—over night we were talking of the best means
of escaping the epidemic—in the morning it came and remained thirty-six
hours, then quitted me; a strong eruption came out, like the measles, and
left me weak and thin. My husband’s fever left him in thirty-six hours,
but he was unable to quit the house for nine days: the rash was the same.
Some faces were covered with spots like those on a leopard’s skin. It was
so prevalent, that the Courts of Justice, the Custom House, the Lottery
Office, and almost every public department in Calcutta, were closed in
consequence of the sickness. In the course of three days, three different
physicians attended me, one after the other having fallen ill. It is
wonderful, that a fever producing so much pain in the head and limbs,
leaving the patient weak, reduced, and covered with a violent eruption,
should have been so harmless; after three weeks, nobody appeared to have
suffered, with the exception of two or three children, whom it attacked
more violently than it did grown-up people, and carried them off.
The politicians at home have anticipated us in reckoning upon the
probability of a Burmese war. We have hitherto been altogether
successful. I saw yesterday a gold and a silver sword, and a very
murderous looking weapon resembling a butcher’s knife, but on a larger
scale. A necklace (so called from its circling the neck, for it was
composed of plates of gold hammered on a silken string), and some little
squab images, gods, perhaps, taken from a chief, whom Major Sale of H.
M. 13th, dispatched in an attack upon a stockade, leaving the chief in
exchange part of the blade of his own sword, which was broken in his
skull by the force of the blow that felled him.
It is an unlucky business: the Company certainly do not require at
present more territory on that side India, and the expense to which
Government is put by this elegant little mill, as Pierce Egan might call
it, is more than the worthies in Leadenhall-street suppose.
I see Lord Hastings is made Civil Governor of Malta! “To what base uses
we may return!” I observe the motion to prevent the necessity of parents
sending their sons to Haileybury has been lost. The grand object of
the students should be the acquisition of the oriental languages; here
nothing else tells.
If a young man gets out of college in three or four months after his
arrival, which, if he crams at college in England, he may easily effect,
he is considered forthwith as a brilliant character, and is sealed with
the seal of genius. Likewise pockets medals and money, and this he may do
without knowing any thing else.
To a person fresh from England, the number of servants attending at table
is remarkable. We had only a small party of eight to dinner yesterday,
including ourselves; three-and-twenty servants were in attendance! Each
gentleman takes his own servant or servants, in number from one to six,
and each lady her attendant or attendants, as it pleases her fancy. The
Hooqŭ was very commonly smoked at that time in Calcutta: before dinner
was finished, every man’s pipe was behind his chair. The tobacco was
generally so well prepared, that the odour was not unpleasant, unless
by chance you sat next to a man from the Mofussil, when the fume of the
spices used by the up country Hooqŭ Bardārs in preparing the tobacco,
rendered it oppressive and disagreeable.
_Sept. 1st._—The fever has quitted Calcutta, and travelled up the country
stage by stage. It was amusing to see, upon your return to the Course,
the whole of the company stamped, like yourself, with the marks of the
leech upon the temples. Its origin has been attributed to many causes,
and it has been called by many names. The gentlemen of the lancet are
greatly divided in their opinions; some attribute it to the want of rain,
others to the scarcity of thunder and lightning this season. There was
an instance of the same general fever prevailing in the time of Warren
Hastings. Not a single instance has been heard of its having proved
mortal to adults.
_Extract from a homeward-bound epistle._
“The cold season is fast approaching, when every one becomes,
_per force_, most amiable. Indeed we are all creatures of a
different order during this delightful time. You in England
cannot fancy the sensible feeling of actual enjoyment our
bodies and minds experience from this exhilarating change. We
live upon the thought of it for months; it must beat the snake
casting his skin. I feel quite invigorated even at _describing_
its effects.
“We both continue excellently well, and persist in defying the
foul cholera and all other tropical maladies. The hot season
has passed, and the rains are setting in, rendering the air
more temperate. We now occasionally enjoy a cool fresh breeze.
A few days since I felt gay enough to fetch a walk in the
evening, and got well ducked for my reward; also an appetite
for dinner. _Apropos_, I rejoice to see that feeding is
assuming the high place among the sciences which was always its
legitimate right.
‘Oh Dick! you may talk of your writing and reading,
Your logic and Greek, but there’s nothing like feeding.’
Dr. Kitchener has borrowed the most erudite and savoury parts
of his two books from the ‘Almanach des Gourmands,’ a work well
worthy of being placed in the hands of the rising generation
as a standard book; I am sure it would be a perfect Kurān for
an English lady. But, alas! in this savage place, _dindon aux
truffes_, _omelette soufflée_, _vol au vent à la financière_,
_coquille de volaille_, _pâté de Strasbourg_, exist but in
name. The thousand temptations which fascinate the eye and
distract the choice in a French _carte à dîner_, rarely, very
rarely appear. The beef of to-day succeeds to the mutton of
yesterday; none of those ‘coruscations of genius, breaking like
lightning from a cloud,’ which must now so frequently illumine
the horizon of the London mahogany. But all is tame and
unvaried, and man remains here comparatively dead to one of the
noblest ends of his creation. I endeavour to struggle against
this lifeless life by anticipating the time when I shall return
to Europe, at the proper gourmand age of forty-five, with a
taste corrected by experience, and a mouth open as day to
melting delicacies.
“_Oct._—We have heard with sorrow of the death of Lord Byron;
the other evening, as we were driving past a Greek chapel on
the banks of the Hoogly, prayers were being offered for the
repose of the soul of the departed. We cannot join with the
yelpers who cry him down on the score of his immorality; the
seed he sowed must have fallen upon a soil villainously bad to
have brought forth nothing but an unprofitable harvest. Mr.
Hunt is publishing a translation of a work capable of producing
more evil than any of his lordship’s—Voltaire’s ‘Dictionnaire
Philosophique’ to wit. What is the correct story about the
Memoirs? Are we to believe the papers?
“The cold weather has now begun. We have weddings and rumours
of weddings. The precipitate manner in which young people woo
and wed is almost ridiculous; the whole affair, in many cases,
taking less than a month. Many young gentlemen become papas
before they have _lawfully_ passed their years of infancy.
Marrying and giving in marriage is, in this country, sharp,
short, and decisive; and where our habits are necessarily so
domestic, it is wonderful how happily the people live together
afterwards.
“_Dec._—The races are beginning, the theatre in high
force, fancy-dress balls and dinner-parties on the tapis,
water-parties to the botanical gardens, and I know not what. My
beautiful Arab carries me delightfully; dove-like, but full of
fire.
“We shake off dull sloth, rise early, and defy the foul fiend.
Many a nail is extracted, by this delightful weather, from our
coffins. Calcutta opens her palaces, and displays hospitality,
after a fashion which far outdoes that of you cold calculating
islanders. And there is such a variety in our pastimes, and the
season is so short,—about four months,—that we have no time to
‘fall asleep in the sameness of splendour.’
“We were glad to hear our friend would not come out to India.
It is a pity that men like him should be sacrificed—and
for what? To procure a bare subsistence; for the knack of
fortune-getting has been long since lost. Show me the man in
these latter days who has made one,—always provided he be no
auctioneer, agent, or other species of leech,—and we will sit
down and soberly endeavour to make one for ourselves.
“A merry Christmas to you, dear friends; may you find it as
great a restorer as we favourites of the sun and minions of the
tropics!”