Here beginneth another week of observations. To begin with, I purchased
E. H. A.'s "Tribes on my Frontier," feeling that a groundwork of study
in this writer's popular books was necessary before leaving Bombay's
coral strand and adventuring to the interior of this interesting
peninsula. My library increases, you observe. I purchased Holdich's
"India," and I now admit I own a red Baedeker-looking book published by
Murray. With these three I consider I have enough reading matter to make
me pretty "tired" in the next three or four months. At home I have only
read bits of "The Tribes on my Frontier," out here everyone has read it;
it is all about bugs and beasts and nature studies, the common beasts
you see here, that no one notices after a time. To-day I timidly
approached one of the ferocious looking animals he writes about. It was
spread out on a window pane in the back premises of the Yacht Club. No
one was looking or I would not have dared to exhibit an interest in such
a common object. It was like this, a dream-like beast, with a golden eye
and still as could be, except that its throat moved (the window and
lizard, are reduced to about one-fifth of life size), and its eye
meditated evil. I ventured to put the end of my stick near it, and it
went off with such alarming speed that I hastily withdrew my stick. It
had vanished into a crack, I'd never have dreamed a small crevice in a
window sash could hold such an extraordinary creature! I must look him
up in "E. H. A."
[Illustration]
Colonel Sir Thomas Holdich's "India," in my humble opinion, is an
absolutely perfect book of reference, of concentrated information on
populations, their origin and characteristics; geology, meterology,
distribution plants with excellent maps printed by Bartholomew; it might
be called scientific, but for the charm of the touches of colour the
whole way through.
The Murrays' book is very useful, but so dry that you hardly care to
open it except in emergency. It has many references to the times of the
Conquest of India and the Mutiny, and the editor, an Englishman or
Anglicised Scot, frequently gives the names of individuals, soldiers and
private people, who distinguished themselves in these times. For
example, at the Siege of Seringapatam, where he mentions such well-known
names as Baillie, Baird, Campbell, and M'Donald, two-thirds the names of
my countrymen, and he calls them "English!" which makes me think of Neil
Munro's skipper of "The Vital Spark" and his remark about his Mate, "He
wass a perfect shentleman, he would neffer hurt your feelings unless he
was trying." Writers in the days of the Mutiny wrote of the feats of the
"British troops," their gallantry, and all the rest of it; look up _The
Illustrated London News_ of that time, and you will see this is true.
Why--confound them all--do they talk of "English" to-day, when they
refer to Scots, Irish, and Englishmen, and the people of our Colonies;
is it merely casual, or a deliberate breaking of the terms of Union of
1707? Eitherway the effect tends to dis-union, it is ante-Imperial and
for Home Rule for "A Little England." Ahem--may that pass as a
"digression?"--Now for more nature studies. I saw in the Crawford market
this afternoon fresh fish, and dried and unfresh, and the vendors
thereof. There were many kinds of so-called fresh fish, but the most
were dried, to mere skin and bone, sharks and sprats, piled in baskets
or hanging in bundles. Diminutive wrinkled women sat on little bits of
wet mat in rows, and chopped the "fresh" fish into little morsels with
little choppers by the light of little cruisie oil lamps, that flickered
and smoked beside them, and lit up their puckered little chocolate
faces, glinted on their teeth and gums scarlet with betel, and threw
warm lights on the customers faces, who leant forward to close range and
haggled, and, I daresay, said the fish wasn't fresh--and if they had
asked me, I'd have entirely agreed with them. Respectable looking Parsi
men in tight broad cloth coats and shiny black pointed pot hats did this
marketing--not their wives--peered through their spectacles very
carefully, down their long noses at each little chunk. I hoped they
could smell no better than they could see; and the grotesque little
women slipped the minute coppers they secured under the damp mat on the
wet stones between their feet. That was all very poor and small and
sordid, but the grain sellers were pleasant to look at. They sat in nice
clean booths, with around them an endless variety of neat sacks and
bowls displaying all kinds of rice and corn and lentils and baskets of
bright chillies and many other dried fruits for curries.
To chronicle some more small beer, I may put down here that we dined
last night at the Yacht Club. The Yacht Club has little to do with
yachting. There are models of one or two native-built boats in the
passages and rooms; these have deep stems and shallow sterns, evidently
meant to wear, rather than to go about. We did not hear of any yachting
going on, why I do not quite know, as I'd have thought The Bay a perfect
place for racing, and with its inlets a rather pleasant cruising ground,
but perhaps the sun makes sailing uncomfortable. There are both lady and
men members. You can live, dress, bath, and entertain your friends, or
be entertained by them, hear music, read papers, write, talk, and walk
about in pretty grounds, all pleasantly, decently, and in order, for it
is all very open and above board. I do wish we could have such clubs at
home, I mean in Edinburgh, instead of our huge dismal men's clubs where
never a lady enters, and food, drink, and politics are the only
recognised interests.
Here you have talk on everything, and music (of a kind), and see pretty
dresses and faces, and when you wish to be lonely, you may be so from
choice, not from necessity. To a good club, two rooms I think are
essential, a gymnasium and a music room; and where out of France can you
find them! The talk, I must say, is principally about one's neighbour,
which is quite right; it is a most enviable trait, that of being
interested in your neighbour and his affairs. Here, too, when you are
tired of people, you can study beasts, they cannot bore you. I think E.
H. A. is of this opinion. I have been reading more of his researches
into animal life, and find that he says he has fathomed the intellect of
a toad; but verily, I cannot believe that! Several of E. H. A.'s
acquaintances have come round me as I scribble here in the verandah. A
brute, a grey crow perched this moment on the jalousies, and let out
that bitter raucous caw, that would waken the Seven Sleepers or any
respectable gamekeeper within a mile; abominable, thieving, cruel brutes
they are, with rooks they should be exterminated by law. Once they were,
in the reign of James the Fourth, I think, for he needed timber for his
fleet. The law was then that if a crow built for three successive years
in a tree, the tree became the property of the Crown. This has not been
rescinded, so _Field_ please note and agitate in your country and save
your beloved partridges and the eggs of our grouse. Now two green
parroquets have gone shrieking joyfully past. I suppose I must believe
they are wild, but it takes faith to believe they have not just escaped
from a cage; they are uncommonly pretty colour, at any rate, against the
blue and white sky; they have taken the same flight at the same time
these last three days, and a dove is cooing near, a deliciously
soothing sound. Persians say it cannot remember the last part of its
lost lover's name, so that is why it always stops in the middle of the
co-coo, co--
As it grew to twilight I went over to the Bundar and studied reflections
in the calm, lapping water at the steps where so many dignitaries have
arrived and departed, and made notes of the colours of the dark stone
work and pier lamps against the evening glow and the reflections of
boats' lights waggling in the smooth water.
... A launch bustles in from the _Renown_ and brings up quickly--a white
light between her two brass funnels and green and red side lights. The
red light glows on the bare arm of the jack tar at the bow with the
boat-hook, and just touches the white draperies of the native passenger
as he gets out awkwardly and goes up the steps--a person of importance
with attendants, I see, as they come up into the full acetylene light on
the quay head, someone very princely to judge by his turban and
waist--but a native's waist measurement sometimes only indicates his
financial position.
There is considerable variety of type and nationality amongst the few
people who sit taking the air on the stone parapet of the Bundar. On my
right are two soldiers--one an _Argyll and Sutherland_, with red and
white diced hose and tasselled sporran, a native of Fife to judge by his
accent; next him there is a _Yorkshire Light Infantry_ man. They chat in
subdued voices, people all do here, I suppose it's something in the sea
warm air--have you ever noticed how softly they talk in the Scilly Isles
at night? It is the same cause I expect--the soft warm atmosphere. They
smoke Occidental (American) cigarettes after the manner of all the wise
men of the East of to-day. A yard or so along is a bearded turbaned
native; he is from up North I think. He sits on the parapet with knees
under his chin, and a fierceness of expression that is quite refreshing
after the monotonous negatively gentle expression of the Bombay
natives; then beyond him are two Eurasian girls in straw hats and white
frocks, and they do look so proper. Further over the Parsi men in almost
European kit with their women folk sit in lines of victorias and
broughams, and they are silhouetted against the glow of lamps on the
lawn of the Yacht Club, under which the white women from the far
North-West listen to music and have tea and iced drinks through straws.
And the local Parsis _seem_ quite content eating the air in the
dusk--one or two of their menkind pay visits on foot from carriage to
carriage--they have at least a share in the pom pom of the brass
band--and welcome.
By the way, my piper friends who may read this, you will be amused to
hear some natives of Sassun objected to having the pipes on the lawn in
the afternoon at the Yacht Club--said they "couldn't hear any music in
them"--so Queen Victoria's favourite, "The Green Hills of Tyroll" was
turned on, in parts, and they were quite happy!
Now dinner, for there goes the Hotel brass band down below--_a cada
necio agrada su porrada_--to me the pipes, the brass band to the
Southerner, but for us all dinner--"both meat and music," as the fox
said when it ate the bagpipes.[7]
[7] To each fool agreeable is his folly; and, the bag of the pipes is
made of sheep-skin you see.
[Illustration]
We have home letters to-night; "The Mail" they speak of over the Indian
Peninsula has arrived. G.'s maid has a letter from St Abbs from her
mother, who is anxious about her, for she says, "There's an awfu' heavy
sea running at the Head." Even at this distance of time and sea miles,
we find home news takes a new importance, and are already grateful for
home letters with details of what is going on there from day to day;
trifles there, are interesting to read about here, there's the
enchantment of distance about them, and they become important by their
isolation.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Nov. 22nd.--We conclude, that considering packing, calling on Cook, and
a complete absence of any Royal function or Tomasha of any sort, that we
have put in a most excellent day, in fact the best day we have had since
we landed--and it was spent at sea!--at least the best of it was. I
visited the Sailors' Home in the morning, which is a palace here where a
sailor man who has the money, and doesn't mind the loneliness and ennui,
can live like a prince for a rupee a day, and as comfortably or more so
than we can in the Taj for heaps of rupees. Perhaps it was the
suggestion of being at anchor in that refuge that made G. and me go off
to sea this afternoon, and we are glad we did so. We looked at a steam
launch opposite the Hotel which was full of white passengers seated
shoulder to shoulder round the stern like soldiers; they were bound for
Elephanta and the caves there, and we decided to go too; but they seemed
so awfully hot even in shadow of an awning, and so packed and formal
that we elected to take time and sail, in a boat of our own, with our
own particular piratical crew, and lateen sails, and white awning. We
were warned we might have to stay out till late at night! As it is said
to be seven miles, I thought with a crew of four men, Krishna, and
myself, we might by an effort even row home in time for dinner though it
did fall calm!
So we chartered the craft for seven rupees there and back--which was two
rupees above proper rate--left our packing undone, and sailed for
Elephanta. It was altogether delightful being on the water again the
first time for many months--of course being on board a P. & O. steamer
doesn't count, as that hardly conveys even the feeling of being afloat.
The breeze was light and southerly, so at first we rowed, and the cheery
dark faces of the crew beamed and sweated. These coast men are nicer to
look at than the natives on shore. They did buck in with their funny
bamboo oars, long things like bakers' bread shovels, with square or
round blades tied with string to the end of a bamboo, which worked in a
hemp grummet on a single wooden thole pin.
What a study they make! Bow, Two and Three, have skull-caps of lemon
yellow and dull gold thread, and blue dungaree jackets faded and
threadbare. They are young lusty fellows, and Stroke, who is a
tough-looking, middle-aged man, with a wiry beard, has a skull-cap
between rose and brown, and round it a salmon-coloured wisp of a
turban--over them there is the arch of the frogged foot of the lateen
sail. All but Bow are in full sunlight, sweating at their oars, he is in
the shadow the sail casts on our bow. We recline, to quote our
upholsterer, in "cairless elegance" on the floor of the stern, on Turkey
red cushions under the shadow of the awning, and I feel sorry we have
spent so much time on shore.
We pass under the high stern of a lumbering native craft; its grey
sun-bitten woodwork is loosely put together: on a collection of dried
palm leaves and coir ropes on the stern, sit the naked, brown crew
feeding off a bunch of green bananas. One has a pink skull-cap, and at a
porthole below the counter the red glass of a side-light catches the sun
and glows a fine ruby red; a pleasant contrast to the grey, sun-dried
woodwork. Just as we clear our eyes off her, from seaward behind us
comes an Arab dhow, a ship from the past, surging along finely! An
out-and-out pirate, you can tell at a glance, even though she does fly a
square red flag astern with a white edge. Her bows are viking or
saucer-shaped, prettier than the usual fiddle-bow we see here, and her
high bulwarks on her long sloping quarter deck you feel must conceal
brass guns. From beyond her the afternoon sun sends the shadows of her
mast and stays in fine curves down the bend of her sail, the jib-boom is
inboard and the jib flat against the lee of the main sail. She brings
up the breeze with her, and our bamboo oars are pulled in and we go
slipping across the water in silence, only the bows talking to the small
waves. Now, how sorry we feel for those other globe trotters on the
launch, birring along behind a hot, bubbling, puffing, steam kettle--and
so crowded, and in this heat too, whilst we extend at our ease in a
white and sky-blue boat, with pink cushions, and dreamily listen to the
silky frou frou of the southern sea. The crew rest; and one brings out
the hubble-bubble from the peak, with a burning coal on the bowl; it is
passed round and each of them takes three or four long inhalations
through his hands over the mouth-piece, to avoid touching it with his
lips, and the smell of the tobacco is not unpleasant, diluted as it is
with the tropical sea air. Now it is brought aft to the oldest of our
crew, the master I suppose, a grizzled old fellow, who sits on his heels
on a scrap of plank out at our stern and steers. He takes four deep
inhalations and the mutual pipe is put away forward again. Our elderly
"Boy" is a Madrassee, tidy and clerk-like, and a contrast to the
pirates; and he does not understand them very well, but he pats the pipe
condescendingly as it is passed forward, and puts questions about it
with a condescending little smile.
[Illustration]
Elephanta comes closer and we see the undergrowth on the hills, and it
does not seem very unfamiliar; it is considerate the way in which Nature
leads you from one scene to another without any change sudden enough to
shock you; in the most out-of-the-way corners of the world I believe,
you may find features that remind you of places you have known. Here the
few palms on the sky-line of the low hills, almost accidental
features you might say, are all there is to distinguish the general
aspect from some loch side at home. Our Stroke points ashore and grins,
and says, "Elephanta," and we say, "Are you sure, is it not an island on
Loch Katrine?" and he grins again and bobs and says, "Yes, yes
Elephanta!"
[Illustration: Sailing from Elephanta.]
I thought I'd written a remarkably expressive description of the
carvings in the caves; if I did I can't find it, so the reader is
spared. But I must say, before jogging on, that they are well worth
taking far greater trouble to see than the little trouble that is
required. I had heard them often spoken of lightly, but in my opinion
they are great works of a debased art. The sculptured groups would be
received any day _hors concours_ in the Salons for their technique only.
There are figures in grand repose, as solemn and dignified as the best
in early Egyptian sculpture, others show astonishing vigour, and
fantastic freedom of movement and of light and shade. They are cut in
the rock _in situ_, hard, blackish serpentine, which is a soft grey
colour on the exposed surfaces. In some parts the carving is as modern
in style and free in movement and composition as some _tourtmente_
modern French sculpture. But here, as in Europe and Egypt, marvellous
talent has been used in the name of religion to express imaginings of
the supernatural and inhuman, instead of being humbly devoted to the
study of the beauty presented in nature.
Going home we sailed into the sunset, and it certainly was pretty late
when we got back to dinner; in fact half of our little voyage was in the
dark, in heavy dew and with red and green lights passing across our
course rather swiftly; we had one white light, and the glow in the men's
big pipe. We were pleased with our crew and they were pleased with us
for an extra rupee, and altogether we felt very superior having gone in
so much better style than other poor people, so down on the bedrock for
time that they cannot spare a half-hour here and there.