Sampwallahs, or Serpent-Charmers.--Jâdoowallahs, or
Miracle-performers.--Nuzer-bundyânâ, Mesmerizers.--Yogees,
Spiritual Jugglers, and Naga-Poojmi, or Serpent-Worship, in India.
Life in the East is altogether so novel, so full of dramatic sights and
sounds, that one's curiosity seems to grow with the abundant nourishment
it finds everywhere. Now one sees a Mohammedan funeral, or the
procession of gorgeous Taboots of Moslems, or gods of the Hindoos; anon
the body of a Hindoo or a Parsee borne on an open bier by white-robed
priests, the one to be burned, the other to be abandoned to birds of
prey in their strange silent "towers of the dead." Sometimes a gay
procession of dancing-girls, followed by troops of men and elephants
richly caparisoned, waltzing all the way to the temple and keeping time
to the pipes, cymbals, and the beating of most discordant drums; at
others, a poor funeral of some low-caste person, quiet and
unpretending--an open bier, on it perhaps an only child in its every-day
soiled garments, followed by women wailing and beating their breasts and
throwing dust on their heads. This wailing is inexpressibly mournful.
One morning, as I sat at work in my room, there came floating upon the
breeze toward the "Aviary" a sharp, penetrating, and very peculiar cry.
While I listened there came another and another of these unearthly
sounds; again they were repeated, and all at once there appeared in
sight a band of half-naked men accompanied by two women and a perfectly
nude little child--all so strange and weird-looking that I almost felt
the victim of some illusion.
They were a band of sampwallahs, or serpent-charmers, and in rather a
bewildered state of mind I watched the gang approach the front of the
house and take their places around the doorsteps. Having deposited their
bags and baskets, they proceeded to salââm before me. I could not summon
resolution to send them away, as my curiosity was gradually getting
better of my fears, nor could I bring myself to witness their
performance in the absence of my husband. I therefore sent a message to
the one who seemed the headman of the band by my "ayah," or maid, to
inquire if they would not go away now and return in the afternoon about
four o'clock. "Return? Why, what is to prevent us from remaining just
where we are until the master comes home?" I could see no just reason
save my own fears to have them lounging around my lonely house, and in
spite of these concluded to let them stay.
Strange it was to see these, to me almost supernatural men and women,
enjoying themselves as naturally and innocently for three or four full
hours as did this company of wild serpent-charmers and jugglers. The two
women of the party searched for the most delicate and polished pebbles
to be found in the gravelled walks of the garden, and entertained
themselves by digging holes in the sand and rolling their pebbles with
great skill into these, hitting off one with another, and seeming to
think it capital sport. Some of the men took some caiah, or
cocoanut-fibre, out of their bags and proceeded to twist a rope out of
it. Some lighted long pipes and began to smoke quietly, stroking down
the cobra de capellos, who would poke their heads from under the baskets
by their sides. The boy of the party had a bit of rag spread for him
under an adjoining tree, and here he stretched himself at full length to
sleep, with a basket of snakes for his pillow. Every now and then the
upper lid of this basket seemed to open and a snake would thrust out his
head, as if to survey the sleeping boy, then as suddenly withdraw. All
the while the beautiful sea gleamed and sparkled and dashed against the
rocks in front of the "Aviary," and completed this strange picture.
[Illustration: NATIVE SNAKE CHARMERS.]
A little after four o'clock my husband arrived, and, seated on the steps
of the "Aviary," we witnessed some most astonishing performances. Before
beginning his music, and while the women were girding themselves for
action, the snake-charmer paid us some very startling and original
compliments. All at once, seizing his bagpipe-like instrument and
puffing out his polished black cheeks, he produced the same queer melody
that I had first heard, with its endless reverberations, creating a
strange effect upon one's nerves. The women kept time to these sounds by
motions the most gently waving that one could conceive of. When the
sounds were low and faint they waved their arms and bent downward in
graceful undulating curves; then again, as the sounds began to be shrill
and piercing, they raised their arms aloft, turned up their faces to the
sky, and, poised on tiptoe, beat a rhythmic movement to the sound. The
dance was in itself a wonder of grace and flexibility. But, strangest
sight of all, the serpents were equally moved. In raising their heads
they had thrown off the covers of the baskets, and presently every
snake, large and small--and there were no less than six--had begun to
take part in this dance, their eyes glistening, their forked tongues
extended, their hoods spread to the utmost; they raised themselves on
the abdomen and swayed their heads to and fro, following the movements
of the charmers and seemingly ravished with the strange sounds. There
was not a doubt in my mind, as I watched the serpents, that they
distinguished the varieties of sound, for with every rise and fall of
the music they kept time with their inflated hoods and slender forms.
Suddenly the serpent-charmer started to his feet and began a wild
circular movement, accompanied with wilder and more energetic sounds,
which were reverberated from every rock of the hill. After a few minutes
he stood still, and, taking for a moment the instrument from his mouth,
uttered a sudden "Ah!" short, sharp, and guttural, and all at once
resumed his former movements both of sound and action. We involuntarily
turned our eyes in the direction of those of the serpent-charmer, and
noticed a slight movement in the grass and brushwood that covered the
ground-floor of the "Aviary;" and as we looked the head and neck of a
cobra de capello of large size rose above the grass. The strange reptile
approached nearer and nearer. He passed with folded hood through the
open wirework of the "Aviary." Out of it, he once more unfolded his
hood, and, waving it to and fro, looked like one suddenly awakened to
some subtle and purely spiritual influence; he leaped rather than crept
toward the sound of the charmer; every curve, every change of motion,
and every movement of the body betrayed an exquisite apprehension of the
peculiar waves of the melody. The serpent, followed by another more
slender in proportions, leaped almost into the arms of the charmer, and,
swinging their bodies to and fro, both snakes seemed to give themselves
up to the enchantment of sound. Very slowly but deliberately the
serpent-charmer dropped one hand, and, stooping over the head of the
largest serpent, playing all the while, grappled it just under the head
by the thumb and forefinger and handed it to one of the men. This done,
he proceeded to enchant and capture the smaller snake, which was
accomplished in the same way. Then he dropped his instrument, took a
curious flint knife out of his bag, and, pressing tightly the windpipe
of each of the serpents in turn, cut out the bags containing the
poisonous fluid and dropped the deadly reptiles, now rendered for ever
harmless, into the bags. This was done in broad daylight, in the open
air, where no deception could have been practised.
Some persons have suggested that these two snakes might have been
brought by the band and let loose in the "Aviary." Even if this were so,
it could not destroy the mystery of the influence which certain sounds
evidently exercised over the serpents, who voluntarily returned to
captivity even before the poison-bag had been cut out, the removal of
which, according to all testimony, renders them harmless and agreeable
pets. As far as my observation went, I am inclined to believe that these
snakes were perfectly wild till caught by the serpent-charmer.
When I asked him by what power he compelled these snakes to abandon
their holes and come out to hear his music, his reply was
characteristic. "Asmani ka jore se, Maim Sahib," translated into
English, would mean, "By the secret power of the heavenly motions."
The other tricks of the band were very wonderful, but not as absorbing
as serpent-charming. They appeared to cause a seed to bud, grow,
blossom, and bear fruit in the open air in a short space of time and
with but few contrivances. They showed us a mango-seed, which they
planted before our eyes in a pot of prepared soil brought with them;
this they watered again and again with a peculiar liquid, also in their
possession. Each time that there was a positive growth in the tree the
round basket which covered it was removed, and our attention called to
the fact that it was growing. When the tree had outgrown the basket a
large cloth was thrown over it. Finally, it was presented to us full
grown, and, though dwarfed in stature, with ripe mangoes hanging from
its branches. They invited me to taste the fruit, which I did, and found
it decidedly inferior in flavor to the most ordinary mango produced in
the natural way. The curious part of this feat is this, that the tree
itself, supposing they carried it about with them, had that fresh and
vigorous look of active life and growth which it could not possibly
retain out of the earth in a hot climate for any length of time without
a very delicate and careful knowledge of how to preserve plant-life on
the part of these apparently savage jugglers. I have also seen them
produce flowers on plants in the same way.
A great many other feats and tricks were performed, such as throwing up
a top, and not only catching it on the end of a slender stick, but
balancing it on the point of the nose, and causing it, without any new
impetus to stop or to go on spinning at the request of the spectator.
Some of the tricks are called _nuzzerbund_, "blindfolding" or
mesmerizing the spectator. A ring is placed in your hand and you are
requested to hold the hand tightly between your folded knees, and when
you look again you find a little dust. One of these tricks, called
_khano-nuzzerbund_, "ears and eyes bound," is that of a small boy being
put into a basket and made to disappear and reappear. Our juggler
produced a small basket and beckoned to the boy to get into it, which he
did; two of the men then produced instruments that looked like
flageolets and began to play, moving round the head of the child. This
seemed to have a peculiar effect on the boy, who appeared like one in
paroxysms of pain. It was very distressing to witness his convulsions,
and even while we looked the child began to disappear in the basket.
The moment he was out of sight the musicians seized long knives and fell
upon the basket and pierced it with many thrusts, and it seemed certain
that the child was not in it, nor could we see him anywhere. Presently
they straightened out the basket and resumed their music, when, all at
once, from afar the clear answering voice of the child was heard; nearer
and nearer came the sound, until the basket swelled and distended, and,
lo! there was the boy peering from under the lid serene and smiling.
These jugglers call themselves Jâdoo-wallahs, and are of the same tribe
as the Yogees who follow the Mohammedan processions and cut themselves
with knives and sharpened flints in order to extract money from the more
tender-hearted of the crowds who always frequent such spectacles. The
name of Jâdoo-wallah is a corruption of the words Yahdèo-Wallah, "filled
with god-power." The common people believe that these powers are
bestowed upon them by the gods, and thus do everything and anything in
their power to propitiate the goodwill of the Jâdoo-wallahs. As acrobats
they far surpass the Europeans. One of the men who performed for us
received on his right shoulder, as lightly as if it had been a feather,
a heavy weight which was dropped from an over-hanging branch of a tree
above.
It was dusk before the jugglers and serpent-charmers finished their
astonishing feats and performances. We handed them five rupees, and they
were delighted with this liberality, though I had feared they would not
think it enough. They departed with the usual benediction, "Both burrus
Jeho Sahib loke. Tumarra bucha kè bucha Ingrage kè guddee per bait
jowoh" ("Long may you live, gentlefolk, and may your children's children
seat themselves on the British throne").
Not long after we had an opportunity of witnessing the grand
serpent-festival held in Bombay and other parts of Hindostan in the
months of July and August. It is called "the naga-poojmi," literally,
"serpent-worship." There are many tribes in India who have assumed the
name of Nagas or Serpents from the earliest times. Diodorus supposes
that the snake had been used as their crest or banner. There are three
kinds of serpent-worship practised in India, and each is peculiar to a
distinct class of people, although all the natives of India, except the
Mohammedans, either from dread of the deadly serpent or from a feeling
of veneration, join in the festival of the naga-poojmi.
The first of these is the worship paid to the serpent by the high-caste
Brahmans, who adopted the early serpent-worship from the non-Aryan
populations, placing the serpent, as a symbol of the masculine energy of
the world, in the hand and sometimes around the head of Brahma, the
chief god of their trinity; they adroitly represent that on the day
sacred to the serpent, Krishna, their last incarnation, slew the great
serpent Kali, who was just in the act of swallowing up the sun and moon.
The second is the worship made to the serpent-gods carved in their
temples by the non-Aryan and low-caste races of India, by whom the
serpent is regarded in the light of a benefactor and friend, and to whom
it was at one time customary to offer annually a human victim to
propitiate its deadly sting. And, last of all, is the worship paid to it
by the professional snake-charmer, to whom the art of taming the serpent
has been transmitted from father to son, and in whose eyes the serpent
is an oracle of wisdom, the harbinger of all good things, and last, but
not least, a means of livelihood to the tribe.
On the last day of the waning moon at the end of July we rode out,
accompanied by a party of friends, to the native part of the city,
where we were told the chief of the serpent-worshippers were assembled.
Here we found an immense throng of men and women gayly dressed, bands of
handsome dancing-girls in flowing veils and glittering jewels, and rows
of young maidens beautifully attired, with offerings of rice and milk,
and some with fruit and flowers tastefully arranged in baskets which
they carried on their heads; others with baskets filled with such
flowers as serpents are reported to delight in--the champu, the
marigold, the water-lily, the tuberose, and quantities of the
snake-plant commonly called _sampkèmah_, "the mother of the serpent." We
passed through the crowd and succeeded in reaching the centre of a great
_maidan_, or open plain, where we stood.
Not far off clustered a vast number of serpents, with their charmers and
worshippers. Immediately behind this curious assembly was a temple
dedicated to the snake-god. From within these walls the lights, kept
burning in great numbers, could be seen pale and ghastly amid the
daylight, and the sounds of the tomtom and gongs beat in honor of the
idol were heard; some noble old peepul trees surrounded the temple.
Right in front of the temple were placed great basins containing milk
and a preparation of rice and milk called _khir_, for the serpents.
Those, however, that fed out of the basins were mostly all tame; they
coiled in and out and round about the worshippers in a careless and easy
manner. But farther on, beyond the stone basins and amid flowers and
floods of sunshine, women dancing and men and boys singing, might be
seen the deadly cobra de capellos now and then inflating their hoods and
keeping time to the music.
The Brahman worship of the serpent is characteristic. Regarding the
snake purely as a symbol, each priest prepares a clay figure of a cobra
and winds it when in a plastic state round a tall pole, the upper part
of which is ornamented with a ring, which in its turn typifies the
feminine powers of nature.
On the day of the festival thousands of Brahmans, each with his pole
thus ornamented, accompanied by musicians and dancing-girls, the former
playing on their instruments and the latter keeping time to the music
and performing a mystic circular dance, surrounded by half-naked fakeers
and gossains, who keep shouting and leaping about, traverse the length
and breadth of the native town till they reach their temples. Entering
these, they plant their poles in front of the shrine of Siva, after
which they make over the clay serpent a wave-offering of fire, pouring
over it the oil pressed from the "telah," or sesamum-seed, sacred to the
serpent, and repeat the prayer, "Life has sway over all in earth and
heaven; protect us as a mother her children; grant us life, prosperity,
wisdom," etc.
On this day every Hindoo and Brahman woman places seven wicks in a dish
of silver or other metal, fills the dish with telah oil, and at
nightfall waves it around the portals and windows of her house. When her
husband returns he makes her a present, generally of a scarf, and she
then performs a curious and very mysterious rite: placing her hands on
her own hip-joints, and touching his with the tips of her fingers, she
prostrates herself before him and implores for him, from the god of the
day, renewed vigor, health, and strength.
The Nagas, or low-caste serpent-worshippers, assemble with the
snake-charmers in open plains, where all the tame snakes in the country
are brought together. After having fed these creatures, they offer up
prayers, each to his own deity, but mostly to the god Siva, for long
life and for protection from its deadly bite, making offerings of the
snake-plant, and to the priests of little lamps lighted with one or two
wicks for the altars.
The common people in the Hindoo villages also make clay images of the
cobra and pray to them. Most of the abandoned characters turn out on the
occasion of these festivals, and the night is spent in licentious
merriment, music, and song, while the snake-charmers, jugglers, and
Yogees obtain large sums of money and presents from the people, who
regard them in the light of divine benefactors to their race.
To understand the worship paid to serpents we must remember that the
earliest feeling which mankind had of a relation to invisible powers
must have been a compound of dread and gratitude, and in the mingling of
these emotions dread predominated. The dreaded serpent alone, says
Fergusson,[9] without arms or wings or any of the usual appliances of
locomotion, still moves with singular celerity and grace; its form is
full of elegance, its colors are often very beautiful, its eyes are
bright and piercing. A serpent can creep, spring, climb, swim, expand,
constrict, suspend itself by the tail, burrow in the ground, and even
raise its body almost erect. Its muscular irritability is remarkably
great and persistent, depending on its nervous energy. The heart
palpitates long after death; the jaws open and shut even when the head
is severed from the body; the outer skin is shed more than once, and the
ancients believed that by this means the snake renewed its youth. It
does not need food for long periods when casting its skin. It often
changes color at will, and, above all, its longevity is so great as
still to make the superstitious ascribe to it immortality. It makes no
nest (except in the case of the python, who hatches her eggs by the heat
of her own body); no food is stored for the young, who are born with
all powers in full perfection. Then the poison of a serpent is so deadly
and subtile that it excites in the heart of the savage the greatest
dread and mystery, and even more startling and terrible than the poison
of the cobra is the flash-like spring and fascination of the boa
constrictor, the instantaneous embrace, the crushed-out life,--all
accomplished faster than the human eye can follow. These are the powers
that must have impressed the primitive races of the East with dread and
terror, and wherever the serpent was found, there he seems to have been
propitiated by man with prayers, supplications, and all forms of
worship. It is perhaps strange that the serpent in the early period of
the worship was not so much dreaded as loved--whether from a feeling
that it was not as deadly as it has in its power to be, or for some
other reason, it is now impossible to determine. However, in the history
of this peculiar religion it is found that in course of time the serpent
began to be regarded as the harbinger of good gifts, the teacher of
wisdom, the symbol of subtlety, the oracle of the future, and even the
healer of all diseases.
All the gods, and even the kings and queens, of the old world are
usually represented with serpents coiling about their heads or arms. The
Hindoos most probably adopted this symbol of the serpent from the
aboriginal populations among whom they settled. "Sanee," the oldest
rock-sculpture of the Hindoo "Saturn," the presiding deity of the
seventh day of the week, has serpents for her belts or rings. She rides
on a raven, a bird of ill omen sacred to her, and no Hindoo will
undertake any new enterprise on the day over which she presides. As one
wanders through the forests of India one finds that many of the finest
trees served as altars to a generation long gone by. Their huge old
trunks have been hollowed out and carved in the form of oriel chapels
or windows, in the inmost recesses of which may be still traced the
faint remains of what was intended to represent the cobra de capello or
hooded serpent of India.
Sacred trees have from very early times shared a portion of the homage
paid to serpents. It would appear that while the serpent was made to
symbolize both the beneficent and dreaded powers of nature, the tree
represented man. The wondrous spectacle of a new creation every year,
the forest trees gathering their fresh leaves every spring, became to
the primitive man a steadfast promise of a similar resurrection, and
perhaps caused him to associate the tree with the serpent because of the
analogies that exist between them. The one shedding its leaves, the
other its skin, their mutual inactivity in winter, their awakening to
life in the spring, their longevity, the twig-like form of the serpent,
and a last, but not least, important fact is this, that wherever, in
India, the deadly serpent is found, there also abounds the mungoose,[10]
or snake-plant, with convex flower-clusters and long serpentine roots,
possessing the mysterious power to cure the deadly bite of a snake.
Thus, in the course of time, the serpent became an endless writing on
the wall, so full was it of mysterious significance and dread to the
ancient races of the world. In fact, serpents play an important part in
the mythology of every nation of the earth. Even to-day the
snake-charmers will tell you that the circles on the head of the cobra
de capello are spiritual eyes which enable it to distinguish between
good and bad men. If a good man is bitten to death, they account for it
by declaring that he must have committed some deadly sin in a former
state of existence, hence his punishment in this.
It will not be amiss to conclude this chapter with a mention of some of
the symbols for which the serpent stood in ancient times. It stands for
the higher and lower forms of the creative energy of nature; for the
emblem of evil; for wisdom and subtlety, as we all know, being
self-supporting from the moment of birth; for immortality, because of
its fabled longevity; for death, for new birth, and resurrection, from
its casting its skin and from its awakening in spring from the torpor of
winter. In the oldest hieroglyphics the serpent with its tail in its
mouth stood for cycles of time, for the horizon, for eternity, and for
life to come. Twined around the crown of ancient Oriental kings and
queens, it symbolized the fatal sting lurking beneath the power
entrusted to them; and bound round the royal sceptre, it typified
national life, vigor, and strength.
FOOTNOTES:
[9] See Fergusson's _Tree- and Serpent-Worship_.
[10] This plant is named after a large rat common in India and called
mungoose by the natives. It is said to have a deadly antipathy to snakes
of all kinds. It will hunt and destroy them wherever they are found. If,
however, the mungoose happens to be bitten by a snake, it is said that
it instinctively runs to this plant, gnaws at its roots, and thus cures
itself of the poison.