The scene now before you represents a _Satī_, the burning of a Hindū
widow with the corpse of her husband. The event here represented took
place on the 7th November, 1828, near Raj ghāt, under the Mahratta
_bund_ (an embankment raised to prevent the encroachment of the Ganges).
The woman was the wife of a rich _buniyā_ (a corn-chandler), and she
determined to burn on his funeral-pile. The magistrate sent for her,
used every argument to dissuade her, and offered her money. Her only
answer was, dashing her head against the floor, and saying, “If you will
not let me burn with my husband, I will hang myself in your court of
justice.” If a widow touch either food or water from the time her
husband expires until she ascend the pile, she cannot, by Hindū law, be
burned with the body; therefore the magistrate kept the corpse
_forty-eight_ hours, in the hope that hunger would compel the woman to
eat. Guards were set over her; but she never touched any thing. A
procession of people accompanied the widow from her dwelling to the
river-side; she walked in the midst, dressed in a red garment, and the
corpse, placed on a charpaī, fixed on long bamboos, was carried on men’s
shoulders. About 5000 people were collected together on the banks of the
Ganges: the pile was built, and the putrid body placed upon it.
After having bathed in the river, the widow lighted a brand, walked
round the pile, set it on fire, and then mounted cheerfully: the flame
caught and blazed up instantly; she sat down, placing the head of the
corpse on her lap, and repeated several times the usual form, “_Ram,
Ram, sātī; Ram, Ram, sātī_;” _i.e._ “God, God, I am chaste.” As the wind
drove the fierce fire upon her, she shook her arms and limbs as if in
agony; at length she started up, and approached the side to escape. An
Hindū—one of the police who had been placed near the pile to see that
she had fair play, and should not be burned by force—raised his sword to
strike her, and the poor wretch shrank back into the flames. The
magistrate seized and committed him to prison. The woman again
approached the side of the blazing pile, sprang fairly out, and ran into
the Ganges, which was within a few yards. When the crowd and the
brothers of the dead man saw this, they called out, “Cut her down! knock
her on the head with a bamboo! tie her hands and feet, and throw her in
again!” They rushed down to execute their murderous intentions, when
some English gentlemen and the police drove them back. The woman drank
some water, and having extinguished the fire on her red garment, said
she would mount the pile again and be burned. The magistrate placed his
hand upon her shoulder (which rendered her impure), and said, “By your
own law, having once quitted the pile, you cannot ascend again; I forbid
it.” He sent her in a palanquin, under a guard, to the hospital. The
crowd made way, shrinking from her with signs of horror, but returned
peacefully to their homes; the Hindūs annoyed at her escape, the
Musalmāns, saying, “It was better that she should escape, but it was a
pity we should have lost the _tamāshā_ (amusement) of seeing her burnt
to death.” The woman said, “I have transmigrated six times, and have
been burned six times with six different husbands; if I do not burn the
seventh time, it will prove unlucky for me!” “What good will burning do
you?” asked a bystander: she replied, “The women of my husband’s family
have all been _satīs_: why should I bring disgrace upon them? I shall go
to heaven, and afterwards re-appear on earth, and be married to a very
rich man.”
The woman was about 25 years of age, and possessed some property: had
she performed _satī_, her relatives would have raised a little cenotaph,
or a mound of earth, by the side of the river; and every Hindū who
passed the place returning from bathing, would have made _salām_ to it—a
high honour to the family. The _shastrs_ say, “There is no greater
virtue than a chaste woman burning herself with her husband.” Mothers
collect the cowries, strewn by a satī as she walks round the pile, ere
she fires it, and hang them round the necks of their sick children, as a
cure for disease.
The woman became an outcast: her own and her husband’s family would lose
caste, if they were to speak to her; no Hindū will eat with her, enter
her house, or give her assistance; and when she appears, they will point
at her, and give her abuse. Many years after this event took place, the
woman regained caste by giving large feasts and donations to the
Brahmans.
In the Museum are five _kalsas_, or crowns of unglazed pottery, some of
which formerly decorated the _satī_ mounds in Alopee Bagh, near
Allahabad, and the rest were brought from Ghazipūr. There are also two
black stones, apparently very ancient, on which figures are carved,
brought from the _satī_ mound of the widow of a Brahman, at Barrah.
About two years after this event at Allahabad, the practice of _satī_
was abolished, by order of government.
The fine building here represented is a _dhrum-sala_, or place to
distribute alms, at Benī Māhadēo Ghāt; it is dedicated to a form of
Māhadēo, which stands in the _shiwālā_, or little temple above. Under
the arches in the lower part, by the side of the Ganges, is an enormous
figure of Ganesh; the worshippers pour oil and Ganges water over the
image, with rice and flowers, and hang chaplets of flowers around its
neck: the idol is generally dripping with oil. The red flag, at the end
of a long bamboo displayed from the _pīpul_ tree, denotes the residence
of a _Fakīr_. The temple is very picturesque, and the foliage adds to
the beauty of the scene.