KURUNÉGALA.
On my way here, on the coach, I fell in with Monerasingha, a Cinghalese
of some education and ability, a proctor or solicitor. He is a cheerful
little man, an immense talker, and very keen on politics. He was very
amusing about the English; says they are very agreeable at first, “but
after three months’ stay in the island a complete change comes over
them--won’t speak to us or look at us--_but I can give it them back_.”
His idea seems to be that representative institutions are wanted to
restore to the people that interest in public life which has been
taken from them by the destruction of their communal institutions
under British rule. He seems to be a great hater of caste, and thinks
the English have done much good in that matter. “I am loyal enough,
because I know we are much better off than we should be under Russia.
The English are stupid and incapable of understanding us, and don’t go
among us to get understanding; but they mean well, according to their
lights.”
This place (called Kornegalle by the English) is a little town of 2,000
or 3,000 inhabitants, fifty miles from Colombo and eleven miles (by
coach) from Polgahawella, the nearest railway station. It lies just
at the foot of the mountain region of Ceylon, and takes its name,
Kurunégala or Elephant-rock, from a huge Gibraltar-like rock, 600 feet
high, at the base of which it nestles--and whose rounded dark granite
structure, wrinkled with weather and largely bare of trees or any
herbage, certainly bears a remarkable resemblance, both in form and
color, to a couchant elephant. Ascending its steep sides, on which the
sun strikes with fierce heat during the midday, one obtains from the
summit a fine view--westward over low plains, eastward over mountain
ranges rising higher and higher towards the centre of the island. The
prevailing impression of the landscape here, as elsewhere in Ceylon,
is its uniform green. There is no change of summer or winter. (Though
this is the coolest time of year, the daily temperature ranges from 85°
to 90° in the shade.) The trees do not cast their leaves at any stated
time, though individual trees will sleep at intervals, resting so. In
every direction the same color meets the eye--tracts of green scrub,
green expanses of forest, green rice-fields, and the massed green
of bananas and coco-palms. A little monotonous this in the general
landscape, though it is plentifully compensated on a near view by the
detailed color of insect and flower life. One curious feature is that
though the country is well populated, hardly a trace of habitation is
to be seen from any high point such as this. Even Kurunégala, which
lies at our feet, is only distinguishable by its court-house and prison
and one or two other emblems of civilisation; the native cabins,
and even in many cases the European houses--which are of one storey
only--are entirely hidden by trees. Those clumps however of coco-palms
which you see standing like oases in the general woods, or breaking
the levels of the rice-fields, with occasional traces of blue smoke
curling up through them, are sure indications of little native hamlets
clustered beneath--often far far from any road, and accessible only by
natural footpaths worn by naked feet.
[Illustration: NATIVE HUT.
(_Among banana and coco-palms._)]
From the top of the rock one gets a good view of the tank which
supplies irrigation water for the town and neighborhood. It is about
three-quarters of a mile long and half a mile broad, and forms a
pretty little lake, over which kites hover and kingfishers skim, and
in which the people daily bathe. These tanks and irrigation channels
are matters of the utmost importance, to which I think Government can
hardly give too much attention. Their importance was well understood in
past times, as indeed the remains and ruins of immense works of this
kind, over a thousand years old, in various parts of the island fully
testify. A little is being done towards their renewal and restoration,
but the tendency to-day is to neglect the interests of the rice-growing
peasant in favor of the tea-planting Englishman. The paddy tax, which
presses very hardly on the almost starving cultivator, while tea
goes scot-free, is an instance of this. Tea, which is an export and
a luxury, and which enriches the few, is thought to be so much more
important than an article which is grown for home consumption and for
the needs of the many. It is of course only an instance of the general
commercial policy of all modern Governments; but one cannot the less
for that think it a mistake, and an attempt to make the pyramid of
social prosperity stand upon its apex. There is something curious--and
indeed is it not self-contradictory?--in the fact that every country
of the civilized world studies above all things the increase of its
_exports_--is engaged, not in producing things primarily for its own
use, but in trying to get other people to buy what it produces!--as
if we all stood round and tried to shuffle off our bad wares on the
others, in the hope that they by some accident might return us good
stuff in exchange. Somehow the system does not seem as if it would
work; it looks too like the case of that island where the inhabitants
all earned a precarious living by taking in each other’s washing.
What, one may ask, is really the cause of the enormous growth of this
practice of neglecting production for use in favor of production for
export and for the market? Is it not simply money and the merchant
interest? Production at home by the population and for its own use is
and always must be, one would think, by far the most important for the
population and for its own comfort and welfare, though a margin may of
course be allowed for the acquirement by exchange of some few articles
which cannot be grown at home. But production such as this does not
necessarily mean either money or mercantile transaction. Conceivably it
may very well take place without either these or the gains which flow
from their use--without profits or interest or dividends or anything of
the kind. But this would never do! The money and commercial interest,
which is now by far the most powerful interest in all modern states, is
not such a fool as to favor a system of national economy which would be
its own ruin. No; it must encourage _trade_ in every way, at all costs.
Trade, commerce, exchange, exports and imports--these are the things
which bring dividends and interest, which fill the pockets of the
parasites at the expense of the people; and so the nations stand round,
obedient, and carry on the futile game till further orders.
As a matter of fact in these hot countries, like Ceylon and India,
almost unlimited results of productiveness can be got by perfected
irrigation, and as long as the peasantry in these lands are (as they
are) practically starving, and the irrigation works practically
neglected, the responsibility for such a state of affairs must lie with
the rulers; and naturally no mere shuffling of commercial cards, or
encouragement of an export trade which brings fortunes into the hands
of a few tea-planters and merchants, can be expected to make things
better.
It is sad to see the thin and famished mortals who come in here
from the country districts round to beg. Many of them, especially
the younger ones, have their limbs badly ulcerated. One day, going
through the hospital, the doctor--a Eurasian--took me through a ward
full of such cases. He said that they mostly soon got better with the
better hospital diet; “but,” he added, “when they get back to their
old conditions they are soon as bad as ever.” In fact the mass of the
population in a place like Colombo looks far sleeker and better off
than in these country districts; but that only affords another instance
of how the modern policy encourages the shifty and crafty onhanger of
commercial life at the cost of the sturdy agriculturist--and I need not
say that the case is the same at home as abroad.
It is quite a pretty sight to see the bathing in the tanks. It takes
place in the early morning, and indeed during most of the day.
Cleanliness is a religious observance, and engrained in the habits of
the people. Of course there are exceptions, but save among the lowest
castes this is the rule. An orthodox Hindu is expected not only to wash
himself, but his own cloth, at least once a day. The climate makes
bathing a pleasure, and the people linger over it. Men and boys, women
and children, together or in groups not far distant from each other,
revel and splash in the cool liquid; their colored wraps are rinsed
and spread to dry on the banks, their brass pots glance in the sun as
they dip the water with them and pour it over their own heads, their
long black hair streams down their backs. Then, leaving the water,
they pluck a twig from a certain tree, and, squatting on their hams,
with the frayed twig-end rub their teeth and talk over the scandal of
the day. This tooth-cleaning gossiping business lasts till they are
dry, and often a good deal longer, and is, I fancy, one of the most
enjoyable parts of the day to the mild oyster. In unsophisticated
places there is no distinction of classes in this process, and rich
and poor join in the public bathing alike--in fact there is very
little difference in their dress and habits anyhow, as far as regards
wealth and poverty--but of course where Western ideas are penetrating,
the well-to-do natives adopt our habits and conduct their bathing
discreetly at home.
The people never (except it be children) go into the water _quite_
naked, and the women always retain one of their wraps wound round the
body. These wraps are very long, and the skill with which they manage
to wash first one end and then the other, winding and unwinding, and
remaining decorously covered all the time, is quite admirable. I am
struck by the gravity and decorum of the people generally--in outer
behavior or gesture--though their language (among the lower castes)
is by no means always select! But there is none, or very little,
of that banter between the sexes which is common among the Western
populations, and even among the boys and youths you see next to no
frolicking or bear-fighting. I suppose it is part of the passivity
and want of animal spirits which characterise the Hindu; and of course
the sentiment of the relation between the sexes is different in some
degree from what it is with us. On sexual matters generally, as far as
I can make out, the tendency, even among the higher castes, is to be
outspoken, and there is little of that prudery which among us is only
after all a modern growth.
[Illustration: NATIVE STREET, AND SHOPS.]
The town here is a queer mixture of primitive life with modern
institutions. There are two or three little streets of booths, which
constitute the “bazaar.” Walking down these--where behind baskets
of wares the interiors of the dwellings are often visible, and the
processes of life are naïvely exposed to the eye--one may judge
for one’s self how little man wants here below. Here is a fruit and
vegetable shop, with huge bunches of plantains or bananas, a hundred
in a bunch, and selling at five or six a penny; of a morning you may
see the peasant coming in along the road carrying _two_ such bunches--a
good load--slung one at each end of a long pole, or _pingo_, over
his shoulder--a similar figure to that which is so frequent on the
Egyptian monuments of 3,000 years ago; pineapples, from 1_d._ up to
4_d._ each for the very finest; the breadfruit, and its queer relation
the enormous jack-fruit, weighing often as much as 12 to 14 lbs.,
with its pulpy and not very palatable interior, used so much by the
people, growing high up over their cabins on the handsome jack-tree,
and threatening you with instant dissolution if it descend upon your
head; the egg-plant, murngal, beans, potatos, and other vegetables;
and plentiful ready-prepared packets of areca nut and betel leaf for
chewing. Then there is a shop where they sell spices, peppers, chilis,
and all such condiments for curries, not to mention baskets of dried
fish (also for currying), which stink horribly and constitute one of
the chief drawbacks of the bazaars; and an earthenware shop,--and
I must not forget the opium shop. Besides these there are only two
others--and they represent Manchester and Birmingham respectively--one
where they sell shoddy and much-sized cotton goods, and the other which
displays tin ware, soap, matches, paraffin lamps, dinner knives, and
all sorts of damnable cutlery. I have seen these knives and scissors,
or such as these (made only to deceive), being manufactured in the
dens of Sheffield by boys and girls slaving in dust and dirt, breathing
out their lives in foul air under the gaslights, hounded on by mean
taskmasters and by the fear of imminent starvation. Dear children!
if you could only come out here yourselves, instead of sending the
abominable work of your hands--come out here to enjoy this glorious
sunshine, and fraternise, as I know many of you would, with the
despised darkie!
The opium-seller is a friend of mine. I often go and sit in his
shop--on his one chair. He teaches me Tamil--for he is a Tamil--and
tells me long stories, slowly, word by word. He is a thin, soft-eyed,
intelligent man, about thirty, has read a fair amount of English--of
a friendly _riant_ child-nature--not without a reasonable eye to the
main chance, like some of his Northern cousins. There are a few jars of
opium in its various forms--for smoking, drinking, and chewing; a pair
of scales to weigh it with; a brass coconut-oil lamp with two or three
wicks hanging overhead; and a partition for the bed at the back,--and
that is all. The shopfront is of course entirely open to the thronged
street, except at night, when it is closed with shutterboards.
At the corner of the street stands a policeman, of course, else we
should not know we were being civilised. But, O Lord, what a policeman!
How a London street arab would chuckle all over at the sight of him!
Imagine the mild and somewhat timid oyster dressed in a blue woollen
serge suit (very hot for this climate), with a belt round his waist,
some kind of turban on his head, a staff in his hand, and _boots_ on
his feet! A real live oyster in boots! It is too absurd. How miserable
he looks; and as to running after a criminal--the thing is not to be
thought of. But no doubt the boots vindicate the majesty of the British
Government.
While we are gazing at this apparition, a gang of prisoners marches
by--twenty lean creatures, with slouched straw hats on their heads,
striped cotton jackets and pants, and bare arms and lower legs, each
carrying a mattock--for they are going to work on the roads--and the
whole gang followed and guarded (certainly Ceylon is a most idyllic
land) by a Cinghalese youth of about twenty-one, dressed in white
skirts down to his feet, with a tortoise-shell comb on his head, and
holding a parasol to shade himself from the sun. Why do not the twenty
men with mattocks turn and slay the boy with the parasol, and so depart
in peace? I asked this question many times, and always got the same
answer. “Because,” they said, “the prisoners do not particularly want
to run away. They are very well off in prison,--better off, as a rule,
than they are outside. Imprisonment by an alien Government, under alien
laws and standards, is naturally no disgrace, at any rate to the mass
of the people, and so once in prison they make themselves as happy as
they can.”
I visited the gaol one day, and thought they succeeded very well in
that respect. The authorities, I am glad to say, do all they can to
make them comfortable. They have each a large dish of rice and curry,
with meat if they wish, twice a day, and a meal of coffee and bread in
the morning besides; which is certainly better fare than they would
get as peasants. They do their little apology for work in public places
during the day--with a chance of a chat with friends--and sleep in
gangs together in the prison sheds at night, each with his mat, pillow,
and night suit; so possibly on the whole they are not ill-content.
My friend A----, with whom I am staying here, is a Tamil, and an
official of high standing. He became thoroughly Anglicised while
studying in England, and like many of the Hindus who come to London or
Cambridge or Oxford, did for the time quite outwesternise us in the
tendency towards materialism and the belief in science, ‘comforts,’
representative institutions, and ‘progress’ generally. Now however he
seems to be undergoing a reaction in favor of caste and the religious
traditions of his own people, and I am inclined to think that other
westernising Hindus will experience the same reaction.
He lives in an ordinary one-storied stone house, or bungalow, such as
the English inhabit here. These houses, naturally cover a good deal of
ground. The roof, which is made of heavy tiles or thatch, is pitched
high in the middle, giving space for lofty sitting-rooms; the sleeping
chambers flank these at a lower slope, and outside runs the verandah,
almost round the house, the roof terminating beyond it at six or seven
feet from the ground. This arrangement makes the interiors very dark
and cool, as the windows open on the verandah, and the sun cannot
penetrate to them; but I am not sure that I like the sensation of
being confined under this immense carapace of tiles, with no possible
outlook to the sky, in a sort of cavernous twilight all the while. The
verandah forms an easy means of access from one part to another, and
in this house there are no passages in the interior, but the rooms
all open into one another; and plentiful windows--some mere Venetian
shutters, without glass--ensure a free circulation of air.
Mosquitos are a little trying. I don’t think they are more venomous
than the English gnat, but they are far ’cuter. The mosquito is the
’cutest little animal for its size that exists. I am certain from
repeated observations that it _watches one’s eyes_. If you look at it,
it flies away. It settles on the under side of your hand (say when
reading a book), or on your ankles when sitting at table--on any part
in fact which is remote from observation; there is nothing that it
loves better than for you to sit in a cane-bottomed chair. But it never
attacks your face--and that is a curious thing--_except when you are
asleep_. How it knows I cannot tell, but I have often noticed that it
is so. If you close your eyes and pretend to be asleep, it will not
come; but as sure as you begin to drowse off you hear the ping of its
little wing as it swoops past your ear to your cheek.
At night however the mosquito curtains keep one in safety, and I cannot
say that I am much troubled during the day, except on occasions, and
in certain places, as in the woods when there is no breeze. A. is a
vegetarian, and I fancy diet has a good deal to do with freedom from
irritation by insects and by heat. The thermometer reaches 90° in
the shade almost every day here; to sit and run at the same time is
a gymnastic feat which one can easily perform, and at night it is
hot enough to sleep without any covering on the bed; but I enjoy the
climate thoroughly, and never felt in better health. No doubt these
things often affect one more after a time than at first; but there
seems almost always a pleasant breeze here at this time of year, and I
do not notice that languor which generally accompanies sultry weather.
A. has most lovely vegetable curries; plenty of boiled rice, with
four or five little dishes of different sorts of curried vegetables.
This, with fruit, forms our breakfast--at ten; and dinner at six or
seven is much the same, with perhaps an added soup or side-dish. His
wife sometimes joins us at dinner, which I take as an honor, as even
with those Hindu women who are emancipated there is often a little
reserve about eating with the foreigner. She has a very composed and
gentle manner, and speaks English prettily and correctly, though slowly
and with a little hesitation; approves of a good deal of the English
freedom for women, but says she cannot quite reconcile herself to women
walking about the streets alone, and other things she hears they do in
England. However, she would like to come to England herself and see.
The children are very bright and charming. Mahéswari (three years old)
is the sweetest little dot, with big black eyes and a very decided
opinion about things. She comes into the room and lifts up one arm and
turns up her face and prophesies something in solemn tones in Tamil,
which turns out to be, “Father is very naughty to sit down to dinner
before mother comes.” Then she talks Cinghalese to her nurse and
English to me, which is pretty good for a beginner in life. Mahadéva
and Jayanta, the two boys (seven and nine respectively), are in the
bubbling-over stage, and are alternately fast friends and fighting with
each other two or three times a day, much like English boys. They are
dressed more after the English fashion, though they are privileged to
have bare knees and feet--at any rate in the house; and Jayanta has a
pony which he rides out every day.
A. sets apart a little room in this house as a “chapel.” It is quite
bare, with just a five-wicked lamp on a small table in one corner, and
flowers, fruit, etc., on the ground in front. I was present the other
day when the Brahman priest was performing a little service there.
He recited Sanskrit formulas, burned camphor, and gave us cowdung
ashes and sandalwood paste to put on our foreheads, consecrated milk
to drink, and a flower each. The cowdung ashes are a symbol. For as
cowdung, when burnt, becomes clean and even purifying in quality, so
must the body itself be consumed and purified in the flame of Siva’s
presence. A. says they use a gesture identifying the light (of Siva)
within the body with the light of the flame, and also with that of the
sun; and always terminate their worship by going out into the open and
saluting the sun. The Brahman priest, a man about forty, and the boy
of fifteen who often accompanies him, are pleasant-faced folk, not
apparently at all highly educated, wearing but little in the way of
clothes, and not specially distinguishable from other people, except
by the sacred thread worn over the shoulder, and a certain alertness of
expression which is often noticeable in the Brahman--though the trouble
is that it is generally alertness for gain.
The priests generally here, whether Buddhist or Hindu (and Buddhism
is of course the prevailing religion in Ceylon), occupy much the
same relation to the people which the priests occupy in the country
districts of France or Ireland--that is, whatever spiritual power they
claim, they do not arrogate to themselves any worldly supremacy, and
are always poor and often quite unlettered. In fact I suppose it is
only in the commercially religious, _i.e._ Protestant, countries that
the absurd anomaly exists of a priesthood which pretends to the service
of the Jesus who had not where to lay his head, and which at the same
time openly claims to belong to “society” and the well-to-do classes,
and would resent any imputation to the contrary. There are indeed
many points of resemblance between the religions here--especially
Hinduism--and Roman Catholicism: the elaborate ceremonials and
services, with processions, incense, lights, ringing of bells, etc.;
the many mendicant orders, the use of beads and rosaries, and begging
bowls, the monasteries with their abbots, and so forth.
[Illustration: VEDDAHS.
(_Aborigines of Ceylon._)]
There is one advantage in a hot damp climate like this; namely that
things--books, furniture, clothes, etc.--soon get destroyed and done
with, so that there is little temptation to cumber up your house with
possessions. Some English of course try to furnish and keep their rooms
as if they were _still_ living in Bayswater, but they are plentifully
plagued for their folly. The floors here are of some cement or concrete
material, which prevents the white ants surging up through them, as
they infallibly would through boards, and which is nice and cool to the
feet; carpets, cupboards, and all collections of unremoved things are
discountenanced. A chest of drawers or a bookcase stands out a foot or
two from the wall, so that the servants can sweep behind it every day.
Little frogs, lizards, scorpions, and other fry, which come hopping and
creeping in during or after heavy rain can then be gently admonished
to depart, and spiders do not find it easy to establish a footing. The
greatest harbor for vermin is the big roof, which is full of rats. In
pursuit of these come the rat-snakes, fellows five or six feet long,
but not venomous, and wild cats; and the noises at night from them, the
shuffling of the snakes, and the squeals of the poor little rats, etc.,
I confess are trying.
We have three or four male servants about the house and garden, and
there are two _ayahs_, who look after the children and the women’s
apartments. I believe many of these Indian and Cinghalese races love to
be servants (under a tolerably good master); their feminine sensitive
natures, often lacking in enterprise, rather seek the shelter of
dependence. And certainly they make, in many instances and when well
treated, wonderfully good servants, their tact and affectionateness
riveting the bond. I know of a case in which an English civilian
met with an accident when 200 miles away from his station, and his
“bearer,” when he heard the news, in default of other means of
communication, _walked_ the whole distance, and arrived in time to
see him before he died. At the same time it is a mistake to suppose
they will do anything out of a sense of duty. The word duty doesn’t
occupy an important place in the Oriental vocabulary, no more than it
does among the Celtic peoples of Europe. This is a fruitful source
of misunderstanding between the races. The Britisher pays his Indian
servant regularly, and in return expects him to _do his duty_, and to
submit to kicks when he doesn’t. He, the Britisher, regards this as
a fair contract. But the oyster doesn’t understand it in the least.
He would rather receive his pay less regularly, and be treated as “a
man and a brother.” Haeckel’s account of the affection of his Rodiya
servant-lad for him, and of the boy’s despair when Haeckel had to leave
him, is quite touching; but it is corroborated by a thousand similar
stories. But if there is no attachment, what is the meaning of duty?
The oyster, in keeping with his weaker, more dependent nature, is
cunning and lazy--his vices lie in that direction rather than in the
Western direction of brutal energy. If his attachment is not called
out, he can make his master miserable in his own way. And he does so;
hence endless strife and recrimination.
The Arachchi here, a kind of official servant of A.’s, is a most gentle
creature, with remarkable tact, but almost too sensitive; one is afraid
of wounding him by not accepting all his numerous attentions. He glides
in and out of the room--as they all do--noiselessly, with bare feet;
and one never knows whether one is alone or not. The horse-keeper
and I are good friends, though our dialogues are limited for want of
vocabulary! He is a regular dusky demon, with his look of affectionate
bedevilment and way of dissolving in a grin whenever he sees one. A.
says that he thinks the pariahs, or outcastes--and the horse-keepers
are pariahs--are some of the most genuine and good-hearted among the
people; and I see that the author of _Life in an Indian Village_ says
something of the same kind. “As a class, hardworking, honest, and
truthful,” he calls them; and after describing their devotion to
the interests of the families to whom they are often hereditarily
attached, adds, “Such are the illiterate pariahs, a unique class, whose
pure lives and noble traits of character are in every way worthy of
admiration.”
It is curious, but I am constantly being struck by the resemblance
between the lowest castes here and the slum-dwellers in our great
cities--resemblance in physiognomy, as well as in many unconscious
traits of character, often very noble; with the brutish basis
well-marked, the unformed mouth, and the somewhat heavy brows, just
as in Meunier’s fine statue of the ironworker (“puddleur”), but with
thicker lips.