THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES A MISSION TO THE MYSORE WITH Scenes anD facts II.I.USTRATIVK OF INDIA, ITS PEOPLE, AND ITS RELIGION BY WILLIAM ARTHUR, A.M. EDITED WITH INTRODUCTION, NOTES, AND APPENDIX BY HENRY HAIGH LONDON CHARLES H. KELLY 2, CASTLE ST., CITY RD., AND 26, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C, 1902 PRINTED BY MORRISON AND GIBB LIMITED EDINBURGH TO JOHN POYNDER, ESQUIRE, WHOSE ABLE AND SUSTAINED EXERTIONS, ©It behalf of EnUia, HAVE, BY THE BLESSINO OF GOD, ENCOURAGED EVERY LABOURER FOR HER ENLIGHTENMENT, REMOVED DISHONOURS FROM THE BRITISH NAME, AND FACILITATED THE REGENERATION OF A GREAT CONTINENT ; THIS VOLUME IS MOST RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED. 1661523 INTRODUCTION " A Mission to the Mysore " was Mr. Arthur's maiden volume. It created an extraordinary interest at the time of its publication, alike in the author's own Church and in other Churches ; and it circulated widely for a long period. Few volumes have done more to stimulate missionary interest. I, for one, can never forget the glamour which the book threw over me when I first read it, more than thirty years ago ; and now, having lived the greater part of that time in the very region of which Mr. Arthur writes, I find as I turn to it once more that it is yet a living book. Its enthusiasm is still catching, its eloquence still attrac- tive; and, judging it from a standpoint which was then impossible to me, I own myself surprised at the range and accuracy of its information, at its clear insight into many problems, and at the validity of many of its judgments. It is fifty-five years since the book was first published, and, inevitably, that lapse of time has changed the point of view in regard to many things Indian; but on the whole there has been little to VI INTRODUCTION correct in this volume, and the work of editing has been in the main supplementary. Fifty-five years ! They have been among the most fateful years of India's history. Think of the changes which they have wrought in her outside relationships. England is now only a fortnight from her shores, and each evening the cable tells her what of importance all the rest of the world has done that day. India is not any longer islanded from every other nation. The whole world obtrudes itself upon her, mingles its interests with hers, and compels her attention. Her old aloofness has become impossible; her old disdain could henceforth be only a silly anachronism. Within, the changes have been still more impressive and potential. The Mutiny first tested, and then con- firmed, British supremacy ; the East India Company has been superseded by the Crown ; railways and telegraphs have been making for political unity and a national sentiment; and education — inviting both sexes and all classes, displacing ancient and venerable fables in favour of history and modern science, and provoking such literary activity as India has not often known before — has set on foot a revolution. Side by side with these momentous developments there has been a steady but gradual extension of the Christian propaganda. In Mr. Arthur's time the number of Protestant missionaries in India was still INTKODUCTION VI 1 insignificant. To-day, though far from being sufficient, they are ten times more than they were then ; while the Indian preachers, few relatively, have become in the aggregate a great company. With larger numbers there has come better organisation, the friendly de- limitation of areas, increasing concentration, and a much greater variety of method. Christianity is not only touching a vastly larger number of the people of India than ever before, but it is touching their life at far more numerous points. It reaches them through their women ; it talks to them in their newspaper ; it appeals to them in their sickness ; it invites them through their industries ; it suggests relief for their social wrongs ; and is striving with patient zeal and growing success to encompass the whole round of their interests by its gracious ministry. Of the various missionary developments which have taken place in India since Mr. Arthur's time, three may perhaps be briefly indicated : — (1) The first has reference to missionaries themselves and their attitude towards the non-Christian systems that confront them. Mr. Arthur's book reflects the assumption which was prevalent in his time, and for a long while after, that that which is outside Christianity is wholly and hopelessly false. It was not unnatural that such an assumption should express itself chiefly in uncompromising criticism, and earnest, if pitying. Vlll INTRODUCTION denunciation. Gradually, however, the method of St. Paul at Athens has been impressing itself upon Christian missionaries. They have come to apprehend that God can never have left Himself anywhere without witness, and that in Hinduism and such like systems there is of a surety some, vital truth, however hidden and entangled, the recognition of which is just and necessary, and likely to afford the best approach to the heathen man's intelligence and heart. (2) The second development has been among Hindus- of the most thoughtful and best educated type. In many striking ways the conviction has begun to express itself that somewhere in their system they must find a Christ, or their system will stand finally discredited. (3) The third development is among the Pariahs. A great nation, that does not know its greatness, has begun to stretch out its hands to Christ's messengers, and to demand of them recognition, instruction, and direction. In tins movement there are potentialities transcending all common dreams. The Pariah cannot emerge into manhood and freedom and knowledge without becoming a force tliat shall move and mould the thought and sentiment of the caste populations of. India. Tlie Chureli of ('lirist is in truth only just fairly embarked u]»on the task which awaits it in India. INTriODUCTION IX The most difficult conditions meet it tliere — moral, intellectual, and social, — and it has been mainly occupied hitherto in apprehending those conditions, and preparing itself for its enterprise. It has already won results which, if not sensational, are substantial and strategic. If individual conversions are less numerous than devotion desires and enthusiasm anti- cipates, they are nevertheless multiplying steadily and with increasing rapidity ; while all the time the con- version of India as apart from the individual — of its standards, sentiments, and ideals — is proceeding with sure and unhalting success. Not easily and not quickly will India become Christian. If anywhere enthusiasm needs to express itself in steadfast patience and courageous hope, it is there. But the task which the Master has committed to His Church in India, if so difficult, is also so splendid that she cannot for very shame shrink from any toil or sacrifice that may be necessary to fulfil it. Everything which can stimulate in Christian minds the sense of obligation in regard to the evangelising of India has special value, alike religious and imperial ; and it would be hard to suggest a volume better calculated to do this than Arthur's Mission to the Mysore. The pen that wrote it was the same as that which wrote The Tongue of Fire, and there is in this volume the same passion of devotion, the same urgency of desire, the same spirituality of X INTRODUCTION toue as are to be found in that. The book by no means exhausted its message in the generation to which it was addressed. It has a message for the Churches of to-day, and we may well expect that that message will prove as impressive and compelling to the Christians of this generation as it did to those in whose day it was written. The text of this volume remains unaltered, but the spelling of all proper names, except the most familiar, has been brought into accord with the system followed by the Government of India. For the rest, the attempt has been made in notes, which have been enclosed in square brackets, so far to supplement the information of the text as to give the book a present-day use and worth. In compiling them, I have not been content merely to draw upon my own experience and obser- vation, but have consulted many authorities, both European and native. It is hoped tluit in regard to everything important due acknowledgment has been made. In regard to two or three points, the Eev. G. M. Cobban has kindly placed at my disposal his knowledge of Tamil and the Tamil country ; and the Secretaries of the Church ]\Iissionary and London Missionary Societies very courteously supplied me with some of their latest statistics. I trust that this reissue of Mr. Arthur's book will uKain do much to stimulate INTRODUCTION XI and develop the missionary zeal of the Churches of this land, and that it may prove in various ways of special service to many young men and women, who shall henceforth be designated for mission work in our great Eastern Empire. HENRY HAIGH. PREFACE The following pages, prepared with the hope of con- tributing, in some humhle way, towaixl circulating information with regard to India, and promoting an interest in its welfare, were communicated to the Weslcyan Methodist Magazine. Hundreds of persons who read them in that periodical have requested that they should be separately published, and a respectable New York journal has deemed them worthy of re- production. To these encouragements, and not to any previous resolution, is due their appearance in the present form. The reader should be apprised that, as the views of Hindu mind and manners he will here find were formed through familiar intercourse with the people of a district remote from any European station, they will probably differ in some points from those of writers who have resided only in the Presidencies or other centres of English influence. It should also be remembered that India is so vast a region, that a trait XIV PREFACE prominent in tlie character of one Hindu nation may be faint, or even imdiscoverable, in another. In extenuation of defects beyond those incident to a first attempt at authorship, all the usual pleas might be urged with more than usual truth. But apologies would neither enrich the matter nor improve the style ; and where neglect may reasonably be apprehended, it would 1)6 gratuitous to raise a shield against criticism. With whatever success, the writer has desired through- out to avoid equally the extreme of those who, from a culpable prejudice, exaggerate every blemish of Hindu society, overlooking every grace, and the more tempting extreme of those who, from a generous prejudice, exaggerate every grace, overlooking every blemish. To give fair representations, and to promote good ends, has been honestly meant, and the attempt is humbly commended to the blessing of God. CONTENTS PAGE Introduction v Preface xiii CHAPTER I The Voyage 1 CHAPTER II Madras 25 CHAPTER III The Journey "Up Country ' . .... 63 CHAPTER IV Bangalore 117 CHAPTER V My Circuit Ifil CHAPTER VI Our Work 202 XV XVI CONTENTS PAGE CHAPTER VII India: What Is It ? 265 CHAPTER VIII India : Its People 287 CHAPTER IX India : Its Religion 368 CHAPTER X The Return 449 APPENDIX 477 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE -»>^ CHAPTER I THE VOYAGE On the afternoon of Sunday, April 14, 1839, the "holy and beautiful house " at City Road was thronged with a devout multitude, met for the purpose of commending to the Lord of the harvest four labourers for His field in the East. It was the Centenary year ; and the Rev. Thomas Jackson, then President of the Conference, wdio conducted the service, diifused through it the intiuence of that special unction wherewith the Head of the Church had endowed him for the duties of that memorable time : this, with Dr. Hamaah's touching and appropriate counsels, the mighty supplications of Dr. Bunting, the fervent response of that Christian assembly, and the emotions raised by the surrender of every early endearment, and the entrance on untold responsibilities, conspired to make it an hour never to be forgotten by the departing missionaries. Often since, when ministering in the same sanctuary, have I longed to recall the very feelings of that day of dedication. The following morning, in company with Messrs. Square- bridge, Garrett, and Pope, I embarked at Gravesend on the Essex, Captain Foord, bound for iSIadras. The secretaries of the Missionary Society had accompanied us on board, where, assembling in one of our cabins, Mr. Hoole and I 2 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE Dr. Bunting earnestly implored on our voyage and mission the blessing of that God in whose name we were going forth. The latter then addressed us in a few sentences of counsel, blending an indescribable fatherliness with his characteristic wisdom. The thoughts of the moment made our hearts tender ; and the impression of those last kind words was deep and enduring. They then took their leave ; my eye followed them till no longer discernible, and then turned to the Friend who " forsaketh never." Time was when a voyage to the East commanded some such interest as will await the journal of Mr. Green's first aijrial voyage across the Atlantic ; but, living in less favoured days, we must be content to proceed on our way accom- panied only by such as may be attracted by sympathy with our object, or who will deign to fill up a vacant hour by listening to our tale. We found the Ussex, a line new ship of nearly eight hundred tons, well officered, manned, and provisioned. There were about fifteen passengers, for whom the accommodations were good and the fare sumptuous. About one hundred and fifty recruits for the service of the East India Company occupied one apartment between decks, their hammocks being suspended by cords of dilierent lengths, so as to form tiers one above another ; thus they slept, and that they managed to exist in the warm weather of the tropics was wonderful. In all other respects they were well provided for. The sjxxcious poop, being free from hencoops, which usually encumber that locality, served the passengers fur an agreeable promenade. At the ]jow was a similar erection, called by the sailors " a top- gallant forecastle," under which a multitude of geese, ducks, fowls, and guinea-fowls were })acked into coops " as closely as bottles in a rack " ; here also a cow and calf had a com- fortable berth. In the space between the fore and main masts stood the capacious long-boat, serving, I'or the time, as a sheep-fold, while underneath it a number of pigs were closely penned. Everything gave indication of plenty ; THE VOYAGE 6 and on a long voyage tliore is not a more welcome ship- mate. A foul wind prevailing for some days, we were detained off Deal in company with a numerous fleet, which, weighing anchor simultaneously, gave us the gratification to see our own vessel outsail all the others, the last being one of tlie American line of packets, which had a considerable advan- tage in starting. This triumph completely established the Essex, not only in the confidence but in the affections of her crew. For it is just as impossible for a sailor not to invest his ship with personal attributes as it is to traverse a noble picture-gallery and not forget that those eloquent groups, which stir in turn every feeling of your nature, are them- selves devoid of emotion as the air around them. Basil Hall tells us that the men of the Leander were in the habit of saying the old ship " could do anything but speak " ; and I well remember with what emphasis our boatswain ex- claimed, after we had cast anchor in ^Madras Eoads, " She has done beautiful ! " Thus, too often, our seamen, when brought to " their desired haven," praise their ship and forget their God. Daring our first Sabbath at sea we were " beating down Channel " in a thick fog, which so occupied all hands as to prevent an assembly for public worship ; but we had service twice in one of our own cabins. On the second, the Atlantic was tossing us on its majestic waves in such a way as to render a deck service impossible, and accordingly we assem- bled in the cuddy. On the third we were sailing before a mild breeze, with the sea smooth and the sky bright ; so orders were issued that all should " prepare for church." A few minutes before the time, the ship's bell commenced to ring exactly like the " churchgoing bell " of a village Sabbath. This was unexpected, and brought crowding before the mind many a memory of the past, and with them those emotions which only they can know who have proved the susceptibilities awakened in the heart by long 4 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE distance from all who are dear, added to the uncertainty of reunion. Above we found the larboard quarter-deck occupied by the seamen sitting on temporary benches, and presenting in their beautifully clean clothes a pleasing con- trast to their ordinary appearance ; on the opposite side stood the soldiers, rank and file, each man furnished with a Bible and prayer-book ; the officers and passengers were seated upon chairs. The capstan was the pulpit, the British ensign its drapery. A congregation so picturesque I have never seen, and seldom one more attentive. These services were continued every Sunday throughout the voyage ; on deck, when the weather permitted, and, when too boisterous, in the cuddy, each of the missionaries officiating in turn. Our opportunities of doing good among the soldiers were restricted to visiting the sick and conversing with those Avhose attention we could engage on such occasions. We found amongst them two or three who had known some- thing of the grace of God, whom we brought to our weekly class-meetings, and, when practicable, to our morning and evening prayer. Christian fellowship is always sweet ; but it was doubly so when, far from sanctuaries, we weekly met on the deep to recount the mercies of our God, and to look forward with prayerful hope to the toils which lay before us. Beside our regular class-meetings and " family prayer," as we called it, we two or three times joined, with a few who were devout, in commemorating the Saviour's death. After having struggled to the mouth of the Channel, we were favoured with a fair breeze, which never failed till it had carried us within tlie inlluence of the north-east trade- wind. The ])ay of Jjiscay gave us a vigorous tossing, which caused abundance of sea-sickness, and ludicrous accidents at the dinner-table. In six days after clearing the Channel, Madeira came in view, at the distance of about twenty miles ; reminding me in its appearance of Clare Island, as it stretches across the month of the incomparable Clew Bay, sheltering its hundreds of islets from the ocean, as of yore it screened THE VOYAGE 5 the armaments of Graiiua Uile from her Saxon foes. From this point the climate perceptibly changed, the breeze became balmy, the sky cloudless, the sun fervid. Shoals of porpoises occasionally gambolled round the ship, seeming to take delight in racing Avith the gigantic intruder on their home. It is hard to find a more vivacious exhibition than they display, as they dart along the side, round the stern, before the bows, now under their comrades, now over their backs ; as intent on progress and sport at the same time as the children of a village school just let loose for dinner. Occasionally, also, "we saw the interesting little nautilus spreading its graceful sail, as confident in the care of Him who " holdeth the winds in His fist " as if that sail propelled a fleet on which the hopes of a nation were attent. Our wake was often followed by the symmetrical and many-hued dolphin, some of which were made to increase the variety of our cuddy table. As we advanced, shoals of flying-fish were seen to rise upon the wing, and, after a brief airing, return to their native tide. It seemed very plain that they took flight, not from any danger, but from the impulse given by the Creator to all His works, to develop every power with which they are endowed. While sailing in this beautiful region, a soldier became dangerously ill. To afford him more air he was carried on deck, where it formed a strange contrast to the ordinary gloom of a sick-chamber, to see the bright sunbeams dancing not only on ever}"^ object round the poor invalid, but on the very features which death Avas blanching. He had been a man of good character, much respected among his comrades, and manifested deep feeling when spoken to on his religious state. His prayers for mercy were fervent and touching ; and, ofl'ering those prayers, he died. This called us to wit- ness that scene which is always described as so melancholy — a funeral at sea. It is certainly affecting — affecting from its own solemnity, and perhaps still more so from the contrast it presents to all you have been wont to witness. You have death without any of those attendant forms with which it 6 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE seems so naturally to harmonise. There is no sable bier ; no dark train moving slowly on a sad errand ; no passing from common ground within the hallowed enclosure consecrated to the memory of the dead, to the hope of the resurrection ; no grave before you yawning for its prey ; none of the objects in which the eye usually recognises Death. All his retinue is wanting ; but himself is there, and his presence is the more startling because of the everyday and lifelike character of surrounding appearances. The body, wrapped in the hammock it had been wont to occupy, was carried to the side of the ship, and laid on a plank so placed as to incline toward the v/ater. Around this thronged a numerous group, every countenance wearing the impress of thought and tenderness. During the reading of the solemn service, the reckless look of the young recruit gave way to one of deep emotion ; the hardy visage of tlie seaman relaxed, and his eye swam ; every spectator shared and manifested that " undefined and sudden thrill" which the nearness of death does not fail to inspire. The words " AVe therefore commit liis body " were not followed by the usual thrice-repeated hollow sound which rises from the grave as the decree of separation between the living and the dead ; but at those words the inner end of the plank, on which rested the corpse, being raised, it glided slowly into the deep blue wave that was heaving below. " One sullen plunge, and the scene is o'er ; The sea rolls on, as it rolled before." In the case of another man, and also of a soldier's child, this sad ceremony was twice lepeated during the voyage, willi the same circumstances, except that in the last-named instance the melancholy silence usually following the " sullen plunge " was broken by a mother's grief. We were now fairly in tlie tropics. The weather had become extremely hot, but an awning pleasantly shaded the poop ; here the passengers were usually to be found, either in study or promenade ; these occupations lieing sometimes THE VOYAGE 7 vaiied l)y a game of leap-frog or a lu.sty romp. One day, while I lay stretched on the dock reading, the man at the wheel cried out, " A school o' whales ! " Havhig never seen a whale, I started np in great haste, but, placing my foot on a round stick, left there by the sailmaker, came down again with greater, receiving such an impression on the protuberant joints of one side as served to remind me of my first sight of a whale for a week after. The "school" (shoal) proved to consist of several grampuses and one immense whale, which the sailors averred was as long as the ship ; but that, being about one hundred and forty feet, seemed rather improbable. We saw him fill and blow several times ; which operation very much resembles the first puffs of steam from a locomotive engine just starting. The marine scenery of the tropics exceeded in splendour and variety all my anticipations. During the day the sky formed a superb dome of stainless and polished azure ; while, lighted from above by its one magnificent lamp, it constituted an object passing beyond the beautiful to the highest order of the sublime. At evening those two features of scenery were displayed in a combination scarcely attainable in any other field of nature. ^Vs the sun sank to the ocean, heavy clouds gathered about him, like sorrows round a deathbed. r>ut as the soul that is departing in faith makes pain, feeble- ness, and poverty but the means of more fully displaying its graces, so the setting sun made each cloud a prism whereby to analyse his golden light and exhibit its variety of hue. The whole hemisphere glowed with indescribable beauty. All nmud the horizon islets of gold were floating on the bright blue surface of the "ocean hung on high"; while in the west the assemblage of gorgeous forms and dazzling tints Avas such as to produce a bewildering ecstasy. The prevail- ing hues were burnished gold and the pure prismatic red ] but all the primitive colours were present, and formed them- selves into combinations so lovely and so various as equally to outstrip the vocabulary and delight the eye : the " pale 8 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE translucent green " of Bishop Ileber was one of the most pleasing ; wliile the blue, now combining with the red, now displaying its own brightest tints, exhibited every variety, from the deep purple of the pansy to the lightsome blue of an uifant's eye. On the craggy sides of many a mountain cloud were pencilled, with inconceivable effect, every hue that is delicate or brilliant, till the impoverished expression is glad to escape the difficulty of specifying by the aid of Mrs. Hemans' adroit summary, " the rich hues of all glorious things." The charms of the nocturnal heavens are not inferior. Not only are new and brilliant constellations brought within the field of vision, but the pellucid atmosphere gives to the most familiar stars a larger disc and brighter radiance ; Avhile numbers, barely discernible in our clime, shine out from their retirement with modest lustre ; the planets, and even some of the stars, casting on the wave streaks of silver light. "When the moon is dark, the sea itself becomes an object of great interest. Whenever a wave curls, the broken waters emit a brilliant phosphoric light, supposed to proceed from animalculae ; turn which way you will, the eye rests on numberless fires, seeming as altars of incense sending up their grateful flame to heaven. Sometimes, as the ship dashed along in her course, the spray cast from her side sparkled with such hues that you might have imagined yourself on a sea of liquid jewels: This marine phosphor- escence is known in northern climates chiefly to fishermen, who, on a dark night, after a draught of herrings, have their humble boat glowing with an illumination of more brilliant tints than the proudest metropolitan saloon. If God has treasured up such mines of enjoyment in every recess of a world stained with sin, what will be the display of His resources where trespass and defilement are unknown? I particularly remember, and shall never forget, one Sabbath night in those glowing latitudes. ( )n gaining the deck, after our usual evening service, the scene which THE VOYAGE 9 met our eye was not calculated to dissipate, but to renew, the feelings of devotion. It was one of those nights to be witnessed only on a tropical sea, when the moon and stars seem so bright, so large, so near, as almost to make you think you are looking on other things. Orion was stretching his giant frame across the mid heaven, his " studded belt " seeming newly set with richer gems. From the west, Venus flung a long stream of silver light which danced on the wave- lets of the peaceful sea. In the extreme north hovered the Great Bear, at once the memento of past scenes and the ornament of the present. A few degrees above the opposite horizon shone the four bright stars of the Southern Cross. Marshalled under these leaders, the celestial host thronged in countless multitude around their peerless queen; and the Milky Way was spread abroad, as the white banner of their peaceful march. That host was sublime from its very numbers ; and the impression became overwhelming by the thought that, though the least of them all was a sun, and the nearest at a distance too great to be measured, even by the giant hand of modern science,^ yet all were made, sus- tained, scrutinised, and ruled by the great Being, whose presence at our lowly devotions had been shedding such sweetness on our souls. We felt it was a time to worship. The temple was not to be sought. One of God's own rearing was encircling us, and "Keason's ear" heard, from the spheres suspended in its dome, a silvery chime, summoning us to praise and prayer. Yielding to the influence of our reflec- tions, we sat down on the taftrail, and, with feelings not to be described, sang Addison's inimitable version of the nineteenth Psalm. Such was the efl"ect produced by the "spangled heavens" on Christian missionaries : and yet the great sceptic poet, when describing their beauty as they beam on an Eastern sea, asks — " "Who ever gazed upon them shining, And turned to earth without repining 1 " 1 The successes of Bessol and Henderfon were not then known. 10 A MISSION TO THE :\IYSOrxE This is natural enough in a sceptic; for to him earth is "a forsaken and fatherless world." He must look on the glories above,, not as a child viewing the display of his father's wealth, hut as an exile gazing on the shore from which he is excluded. When approaching the Line, we fell in with two French ships, one being a frigate homeward bound from the South Seas. We spoke her, and requested to have a packet of letters forwarded, which was readily granted. Accordingly, a boat from our ship boarded her, manned by six noble- looking seamen, who might have served as a specimen of British tars, and certainly were calculated to make anything but a mean impression of their prowess. The two vessels lay nearly side by side for some minutes ; and it was a pleasing sight to view the two formidable ensigns — the meeting of which would once have been a signal for thunder and blood — peacefully spreading their folds within a few yards, and, as Campbell prettily expresses it, "wooing social the wind." Although quite prepared for a day of barbarous sport on crossing the Equator, I did not anticipate such a set routine of fun and absurdity as really occurred. One evening, when we were known to be very near the Line, it was generally reporteil that jS'eptune would board us. And accordingly, at nightfall, a noise of the voice species was heard proceeding from the bow — loud, grutf, and monster-like enough to have been that of His Oceanic Majesty when rebuking the violence of /Lolus. He demanded to know the ship's name and destina- tion. Tlie chief mate answered, and invited him to stay to tea. This he declined, on the score of haste, but promised to call in the morning, take a glass of grog with the captain, and see "some of his children who had never passed that way before." A vessel, purporting to be his car, was then dropped into the sea ; and, as it floated past, exhibited a tolerably forinod figure holding a trident, seated in a half- barrel, nearly filled with tar, which was blazing liercely. THE VOYAGE 11 The sea was (^uict, so that, as the car rose and sank on the gentle waves, the alternate flash and darkness were observable until lost in the distant horizon. The next morning we found a kind of booth standing on the waist of the ship, so constructed by means of tarpaulins as to contain a consider- able quantity of water. Over it was a board bearing the inscription, "Mr. JSTonsuch, escy shaver." After breakfast a procession came aft, with a great display of mimic pomp. A gun-carriage, decorated with flags, formed no despicable chariot, on which was seated l^eptune, — an old sailor dressed with some attempt at classical costume, and smeared over with paint. Beside him a lusty young tar, in female garb and richly rouged, personated Amphitrite ; while one of the boys, rejoicing in the title of " Master Xeptune " — Triton, I suppose, — shared the royal seat. This august vehicle was drawn by eight brawny seamen, disguised with grotesque painting and the most hideous masks. The charioteer, who, in all other stages of the proceedings, seemed to act as Mercury to the royal visitor, was so dressed as to look half Negro, half monkey. An elderly man, in shabby black and wearing a hat cut into squares, with the words "Doctor Syntax " chalked upon it, carried a portable medicine chest suspended round his neck, in the fashion of a street organ. Another, going on all-fours and covered with a sheepskin painted black, made a better representation of a bear than would be thought attainable- by the human form. This burlesque procession moved slowly along the deck, and halted before the cuddy door, where the monarch was mot by the chief mate, with whom he interchanged civilities. Amphitrite then sang "Rule, Britannia," all joining in the chorus ; and, in spite of the heathenish aspect of the whole scene, when the full deep bass of so many manly voices burst forth in the words of our national pride, every tone thrilling with the impulse of patriotism, I could not repress the heave of a strong emotion, nor abstain from ofl'ering a prayer that Britons never might be slaves. A dram was 12 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE theu circulated, which even the monarch did not disdain ; nor did Ursa forego his share. They next proceeded to the booth, beside which Neptune took his seat; the bear and his keeper making their way into the inside, and standing in the water. Outside, Mr. Nonsuch stationed himself, bran- dishing a piece of hoop-iron, having one side smooth and the other horribly rough. The smooth side he described as a " splendid razor, prepared by Queen Victoria's own barber " : this was for the passengers who would pay a fine. The rough side he called " a very good plain razor": this was for the use of those from whom nothing was to be expected but amusement. He was also furnished with a copious lather— of what composition deponent saith not ; but certainly not any of those which are so frequently the theme of mag- niloquent encomium in perfumery lists. These preliminaries arranged, Neptune, through his speaking-trumpet, ordered his children to be produced. Nearly all the passengers had voluntarily chosen to submit to the uncouth tonsure, and were assembled in the steerage, waiting their summons. The sailors Avho had drawn the chariot now assumed the name of "constables," and, proceeding down the after-hatch, speedily returned, leading the surgeon by a bandage passed round the eye?, and held tightly behind the head. A number of men had stationed themselves ready with buckets of water ; and the moment he set foot on the deck, dash went the contents of the first in his face, then another, and another, and another, in instant succession, until he was fairly seated on the top of the bootli, with his back toward the water contained in it, where the bear and keeper were anxiously waiting his descent ; while he of the bandage hold him with " no maiden's hand," ready, at the signal, to jerk him from his balance. Sundry ridiculous questions were then put, an ample lather applied, this scraped vigorously with the hoop, and then the jerk given by which he was precipitated backward into the water, where bear and keeper, pouncing on him, rolled him about till he managed to escape THE VOYAGE 13 by climbing over the side. After all the willing passengers had been attended to came the novices of the crew, who were much more roughly handled. Beside the rough razor, and an increase in every other stage of torment, Dr. Syntax put many considerate (juestions respecting their health and that of their family, taking occasion of the least motion of their lips in reply to insert a nostrum in the form of draught or pill. Their medical properties were not stated ; but, from the distance, they seemed to produce an instant and unique action of the muscles of the face. In almost every case these inflictions were borne with good humour : and when one or two showed symptoms of resistance, hot and heavy was the retribution which befell them. It is impossible that a custom so barbarous should continue to be tolerated, were it not that the monotony of a long voyage induces an ennui which makes any diversity acceptable to both crew and passengers. Sir E. Parry tells of beguiling the tedium of frozen winters in the northern latitudes by theatrical enter- tainments got up on board. This, no doubt, would afford amusement. But only imagine the officers, non-commissioned officers, and men of the Royal Navy turned into mimic play- actors and actresses ! Xo one will wonder at the ceremonies on crossing the Line who has witnessed the equally ridiculous, and far less modest, masquerade at Paris on the Sunday and Tuesday preceding the commencement of Lent. That takes place, not in a lonely ship, among rude sailors, but in the chief promenades of the belle of capitals, on the Sahbafh- day ; is shared in by both sexes, and gazed on by the haul ton of the country, whose glittering equipages, filled with ladies, crowd to witness the silly, contemptible, often indecent, exhibitions of thousands of male and female buffoons. And this is part of their religious routine — of what Mr. Keble would call their *' Christian year." Shortly after passing the Line we were favoured with the mild, steady breezes of the south-east trade-wind, which 14 A MISSION TO THE MYSOllE frequently carried us along at the rate of eight or nine knots per hour, on a sea smooth as a lake. This kind of sailing is delightful in the extreme. There is scarcely any motion : the water rushing past like an immense river gives exhilarating impressions of progress ; the ship spreading her volumes of canvas to the breeze furnishes the eye with an object of no common majesty and grace, — exceeding her own appearance under moderate sail, as far as the tree in full bloom does that of the early spring. The regularity of hours and absence of all temptation to wander make a ship not disadvantageous for study. Having learned a little of the Kanarese grammar before sailing, and being furnished with M'Kerrell's Grammar, Reeve's Dic- tionary, and a copy of St. Luke's Gospel, I was able to occupy myself with the language in which it would be my duty to preach. The want of capital letters, of divisions between the words, and of stops, makes the rudiments of Kanarese perplexing without a living tutor. From the commencement of a jjaragraph to its close there is no space between any two letters, so that you can no more tell, by the eye, where one word or sentence ends and another begins, than you can tell on a railway when you change counties.^ To be told that this custom obtains in the old Greek manuscripts may satisfy the student of its anti- quity, but even that does not make him feel it to be convenient. Mr. Pope, my companion in the same cabin, was occupied with the acquisition of Tamil; and day and night we toilel side by side, without being able to render each other any considerable assistance. Like other students, we had often to pursue knowledge under difficulties. Being young sailors, we did not know how to provide ourselves with the articles necessary to make a small cabin serve ' [Tins was true at the time ; Imt in modern Kanarese prose publi- cations, tliough there are no eapitals, words are divided and European methods of punctuation are larj^ely followed.] THE VOYAGE 15 conveniently the double purposes of bedroom and study. One item of furniture, though not " A bed by night, a cliest of drawers by day," served me for nightly repose and daily employment, taking in the latter case the office of a sofa. Table I had none ; so, seated on my couch, with Reeve's ponderous c^uarto of nearly fifteen hundred pages on my knees, my feet raised upon the rail of a chair, the grammar by my side, the gospel in my hand, and my sea-lamp hanging overhead, many a long hour did I spend in conquering the difficulties of our Lord's Parable of the Prodigal Son. All went on pleasantly enough when the ship was steady, but when she laboured it was no easy matter to preserve an equilibrium. What with the jolting of the books, the violent swinging of the lamp, and the effort to hold on, one was obliged to read by snatches, like boys in a class. Occasionally a violent pitch would dash chair, books, student and all to one side or other of the cabin ; while the effort to regain our former arrangement would be twice or thrice foiled by similar catastrophes before it could be accomplished. These diffi- culties may look formidable to one who has never passed beyond the threshold of comfort ; but they are nothing in reality. He that has an object in view so exciting as the acquisition of ability to preach Christ to the heathen, plods along without one thought of weariness or inconvenience ; loving to tread the rough furrows, because he sees them strewn with the promise of many a sheaf. The drudgery of conquering rudimental difficulties was enlivened by read- ing the works or memoirs of those who, under greater dis- advantages and fewer encouragements, had trodden the same path and attained noble results. The young missionary derives from the records of such heroes as Ziegenbalg, Carey, Schwartz, and Marty n the same incitement to lofty aims and giant toils which the noble Romans attril)uted to the statues of their ancestry. Their example kindles an intense ilame. 16 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE His heart burns to live as they lived ; the remnants of worldly feeling are discovered in their lurking-places and warned away ; while the fused affections are cast into form in the apostolic mould, Near the island of Trinidad the trade-wind failed us. Up to this time our progress had been so rapid that the officers began to talk of completing the voyage in thirteen weeks. But, after losing our steady friend, we were baffled with light and contrary winds, so as to make scarcely any progress for a fortnight. This lengthening of the voyage wonderfully shortened the temper of almost everyone on board, except the sailors, who said that the fair wind was the owner's wind, but this wind was their wind ; for the longer the voyage, the more money to draw. This view of the case surprised me, but it evidently comforted them. The result of the regular noonday observations, by which is ascertained the progress made during the twenty-four hours, was always a matter of interest to the passengers, but now they were to be seen pressing round the officers as eagerly as the politicians of a village round the coach which arrives from the county town during a contested election. At length, however, cloudy skies, cold rough winds, turbulent seas, and the appearance of several beautiful birds, called Cape pigeons, indicated an approach to the region of the Cape, the half- way house of the Indian voyage. The passengers frequently amused themselves by shooting the poor creatures, which never fell into their hands, and would have been of no use if they had ; but, dropping into the water, they must, when only wounded, have died a lingering death. These torments were inflicted for that cogent reason which justifies all kinds of cruelty to fish, fowl, and quadrui)eds — sport. Magic word ! which transforms the ugliest barbarism into a captivating pleasure ! The pigeons were joined by a large dark bird called the Cape hen, and also by several albatrosses. Of these latter two were caught, which measured ten feet across the wings. This feathered convoy bore us company for several weeks. The voyage 1^ Kot intending to touch at the Cape, we stood considerably to the south, and, in latitude 40°, encountered one of those gales for which that region is so notorious. It blew for upwards of two days, and Captain Foord, though an officer of long standing in the Honourable Company's service, stated that he had never seen it worse. But with a good ship, an admirable commander, and competent crew, nothing occurred to excite grave alarm. The bulwarks were dashed to pieces, a soldier had his leg fractured by the breaking loose of a water-cask, and a cadet who occupied one of the awning cabins had it literally filled with water while he was asleep in his cot, a sea having swept the ship, carried away his dead-lights, and burst in upon him at once through both window and door. He was almost drowned, and could scarcely believe himself when, gaining the deck, he found the ship gallantly riding the waves. AYith the exception of falls, bruises, and copious aspersions, we were preserved, by the mercy of Providence, from injury. I could not help comparing the storm, when at its height, with the anticipations raised in my mind by descriptions of that spectacle. In almost every case you are told of mountain- waves, and that you cannot conceive the terrors of the scene* Now, the fact is, you find no wave anything like a mountain j and most probably you have carried your conceptions to a pitch by which the reality loses much of its effect. While you remain below, the roaring of the wind and the rush of the sea make the voice of the storm fearfully impressive j and to look at the waves from the narrow cabin windows, you are obliged to assign their height by imagination, for you cannot by the eye. It is here where you feel the shock, and listen to the roar of the tempest, without being able to watch its movements, that the impression is most appalling. The ship pitches, writhes, and trembles beneath you, every joint in her giant frame groaning doleful complaints against the violence with which she is assailed ; the howling of the wind, the rush of the seas making a highway of the deck, l8 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE the moaning of the ship, sound like the shock of the onset, the struggle of contending feet, and the cries of the wounded. On deck the scene is truly grand. The sky is black, rugged, and shifting ; the wind terrible, with its alternate gust, "sough," and lull; the sea heaped up into a ridge of low hills on either side. The ship lies wriggling in the dale, like a winter tree, the masts stripped of all their clothing, the storm staysail being the only stitch of canvas set. A' billow is rushing forward, with its white crest shaking like a lion's mane. Nearing the bow, it looks so lofty, that she must be overwhelmed ; but, with mingled delight and appre- hension, you see her rear herself upon its base ; then rapidly mounting, till the summit is gained, she dashes forward, as if rejoicing in her escape. At that moment a cross-sea strikes on the weather-bow with a dull sound, like the stroke of a battering-ram : the noble bark shudders like a child in a thunder-clap ; and, while you are quivering by sympathy, a fierce surge careers along the deck, making your firmest grasp needful to prevent being borne away. When you emerge, the ship is reeling on the top of another wave, as if to shake off the moisture of her last immersion ; and just as this passes from under her, it strikes fiercely on the counter, in seeming anger at being foiled in its assault. While staggering from the effect of this after-blow, a broken sea, like an ambush attacking in fiaiik, dashes suddenly upon the weather-beam. Instantly the topmasts seem nearly touch- ing the water ; the firmest hold of rope or bulwark can scarcely save you from sliding down the almost vertical deck ; it seems impossible the ship can right. Volumes of water rushing over you confirm the impression that the moment of danger is come ; but a counter-swing restores you to your footing, and shows the bow jilunging bravely into another billow. The whole scene is sufficiently awful ; and, if one but give way to fear or fancy, it nmst be easy enough to make the waves mountains, the gusts artillery, and to crowd the picture THE VOYAGE 10 with gigantic forms of horror. The lesson of a storm is one of humility. Each cloud may he the engine of destruction ; you cannot bid it hurst elsewhere. Each blast may bring the additional strength necessary to crush you ; you cannot divert its course. Each sea may capsize or overwhelm your ark ; you cannot lighten its stroke by a single drop. Sur- rounded by agents all potent to destroy, there is not one on which your skill can work the least amelioration. The sky, the wind, the wave, are eloquent with the announcement— " God is all in all." You can do nought but meekly crave His compassion or mutely await His will. And, when the danger is past, man has had no hand in averting it. It came upon you, pressed you on every side, brought you to your " wits' end," showed human help to be vanity, and then dis- appeared. You are safe again ; that safety is sealed with the hand of God, and attests itself His own gift. You see His agency through no obstructive instrument ; you have been dealing directly with your Maker. Therefore " being glad, because they are quiet, they praise the Lord for His goodness." From this time we proceeded in an almost directly eastern course, until, having gained the longitude of Madras, we turned northward, and began to look forward to the close of our voyage. The probable time of landing, the people, man- ners, and productions of India, now become exciting subjects of conversation. We had some amusing instances of the difficulty with which missionary motives are understood by the world. One evening a gentleman who had spent several years in India said to me, "If you take my advice, you will go, not to the Mysore, but to the western coast." To this I replied, that it Avas not my intention to say a word to deter- mine the station Avhich might be assigned me. This he strongly objected to, on the ground that a young man ought not to leave himself in the hands of others. " But why," I inquired, "should I prefer the one country above the other 1' "Why, for one thing, you would have a much easier situa- 20 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE tion." " But I don't want an easy situation ; I am going on purpose to work, and intend to work as hard as I can." " Well, but you could save a great deal more money, for it is a much cheaper country." " But I don't want to save money ; I intend to leave the country no richer than I entered it." "Oh, then," was the final reply, "if you don't want either ease or money, it doesn't matter where you go." Another gentleman, in conversing on our mission duties, said, " I suppose you will have a pretty good thing of it." I replied that no doubt our provision would be quite suffi- cient. " How many rupees per month will you have 1 " I was obliged to confess my inability to answer this business- like question, and replied by simply stating that, being confident our Committee would make a provision adequate to my wants, it had never once occurred to me to ask what that provision would be. This elicited a look of all but incredu- lity ; and he said, laughing, " Well, I never before heard of a young man coming out to India without knowing what was before him." This conversation, being reported among the passengers, excited some attention ; and possibly they re- garded me as very much of a simpleton, until they had discovered that each of my three companions had been equally negligent to inform himself respecting his financial prospects. God forbid that our glorious mission work should ever be committed to men who could wait to consult pro- spects and negotiate terms ! Marius aptly designated as homines p-op/^rAs/o-i those who first assumed the consulate and afterwards commenced to study military tactics. lUit exquisitely preposterous as is an undrilled general, a mer- cenary missionary is abundantly more so. We soon re-entered the tropics ; and about that time my sea-sickness, which had faithfully pursued me hitherto, abated. At the second passing of the Equator, a calm de- tained us for two or three days. The sea was glassy, but not still. Every ripple disappeared from the surface ; but there were long, heavy swells, like undulations in an ex- THE VOYAGE 21 tended sheet of tin. The smooth surface strongly reflected the liglit of a blazing sun ; the glare was dazzling, the air motionless, the heat oppressive. It was an unquiet sleep for the giant ship ; she now lay perfectly still, now turned heavily on her side. The canvas fretted upon the yards, and flapped against the masts, like an impatient steed chafing his bit. Pjveryone looked the picture of ennui and lassitude. The very atmosphere was languid and unable to spread its wings. It is often said that even a storm is preferable to a calm ; which is quite true, so long as the storm keeps below the danger-point. During one of those breathless nights I was called from my bed to witness the capture of a shark. He had been discovered, by the moonlight, sailing round the ship ; was hooked, haided up, and, after a stout resistance, despatched. He proved about seven feet long, and was cooked by the sailors, who, with the soldiers, were glad of some fresh food to vary their salt provisions. It looked very coarse, but is eaten freely in the South Seas, and also, I believe, on some parts of the coast of Spain. Three months had just elapsed since our last glimpse of land. During that time a few ships, birds, and fishes were the only tokens that we were not alone in the world. Day after day, week after week, it had l>een to our eyes as of j'ore to the Trojan exiles : Caelum undicjue et undique pontus. After Captain Foord had taken his usual noonday observa- tions, on the 30th of August, he said, " If the wind holds, we ought to see the Friar's Hood " — a mountain in Ceylon — "about three o'clock." Someone expressed a doubt of his being able to calculate so accurately. He replied that it was quite possible he might be out in his reckoning " a handful of degrees"; "but," said he, with a smile, which did not indicate much doubt, "we shall see." About half- past two, a man aloft cried, "Land on the weather-beam." Instantly passengers, soldiers, sailors, all, were straining their eyes in the direction indicated. It was some time, however, before any landsman could distinguish anything from the 22 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE clouds. At length the outline of an elevated coast disen- tangled itself, and the telescope shortly gratified the eye with groves of palm — the region so long pursued was at length hefore us. It was a moment of gratitude and joy. The memory of dangers, apprehensions, and prayers, of mercies unnumbered, fears disappointed, and hopes fulfilled, came crowding upon the heart, and elicited a burst of praise to God. After a while, the summit of the Friar's Hood rose upon the view, fully attesting the accuracy of Captain Foord, and offering an example of the perfection to which naviga- tion has attained, certainly not less striking than the case made so famous by Captain Basil Hall. The groves of tall and branchless palm were soon visible to the naked eye, looking, in the distance, like groups of Corinthian pillars, with disproportioned capitals. On the jidge of a wooded hill rose a huge volume of smoke, showing that we were not gazing on solitudes, but that men were there. We could not help wondering how they were em- ployed. Were they mourning over the conflagration of their village 1 Were they gazing timidly in the distance on tracts of sunburnt grass, which a spark had ignited, and which the flames were sweeping with resistless haste ? Were they lioting in some heathen feast? Were they performing some occult sacrifice, far from the eye of civilisation and reproof 1 We wondered how it might be ; and while we wondered distance covered the hill. Some journals had led us to expect that the shores of the spice-bearing isle, now beneath our eye, would greet us with aromatic gales. On naming this to Captain Foord, he smiled, and bade me ask the chief mate. My applica- tion to him also produced a smile; and, after a time, the exjtlanation that, in the earlier days of voyaging, sailors took great delight in imposing upon the less-travelled lands- men. Accordingly, on nearing the shores of Ceylon, a few sticks of cinnamon were ignited and carried to windward, so as to difi'iise their incense over the whole ship. The THE VOYAGE 23 delighted olfactories of sea^wearied passengers hailed, in this odoriferous gale, the promise of voluptuous festivity. The next day found us again out of sight of land, sailing with a light breeze under a cloudless sky and directly vertical sun. On coming on deck the following morning, I found a lengthened line of low coast close upon our starboard, In the distance, apparently right ahead, was Avhat seemed to me a ridge of breakers stretching into the sea, To this I called the attention of the officer on watch, who said, " Why, that is the town of Pondicherry." That the town of Pondicherry ! I then felt that I was looking on the continent of India. Leanhig over the bulwark, and gazing on the extended coast, the tufted palms, the shining surf, and the distant city, what a crowd of confused but exciting suggestions rushed upon my mind ! Home, with its endearments ; the dangers and mercies of the voyage ; the duties and hopes of my mission ; native splendour, and European enterprise ; Delhi, with its mosques ; Benares, with its pagodas ; Jagannath, with its immolations ; the sati pyre ; the pilgrim train ; the Thug banditti ; Timour and his conquests ; Aurangzib and his magnificence ; Hasting.'^, the changes of his lot, and eloquence of his impeachers ; Dupleix, his talents, victories, and humiliation ; Clive, his meteor course and maniac end ; Schwartz, the John of the Indian apostles, by meekness, integrity, and zeal, rising, without genius, to the loftiest heights of character and achievement ; Hyder, the Napoleon of the East ; Tipii, uniting the natural cruelty of Nero with the religious bigotry of Mary ; Carey, with the faith of Abraham and the powers of Grotius ; Wellington, rising on the farthest horizon of our Erai)ire, and culminating at the very steps of the throne ; Martyn, with his seraphic piety glowing on deep constitu- tional melancholy, like sheet-lightning on a black sky ; — these, with images of heathen temples and orgies, Christian congregations and sacraments, sped across the mind in exciting disorder, and raised a state of feeling which baffled 24 A :\rissiON to the mysoee analysis ; but tiie prevailing elements were gratitude and hope. It was a day of restless excitement. Every eye was fixed on the shore, every glass extended, every voice busy in discussing the probabilities of landing that night. All were as impatient for Madras as a schoolboy for home when returning at his first vacation. The wind Avas blamed for not being steady enough, the current for not being strong enougli, the ship for not being fast enough, and the captain for not crowding sail enough. We passed Pondicherry sufficiently near to see some vessels, and to distinguish the governor's house. In the afternoon a native boat hailed us. Then St. Thomas's Mount was descried. Just as the sun was setting in a gorgeous horizon, the spire of St. Andrew's Church was announced in sight. This speedily congregated the passengers on the forecastle ; and it was not with ordinary pleasure that, by the help of a glass, I traced the slender forms of several masts, and three church spires, pencilled on the brilliant ground of the western sky. The Roads of Madras, thronged with English and native ships, were presently in full view. Fort St, George and a line of lofty buildings stretched behind them. The distinctive flags were got ready to signal our ntime. "We could see the flagstaft" on shore, and witness the hoisting of what there could be no doubt was the question, "What ship is that?" l»ut the distance was too great to read even the language of Marryat's code. The light failed rapidly. Our ready signal was laid aside. Just as night fell we cast anchor opposite Fort St. George, and made u|) our minds to sleep once mo^e in our sea-home, CHAPTER II MADRAS The night was moonless. The lighthouse lamp blazed before us. The well-known appearance of two lights, in rapid transit, told us, ever and anon, that some fellow- countryman was whirling in his buggy ^ along the beach. Glimmers in the distant south indicated where St. Thome stretched along the shore. The starlight faintly showed the tall, unearthly forms of the English ships, sluggishly rolling on the waves ; while, on the other hand, a bristling underwood, barely traceable, marked the situation of the "mosquito fleet," as our sailors delight to call the native craft which throng the northern portion of the jNIadras Roads. The scene was strange, and still, as to all human sounds ; but the hoarse voice of the surf roared in the distance, like a storm upon a grove, with occasional lull, but instant repetition, A sudden flash crossed the scene, followed by a peal of man's mimic thunder. Then came the roll of a drum beating to quarters the crew of a man- of-war that lay close by. Rising wild and high above the moan of the surf, a harsh noise was heard from the direction of the shore, which seemed to be vocal, but whether articulate or inarticulate, — the strain of one voice, or the effort of many — was at first a mystery. As it neared, however, a voice was distinctly heard performing a something. I had heard lilting song and holy anthem, the glee of mirth and the keena of bereavement, — but never anything with which the strange ^ [A species of light gig, high and with a large hood.] 26 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE tones of the unseen warbler might be classed. Its uncouth strains, sounding in the darkness of that exciting scene, awoke strange imaginings. One could not but wonder what would have been the effect of such a phenomenon ou the superstitious crews of Columbus, had it visited them on that anxious night when, after the first glimpse of the Caribb lamp, they were held in doubt as to whether the morning sun would reveal that wondrous Ind which they were pursuing, or only the blank of sea and sky opening before them,— nature's silent reproof of their leader's temerity. We learned that the singing — for singing it was, but such as only Tamil boatmen can achieve — proceeded from a catamaran. It ceased by our ship's side ; and presently we had on deck a man of light frame, nearly jet black, and destitute of drapery, except a very scanty morsel. On his head was a neat conical cap, of soft, mat-like texture, made from the leaf of the jjalmyra tree. Doffing this, from between the plies, of which it had two or three, he pro- duced a note from the master attendant to the captain. This was the first I had seen of the people of that great country which was to be the place of my future labours ; and never before had I gazed on a human being with such feelings. I thought of the multitudes he represented ; of the deep, deep sinfulness in which they lay ; of the super- stitions that crushed, and the vices that polluted them ; of their identity with ourselves in origin, fall, immortality, and redemption : and, as I thought, my heart grew full and heavy. If ever I olfered a prayer, it was then, — that God would give me grace to preach the gospel to these, the brethren of my nature, but strangers to my hopes. Charged with letters from almost every passenger, he presently took his departure, with the same wild chant as before. A catamaran (literally, "tied tree") is a raft formed of three cocoa-nut trees lashed firmly together, the middle one being a little longer tliau the other two, and the whole so MADRAS 27 flattened on one side as to make a surface nearly even, and to preserve the same side uppermost under all accidents of weather. It measures about fifteen feet, and carries two or three men ; one of whom, by means of a paddle, navigates with great dexterity and ease. The body of the raft being almost wholly submerged, the appearance from a distance is very singular, the men seeming to tread the waters. They are free and unencumbered navigators ; no drapery embarrasses their persons ; their bark can spring no leak, lose no rudder, nor sink in any sea. When the terrors of the surf are not to be faced by any species of boat, they venture without fear, are swept off by a wave, climb on again, are once more overwhelmed, again remount, and so effect their passage. When at any distance from the coast, dispensing with the paddle, they show you a brown three-cornered sail, with two or three black men, skimming along the surface of the sea in a style which recalls all the lake legends of fairy skiffs. Tliose whose nautical excursions have never carried them beyond the region of saloons, stewards, and pantries will not so much covet the position as they will honour the self-denial of Mr. Percival, when told that in the prosecution of his mission duties he has more than once passed on these exposed and comfortless floats, from Negapatam on the continent to Jaffnapatam in Ceylon, — a distance, I believe, of about eighty miles. The sound sleep that had followed a day of unequalled excitement was broken at morning light by a perfect storm of the same wild songs which had formed one of the wonders of the preceding evening. From the cabin window a crowd of awkward boats and black men were seen thronging the ship's side. Hastening, without loss of time, to the deck, I found a large number of natives, presenting, in their grace- ful costumes, a pleasing contrast to the nude Neptune of the catamaran. To form an idea of a respectable Hindu, take a man of the middle size, with a light, supple, graceful figure, the complexion of a dark hazel-nut, a good forehead, small 28 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE but regular features, a black eye — quick, intelligent, and curious — and a moustache covering the upper lip. On a head closely shaven you })lace a turban of white or turkey-rod muslin, with stripes of gold j a tight frock-coat of calico, with' out any collar and white as snow, clasps round the base of the brown neck ; a piece of the same cloth showing a broad stripe of gold or crimson forms a kind of flowing trousers, which cover the person nearly to the feet in front, but behind leave the brown leg, from the calf downwards, standing out in contrast to their white folds. The costume is completed by a pair of red slippers, always down at the heel ; while the toe, spreading to a great width, turns up in a curl. You are struck at first by a mark on the forehead indicative of the religious sect to which he belongs ; it is frequently in the form of a trident, having all the parts white but the central prong, which is bright yellow. In other cases it consists of three stripes, which cross the whole breadth of the forehead, intersecting a dark circular mark in the centre. The trident, or any vertical mark, designates a worshipper of Vishnu ; horizontal marks point out the votary of Shiva ; and those sects which unite the worship of the two rival divinities combine both. Of figures such as this a large number were perambulating the deck inquisitively eyeing the new-come Europeans, who stared at them not less in(|uiringly in return. They made free ofleis of their services for different employments^ exhil)iting certificates of character, and describing their qualifications in tolerable P^nglish. The passengers, having been more anxious to see the natives than to make a good impression, had contented themselves with a hasty toilet, and were all in morning attire. I stood amongst them in like garb, without anything to designate my office ; but a native, after glancing round, walked right up to me, and said intjuiringly, "Master missionary?" IJeing the only missionary at that moment on deck, this impressed me strongly with his power of discernment. Further inter- MADRAS 29 course with the people abundantly confirmed that impression. They are keen students of character. One of the first things a Hindu does when introduced to an Englishman is to scan him thoroughly, mainly with the view of deciding in his own mind whether or not he is a liopislitaim, " a man of anger." For, by some means or other, they have got the impression that a white face, though a very respectable thing in India, is not in itself an absolute guarantee against infirmities of temper. The deck at this moment afforded a scene of uncommon variety and animation. There were the red coats of the British soldier, and the blue of the British tar, mingled with the light, snowy costume of the Oriental and the unclad sable of the boatman. Presently pale-faced Englishmen in round jackets of white calico jumped on deck inquiring for their friends. Then came joyous meetings. Some of the soldiers looked wistfully on, and their eye seemed to say, " There is no one to welcome me." The rising sun shone on Madras. A line of noble buildings stretched along the northern beach, their chunam fronts glistening in the morning beam. The sombre fort was right in front, with its white lighthouse and church, spire ; while the ensign of England, waving from the flagstaff, seemed to proffer us both welcome and defence. The minaret of IMuhamniadan mosque, the tower of heathen temple, and the spire of Christian church were equally sharing in the brightness of the new sun. To the left the eye caught sight of many detached dwellings scattered along the shore, and looking like the villas adjacent to English towns. The city looked fair and beautiful, but the pleasure of the prospect Avas repressed by the recollection that it was "given to idolatry." Three missionary brethren — INIessrs. Haswell, Male, and Fox — soon welcomed us to India. Having taken leave of our truly kind and gentlemanly captain, we left, with hearts full of gratitude to our gracious God, the ship where we had spent so many days and seen so many mercies. Months of 30 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE preservation on the sea, the happy close of a long voyage, the presence of Christian brethren, the knowledge that we were again amongst sanctuaries, and the hope of shortly preaching among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, Avere thoughts under which the soul thrilled with no common emotion. We looked to the ship with thanks, to the shore with prayer. We found ourselves seated in a large, clumsy boat, with high sides of rough plank. It was manned by a crew of ten, eight men rowing witli long, thin sticks, having a flat piece of wood at the end like the fluke of an anchor ; and these puny oars, instead of playing freely in the rower's hand as with us, are tied to a pin in such a way as to permit the performance of the necessary evolutions, and yet secure them from escape in all emergencies. They pulled with more energy than order, and ?ang excruciating ditties all the while. These ungainly conveyances, called viastila boats, are rendered necessary by the peculiar character of the landing-place. Along the coast of Coromandel a surf of three successive waves rolls heavily upon the strand. Even in fine weather it is loud and high, but in a storm terrific. No European boat can cross it. Its violence at Madras has l)revente(l the formation of any harbour,^ and compels ships to anchor in the open roadstead at the inconvenient distance of a mile or upwards from the shore. The vias/ila boat is the only safe medium of communication. It is constructed of planks -which, after being bent by fire, are not nailed to timbers as in English boats, but are fastened to one another by a monster seam. The edges of each plank being pierced with numerous holes, a cord of cocoa-nut fibre is employed as a tliread, and thus they are literally sewed together, although that term conveys an inadecpiate impression of the strength and compactness of the frame. Held together thus, ' [A good liaibour, built at very great cost, liaR been in existence many years now, and passengers by steamer generally land at the pier, not through the surf as in Mr. Arthui'a time.] MADRAS 31 they easily yield to the pressure of the wave, Avhen it is removed resuming their natural shape, and in this way arc able to dare the surf in which none of our boats can live, unless, indeed, the new and beautiful process of building recently introduced into Chatham dock-yard, in which timbers are dispensed with, be found to combine the requisite strength and pliancy with the elegance of a British man-of-war's boat. The morning being perfectly mild, the surf was low ; but the shock of its three waves Avas sufficient to accredit the accounts given of its violence in stormy weather. The power of these comparatively small waves, where there is an evident progression of the water itself, strongly confirms the hydrostatic theory Avhich regards the propagation of sea- waves, like those of a cornfield, as not consisting of any progress of the agitated body, but simply the progress of an undulating motion, while the particles affected by it vibrate in a vertical line. The dangers of those inshore waves which, though the body of water is small, yet carry it in a forward direction, clearly show that if the huge masses of elevated water which form the waves of the open sea had a forward motion of anything at all like the apparent velocity, not only must the very first of them overwhelm a ship, but a violent storm in any part of the ocean would be attended Avith consequences of a most destructive character, even in remote provinces of the watery domain. The last of the three waves cast our boat aground upon the beach, on which the men leaped out and laid hold to prevent her being carried back by its return. Two men from the shore then ran into the water, carrying a small arm-chair on their shoulders which they presented, and, receiving a passenger, hastened to the dry beach where, having discharged him, they returned for another, and so on till we were all stand- ing safely and thankfully on the soil of India, to which many cheerful faces of various hues gave us a hearty Christian welcome. 32 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE In a few minutes Mr. Fox was driving me briskly through Blacktown in his buggy. The streets are of tolerable width, and occasionally lined with rows of palm. The houses are for the most part built of mud, flat-roofed, only one storey high, without windows, and beautifully whitewashed, thus present- ing a continuous line of smooth white wall, broken only by narrow doors. Projecting about two feet from the wall, a raised seat of the same material, and similarly whitewashed, runs along the whole extent of the street, and is broken by a kind of pillow-like elevation, which divides unto each house its share ; thus affording an agreeable open-air couch for the inhabitants. On these were seated a number of men, some cross-legged, like tailors ; others with their black eyes peep- ing over the knees, which stood up dusky and meagre, support- ing the cbin ; others again, resting the weight of the whole body upon the heels, a position which, though less disagreeable to the eye of a European than the last named, is more dis- tressing to his feelings, as he is put in pain for the poor man's heels and toes. These are the usual positions of the natives : the climate is so dry that no danger arises from sitting on the ground, and consequently the use of chairs would only be increasing the number of their wants without any correspond- ing addition to their comforts. For, though we may think otherwise, they feel more easy in their own posture than on a chair. I have seen a native, on taking a chair, fidget from side to side, backward and forward, and in every other way by whicli he could express uneasiness, until, taking courage, he pulled up his legs, crossed them under him, adjusted him- self with an air of great complacency, and so sat perched as we are wont to see Eastern kings painted on their musnuds. Several women were passing along the streets ; they are about the middle size — slender, symmetrical, and brown ; the hair — long, glossy, and jet black — is gathered into one heavy and ungraceful clumi) behind. An elegant flowing garment covers the person from the waist downwards ; from the right side a fold of the same piece passes across the shoulders, MADE AS 33 leaving the small of the back exposed, but covering the chest, and even the face, when the wearer pleases. In some cases a very small, tight bodice is added ; for without this the other robe, like the Roman toga, requires the hand to pre- serve it in position. The favourite colours are purple, white, yellow, and red ; frequently plain, but often also in stripes or checks ; while a broad border, of some bright contrasting colour, is always disposed with great taste. The dyes are, to an English eye, very striking, as, probably from the advantages of climate, they have a vividness which we cannot give ; while the white far surpasses our finest bleach. Tlius attired, with the left hand supporting a waterpot on the head, and the right carrying another, the Hindu housewife returns from her morning errand with an air of considerable grace, but defective vivacity, presenting a figure more pict- uresque than animated. The waterpots are exactly the shape you would obtain by taking a cabbage, covering it with brass, and leaving a large aperture at the top of the form of a tulip. Eut no description, and no European drawing, can give so accurate a view of the natives of India as is aiforded by their own drawings on talc, where you have the colours of person and costume, the shape of implements, and the air of easy listlessness or pompous conceit, with amusing exactness ; while the very defects in perspective seem to render the picture all the more instructive. Besides the ladies who had been with their waterpots to draw water, a number of others were engaged in an occupation strange to Western eyes, — diligently gathering into baskets all the cow-dung they could find on the streets. This is as much a domestic duty as the former, and serves also both cleanly and culinary purposes. It is spread in broad patches on a wall for several months, to bake in the sun, and then used for fuel. Part of it is employed, while fresh, to wash the floors and walls of the mud-built dwellings ; for which purpose it is highly service- able, when plentifully diluted with water. Odd as this may sound in English ears, everyone who has proved the 3 34 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE (lifFerence between a dirty choultry ^ and the cleanly freshness of one just washed out with this strange preparation, will bear testimony to its utility for that unlikely purpose. Many other females appeared at the doors sweeping their houses, or marking the ground just before the entrance with white stripes of the ashes of cow-dung, crossed into various checks, according to taste. This is done as a kind of cleanly orna- ment. It is a favourite amusement with writers on India to rate at the natives for dirtiness, but it is done in perfect ignorance of their domestic habits. Though the whole scene was novel and interesting, one aspect rested on it all, one thought was continually recurring, — it was a city given to idolatry. The men and women before me were wont to worship and kneel down, not before the Lord their Maker, but before things themselves had made ; the houses I was passing contained idols ; at that instant incense was ascending to scores of miserable stocks ; and hundreds of accountable immortals were in the act of pro- stration before man-made gods. These were thoughts to chill the heart, to invest eternity with redoubled awe, and to make the soul yearn for the time when God should look down upon earth and see no rival to His claims, no wanderer from His fold, A short drive carried us through the northern gate of the city into the suburb of Royapuram, where we were most hospitably received at the house of Mr. Orme, who kindly became our host in the absence of INIr. Crowther, then at Pulicat. We immediately sat down to breakfast, which differed only from a bountiful repast of the same kind in England, by the addition of several Indian fruits and such a profusion of dishes as made it resemble the French dejeuner a la fourchette. With tea and coffee, bread and butter, toast and eggs, one seemed rather more at home than suited the idea of an Oriental meal ; but yet the strange fruits, the crowd of black attendants, the play of switches protecting you from ' [A [tlace of rost and slielt'T for passing travfllors. ] MADRAS 35 Hies, and the swing of the punkah above, sufficiently attested a strange land. The favourite term to describe a punkah among Indian tourists is a " large fan." It is hard to imagine what idea will be formed, by a person wlio has never seen one, of a fan large enough to serve a whole company, and playing overhead. You have observed by the side of a country inn a sign-board suspended so as to flap about with the wind. Now just fancy one of these, instead of being nearly square, extended so as to stretch the whole length of a long diniug-table ; you suspend it from the roof — for ceiling there is none ; in place of the wind, you use a line which, being attached to the punkah, is carried through a doorless doorway into another room, where stands a servant, and, by slow but constant pulling, produces a refreshing motion of the air. It is said that some of the patricians at Rome had such a multitude of slaves that one was constituted nomenclator, being charged with the duty of reciting to his master the names of the others, who were so numerous as to require an official memory. I am not aware that this ancient and reputable custom has yet been introduced among our countrymen in India ; but certainly their retinue is such as to suggest its desirableness. This arises partly from a will- ingness to live in state, partly from the inactivity of the natives, who believe the doctrine that many hands make light work, and partly from their habit of considering the several offices of menial service as so many different trades. The man who cooks the meat would as soon think of washing the plates as would a milliner of making horseshoes ; and the man who grooms your horse would as soon think of cutting grass for him as a hosier would of making hats. All the servants find, or profess to find, their own provisions ; sleep about the verandahs or outhouses, no one ever dream- ing of affording them apartments, and receive wages ranging from five to ten rupees a month, according to the dignity of their office and the wealth of their master. 36 A MISSION TO THF. MYSORE After breakfast we were summoned to family worship. It is always refreshing to sanctify our mercies by the Word of God and prayer ; but on this occasion the hymn seemed passing sweet, the word flowed with fresh unction ; and few can tell the feeling with which the missionary breathes his first prayer on heathen soil. The soul has no greater thoughts than those with which such a moment supply him. Separated from home and its joys, the world and its excite- ments, he there gives up spirit, soul, and body to be employed of God in conferring, by the gospel, life and immortality on multitudes who are hopeless and unholy. The knowledge that he is doing God's will, the hope of winning souls, and meeting them in heaven, fill his breast with a lofty happiness which must strangely contrast with the feelings of those who land on such shores with no higher aim than to get a living, or make a fortune, or earn a name. During the morning we observed in the neighbourhood a high pole, with the appearance of some machinery at the top, on which sat a large bird, of bright brown plumage marked with white. The pole, we learned, was erected for the barbarous uses of the chedil feast, ^ about to be cele- brated ; and the bird was that species of vulture which receives divine honours from the Brahmans, being that of Garuda, the steed of Vishnu. To look on those two objects, and think of the worship the one was wont to receive, of the torments the other would be used to inflict, they seemed a meet emblem of idolatry pedestalled on human woe. Whilst walking in the verandah some snake-charmers approached, and forthwith began to show us their skill. They produced several bags and baskets, containing serpents of the most poisonous kind — the cobra di capello ; then blew upon an instrument shaped like a cocoa-nut, with a short tube inserted, and producing music closely allied to ' [Vhedil-attam is the Tamil name for the Hook-swinging festival in honour of Marianima. " Chedil" is the name of the machine, i.e. the post and long swivel used in swinging.] MADRAS 37 that of the bagpipe. The animals were brought forth, raised themselves to the music, spread out their head, showing the spectacle mark fully distended, and waved about with con- siderable grace and little appearance of venom. The men coquetted with them, and coiled them about their persons, without any sign of either dislike or fear. This power of dealing with creatures so deadly is ascribed by the natives to magic. Europeans generally account for it by saying that the fangs are extracted. But the most reasonable explana- tion seems to be, that, when the snake is first caught, by a dexterous movement of the charmer the hand is slipped along the body, until it reaches the neck, which he presses so firmly as to compel an ejection of the virus — thus destroy- ing, for a time, all power to harm ; and that this operation is repeated as often as is necessary, to prevent the dangerous accumulation. If this be true — and I believe it is — noth- ing is necessary to the safe handling of these reptiles but a knowledge of the laws which regulate the venomous secretion. The wonder seems to lie in the power they possess of attract- ing the snakes by their rude music, and seizing them, in the first instance. But enough is known to make it evident that, in what all natives and many Europeans regard as mysterious and magical, there is nothing but experience, tact, and courage. With a Hindu, the cobra is the most sacred of reptiles. Most of the natives pay him divine honours ; in some places he has temples consecrated to his special worship ; and not even the charmers, who seize, imprison, and sport with him, will take away his life. The grounds of this are several : Shiva makes him his chief ornament ; Vishnu reposes on his ample folds on the sea of milk, and the whole earth is sustained upon his head, which has consequently a llatness observable on the back part of it when distended. The native Romanists are said to account for this by saying he was the serpent that tempted Eve ; and that she, retiuiring help to reach the fruit, availed herself of the offer of his head, which the pressure of her foot flattened. As illus- 38 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE trative at once of their astronomical system and their rare talent for flattery, the following circumstance may be named : — A Brahman desirous of a court appointment had obtained an introduction to the celebrated Bhoja Raja, and, entering into learned discussion, delighted his majesty by the display of superior parts. After having exhausted his store of pro- blems, in the vain attempt to perplex the candidate, the king, in despair, demanded to be told why the serpent was made ■without ears. " Oh," said the pundit, nothing at a loss, " the reason of that is very plain. When Bramha -was engaged in the work of creation, he foresaw that, in process of time, Bhoja Raja would arise, and, by unequalled achieve- ments, spread his fame through the fourteen worlds. Some great Rishi, in his delight, would hasten to Adi Sesha, the serpent who upholds the world, and recount the wonders that were astounding the universe. Adi Sesha, trans- ported by the matchless rehearsal, would forget his position, and, as he does when delighted with music, would shake his head, by which the world would be cast out of equilibrium, and all things be reduced to confusion. To })rcvcnt this otherwise unavoidable catastrophe, the serpent was made without ears." But though they, in theory, hold serpents to be deaf, they never walk in a grassy place at night with- out making a noise to frighten them away. And, notwith- standing their veneration, I have known them to stand quietly by to see one killed ; and the low-caste people make curry of the flesh, which they pronounce a delicious dish. We spent the night under the same hospitable roof. The beds used in India are very hard mattresses, generally of cocoa-nut fibre, with pillows of the same substance, so unyield- ing that someone has humorously compared them to petrified meal sacks. A single sheet is the covering, and mosquito curtains of thin gauze complete the equipment. It would be hard for the Madras magistrates to impose a worse punishment than to make a man lie — sleep if he could — on a good feather bed, with Holland sheets, Witney blankets. MADRAS 39 Marseilles counterpane, and damask curtains. A comfortable bed in England is a warm one, in India a cool one. The next day we attended a prayer-meeting, held in the schooh'oom under our Blacktown chapel. The larger part of the persons present were Indo-Britons ^ ; and it was no small happiness to hear fervent thanksgivings for our preser- vation and prayers for our usefulness oifered up to God by persons themselves the fruit of missionary labour. For a full description of this chapel, as well as for many particulars connected Avith the mission in Madras and the Tamil country generally, I would refer to the valuable and accurate work of Mr. Hoole ; a work full of information on the customs, literature, and religion of the Hindus, and quite free from the exaggeration and incorrectness by which so many clever books on India are vitiated. At this meeting we first met with 'Mv. Crowther, who received us with a most affectionate welcome, and conducted us to his own house, where we were kindly entertained during the remainder of our stay. It was on this occasion I first entered a palanquin, and shall not easily forget my excessive discomfort at being carried by my fellow-creatures. But when one learns that the men are cheerful and content, have no other means of living, and are, physically, one of the finest castes of men in the country, though he does not be- come wholly reconciled to it, he feels it would be as unreason- able to refuse to employ them as to refuse to burn coal in England because your fellow-creatures must live and toil underground to obtain it. To form an idea of a palanquin, look at the body of an omnibus, and you have the exact shape ; only just imagine it removed from the wheels and reduced to about six feet long, with a corresponding decrease ^ To this class the name "half-caste" is odious, and "cotuitry born" distasteful. They like "East Indian," but that is unintelli,i,dblc, for persons in Europe would suppose it meant natives. ' ' Imlo- Briton," is at ouce acceptable and signilicaut. [The universally accepted name now is " Eurafian."] 40 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE of the other dimeusions. The entrance is on the side, which is open or close at pleasure, by means of slidiug doors. From the centre of the end panel projects a thick pole for about four feet behind and before. The passenger, having entered, has the choice of lying full-length, sitting up as in a bed, or, as the natives do, cross-legged ; but other posture he cannot adopt. Three men seize the pole in front and raise it upon their shoulders, three more do the same with the one behind, the head bearer strikes up a song, and the whole start off at a quick trot. On the Sunday morning I proceeded to Royapettah in order to be near St. Thome, where I had to preach at night. Here first it was my happiness to see a native Christian congregation, of which the number was small, but the appearance devout and pleasing. Mr. Haswell read the Liturgy and preached in Tamil, and though I could not understand a single sentence, yet the scene awakened reflec- tions which made it a season of surpassing interest and profit. In the afternoon Mr. Haswell went to distribute tracts and converse with the multitude he knew would assemble in the immediate vicinity to celebrate the cliedil feast, and I gladly embraced the opportunity^ of accompanying him. We found an immense crowd in an open place around a pole similar to the one we had remarked at Royapuram. They received the tracts offered, and freely entered into conversation ; but all that passed was secret from me, except so far as looks might happen to reveal it. It is a fearful thing to see a number of men met together to do evil. Dut when the evil is part of a system, when it is accounted right and even religious, when it includes both dishonour to God and cruelty to man, when nations are in sympathy with the deed, and when, standing amidst them, you see theni rush along the road that leadeth to destruction, and are not able so much as to say, "Turn ye, turn ye," — oh, then there is a pressure upon the heart, the intensity of which none can tell, but he that Avith a Christian's feelings has looked upon the abominations MADRAS 41 of heathenism perpetrated on the Sabbath. A movement in the crowd presently called our attention towards the pole. From a slicd placed near it was led forth a man naked from the waist up, but having round it a cloth so tied that a part of it formed a kind of bag, which was filled with flowers. A little below the shoulder appeared two large hooks, inserted into the back, one on either side of the spine. ^ Across the top of the upright pole was another of great length, and so affixed that it could revolve freely, and either end be lowered or raised at pleasure. A rope was attached to each extremity. One of these was seized, the end of the cross-beam was lowered nearly to the man, the rope was passed through the loop of the hooks, and tied fast. Four men began to pull upon the rope attached to the opposite end, and thus gradually raised that to which the poor victim was attached. He bent for- ward, was lifted from the ground, and hoisted into high air amid the plaudits of that great concourse over whom he hung quivering. The men holding the rope then began to move slowly round, causing a corresponding motion in the other end of the transverse beam, by which the miserable object suspended from it was made to describe a circle in the air, where, as he writhed and shudderetl, he frequently took a handful of llovvers and let them fall on the crowd below, by whom they were caught up as if an angel were scattering blossoms from the tree of life. After having four times traversed the circle, the poor victim was taken down and led away. jNIr. Ilaswell continued earnestly conversing with the people, and distributing tracts at such intervals of excitement as permitted tlie withdrawal of their attention from the spectacle, until four persons had submitted to this revolting penance. Disgust rendered a longer stay impos- ^ [This is not now, to the best of niy knowleilge, permitted or practised anywhere. The feast is still heUl, but hooks are no longer inserted in the devotee's llesh. A rope is placed under the arms or round the loins, and the swinging is thus reduced to a harmless amusement.] 42 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE sible ; and, as we left, I could hardly prevent my desire for the ability to preach Christ to those multitudes from heaving into impatience. Sympathies, at once poignant and ennobling, are stirred in the breast of a missionary standing amid masses of heathen. The heart bleeds to think of their darkness, but finds large consolation in the assurance of being an agent, however humble, in God's great plan for their regeneration. Faith opens the view of better days, when Jehovah shall be honoured and man blessed ; hope exults in the prospect, and joy; unique and fervid, glows upon the heart. Then does the gospel seem glorious, and the commission to preach it an unspeakable gift. When standing by the deathbed of the venerable Henry Moore, I asked him, " Were you again young, would you wish to apply your life to any other purpose than that to which it has been devoted 1 " The aged servant of God, raising him- self in his bed, and looking me steadfastly in the face, said warmly, " No, not at all, not at all : the best thing a man can do, the very best, is to preach the gospel."^ It is truth. To be employed as God's instrument in making men good is the noblest, happiest, most remunerative application of our brief but momentous life. Would to God that every Chris- tian parent and every Christian youth felt it so ! Then we should not see the otfer of a cadet's commission, a merchant's partnership, or a civilian's appointment hailed as "a good thing," and a commission to preach Christ to the Gentiles re- luctantly yielded to Avith speeches about heroism and sacrifice. During our stay, the friends at ^Madras held their Cen- tenary meeting, having purposely delayed it till our arrival. It was numerously attended, and evinced the same spirit of holy joyfulness and gratitude which so remarkably charac- terised like assemblies at home. INIany delightful testimonies were borne to the power of saving grace. From some of the statements it appeared that a few pious individuals had ' The Kcv. Henry Moore, tlic friend and biographer of John Wesley, who iliid at the ago of nincly-thrcc. MADHAS 43 formed themselves into a society, adopted lules very similar to those of the Wesley?, and taken other measures remark- ably coincident with the usages of Methodism, before they had any correct information of its character, and previous to any of our missionaries reaching their shores. During our stay we visited St. Thomas's Mount, which, beside its religious celebrity, has a military importance os the depot for the Company's troops. The drive is said to be one of the finest in India, and certainly is the most interesting in the neighbourhood of Madras. Leaving Black- town, you cross the spacious esplanade, which is flanked on the east by Fort St. George, with its sloping glacis and all but impregnable rampart, beyond which rises the roar of the " much-resounding sea." You shortly pass Chantrey's noble equestrian statue of Sir Thomas Munro, a man who, by emi- nent talents, unswerving rectitude, and careful attention to the people's interests in the various offices to which his merits raised him, attained a reputation among the natives of South India far higher than that of any other European. In the remote villages the brilliant name of Clive is forgotten, that of Wellington barely known ; but Munro's is cherished and dwelt upon with the liveliest admiration. I have known a native say, with evident pride, when asked from what country he came, "I am from the country of Munro," mean- ing the Ceded Districts. I once heard a Brahman bitterly complaining of the ]\[adras authorities for placing his statue in the open air, as he thought exposure a mark of deficient respect; and added, with as much feeling as if resenting an insult to his mother, " I saw an unclean bird perched on the head of the illustrious ]\Iunro." It is said that in the districts which were favoured so long with his judicious government, the natives frequently call their children by his name ; and that, soraewliere near Gooty, a likeness of him is kept, and treated with a veneration very similar to that paid to their gods. As you proceed, the way is crowded with pedestrians, 44 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE steeds, and equipages. The English soldier, the brown native, and the Indo-Briton, M'ith light garments and leisurely pace, move along in continuous and picturesque succession, a stream almost as constant, but not so impetu- ous, as the torrents of Cheapside and the Strand. Mingled with these are the light Arabian horse, the sturdy Persian, the sprightly Pegu pony, the bullock, belled and caparisoned, and occasionally the tall, soft-paced camel, bearing riders in the respective costumes of England, Persia, and Hindustan. Then you have the open carriage, with a black groom holding on by either side, and keeping pace with the horses, however fleet, brandishing their switches the while, as a warning to all mosquitoes ; buggies, with the master driving and the servant pursuing on foot ; native carriages, with a dome- shaped roof supported on four pillars, showing you the portly bust of some Hindu seated cross-legged, while the coachman, perched upon the pole, urges on two bullocks, each graced with a necklace of tinkling bells ; then there are palan(|uins, with their troop of singing bearers ; tonjons, with pale children and black ayahs, and of bandies ' no end. The way, thus animated, is lined by rows of trees, among Avhich you recognise the aloe, the palmyra, yellow tulip, mango, banyan, and lime. At every few perches a neat gate opens into a cultivated enclosure with a handsome residence, while a glow of intense sunlight sheds brightness over all the scene. The Armenian bridge of Marmalong is an inter- esting object, near which is a Romish church, said to stand on the spot where tlie Apostle Tliomas had his residence, and whence he took liis last flight when assailed by the heatlien. The Mount, distant from Madras about eight miles, is an isolated cliff of granite, rising abruptly from a plain near the shore, and crested by a simple but picturesque Romish churcli. Steps have been cut in the rock to facili- tate the ascent, which they may do in the case of the infirm ^ [Springless carts drawn by bullockw and used for all purposes of transport.] MADRAS 45 or timid, many of whom doubtless are to be found in the crowds of pilgrims resorting hither ; but, for my own part, I would much rather clamber a hillside, however rugged, than drag up flight after flight of dull, heavy stone steps. The summit was the first place from whence we obtained any extensive prospect of the country. To our east spread the wide and placid sea, fringed by the foaming surf, and agreeably spangled by the strange sails of the dhonie and catamaran. Immediately below us lay the cantonment, with its barracks and bazaar, the noble English church, and our own beautiful gothic chapel ; enlivened by figures in light costume, and the evolutions of the soldiery at drill. The view inland has but little interest, the land spreading abroad in one extended flat, with a few hills in the distance, scat- tered clumps of trees, and paddy-fields of rich green; but not anything to save the landscape from an air of dulness and monotony. Persons at home are apt to look at every- thing Oriental through an atmosphere of beauty and romance, with which the books read in childhood surround them, and which those of after years too often leave undisturbed. Lands where the orange and lime, the banana and tulip tree, the talipot and banyan flourish ; whose soil imbeds diamonds and nourishes incense ; in whoso forests elephants range and peacocks glitter ; where the tedious night never abridges the day, nor the dew-drop chills to frost; where nature never puts on the hoary covering of a barren age, but stands always dressed in the green of prolific youth, — such lands, it is thought, must be far fairer than the commonplace scenery at our own doors. But it is not so ; our groves and gardens, our fields and flowers, are lovelier than theirs. Palms are graceful, but, when constantly before the eye, the branchless and scaly shaft becomes monotonous ; banyans, when many-trunked, form an object of singular interest, but their occurrence in such specimens is not so frequent as to affect the general aspect of the scenery ; and, on the whole, though the woods of India never are leafless as ours in 46 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE January, they are never equal to them in May, either as regards appearance or perfume. Those who have wandered in the woods of Bolton Abbey, by the banks of the Dart, the Avon, or the Wye, have stood on Croagh Patrick or Richmond Hill, or sailed on the waters of Lough Erne or Lough Gill, need not sigh for the region of cloudless suns, nor envy " the green of its shores or the blue of its skies." But it was not possible to stand on St. Thomas's Mount without other reflections than those suggested by the land- scape. On this spot tradition states that the apostle, having fled from his usual dwelling-place, before referred to, was overtaken and slain. On the strength of this tradition the church now standing was erected by the Portuguese, and time was when their warships never sighted the sacred place without greeting it with the honours of a royal salute. A Christian missionary then was not likely to stand here without asking, " From that plain below did the very hand which our blessed Lord called to touch His sacred wounds point the eye of nations to their God ? And did that hand, on this very spot, stifl"en in a death incurred for love of Him whom once he doubted 1 " The authenticity of the tradition is matter of dispute.^ But be the decision of history what ^ Hamiltoii doubted not ; Bishop Heber believed it firmly ; and Captain Swanston, in a paper on the "Primitive Christians of Malayala," in the Royal Asiatic Society's Journal boldly states : "This is not asserted on the authority of any obscure tradition, but unites in its favour all the proofs which can wairaut its correct- ness ; the accumulated testimonies of the lirst ages of the Church, of St. Jerome, of St. John, surnamed Clirysostom, Athanasius, and Easebius." Mr. Hough, however, to whoso historical researches Christianity in India is greatly indebted, has given to the question a lengthened review, and concludes decidedly against the tradition. He does show that in the ancient ec(desiastical histories of the West it has a very slender foundation, but does not iuforiu us of the records held by the native churches, or what credit he supposes due to tliem, — an omission which certainly weakens the impression of his argument. His own Images, however, contain enough to show tliat his conclusion is no more free from historical dillicuUics than the other ; nor, indeed, so MADRAS 47 it may, it was not to be expected that Romanism should exist near a place favoured with such a rich mine of pious marvel as that presented by this tradition without adopting means to develop its resources. Accordingly, after the Portu- guese had established themselves in the neighbourhood, their priests, as quaintly narrated by Hamilton, discovered the lance with which the apostle had been slain, and the cross stained with his blood, which, with other relics equally genuine, are preserved to this day, and occasionally exhilnted for the edification of the pilgrims resorting to the holy place. St. Thomas's Mount is to the Romanists of India Avhat much so. The tradition exists, and lias existed from a very early age. If we deny its truth, it is but reasonable that we account for its origin. This Mr. Hough endeavours to do by referring to two persons of the name of Thomas, who, having an early connection witli the native churches, might have been confounded with the apostle, owing to the identity of name. It is not professed that either of these intro- duced the gospel into India ; for Mar Thomas lived in the ninth century, and Thomas the Manichee in the latter part of the third ; whereas Mr. Hough admits the existence of Christianity in India previous to the mission of Pantivnus from Alexandria, which occurred in the second. Now, the existence of churches in the second century being proved, it follows they could not adopt the name of any labourer subsequent to that period as the name of their founder ; and that, if adopted at all, it must be on account of eminent influence and reputa- tion. But had any man attained such consideration amongst them, that they delighted to be called by his name, they would surely not have rejected his doctrines ; and there being no kind of proof that these churches embraced the heresy of Manes is strong presumptive evidtnce that whosoever might be the Thomas from whom they took their name, he was not a Manichee. All the information given of such a missionary is thiit Manes "is said to have sent one of his disciples named Thomas into India to propagate his heresy " ; which certainly is slender ground whereon to rest a grave conclusion. As to Mar Thomas, Mr. Hough himself scarcely goes so far as to attribute to him the origin of the name ; and that he should at all cite him in the case is not easily accounted for, when he himself informs us that in the seventh century the claims of the patriarch of Seleucia were disputed, on the grounds that "the Christians of Persia and India were Christians of St. Thomas," a statement sutliciently proving that a person who lived in the ninth century could have 48 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE Croagh Patrick is to those of Ireland, or a Becket's tomb once was in England. On descending from this remarkable eminence we found a good company assembled in our elegant little chapel, where we held a missionary meeting characterised by lively feeling and liberality. I cannot refer to this chapel without being reminded of a circumstance which occurred at a subsequent visit, wlien, after the service, a young man in artillery uniform came into the vestry. He was introduced to me by Mr. Pope as the son of one of our ministers at home, a man of great distinction and respect. His looks indicated a full nothing to do with giving them that name. Again, he notices the celebrated mission of our own Alfred the Great to the "shrine of St. Thomas in India," which, leaving England as it did in the same century as that in which Mar Thomas flourished, proves that in the West a belief prevailed that the apostle had laboured and died in India long before it could possibly have arisen from a confusion of two persons separated from each other by so many centuries. From what- ever source the primitive churches of India derived the name of Chris- tians of St. Thomas, and whatever may have been the origin of the tradition which ascribes that name to an apostle, it seems tolerably plain neither is to be found in the persons from which the historian of Christianity in India supposes them to have arisen. But besides these matters of consideration furnished by j\Ir. Hough's own pages, there are others which go strongly to corroborate the tradition. We must take into account the ancient origin of those churches, their own confident belief that the apostle founded them, their use of the Syriac language, and the assertion of their own historians (see Swanston's Treatise as above), that up to the year 345 there had been no foreign bishop or clergyman amongst them, — a fact which goes far to confirm the opinion that the India visited by Pantajnus was, as so many good authorities suppose, not Hindustan but Ethiopia. Another fact of great moment is that the Jews on the Malabar coast have a tradition, stating that their fathers landed in India in the year of our Lord 69, and that the Apostle Thomas had reached it seventeen years before, having arrived in 52. Now, as this leaves a space of nineteen years after the ascent of our Lord, and mentions a time when the intercourse with India had just become greatly facilitated by the enterprise of Hippalus, there is about it an air of considerable probability. As Parthia is named l)y Eiisibius as the sphere of St. Thomas's MADRAS 49 heart, and he said, " I have just heard from home. My father is dead." He wept sore, reproaching himself bitterly for conduct which he feared had shortened the days of the excellent parent he was now lamenting. After his feelings had somewhat subsided, lie told us that had this terrible news reached him only a short time before, he feared to think what the consequences might have been ; but that God had in mercy brought him to a state of heart in which he was better able to bear his self-reproach. " For some time," he said, " I have felt the burden of my sins, and longed to become a new creature ; but in the barrack-room I had little opportunity to seek God, and was interrupted in every attempt to pray. At last my desire became so earnest that I resolved to seek Him where I could do so in ministry, we should have been led naturally to expect that he would penetrate into the north of India, which lay so adjacent, to which attention had been long directed, and which had been made compara- tively known by the residence of Megasthenes at Palibothra, which, notwithstanding the opinion of Robertson in favour of Allaluibad, appears to have stood on the site assigned by Major Rennell at the junction of the Sone with the Ganges near Patna. But the appear- ance of Christianity so near the apex of the peninsula renders it very improbable that it was carried thither from the north, and points out the commerce with the West as the channel of its introduction. Here lies the only dilliculty of believing that the labours of Thomas called Didymus were the first which ever brought Christ to the knowledge of Hindus. Bishop Heber states that the passage from the Persian Gulf was then quite common, — a statement, however, which cannot apply to the Persian ports, as there did not then exist any maritime commerce from that country, in consequence of the religious aversion to the sea entertained by its inhabitants — an aversion never overcome till when under Artaxerxes they had thrown of the Parthian yoke, which event did not occur till the third century. Now, as no port was open on the Arabian Sea, or the eastern shores of the Persian Gulf, the missionary must have sailed from some port in Arabia or Egypt. To the former country the traditions of Malayala ti'ace the apostle, so that the only difficulty is to reconcile the statement of Eusebius, that his sphere w'as Parthia — a very wide term, with the fact of his being found in Arabia some twenty years after the commencemeut of his labours, which difficnlty, we apprehend, will not be esteemed formidable. 4 50 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE quiet. So, retiring to a grove of cocoa-nut trees, I there knelt down, poured out my soul to God, cried for mercy, and continued wrestling with Him until He was pleased to reveal Christ in my soul, and to give me the sense of His pardoning love. Had it not been for this, what should I have done now ] " There was every token of sincerity and true penitence. "We rejoiced over him greatly, but with trembling ; for, knowing the temptations by which he was surrounded, it was impossible not to have apprehensions. The event, however, showed that the work was of God. He continued steadfast, left the army, and obtained a respectable situation. His health failed, he was ordered into the interior, and on the journey was attacked by cholera. His only attendant was his excellent wife, to whom he had not long been united, and who now watched the agonies she could not alleviate, closed his eyes in death, and committed him to a lonely grave far from any place where Christians bury. She has since been called to follow, but survived long enough to tell of the peace and hope which comforted her husband during his last struggle, and animated her amid the gloom of her own bereavement. We doubt not that now father and son are together before the throne of God and of the Lamb, adoring His mercies, and rejoicing that He sent His servants to the far country whither the prodigal had wandered. During our stay at INIadras, the missionaries of the different denominations met to spend an evening at Mr. Crowther's. This they are in the habit of doing monthly, at one another's houses in turn, for the purpose of mutual profit, by con- sidering subjects connected with missionary enterprise, and offering united prayer. There were present Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Independents, and Wesleyans, being all the Protestant denominations having establishments in Madras. This exhibition of union and love is most refreshing, and yet it is melancholy that our miserable littleness has reduced us to a condition wherein even natural co-operation assumes the aspect of an attainment, and wherein we are pleased with JIADKAS 51 ourselves for just beginning to be something like what our religion requires. Being ignorant of the Tamil language, the vernacular at Madras, it was not possible for me, by personal observation, to learn much of the state of religion among the natives. The oldest mission is that of the Romanists. It is probable the Portuguese found some Christians on their arrival at St. Thome, and managed to incorporate them with their own church. At one time they had large numbers of natives who called themselves Christians ; but the disputes of the clergy amongst themselves so violently agitated their congregations, and brought upon them such reproach, as greatly to diminish their influence. When the English established themselves in Madras, so far from taking any steps to spread the* truth, they thought the importance of their place might be increased by a settlement of monks ; and, accordingly, some Capuchins were invited. One of these, not being sufficiently a Mary-worshipper to suit the Romanism of India, was cajoled beyond the English terri- tory into St. Thome, there kidnapped, hastened off to Goa, and immured in the Inquisition. Some time after, a party of English landed in that city, and went about seeing the "lions" of the place. Among others, they wished to view this far-famed tribunal of religious terror, and were admitted; but no sooner had they gained an entrance than, like Glenara's accusers — "Each mantle, unfolding, a dagger displayed." The gate was immediately secured ; then, rushing into the presence of the Inquisitors, they presented to that astounded tribunal the unwonted alternative of instant death or the surrender of their victim. Caught for once in their own snare, they yielded, and Father Euphrem was borne back in triumph by his deliverers. The Romish cause, thus be- friended, has not languished, although the number of their adherents has never recovered the loss occasioned by the wars of the monks. In the year 1811 there were in ^ladras, 52 A MISSION TO THE MYSOKE St. Thome, and the neighbourhood fourteen priests, — some Portuguese and some from Maynooth. These two parties, rekindling the embers of former fires, had been vigorously contesting their rights, and suing each other in the courts at ]\ladras. They have several large churches. The uniform testimony of everyone, lay or clerical, whom I consulted as to the character of their converts, was that they are not superior to their heathen neighbours in any point of enlighten- ment, civilisation, or morality ; that they wear heathen marks, maintain the heathen institution of caste, and participate in heathen festivals ; while they have many processions, and such like, which are only accommodated heathen ceremonies, adopted to conciliate, and remove all idea of difficulty in passing from the rule of the Brahman to that of the priest. The Church of England has long had a valuable mission at Yepery, a suburb of Madras, where there is a noble Gothic church, a priiiting-press, and a considerable number of converts. This establishment is under the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, which also has a station at St. Thome. In Blacktown the Church Missionary Society have a large chapel in an important cause ; also an institution for training natives and Indo-Britons for the work of carrying the gospel to their countrymen. There is also a bishop, with several chaplains ; but, as they receive their appointment and salary from the Company, they are regarded as Government officers, and confine their labours to the English, none of them preaching in the native tongues.^ The London Missionary Society has a large chaj^el in Blacktown and another in Vepery. The American brethren, besides several schools, have a large printing establishment, which employs a considerable number of presses, and is conferring incalculable benefit on the country. The Church of Scotland had also three missionaries, who now belong to the Free Church. They conduct an English school, in which ' The liishop. however, takfs the supervision of tlie missionaries of the Church of Enjiland. MADRAS 53 an excellent education is given, and every means taken to imbue the minds of their pupils with Christian truth. Some recent successes in their labours have so alarmed the Brahmans that steps were taken to agitate the whole country asainst mission schools. Our own missionaries have several schools, congregations, and small societies. Taking all the labourers together, they are, as compared with the magni- tude of the work, few, very few ; but their faith is unshaken, their hope high, and their resolve steadfast to proclaim Christ to the multitudes who surround them, until, moved by His attractions, they shake themselves from the dust and rise to lay hold upon His strength.^ Schwartz tells us that in his early days he sought in vain for a pious European in India ; and I have myself heard an old missionary say that when he first was in the country he knew not one. At that time Englishmen were in the habit ' [This description of missionary agencies in and around Madras needs now, happily, to be greatly supplomented. There are at least eight great Missionary Societies at work there, representing England, Scotland, America, and Denmark. They differ in name and organi- sation, but they are all evangelical in spirit, and they work in com- plete harmony. The department >< of mission work have multiplied greatly during the past sixty years. Women missionaries were then practically unknown ; now they are numerous and invaluable. Medical mission work was not then in vogue ; now it is steadily increasing. Literary activity has developed enormously, stimulated on the one hand by the Religious Tract Society and Christian Literature Society, and on the other hand Ity such splendid missionary printing estab- lishments as that of the American Methodist Episcopal Mission. The " English School " mentioned by Mr. Arthur has developed into the United Christian College of Madras — one of the most remarkable missionary institutions in Asia. Dr. Miller, its Founder and Prin- cipal, has seen an organisation grow under his hands which is contributing most intluentially to the conversion of India. The neighbourhood of Madras has also seen, and is still seeing, a very successful work among the Pariah classes. During all these years, Mr. Arthur's own Mission, the Wesleyan Mission, has fully held its place with the others. Its work has grown steadily, alike in variety of range, intensity of influence, and in visible results.] 54 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE of saying they left their religion at the Cape of Good Hope, where they should resume it on their way home. They were faithful to the spirit of this surrender; their State religion was Paganism, their private devotions paid at the shrine of Mammon, of Bacchus, and of Venus. But, by the blessing of God on the word of His grace, there is now another state of things. Profanity has grown timid, intem- perance is awed into secrecy, and the miserable copyist of Eastern voluptuousness is a rare excrescence upon Anglo- Indian society. Perhaps there is not any similar number of our countrymen among whom may be found a larger pro- portion of persons truly converted to God than the civil and military servants of our Indian Government. The fol- lowing extract from the work of a French writer, M. de Warren, reviewed in the Church of England Quarter] i/, though designed to caricature the piety which — blessed be God — is cherished in the hearts and families of so many of our countrymen in India, yet affords an important testimony of its existence, and so delineates some of its features, that Christians at home will gratefully recognise the family like- ness. Speaking of Madras, he says: "At my last visit, in 1840, I was struck with the change that had fallen upon all social relations. The saints, as they are called in the country, have spread themselves like a leprosy over all society. A dark fanaticism — excusable when it is sincere, but odious when it is a hypocritical mask, assumed by avarice or ambition — has invaded everything. Merchants and civil and military functionaries of the highest rank, who desire to economise almost the totality of the profits of their enormous salaries, assume this mask voluntarily enough, in order to escape from the obligation of contributing to the pleasure of the community, and from the exercise of a ruinous hospitality which was once almost exacted from them. In place of dinners and balls, which once cost them much, they now entertain you with sermons, whicli cost them nothin" Youul' men who wish to advance in life MADRAS 55 also put oil the same mask — -which suits them even more indiflferently still — that they may find favour with the power- ful and obtain appointments from them. Thus, at Madras, a man had need to be upon his guard : an invitation to a dinner, or even to a soMe, is nothing but a trap. Immedi- ately after the repast, or previous to the introduction of the refreshments, the master of the house compels you to purchase or to expiate your pleasures by keeping you at least an hour on your knees, while he gives forth a sermon, under the guise of a prayer, with all the nasal recitative of the Roundheads of the time of Cromwell. In my preceding visits to Madras I considered that I had fairly to complain that the English seldom spoke ; but, like the father of the dumb girl in the AL'decm mahjre lui, I confess that I pre- ferred their silence of former days to their rhapsodies of the present, and I would, with all my heart, have rendered them as dumb as they were used to be." On the last day of the sixteenth century, that springtime of great men and great events — the century of Luther and Knox, Galileo and Bacon, Tasso and Spenser — the virgin Queen of England aftixed her name to a deed, incorporating " the Governor and Company of the Merchants of London trading to the East Indies." Little thought the clear-sighted Elizabeth that such a transaction was destined, in the pro- vidence of God, to give a wider sweep to the sceptre of her successors than any other of her reign. Little thought the "merchant adventurers" that, in the scroll then presented, they laid the first stone of a monument to their country's prowess far more colossal than any her Edwards or Henrys had reared. And little did the century that followed promise such wonders. The early days of the British enterprise in the East — like the youth of Clive, who first raised it from adventure to empire — were remarkable only for a want of promise. Over- awed by the Portuguese, beaten by the Dutch, circumvented by the French, and despised by the natives, our countrymen maintained a precarious existence of little measures and 56 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE great murmurings. The islands were their main desire ; but, driven by the jealous Dutch from one post after another, they sought refuge on the coast of Coromandel. Here, again, pursued by the rivals, they were compelled to abandon their first settlements at Masulipatam and Pulicat. At length they found rest at Armagaon ; but that settlement proved unsuitable for trade, and another was desired. Thirty years after the signing of the first charter, powers to purchase land for a new town were granted to Mr. Day, the English agent at Armagaon, by Sri Ranga, Raja of Chandragiri. At the place assigned was a local naik, whose father was named Chinappa ; in deference to the wishes of this officer, the new town was, after his father, called Chinappa Patam, or the city of Chinappa ; under which name, contracted into Chinapatam, it is still known among the natives. The origin of this great city, like that of others more ancient and more renowned, was sufficiently humble. "At the Company's first beginning to build a fort," wrote the local agency to the Presidency of Surat, " there were only the French padres, and about six fishermen's houses ; so, to entice the inhabi- tants to people the place, proclamation was made, in the Company's name, that, for the term of thirty years, no custom of anything to be eaten, drunk, or worn, should be taken of any of the town-dwellers."^ But the Theseus of Coromandel, intent, like his Athenian prototype, on an aggregated population, did not confine his inducements to mere fiscal immunities, but proceeded to add ecclesiastical attractions. He, as already stated, encouraged the settlement of Capuchin monks ; not, as INIr. Hough very naturally supposes, with the view of afibrding the benefit of their instructions to the members of their own community already settled in the Company's territory, but for a reason, to him, far more cogent, namely, " in order to draw the Poituguese from San TIiouk', wlio, being considered as Eur()j)eans, would add to the military reputation of Madras, con- ' St'c Ornie's Fraiiincnlf, Note xxxviii, MADRAS 57 sequently attract the resort of the natives, and with them an increase of trade." ' Thus, at the foundation of our oldest existing Presidency, religion was made the handmaid of secular advantage — a procedure which, however derogatory to our national character, has, unhappily, not been confined to obscure factors and struggling enterprise, but been too often adopted by exalted dignitaries, ruling an empire, the very magnitude of which might have made salutary impres- sions of responsibility. Fourteen years after its foundation, the new city had attained such importance as led to its being erected into a Presidency, having Bengal dependent. During the early part of its existence, the whole Carnatic was swept by the armies of Viziapur - and Golconda ; but it was too insignificant to excite their jealousy, and therefore escaped unhurt. The first enemy who threatened its peace was Daudd Khan, one of Aurangzib's generals, who, in 1702, laid inefi'ectual siege to it ; after which time it enjoyed forty years of peace, rapidly increasing in commerce and importance. In September 1746, La Bourdonnais arrived on the coast; a man who, by genius, courage, enterprise, and moderation, was equally fitted to conquer or govern, and who, had his employers in France only possessed similar foresight, and had he met with a coadjutor instead of a rival in Dupleix, Avould, in all human probability, have crushed the nascent power of England in the East. He had imported to the INIauritius a number of Africans, called, in the histories of the times, " Cafires," but more likely Mozimbiques ; had them trained in military discipline, and, with an army consisting of one thousand French, four hundred sepoys, and four hundred Africans, aided by a fleet from which the English admiral commanding in those seas had run away, he commenced a vigorous investment of the place. Five days reduced the garrison, consisting of two hundred men, to the necessity of ' See Orme's Frcu/moif-; Note xxxviii. -' [Best known as Bfjapilr,] 58 A MISSION TO THE .MYSORE signing articles of capitulation, by which it was agreed that the French should take formal possession, receive a stipulated ransom, and then deliver up the place to the English. But Dupleix, having already formed the project of an Eastern empire, with France for its head, and himself for its exe- cutive, foresaw that the English would be dangerous rivals, and, in direct opposition to the honourable remonstrances of La Bourdonnais, violated the agreement, marched the Madras authorities in triumph through Pondicherry, bravely repulsed the Nawab of the Carnatic, who appeared with a large force to claim fulfilment of a promise that Madras should be his reward for services rendered to the French against the English, and retained the place for three years, until com- pelled to resign it by the treaty of Aix la Chapelle. Though these proceedings were for the time so disastrous to the British, yet to them may be traced the foundations of that pre-eminence which they shortly after began to acquire, and have since maintained. Up to this time they were under awe of the Mughal armies, and formed their own solely of Europeans. Dupleix defeated a Mughal force by one of very inferior numbers, and had in his ranks an efficient auxiliary, formed of natives whom he had trained to the European mode of warfare. Thus he taught his opponents, as Peter the Great said Charles xii. did the Russians, the way to beat himself : the English learned the superiority of Euro- pean to native valour and discipline, as also the possibility of raising from the natives a valuable force. They were not slow to practise these lessons, and l^y so doing have become masters of Indin. The flight of ten short years brought another French armament under the walls of Fort St. George. Count de Lally was a man of great bravery and talent, whose enmity to the English was not the result of national jealousy, as in the case of La Bourdonnais, or of personal ambition, as in that of Dupleix, but of that fierce religious rancour which characterised the Irish Papist of his days, and is yet far from MADRAS 59 being extinguished. He landed in India with the full intention of extirpating the British from that country ; marched on Fort St. David, where they had been sheltered during the time that Madras was in the hands of the French, took it, and razed it to the ground ; occupied Arcot ; assailed Madras, taking Blacktown, and laying formal siege to the fort. The siege was active, the defence resolute : two months elapsed before any decisive advantage was gained. The breach was reported practicable, the assault ordered for the hour when the moon should set, Lally was exulting in the hope of a triumphant to-morrow, the besieged determined to repel him or die, when Admiral Pocock appeared with an English fleet ; the besiegers broke up precipitately, and lied ; their opponents became assailants in turn. After several minor actions, Lally sustained a decisive defeat at Wandiwash, and the power which a few years before had been paramount in the Deccan and Carnatic was reduced to dependency on the Mysorean usurper. Since that time the thunders of Fort St. George have reposed ; and the place where, only two centuries ago, there were " about six fisher- men's huts," has for many years been the second city of Hindustan, giving a home to nearly half a million inhabitants, presiding over a territory wider than some of the great kingdoms of Europe, and boasting an army of above seventy thousand men. The climate of Madras is hot, the thermometer often rising to 100° in the shade ; sometimes being known to reach 110° ; and in the coldest night of winter not falling below 65°. But, as the absence of marshy ground prevents those exhal- ations so deadly in the tropics, and as the wide Bay of Bengal both protects it on the east from all noxious influences, and serves to fan its inhabitants by cool, refreshing gales, it is more salubrious than many a more temperate place ; and not a few " old Indians " prefer it, with all its heat, to the cooler regions of the Mysore. The most unpleasant part of the year is in the month of May, when the sun is vertical ; 60 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE and, concurrently with this, a wind from the west brings all the heated air of the peninsula in a scorching current, like a furnace-blast, producing a disagreeable irritation of the skin, known by the name of " prickly heat "; so that to drink a cup of tea at that time subjects you to a sensation like the simultaneous prick of a thousand needle-points. It is a familiar fact that wherever two portions of atmosphere are at different temperatures, the dense air of the cooler region will press in upon the space occupied by the lighter air of the heated one, as everyone knows Avho has ever sat at the window of a crowded place of worship, or other warm room. Now, as this principle acts equally on the large scale as on the small, its effects are very observable in the winds which prevail in those regions of the earth where climate is not subject to endless vicissitudes, but annually exhibits its phases with little variations. Thus at Madras, when, shortly after the summer solstice, the lands to the north become greatly heated, the winds naturally tend in that direction, and thus the westerly gale becomes south-west, which wind brings from the Indian Ocean immense quantities of rain, the clouds carrying which break against the western Ghauts, or are expended on the table-lands of the Mysore, trans- mitting only occasional showers as far as Madras. Again, after the autumnal equinox, the regions lying southward become more heated, and the consequent rarefaction of the atmosphere in that direction demands a supply from the north. To meet this, vast currents of air rush southward, and, receiving in their course the natural trade- wind direction, blow horn the north-east, and burst upon Madras, in the month of October, with terrilic ell'ect. The l)arometer falls half an inch, the air becomes still and oppressive, portentous clouds load the sky, and the monsoon opens with thunder, lightning, and rain, which far surpass anything witnessed beyond the tropics ; while the wind beats fearfully, and the roaring of the surf makes wrathful interchange with the peals of thunder. For more than six weeks there is a succession MADRAS 61 of such storms, witli l)riglit intervals ; and then succeeds a period of dry, clear, and, for Madras, cool weather. So accurately is the commencement of this season of tempests reckoned on, that on the 15th of October the flagstaflf at the fort is annually struck, as a warning to ships in "the roads," that their anchorage is no longer safe ; and when any are hardy enough to delay their escape for a day or two, they not unfrequently sutler shipwreck fur their temerity. Besides these unfailing annual phenomena, God has made a daily provision for moderating the temperature of those sun- burnt shores. The sea does not absorb heat so rapidly as the land : consequently, under the sun's rays, the atmosphere of the latter becomes warmer, and thus the denser air of the sea presses in upon the land, causing an agreeable current, known by the name of the sea-breeze, Avhich rises before noon, and blows steadily till evening cools the land. Again, the land radiates its heat more rapidly than the sea, and thus, in the sun's absence, sinks to a lower temperature ; so that its atmosphere in turn becomes cooler, consequently more dense, and so presses out upon the sea, making what is called the land-breeze, which rises about midnight, and blows from the shore till morning. These arrangements of divine Providence beautifully exemplify the truth that God " rejoices in the habitable parts of His earth, and His delights are with the sons of men." Did He not care that the earth should be peopled, and that men should live in comfort, liow differently might He have arranged the distribution of land and sea, and so rendered whole continents, if habitable at all, the arid nursery of a miserable and complaining population ! We find that, in traversing the surface of the globe, the eejuator wholly escapes the great continents of Asia and Europe, crosses Africa and America at points where the breadth of the land suddenly decreases, and touches no great island but Borneo and Sumatra. Thus by far the greater portion of the earth's surftice lying within the tropics exposes to their torrid heats, not the habitable plains, which drought would 62 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE desolate, but the pathless and homeless sea, whose waters yield to the same influence those abundant evaporations which serve to fertilise the land that our Father's care has gathered beneath milder skies. By this gracious arrange- ment the continents are both saved from destructive heat and provided with copious irrigation. But were it otherwise, — were the great continents spread around the torrid zone, and the oceans now so beneficially occupying that region transferred nearer to the poles — then the aggregation of such masses of land beneath tropical suns would engender a heat, in all likelihood, destructive to animal life ; while, on the other hand, the waters, acted on by more languid suns, would have but a slow evaporation, and consequently the supplies of rain become scanty as the necessity for their profuseness increased. Under such a distribution, extreme heat and defective moisture must induce widespread sterility, and if not destroy, at least sorely embitter, all existence. The same benign wisdom is also manifested in the allocation of the great ranges of the Mountains of the Moon, the Himalaya, and Andes, in those parts of the three continents where the copious rains and large rivers, which they attract and originate, are most necessary to constitute the adjacent countries " habitable parts." ^ In our favoured clime these reflections are not so likely to arise, as where fiery suns, "in a hot and copper sky," make one feel that if Providence had not provided means to "abundantly Avater the earth," life must shortly languish. There the eye is far more open to the records, and the ear to the voice, by which Nature pro- claims the mercies of her Author. The bright testimony, " God is love," is seen equally emblazoned on ocean and plain. " The trees of the field clap their hands, the floods lift up their voice," even " the mountains and hills break forth into singing," and all creation speaks eloquently of His wisdom and grace from whom it sprang. ' The same benevolent design is conspicuous in the elevation of immense plateaux in Asia, Africa, and South America. CHAPTEll III THE JOURNEY " UP COUNTRY About sunset on the 27 th of August, on the compound, or grass-plat, in the front of Mr. Crowther's house stood four palanquins, looking like dwarf omnibuses dismounted. About fifty natives, with dusky skins, and drapery of tarnished white, surrounded them. These consisted of four sets of bearers, each numbering twelve ; for, though only six carry at a time, they change every seven or eight minutes, and thus require double the number actually engaged. The spare men run beside the others, and so rest. They were busy girding for the journey. A piece of coarse, half-bleached calico, several yards long and about one and a half broad, is produced ; a man stands at either end ', it is doubled to about half a yard's breadth ; then the one to be girded passes his own end about his person, and, turning round and round, while the other holds with all his might to secure its tight- ness, he winds it up on his waist as in factories they do on a roller. This preliminary accomplished, they are ready at a moment's warning. Each set of bearers has a niashalchi, a gentleman bearing in one hand a tin vessel, like a small gasometer, with a spout, and, in the other, an instrument which at first sight you are ready to imagine a cigar, intended for some illustrious Brobdignag. The vessel, you learn, con- tains oil, and the monster cigar is a flambeau, which, though looking very like tobacco, is composed of rags tightly rolled together into one hard stick of about three feet long and several inches round. On the end of this he pours a quantity of oil, ignites it, fans it by running, till it flings on the path- 64 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE way a broad and In-illiant light. He feeds it with fresh oil as regularly as a student snuffs his candle ; while its hardness is such as to secure its lasting through the night. This custom beautifully illustrates the Parable of the Ten Virgins, as showing the folly of neglecting to take " oil in their vessels with their lamps." Then there were the kavadi coolies, each man with two tin boxes painted green, and shaped like a wooden bee-hive, but rather larger. These contain the travelling wardrobe, and are suspended from either end of a long bamboo lath, which the coolie places on his bare shoulder, and trots after the palanquin with one box swinging before and the other behind. The bearers also have coolies of their own, who carry in similar style a pyramid of round black earthenware pots, which constitute their itinerant kitchen ; for, being particular in caste matters, they will not eat any food unless cooked in their own vessels. Shortly after night, the flambeaux were lighted, the coolies took up their loads, the bearers stood round their palanquins, and the completion of the multiform preparations was announced. Taking leave of our fellow-voyager, Mr. Pope, who was appointed to stay in Madras, and of our other kind friends, we each re2:)aired to his own unsocial vehicle. We were hoisted from the ground ; "Bey-din, hey-din" &\\o\xi(i(\,m. a loud recitative, the head-bearer of the foremost palanquin ; and in a few minutes the flash of torchlight and the song of four dozen voices, announced our progress along the " Great Western" road to ]>angalore. The exajnple of the munificent usurper .Shir has not been wholly lost on our Indian Government. He was a father to travellers ; ordered that they should be entertained at the public expense, built caravanserais from the Bay of Bengal to the Indus, planted the road with trees to shade them, dug wells every two miles to refresh them, and erected s{)lendid mosques to pronq)t and accommodate their devotions. ^ The 1 Mill's History of Uritixh IvdUi, by Wilson, vol. ii. p. 328. It is a remarkable proof of the civilisatiou of his govennnent, that about THE JOURNEY "IT COUXTRY " 65 religious part of these princely arrangements was not likely to find imitators in our authorities ; but they have conferred on travellers an invaluable boon by the erection of bungalows at convenient distances, along the most frequented roads. Bungalow is the term invariably used in India to designate a house of one story, built after the style adopted by Europeans. In those provided for the benefit of the wayfaring, you find a table, half a dozen chairs, and an old pensioned sepoy, who, gracefully combining the native obeisance with our military salute, makes a profound salaam, and proffers his services to obtain any requisite articles of food. Of these he presents you with a list provided by authority, with prices affixed, to prevent imposition. You are amused to find a sheep stated at a rupee (two shillings), and one of an inferior order at fourteen annas (one and ninepence).^ The sheep of the Carnatic are small and lean, without a particle of wool, the hide being just like that of a calf ; but their mutton is toler- ably good. Almost every day during a journey a deputation from the bearers, after very low salaams, present a request for seep : the gift is not near so much as would be paid to coach- men and guards at home for a night's travelling ; but it is not claimed as a right, only sought as a favour, and, when granted, they go away as pleased as schoolboys with a holiday. Before daylight we were deposited in the verandah of the bungalow at Stn'permatur, about twenty-seven miles from Madras. By sunrise the coolies had arrived with the changes of raiment and culinary apparatus ; the sepoy was in attendance; milk and eggs were procured, and we lacked noth- ing whereby to make comfortable the hours which the heat of the middle of the sixteenth cciituvy he established a post system, by means of horses, " for the more rapid conveyance of intelligence to Government, and for the accommodation of trade and correspondence." ' [Prices of food have risen greatly and permanently since the days when this was written — the result, in part, of repeated famines. On the other hand, the value of the rupee in sterling has declined to one and fourpence, at which rate it now seems fairly stable.] 5 66 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE the sun compelled us to pass under shade. During the day the sepoy laid on the table a small box containing books, all of which we found to be of a valuable and religious character. This laudable custom is frequent in the bungalows ; and I never saw one of those little libraries that did not bear marks of having been Avell read. It is true that in some places there are unseemly records of distaste for such literature. I recollect one poetical effusion complaining that they Avere " Too dull to read, too good to tear." But who can tell the benefit that may accrue even to a tra- veller of this temper, from his consenting to relieve the ennui of an idle, hot day in a lonely bungalow, by reading a chapter of Doddridge's Rise and Progress, or of James's Anxious Iiiquirer 1 The country around answered ill to the descriptions which authors delight to give of India. But it would be well for readers of travels to remember that the popularity of a book depends far more on eloquence than accuracy. When look- ing on the tame flats and patches of brown copse about Stripermatur, it was hard to believe that this was the Ind of history, fable, and song — the country by whose transit commerce the isolated Tyre rose to such fame ; and " Tadmor in the wilderness," Solomon's " city of store," into that proud Palmyra which, though sand-girt and without territory, rivalled the first capitals of earth, subdued Mesopotamia, Syria, and Egypt, won from Gallienus the right to array its prince in imperial purple, and, under a woman's leadership, tried well the strength of Rome, though directed by the war- like Aurelian ; — the country from whose surplus treasures Alexandria, Genoa, and Venice, derived their splendour ;i whence Shoaljeddin is said to have carried a booty of three thousand i)Ouiuls weight of diamonds, and the monster ^ See Robertson's HiMorkal Dinqiugition concerning the Knoickdjc which the Ancinits had of India. THE JOURNEY " VV COUNTRY" G7 Thamas Kauli Khan seventy millions sterling ;i and, above all, that this was the very Carnatic from the plunder of which the eunuch Kafur returned to his ambitious master, Ala, laden with a sum which even our own historians are not disposed to reduce below one hundred millions. But the tameness of one district or the beauty of another is never to be taken as the type of a great country. We do not judge of England either from the cheerless fens through which the southern Ouse loiters toward the sea, or from the exquisite pictures that adorn the progress of the Wharf. India, though, on the whole, much inferior to England in beauty of land- scape, has many regions of exquisite attraction. But, when looking on those pleasant spots, you cannot but remember that their beauty and their bounty are lost on those who enjoy them ; that the eyes that look on their charms, and the hands that reap their produce, lay the thankoflering of this year before an idol, and to it look for the fruits of the next. This reflection breaks in on your enjoyment like a knell among merry voices ; gratification yields to pensiveness ; and the train of thought, that began in a lively sense of the beautiful or the grand, ends in a mournful sympathy with the feeling that wrested from the dissimilar minds of the sceptic peer and the Christian bishop, when lingering on such scenes, the twin sentiments — " All, save the spirit of man, is divine." " Only man is vile." When the heat of the day had passed Ave started, two on horseback and two in palanquin, two of the latter convey- ances having been sent back to Madras. The road lay over a flat country, interspersed with groves. In these Avere multitudes of croAvs, Avho chattered and caAved just as they do at home ; the SAveeter voice of the dove mingled with their tuneless clamour ; flitting among the trees Avere numbers ' Orme's Military Transactioit'i of the British in India. QS A MISSION TO THE MYSORE of those beautiful little parroquets which abound in the country, whose plumage of sparkling green is a favourite simile with native poets ; squirrels were gambolling nimbly and merrily in the boughs ; crawling on the roots of the trees, or squatting on a stone, you would see, every now and then, a hmnble scion of " that most ancient family of quadrupeds," as Dr. Buckland calls the lizards, betraying, however, no consciousness of the ancestorial honours where- with geological industry has enriched them from the heraldic records of " former worlds," and, in physical proportions, woefully degenerated from the ]\Iegalosauri, the Iguanodons, and other distinguished founders of the " most ancient " house of Lacertse, whose escutcheons still grace their former homes in the Oolitic and Wealden formations. We passed a body of convicts working on the reads, guarded by peons (native police), and every man in chains. This is one of the most common punishments inflicted by our Government for serious oflences, and, to an English eye, the poor manacled wretches look sufficiently miserable. Yet the natives frequently complain that our administration of criminal laAv is too lenient, and that our judges are exces- sively scrupulous about convicting, unless the evidence is complete in every part. A judge, in their estimation, ought to have some such facility in detecting a culprit, by his very appearance, as Cuvier had in discovering by a solitary bone the genus to which an animal belonged. They think he ought not to wait servilely on the chain of evidence, which may be interrupted by the absence of a witness or entangled by his dishonesty, but to use his own discretion, guided by the general aspect of the case. In cases of theft, they con- sider this procedure imperative. " Who," they have often said to me, "who ever heard of a man calling Avitnesses when he was going to steal] To elude observation is the very perfection of his art; and to punish him only when he suffers himself to be seen, or leaves traces by which he may be detected, looks very like punishing him not for being a THE .TOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" 69 thief, l»ut for being a blunderer." All claims for justice to the accused they get over with great ease, and reject as purely mischievous the principle of English law — that it is better ninety-nine guilty persons should escape than one innocent man suffer. "And then," they will say, "suppose a thief does blunder, so that evidence is found to bring guilt home, what do you do with him 1 Why, you just put him in a good house, set a guard before the door to see that nobody hurts him, give him rice twice a day, send him home not a pin the worse, and then call that punishing him ! Pretty punishment for rogues that is ! " They can no more sympathise with the feeling which looks on the loss of character and deprivation of liberty as themselves con- stituting a severe punishment (except to persons of family and repute), than a Turkish serf, viewing the comparative comfort in which Charles xii. lived in his retreat at Bender, could sympathise with the mighty dissatisfactions that stirred in the breast of the fallen hero. In cases of petty theft, their own laws award a fine as the punishment; but in graver one^, dreadful mutilation. Halhed's Gentoo Code informs us that " if one steal a horse, excellent in all respects," his penalty is that "the magistrate shall cut olf his hand and foot and buttock, and deprive him of life." Whether correctly or not, they complain that petty theft increases under English rule; as also a certain domestic crime for which our code provides no commensurate punish- ment, and against which the executive do not choose to administer the severities prescribed by Manu. The next evening we started with the intention of reaching Kaveripak, Mv. Crowther and Mr. Garrett being in palanquin, and Mr. Squarebridgc and myself on horseback. Proceeding quietly along, with INIr. Crowther a few paces in front, we heard a crash, when down came the hindmost end of his palanquin on the road, the pole having broken off at the point of junction. The head-bearer, who was full six feet high, thin, dusky, and stooping, gazed down on the 70 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE prostrate vehicle with as great consternation as a child on a broken plaything, anH, lifting up his hands, cried, ^' Hunibu bhdram" ("Plenty of weight"), while Mr. Crowther scrambled out upon the road to learn the cause of his sudden arrest. The breaking of leins or traces, the loss of a horseshoe or linchpin, are calamities in their way ; but the breaking of a palanquin pole is to lose your axletree, and place your vehicle in utter helplessness. After several ineifectual attempts to repair the damage, the poor bearers, mounting the body of the palanquin on their shoulders, slowly pro- ceeded to the next village. The inhabitants gathered round, and a multitude of things were said, but all unintelligible to me. At length came a venerable-looking old Musalman, with broad turban, portly carriage, dark skin, and flowing white beard, who seemed to give decisive information to the effect that neither carpenter nor wood Avas obtainable. Our only hope was Wilcheri, a bungalow some miles in advance ; so there was no alternative left but to carry the dismantled vehicle thither as best we could. The bearers cheerfully undertook this tedious task, but first demanded a bottle of arrack, a spirit commonly drunk in the country, and obtained by distillation from rice, sugar in its raw state, or toddy, as the juice of the cocoa-nut tree is called. Mv. Crowther had been provident enough to bring with him a spare pony, so that in case of accidents we might not be detained ; but on the present occasion, not apprehending any need for his services, he had been despatched in advance. ]\Iy pony was resigned to Mr. Crowther, while Mr. Sipiare- bridge rode on to order back the other, and i\Ir. Garrett proceeded to the bungalow to await our arrival. After a long walk, at the miserably slow pace made necessary by the awkward load on the bearers, the pony arrived, and I was again mounted. Throughout the day the sky had been cloudless, its irradiated sapphire looking calmly joyous as the counten- ance of one who had long had peace Avith God. But, in THE -lOL'KNEY "UP COUNTRY" 71 advancing to the west, the sun flung other beauties round him, and, as if conscious king of light, marched royally to his chamber, arrayed in purple suffused with gold. For the last few minutes he shone from behind a bank of dark and watery clouds, too dense to permit of his body appearing through, but exhibiting on their upper edge a fringe of thrice-burnished gold, that hung over the crags below with an effect singularly majestic. At the same time a radiance streamed upwards from the invisible luminary, making one think of the first stream of celestial light greet- ing the ascending saint, ere yet the throne of Presence has opened on his eye. The clouds rapidly mounted, and hung fiercely on the face of night. They grew black, dense, low, till the very air, as if fearful to stir in such a presence, hushed itself to perfect stillness. We entered a wood ; every leaf stood motionless with the same awe. The gloom was fearful, the silence broken only by the bearers' hum. A flash gleamed across the sky : its light was still lingering on horse's mane and bearer's turban, on leafy mango and slender palm, when a peal crashed over us, so nigh, so loud, that it seemed the united voice of a hundred storms. Then the sound of abundance of rain rustled in the trees, followed by masses of crowded and ponderous drops, dashing head- long to slake earth's greedy thirst. Amidst this deluge, flash succeeded flash, and peal after peal roared fearfully, each of which was followed by a thicker rain, as if the gleam had been struck from chains that bound up the stores of Provi- dence, and the thunder were the crash of that rending wliich set them free to enrich the earth. The horses shuddered and started ; the bearers plodded on with a low, Ijroken murmur ; the branches glowed in the almost continuous light, trembled with the thunder, and stooped beneath the rain. The whole scene vividly recalled the Psalmist's words, *' He bowed the heavens and came down, and dark- ness was under His feet. He made darkness His secret place : His pavilion round about Him were dark waters anil 72 A MISSION TO THE MYSOEE thick clouds of the sky." In that august pavilion sat the power of the Supreme. The scowl of its brow, the gleam of its eye, the tones of its voice, were all furious as long-pent vengeance ; and yet its mission was not wrath, but good- ness ; not to wither, but refresh. So it is in the ways of God : amid appearances that prove our nothingness, He mildly works our weal. Well drenched and weary, we reached the bungalow at last. By the time a cup of coffee was prepared, a slumber had seized me that no persuasion could break, and from which I was released only by the broad light of day. In the meantime the palanquin had been set to rights, and we were ready to proceed. That morning we reached Kaveri- pak, which, though a small place, is celebrated as the scene of a night-battle, in which Clive gained an important victory over the French. Among the natives it is famous as the residence of learned jotishas, or " astronomers," who annually publish almanacs that are in great repute even as far away as the western districts of the Mysore. In these, eclipses are accurately calculated ; but they afford no other astronomical information of value. It is mar- vellous that, by any perversity, men can manage to com- bine the astuteness that distinguishes an educated Hindu with belief in the monstrous absurdities which their sacred books teach respecting the heavenly bodies. Being all considered as gods, the various phenomena which they exhibit are accounted for, not by laws that a presiding mind has impressed on passive matter, but by myths which seem equally to exhaust man's wits to invent and his credulity to receive them. The sensible founder of Anglo- Indian history, Orrae, tells us of "the sun getting his teeth knocked out, and the moon having her ^ face beat black and blue at a feast, at which the gods quarrel and fight with the spirit of a mob. They say the sun and moon carry in their ^ He should have said "his"; for the moon is not a goddess, but a god, in Hindu mythology. THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" 73 faces to this day the marks of this broih" And thus the Galileos and Keplers of India have been saved the trouble of observation or conjecture as to the solar and lunar spots. Eclipses are accounted for in a way equally satisfactory. On one occasion Vishnu was distributing the amrita, or "food of immortality,"^ among the gods, when two Asuras (the Titans of Hinduism) having obtained admittance in disguise, he ignorantly helped them to the precious repast. Silrya and Chandra (the sun and moon) having discovered the fraud, apprised him of it by a wink, when he instantly beheaded the intruders : the bodies died, but the heads, having received the death-preventing amrita, were immortal, and obtained a place as planets in the sky. There they live ; and, in the form of a red and black serpent, periodically seize on Silrya and Chandra, by whose untimely disclosures they were prevented from acquiring perfect godship. The waxing and waning of the moon, again, is readily explained by the happy genius of Hinduism. On a certain occasion Chandra was so unhappy as to aggrieve Dakslia, the son of Brahma, who vented his fury in a curse. That curse brought a rust on the silver countenance of Chandra, which, by alternate increase and decrease, obscures or permits its radiance. The tides, again, which have so sorely puzzled Western sages, have long been known in the East to depend on the heaving or contraction of that enormous turtle into which Vishnu entered at the Kfirma Avatara,^ when he descended into the sea to recover the lost Vedas, — thus showing that we have been all along mistaken in supposing that the most distinguished service in which tortoiseshell had ever been employed was to cradle that illustrious rene- gade, Henry the Great. Nor are their notions of the permanent facts of astronomy less curious than those of its ' [More strictly the wine of immortality, or water of life— a beverage resulting from the fabled churning of the llilk Sea.] - [The Kurraa Avatara, or Tortoise Incarnation, is the second of the nine incarnations of A'^ishnu. ] 74 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE periodical phenoiuena. The river Ganges is considered as the earthly antitype of a celestial original. That heavenly Ganges is the Milky Way, which is placed nearer the earth than even the sun, to whom, however, the second place is assigned, and that at the distance of just half a million of miles. The moon is exactly twice as far off; then come the stars, and after them tlie planets, Avithout any distinction between the inferior and superior ones, although Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn are placed in their proper order. The suspicion that Earth is a member of this family is not once entertained. Farthest off of all is the pole-star, who, however, is distant only seven and a half millions of miles. These are not regarded as the deductions of vulgar science, but as authoritative revelations on matters inac- cessible to unaided research. It is true that they strangely contradict the results of the beautiful argument from parallax, on which we — who are not favoured Avith more direct methods of computing celestial distances — are wont to look as about the choicest effort of man's reason, and which leads to the startling conclusion that one of the " swift-winged arrows of light," though travelling in a second eight times the circumference of our globe, would spend three weary years on its flight to the nighest star ; while to the one first calculated by Bessel, the journey would occupy ten. As if conscious of parsimony in the celestial measurements, the Hindu philosophers are munificent in terrestrial dimen- sions. The earth, instead of the twenty-four thousand miles lo which our astronomers reduce it, expands, under the warmth of Brahmanical fancy, to a si)acious orb of one thousand and twenty-seven millions, having seven overgrown continents, each with an ocean to match. These oceans are ditfercnt in composition as in dimensions from that which is familiar to our grovelling researches ; the first is of salt water ; the other six consist respectively of wine, sugar-cane juice, clarified butter, curds, milk, and fresh water. In the centre of Jambu, the first of the seven continents, and the only one THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" 75 whicli exists elsewhere than in the Puranas, stands Mount Meru, not shaped as vulgar hills, hut bearing the elegant form of a lotus. This mountain measures in height four hundred and twenty thousand miles, its circumference at the base two hundred and forty thousand, and at the top it spreads to double that extent.^ To support this gigantic world, three different agencies are named — a serpent, a turtle, and eight elephants. What relation these sustain to each other — which is higher or lower, how their different offices combine — I never could satisfactorily learn. The fact seems to be, that different •writers have assigned the impor- tant duty of upholding the world to that animal which each has happened to regard with greatest favour. When viewing the colossal nonsense whereby the Hindu sages have endeavoured to build up their claim to inspiration, it is impossible to resist a vivid impression that one has written of creation without being abandoned to his own conjectures. There is a book written by one educated in the first Egyi^tian schools, and consequently versant in their system of cosmogony : written for a people still sunk in the ignorance attendant on serfdom, and thus prepared to receive blindly any feasible speculations on subjects beyond their reach ; written in a desert, where there were no scliools to criticise, no enlightenment to detect errors, no rivals to expose them ; written, in fine, under every imaginable temptation for the author to indulge his fancy or display his learning. Yet while the advancing stream of knowledge has swept into the sea of fiction all other early records of creation, this one stands proudly amid the tides which fret against its borders but bear not an atom aAvay. The very torrents that have overwhelmed its counterfeits flow around it, an unfordable defence ; while every tributary poured in from some new-sprung source of knowledge only swells the stream that would bear down an assailant. He ^ Vishuu Puraaa, Wilson. In all these computations I take tfie ydjana at five miles : it may be nine. 76 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE who believes that any man, by his unaided foresight, could have chronicled creation's birth, in times when its system was grossly misconceived, without assuming principles and hazarding facts which would be falsified by the discoveries of subsequent ages, not only displays a capacious credence, but forgets the character of all such chronicles but one. But monstrous as are the chimeras of Hindu science, I have been as much laughed at for crediting the facts of our system as we are disposed to laugh at them for entertaining the follies of their own. To say that the sun, which is so warm, is farther off than the moon, which is so cold ; that the world, which is so heavy, is " hung upon nothing "; that, though everyone sees it to be flat, it is round ; that, though a child may tell it is perfectly still, it is whirling both round its own axis and the sun ; that an eclipse of the moon comes of her getting into the earth's shadow, which no one ever saw ; that an eclipse of the sun comes of the other luminary wandering between him and us, when it is plainly farther off than he ; and that the fixed stars are more than nineteen billions of miles distant, — does appear an exhibition at once of boldness and imbecility not to be adequately scorned. They summarily dismiss all reasoning on our different methods of arriving at conclusions by saying, " We trust the Shastras, which, as divine revelations, cannot err ; you trust to instruments and calculations, which may easily mistake : our ground is sure, yours fallacious." We sliould entertain about the same opinion of him who should tell us he had just completed a survey of the moons of Uranus with chains and theodolites as does the Urahman of the Euro- pean who states that our astronomers can calculate the apparent size of the earth to an eye situated at the distance of the sun. The seven seas might l)c thought a weak point, as requiring nothing but travel to demonstrate their non- existence ; l)ut to all my objections about circumnavigators never seeing oceans of curds, butter, or toddy, they used THE .TOT-fT^NEY "UP COUNTRY" 77 coolly to reply, " That only proves that they have never gone beyond the sea of salt water." Of all phenomena, an annular eclipse of the sun enabled me to perplex them most, as they could not account for it on the serpent-seizing theory, and were constrained to admit that its appearances were such as would naturally result from the combination of causes to which ours ascribes it. It is perfectly true that if you teach a man science, you annihilate his faith in Hinduism. Astro- nomy is as dangerous to the Shastras as the Vatican once deemed it to the Bible. But it can never be taught by desultory argument : its proofs must be exhibited in series, and then conviction is inevitable. This, however, cannot be extensively afforded to the advilt population. In dealing with them, my own experience utterly contradicts the opinion that it is best to approach them first by exposures of the scientific blunders of the Shastras, and so destroy their confidence in these, the basis of their own religion, before advancing the truths of which you require their acceptance. The Shastras are equally assailable on moral as on scientific grounds ; while in the one case your appeal is to the man's conscience, which decides for you ; but in the other, is to facts he discredits, and to processes he can neither comprehend nor trust. The shortest way to his heart is to " reason of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come," of the consequent need of pardon and sanctification, the impotency of his gods to bestow it, and Christ's glorious power to create anew. But to return to Kaveripak, whence we have been beguiled by its astronomical fame, it has the advantage of a noble tank three miles broad and eight in length. Tanks are of two kinds, those which serve as public baths and those constructed for the purpose of irrigation. The former are nothing more than gigantic wells, generally sunk to a great depth with an upward opening shaped like the hopper of a corn-mill, which, being lined on four sides with stone steps, affords an easy descent to the water. These are to be 78 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE found near most towns, and every morning the respectable inhabitants, especially the Brahmans, may be seen crowding the steps, performing their ablutions and the accompanying devotional exercises. The erection of these is considered an act pre-eminently meritorious. But should the projector be unhappy enough to fail in obtaining water, or to find it of an inferior quality, he remains for ever under the stigma of being frustrated in his attempts to acquire merit in the present birth by some blot contracted in the last. They will not hear of mineral causes modifying the supply ; and, as a triumphant proof that it is regulated only by the merit of the party seeking it, adduce instances in which two persons having dug on the opposite sides of the same road, the one obtained good water, the other bad. The merit, however, no way depends on their virtues in the present birth, for I remember a Brahman naming a case in proof of his point, in which the parties being a polygar^ and one of his favourite temple women, the latter was the successful candidate for *' sweet water." This gave rise to the question, If she were superior in merit, how came it that the birth assigned her was not only female, but that in disreputable circumstances ; while the other, though less meritorious, obtained the male birth, and that in a position of honour? This was a difficulty which the worthy disputant had not seen, and could not solve. The tanks constructed for agricultural purposes are usually placed on the bed of some rivulet ; a strong embankment being run across the line of its course at a favourable place, sometimes to the length of one or two miles. In the rainy season, when the stream swells, this dam retains the water, which forms a lake of greater or less extent, according to the nature of the ground. Should the water overflow, arrangements are made to conduct it to another tank, perhaps several miles below. All the ground which the level will command is parcelled out into compart- ments of a few yards squaic, separated by low ridges of ' [A feudal lord.] THE JOUKNKY "UP COUNTRY" 79 earth. Xarrow chaiiLcls run between every two rows of these compartments, having an inlet to each. These are supplied by a large duct connected with the tank. The rice, from the time of its sowing till on the point of shooting into ear, is kept in water about ankle deep. Great ingenuity is manifested in all these arrangements. The irrigation of gardens and smaller plats of ground is provided for by other means. Close by a well stands a high pole, on the top of which another is fixed transversely so as to play up and down. From one end of this depends a long bamboo rod reaching to the water, with a leathern bag attached. A man mounts on the transverse spar, and, start- ing from its junction with the upright one, proceeds towards the extremity like a seaman making for the yardarm, only that he walks upon the spar itself, which, pressed by his whole weight, sinks down, so raising the opposite end and lifting the vessel out of the water which, gaining the top, strikes against the edge and empties its contents into a trough prepared to carry them over the ground. He then hastens back to the centre ; the spar, relieved from the pressure, follows the weight of the bamboo and bag, which latter becomes instantly immersed and filled : thus he pro- ceeds backwards and forwards, adroitly balancing himself on his dizzy footing. A less frequent, because more expensive, method is to place two oxen with their backs to the well ; a rope connected with a large vessel is passed over a revolving axle and attached to their traces. They being backed close to the edge, the vessel is immersed and filled, on which they are driven quickly forward, thus raising the vessel to the top where it u^jsets, and channels are prepared to distribute the water. As these operations vividly recall, and at the same time illustrate, much of the beautiful imagery of Scripture, to observe them is peculiarly pleasing. Those who live under showery skies little think how precious is water where whole months together are cloudless, and the earth is scorched by fierce red suns. Someone has truly said, "The 80 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE luxuries of India are cold air and cold water when we can get them." The people of India have only one fear — a failure of water. Let but Providence vouchsafe that price- less essential and all their necessities are met, all their labours productive. I remember when there had been no rain for some three months, and when it was apprehended that a continuance of the drought for a few days longer would be fatal to the crops, seeing a ryot clap his hands at the first drops of a shower ; and as it descended richly, his satisfaction turned to joy — " Delight o'er all his features stole " ; with the glee of a child, he cried out, " It is just as if God had sent it !" So far their estimate of water is natural and wise, but they carry it further than we should be disposed to go. Water is everything. If they thinlc of settling in a new place, the first question will be, " What kind of water does it enjoy V All the benefits Ave attribute to a change of air they seek in a change of water. If healthy while resident in a strange neighbourhood, they celebrate the virtues of the water ; if bilious or feverish or rheumatic, they lay all the blame on the water. The most common complaint of an invalid is, "The water disagrees with me." This is not to be wondered at when, according to their physiological system, it is water which, transmuted by internal processes, forms the blood, while its more refined particles sustain the respiration. And this is but a mild si)ecimen of their attainments in that branch of science ; flesh is formed from corn and vegetables : oleaginous food supplies bones, marrow, and the faculty of speech. The various emotions and physical states are regulated by certain sylvan exercises of the soul, which dwells in the region of the heart, Avhere it is surrounded by sixteen leaves, each possessing a distinct property : as it flits around this pericardial bower it alights on leaf after leaf, each change of perch being attended with Ttr^: JOURNEY "UP country" 81 a corresponding change of state. On one it sins, on another sleeps, a fourth transforms it to virtue, a fifth makes it wide awake, and so on. These are not all the wonders of the Hindu heart, for out of it proceed no fewer than a hundred and one arteries, one of which passing to the crown of the head is of no small importance, as holy men are capable of elevating the life to that point where it will remain during pleasure without any aid from food.^ These absurdities could not, of course, exist for a day were anatomy studied, but that science their religious prejudices induce them to regard with about the same feelings as we entertain towards cannibalism. The consequence is, they judge of our internal structure and operations on the most fanciful principles, and arrive at conclusions which, though highly serious as regards the treatment of disease, are so inimitably ridiculous that to avoid laughter is impossible. I well remember one day my munshi asked leave to go home sooner than usual, saying he was very bilious and must take remedies. I asked him what medicine he used, and whether he had any confidence in its efficacy. He said that as to its efficacy he had ample proof, but seemed rather reluctant to name it ; when pressed, how- ever, he told me it was an application he had often success- fully adopted, and of admirable properties, as all skilful physicians knew ; and that it was simply to cut an onion in two and squeeze the juice into his eye. After Kaveripak the next i)lace of importance was WrUajnagar, a town built by the ^""awab Muhammad Ali Wrdaja, called after him, and peopled from the neigh- bouring town of Lcllpet. Those who have taken their imjjressions from certain writers, who represent every Hindu as an incarnation of idleness, would look with surprise on such a town as Walajnagar. The streets are beautifully clean, the houses Avliite as purest snow, and in many cases ornamented with streaks of red. You have everywhere symptoms of stirring commerce and various manufacture. ^ Second Exposure of Hiiiduit<7v, by Dr. Wilson, of Bombay. 6 82 A MISSION TO THE :mysorE "Well-dressed merchants, tidy artisans, shopmen in their bazaars, weavers dressing their warp or plying their loom in open air, numbers of females assisting in the various opera- tions, — all attest an active and Avell-employed population. Goldsmith's Auburn or Campbell's Wyoming could hardly exhibit greater cleanliness, industry, and comfort. It is, however, the most busy town in that part of the Carnatic ; the spirit of its merchants having made it the entrejyut for the commerce between the Presidency and Mysore. The betel- nut, the produce of the beautifully tall and slender areka- palui, is a leading article of tralhc, being chewed by every native. It is a j)OAverful astringent, tasting somewhat like catechu. But Walajnagar contained one object far more at- tractive to us than any we had met with on our way. Close by the town stood a neat bungalow, the residence of Mr. Bilderbeck, an excellent missionary of the London Society. He was, unhappily, from home, and thus Ave lost the pleasure of seeing him and learning his progress. On this mission residence the Christian traveller from Madras to Bangalore looks with mingled joy and dissatisfaction, — ^joy to see one place where the God he loves has an altar, and the Saviour who bought him a herald, but dissatisfaction, deep dis- satisfaction and pain, to think that, though his road lies over two hundred miles of populous country, through the important towns of Arcot, Vellore, Kolar, and a multitude of smaller ones; near Arni, Ambiirdrug, and other places celebrated in the history of India ; though our armies have marched every step of the way many a time ; though every village abounds with tales of our prowess, and reposes under our sway, — yet, in the whole distance, this is the only place where you can find a man sent to instruct the people in our religion and lead them to our God. You are met everywhere by proofs of the religious activity of the Musalmans during the short time that they held this part of the country, before Western ambition snatched it from their THK .TOUIINEY "UP COUNTRY" 83 hvld, but look in vain for temples to attest thattlie people wlio rule it now know or regard a God. Is this wise, or guiltless ? Considerably after night we arrived at the far-famed city of Arcot. Robertson supposes this to be the place men- tioned by Ptolemy as Arcafi-Iie/jia ; but the identity is at least doubtful. There is reason to believe that no town existed on the present site till 171G, Avhen the Mughals, driven from Gingi by its unhealthiness, encamped on the banks of the Palar, and built a town which speedily rose into note, and became the capital of their possessions in the Carnatic. In 1744, it witnessed one of those tragedies with which INIuhammadan courts are so dreadfully familiar. The murdered Nawab, Safdar Ali, had left a son named Saiyud Muhammad, whom the Nizam placed under the guardian- ship of his father's successor in office, promising that when of age the nawabship should be his own. His youth, parentage, misfortunes, and character all conspired to make him a favourite with the people. He Avas celebrating the nuj^tials of a relative with great pomp, and had invited his guardian, Anwar-ud-din, to attend ; when he approached, the noble youth, to show all due respect, proceeded to the foot of the steps before his house, in order to receive him. Here a crowd had assembled, among whom were some Patans formerly in his father's service. One of these ad- vanced towards Saiyud ]\Iuhammad in a humble posture, as if to crave forgiveness for insolence he had lately shown, and, when sufficiently near, stabbed him to the heart. In an instant (to quote Orme) "a thousand swords and daggers were drawn "; the assassin sank imder countless wounds, and several of his companions shared his lot. Suspicion instantly fell on Murtiza Ali, uncle to the victim, and the murderer of his father. The crowd rushed in search of him, determined to avenge the crime. He was found sur- rounded by a guard that defied attack, and proceeded to his fortress at Vellore unharmed, except by the malediction of a whole city. 84 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE It SO happened that we were in Arcot on the anniversary of that event which is the most important of its history, as well as the first that, in the words of Morari Rao, taught the natives to "believe that the English could fight." In 1751 Chanda Sahib, the Nawab supported by the French, had reduced his rival, whose pretensions our countrymen espoused, to the single post of Trichinopoly. He led an army to besiege this, leaving eleven hundred men to defend his capital. The English, seeing their last hope threatened, despatched a force against him. They encountered him, but ran away from the attack, even while the natives in their pay continued in action. Chanda Sahib proceeded triumphant ; the English had become despicable, and every- thing portended their speedy extirpation. But, on the 30th of August, the garrison of Arcot were astounded by intelli- gence that a British force had been seen marching towards the city, with perfect steadiness, in the midst of a terrific thunderstorm. This they took both as indicative of great courage and as an omen favourable to their enterprise ; they were awed accordingly. Tlie next day two hundred Europeans and three hundred sepoys presented themselves before the capital of the Carnatic. The heart of the garrison failed ; they quietly marched out of their strong- hold, of which that handful of men took possession amidst the mute and wondering gaze of the inhabitants. That bold band was led by a young clerk of limited education and unmanageable temper, who, at the time, according to his contemporary Orme, " had neither read books nor conversed with men capable of giving him much instruction in the military art." Dupleix's perfidy at Madras turned against him and his schemes those pro- digious passions which had sorely troubled Shropshire pedagogues and Indian merchants. Clive, disguised as a Musalman, fled from the scene of the dishonoured treaty, reached Fort St. David, joined the military, displayed matchless bravery, and, up to this juncture, had alternated THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" 85 between battles and bookkeeping. By the siege of Trichino- poly, be saw assailed the last stay of his country's interests. Roused himself, he succeeded in rousing the lethargic Govern- ment ; pointed out the seizure of Arcot as the only way to procure a diversion ; oil'ered to conduct the expedition ; obtained five hundred men, under eight officers, of whom four left the desk, while other two had never been in action ; marched against a fortress manned by above double his numbers, and took possession without firing a shot. Property found, to the amount of half a million sterling, he restored to the owners ; conciliated the people by modera- tion ; repaired the fort, and provisioned it for a siege ; made two successful sorties against the former garrison, which lingered in the neighbourhood ; beat up their whole camp in a night attack ; and, at a time when all his men but eighty were despatched to a distance, repelled an assault made by them with the knowledge of his weakness. Raja Sahib, the son of Chanda, led against him four thousand men, who were joined by the remains of the garrison, and also one hundred and fifty French. They took possession of the town ; Clive made a sally, and drove them from the street, but was compelled to retire to his fort. The next day, two thousand men, under Murtiza Ali, arrived, to reinforce Raja Sahib. They commenced a vigorous siege ; but the feeling within was indomitable : Englishman and sepoy were equally inflamed by the spirit of their leader. Daring and skill so counterbalanced paltry numbers and wretched supplies, that it was fifty days before the beleaguer- ing host were prepared to storm. At the end of that time, two wide breaches invited tlieir advance. Raja Sahib sent to Clive a proposal of honourable terms and costly presents if he would surrender, accompanied by severe threats in case of resistance. Little did he know the mind with which he had to deal. Danger awed Clive just as darkness shrouds phosphorus ; and to bend him by threats was as likely as to chisel from granite a drapery of gauze. His soul was 86 A MISSION TO THE MYSOKE unutterably proud, audacious, and inflammable, but acute, self-possessed, and generous the while. At this juncture his force was eighty Englishmen and one hundred and twenty sepoys ; the general who challenged him led a host of ten thousand; but the answer was, that "he had a better opinion of his prudence than to believe that he would attempt to storm till he had got better soldiers than the rabble of which his army was composed." Such a spirit within a fort is more terrible than a thousand men. Even in times of peace, Musalman breasts are stirred with mighty passions by the anniversary of the day on which Hasan and Husain were martyred. That day had come. Its memories fired, the soldiery with tenfold hatred of the infidels ; while all whom the sword should release from life during its holy hours were secured instant re- ception to the realms of houri without purgatorial delays. Bang, freely distributed, added intoxication to bigotry. Then the fierce stream of fanaticism and inebriety was rolled against the weak defences. The gates and both breaches were simultaneously assailed. A steady fire made the elephants which led the attack on the gates recoil, treading down in their retreat the crowds that pressed behind them. The party attacking the breach, which lay across the wet ditch, were foiled by the effective play of a gun which Clive himself pointed. A mass that seemed resistless mounted the other breach, while a multitude coolly sat down below to replace them if they should fall. Not even at Badajoz was breach more effectively counter- worked or more bravely defended. The stormers ascended without receiving a shot, gained the first trench that had been raised, and then were opened on by a fire close, cease- less, and deadly. The front ranks of the defenders fired without intermission, being supplied from behind with charged muskets. Every shot slew, they fell in masses, were instantly replaced, their successors fell as they ; while THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" 87 sliells, cast I'lom the ramparts, were spreading wide destruc- tion and wider terror among the crowd seated below. For a whole hour they passed on to certain death as doggedly as snovvHakes to the ocean. For a whole hour every man that advanced perished in that terrible fire. At length they faltered, wavered, and withdrew. Their brave leader was left among the slain. And heroic as were the deeds at Lutzen, when Gustavus fell, none equalled that of a soldier who returned beneath the wall to rescue the body of his commander. Forty muskets showered danger around him ; but he flinched not, and bore aAvay his generous burden unharmed. That night the siege was raised. Clive was reinforced the next day, pursued the enemy, defeated them at Arni, captured Conjeveram, and made the English arms respected — eventually triumphant. Perhaps the historians of future ages may say that the defence of Arcot bore the same relation to the Muhammadan power in the East as the battle of Tours in the West ; and that Charles JNIartel and Clive were the instruments of Providence in giving the check, at those extreme points, to the restless current by which that system of lust and bloodshed had overswept the nations, and in commencing the reflux by which we now see it falling back, with rapid subsidence, on the centre whence it originally sprang. An instructive lesson is conveyed by the fate of those who conducted the struggle for a European empire in India. Dupleix rose to splendid dignity, became arbiter of the Carnatic and Deccan, was courted by Eastern kings, ennobled by his own, and then died the victim of dis- appointment and poverty. La Lourdonnais found the reward of pre-eminent talents and services in the Bastile. Lally, after displaying bravery and zeal in the cause of his adopted country, was drawn through Paris in a dung-cart to the guillotine.^ Clive rose from an obscure clerkship to be ^ Voltaire states that he was imprisoned in tlie same cell of the Bastile where La Bourdonnais had laiu. — Frcujni. Jlistorique sui: V Inde. 88 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE governor of Bengal, a British peer, the boast of his country, the hero of his age ; and, at the very moment when his sovereign was looking to the talents he wielded as the only hope of saving America, his life of victories, aggrandise- ment, and fame was closed by suicide. Such is the bliss of greatness ! The love of conquest, like INIoore's Prophet, wears a veil of transcendent lustre, to shroud features of ineffable disgust. On that mask poets and historians con- verge the rays of glory, till it dazzles, fascinates, inflames. But, ever and anon, such events as the suicide of Clive lift the veil, and discover lineaments far fouler than those which mar the less destructive, but less caparisoned furies. Pestilence and Famine. How different is his lot who toils under the same suns to turn men to God ! His deeds rejoice the hosts who little reck of the battle's issue, but sing when a soul is saved. His name is written in letters bright as heaven's crystals, incorruptible as its light. His reward is God's approval upon earth ; and, when earth is burnt up, a crown flashing with the glories that beam from Deity unshrouded; a throne that even eternity cannot crumble, and which immortals whom his toil was the means of saving, will joyfully surround. Let the merchant tell his gold, the statesman sway his realm, the warrior trample on his foe ; let the philosopher expound creation, the scholar elaborate his tome, the poet attune his lay ; but let him that would have bliss for ever unshorn go and win souls ! Arcot has no missionary, and, I believe, never had any.' ' [It was not until 1851 that Dr. Henry M. Hcudder founded the American Arcot Mission. He was joined in his enterprise by five brothers— a noble company, of whom only one remains alive and at work. The Mission is supported by the Reformed Protestant Dutch Church of America, has been very ably manned, and is to-day one of the most vigorous and successful Missions in South India. Its activities are manifold — evangelistic, educational, medical ; the area over which its operations extend is comparatively limited — an important advantage.] THE JOURNEY " UP COUNTRY " 89 " The next day," to quote Mir Husain Ali Khan Kir- mani, the admiring and devoted biographer of Ilyder Ali,^ " when the lion of the heavens at one leap or bound liad scattered the starry host like a Hock of sheep, and had risen from the East with his jaws and claws stained with blood " — that is, as we commonplace occidentals should say, when the sun rose, — we were urging our way to the celebrated fortress of Vellore. Hitherto the country had been monotonous Hats, but at this point several hills started suddenly from the j)lain, looking like gigantic haycocks on a level meadow. Overlooked and partly embosomed by these eminences, lies the stronghold which, in the contests of the last century, was regarded as the key of the Carnatic. Turning round the base of a hill, the minarets and dome of a noble mosque rear themselvts from the midst of a grove, with whose dark green foliage their forms of glisten- ing white stand in bold and picturesque contrast. Passing a native town of no attractions, you find the citadel, so completely commanded by the hills, on which traces of once formidable works are still discernible, that a six- pounder will pitch a ball beyond it. The fortifications are of immense strength, and surrounded by a deep, wide ditch, in which, as an addition to the dangers of assault, a number of alligators are carefully kept and fed. Yellore has full often been deluged with blood. Here its notorious commandant, Murtiza Ali, obtained the assassination of the Nawab while sleej)ing in imagined security as his kinsman's guest, during the festivities of the Muharram. Here also Hyder Ali pressed close sieges ; and the place was twice relieved by Sir Eyre Coote, when reduced to extremities. Of the action which preceded the first relief, Mir Husaiu gives the following characteristic account : — " The general left his ground, and advanced to an extensive plain. He had scarcely reached it, before the Nawab's ' HUtory of Hydur X(tlk. Translated from the Persian by Colonel AY. Miles, 90 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE cavalry, with horses as swift as the wind, attacked him on all sides, and, giving up all consideration either of their lives or those of others, surrounded the general's troops in close combat ; and to what an extent did they not exert their valour ? The ISTawab himself, with his artillery, took up a position on a high ground on the general's route, and lighted up the fire of war in his front. On the right flank, the prince (Tipii) determined to imitate in his attack the battle of the Last Day ; and a total dispersion of the troops, followers, and baggage of the rear-guard ensued ; and, at one charge, thousands of men and women passed under the edge of the sword, perished by the arrow and musket-ball, or were put to flight. The officers of the musketeers, and "ahsham," or irregular foot, with the breath of the musket and rocket, lit up the fire of battle and slaughter, and many were uselessly burned, and many drowned in a river of their own blood. In fact, a great multitude of officers and men, on both sides, slept on the field of death. The army of the general in this action received a severe blow, a cannon-ball from one of the IS'awab's guns having broken the leg of Colonel Stuart, and thereby caused the commander a deep affliction ; but, more than this, another shot also struck the horse of Syfe ul Moolk, by which he, Syfe ul Moolk, was thrown on the ground, and his brave heart split in twain. In short, it went very near that the stone of defeat and dispersion would fall among the troops of the general, when gloomy night suddenly arrived, and cast a veil of darkness over the world, and closed the contest of the two fierce lions." He does not insinuate tliat a missile so awkward as " tlic stone of defeat" fell among the host of his own licro. After the dynasty of Ilyder had been hurled from the Mysore throne, Vellore became the scene of an atrocity which has ever since allied it with fearful associations. At the death of Tipii, his family, consisting of several sons and daughters, were removed to this ibrtress, where, indulged with a jjrincely income and retinue, they lived far more in TlIK JOUKNF.Y "UP COUNTllY " 91 state tlum in captivity. Four of the princesses had Leon married ; and amid the splendid festivities attending tlie nuptials of the fifth, closed the 9th of July 180G. About three o'clock the next morning, the European troops, con- sisting of four companies of the G4th Itegiment, were awakened by volleys of musketry crashing into their rooms. The assailants were the sepoys of the garrison, who remained outside, pouring in a murderous fire, not daring to encounter the bayonets of the Englishmen by attempting an entrance. Two colonels, thirteen officers, and eighty-two men became their victims ; ninety-one others were wounded. Some found shelter in nooks, where the shot could not reach them. A few managed to gain the ramparts, and maintained them- selves by desperate valour. A fugitive carried the tidings to Arcot. The 19th Dragoons, under Colonel Gillespie, were in instant motion ; the galloper-guns followed. By eight o'clock the Dragoons Avere at the gate, but could not effect an entrance. At ten the guns arrived ; the gate was blown open, the troopers dashed upon the crowd within, cut them down by hundreds, and avenged the treachery with an un- sparuag hand. It is not to be wondered at that the alarmists of the time should find the cause of this horrible catastrophe in a religious panic created by the labours of missionaries ; but it is greatly to be regretted that, in the present day, a name so distin- guished as that of Professor H. H. Wilson should be found giving its sanction to that opinion. Our regret, however, would be greatly moderated could we only make sure that every reader of his able volume ^ would carefully weigh the statements adduced by the learned professor in support of his allegation. Dr. Buchanan, writing after considerable intiuiry, said, "That the insurrection had no connection with the Christian religion, directly or indirectly, immediately or remotely, is a truth which is capable of demonstration." 1 The Hidory of British India ; being a continuation of Mill. 92 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE This, with similar denials, Professor Wilson characterises as " wide of the truth," and says : " The essential and main- spring of the mutiny was religious principle, although its occurrence was influenced, in the manner and season of its development, by incidental and local excitement." To sus- tain this statement, the following fticts are brought forward : — " The sipahis (sepoys) were forbidden to appear on parade with ear-rings, or the coloured marks on the forehead and face significant of sectarial distinctions ; and they were commanded to shave their beards and trim their moustaches according to a standard model. . . . Other innovations in their dress and accoutrements, such as a particular undress jacket, black leather stocks, and a turnscrew which some susceptible minds had identified with a cross, had previously occasioned widespread dissatisfaction ; and the last drop of the cup was poured forth when a new pattern for a turban was devised, which, in the apprehension of the sipahis, resembled a hat. This confirmed their fears, and insubordination was the result." That insubordination was a demur to wear the new turban ; on which their officers acted with great violence, and the commander-in-chief, to whom the matter was referred, dealt most severely with the offenders, Now, this is really all that is said, and, we presume, all that can be said, to prove that the disafi'ection which occasioned the mutiny was the result of missions. These facts — for as such we cordially accept them — do prove that Buchanan used a loose expression when he said the mutiny had no connection with the Christian religion. It had a connection with it ; but that connection was simply this : the sepoys knew that the P]nglish were Christians ; and identify- ing, as they do, costume with caste and religion, naturally looked on the innovations made, with such reckless contempt of their feelings, as steps towards breaking their caste and coercing them into the creed of their foreign masters. Harshness turned jealousy to rage, to which the presence of THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTKY " 98 tlie captive princes gave point and direction. But what had the missionaries to do with all this 1 Was it they who told the Musalmans that the English were Christians, or who taught them to hate Christianity ? The religious distrust was occasioned, not by missionaries, but by the simple fact that the English held a different creed from the sepoys. The feeling thus created was roused to exasperation by incon- siderate meddling with prejudices which, though silly as the whims of a child, are, to those who cherish them, sacred as the postulates of a mathematician. Suppose — which Avould have been far more reasonable in the climate — that the order had been for the British soldiery to adopt the dress of the sepoys ; that they should shave the cranium as close as the chin ; dismiss hats, and wrap up their heads in a mass of calico, and supersede their pantaloons by a long loose cloth of the same fabric, — woidd they not have remonstrated? And, if treated as mutineers for such remonstrance, would they have been quite submissive, even without the aggravations of opposed religion, alien blood, recent conquest, and the presence of those who represented illustrious leaders of their own race and creed, to stimulate their disaffection and point their revenge 1 Surely the learned professor assigns causes for the mutiny sufficient to satisfy any reasonable man without seeking for it in the labours of the few Protestant missionaries who were acting at a distance, and of whom in all likelihood most of the sepoys had never heard, for at the time there was no English missionary in the Madras Presidency, and the Danes and Germans were labouring at a great distance from Yellore. But he does not prove, or adduce a single fact going to prove, that the slightest connection existed between the missions and the massacre. Had Buchanan only used the definite term " missionary efforts " instead of the vague one "the Christian religion," his position — for anything, at least, that Professor Wilson has shown — would have been unassailable ; for to show that the mutiny arose 94 A MISSION TO THE ^MYSORE from religions jealousy is no proof that the jealousy was either created or developed by missions, in the absence of any fact indicative of such connection, and when, inde- pendently of it, there were ample causes and bitter excite- ments. "We may add, that though many of our intelligent countrymen have regarded with singular timidity every attempt to teach the Hindus the truths of their own pro- fession, w'atclung missions as a sailor watches a troubled sky, they have yet to prove a single case in which the pro- ceedings of Protestant missionaries have begotten hostility to the British Government. AVe cannot profess any sym- l^athy with that style of feeling which regards all the fears of our Eastern rulers on this score as merely the expression of dislike to the progress of Christianity, and of desire to perpetuate the revenues so shamefully derived from idolatrous rites. The fears were genuine, produced in minds where the love of truth was postponed to secular expediency, partly by the representations of native officials, or of English ones who had adopted native vices, partly by confounding the effects that Avould rcsidt from their tolerating their own religion with those that would spring from their proraulging it. Any attempt to convert the Hindus by public inter- ference would be as pregnant with mischief to our politics as it Avould be abortive of benefit to our religion. On such a course the body of Protestant missionaries could not look otherwise than Avith strong disapprobation. The religion they disseminate repudiates hollow adherents. It seeks not a new ceremonial, but a new heart ; not a change of creed only, but a change of character. They feel this. Conse- quently they desire to approach the strongholds of Hinduism with the one weapon of fair argument, wielded by vernacular addresses and publications, and thus to lead the people to a purer faith than that which their fathers taught ; showing them, at the same time, that they are armed with no power to coerce or to reward ; while, so far from seeking, they would dread compulsory disciples. oS'ow, we think that this THE JOURXKY "UP COUNTRY" 95 mode of procedure, so I'ar from being likely to excite jealousy of the Government, is the only means of dissipating the suspicions naturally entertained respecting rulers of an alien religion, by giving just views of the spirit of Christianity, and of the relation in which the executive stands to its propagation. And in this conviction we confidently antici- pate the concurrence of everyone whose knowledge of the Hindus has been derived from a free intercourse with all classes of the community, at a distance from those difficulties to accurate views which are found in pundits, officials, and the sophisticated natives of the Presidencies, who, being the ordinary channels of information, soon learn to impose all sorts of deceptions, which deceptions we sometimes find re- produced in clever books. On no point can any people be more sensitive than are the Hindus to forcible interference with their caste and religious customs. Any course indicating a desire to violate these would be the height of folly on the part of Govern- ment. At the same time, no people can be more accessible to argument. Only address their reason, no matter how pointedly, or with what discredit of their most cherished dogmas, and they are never enraged, but seldom oflended. On discovering that the people who rule them have a religion which can bear, and even court, comparison with their own, their first feeling is one rather of gratification than otherwise. When the missionary has succeeded in convincing them that he is no Government officer, no fortune-seeking adventurer — that his sole object is to pro- mulge truth and turn men from sin — they freely accord him the respect due to a noble intention and an elevated character. Our authorities may rely upon this : that the more the natives see of Protestant missionaries, the less will they suspect any collusion between them and the Govern- ment with a design unfriendly to their religious freedom. With profound respect for Professor Wilson's pre-eminent accomplishments as an orientalist, we cannot but deplore 96 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE that, in his office of historian, he has countenanced a habit of thinking little calculated to accelerate what must come, if truth and righteousness are not phantasms — the extinction of Brahmanism, and with it the regeneration of those fair provinces of the human kingdom Avhich that system of sublimated depravity has so long enthralled, polluted, and accursed. After leaving Yellore, our next stages were Pallicondah and Goriattam. When at the latter place, on a subsequent visit, I found that the old sepoy attached to the bungalow, having served in the Mysore, had a slight blundering know- ledge of Kanarese, and asked him if any persons in the neighbourhood could speak it. He said, "Not one," but after a while returned to tell me that there was a village of Kanarese people at the distance of about a mile and a half. Finding that I intended to visit it, he offered to be my guide. Crossing the broad sandy bed of the river, which w'as almost free from water, we found a neat, sequestered village, situated Ijy a grove which shaded a handsome temple. On entering a clean but narrow street, we found several respectable-looking men of the mercantile castes seated outside the doors. They seemed not a little sur- prised by my appearance — never, most j)robably, having been visited by a white man before ; but, when addressed in Kanarese, they stared at one another as if I had been uttering thunder. Soon, however, recovering that easy self- possession in which a Hindu never fails, they entered cheer- fully into conversation. I learned that they Jiad — h&%R settled in this place nearly two hundred years, but still spoke their own language amongst themselves, although it was of no use to them elsewhere. This custom is main- tained by all native families, no matter how far removed from their original country, Uand ought to satisfy those "sanguine Anglicans who expect to make their mother-tongue the vernacular of Hindustan ; if, indeed, satisfied they can be, who hear in vain the perpetual jar of Irish, Welsh, THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" 97 ^liuix, and Gaelic, amidst the luinuony of Anglo-Saxon vocables. Certain forms of pronunciation leading me to ask if they did not come from the Bellary district, they replied, "From its immediate neighbourhood." During this conversation a considerable number of men had assembled round me, while some women stood looking on in the dis- tance, or came, and, casting a furtive glance on the pale- faced stranger, rapidly disappeared. I then opened my Bible and read; explained why I had sought them out; entered into a statement of the great truths of religion, and enforced them with feelings which he only can tell who has found himself preaching Christ to an audience who never heard of His grace before, and who, likely, might never hear it preached again. It was a moment to make one in earnest. They listened with deep attention, and received some tracts with wonder and delight. I earnestly implored the blessing of the Holy Trinity on my feeble attempt to make Him known, and, after a cordial interchange of civilities, closed my interesting visit, heartily praying that some other day a messenger of the Cross might find them the enlightened worshippers of the only wise God. At Lalpet, our next stopping-place, we found a superb mausoleum, marking the resting-place of some distinguished ]\Iuhammadan. Here, also, eager vendors invite your atten- tion to baskets of small, sweet oranges, brought from the adjacent gardens of Satgur, a place formerly of great note, being, as Mir Husain says, "one of the greatest fortresses in the Carnatic, and, like the seven heavens in strength and height, towers fearfully above all the rest." From this point the dark outline of the Ghats stretches before you. Several bluft" hills are jutted out on the plain, as if redoubts of the great citadel. Along the base of the ridge runs a ravine, nearly dry in fine weather, but furious in times of rain. A serpentine road, cut out of the mountain, facilitates the ascent. A thick jungle covers the rugged and precipitous hills. As we proceeded, the sun shone cheerfully on the 7 98 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE many-shaded foliage ; birds of bright plumage glistened in his beams ; squirrels careered in the trees with nimble glee ; the bearers' song sounded musically among the echoes ; a string of bullock-drawn bandies were slowly and laboriously toiling np the steep ; and native sportsmen, with long, rude, fragile-looking matchlocks, were in pursuit of game. But, amidst the mingled grandeur and vivacity, one thing was wanting — no lark was chanting its matin, no note of linnet or thrush, of goldfinch or blackbird, sounded the Creator's bounty or the creature's joy : of all the birds that flitted about you, not one had a voice to sing. It seemed as if idolatry had struck Mature dumb. I had climbed mountains before ; but there was a strange sublimity in finding oneself on that wondrous ridge, Avhich, rising in Khandesh, stretches to Coimbatore, and, there turning northward, travels back to Cuttack ; thus extending, on both coasts of the peninsula, through a distance of latitude greater, on either side, than from Newcastle in the north of England to Bourdeaux in the south of France. Yet all this may be considered as one huge mountain ; for the wide area embraced in its sweep is not a hollow between two ranges, but stands upheld on the shoulders of these everlasting hills ; so that countries of vast territory and varied language are spjt'cad out in high air, one enormous mountain-top. Entering the Indian continent on its apex, you find, a little above Cape Comorin, " a bluff granite peak, about two thousand feet high." ^ Commencing from this point, a chain of mountains extends northward through Travancore and Cochin, terminating a little below Cherpalcheri. After a flat of about twenty miles, you are met by a huger ridge, called the Nilgiris, of which the highest peak towers eight thousand seven hundred and sixty feet above the sea.- This giant ^ See an able article on the geology of Southern India, in a number of the Journal the I'oi/al Asiatir Sorhtlij, by Cai>tain Newbold. - [Tennyson writes most aptly ia '' The IJrook " of " the sweet half- English Neilglu-rry air."] THE ,TOUI!XEY "UP COUNTRY" 99 stretches an arm of tlie same stern mnscle as liimsolf for about seven liuntlred miles along either coast, and holds aloft the wild regions encircled in their granitic embrace. These arms are called respectively, the Eastern and Western Ghats. Diverging, as they do, to a distance of several hundred miles, and meeting the traveller in direc- tions exactly opposite, they might easily be regarded as separate chains, but are in reality one, and connected in the way suggested by this illustration. In their whole course, the only breaks of importance are one lying in a direct line between Seringapatam ami Salem, through which the Kaveri descends from the tableland to the plain ; the other at Nagari, above fifty miles from J\Iadras, at which point the eastern range varies its direction. The tract on the two coasts lying between the Ghats and the sea is called by the Musalmilns Payin Ghat, or the foot of the Ghats. On the east this includes the Carnatic, with the country known as the Northern Sirkars, and may be said to extend from the mouth of the iMahanadi to that of the Coleroon, a distance, in latitude, greater than the whole length of the British Isles, or than the breadth of the European continent, taken from the Adriatic to the Baltic, or from the Gulf of Genoa to the mouth of the Rhine. These countries are flat, with "a sandy soil, resting on a bed of black clay, embedding marine shells," ^ and thinly interspersed with detached hills of granitic rock. The breadth of this tract varies from a few miles, as between Ganjam and Chicacole, to a hundred or upwards, as towards its southern extremity. The western Payin Ghat includes Kanara, the Portuguese territory of Goa, the state of Sawantwari — -which has recently been disturbed, — the Konkan as far north as Daman, with part of the Gaekwar's territory. This, in some parts, is only a strip of land at the foot of the mountains ; but, in others, acquires a breadth exceeding fifty miles. The tableland comprises, in its enormous plateau, the Mysore, the Ceded Districts, the * Kewbold, ut su2)ra. 100 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE South Maliratta country, and the Deccan. The whole of this has an inclination from west to east ; the Western Ghats having an average height double that of the Eastern ; the intermediate region gradually slopes from the one level to the other, like the roof of a hothouse. This arrangement of Providence confers on the flat, sandy countries of the eastern Payin Ghat the benefit of a copious irrigation, by means of those noble rivers — as the Godaveri, Krishna, and Coleroon — which are formed by the drainage of the elevated regions ; while the narrow tracts of the western are provided for by the greater height of their adjacent Ghats and other peculiarities of surface. The elevation varies at different points of the plateau : at Hyderabad it is one thousand eight hundred feet above the level of the sea ; at Bangalore, three thousand. Captain Newbold describes the tableland of the Mysore as " hypogene schists," that of the Ceded Districts as similar, and that of the Deccan as presenting, in some cases, overlying trap, — in others, blue, grey, and buflf lime- stone, with extensive tracts of granite and hypogene rocks, penetrated by trap-dykes, and partially covered with regur. "~ "With all respect for the geologists, it does tax one's faith in the power of their " incandescent elements " to stand on the summit of the Ghats, spread your thoughts over the wide regions they sustain, think of the kingdoms, the capi- tals, the tens of millions held up on the top of this mammoth mountain, and then ascribe its elevation to the activity of forces within the earth. The mind is disposed to refer this stupendous phenomenon to a direct exertion of the Creator's power. At the same time, we must own that His hand is seen most conspicuously in the endowment of agents evidently incapable of self-production or self-control with the ability to accomplish magnificent results. In the powers of fire, light, and electricity we have glorious proofs of what God can do ; and who can trace the services in which He employs those mighty, but mindless, things, without asking, To what THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" 101 style of achievement may He not yet conduct the spirit of man, which daily demonstrates its superiority to them by making them all its instruments 'i The man who discovers and exhibits the servants whom our Maker has been pleased to employ helps me to adore more humbly His eternal power and Godhead; as also to take conceptions of the possible attainments of my own soul, which more impress me with the responsibility of its possession, with the need to be sedulous in its culture. His industry deserves, and has, my gratitude. But if he descant on the wonders of agents which, after all, have neither will nor judgment — no, not the knowledge of their own existence — without rising higher, he forces me to think of a mechanic who would account for all the marvels of the factory, the telegraph, or the calculating machine by referring you to the engine-room, the battery, or the framework, without one allusion to an inventive or pre- siding mind. Light is at this moment rejoicing every eye in a hundred nations, but it knows it not ; it has no share in the vivacity which it bestows on living things ; no sense of the beauty wherewith it decks the inanimate. It is well to ponder the laws under which nature operates. But laws never make themselves. It was a touching and a mournful thing, as, full of such reflections, we pressed upon the giant hill, to see the bearers ground their palanquin, produce some cocoa-nuts, turn aside to a small temple, and there reverently present them to a miserable little image, as an offering to propitiate his favour on their way. The surrounding witnesses to the Creator's glory, and the idol's impotence, were so numerous and so plain-spoken that this act made one feel he belonged to a race degraded indeed. The stock's nothingness was inscribed on all you looked at. The mountain, swelling with a majesty it never wore ; the light, glowing with a radiance it never gave ; the vegetation, springing Avith a life it had long since lost ; the parroqiiet, clad with a loveliness it could neither give nor prize ; the squirrel, gamboling with a vivacity it 102 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE could not share ; the very fruit, lying as its ottering, and rich with nutriment it could not impart, could not even derive, — all, all lifted up their voice, and witnessed against the madness, the wickedness of man. To see the Almighty insulted so, amid the stupendous monuments of His power, and to think that, inane, loathsome, as was the deed, yet half the millions of our race would not blush to join in it, awoke within a strife of shame, indignation, and pity that tore the very heart. Lord God, holy and true, how long 1 How long will rational beings affront thy Godhead ? How long will men, lost, contemn their Creator and adore His creatures'? Earth and heaven answer, "How can they call on Him of whom they have not heard 1 And how can they hear without a preacher 1 " Oh, where is the youth with soul so earthly that would rather spend his days in gathering money than in calling the cities of heathendom to behold their God 1 And where is the mother who would not thank- fully devote her firstborn to a work so holy 1 And where is the man who Avould rather reserve his thousands to tempt his children when he is dead than send them to bless his species while he lives 1 At the head of the pass stands the bungalow of Naikaneri, surrounded by copse and low hills, without anything to indi- cate that, close by, an extensive country is spread out on a level many hundreds of feet below you. A change of temperature is at once perceptible. The sun shines just as fiercely, but the air is not so heated, and at night has a bracing coolness, not wholly lost even in May, at which season the night atmosphere of the Paytn Ghat is so languid and sudorific that you are not surprised the author of the Jaimcuii — a cele- brated native poem — should, in one of his fancies, put the question, "If the wind should grow so warm that he began to perspire, who would be found to fan himf One is much struck to find the sheep on the top of the Ghats having a covering of wool, far short of the luxurious garment of a Southdown or Leicester, but (|uite sufficient to afford the THE .lOUKNEY "UP COUNTUY " 103 inhabitants material wherewith to manufacture kamhlis (" camlet "), which the cold incident to their elevated situa- tion renders desirable, and wliich they weave in long pieces, like Scotch plaids, and use generally as a night-covering ; but, in tlie cold season, do not disdain its comfort even in the day. This provision is forcibly illustrative of God's paternal care, when you remember that, within two or three hours' walk, on the i)lains below, sheep are browsing with precisely the same kind of hide as the calf or foal beside them ; because there, even in December, woollen clothing would be only an encumbrance. The same attention to our happiness which leads the All-giving to ordain that various climates shall produce each the most suitable kind of sustenance is equally manifest in the distribution of material for covering: the delicate silk and cotton, so admirably suited to the regions of balmy airs, we find to flourish there ; the sub- stantial wool, so well adajjted to the changing heats of the temperate zone, is in that zone profuse ; while for the furs, that protect from extreme cold, we travel to the realms of snow. Just about the Ghats the language changes from Tamil to Telugu. This latter continues to near Hoskotti, where the Kanarese begins. These three languages have a strong affinity, but are not to be regarded as dialects of the same tongue. The Kanarese and Telugu use a similar alphabet, but are as distinct as French and English ; only the sensible usage of having a letter for every elemental sound, and of writing every word as it is pronounced, greatly facilitates the acquisition of one when the other is known. The Tamil alphabet is perfectly different, not having a single letter the same, nor even the numeral signs, which in European languages are common ; while its letters in number are only between two and three hundred, whereas in the Kanarese they are nearly seven. ^ Persons used only to '[Tamil has 216 vowel-consonants. "Nearly seven" should bo " nearer six."] 104 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE the parsimonious alphabets of the West take alarm at this host of letters, regarding it as a useless and embarrassing multiplicity. But it is the most convenient arrangement of which orthography admits. In English the learner is deluded into the belief that there are five vowels, and then is rebuked, not five nor fifty times, for pronouncing each of them just as he had been taught to pronounce it half a minute before. Every time he meets with the vowel a, it has to be considered whether he will pronounce it like itself, as in "bacon"; or like e, as in "many"; or short, as in "man"; or long, as in "mar"; or broad, as in "all"; or something else ; and thus the time lost and the labour demanded are incomparably greater than if, in the first instance, he had been required to learn a separate letter for every separate sound. In Kanarese the vowels are sixteen ; the consonants thirty-three. Every consonant adopts sixteen changes of form, each expressing its combination with a certain vowel. Thus five hundred and twenty-eight com- pound letters are really syllables, which, though they facili- tate the writing of the language, yet, by multiplying the forms, increase the tediousness and, consequently, the expense of printing.^ This is the only inconvenience of the extended alphabet, and it is a serious one. But it arises not from securing to each elemental sound a distinct sign, but from the syllabic combinations. To the natives our alphabet seems exquisitely absurd. They think its framers must have been of remarkably barren invention, when they could afford only two dozen signs for all the varieties of sound which language employs. They com- plain bitterly, and no wonder, of the miserable uncertainty entailed upon them as to whether they are pronouncing a word riglit or wrong. The boys in one of our Ceylon "nTission scliools archly called the letter a " the lying letter," ' [There are really .^)'2 letters — Ki vowels, 34 consonants, and 2 other letters belonging to neither class : a nasal symbol and a final aspirate. In conildnation, the signs number 532. THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" 105 saying that it so constantly changed they could never trust it. The Kanarese alphabet affords four, to take the several posts, on all of which, and some others to boot, we compel this one overworked vowel to do duty. Would the chemical student deem his task lightened if, instead of having to learn a name for each of the fifty-four elements, he were obliged to use the sound sodium equally for the one it now indicates, and for :dnc, azote, and chlorine, leaving the context to determine which was meant? Or would the juvenile musician be assisted by having semibreves, minims, and quavers all expressed by one sign, memory or judgment deciding the particular application? Or would the master of ten workmen diminish his trouble were he to get three John Joneses, three John Smiths, and three Thomas Browns, rather than learn ten separate names? Yet such is the principle on which all the sounds of our copious tongue are compelled to find expression, through the stinted and impoverished medium of the Eoman alphabet. A certain lively writer gives the following description of Tamil : — " This Tamil is a fearfully ugly language ; clatter- ing, twittering, chirping, sputtering, like a whole poultry- yard let loose upon one, and not a singing-bird, not a melodious sound, among them." This is far more likely to be read and remembered than the sober descriptions of those Avho are guilty of weighing words. It is, however, mere humorous rattle, a playful way of venting the annoy- ance so natural when hearing a thousand things said that you cannot understand, and when perplexed in attempts to learn what you are told is very easy. I never spoke Tamil, and understood it but very imperfectly ; but feel no hesita- tion in saying that were one who knew nothing of it, or English, or French to hear the three languages well spoken, he would at least hesitate as to whether the palm of euphony were not due to the " poultry-yard let loose," / Telugu is remarkable for soft, agreeable sounds, and is popularl}'^ called " the Italian of India." Kanarese, on the other hand, 106 A MISSION TO THE MYSOPxE abounds in rugged combinations of mutes and aspirates, which give it a character of force and harshness.^ But though defective in melody, its grammatical structure has a beautiful philosophical simplicity ; while as a vehicle of knowledge and emotion it is admirable. Wealthy in native resources, and abundantly replenished from the exhaustless Sanskrit, it is copious, definitive, and nervous — equally competent to express the boldest passion or the softest sympathy, the tale of history, the flights of song, the refinements of metaphysics, or the high and spiritual discourses of theology. For the discussion of physical science, it will require a liberal invention of technicalities. Kanarese is spoken all over the Mysore, in the provinces of Kanara and a considerable portion of the Ceded Districts. The population using it is variously estimated by Europeans at from ten to fifteen millions.- The natives state it higher, but they are poor authorities. Up to a quarter of a century ago every book in this many-tongued language was a heathen one. '. No volume kindled the fancy of ^ I am aware that in this statement I differ from the Kev. W. Campbell, who in his work, British India, etc., characterises Kanarese as "mellilluous in its sounds." It is capable of softness, but that is not its eliaracteristic. - [The census of 1791 put the number of Kanarese-speaking people at close upon ten millions. This, however, only represents the number of those who reckon Kanarese as their mother-tongue and "house-language," and does not represent the range of its actual use. There are many people whose ancestors came long ago from the Tamil or Telugu areas, who at home always speak their ancestral language, and who in the census paper would enter themselves as Tamil or Telugu. JNIeauwhile, Kanarese is the only language they read ; it is the language also in which they transact all the business of life outside their own doors. The same is true of some Muhammadans. The Kanarese-speaking country is practically cut in two by the Tunga- bhadra. North of that river the language is used in the South Mahratta country, and other parts of tlic Bombay Presidency, in portions of the Nizam's Dominions, the Central Provinces, and Berar. South of the river it is used in Mysore, in Kanara, Bdlary, and several other parts of the Madras I'rcsidencv, in Coorg and Cochin.] THE JOUKNEY "UP COUNTRY" 107 youth or beguiltd the tedium of age, but stultified the intellects with drivelling idolatry, and polluted the soul by foul and disgusting recitals.^ A dark awe comes over one to think of a tongue, spoken by civilised and populous nations, continually uttering men's cares, agitations, and joys; as continually instilling doctrines, principles, facts ; but dumb, wholly and for ages dumb, as to any sanctifying truth, any saving message. Blessed be God that, with Kanarese, it is so no longer ! It is eloquent now with every truth of that religion Avhich is rich enough in holiness to make even a Hindu pure ; rich enough in love to melt the chains of centiiries and fuse all castes into brotherhood ; rich enough in consolation to heal the countless sorrows that follow strange gods. In 1820 the Rev. John Hands, of the London Missionary Society, printed the New Testament at Bellary, and twelve years after, the Old." I cannot utter, nor yet repress, the veneration with which such a boon to mankind inspires me. He that benefits his species is greater than he that pleases or astounds them. But to be the benefactor of millions, and that to the end of time, is a dignity conferred on few. Let others pay their honours where they will. The profoundest reverence, the liveliest thanks I may offer to creature, shall be reserved from genius, grandeur, heroism, but cheerfully rendered to him by whose godly toil a wide- spoken tongue is first made to utter the words whereby my Redeemer may be known, my fellow-sinners may be saved. The deed is too vast for the chronicles of earth, too pure for ^ [In Kanarese literature, as in all Indian literature, there is a per- vasive idolatry, and debasing narratives have too much place. But it is not wholly devoid of things of better import. One meets now and again with worthier views of God, with confession of sin, with the expression of siiiritual desire ; and it includes a serious philo- sophy.] - [A new translation of the Bible into Kanarese was completed, after sixteen years' labour, in 1759. This is now undergoing careful revision, the revised New Testament having been com])leted in 1901.] 108 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE the praise of men. Every letter of its record will be a re- generated soul, every stone of its testimonial a redeemed family, every note of its paean an angel's joy. He who can pursue the sunbeams, and trace, without one omission, every lineament of beauty they pencil on tree, and flower, and living thing, may tell the blessings that accrue when the light of life is flung on the pathway of millions, whom the darkness bewildered and destroyed. It is strikingly characteristic of the two systems that, while Protestantism has enriched the various tongues of India by versions of the Holy Scriptures, and is rapidly adding the boon of a pure literature, Komanism found sacred tomes in the custody of the native churches, which would have been valuable both to the biblical critic and the ecclesi- astical historian ; but she consigned them to the flames by the hands of her infamous Archbishop Menezes, who, with the soul both of an Inquisitor and a Goth, was not content to inflict wrongs on the Syrian Christians, which associate his memory with that of Pizzaro and Cortes, but must consummate his barbarism by burning documents whose antiquity and sacred character, while they would have commanded veneration everywhere else, only served him as a stronger motive to remove such undesirable impedi- ments to the assumptions of his Church. Of his proceeding a full detail may be found in the Rev. James Hough's History of Christianity in India ; while a succinct and interesting summary is given in the second edition of the Rev. E. Hoole's Mission in Madras, Mysore, and South India. The second stage from Naikaneri was Betmangala, which lies within the Mysore boundary. Here, one of our horses having lost a shoe, we had the opportunity of seeing the operations of a native blacksmith. He came with ready- made horseshoes, hammers, fuel, anvil, and bellows, all contained in one very portable bundle. The fuel was char- coal, and the anvil tiny, with a spike, by which he drove it into the ground ; but the bellows were the most elaborate THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTIIY " 109 and ingenious implement in his whole workshop. The pipe was an iron tube, about one inch in diameter ; after a few inches it branched into two, each of which terminated in the corner of a leather bag, where it was tightly tied. These bags were open at the top. The operator, placing the pipe under the fuel, sat him quietly down, and took the top of a bag in either hand. Thin slips of wood ran along the edges to enable him to open and close them more readily. Spread- ing his right hand to its full extent, and raising it at the same time, he both opened and stretched the bag held by it which, consequently, filled with air. He then closed his hand firmly, and, pressing down the bag, forced the air con- tained in it to escape through the pipe below. The left hand then performed the same duty; and the two plying in- regular alternation, sustained a blast sufiicient for his pur- pose. Wlien the shoe was heated, he shaped it on his tiny anvil, still sitting on the ground ; his easy quiet presenting a strange contrast to the sturdy manipulations of our Vulcans at home. This habit of sitting at work gives the Hindus an air of laziness to English eyes. The bricklayer sits to build ; the stonecutter sits to chisel ; the reaper sits to reap ; the potter sits to turn his wheel ; and, from all appearances, the ploughman would sit to plough, but that the erect posture is more convenient for walking. It is usual, during the growth of the rice, to rear a kind of platform to watch it against the crows ; and there you may see a poor boy squatted, for hours together, under a sun hot enough to scorch the board he sits on ; and yet he takes it as patiently as though he were a portion of the wood. Here, also, we saw part of the process of preparing cliunam} The lime (generally made of shells), after being slacked, is sifted again and again through thin cloth. A woman takes a quantity of this, and, sitting down with a small ^ [Chunam — the common name in India for lime. The Madras dmnam, made of calcined shells, has a great reputation all over India.] 110 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE pot of water aud two stones, one flat the other round, places a little lime on the flat stone, moistens it, and then rolls it with the other till she thinks it impossible that the minutest particle can have escaped. Then it is mixed with the white of eggs, and also, I have been told, with sugar, after which the pounding is repeated. The plaster thus produced, when carefully polished, has a surface singularly smooth, and of a whiteness not so soft, but more intense, than the finest Italian marble. Erections which, have received the highest chunam finish, aff'ord, in the massive purity of glistening white, a species of architectural beauty not to be found in Europe, The interior of some churches at Madras look as if the plastic hand of some giant modeller had shaped the whole from one Parian rock, without vein or joining. This majestic unity is far more impressive than the agglomeration of gilding, painting, sculpture, white marbles, coloured marbles, balustrades, colonnades, angels and emperors, saints and crusaders, which decks that paragon of magnificent bad taste, the Madeleine at Paris. Our next stage led us to Kolar, at the entrance of which two stately minarets, glistening in the morning sun, and gracefully contrasting with the dark foliage of a surrounding grove, indicated the spot where the remains of that wonder- ful man, Hyder Ali, had been interred.^ Of low extraction, utterly uneducated, and spending up to his twenty-seventh year in idleness, he managed to subvert the throne of Mysore, conquered several adjacent countries, maintained long con- tests with " the stormy and warlike English," as Mir Husain terms us, ravaged all their territory, annihilated a division of their army, eclipsed the glories of the hero of Buxar, and dictated peace almost at the gates of Madras. His bravery, enterprise, decision, and foresight will bear comparison with those of Xapoleon. His power of giving simultaneous attention to several concerns exceeded that even of Csesar. Yet he never could read or write, his greatest literary attain- ' Afterwards removed to Seringapatam. THE JOURXEY " VV COUNTRY" 111 ment being the ability to shape one letter, which he appended to official documents as his sign-manual ; and even this is called by hi.s laudatory biographer the result of " much labour." This ignorance, doubtless, whetted the suspiciousness that ever curses a tyrant. Never were countries ruled with a more coarse and relentless despotism than those that fell beneath his sword. The tales of his cruelty that circulate among the villages of Mysore chill the blood, even at this distance of time. His desires were large, and he lived for himself. The pleasures of conquest, of wealth, and of the harem moved his soul with resistless impulsion. In their way, the faith of treaties, the rights of property, the sanctity of homes were but gossamer. He lived in battles and in marches. His appearance in any neighbourhood was a portent of woe to all who had aught to lose. The wealthy were commanded to produce their long- kept treasure : reluctance was ruin. Those who had beautiful daughters saw them torn away to swell his harem or amuse his favourites. Woe to him who murmured, no matter how deep his wrongs ! The ears of the tyrant where everywhere ; his spies numberless and unknown, The silence of Russia on a toijic inhibited by the Czar is not more perfect than was that of the dominions of Hyder on his oppressions. In ruling men he used but one instrument — terror, pure and unmasked. The faith of his ministers, the integrity of his zemindars, the zeal of his spies, the punctuality of his horse- dealers, the very courage of his troops in the charge, were all secured by terror.^ The faithful Mir Husain, though asserting that " he was altogether full of kindness and generosity," quietly admits that " the backs and sides of his ' " AVhen, stimulated and forced on by the abuse he gave them, the horse had charged the enemy, he sent for the syces ('grooms' or ' horse-keepers ') of the cavah-y, and, giving them bamboos or shoes, he placed them in line, himself taking a post in rear of the whole, and giving orders to them to strike and beat any who retreated." — Colone Myles' translation of the Ahwali Ilydur. 112 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE negligent and extortionate servants were frequently softened by stripes of the whip," an emollient to which he was very partial; while the author of the Aluuali Hydur hesitates not to say that "cutting off the nose and ears of any person in his territories was the commonest thing imaginable ; and killing a man there was thought no more of than treading on an ant." The account of his death is very characteristic, and, to those who look on a dying man with Christian eyes, very sad. " On the last day of the Mohurrun ii Huram," says Mir Husain (page 471), "he asked his attendants what was the date of the month ;^ they replied, 'This is the last day of the month Zi Huj, and to-night is the first of the Mohurrun.' He then directed that water should be made ready for him to bathe ; and, although the physician objected to his bathing, they turned him out of the tent, and the Nawub bathed. Then, having put on clean clothes, he repeated some prayer or invocation on his fingers, rubbing his face, and at the same time despatched two thousand horse to plunder and ravage the country of the Polygers, north of Arkat, and five thousand horse towards Madras, for the same purpose, and to alarm the people there. He next sent for some of his officers, and gave them strict orders for the regulation of their departments, and afterwards swallowed a little broth, and laid [lay] down to rest. The same night his ever-victorious spirit took its flight to paradise." Such were the last deeds of a man who possessed talents equal to any that the history of wars has developed ; while in character he combined the darkest features of the tyrant, the libertine, and the lover of pelf. Who would die under the curses of a whole nation 1, But the last moments of a hero are seldom envialjle. No one would covet Alexander's end. Caesar had for his dying thought a biting sense of ingratitude and friendlessness. William the Conqueror died ' He knew that he was dying, having been suffering for some time witli a cancerous affection. TllE JOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" li."^ with tormenting recollections of the "many robberies "he had committed ; and his corpse lay rifled and exposed on the floor for hours.' The proudest hero of our navies, when he felt himself smitten by death, cried, " What will Lady Hamilton sayl" thus giving the last thought of his great spirit to one whose disgustful life should have made A common informer blush to name her. Happy, happy, happy hcj lowly or illustrious, who in the final call can recognise the voice of Him whom he sought in his youth and served in his prime ! Our journey was now drawing to a close. In India tht3 incidents of travel are few. The roads are anything but crowded. You see now and then a string of bullock-carts ; a sepoy on furlough, with native complexion and English attire j a peon,- with sword and tiger-skin belt ; a barbel: sitting under a ttee, and performing the monthly tonsure ort the heads and chins of patient-looking victims ] a dram-sellei* in a shed, with bottle and glass of English manufacturej and native vessels for toddy ; or a religious mendicant ringing his gong, sounding his shell, or bawling out the names of his god. By a village at sunrise you are sure to meet, issuing out, a multitude of cows and buffaloes, which are driven within the walls every night for greater security. The cows are generally small and ill-fed, but the bullocks, being well cared for on account of their value as beasts of draught and burden, are fine animals, with a broad flowing dewlap and large solid crest on the shoulder, shaped not unlike a cock's comb, but without the scalloping. Of all animals the bufiFalo is least indebted to beauty. The hide is a dull, dingy blue, without hair ; the head long, poking, and horizontal ; the ^ See Pictorial Ilidory of France. -[A "peon" is a messenger. Every Government office, civil or military, has its own staff of peons, and each one wears a belt (generally red) with a brass plato setting forth the Department ill which he serves. Constables also are called "police peons." The " sword and the tiger-skin belt" are not now the iusignia.] 8 114 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE gait shambliug and lazy ; the look ineffably stupid. You are ready to imagine it an ill-shapen cow, clothed in soiled slate, and feeling about as comfortable in mail as the " man of brass " at the Lord Mayor's show. Occasionally on an ox, with decorated horns and necklace of sounding bells, rides by a country gentleman, with bright garments, rich turban, and expansive slippers, who looks, as country gentlemen sometimes do, as if he were somebody in his own neighbour- hood. Then you meet a family, the father walking before, silent and haughty, the mother coming behind, silent and craven, with a child slung at her back and a bundle, con- taining their household goods, on her head. They go on and on in dead silence, with as little sign of mutual feeling as the fore and main masts of a ship. For miles together the husband maintains his dogged silence, the wife her humble distance. Sometimes you see a pompous, swelling Musalmdn, followed by a pony supporting a white pyramid, which, when near, is discovered to be a lady in a muslin bastile, with only a small aperture at the eye for her to peep through. Such poets as Mr. i\Ionckton Milnes may commend the atrocities of the harem by singing— " Within the gay kiosk reclined, Above the scent of lemon groves, Where bubbling fountains kiss the wind, And birds make music to their loves, She leads a kind of faery life, In sisterhood of fruits and llowers, Unconscious of the outward strife That wears the palpitating hours." As if a human breast were to be freed from cares by lemon-scents, fruits, flowers, and bubbles, when those very things come to her in an isolation which remind her of her own, and show in their very form that she is not allowed to wander in fields where their beauties flourish, or trace the stream whose waters are free ; but that, with Jealousy for her judge, and Contempt for her jailor, she is captured and THE JOURNEY "UP COUNTRY" 115 caged, a perpetual prisoner, for the crime of being a Avoraan, and that, too, by the man whose children she has borne ! Let those who choose read and admire such elegant inanities. For our own part, we honestly say that they who could look on such a monument to man's depravity and woman's degra- dation, as is afforded by a Muliammadan lady in her itinerant prison, and recollect that her humiliation and wrongs are shared by the women of many a nation, without being heart- stung, deserve, if men, such affection as tyranny fosters, such peace as jealousy brings ; if women, could such women be — " If women, to Turkish serails let them sfieed, And be mothers of Mussulmaun slaves." Painful reflections arose in looking back on the way we had passed. It is much frequented by our countrymen, but the spiritual interests of the population lying along it are sadly overlooked. Villages, towns, cities are slumbering in undisturbed idolatry. They worship gods of wood and stone ; no one points them to a greater. They seek purity by torture and ablution j no one tells them of the fountain that is opened for sin. It is sad — and sad with shades of awe and sorrow not easily depicted — to pass, one after an- other, through places where thousands dwell, and think of their children, all imbibing errors that will vitiate their life and curse their eternity ; of their daughters, whose birth, instead of being hailed as a father's joy, is endured as fate's decree, who learn no letters, aspire not to equal companion- ship, but live and die in ignorance and contempt ; of their mothers, who never share their husband's board, and seldom see his smile ; of their widows, whose bereavement is looked on not as a sorrow to attract pity, but as a curse to mark them for execration ; of their orphan girls, sold to the temple and infamy; and, saddest of all, of their old men, in whose eye no hope kindles as they bow down to the grave. He that knows the heart of a missionary knows what anguish these reflections bring; but anguish is not all : ever and anon will stir within him an impetuous 116 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE indignation at the supineness by which fields thus opened by Providence are left imtilled, and the mind grows bewildered with questions as to what shall be the final award of Christian men who, aware of the world's state, prefer laying up for themselves treasures on earth to making millions rich for ever. At Hoskote, the last stage from Bangalore, we were delighted to find Mr. Cryer and Mr. Jenkins waiting to receive us. After a happy day spent in their society, we started early in the afternoon. About an hour after night, hedgerows skirting the broad, regular roads, English-looking gates, lights shining from between clumps of trees, the white fronts of houses glistening in the brilliant moonlight, and tlie stir of buggies hurrying hither and thither, told us that the merciful care of our Heavenly Father had conducted us to the English capital of the iSfysore. CHAPTEli IV BANGALORE The first object morning presented to our view was that whicli is always beautiful, but doubly so in a land of idols. Surrounded by heathen dwellings, the house of God is welcome as a water-spring in the desert. Just before the mission-house at Bangalore stands a chapel, capable of accom- modating about three hundred persons, substantial and neat. It is situated in the very centre of the cantonment,' on a spot more eligible for the English and Tamil communities than any in the place. A large part of the cost of its erection was defrayed by the liberal contributions of the resident European gentry, many of whom are ready with their aid in every good work. A native gentleman who had acquired great wealth, and received a highly honourable title from Lord "William Bentinck when Governor-General, handsomely forwarded £100 towards the expense of the building, accom- panied by a letter to the missionaries, in which he begged their acceptance of this sum as a token of his respect, and especially of his gratitude for the benefits derived by his grandson, who had been educated in one of their schools. In front of the chapel stretches an open esplanade more than a mile long and of considerable breadth. Each of its sides is skirted by an avenue of trees, with a fine broad road. ^ [The cantonment is that part of an Indian city in which British troops are quartered, and the part, therefore, in which Europeans chiefly live. It is often some distance from the native portion of the city — the Pettah. In Bangalore, the distance between the two is about a mile, 117 118 A MISSION TO THK MYSOKE Along the riglit-hand road extends a series of barracks, capable of accommodating a regiment of European cavalry, one of infantry, and two of sepoys. The opposite road is lined with compounds, as the garden plots in which houses stand are invariably called ; a large building for assembly- rooms terminating the row at one end, and a spacious English church adorning the other. At the head of the esplanade is seen the residence of General Cubbon, the chief of the Com- mission for governing the ]\lysore territory, who, in connec- tion Avith his colleagues, has administered that responsible trust in a manner honourable to the English name and advantageous to the country. Branching from this centre, roads run in every direction, pleasantly skirted by com- pounds, each with its smiling bungalow, and not a few bearing marks of horticultural taste. At a short distance on one side, a regiment of native cavalry is quartered on the border of a smooth lake, while in a different direction you come upon the post of a large body of artillery, horse and foot, English and native ; each of these places forming an agreeable extension of the military lines. The martial air of the place strikes you at once. Your eye is constantly falling on a military figure. In the early morning you have in one direction the brilliant manoeuvring of the Hussars ; in another a regiment of sepoys, like an assembly of bronze statues in red coats, turned into a huge automaton, and performing rapid evolutions at the will of a mounted operator ; in another a squadron of brown lads in dark trousers and white jackets doing drill at the word of a sepoy sergeant, who is educating them in soldiership, that, when of proper age, they may be drafted into regiments not as awkward recruits, but as veterans in tactics, if not in campaign. On the left you hear the angry artillery practising its thunders on mock mud forts, and, on the other hand, the volleying of musketry from some sham fight or regiment in exercise. Then, during the day, look where you will, into church, drawing-room, street, carriage, or palanquin, you are almost sure to see either BANGALORE 119 the scarlet of the line, the blue of the artillery, the glitter of the Hussar, or the bright sky-colour of the native horse. In the evening everybody is abroad, most of the carriages being drawn by a pair of well-conditioned bullocks, At this time the sparkle of military costume, combined with the richness of the foliage, the beauty of the sky, groups of natives, palanquins, and an occasional train of elephants, gives a romantic air to Bangalore, The faces, too, look more English than those that are paled or browned by the fiercer heats of Madras ! you often see a child looking rosy and merry, which is hardly ever the case below the Ghats. But the endless recurrence of war-dresses brings no pleasing thoughts of the struggles through which the country has toiled to its present peace, and of the seeming distance of that day when men shall learn war no more. At the same time it is delightful to feel that under many a military coat beats a heart wherein the love of Christ has implanted those principles which, when generally diffused, Avill make " peace to spring out of the earth, and righteousness to look down from heaven." Close around this beautiful assemblage of European dwell- ings, the Tamil population are congregated in clusters of houses, some of which, as Alasur, the ShCilei, and the Great Bazaar, swell into considerable towns. This is what first meets the eye as Bangalore, and what many of the residents regard as such, treating the Pettah — the real Bangalore — as a mere appendage, which they seldom see, some of them never. "A lady" states that, on proposing to visit it, she was dissuaded from the step on the ground that it was " quite native " ^ — the very reason that one would have thought would command interest. All we have been describing is merely the creation of the English, the clumps of Hindu dwellings interspersing the cantonment being tenanted by foreigners who have come from the Tamil country in quest of the trade and employment incident to the presence of a ' Letters from Madras, u 120 A MISSION TO THE MYSOEE large European force. It is a singular fact that, though tlie English have held the place for nearly half a century, you scarcely find a single Mysorean among their menial servants • but, if employed at all, it is as gardener, bearer, or wet-nurse. The other offices are filled by Tamil people or Musahnans. The Mysore having been far less accustomed to foreign intercourse, and less broken by foreign conquest than the countries on the coast, its people are more shy of domestic connection with strangers, and maintain a more independent bearing. Bangalore itself lies above two miles from the military centre, and is, on that side, completely hidden by a dense tope (grove) which stretches round it, and is penetrated at different points by roads leading to the gates. This grove is a perfect metropolis of monkeys. They swarm in thousands, chasing each other on the roads, capering on the hedges, chattering on the boughs, and grinning hungrily at every- one who passes with any eatable. They are a constant pest to every housewife in the town, discovering unsuspected passages to their stores, forestalling the meal, and making hasty retreat. A native fable, in illustrating the danger of mischievous companions, tells of a man who took a journey, accompanied by his monkey and his goat, taking with him rice and curds for a refreshment by the way. Arrived at a tank, he resolved to bathe and dine. Laying down the bundle with the provisions, he tied the two animals to a bush, and went down to the tank. No sooner had he dis- appeared than the monkey took the bundle, untied it, disposed of the good things, and then wiping his hands on the beard of the goat so as to leave plenty of marks, sat down solemnly at the other side of the tree. The poor goat suffered the beating due to her arch companion. The endless gambols of the monkeys would afford amusement, but that idolatry invests them with an unnatural and repul- sive importance. They are the representatives of a delusion tl^at darkens countless souls. Their impunity in mischief is BANGALORE 121 not granted by the indifference of those they infest, but is guaranteed by their own sacredness, a sacredness that would entail on one who killed them all the odium of murder, and which often brings to their ridiculous presence a man per- forming his namasMra (sign of religious veneration), or presenting his offering. All over the country you find temples to Hanumanta, a monkey ; and before those wretched images you see the child and the grandfather bowing. The Ramayana, one of the great epic poems, gives this account of the origin of monkey- worship. In the Treta Yuga, Vishnu (the preserver of all worlds), under disguise of her husband, succeeded in seducing the beautiful and virtuous wife of Salantankasura. On discovering her dishonour, she pro- nounced on him a curse to the effect that he should become a man, have his wife stolen by giants, and rescue her with an army of monkeys. In consequence of this curse, a part of Vishnu became incarnate as Rama. At the same time Anjana Devi (wife of the wind), had a monkey son, whom she called Hanumanta. He was an avatdra (incarna- tion) of part of Shiva, the destroyer. Rama married Sita, who had been originally born from the pure sound of the Veda. She was carried away from her husband by Ravana, a giant king of Ceylon. Eacus, when in trouble, obtained help by having ants elevated into armies ; but Riima was assisted in his distress by all the gods incarnating as monkeys. Hanumanta became his general, and, as the host was approaching Ceylon, undertook a mission to the island, discovered the prison of Sita, cheered her by the prospect of deliverance, received a token of her constancy to Rama, and when bearing it back was seized by the giants and dragged before their king. They set fire to his tail as a punishment ; but, dashing through meadows, cornfields, stack- yards, and dwelling-houses, he spread general conflagration, until, chased into the tower of a temple, he threw it down on his pursuers, and then, extinguishing his tail in the sea, returned triumphant, The army, interrupted hy the strait 122 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE which separates Ceylon from the mainland, seize on moun- tains, and hurl them into the sea till a bridge is formed. Terrible conflicts ensue. Rama's host is nearly destroyed, A council of war is held : one sage declares that an herb is growing on the Himalaya, which, if applied before the next sunrise, will restore both dead and wounded. Hanumanta offers to procure it. Three leaps carry him over the fifteen hundred miles that intervene. After spending hours in a vain search, he despairs of finding the herb in time, so he shakes the mountain, starts it from its base, heaves it on his shoulders, and, with this credible burden, hastens back. On his way he sees the east reddening, and fearful lest the sun, rising before his arrival, should nullify the virtue of the herb, speeds to meet him, bows low, represents the pressure of the case, and craves half an hour's delay. The proud day- king denies him abruptly. But the captor of the Himiilaya is not to be daunted. He mounts the car of Surya, seizes him by the hair, drags him from his seat, gathers him under his arm, and thus, doubly freighted, completes his journey. The specific is found, the army restored, and the giants vanquished. Such are the recitals which millions of our fellow-subjects devoutly read as revelations from God ! But it is not supposable that this rhodoraontade is the real origin of that leverence for the monkey race which has for ages possessed the soul of whole nations. The doctrine of metempsychosis is the natural source of all the varieties of animal worship. "All life is the same," is the great axiom of that monstrous theory. The moment a man assents to this dogma, nature is metamorphosed, all animation equalised, and a countless brotherhood surrounds him. " All life is the same." To him the same soul that beams forth from the human countenance glares in the serpent's eye, speaks in the tiger's howl, guides the march of the ant, and the trunk of the elephant, animates the wing of the fire-fly, the beak of the vulture, the horse's limb, the scorpion's claw, and all BANGALORE 123 that crawl or swim or fly or reason, differ only in the form under which the kindred spirits are at present housed. This amuses the Englishman as unadulterated absurdity. To the Hindu it is ponderous and overwhelming truth. It makes every form he sees one of mystery. For aught he knows, the horse he rides, the dog he beats, the worm he crushes, may have been not long ago a poet, an orator, a priest ! The parrot he teaches to chatter may be the man from whom he learned letters ; the son Avhose birth he hails may be the ant his own foot trampled ; the lamb that is yeaned to him to-day may be the child he buried yesterday ! He looks on the lizard that crosses his path without any means of conjecturing which has been greater in past history, it or he, or for which the better lot is in reserve ! He may yet be a lizard, the lizard may yet be a king ! Muhammad- anism, incapable of seeing indications of soul except in the gleam of the sword, which woman wields not, denies it to one- half of the human species. Hinduism, prodigal of that which it cannot appreciate, lavishes it on every emmet. The jNIuhammadan despises his wife as a perishable toy ; the Hindu reveres his cow as a rightful equal. This is amusing as a theory but calamitous as a creed. It rives from the human mind every dignity of birthright or hope, and reduces it to timid fellowship Avith "fowls of the air and four-footed beasts and creeping things." Everything that loiters in the dust or nibbles in the pool is its equal. "All life is the same." It fears all, worships most. Low as the curse- smitten serpent wriggles, man bows lower, and calls the reptile God ! It is a bitter sight to see. It is natural that those who hold this doctrine should regard the monkey tribe as embodying their forefathers — a notion which must beget a reverence soon passing to adora- tion. But it is not to be supposed that the Hindus pay to animals, or even to subordinate gods, what some reasoners on worship delight to call "divine honours," — that is, adore them as supreme. Idolatry never imagines a plurality of supremes. y 124 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE Its principle is that the executive of the universe is vested in the hands of "lords many," to whom we should look not as each the supreme, but either as His deputies, each acting in a certain province, or as the friends of man possessing a certain degree of influence, and willing to exert it on his behalf. Its sin does not consist in multiplying supremes ; but in interposing between the Supreme and His servants beings avowedly inferior ; as if His power were too much taxed to meet every claim, or His goodness too lethargic to act with- out prompting. Its blasphemy consists not in avowing a second Almighty, but in raising many to a virtual equality as to knowledge and presence, and to a superiority as to grace. The moment any being is declared a suitable object of uni- versal prayer, he is assumed to be not only omnipresent, but omniscient ; for a million souls may be each pouring into his ear a different prayer at the same moment. Then if he is moved by a feebler petition than would move the Supreme, he outdoes Him in the attribute of goodness. The true test of divinity is being to all men the legitimate object of prayer. He who holds these to be many, may, as does the Hindu, attempt to cover his sins by distinctions ; but the sin is upon him. He who owns many objects of universal prayer owns many gods. On the inner edge of the grove whose vivacious tenantry have called forth these remarks you have the mud wall of the town. Within the gate a scene opens, strongly con- trasting with the broad avenues, the military groups, the intermingling of lawns, gardens, and villas which grace the adjoining cantonment. Here you have a native town in all its perfection. To conceive rightly of this, it is necessary to dismiss all the red bricks, grey stones, drab stucco, storied houses, windows, balconies, slates, pavements, and lamp-posts, which so naturally introduce themselves with the idea of a town, as if they were essential to it. There is none of them here. 1 You see a long, moderately narrow street, witli houses of one low storey, llat-roofed, white-washed, and windowless. BANGALOKE 125 Parallel with them runs a thinly planted avenue of cocoa-nut trees. Monkeys countless are scrambling up the side-walls, playing antics on the roof, bounding from the houses to the trees, and peering everywhere in search of plunder. The street is thronged with turbaned men, some fully clad in shining white, the majority bare from the waist up ; some with flowing beard, some with simple moustache, and some with every hair shaved to the very eyebrow. There are numbers of women, some bearing water-pots, some baskets of fruit ; some having a child seated on the hip, with its face against the mother's side, and supported by her arm — beauti- fully illustrating the prophetic expression, " Daughters shall be nursed at thy side." Occasionally a widow steals through the crowd, in her miserable dress of pale yellow, looking as if under the feeling that she had no right to live, or to obtrude herself on a world from which her religion would have cast her, had not the kind hand of British Christianity interposed. On turning into the bazaar, if you have allowed your expectations to be formed by the descriptions which travellers in Persia give of the structures found in that country, your disappointment will be woeful. Instead of the grand build- ings and glittering display which would suit your Eastern notions, there is the same long, narrow, low street, differing only in this, — that the houses are not built up in front, but open, in the fashion of a coach-house. Indeed, you can hardly form a better idea of an Indian bazaar than to imagine a street of small, doorless coach-houses, parted by Avhite- washed mud walls and roofed with red or black tiles. The only dissimilarity is that the floor of the shop is raised above the level of the street, and the cross-beam sustaining the roof supported from below by two bamboos. The front is often without any protection ; the owner withdrawing the goods at night into his house, which communicates with the shop by a door from behind. In many cases, however, a piece of wicker-work, as large as the whole front, is hinged on the beam which supports the roof 3 and, being let down at 126 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE night, forms a covering, which is secured by a lock of con- struction and workmanship far behind Chubb's detector. During the day it is lifted up, and forms a projecting shade. On the floor of one of these shops you see the banker seated, with a few small bags about him, scales to weigh coins, and a stone whereby to test gold. Of this precious metal he tells you there are sixteen qualities, each of which his stone instantly detects. All he judges trustworthy may borrow at various rates of interest ; the most equitable in the esteem of the people being what they call one per cent., that is, per month, or twelve per cent, per year. They say if a man is not willing to give one rupee to have a hundred for a whole month, he cannot be in great need, and has no business to borroAv. A great many of the merchants trade on capital entirely fictitious. Few families are found who are not, in one way or other, suffering under the curse of usury. The banker is money-changer also, not giving rupees for a single pagoda, or annas for a single rupee, without his deduction. Perhaps next door to him sits the draper, surrounded by a few rude shelves, covered with pieces of silk and cotton cloth. His stock offers no great variety. One set of pieces is dresses for women, another for men ; another, turbans ; another, handkerchiefs ; and these, with perhaps a piece or two of English goods, complete his store. The endless variety of f articles which a cold climate and changeful fashions have I introduced into Europe are unknown where the breezes are \ kindly and a man is content to dress like his grandfather. Then the grocer has a host of spices, for curry powder, piled up in rough round baskets, with sugars varying from a white- ness almost equal to flour to a dark hard substance like dirty jlue^A variety of grain is also displayed. They enumerate \ nine kinds, several of which, however, are properly pulse. 1 Rice is generally spoken of as the universal food of India ; but in many districts it is comparatively little used. In the Mysore, ragi (Cynosurus corocaiius) is the general food. It j is a round seed, of reddish brown colour, and much smaller BANGALORE 127 I than millet. It is ground, made into a sort of thick pudding, I rolled up between the hands into long quids, which are : dipped into a condiment formed of several spices, and ^1 swallowed by efforts that none can make who has not had \^ the benefit of an early training. They regard it as a far more substantial food than rice, speaking with no measured contempt of the imbecile frames of those who eat only the latter. It is as difficult of digestion as rice is easy. " Sir," said a youth to me one day, in extolling his country's food, as would a Scot his bannocks, — " Sir, an hour after a meal of rice, you feel as if you had eaten nothing ; it is melted and gone : but, after a meal of ragi, it is just as if a cannon-ball had sat down in your stomach ; it stands by you the livelong day." Yet all who can afford it, eat rice once a day. Ragi requires no artificial irrigation, and is capable of being preserved, when buried in a hole dug in the ground, for five years or more ; I have been told, for ten. The people of Mysore say they have enough food buried in their fields to serve for a year, even if the crops should fail ; but that, when a scarcity occurs, the people from below the Ghats flock to them, and "eat them up." Then you have the fruiterer, and the goldsmith, and the coppersmith, whose wares consist of pots, lamps, toys, and gods. Of these latter you may buy several for a few pence; for the image is of no account until it has been duly transub- stantiated by a priest : after that, no price will win it from a really devout Hindu. It stirs one's spirit within him to see a man buying a water-pot and a god from the same stall. The bazaars of Bangalore give ample testimony to the prevalence of idol-worship, and, at the same time, indicate a rude state of commerce, as compared with the superb temples of traflS.c at home. The tradespeople themselves look active and respectable. Close by the town is the fort, containing a considerable number of inhabitants. In it Tipu's palace is still standing, but is now used for Government offices. It is difficult to ascertain the population of the place. I have heard intelligent natives state it at from half a lakh to 128 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE two lakhs, — that is, from fifty to two hundred thousand. The best-informed Europeans estimate it at from sixty to eighty thousand. Now, let any Christian living in a considerable town conceive the place to be suddenly changed. In the morning you walk out, and find a low building, in which is a rude image of a bull. Before that image a white-headed man, with his staff in his hand, " for very age," is casting himself prostrate. You ask him why. He replies, "It is God." A little farther on, in a similar building, stands a cast of a human form, not larger than a child's plaything : before it fathers are bowing, and teaching their children to bow. You ask why. They say, "It is God." The men that meet you carry small silver boxes on their chests. You ask, "What are these?" They say, "It is God;" Every man, woman, child you see has a lie in his right hand. They are calling stocks, birds, beasts, reptiles — God. Think how shame — that men should be so foolish, and horror that they should be so wicked — would sting you to the soul; think how you would call on the God they were forsaking, to save them from their darkness ; think how you would throw into that prayer all the pang of a calamity, all the vigour of a rescue : and then judge how the soul of a good man mourns as he threads his way through multitudes, each one of whom bears on his forehead marks that he knows not Him whom to know is life eternal ! On the morning after our arrival we received a visit from the Rev. Messrs. Hands and Rice, of the London Missionary Society, who were about to hold their annual missionary meeting the same evening. They hailed with joy the arrival of more labourers in their wide, neglected field. The venerable Mr. Hands referred, with touching gratitude, to the advances made by the cause of God since he landed, thirty years before. At that time a missionary was as welcome in India as a preacher of freedom in Carolina. The Government saw plots, mutinies, insurrections, all kinds of political disorders, attending the man who would attempt to BANGALOEE 129 break the long repose of superstition in Hindustan. Mr. Hands' arrival caused no small stir. He was cited before the authorities more than once. They cautiously resolved to remove so dangerous a visitor from shores they had tabooed to idolatry, and to send him back whither he had come. The influence of an excellent chaplain saved them from doing them- selves that disgrace. But things were altered now; the country was wide before us ; the authorities favourable, the people attentive ; and all the facilities that Providence could furnish were inviting us to preach the gospel to every creature. At that time a European professing religion was as rare as a white Negro ; now they were to be found in every little com- munity. " What," said Mr. Hands, " what hath God wrought !" That evening, in the beautiful chapel of the London Missionary Society, was held a numerous meeting, character- ised by spiritual feeling and high confidence in the victory of the gospel over the giant errors with which it is grappling. One most pleasing feature of the meeting was the truly Christian co-operation of some gentlemen connected with the Government — men representing a class once unknown in India, but now, happily, numerous, who combine all the qualities of valuable public officers with piety based on a scriptural conversion, and manifested by open and consistent acknowledgment of God. Our brethren of the London Society have the honour of being the first Protestant missionaries who sought out the millions whose tongue is Kanarese. In 1810, Mr. Hands opened the mission at Bellary. It has been prosecuted with admirable zeal. Good men have fallen ; others have been forced to retire shattered : but their toils have not been in vain. At Bellary they have gathered a native church, numbering about sixty.^ In the surrounding districts a wide spread has been given to Christian light, and no small influence exerted on the people, tending to the abrogation of ^[To-day there are 172 Church members, and 450 "other native adherents." There are also 13 schools and 1041 scholars.] 9 130 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE Hinduism and the acceptance of the holy faith. They have also translated the entire Scriptures, issued a number of valuable publications, and prepared a copious lexicon of the language : thus both placing the Word of God within reach of the people and providing greater facilities for every successor in the field. Many a time, when my heart has been " hot within me," either from impatience for the ability to preach freely or from joy in the assurance that God would make the truth I was uttering to effect something towards the regeneration of India, have I invoked a blessing on Mr. Hands and Mr. Reeve, by whose toilsome years of translation and lexicography the difficulties of mastering the language had been so greatly liquidated. In Bangalore they have a handsome and spacious chapel in the cantonment, with a smaller one in the pettah, as the town is called.^ Their native church numbers upwards of fifty.- Mr. Crisp is at the head of a seminary designed for the training of native agents. They have also day, Sabbath, and infant schools. Their female schools contain above fifty girls, all the children of caste parents. In the school of the Wesleyan mission are above seventy girls. Thus in Bangalore more than a hundred Hindu females are under Christian instruction, — a circum- stance both delightful and surprising to those who know the prejudices universally entertained by the natives against female education.^ The evil power that reared those ^ The term " pettah " is used with regard to every town with a fort attached, and distinguishes the town from the fort. -[Now there are 121 Church members, and 336 "other native adherents." There are also 14 schools and 1326 scholars.] •' [All this is greatly changed. At the end of 1901 the Wesleyan Mission had 1193 Hindu girls reading in their various schools in Bangalore ; the London Mission also some hundreds. In addition, there are several girls' schools started, and managed by the enterprise of the Hindus themselves. It must also be added that education has been extended to the women and girls of the Muhammadan com- munity in Bangalore liy the ladies of the Church of England Zenana Mission.] RANGALOIJE 131 munitions of iniquity with which the social code of India everywhere abounds contrived that education should be allowed to no female but such as would use it to grace impure attractions. For ages female education and female infamy have been associated in the mind of every Hindu. This has been a law of entail securing to every family in the land an inalienable heritage of narrowness of mind and obdurate prejudice. Every man born in all the nations of India has been doomed to be the son of a mother studiously consigned to unmitigated ignorance. Every breach in this system is a high joy to those who long for the day when the sons of India and her daughters shall rejoice together in light. Of the commencement of the Wesleyan mission in Bangalore, Mr. Hoole, who was one of its founders, has given a full account in his work. As our brethren had learned Tamil, and found in Bangalore a population using that language quite sufficient to engage all their attention, and were too few to detach any of their number for a new sphere, many years passed before they were able to include the Kanarese people in their labours. During the residence of Mr. England a chapel was built, which stood until shortly before our arrival, when Mr. Cryer bad it taken down to make way for the more spacious one now occupying the same site. Two of our brethren had been appointed to Calcutta. After a short time that post was, unhappily, abandoned.^ Mr. Hodson, one of the withdrawn missionaries, was sent to Bangalore. He directed his attention to Kanarese, and, by urgent representations to our home committee, prevailed upon them to undertake operations in that language. And since that time our work has proceeded in three separate departments — English, Tamil, and Kanarese. In each of these languages the gospel is preached, the sacraments ' [It was reoccupied more than thirty years ago, aud is the head- quarters of an extensive and successful work among the Bengali people,] 132 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE administered, Christian publications diffused, and schools maintained. For English services we have three places — the large chapel, a very small one close by the fort, and one extremely small in the cavalry lines. In the last, service is held one night in the week ; and in both the others once on the Sabbath and once in the week. There are also class and prayer-meetings. The congregations are good, and highly interesting. They are composed almost exclusively of officers and soldiers, with their families. In that far land many a prodigal, on whom warnings had been wasted at home, has come to his right mind, and with astonishment found himself received in his Father's mercy. Many whose souls dwelt in darkness while the day of English Christianity was glowing around them, have here, in the very shadow of death, seen a great light. It is most touching to mark the joyful wonder of a man who, amid Christian privileges, had lived as a heathen, but amidst heathen darkness finds his God. I once or twice met an English class, composed mainly of soldiers, and was delighted by their simple experience of the Saviour's love and their warm devotion to His service. The fruit of our English labours has been highly encouraging ; ^ and yet young ministers at home will perhaps be surprised to learn that, of all departments of their work, the mission- aries are least attached to this. For though in such a land the soul is glad to commune with those who have learned the will of God from youth, the wants of the natives are so crying, and the joy of meeting those wants so pure, that I found our brethren, without exception, to prefer that above ^ [Since this was written, three new chapels have been built for English work in Bangalore, and four "other preaching places" are in regular use for English services. In addition, three chapels have been built on the Kolar Gold Fields, fifty miles away, where there is a consideralde colony of Cornish niinrrs. In 1901 the circuit returned •j;'l "English" adherents, of whom 200 are communicants.] BANGALORE 133 every other work. This is their great calling ; the English duties they regard as extra. But they are constrained to sustain them by the conviction that it would be wrong to leave undone anything they can effect for the spiritual welfare of our own countrymen, and also that the labour bestowed on them tends to facilitate the conversion of the heathen by presenting to their view more attractive examples of Christian life. The London Mission has also English services/ and the garrison has two chaplains - appointed by Government. The effect of these agencies on the English community at Bangalore has been truly blessed. In that community at present, may be found a large amount of scriptural piety. The experience of many hearts, and the life of both individuals and families, is such as to elicit the warmest gratitude to God from any who rejoices in the spread of Christ's kingdom. The Tamil department presents much interest and encouragement. Beside the large chapel, there are several preaching-places in the bazaars. The aspect of the congre- gation on the Sabbath is beautifully clean and reverent. I heard many mention with delight the impression made upon their minds at the watch-night service at the close of the year 1840, on which occasion Mr. Hardey assembled the members of the native church at the same time with their English brethren. During my visits to Bangalore, 1 was greatly pleased to see candidates for baptism coming regularly to the mission-house, that they might receive instruction. Nathaniel, the native assistant, was a man of decided piety and active zeal. He had been converted from a family purely heathen ; but the blessing of God had so attended his example and his arguments that they were one by one becoming partakers of like precious i'aith. j\I;niy instances have arisen in which the converts have withstood opposition such as none have ever to encounter in a Chris- ^ [This is 110 longer the case.] - [Now four.] 134 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE tian land. One case is mentioned by Mr. Hardey, in which a man and his wife after baptism were assailed by their relatives with vexatious opposition. They were firm, but in the heat of the strife one of their children was seized with convulsive fits and died. The heartless relations exulted, declaring that they had influenced the devil to kill the child as a punishment for their apostasy. The poor mother was overcome by grief and conflict : her reason fled. The man lost his employment. But, while stung to the soul by the death of his child, the frenzies of his wife, the failure of his subsistence, and the restless assaults of his kinsfolk, he " did not," to use Mr. Hardey's own words, " waver for a moment "; but standing still in his faith, he saw the salvation of God. His wife was perfectly restored, his employment recovered, and his trials ended in peace. In another case a Christian mother had a prodigal son who had forsaken his home. She heard that he was at Vellore. She had other children, over whom she watched with motherly tenderness. But her heart yearned after the prodigal ; he was her first- born. She determined to make the long journey, hoping that his mother's presence would melt him, and that she should win her son. She stated her intention to Mr. Hardey, who reminded her of the claims of her other children, of how faint M'as the prospect of success, and of the hardships attending such a journey on foot. " He is my son, my child still, and I must go," was the mother's reply. She went, she found the prodigal ; but her toils and her tears were vain. Weary and broken-hearted, she returned ; and shortly after, " being warned of God in a dream" that her end was nigh, she diligently put her house in order, was taken ill, and died, peacefully resting on her Redeemer. At one Sabbath morning's service Mr. Hardey baptized four adults, of whom three were people of caste, who declared that they fully and for ever abandoned " every part of that heathenish system." On one occasion Mr. BANGALOKE 135 Hardey met the people on the day previous to the adminis- tration of the Lord's Supper. He remarked strongly on the guilt of any who, while sinning against the Lord Jesus, came to take those emblems of His sorrows. The next day thirty- seven natives celebrated the Saviour's death under an influ- ence deeply hallowed. But one was wanting who had l)cen with them on the Saturday. Inquiry being made as to the cause, it was found that he had been living in secret sin. The word of rebuke had pierced his heart : he durst not go to the holy sacrament, and thus was saved from continued hypocrisy, and the church from the guilt of such a member. God has given our brethren who have laboured in this field many proofs of His approbation. Mr. Cryer was Mr. Hardey's predecessor, and I have seldom seen anyone more affected than was he when parting from his beloved Tamil flock. Their evidences of fervent attachment quite melted him, and it was easy to see that between him and them subsisted warmly all the affections that endear pastor and people. In connection with this branch of the mission are five day and two Sabbath schools.^ The third, and most important, branch of our operations in Bangalore is the Kanarese.- About three miles distant from the Tamil mission-house, and just outside one of the gates of the town, Mr. Hodson obtained a piece of ground. At first there was no missionary to occupy it ; and, as the only measure then practicable, a school was built, with a small house for the master's residence. The education given was in English, and the attendance became considerable. Afterwards Mr. Webber, an excellent and gifted Indo- Briton, was sent to labour on the station. In the year 1840 Mr. Jenkins and Mr. Garratt were appointed as Kanarese missionaries, with authority to build a mission- ' [Now nineteen day schools with 1251 scholars of both sexes, and twelve Sabbath schools with 728 scholars.] '■' This word ought to be Kannada, but the corrupt form is cnirent. 136 A MISSION TO THE MYSOKE house and printing-office. The English gentry subscribed most liberally to the new erections, which in a few months were completed. The mission family took up their abode close by the town, and the printing-press Avas put into immediate operation. The coolness of the morning air, the^ early habits of the country, and the comparative freedom of the people from occupation about sunrise, point out that time or shortly afterwards as the most favourable for preaching to the natives. Having been obliged to spend some time in Bangalore under medical treatment, which was not to be obtained nearer my own station, I had many opportunities of witnessing and sharing the labours of our brethren in the Kanarese department. Going into some street, they would select a favourable place, open the Scrip- tures, and read. While thus engaged, the people gather round. The missionary then selects a text, and proceeds to preach. The subjects are generally of the most elementary kind. The unity of God, His spirituality and holiness, the corrupt heart and guilty life of man, the certainty that these will entail punishment, the incompetence of penance or idols to save, and the wonderful atonement of Christ, whereby pardon is made just and renewal of heart possible, are the truths I have often heard Mr. Jenkins proclaiming in the streets of Bangalore, and often attempted to proclaim. Few things are more affecting than to see a messenger of the Cross take his stand in some thoroughfare of a great heathen city and begin to set forth the truth of God. A crowd of dark faces soon surrounds him, some sneering, some deeply attentive, the greater number with a look of pure curiosity. They hear strange things. You see on their countenances a constant play of wonder, reluctant concurrence, or resolute dissent. Sometimes the simplest truths in religion or the plainest duties in morals are strenuously controverted. The missionary needs to be prepared with a ready answer to an ingenious cavil, and with a placid temper to meet biting BANGALORE 137 reproach or startling blasphemy, liut in general he has the candid attention of the people, and by far the greater number admit the beautiful purity of his doctrine. They rarely assail Christianity, except on the ground of the immorality of Englishmen or that of Romanism, Avhose disciples, though Christians, are as great idolaters as they. So difficult is it to make them believe that Popery and Protestantism are different religions, that I have very little fear of injurious effects arising from the labours of different evangelical churches, whose faith and worship are one, unless, indeed, the agents of those churches should be guilty of seeking to make their distinctions prominent and their claims exclusive. The congregations are frequently numerous. I have preached to hundreds in the busiest parts of the city. Sometimes a discourse is heard from beginning to end without a word of interruption. The missionary never preaches without the clear conviction that the truth he is delivering will in God's hand speed that change by which the people of a continent will rise into the glorious liberty of the children of God. Of all the combina- tions which in our strange world grief makes with hope and joy, none is more exciting than that in the breast of a Christian man looking on a city of idols, and employing for its regeneration the means appointed of God. Besides their labours in the city, our brethren visit the neighbouring villages, to the distance of six or seven miles, reaching them at such an hour as will permit them time to preach and return before breakfast. They preach to the heathen every inorning in the year, and frequently have evening service in addition. In the Kanarese department of our work at Bangalore are one Sabbath and six day schools. One of the latter receives a grant monthly from Government towards its support. The recent decision by which public employment is opened only to those Avho shall have acquired a competent education will 138 A MISSION TO THE MYSOUE do much to increase the efficiency of this branch of Christian operations. Many more will send their sons, and progress will now be so essential that the attendance will not be suspended by every native holiday, which has hitherto been the case, and has proved a serious counteraction to the good received at school. These effects, I learn from my esteemed friend, Mr. Garratt, are even now observable. Mrs. Garratt has established a school, of a character peculiarly interesting. Of all the objects presented to the eye of Christian kindness in India, there is scarcely one more pitiable than an orphan girl. They are sold for a trifle. Traders in iniquity buy them, teach them to read, sing, and dance, and at an early age devote them to the service of some temple, — that is, to infamy. ]\Irs. Garratt has undertaken a girls' orphan school, in which she not only educates, but entirely supports them ; thus averting the hateful destiny to which they most likely would have fallen, and early imbuing them with Christian truth. Although this mission is of recent establishment, first- fiuits have already been gathered. Mr. Jenkins had not laboured upon it much above a year when illness compelled him to return to England. But on the last Sabbath of his stay he had the delight of baptizing two persons, on whom he looked with joyful hope as the promise of a rich harvest. Since his return he has heard that one of these has testified in death to the Redeemer's grace. Mr. Garratt continues on the station. Under his most efficient management the piinting-press has effected important services. I have in my possession a variety of works issued from it, all of which are calculated to be useful. In Bangalore we have 121 church members, 11 schools, and 507 scholars.^ ' [lu the area covered by this statement, the AVeslcyan Mission now reports a native Church numbering 668 members, with 107 candidates for full membership ; a native Christian community of 1127; 38 schools and 3016 scholars.] BANGALORE 139 The operations of the missionaries are aided by a Tract Society and a School-Eook Society. I had the pleasure of being present at the formation of the latter, which has for its object the preparation of valuable school-books in Kanarese, as also to keep on sale a stock of Tamil and English school-books, with various articles of stationery, thus affording the natives every facility for the pursuit of education. Tliis society has proceeded with great vigour and success ; they have published many valuable works, and brought others into circulation. This is a field of labour eminently important ; for even where no more direct Christian agencies can act upon the people, their own vicious books may be supplanted, and their youth, instead of wading through filthy mythology, receive solid information cast in a Christian mould. This is not so difficult as might be sup- posed. The native books are written on the leaves of the palmyra tree, which are from nine to eighteen inches long, and from two to three broad. Each leaf is pierced with a round hole, through which runs a cord, serving to bind them all together, but permitting them to be held loosely when the book is used. They can only bo multiplied by copying, and the writing is performed by an iron style, like a large skewer, which is held upright in the hand, and scrapes marks on the soft leaf. The writer proceeds rapidly, his letters are well formed, and though both sides of the leaf are deeply indented there is never a perforation. But how- ever you may admire the scribe, his bookmaking is slow and expensive, and, when finished, it is a clumsy thing compared with the compact and beautiful production of the printer. In elegance, portableness, and economy, the European book at once asserts its superiority. The natives are sensible of this — they admire it amazingly. It is as great an advance in literature as in travelling the loco- motive is on the stage-coach. They covet a book, and I have seen them on receiving one squat them down then 140 A MISSION TO THE MYSOlJE and there, and begin to pore over those pages so mysteriously multiplied and yet so unaccountably correct. With adequate funds and agencies, it would not be difficult to introduce our school-books into almost every native school in the country. A proper system of colportage would effect it. One day a fine Brahman boy came into my study at Gubbi and asked for a book. I denied him ; but he repeatedly urged his request. I still declined, saying my few books must be kept for grown persons, as boys were likely to misuse them. He would not be refused. I said, " If you are so anxious to have our books, why don't you come to our school ? " He replied, with vivacity, "I wish to do so, but my father won't let me." "Then to what school do you go T' He men- tioned one, of which the master had always evinced the utmost bigotry, strenuously resisting all our attempts to approach either himself or his scholars. I then asked, " "What are you reading at school 1 " " Just at present, we are reading Strictures on Hinduism " — that being a tract by Mr. Eice, of Bangalore, ably exposing the sins and follies of that system, of which this boy was born a priest. On another occasion I^as preaching under shade of a jack-fruit- tree {Artocarpus^wiejjrifglja) in the market-place of a town called Bidare. On my left arm was a pile of tracts and portions of Scripture intended for distribution. At the close of a long discourse I began to give away the books, when almost every hand and voice in the crowd was raised. Men and boys strained and shouted to gain a book. Low salaams, huge compliments, and right lofty titles were lavished upon me in hope of catching my attention. "Can you read?" I would ask one. " Yes, I can read," and, seizing the book I handed, he would begin in a low recitative to show his scholarship. " Can you read ? " I would ask another. " Yes." But when told to do so — " No, I can't read ; but my son can." In the crowd I observed a tall country lad plying elbows and shoulders with all imaginable spirit, in BANGAT.ORE 141 the vain liope of forcing a passage. At length, despairing of success, he reached over the shoulders of a man, and cried at the top of his voice, "Sir ! sir ! you must keep one for me, sir ; you must keep one for me ! " Amused at his earnest- ness, I said, "Why one for you, above all others'?" "Oh, sir, we want it for our school — we want it for our school ! " This at once arrested my attention, and he told me that he lived in a village some miles distant, in which a missionary had never been ; that some of their people had got books from us during a former visit to Eidare market ; that these had been introduced to the school instead of those in use before ; that they were wonderfully pleased with their huddhi ("sense"), but that they wanted some more to complete the set, and the schoolmaster, hearing that we had been at Cheltir, a neighbouring town, the day before, con- cluded we should be that day at Bidare, and accordingly had sent him on purpose to obtain them. These instances show how easily the Christian school-book may gain access, even where both master and pupils are heathen. Could such a society as the Bangalore School-Book Society only command funds to send their publications through every village in the country, offering them for sale at very low prices, it is most probable the people would greedily receive them, and that they would go far towards paving the way for the advance of Christianity. The Romanists have long had a mission at Bangalore. The only effects of it which came under my notice were these : One day when entering the pettah near the fort, I observed a rude erection, something like the booths built by mountebanks in fairs, and on asking what it meant, was told that it was the Christians, who were getting up a play in connection with some of their religious feasts. From the hints I received as to the subject, it appeared to be the holy family, or the Saviour's history. The Romish priests have carried into India the profane habit obtaining in Popish 142 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE countries of making the holiest themes of Scripture subjects for the drama, and the Hindus learn to judge of the purity and the dignity of our religion from barbarous theatricals. One morning, in approaching the same gate, I overtook an old man, and began my conversation with him in a way which was very much my custom, by asking, " Who is your god?" He said, " Nanage Antow7ii devaru" {" An- towni is my god "). I observed that of all the gods with whose names I was familiar, I had never heard of that one before, and repeated my question. He simply replied, "Antowni is my god." Puzzled, but resolved to learn who this new god was, I said, "What caste are you of?" " I am of the Eoman caste," said the man ; and in a moment I saw that the strange name was Anthony, that Portuguese saint being a favourite among his fellow-countrymen in India. Still, it seemed impossible that the man could mean what he had said, and I asked, " Do you say that he is your god?" "Yes," replied this Christian, '^Antowni devaru" ("Anthony is god.") I asked where he was, what made of, and what size. He said he was in the chapel, made of clay, about as high as his breast, and painted white, yellow, black, and red. " But," I asked, "have you no other god?" "No." "What, no other god but Anthony?" His dogged reply was, "They talk about Mariamma,^ but Anthony is the god." This is a melancholy, a horrifying fact, and will completely remove the surprise that any may have felt, that Protestant missionaries in New Zealand and elsewhere should have raised the question as to whether they ought to rebaptize those who, having been Romanists, seek admission to their communion. Is a man baptized by the water and the words when he does not know whereunto he was baptized, does not so much as know " whether there be any Holy Ghost"? Is baptism, adminis- ^ This is very like the name of the heathen goddess of disease, viz., Mari. BANGALORE 143 tered to a man who has no kind of Christian faith and no knowledge to found that faith upon, a sacrament or a profanation ? ^ Before proceeding to my station, I was detained in Banga- lore for nearly a month. Having obtained a Brahman munshi, I daily prosecuted the study of the language, under his tuition. Feeling the importance of a correct pronuncia- tion, and' the difticulty of obtaining it, I made use of him almost exclusively for this purpose, making him read word by word, and repeating each after him, with an attempt to imitate his tones. After a while this extended to clauses, and then to whole sentences. It soon appeared that he was no way scrupulous in correcting mistakes, and urging him to be so produced nothing but large promises. To meet this, I often made a slip intentionally, and when it was permitted to pass, reproved him sharply ; this produced some little ^ [The Roman Church has developed its work greatly in Bangalore since this was written. I do not know the number of its adherents, but its fine Iniildings are much in evidence — two large churches, a large hospital, a college, and some other important erections. Its progress in the Province generally is less striking, but is not inconsiderable. In commenting on the success of the Roman Mission, the writer of the Mysore Census Report of 1S91 (Mr. V. N. Narasimmiyengar, a Brahman official, whom I have known intimately for many years, and whose ability and judgment I greatly respect) makes the following observa- tions : — "Roman Catholicism is able to prevail among the Hindus more rapidly and easily (than Protestantism), by reason of its policy of tolerating among its converts the customs of caste and social observances, which constitute so material a part of the Indian social fabric. In the course of investigations engendered by the census, several Roman Christian communities have been met with which continue undisturbed in the rites and usages which had guided them in their pre-conversion existence. They still pay worship to the Ixila-'iam (water-pot) at marriages and festivals, call in the Brahman astrologer and puruhit (Hindu priest), use the Hindu religious marks, and conform to various other amenities, which have the advantage of minimising friction in their daily intercourse with their Hindu fellow- oaste brethren."] 144 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE amendment. But he seemed to think it was not quite respectful to expose every little blunder, as if one were to be offended at his doing the very thing he was paid to do. He knew English, and liked to talk it, so that my object being not to improve him in English, but to learn to preach in Kanarese, it became evident that the better way would be to get a man with whom it would not be possible to com- municate except in that tongue. Through the kindness of Mr. Jenkins I secured the services of a Brahman living in a remote village, with some reputation both as a scholar and as an author, and who had not an English word or an English idea in his head. He promised to join me at my station. The earliest historical notice of Bangalore which I have found is that Shaji, father to Shivaji, the celebrated founder of the Mahratta empire, had here the seat of a government which he held under Viziapore.^ The town of Mysore, distant about ninety miles, was the capital of petty rajahs, who gradually extended their territory northward till it embraced Tumkiir and Chelur, and thus the posses- sion of Bangalore became desirable. Chikka D6va, who reigned towards the close of the seventeenth century, was a man of considerable enterprise. He consolidated the grow- ing kingdom by establishing post-offices all over it, and making every postmaster a spy. To gain Bangalore he agreed to pay three lakhs of rupees (£30,000). The terms were concluded with Ekkoji, brother to Shivaji; but before the transfer had taken place, Kassim Khan, one of Aurang- zi'b's generals, stepped in, took the place, accepted the stipulated price, and handed over his capture to the Mysore king. When the old race had fallen under that decrepitude which soon overtakes heathen and Muharamadan dynasties, Hyder seized the country with lion grip. Soon perceiving the importance of Bangalore, he erected a fort, in which his son Tipu had such confidence that, in 1755, he transferred ' Wilko's Historical Sketches, l^ANGALORE i4o liis iiarem thitlitii' from Seringapatam. But when, in 1791, the Marquis of Cornwallis approached at the head of an English army, his confidence gave way, and, instead of de- voting himself to military preparations, he was occupied in personally superintending the removal of the same precious charge back to the island capital. The first stroke of the British was to storm the pettah. Mir Hussein, in his amusing life of Tipu, says: "Colonel Moorhouse and General j\Ieadov/s, with a strong body of troops, attacked the town, and after the sacrifice of thousands of men on both sides, and after an attack of six hours, the town was, with great gallantry, taken ; and so large a quantity of spoil, such as gold, jewels, etc., fell into the hands of the captors, that penury and want were thenceforward discharged or struck off from the muster-roll of the English army. After thiSj the English army commenced raising batteries, and for four^ teen days they battered the fort continually." The result of this battering was a breach, which Lord Cornwallis stormed at night. The next morning a thoiisand lifeless bodies showed how diligently both assailant and defender had done the work of death. The peace of the next year placed Bangalore again under the flag of TipU, who had so com- pletely lost his confidence in the fort that he caused it to be dismantled. At his downfall, the lineal representative of the ancient kings was restored to the throne. But our Government re- served to themselves the right to "interfere to any extent in the internal administration of the country, or even to take the unlimited management of it to themselves," ^ stipu- lating also, that the entire military force of the kingdom should be drawn from their own armies. For the headquarters of this force, Bangalore was marked as highly eligible, equally by its importance as a city, its position toward the realm to be protected, the salubrity of its climate, and its accessible- ness from the Carnatic. On it the choice fell — a choice ' Mill. 146 A MISSION TO THE MYSOEE which greatly increased its importance, and provided the Madras army with a station whose cHmate furnishes a welcome relief from the fiery heats under which they sutler at many of their posts. The new Rajah was a boy. The administration fell into the hands of Brahmans, who continued to hold all real power even after he had attained his majority. Those endless corruptions and rapacities, indigenous to Hindu governments, flourished among the officials, both metropolitan and provincial. The poor ryots were mulcted and oppressed on every hand. To complain of wrong was to incur ruin. The net of ofiicial influence surrounded every village ; and w^oe to him who, in the frenzy of his griefs, attempted to rend a single mesh ! In a country where property is sacred and actions free, it is impossible to credit the tales which the Mysore ryots tell of the heartless cupidity with which the Brahmans were accustomed, during this period, to seize on their little possessions; and of the imperturbable vindic- tiveness wdth Avhich they hunted to beggary any " village Hampden " that ventured upon resistance. A ryot hates a Brahman as a negro hates a slave-driver. And yet he dreads him in his soul. Behind his back he calls him haruvava (" a jumper"); to his face, Siodmi, or Devaru, ("God"). The name "jumper," they say, was given because a Brahman could never be caught in an offence ; no matter how clear the evidence against him, no matter how notorious his crimes or his extortions, no matter how many the witnesses prepared to prove his guilt, by bribery, by cunning, or by interest, he always leaped over the enclosure of difiiculties in which his victims thought him to be inextricably bound. At length even Hindu endurance was worn out. The ryots became maddened ; they rose, seized twenty Brfdimans, and hanged them on trees. The whole country was disturbed, and every eye turned to the British Kesident as the only person possessing the power to terminate these disasters. A Biahman has told me, such was the state of feeling, that, in BANGALORE 147 Nagar, a party of herd-boys, who were in the hahit of beguiling their time with some rude drama, catching the spirit of the day, began to act the characters then most con- spicuous in the national politics. Some were ministers, some provincial officers, some ryots ; one was the British Resident. On him the clamorous ryots cast the principal blame, alleging he could end their wrongs but would not ; on him the one appointed judge declared the blame to rest, and sentenced him to die ; and so thoroughly had they caught the spirit of their piece, that the unfortunate boy was actually hanged. At length, the supreme Government interposed. To the rajah a princely income was secured ■ but they took into their own hands the entire administration of the country. The people say that the rajah was much aftected on learning this decision ; and that his principal officers, appearing before him in high excitement, urged him to take up arms, promis- ing to spill the last drop of their blood in maintaining his rights. But he wisely answered, "The Company are my father ; they gave me my kingdom, and they have a right to take it back. Besides, what king has fought with the Com- l)any and succeeded? I will not fight with the Company." He quietly submitted to the change, lives in comparative retirement, but retains all the insignia of royalty, and enjoys ample revenues. To conduct the afi'airs of the kingdom, a Commission was appointed, consisting of eight gentlemen, most of them military men. To us, with our notions of representation, liberty, and so on, it seems strange that a country which had been disturbed under its own prince should settle down into peace under eight foreigners, un- practised in the duties of statesmen or magistrates. But such has been the case. The people have sometimes sar3~~tcn me, "We can hardly believe ourselves: we lie down at night, and rise up in the morning, and find our cattle safe, our crops safe, everything just as we left it, and this for year after year ! Formerly it was constantly an army here, a foray there, and we never knew what was our own. The 148 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE Company have done a great thing." But they murmur sorely at the amount of power still left with the hdruvavaru ("Brahmans"), paying that, in spite of all possible vigilance on the part of the Commissioners, there is vast extortion in the collection of village revenues. This complaint they incessantly urge ; but, beside it, 1 found entire satisfaction with their new rulers, except an occasional murmur tliat the laud-charge was too heavy, and frequent expressions of dis- satisfaction at the impunity aftbrded to offenders against the marriage vow, and the insufficient punishment, as they deem it, of theft. General Cubbon and the other Commissioners deserve the highest credit for the temper, judgment, and integrity with which they have discharged their onerous trust. ^ In connection with this change. Lord William Bentinck — the best of India's governor-generals — visited the Mysore. The country people from the neighbourhood through which he passed have told me, in terms of unbounded wonder, that they saw him riding in his palanquin like a private gentle- man, without escort or pomp. And their admiration was equal to their wonder. One could hardly believe that this circumstance would have made so deep and favourable an impression upon their minds ; but, from the language they used, it was obvious that no amount of display could have given them such views of the greatness of his own mind or ^f_oijr national character. Closing their tale, they would say, " Among us, if only a little Polygar had to go to the I next village, he must have guards and heralds, and all the [re st of it j but here, the man that rules from the Himalaya ^ [The British Commission continued its work in the Mysore State from 1830 to 1881, wlicn the country was handed back to a young Maharajah. During that time the finances of the country were restored, and considerable credit balances accumulated ; splendid roads were made ; the police, justice, and education were carefully organised ; and the young new ruler found a fine body of native administrators trained in I'ritish methods, awaiting his instal- lation.] BANfiALOHE 149 to Raiiieshwaram comes as if he were nobody at all ; ahali ! ahahf ijenthd janaru nrwuf ('wonderful! wonderful! what a people you are !')" If anything were surprising, it would surpass belief that a gentleman could be found to write the history of India and bestow on Lord William Bentinck such parsimonious commendation and such liberal censure as he has received from ISIr. Thornton. But Mr. Thornton belongs to that class of historians who admire nothing but conquests ; and Lord William performed no great fights. Notwithstand- ing this, both his statesmanship and his philanthropy will be venerated by nations when the censures of Mr. Thornton will be forgotten. The climate of Bangalore is a combination of the tropical and the temperate. It has the sun of India, with the airs of southern Europe. The thermometer seldom exceeds 88" in the shade ; and in the cool season I have known it at 64° at noonday. During a great part of the year the sky is/ \ covered with clouds, which gently shade you from the burn- ing sun — a term really significant in India. At these seasons the gales are cool and bracing, so that those who come from Madras almost fancy that they recognise English breezes. The situation of the country secures it a share in both the south-west and the north-east monsoons, which shed down copious, but not inundating, rains. The soil yields, with cheerful profusion, the various fruits of India and very many of Europe. The orange and the potato, the yam and the ' apple, the strawberry and the cocoa-nut, the mango and V peach, with gooseberries and guavas, grapes and pineapples, are among the productions of this charming climate. At the change of government the whole Mysore became open to Christian missionaries, and it may be fairly asserted that there is no country on the face of the earth where their labours are more free. By the wayside or in the public street, at the temple door or in the tradesman's shop, in the thickest of a feast or the busiest of a market, the minister of Christ may open the I>iblo, preach the gospel, and otter ■^ 150 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE prayer to God. In city or town or village he is heard without molestation, and often with profound attention. Our missionaries have already preached Jesus and the resurrection from the palace of the king down to the hut of the outcast. The kingdom contains thirty-three thousand towns and villages. Of these, four have missionaries ! ^ All the others are equally open, but there is no one to enter in. The labourers are few. ^ [la the same area now the Wesleyan Mission has twenty-four English missionaries and native ministers, with about forty-five native evangelists, at work. The London Mission has six missionaries, and fifteen pastors and evangelists ; the American Methodist Episcopal Church has several representatives ; and an undenominational mission furnishes four or five European workers.] CHAPTER y MY CIECUIT The ^Mysore is never so lovely as in the month of October. The rains have just fallen ; the fields are all green, the tanks full, and the emerald of the trees luxurious. It was on a cloudless afternoon of this month that Mr. Jenkins and myself, riding along the road from Bangalore to Belgaum, approached the hill-pass of Nijagal. At this point the road intersects a chain of hills which runs across the country, offering a bold variety to its gentle undulations, and at some points jutting up to mountain height, as in the case of Shivaganga, a high conical peak, not less sacred here than the scene of St. Patrick's miracle on the coast of Mayo. We dismounted and walked slowly up a declivity, between fields of the castor-oil plant, conversing about our mission work. When nearly entering the pass, Mr. Jenkins said, " Now in a few moments you will see into your circuit." The words were thrilling : joy and hope and prayer rose together and went up to God. AV'e were now at the head of the pass : on either hand rose the hills. Up their sides crowded thick woods, with varied and intensely beautiful foliage, but they were capped with bald domes of dark rock like a weather-beaten helmet surmounting holiday apparel. At the foot of the hill spread several old banyans, their branches in different places forming Gothic arches through which the sun darted glowing beams that, by the aid of the grey stems and green loaves, produced a novel beauty, strangely blending the effect of architecture with that of painting and rare, unhackneyed landscape. Beyond, the 151 152 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE country stretched to the western horizon, seeming at first a long, bright glen resting between two ranges of guardian hills, but as you advanced spreading out into a verdant, undulating vale. The sun was near setting, and his eye kindled to see the charms of his own pencilling. Numerous tanks sparkled among the bright green ricefields. Water in India is not merely beautiful — it is precious. It may not be really a lovelier feature in a landscape than at home, but it is far more effective. It touches two chords instead of one, awaking at once the joy of beauty and the thrill of gratitude. In an English landscape it is only the complexion ; in an Indian one the eye. Those broad sheets of water lay under the evening light, some of them blushing red as if they had been turned to wine to rejoice in a day so fair, some with a delicate radiance on their still surface, beautiful as the light of genius on a pale countenance. Xot a man, not an animal was to be seen — not even the song of a bird or the smoke of a cottage to indicate life. All was peace and solitude. The sun might have kept the spot for himself to look on, and if Peace wanted a temple, let her build it there. But that valley stretched within the circle where lay my sphere of happy duties? It was this that gave to every object a mystic power, which first prepared the heart, and then transferred to it the whole scene with the speed and the truth of a mental photograph. It is there still — there just as at first, with the same objects, the same lights and shadows, the same dear companion watching my emotions with a brother's eye. Descending the pass the hill on our left began to wear appearances that little harmonised with the feeling hitherto reigning over the place. In a few minutes the mouldering outline of fortifications was distinctly visible. Then the path led close by a crowd of graves, — " in the garden there was a sepulchre"; then by the ruins of an extensive town, where hut and mansion were crumbling among brushwood, and all as silent as the hill ! At first sight of this spot one MY CIRCUIT 153 was ready to feel as if it had escaped tlio }jlight of sin, but now it was proved full sadly that death and war had found it. That noiseless hill had listened to the clash of arms. That still rock had echoed the cry of agony and danger. That gentle turf had drunk human gore. Those beautiful leaves were enriched by the ashes of butchered men ! Yes, of men, for men had been there ! Where were they now ? — Where were they nowl This Avas a sudden turn for the feelings. Such desolation on such beauty ! It was melancholy as mourning on a laughing infant. It reminded you of the fine country around, with its polished manners and dead souls. Then the heart, softened as it was, might well weep. It was as when some mighty orator has raised a tear to your eye with delight, and then brings it down with sorrow. I shall never forget the first sight of my circuit. These fortified hills (or drugs, as they were called after the native name) once abounded in the Mysore, and the sudden capture of several by our troops has done far more to impress the people with a conviction that British valour is invincible than all the grand battles or regular sieges. Nandidrvlg and Savandrilg especially were held to be beyond any possibility of assault ; the latter very much answered to Sallust's description of that Numidian dr/nj which was lost to Jugurtha by a Roman soldier's taste for a dish of snails. The march against them was deemed an impudent absurdity. And even now the villagers talk more of some officers employed in these daring exploits than of Lord Harris, who led the grand army which took Seringa- patam, or of Sir David Baird, who stormed that citadel. They say that in our set battles there is little room for the exercise of personal courage ; that the men are a machine, and the weapon is fire. But when speaking of the great drugs and their captors, they shrug their shoulders, shake their heads, cry, " AhaJi / ahah /" and say, "They were as bad as lions." We spent that night at Tumkdr in the house of an 154 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE intelligent Indo-Briton apothecary in the employment of the Government, and started the next morning for Gubbi, the place of our destination. Hitherto we had travelled on a good road lately formed under the direction of Captain Dobbs, the valuable superintendent of the Chitaldrilg division.^ But now, leaving all traces of the English, we struck off to the left by a native road. This was no more than a well-beaten track, occasionally marked by two low fences, but more frequently lying across the cornfields or open plains of grass. The grass is onlj^ such as grows spontaneously, no pains being taken to improve it, by manure or irrigation ; it is, consequently, coarse and in- nutritious ; and on this the numerous cattle of the villagers are miserably pastured. When we had ridden about eleven miles and were wind- ing round a hill, we came upon a path, skirted by two hedgerows, like the road leading to a farmhouse. At the head of this, distant about a furlong, a white bungalow was glistening in the sun. This was the mission-house, the scene of my destined labours. Js^ever did I approach a spot with such feelings. It was a lonely home, but it was a post of glorious duty. There was no Christian congregation with whom to worship, but there was the God whom Christians adore. The people never hailed a Sabbath, nor observed a sacrament, but in another generation they should. By a fault of mine, before these heathen, the Kedeemer would be wounded in the house of His friends, but by grace and faith- fulness His enemies would be won. It was a position in which there was only One to help, but He was nigh. The mission-house is a cottage of one storey, covered with red tiles, beautifully neat, well furnished, and situated on ^ The Mysore is distributuil into four provinc^es or divisions — Asli- tagram, Baiif^alore, Chitaldrug, and Nagar. The oHlcer in charge of one of these is called "superintendent." [Tliis arrangement of terri- tory was in vogue only while the coiuitry was being administered by a British Commission.] MY CIRCUIT 155 the crest of a considerable hill. About it, Mrs. Jenkins had arranged a tasteful garden, on the parterres of which ])leasant flowers were smiling, and a beautiful convolvulus wandering among the shrubs of the hedge. The place had a delightful air of homely cottage comfort, far different from what one would expect in so remote a situation. It was sweet, after six mouths of wayfaring, to bow before God on the very spot to which all your journeys had been directed, and there commemorate the mercies which had enriched the past, and pray for those that would crown the future. The hill on which the mission-house stands commands an extensive prospect. Close round its base spreads a large tank — a sheet of water about two miles long and one broad. At its opposite side lies a smaller tank, where large numbers of wild ducks congregate. In the interval between these two stands a grove, through the branches of which you see the roofs of Gubbi and the tower of the chief temple. On the east the view is bounded by the hills already mentioned, the woods of Tumkur nestling at the base ; whence the blue outline stretches away to jSTijagal, and the sacred peak of Shivaganga, distant about eighteen miles, near which at night you see the blaze of fires, lighted to keep tigers away. Just across the large tank, close by the water's edge, an old temple is shaded by a group of decaying trees, and, close by, a village lies under its tutelage. Behind this, and to its left, you trace other villages. To its right a high hill rises with gradual swell : it is for the greater part overrun with brushwood, but has a bald piece of ground towards its foot, on which stands in solitary pride the noblest banyan I saw in India. It is about two miles from the mission-house, and at that distance looks, as to extent, like a small grove ; but even there the harmony of outline gives an impression of unity. There are — as well as I remember — upwards of thirty trunks, as large as a middle-sized elm, each of them projecting branches, from which again pendant roots have 156 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE struck down into the earth, and are maturing tliemselves into auxiliary stems. The combination of bulk and vitality is unique, and consequently impressive. This stately pile of vegetative architecture, of which the foundations, pillars, arches, all are direct from the hand of God, and vital with His impulse, forms a shade irresistibly calling to meditation. But so far from exciting adoration to Him, amongst the heathen it attracts their worship to itself. Under it you find a rude empty altar, of which this tree is the divinity ! b the right of this stretches a plain, irrigated by the waters of the tank, and covered with ricefields and villages. Toward the west the eye travels over a long valley, with groves, villages, the tower of a temple, and a few mountains peering above the horizon. The whole scene was neither tame nor savage : its combination of objects gave an air of peaceful civilisation, united with novelty and boldness. It was fair, but lonely, passing lonely. There were temples ; but no tower marked a sanctuary of the living God. There were men, old and young, " and boys and girls playing in the streets " ; but in town or village was not a single one who had even been baptized in the ever-blessed Name. And there were homes, not the wild wigwam, nor the miserable kraal, but " fenced towns," with a busy and polite people ; but you could not take to your heart the assurance that one of them was the dwelling of a united family. To one fresh from the land where a sanctuary is always near, where the fellowship of saints is familiar, where round many a fireside domestic love and divine hopes shed their mingled joy, these thoughts were dreary. But the chill they brought was warmed away by the recollection, that to this spot had come at last that gospel, by which, in time, it would be graced with every object that rejoices an angel's eye. In the year 183G Mr. Hodson made a tour in the Mysore and Coorg, in order to acquire information as to the general facilities for missionary labours existing in the country, and also to fix upon some station for immediate occupancy. Of MY CIRCUIT 157 that journey interesting records were publislied at the time in the Missionary Notices, and I have reason to hope that Mr. Hodson himself will give the public some further account of his missionary operations. Several reasons led to the selection of Gubbi. It was the centre of a large and accessible population. It was far from English soldiery, by whose example the cause of Christianity might be prejudiced. The number of resident Brahmans was small, and their in- fluence unimportant. AVhether a prospect of feeble op])osi- tion is a good ground on which to choose a mission station, it is not necessary here to inquire. Perhaps the most natural line of proceeding is both the best and most accordant with apostolic example ; that is, to carry the gospel just to those places where are the greatest number of sinners in need of it, leaving all questions about opposition and facility in the hands of God. When the selection had been made, Mr. Hodson obtained a piece of ground, and began to construct a mud house for temporary residence, Captain Dobbs kindly lending him a tent to live in until its completion. One day, before time was given to take any precaution, a squall, charged with a whole cloud of dust, came down upon them, overwhelmed the tent, filled all their stores with sand, and left both Mr. and Mrs. Hodson to live in their palanquins till the damage was repaired. These squalls are frec^uent at one season of the year ; but high winds and hurricanes are scarcely known. When the mud house was finished, they were very comfort- able till the wet season came ; but then they would some- times awake in the night with the rain pouring on them, and, no other part of the house being safer, Mr. Hodson used, as the only available shelter, to sit up in bed, holding an umbrella over them. After a while he raised the present substantial building of brick and mud, a cement which, though inferior to mortar, is not despicable, but used in many a goodly Indian bungalow. It has this inconvenience, that you are constantly liable to irruptions of white ants 158 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE from any part of the walls. They will break out and spread themselves as rapidly as an army of Mahrattas, devouring everything in their Avay, and sometimes damaging a whole library in the course of a night. Shortly after the com- pletion of the house, Mr. Jenkins joined the station, and Mr. Hodson went to form a new one at the city of Mysore. Mr. Jenkins had been there about a twelvemonth at the time of my arrival. The town of Gubbi, situated about sixty niiles north- west of Bangalore, has between six and seven thousand inhabitants.^ They depend principally on mercantile pur- suits, having a weekly market, and carrying on a consider- able trade in betel-nut, coffee, and grain, which they purchase from the people of the western province, Nagar (formerly called Bednfir), and sell in the markets of Bangalore and Walajnagar. The place has long enjoyed the reputation of great wealth, being called " Golden Gubbi." But wealth in India must not be estimated by English standards. There a man will gladly work for three rupees (six shillings) per month, and be able to support himself. His ragi and spices cost but little ; his rent, except in large towns, scarcely anything ; firing he wants none, but a few fragments of parched cow-dung to cook his two meals, — of these one is often eaten cold ; and if he has no spare money for clothes, it is very little matter — the climate clothes him. A man with ten rupees ^ per month is in comfortable circumstances ; Avith twenty, respectable ; with fifty, prosperous ; and wealthy on a hundred. The merchant ^ [This was probably a mistake. The population now is between four and five thouf^and.] - A rupee is two shillings, consequently ten are a pound ; a hundred, ten pounds; a thousand, a hundred pounds, and so on. [The value of the rupee has decreased ; it is now worth sixteen pence. On the other hand, the cost of provisions has increased, and the price of labour is higher. The standard by Avhicli comfort and wealth are judged has been appreciably raised in recent years.] My circuit 159 \vho can command a capital of five thousand rupees is a sort of prince. Of course this remark does not apply to large commercial cities, where the expansion of English trade dilates everything. Beside the merchants and shopkeepers, there are a few weavers ) but their work is of the coarsest kind ; all fine cloths being obtained from distant parts of the country. The market is hold every Sunday, and is numerously attended. -^ The town is, like all towns in India, surrounded by a wall. They are always of mud, varying in height and thickness according to the importance of the place. It is generally a mere line of wall, capable only of repelling robbers or wild beasts ; but in larger places has, at intervals, square projecting towers, intended for military defence. These mud fortifications have often proved formidable ob' stacles to artillery, the sodden mass permitting the shot to sink into it, without being materially shaken. Even .small villages, with fifty or a hundred houses, have their wall. As well as I could learn, the term " town "_i[[r) is applied only to a i)lacc with both wall and market ; " village " (halli), t o one with a wall, but not a market; and "hamlet" (pdlj/a), to a group of houses without either. " City " (pafna) is used only of seats of government, or very large places. A village usually has one gate ; a town two, at opposite points ; a city several. The gates are of wood, and, though ponderous, help one to conceive how the gigantic strength of Samson might wrest such from their hinges, and bear them away. The gateway is a covered passage of several yards long, with a raised seat on either side. In a country village you will often find the elders {Jiiriyaru) seated here in the early morning. It is a position from which they can speak to the men as they proceed to their duties in the fields, to the women as they go to draw Avater, or where they may be easily found by anyone having to seek advice or make complaint. The town of Gubbi consists of two main streets, intersected by several minor ones. At one 160 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE side stands the fort — mud, of course, — within which live most of the rich merchants ; several holding a private residence here, even though they carry on business in the pettah. On another side is that unfailing appendage to a Hindu town, the village of the out-castes. This is a polluted spot. No caste man, though he be a drudge or a menial, would be found here. He will come within call, without touching the accursed ground, and, bawling out his summons for the person he may happen to want, continues on his own sacred ground till the message is conveyed. No one who has not Hved familiarly among the people can conceive the weight of that curse which Hinduism has prepared for those unhappy beings who cannot claim a standing among the accredited castes. The meanest of the people loathe them as viler than swine. Caste men have followed me to the very verge of the defiled ground, begging me, by all manner of arguments — by my respectability, my regard for decency, my disapproval of everything disgustful, and by the utter impossibility of making them understand anything, not to degrade myself, or affront the people who had just been listening to me, by going to preach to wretches wholly incapable of being taught.^ Servitude is honour ; slavery, brotherhood ; and public con- viction, reward, compared with the fathomless degradation into which the poor out-caste is plunged. Father, mother, children, down they are sunk ; all trample on them, all abuse, all revile, all execrate, all shun ; and this has been going on for generations. By this horrid proscription, millions of human beings are held in a state of anomalous slavery. No 1 [The aloofness is not only and wholly on the side of the caste men. It is true that in country districts the Brahmans avoid the Pariah quarter themselves, and refuse to allow the Pariah to come near to them — to their houses, or even their streets. But it is also true that the Pariahs, on their part, will under no circumstances allow a Brilhman to pass through their portion of the village, believing that his presence would involve them in the direst calamities. In cities and large towns such sharp distinction of neighbourhood is im- possible.] MY CIRCUIT 161 one claims their person — it is too vile ; but, with limbs unchained, the man is denied every right of citizenship ; he and his unborn children, and his children's children, are doomed to ignorance, exclusion, and contempt. He is an exile from the human family, cut otf, and cut off for ever, from affection and improvement. No sum can buy his ransom ; no monarch make him free. He was born to his curse, and his offspring is predestinated to the same. Let him look where he will, he reads the sentence of his exile, pronounced for a crime he knows not. The earth rejects him — he may not own a single rood ; the water rejects him — his defiled vessel, or more defiled person, would pollute a whole well : let him dig in a corner, or drink with the swine. Law rejects him — who is he that he should complain 1 Religion rejects him— his impure step would contaminate the holiest fane : lot him crouch to a goblin on his own vile ground. Aye, Charity herself rejects him — to give him a morsel would be "to take the children's bread and cast it unto dogs." And this bitterness is in his lot, that he is dwelling in his own land, not captured in war, not sentenced for crime, not banished as dangerous ; but living full in the sight of all blessings, and denied every one, because he was born accursed. And will it be believed, that a European, that a Christian missionary, that the Abbe Dubois, first accurately details their vices, and then justifies their wrongs ] " If the caste of the pariahs," says the Abbe, " be held in low and vile repute, it must be admitted that it deserves to be so." It is true they are base, filthy, and immoral ; and, after ages of such treatment, no wonder. They would have been more than human had they not long ago sunk into everything lamentable. But whence their recklessness, their filth, their voracity 1 From oppression, from despair, from hunger. They have no rights to lose : their fathers had none ; their children will have none. If everyone of them vented a ferocious misanthropy on every human form he could fasten upon, it would be only a natural 1 1 1G2 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE result of the treatment that he and his have borne. The Abb6 Dubois states that this wretched section of the Hindu community " must include, at least, a fifth of the whole population." But, in another part of his work, he also states that the " cultivators amount, at least, to five-sixths of the population of India." Now, if the cultivators are five-sixths of the population, and the pariahs one-fifth, it follows that the immense multitudes composing the Brahman, soldier, merchant, and artisan castes are reduced to a fraction less than nothing ; a result which one hesitates to receive, even on an authority so high as that generally conceded to the Abbe Dubois. The proportion of these victims of the caste system is certainly not so large.^ They flock to the places where Europeans have settled, as the employments which they can there obtain greatly alter their circumstances, and, indeed, raise them to a kind of independence of the caste people. But throughout the country, one in ten is a nearer proportion than one in five, though I do not pretend to say what the proportion is. But it is a fearful example of what habit may eft'ect, that the Abb6 should quietly resign a mass of people — more, according to his own calculation, than those of his native France — to a state of degradation so directly at variance with every prin- ciple of that religion which he professed to teach, — to contempt, to exclusion, to slavery (he calls them the " born slaves of the other tribes ") ; yes, to slavery, slavery imposed by custom, a tyrant the most absolute of all, who, in the foulest injustice, is venerable because of age, and because, too, he makes his throne on the tombs of our fathers, and calls to his council the ghosts of the dead. lie laughs at Rucli limited powers as statute-books or armies, and pours his commands through the milk of every mother, through the veins of every babe. ' [The census returns sliow tliat in the Mysore the Pariahs (now known as the Panchanut, classes) of all sects number about sixteen per cent, of tlie total pn|nilatioii.] MY CIRCUIT 163 1 The streets of Gubbi are much like those of IJangiilore, except that instead of the crowd and hurry of a large city you have a few people moving about with the leisurely air of a country town. Almost every person you meet bears on ^ his breast a bright silver box, of more than two inches in length, which he tells you is "god," — that is, it holds the Unga, an idol which may not even be described. Their complexion is observably fairer than that of the people at Madras, owing to the milder climate of the tableland. Almost every forehead is smeared with the white ashes of cow-dung, some in stripes, some having the whole surface covered, and others with the bare chest and arms sanctified in the same way. These marks proclaim them worshippers of Shiva. Then you are sure to meet with beggars in some part of the streets, almost covered with these ashes ; while others of the same profession, but attached to the rival sect of Vishnuites, have forehead, chest, and arms marked over with huge, ugly tridents. Thus adorned, bearing a small brass gong and a conch-shell, and lustily bellowing the name of Govinda or Ishwara, these beggars boldly demand alms, which they receive not so much as a humane gift as a religious debt. They are not the poor who are forced to beg, Init holy monks who have abandoned worldly pursuits. Woe to the poor man who does not meet their demand promptly ! Though it were his own food, it must be given. The really poor fare ill beside these sturdy and licentious vagabonds. It was common on market-days — Sundays — to hear an alms- giving by some rich man announced with the sound of a trumpet ; but it was always a feast to these monks. , At the door of some wealthy merchant you would occasion- ally ^ee his wife or daughter in full dress of costly silk, her glossy black hair graced with a round ornament of gold on the crown ; long pendants from the ears, the perforation of which had been artifically increased to the diameter of half an inch ; the edges of the ears crowded with a succession of rings up to the very tip ; a ring, large enough for a bunch 164 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE of keys, inserted into the nose/ resting on the cheek, and strung with pearls ; a heart-shaped piece of gold suspended from the centre membrane of the nose, and resting on the upper lip ; several chains of gold on the neck, sometimes a richly gemmed collar ; the arms thronged with bracelets from above the elbow ; a ring or more on every finger ; massive silver anklets loading the feet and tinkling with every motion, while each toe rejoiced in a broad ring. In fact, the first trinket graces the crown, the last decks the little toe, and between these two points no available spot is without its decoration. Then, to perfect all, the teeth are stained red, the eyelid a deep black, and the cheek painted straw colour with an effusion of saffron. This latter custom is conclusive evidence against some writers who tell us that among the Hindus a dark complexion is held to be more beautiful than a fair one. Were dark brown or jet black most in esteem, the ladies would paint dark brown or jet black. They paint the very colour peculiar to the fairest natives, which sufficiently indicates the prevailing taste. But everyone acquainted with their habits knows that to be called Icempu, " red or fair," is always deemed a compliment, while kappu, " black or dark," is about as much so as " sallow " among ourselves. Then the statement of Bishop Heber, that there is no observable connection between rank and complexion is an unaccountable mistake. It is a rule, to which the exceptions are very few, that good families, who can keep their children from exposure, are several shades fairer than the labouring classes. I have seen a little girl, not more than live or six years of age, with all the finery just described, standing in her father's 1 That quaint writer, Thomas Fuller, was not a little puzzled with the nose-jewel of which the prophet speaks as part of the finery of the Jewish women ; conjecturing that it must have hung from the fore- head between the eyes: for he thinks they would never be so foolish as to ' make more nostrils than nature has given us " by boring the nose to insert it there. Vanity, like necessity, has no law. MY CIRCUIT 165 door to display it. But I have also seen a little girl, of not more than that age, in one of those same houses, with every ornament gone, her hair shaved oft', and other signs of widowhood. A poor girl of three, or five, or seven may be given by her father to a husband of thirty, or fifty, or seventy. She may never have set her eyes on him, except on the wedding day ; she is still living at her father's house ; but if the man who calls her wife die, she is his widow, and his widow for life. She is stripped of all her ornaments, her head shaved, and a widow's robe put on. Then begins a life of bitterness : she is charged with her husband's death, he has been taken from her to punish her sin in a former birth ; the younger she is, the greater sinner she must have been, to be overtaken so soon, and her accusations are proportion ably malignant ; her presence is a curse — it must never blight social festivity nor sacred ritual ; the house is cursed for her sake ; no accident or misfortune occurs but it is her fault ; she is the drudge, the butt, the sorrow, the reproach of her family. If she has the honour to be a Brahman's widow, in addition to all other inflictions, she is permitted Imt one meal a day. She may not marry again : it Avould be more disgraceful than any immorality. "With us the word "widoAv" sounds tenderly, even on harsh tongues. In the families of India it is a term of execration. And spite can find no name so bitter as the " son of a widow." The influence which this system must exert both on individual happiness and general morality must be apparent. It is a strange instance of the fact that familiarity with vice often changes dislike into fascination, when we learn from the Aljbe Duljois that though quite aware of the "disgusting inequalities of age," and though, when fresh from Europe, he resented the "cruel usage " which dooms a girl of seven to be for life the widow of some dotard ; yet that in time he " completely changed his opinion," concluding that " in no view does society lose anything by this restraint." Were there any truth in metempsychosis, it would be jjlain that the soul of Manu 166 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE had been born, as a European, in the person of the Abbe Dubois, and had taken a jnurncy to India for the purpose of vindicating his own institutions. The town is enriched with two or three scho(jls. These are generally, like the shops, open in the front. As all reading is done in recitative, your ears are regaled from a considerable distance by the nasal music of a score of small voices chanting the changes of the alphabet, arithmetical tables, or the disgusting legends of some purdna. Master and pupils are comfortably squatted on the earthen floor, which is strewed with fine sand. On this the younger boys are busily tracing letters with the forefinger, singing industri- ously all the while a long ditty, which, with an admirable mastery of jingle, describes the various changes by which each letter or syllabic form is made. This is the vestibule of the Hindu temple of knowledge ; and happy and clever is that urchin who within the first three months succeeds in mastering all the forms of the alphabet, so as to chant correctly the history of their mutations, and to trace the example as he chants. This tediousness arises not from any want of aptitude on the part of the boys, — indeed, I never knew a European to vi.sit a native school without receiving the impression that the children were even more apt than among ourselves, — but wholly from the complexity of the alphabet and the utter clumsiness of the system on which it is taught. Tiie alphabetic forms piit forth by the missionaries and in use in mission schools reduce the labour far more than half. At a short distance outside the eastern gate, close by a thick grove, and with an open ground in front, stands the great temple of the town. It occupies the centre of a con- siderable area, enclosed by a high stone wall, in which, just opposite the front of the temple, stands a high pyramidal tower, with a gateway at its base. The temple is raised some feet from the ground, and then stone pillars support the open front of a low sipiare apartment, without window. Behind this is a low nairow door, of which the j^/ljnri, the MY CIRCUIT 167 officiating priest, keeps the key, and in which the god is housed. No one is permitted to pass the gate without taking off his shoes, and, not being disposed to pay such homage, I never entered. The temples are generally of this character : a square area enclosed by a wall, in the centre a low building without any "window, in the dark recess of which a holy lamp is glimmering before an image j^ainted perhaps two or three colours, smeared with oil, and decked with garlands. When the temple is large, the outer wall embraces several acres, and is followed by two or three others before you reach the shrine, eacli wall having perhaps four gates, and every gate its tower. The only temple of any architectural pretensions which I had the opportunity of seeing was at Nanjangild, between Mysore and the Nilgiri Hills. It is built on the ordinary model, differing only in scale. The sculpture, however, is most elaborate, the whole surface of the temple being literally thronged with mythological groups. Up to the point of the highest tower crowds a thick suc- cession of images in every possible form, size, and posture. There is a countless muster of shapes, colossal and pigmy, human and animal, actual and fabulous, devotional and indecent. All the rabble of strange beings with which Hinduism peoples its heaven might, in the midst of their wars, frolics, and debaucheries, have been overtaken, like Lot's wife, with a statuary death, and this temple might be the agglomeration of them all. The worst nudes even of the French school are monitors of modesty compared with these figures. No man who has once seen the gates can ever forget them. It is a strange and hideous sight. And then to see groups of children playing before this pile of sculptured temptation, looking at it, gazing on it ; and to think that thousands of the youth of both sexes go round it every year, regarding it as the shrine and embodiment of religion! Oh, it brings a feeling of oppressive sickness. You feel as if Milton's Belial, " the dissolutest spirit that fell," were stand- ing close by, and, with a hateful leer, pointing to a huge and 168 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE audacious monument to the victory he had won over every- thing pure in man. One day in conversing with a Brahman about China, a country of which he had only lieard the name, he asked me if it were large, and had many people. When told that it had more than all India, his incredulity was perfect ; for if the Persians say that Ispahan is half the world, to a Brahman, India is the whole world, the countries lying beyond its sacred frontiers being only some insignificant spots for " out- side barbarians." At last he demanded, " Well, how many people are there?" "Why, from three hundred and thirty to three hundred and fifty millions." " Three hundred and thirty millions !" exclaimed the astounded Brahman ; " impos- sible ! Three hundred and thirty millions ! how can that be ] Why, that is as many as there are of the gods!" Such is the number of beings, various in power and functions, which the Hindu sltastras recognise as constituting the beatified community of the ccelicolcB. Ample, however, as this number of accredited divinities might be deemed, we found that the great god of Gubbi did not belong to the ranks of the thirty-three krores,^ but was one unknown to any altars save those of the place. About tAVO centuries ago, they say, a schoolmaster lived in their town, who, by learning, piety, and Avisdom, acquired considerable fame. At his death the whole town mourned for its wisest man. They buried him with ceremony, and reared a handsome tomb to mark his grave. Among his pupils was one called Burn' Gauda, Avho entered the public service, and, rising by rapid steps, became a fouzdar, or great officer of the state. Assembling the elders of his native town, he said that all his success in life was due to the lessons of his distinguished tutor, and that he was fully persuaded that one so devout and wise, so virtuous, so learned, so far above ordinary men, could not be a common mortal, but must be an avatara of Shiva. The elders agreed that he must have been an avatara. " Tlien," said Ikirre ' A hrore or kivortd is ten millions. MY CIRCUIT 1G9 Gauda, "if he were an avatdra, is it not right that he should have ptija (worship)?" They said, "He ought to have jpiya." This point conceded, Burrc Gauda at once volun- teered to he at the expense of erecting a temple, and providing for the due celehration of i>«/a, in honour of the new god, who received the name of Gubhi AjyjM, "the father of Gubbi." The present temple was built, a staff of priests and temple-women appointed, an endowment of land obtained, an image made, installed, and in due form transubstantiated. Gubbi Appa soon obtained universal honour in the neighbourhood, and all the older gods were eclipsed ; they are not cast away, they receive their honours, but before their rival they are only dii minores. This is an illustration of the ease with which objects of worship are multiplied, when once a course of idolatry is begun. The knowledge of the true God being lost, divinity is thought so mean or so terrible, that men arc ready to worship anything they respect or dread. AVe are shocked by the darkness which permits the inhabitants of Gubbi to adore their schoolmaster, and yet these simple townspeople are only manifesting the same blindness under which the refined citizens of Athens sacrificed to Theseus, and those of Rome to Romulus. The character ascribed to Gubbi Appa is more entitled to respect than anything recorded of the Latin bandit or the Greek chastiser of banditti. It is most likely that idolatry first began by paying reverence to an image of some departed hero, various tribes adopting that of their progenitor, and communities that of their founder, as those of Athens and Rome.^ Popery is embarrassed in the process of apotheosis by the deference which it is necessary to pay to the Christian Scriptures. Hence, instead of the convenient and intelligible position of a subordinate deity, gifted by the Supreme with a certain realm and definitive ' If Eusebius is right {Chronkou, Lib. Prior), the worship of Baal had a similar origin, being paid to Belu.'s, the first l^ing of Assyria, ijueni As-'<)jrii Dcum nominairrunt. 170 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE powers, she is obliged, in theory, at least, to place her beatified men in the intrusive position of a third party between God and man, effectually precluding all direct approach to the great Presence. This theoretic disadvantage is no doubt fully made up to them by the utter oblivion into which it is cast in the prostrate devotion of the worshipper, who seeks, as the breviary instructs us to do in the case of "blessed Nicholas the bishop," that he may, " by his merits and prayers, be delivered from the flames of hell." Amazing reverence, confidence, and zeal are manifested by the votaries of Gubbi Appa. I have known an old woman say, " What, pray no more to Gubbi Appa ! Why, it is he that gives me health, food, everything. He protects the house from robbers and evil spirits ; he keeps away sickness ; he gives strength to work ; he does every- thing for us. There is no god like Gubbi Appa : I must pray to Gubbi Appa." The merchants avow that when any of their transactions have been successful, they devote part of the profit to Gubbi Appa ; " for," say they, " he gives us health and success : it is therefore just we should acknowledge his favour. If we did not, we should not deserve to be favoured in a similar way again." The way to wealth, station, and domestic happiness is constantly asserted and firmly believed to open or close at the will of Gubbi Appa. Helenus did not more urgently impress on his anxious friend the prime importance of propitiating the vindictive Juno than does every father in Gubbi enforce upon his son the conviction that his sole prospect of a happy life rests in devout and liberal services to this great disposer. For the terror of all sceptics, they tell that on one occasion some robbers scaled the temple wall at night, violated the shrine, took all the valuables, bore away in their sacrilegious hands the very god, and carried him to a distance of several miles. liut he was not to be kept from his favoured altar. So, by a single bound, he passed from the hands of the thieves and replaced himself in his wonted MY CIKCUIT 171 position, to tlic unuttemble joy of his worshippers, who, on his being missed, had spent a sorrowful morning. There are not wanting those who say waggishly that the pockets of some of the rich men know well how the miracle was performed. ^ The honours of Gubbi Appa are frequent and punctually rendered. Every day he has a morning and evening sacrifice. The holy lamp is trimmed ; libations of oil and ghee ("clari- fied butter ") are poured upon the god and before him ; offerings are presented, according to the mind of the devotee, of fruits, flowers, ghee, prepared rice, or, in special cases, of clothes, jewels, or, precious metals. The priest waves the offering before the idol, walks round him with it in his hand, then takes a part, and gives back the rest. Ordinarily the worshipper is content with an invocation and namashhn, an obeisance, in which the hands are joined and raised to the forehead, which is bowed low. If, however, the occa^ sion be solemn or his devotion great, he performs the lowlier 1 S'hhtanga,'-^ in which the forehead, chest, shoulders, both hands and both feet must simultaneously touch the groijadrJ There is no united worship. At the evening sacrifice it is usual to ring a bell, which sounds loudly over the town ; then the musicians and temple-women assembling, play, ^ This tale forcibly reminded nie of one with which I had been lourr familiar. On the coast of Mayo, between the town of Westport and Croagh I'atrick, there is a well much resorted to by pilgrims. Rags of all colours are fixed about the sacred spot, bleaching in the sun and rain, the hope being that as the colour leaves them ihe sins of the pilgrim are purged. In this holy well is a holy trout (idolatry will make anything holy but the human heart), which sometimes rejoices the penitents by coming out and eating of the crumbs they cast to it. At one time some Protestant soldiers from the neighbouring town seized the holy trout, and, carrying him to their barracks, were enjojing the sacrilegious thought of eating that which the deluded Papists held sacred. But no sooner did they place him on a gridiron than he bounded away to his own dear well, some mile or two distant, where to this day. he bears on one side the mark of the gridiron ! ■ 1 - [Sdt:htdnga — {\')TOistra.tion with) the eight members; the eight ' being those enumerated in the text, replacing '■ shoulder?," however, i by " the two knees."] — !_l 172 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE dance, and sing before the idol. About the orgies enacted in the temples of India quite as much has been published as is useful; but those who have done so have this justifica- tion, that it was necessary to lay bare all the abominations which riot in Hinduism, that the ties by which our authorities had bound it to them, if proof against every milder agency, might be burnt up at last by shame. In India no god is thought sufficiently honoured without a parisli6 — a day of devotional festivity — once a year. With modifications from our climate and local customs, the parishe is fairly represented by the patron, or annual feast day of a patron saint or tutelar god, in Ireland. The patron is the great day of the year, a day for the exercise of all kinds of devotion and the indulgence of all kinds of depravity, for penances and gambling, for paying vows and drunkenness, for masses and match-makings, for invoking saints and feeing showmen. Such also is a parishe, but with more parade, less intemperance, and abundantly more of nocturnal licence. Gubbi Appa being far above the ordinary rank of tutelar divinities, his parishd extends over a whole week. One day, as this festive season was drawing nigh, we saw a train of well-dressed natives make for the rnission-housp, led by the shetti and yajanii'nia, the two great municipal authorities;. L'^aving their slippers at a short distance from the house, they advanced with that graceful formality in which they excel, made low mJaams, presented some limes and plantains, and proceeded to pay compliments, which, if " done into English," would sound more ludicrous than respect- ful. After a while, we were informed that they had come to ask a favour, which they hoped would not be denied. Th.Q parislii was approaching; but one wheel of the great car was damaged, and it was found difficult to obtain suit- able timber for a new one, for they are not made with spokes, but of solid wood, in the ancient fashion. When Mr. Hodson was building the mission-house, he had bought and felled some trees ; one of these remained ; it was the MY CIRCUIT 173 very thing for their purpose ; and now they had come to entreat that we would be " favourable, and command them this tree." In vain did we protest that we could not in any way abet idolatry. All who have been in India can bear witness to the importunity of a Hindu applicant. Resolute as a barrister and pertinacious as a tax-gatherer, he assails you on every side. He seems to make it a point of honour not to take a denial : it is a reflection on his power of flattery and knowledge of character, on both of which points they pique themselves. You are entreated, wheedled, and be- praised until, if you persist in refusing till he is beaten off, you feel very much as if you had gained a battle. In the present case they did not want for numbers, for skill, or perseverance ; they argued, they prayed, they cajoled, but all in vain ; it was a matter of conscience, and we stood there. At length, one who was very familiar with me turned to me and said, "Are you not my friend?" "Certainly." "Well, then, as you are my friend, and as you have an objection to give the tree to Gubbi Appa, you can just make a present of it to me, and I will be very thankful for it." This was a stroke of rhetoric by which they plainly thought I was fairly placed in a dilemma. " It would delight me," I replied, " to give you any private mark of friendship ; but, knowing that you want it for the service of an idol, it would be a sin for me to give it to you, and one must not commit sin for any friend." This evidently disconcerted them ; and I added, " Now, does it not strike you as strange 1 We came here for the very purpose of turning you from the worship of Gubbi Appa, declaring that he is only an image ; that he can do nothing for you ; that, indeed, he can do nothing for himself. AVe have never asked anything from Gubbi Appa since we came, yet we have everything we want ; but here comes Gubbi Appa to us, saying, ' I am a very great god, and have many worship- pers ; they are going to make me a grand feast, and I want to go and see them ; but I am lame, and cannot go : won't 174 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE you help meV Is it not strange that Gubbi Appa should come as a petitioner to nsl" They soon took leave, with obeisances far less dignified than those of their introduction. Before the day for commencing the feast, the top of the car was towering among the trees. The prints which every one has seen of tlie car of Jagannath give a just idea of the vehicles used for idol processions all over the country — a ponderous structure of wood, rising through several successive storeys in the form of a tower, and resting on four giant Avheels of solid wood. On the appointed day crowds of people flocked to the sacred spot from every direction. They had no means of shelter, and therefore selected a place under some tree where they might sleep, engaging it by preoccupa- tion. With the devotees was a proportionate number of jugglers, showmen, and gamblers. Those swinging boxes popular in English fairs (called, I believe, " whirligigs "), in which four persons ride at a time, and, revolving vertically, are in turn above and below, were whirling boisterous freights of urchins. I^ot a few were enjoying the excitement of cock-fights and ram-fights, the latter being a favourite pastime with the Hindus, but the former chiefly practised by the Muhammadans. Early in the evening, when enter- ing the eastern gate, we were met by a stately procession. A band of music led the way. Then came a train of ladies, the wives of the merchants residing in the fort, who had exhausted their own skill and their husband's wealth to make themselves splendid. Their silks were costly, their jewels profuse ; they shone with gold ; and, as they walked, silver music tinkled on their ankles. Their cheeks were saffroned, their teeth vermilioned, and their black eyes surrounded with a circle of auxiliary blackness. They marched with a slow and reverential grace, each lady holding upon the palms of her hands (palnias supi7iaK) two vessels, some of polished brass, some of silver, on which were tastefully arranged banana?, mangoes, pineapples, pomegranates, limes, oranges, and tufts of cusha grass, or the sacred tulasi. They MY CIRCUIT 175 were on too high an errand to walk on vulgar earth. Before them a man spread upon the ground a succession of silk cloths, such as are used by the ladies for garments ; and on these garments, thus strewed on the way, they walked the whole distance from the fort to the temple, ahout half a mile, that they might with becoming reverence approach a presence so august as that of Gubbi Appa, the old schoolmaster ! Towards nightfall the crowd stood densely over all the ground spreading before the temple. A small mantapa, or domed canopy, supported by stone pillars, and covering a small raised platform, stood about half-way between the temple and the car, and was used as a station, or resting- place, for the idol. Flambeaux gleamed on the dark faces and variegated attire of the thick mass. Hosts of musicians tortured the air into excruciating cries, as if it were in mortal pain. Groups of gaily-dressed temple-women added to the brilliancy and to the blackness of the scene. Gaudy flags hanging out from the car waved gently, and a thick rope from each side stretched far before it. Between it and the mantapa we stood preaching the gospel of Christ to a serried crowd of listeners. Presently came a priest, bearing in one hand a small brass vessel, and in the other a bunch of cusha- grass. He walked slowly round the car and round the mantapa, which he then ascended ; and, dipping the bunch of grass into the holy water, carefully sprinkled the spot on which the god was about to rest. By this rite India seemed brought into present and vivid connection with ancient and modern Kome. One might have been watching a Romish priest, either of our own day or that of Virgil. Who ever witnessed the close of burial service in a church on the Continent, without being vividly reminded of the very same scene as occurring at the grave of the hapless minstrel ? — " Idem ter socios pura circuratulit unda, Spargens rore levi, et lamo felicis olivie : Lustravitique viros, dixitique novissima veilia." ^Ea., lib. vi , v. 230. 176 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE A moment or two after this, a band of music issued from the temple, accompanied by a blaze of torchlight and a troop of dancing-girls. Priests and wealthy votaries followed; then, borne on men's shoulders, a richly-caparisoned litter, on which sat the idol, covered with a graceful canopy. On each side were men plying large fans, to protect him from dust and flies. The march was slow, solemn, and devotional. It might have been the ark of the Lord. On reaching the mantapa, they rested the god for a few minutes ; and then, reaching the car, began to pace round it a slow circuit ; but, when approaching us, the litter suddenly stopped, and the men moved back a few paces, as if dragged involuntarily. This was repeated several times, leaving us to infer that the god was offended at our presence, and would not proceed ; but not choosing to see the cause of his reluctance, we kept our ground ; and at length some of the great men, seizing on the pole of the litter, pulled it heartily forward, by which zeal the indignation of Gubbi Appa was appeased ; for he forthwith proceeded, and in a few minutes was upon his lofty throne. A suite of priests surrounded him, and the fan-men fanned lustily. Immediately on seeing him seated, the people took hold of the ropes in front, forming two long lines of men, with a space of three or four yards between. In this space the musicians and temple-women took their post. At this moment the car, with its enormous height, its waving flags, and the airy figures perched on high, towered imi)ressively in the glaring torchlight. The long avenue of human beings in front, centred by the group of dancers, gave it a touch of new and wild sublimity, before which curiosity, wonder, and weeping struggled for the mastery. The band struck up, the dance began, the men at the ropes gave a shout, and stretched to the draught. There was a moment's pause ; then the ponderous vehicle trembled, creaked, sliook, and rumbled forward with a heavy crashing. At that instant rose from the centre to the utmost edge of that throng a loud, reverent, but exulting cry, Swamif Sivdmi! "0 God! MY CIRCUIT 177 God ! " Thousands of voices swelled that invocation ; thousands of heads bowed low. The lost race might have risen to hail the Redeemer, " travelling in the greatness of His strength, mighty to save." Then from all sides a shower of plantains rained on the car ; and, as they rebounded, happy, happy did he seem who secured a fruit sanctified by the touch of a thing so holy. The moving tower rumbled on, and the hapless people shouted. Little did they think tliat that wretched idol was both the sign of their darkness and the instrument of their undoing. Their lamentable glee, and the magnitude of the car, irresistibly reminded you of the Trojans rejoicing about the pompous trophy that carried, but concealed, their destruction. And these were men ! And they were our fellow-subjects ! And they must die, and meet God ! And our fathers were once as dark as they I A procession of maniacs to hail madness, or of skeletons to honour famine, or of corpses to welcome plague, could hardly touch you with a stranger or sadder thrill. After the first great day, the attendance on the feast diminished ; but throughout the week the ceremonies went on. Every night the idol made a procession, the vehicle being varied each time, — an elephant, a kite, a peacock and other forms, being called into requisition. Every evening we had a large and attentive audience. We pitched our little tent close by the ground, in order to be near the people during the heat of the day, that we might have op[)ortunities of conversing with them. But our house was such an object of curiosity that the numbers coming to see it were quite sufficient to furnish us with a perpetual congregation. While we reasoned with them freely on religious subjects, we conciliated them by gratifying their curiosity. It is often said, by persons who ought to know the Hindus, that they have no curiosity, which is just as true as the favourite assertion that they have no gratitude. Their capability of the latter 178 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE is not very often tested ; and the existence of the former is frequently concealed by their good breeding, or their pride, which does not like to look ignorant. Everything in our house was wonderful, for the domestic inventory of a Hindu is complete when he has got four walls, a roof, a floor, a few waterpot^ and cooking-pots, a pestle and mortar to pound rice with,^ and a handmill, exactly the same as is still found on the west coast of Ireland, and in some of the Scottish isles, under the name of a quern. A mat for a bed is a comfort ; a ratna kambli — just one of our hearthrugs — is the couch of the luxurious ; carpets are for kings. The dry, clean floor is both chair and table ; the plates are made daily as the meal is cooking, by stitching together a few leaves ; knives are not needed to cut rice — practised fingers make good spoons ; a Brahman has as much notion of a fork as had that worthy Briton, Caractacus ; and a Hindu lady knows as much about a china service as did King Alfred's mother. The cloth that covers a man by day wraps him by night — a custom plainly common in the time of Moses, from Exod. xxii. 26, 27 : "If thou at all take thy neighbour's raiment to pledge, thou shalt deliver it unto him by that the sun goeth down ; for that is his covering only, it is his raiment for his skin : wherein shall he sleep ] " If a man be so luxurious as to have under him a mat or rug, he is ready, at a moment's warning, to roll up his bed, put it under his arm, and walk away. He sleeps as comfortably under a tree as in a house. The houses of the rich differ from those of the poor only in being larger, furnished with better vessels, a few mats and rugs, and perhaps one or two silver drinking- cups. Those who came from remote villages stared at our rooms with pure bewilderment. The table first took their notice: "What is that? What is it for?" And hard it was to make them comprehend how we should need such a cumbrous thing to eat off, a matter they managed with ^ This must not be fancied on the scale of a chemist's shop. The pestle is a hard stick as thick and long as a man's arm. MY CIRCUIT 179 perfect comfort from their knees. ^ A bed was wonderful, and a chair mysterious. The books were objects of special marvelling. One day a fine old man, with white hair, after having wondered over and over again at everything in my study, from the steel pen to the Venetian blinds, said, pointing across the verandah to Mr. Male's study, " May I go into that house 1" He had scarcely entered, when his eye fell on the Centenary volume,- which lay on the table, beautifully bound in red russia, Avith gilt edges. " "What is that 1" he cried; pointing to it with delight and surprise. " A book." " A book 1 " exclaimed the old man ; " that a book]" The printing astounded, and the portraits en- raptured him. " What do you do with it ? " he cried ; "what do you do with if?" "Why, read it, to be sure." "What, do you do nothing but read it? Oh, if we had it in our village, we would do j:>i(;'a (worship) to it ! " Some of them had heard of a watch, and craved a sight of that strange thing. They would eye it at a distance, hearken to the ticks like a child, then eye it again, venture to take it in their hand, turn it round and round, and watch the hands, — uttering notes of high amazement. What was it 1 How did it know the time ? Where could it be got 1 How long would it live 1 And a flood of such interrogatories poured upon you. They would insist that it was alive, " Look at it — it moves ; listen to it — it speaks ; if speech and motion are not attributes of life, what are 1 " They can themselves tell the time with remarkable exactness, either by the length of their .shadows, or by the position of the sun in the sky, — a kind of horography ill adapted to our cloudy regions. As the length of the days does not vary more than thirty minutes during the course of the year, they suppose it to be perfectly equable. Owing to this my watch was in ' [Hindus do 7iol eat from their knees. Their plate, generally made of leaves, but sometimes of metal, is always placed on the Hoor, and the man sits cross-legged beside it. ] - Centenary of Methodism, by Kev. T. Jackson. 180 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE danger of losing its character ; for when, in December, I happened to say it was not quite six o'clock, although the sun had set, they replied, " Who ever heard of the sun setting earlier one day than another 1 No, no ; the sun always sets at six ; he must be right ; the watch is wrong." ^ Gubbi Appa is indisputably the most honoured god of the town and neighbourhood, but he is by no means the only one. To worship only one god is not in the nature of Hinduism. A secret distrust of the favourite deity is mani- fested by a search after others.- The temple of Gubbi Appa stands, as has been said, outside the eastern gate. A few yards within that gate in the main street an open building attracts your eye to an altar of the god Mailappa. Facing you at the head of the same street is a small building to the goddess Yellamma. It is of mud — mean and neglected- looking. But when the cholera was scourging the town, here centred the general hope. They did not take any medicine. They would say, " Medicine is for diseases, but cholera is no disease. Yellamma just determines to kill a certain number of persons, and for that jiurpose put a fire in their belly. To take medicine only enrages her, and makes her kill more." Sacrifices are esteemed the only remedy, and to these they had resort. I saw the heads of the buffaloes ranged before this disgusting idol, and the I)lace around slippery with their blood. The priests managed to delay this sacrifice mitil the disease was abating, but the day after it was offered it broke out anew. After a fortnight had elapsed without a case, they repeated it, but tlie next day a person was seized. This gave us a great advantage in reasoning with them. Where they are within reach of English doctors the success of their treatment soon does away with the prejudice against medicine. In the same street with this temple is a large one with an ^ This, of course, dots not ajiply to the Jotishas, who well under- stand the variation in the length of the day. See Vishnu Pitrdna. - [This cannot be maintained.] MY CIRCriT 181 immense image of 15asava, the ox. Few idols are more honoured than he : his temples are numerous, his wor- shippers everywhere. He is the vahana, or " steed," of Shiva. They say that to honour the steed is to honour the rider, and if they arc not worthy to approach the supreme Shiva they may yet draw near to his steed. Two huge bulls, as fat as they could live, were constantly perambulating the streets with u seal on the hip which served to attest their sacredness. They seem conscious that they are free of the whole town. You see them quietly walk up to the baskets of a grain dealer to levy a contribution, which he tries to make as light as possible by coaxing the god away ; but woe to the profane wretch who would strike his sacred hide, no matter how heavily he may tax his stores ! It has been put to me as a deep question in ethics, whether it were lawful to drive Basava out of a cornfield, and if so, whether violence might be used. Once an arch ryot said, " Oh yes, it is lawful ; for if Basava were left in the field he might eat too much, and hurt himself." Their veneration for these animals is very deep. Sometimes while sitting in one of the shops a man has broken off the conversation, and run into the middle of the street in order to worship one of them that happened to be passing. No crime is held so revolting as cow murder. Had one of us killed a poor old woman of the out-castes, it would not have raised a hundredth part of the commotion that would have followed our getting a beefsteak or a fillet of veal. Sometimes, when we had been preaching against sin, they would say, " You padres are certainly remarkable men ; you have only one sin, but that is as bad as all ours — you are murderers ; we have a great many sins, but we are not murderers." In this they alluded to our eating fowls and mutton, for with them all life-taking is murder. This prejudice is so deep that I sometimes felt disposed to eat only vegetables, but was decided against that course from the consideration that it would be a concession of Scriptural 182 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE truth, and would seem at least a recognition of the dogma, "All life is the same," out of which, this prejudice arises. All that proceeds from the cow is holy. The domestic uses of her droppings have been already mentioned ; but they have far higher offices. Made into pills and swallowed, they are highly effectual for inward purification. The panehagavija, or five products of the cow, including the nauseous with the pleasant, are, when taken by a penitent — whose penitence, by the way, consists in taking them — effectual, as the Abbe Dubois, quoting from a native author, informs us, " to the remission of all sins," even when " com- mitted with a perfect knowledge." It is a wonderful thing to see a man with strong sense looking you full in the fiice, and confidently maintaining this mischievous absurdity. Monday is specially sacred to Basava, and on that day it is not lawful to put him to the yoke, but that rule is observed only by few.^ In the very next street to the temple of Basava is one to Bala Eama,- one of the incarnations of Vishnu. To a curse of this god the Brahmans ascribe the exclusion of their caste from the kingly office. He gave them the whole earth ; and then, to test their generosity, asked for as much land as he could stand on, that he might perform austerities. They, with their characteristic greediness — a disposition they no more seem to think of concealing than a soldier thinks of concealing his bayonet — at once refused, and began to up- braid him with the contemptible sin of dattapahara, "snatch- ing back a gift." Incensed at this, he cursed them to the effect, that no Brahman should ever hold the sovereign right of any land, and should enjoy it only by grant from a prince of inferior caste. Passing from this point through a narrow lane, you find a small mud temple, kept very clean, with an ^ [Farmers rarely plough on a Monday, but carriers will yoke their bullocks to the cart on that day.] '^ There have been three Rainas : Parusha Rama, Bala Eama, and Sri or Dasharatha Rama. MV riRcuiT 183 image of M;uiamma, the goddess of disease, in the same material. She is painted and decked with flowers. In the fort is a temple to lianumanta, the monkey generalissimo ; and another to Shiva the Destroyer, or, as one of the Shilstras calls him, "the fierce lord of devils." Ilis images usually represent him adorned with coils of serpents and a necklace of human skulls. The head of Bramha the Creator, which he cut off with his nail, is sometimes placed in his hand. Besides these public altars, every house has its j;e?iafl/, p^^t, pat, till he seemed fairly stunned with the number of little blows ; then we let him free, and soon finished the contest. It is a singular illustration of the way in which depravity perverts advantages, that the low castes kill this reptile and the high castes adore it. When my munshi, a Erahman, learned on the morning just referred to what had been done, he quite lost his temper ; insisted, with much excitement, that I had been guilty of a great crime in killing his god, and main- tained that the serpent never injured anyone ; if it did bite a person, and he died in consequence, it was only because his fated time had come. They give it great credit for intelligence, asserting that if anyone attack it and fiiil to kill it, no matter where he may flee to, it traces him out, and never rests till avenged by his death. The ryots are afraid to leave the skeleton in the fields, saying young serpents rise out of every bone — they burn it. They also believe that the cobra di capello is only the female, pointing out as the male a larger snake, which is not venomous, but defends itself by lashing with its tail, for which reason it is called the whip-snake. I have found these generally to measure from eight to nine feet, while the cobra seldom reaches seven. They add that if anyone happen to over- look these two snakes when pairing they both give chase, and do not rest till he is destroyed. Surely this is enough — enough for wonder, for grief, for satiety — but not enough to exhaust the manifold idolatries of Gubbi. Inanimate nature is not overlooked in the general lavishing of worshi]). In spring, when the crops are rising, it is usual to hear frightful noises about the fields at night. These proceed from ryots oU'ering sacrifices to Bhdmi, the Earth, who is a goddess. The victim is usually a goat, part of which is burnt, and in the dark the ashes are carried to the fields, on the corners of which they are placed in tessolated marks to warn away evil spirits, witchcraft, or blighting winds. During this ceremony they set up horrible MY CIRCUIT 189 yells to scare oW ilmils. In the (Juni.sur country, a part of India as yet but little known, this sacrifice demands a human victim, lie is placed alive in the midst of a host of ryots, each armed with a knife. They tie him to a post, and at a given signal rush upon him. Each man cuts from his person as large a piece as he can obtain in the struggle, and immediately divides it among the people of his own village, who hasten to their fields and bury in the soil the morsel of palpitating fiesh. In one part of the Himalaya it is done by making a rope fast at the head and foot of a precipice a mile high, and forcing the victim to descend. Should he alight on his feet he is free, but if he lose his balance, even though still holding on sufficiently to prevent his being killed by the fall, he is at once despatched on reach- ing the ground. If, as is most likely to be the case, he parts from the rope, of course he is dashed to pieces.^ The sun, too, is a god, and a great one. The most sacred of all mantras (forms of prayer), the Gayatri, is an invoca- tion of this luminary.^ Its virtue is wonderfuk " He who, seated opposite the sun, repeats it, is liberated from fear and sickness, misfortunes cease, and unlawful meats, drinks, intercourse and connections become pure and lawful."^ Of the sun's private history the following curious passage is given in the Ha7-l Vamsha : — " His wife, the daughter of the Hindu Vulcan, found the heat of her situation so intense that, after bearing it till almost consumed, she at last created out of her own shadow a goddess, the perfect image of her- self, and set off to her father's house. He refused to sanction ^ Wallace's Memoirs of India. [Needless to say, these things have long since ceased.] - [The Oiiyatri is a short prayer to the suu as Savitri the Stimulator. It is the most sacred of the Vedie texts, and is repeated by every orthodox Hindu in his morning prayers. It runs thus: — "Let us meditate on the transcendent glory of that divine Stimulator ; may he stimulate our minds."] ^ The Sunja Ndrai/ana Upaniahad, as quoted by Dr. Wilson, in the Ecposure of Hiudiiitm. 190 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE the crime of forsaking her husband by admitting her ; on which, rather than return, she transformed herself to a mare, and betook herself to the wilderness as a solitary ascetic. Surya (the sun) never suspected the cheat that had been played upon him until, after the lapse of years, one day Yama, his eldest son, came to him in great trepidation, complaining that his mother had cursed him with a severe doom. Surya demanded of his wife why she had pronounced such a doom on her son ; and she justified herself by saying, he had raised his foot to kick her. He then told Yama that the curse, being pronounced, must take efi'ect ; but asked how he came to think of kicking his mother. He said, he was provoked by her constant partiality in dealing with the children, indulging the younger ones, but being very harsh towards him. The mother was now called to account, and, in her confusion, acknowledged that she was not the mother of Yama, but a counterfeit made from her shadow. Grieved and indignant, Surya hastened to his father-in-law, and bitterly accused him of concealing his wife. This he denied, telling him he was so insufferably hot, she could not live with him, and that no power could induce her to return ; for she had refused, even when driven from his door in disgrace. Plunged into the utmost sorrow, poor Silrya asked if, with all his knowledge of the arts, he could not discover means of reducing him to a bearable temperature ; on which the great mechanic put him on his grindstone, and ground oil' an immense host of rays, which he then collected and forged into that terrible and mysterious weapon, the chaJcra of Vishnu.^ The fugitive goddess was then sought out ; and, perceiving the fires of Surya so greatly moderated, _was prevailed upon to resume her natural relation." When I first road this strange talc, it was in the presence of ' The Vishnu Punlua adds — " The student of Sliiva, tlio weapon of the god of wealth, tlie lance of Kaitikejii, and the weapons of the other gods, — all those Vishwakarnia f.ibricatud from the .superfluous rays of the sun." MY CIRCUIT 191 two Brahmans, to whom 1 freely expressed the incredulity and amusement to which it gave rise. This they both resented, and vindicated the truth of every word Avith what an eloquent writer, speaking of Charles Simeon's preaching, has called, " a contagious intensity of faith." "It must be true," said they ; " it is in the Shustra ; the Shastra cannot lie. If the Shastra lied, where could truth be found 1" It is easy for those who have been educated in a land of Bibles and free thoughts to say, with regard to the absurdities of superstition : " They cannot believe them." Yes, they can — they do ; men can believe anything. The moon is not passed by : lie is a god ; and his functions are not confined to nightly illuminations ; but, when the rain has been exhaled from the earth, he receives and accommodates it till the proper time for its return. The clouds also are personated in the god Indra, who holds theiu chained up in eight great masses, and at his i)leasure looses any one. When he angrily smites them with his bolts, it thunders ; and the rainbow appears when he draws his bow. The wind is a god. The sea also is a god, whose Avaters are signally efficacious to purify,— -a single bath sufficing to wash away sin. On the coast, cocoa-nuts and other offerings are cast upon his Avaves. Then the poor soul of the Hindu crouches before several members of the vegetable family. It has already been said that the noble old banyan, before described, has beneath it an altar to its OAvn honour. The banyan tree is everywhere held to be divine. The araJc, ov Jicus relujiusa, is Avorshi^jped as an avatdra of Vishnu, Avho took its shape Avith the same object as Jupiter had in becoming a sAvan. The beautiful margosa also is included in the pantheon. It is not unusual to see these tAvo trees growing so closely together that their branches intermingle, and surrounded by a Ioav Avail, in token that they live in Avedlock, the marriage ceremony having been performed by a priest Avith all due solemnities. The herb tulasi, Avhich is used at almost every religious festivity, is a transformation of one of Vishnu's unlaAvful Avives, to 192 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE whom he was so devoted that, when metamorphosed into a plant, he resolved to abide with her, and for that purpose became the shcilagnima, a black schistous stone, which is, on this account, held to be adorable. Mora Bhatta Dandhekarii, in ably defending the superstitions of his country against Dr. Wilson of Bombay, asks, " How can His (God's) honour be tarnished by saying that fire, the cow, the shalar/rdma, and other things, so holy and purifying, are His very glory 1" These vegetable deities have sacrifices presented during the feast of Dipavali. The cocoa-nut tree is appropriately held to be an embleui of gratitude ; for man brings it water when young and weak, which, when strong, it yields him back in a delicious form. It is highly valued and frequently personated, but does not receive divine honours. I am not prepared to say that it is never worshipped : no doubt it is ; for you can hardly fix on an object, animate or inanimate, useful or noxious, but some time or other has the soul of a man cringing before it and calling it God. These are the leading features in the exterior of religion in Gubbi. It is a dark picture — very dark, if considered merely as to appearances ; but how woeful does that dark- ness grow when we think that it is not a bare shape, not a fugitive phenomenon, but the living representative of souls, of their thoughts, their l^elief, their hopes, their morals ; of the attributes they assign to God, the views they have of their own destiny, the principles on wliicli they guide their life. What state of soul is represented by bull- worship, by monkey-worship, by vulture-worship, by serpent-worship, by implement-worship, by tree-worship, by the worship of the duiigliill ? What state of morals is represented by the worship of Vighiushwara, and Krishna and the Linga ? What state of hope is rei)resented by the worship of the fierce and filthy destroyer, Shiva 1 Who, uh, who would enter into one of those craven bodies, and be a hapless soul, looking out upon a universe in which every monster is a god, and every beast an 0([ual ; in wliicli men are vile, and MY CirvCUlT 193 gods far viler; and in the whole of which the weary eye cannot rest on one pure being worthy to be loved with all the heart, and soul, and mind, and strength 1 Is there any curse one should feel more dreadful than to be transformed into one of these dark souls, bereft of all knowledge of the one holy and true God, of redemption, of the resurrection of the dead, or the life of the world to come ; haunted by a count- less horde of vicious powers, each one demanding our dread ; looked down upon and bidden to crouch by soil and sea, by tree and beast, by bird and snake ; and yet our immortality left with us? The soul shrieks at the very thought, and cries, " Make me miserable, or make me mad ; but oh, do not make me a thing like that !" Yet such are the souls that dwell in Gubbi, and such are the souls that, in our wonderful realm of India, inhabit a thousand plains;. In the vicinity of Gubbi were above twenty towns and villages, which were formed into a regular circuit, and a plan made by which they were visited in turn. Bidarc was a considerable market-town. Chelur, a large village, with about thirty temples. Hosahalli, Netagunta, Nara- mangala, Lekeuahalli, and several others, were populous villages, each with its gauda, or headman. The gauda is of the same caste as the rest of the villagers, but has great honour paid him from his office : he is the umpire in disputes and the medium of all negotiations with Govern- ment. In Hosahalli was a shekdar, a kind of revenue and police magistrate, who holds jurisdiction over ten gaudas. A few miles olf was Kadaba, a considerable town, much under the influence of I^rahmaus, and the residence of the amildar, who is judge and collector for a taluq, a district including many shekdars. The amildar was a civil and in- telligent Muhammadan, who hatl four wives, and married the fifth while I was there. Chunchathalli was a neat village, mainly inhabited by potters, who work in the open air, shaping their ware with great dexterity on a simple wheel fixed horizontally, and revolving close upon the ground, 13 194 A Mission* TO THE ^[YSOEE so as to permit the workmen, according to custom, to sit. The pots are burnt in large open ovens. They make tiles, waterpots, and cooking-pots ; but the fine wares and endless variety of articles manufactured by their Chinese and European brethren are unknown. Their most curious article is a large vessel for holding grain, much the shape of a Chinese jar, and capable of containing several gallons.^ One hamlet was inhabited Avholly by stonecutters, who are a low and ignorant caste ; and, if I remember rightly, one of the few castes that permit a second marriage to young widows. Another hamlet was occupied by shepherds, who rank far below the cowherds. They have about them none of the romance belonging, in our imaginations, to that primitive calling. Once, in the dusk of the evening, I saw a man running along the road, with his whole flock in close pursuit, when, coming up to us, he crossed the road, and was followed by every hoof : he stood still as we passed, and they all clustered behind him. It strongly reminded me of the Saviour's words, " My sheep hear My voice,'and follow Me." Besides the places close about Gubbi, we included in our plan Tumkur, a large market-town, about twelve miles off. It is the residence of the superintendent of the Chitaldrug division, and, in consequence, much resorted to from all the surrounding country by those who have any litigation, or other attraction to the seat of authority. It would be an important post for a missionary, could one be given to it.^ We also visited some villages in its neighbour- hood. I cannot pass over this town without naming one affecting occurrence. Close by the travellers' bungalow, far from any place where Christians bury, stands the lonely tomb of a British officer. One morning, about three o'clock, ^ A vessel of like size and sliapc is shown in Colchester Castle, as of the times of the Romans. '^ [It is MOW a prosiicrous Wcsleyan Mission station, with about two hundred and fifty church members, and a Christian congregation of nearly six hundred.] MY CIRCUIT 195 Mr. Jenkins Avas calk'd up by a niaii, wlio delivered a note, dated Tumkur, from a lady with whom he had some acquaintance, in which she informed him that her husband was dead, and begged he would hasten to her assistance. He found that Captain had left his regiment at Hari- har, to accompany his wife to ]Madras, who Avas obliged to go to England by a total failure of health. Their three children were with them. On their route lay Chitaldrug, where cholera was raging. When between it and Tumkur, Captain was seized with those symptoms, dreadful anywhere, but doubly so on a lonely march. They urged on in hopes of reaching Tumkur ; but, when seven miles from it, his sufferings became so great, that he could proceed no farther. The bearers laid him down on an oj^en plain without either house or tree. He could not, for agony, remain in the palanquin : he writhed upon the sand. For hours he lay there enduring the pain of the disease, aggravated by the bare ground and burning sun. His poor wife was too feeble even to walk : she could only watch and weej). Shade, or help, or friend, she had none. The only white faces near were those of her children, whom she felt to be already fatherless. They now came to mourn over papa, and now went off to play. There sat that weakly lady, hour after hour, watching her kind and excellent husband torn with pains, till at last he lay a corpse on the lone roadside. She got the bearers to carry their sorrowful burden to Tumkur, certain, at least, of all that Christian hospitality could do, in the house of the estimable Captain Uobbs. But he was from home, and the servants in charge, finding she had a dead body with her, refused admittance. The travellers' bungalow, only just built, was incomplete, damp, and un- furnished. Thither she went, her only care being how she could place the remains of her husband in a decent grave. She could not get any one to procure a colfin, or aught rise, fit for interment. She was ill and weak, and not al)le to bully the Musalman attendants, who care little for a 196 A MISSION TO THE MYSOKE woman in sorrow. Happily, she remembered there Wiis an Englishman within twelve miles. INIr. Jenkins soon obtained the things necessary for burial, and committed the body to its lonely home. It was an affecting funeral ; but hope, far better than a crowd of mourners was there. Captain had long been seriously disposed, but a few months before had evinced a decided religious change. For some days he had seemed to be under a presentiment of death, and spoke of its coming with a Christian's confidence. The same evening the widow proceeded on her sorrowful journey. At the distance of about twenty-five miles from Gubbi, is the town of Kunigal, with a population of about seven thousand,^ a considerable manufactory of silk, and a Govern- ment depot of young horses intended for the army. It is situated on a noble tank, ten miles in circumference, the shores of which are variegated with groves of date and mulberry, clusters of bare rock, and, in the distance, blue mountains, among which towers Shivaganga. Morals in India are bad, very bad, but in Kunigal they are lower tlian even the common level. A large proportion of the inhabit- ants arc Miihammadans, and several of the horsekccpers are Roman Catholics. These have a small chapel, with suitable furniture of idols ; and it is no injustice to them to say, that not in any one particular of knowledge or morality aie they before the worst of their neighbours. They are favoured with an occasional visit from a priest residing at Mysore, who, after the habit of the Jesuits, calls himself a European BiAhman, and maintains toward the people the relations implied by that ca.ste. If his teaching were aimed to make the people wise and good, it was utterly inn)otent for that ; but it bore the indubitable voucher of genuine Romanism, in a talismanic power to make bigots. The man who could not make a liigot would be a poor agent of Popery. This priest fully authenticated his mission ; for while heathen and ' [Less than five tliousainl now.] MY CIKCUIT 197 Muhammadau came to hear the Word of God, not one of liis people dared. The curse of God and the priest, denial of absolution, penance?, purgatory, and hell, are mighty things with an ignorant man, when put before him, not to check a passion or enforce a virtue, but to aggravate a fictitious sin or rouse a feeble prejudice. In 1839 a piece of ground was obtained at Kunigal, on which a house of two small apartments was built for a missionary, and close by, a similar one for an assistant missionary. In the opening of 1840, Mr. Squarebridge and jNIr. Webber were appointed to the station. It was considered part of the Gubbi circuit ; but, owing to the distance, the work was conducted on a separate plan. Here the villages lie even more thickly than round Gubbi, and about forty of them were embraced in a regular circuit. They were populous ; many of them, besides agricultural pursuits, rearing silkworms and spinning silk. They were everyone open to our fullest labours.^ Measuring from Chelfir on the north, to below Kunigal on the south, the length of our circuit was about forty miles ; from Tumkilr on the east to the most Avesterly point, the breadth was more than fifteen. It was not possible to bring every jjlace within these limits under regular cultivation, but only the most important towns, and the villages near to Gubbi and Kunigal. Exclusive of villages, the towns alone of the circuit embraced a population full four times ' [Kunigal lias not been a niissionaiy sueoess ; but then it has not been workeil. J[r. Arthur was in Mysore at the beginning of things. The missionaries were still prospecting ; they had not struck their lode. AVhen they did so, labourers had to be withdrawn from less promising places, and stationed where they could best follow the lode. Thus Kunigal lost its mi.ssionary some forty years ago, and it has never since been possible to replace him. A native evangelist is stationed there, and the town and neighbourhood receive brief periodical visits from a missionary. But the Mission has never been in a position to maintain vigorous continued work there. There are twenty-one Christians in the town.] 198 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE as large as that of Tahiti, ^ where a whole colony of mis- sionaries laboured for half a generation, patiently waiting to see fruit, and saw it at last. The population of the circuit was far greater than that of some Avhole groups in the South Seas, and certainly not less than that of New Zealand.- Then these were not isolated from all external influence. The difference between a circuit like this, formed out of the midst of India, and one in Tahiti, or Tonga, is that the one is an island in an ocean of salt water, and the other is an island in an ocean of human beings. In the one case every impulse given terminates at the beach, whence it is reflected back, to increase the commotion within the narrow compass ; in the other, when it has reached the boundary-line of your circuit, instead of travelling back to the centre, it goes on, and oil, and on, for a thousand miles, giving a feeble but momentous disturbance to those cum- brous prejudices which liave crushed down, for ages, inquiry and improvement. You cannot, in India, concentrate your influence under your own eye ; it goes far beyond you, and spends much of its strength where you cannot follow it. This necessarily gives your results slowness ; but it gives them width. You are not so likely to convert a town in ten years, but far more likely to convert a hundred thousand towns in a century. At Gubbi we had no mission-station on the east nearer than Bangalore, sixty miles ; none on the south nearer than Mysore, ninety miles ; none on the north nearer than Bellary, about two hundred miles ; and none on the west nearer than Mangalore, the same or a greater dis- tance; and yet every spot enclosed in these wide outlines is just as open to the gospel as a village in Yorkshire or Cornwall. There is not a })lace where a single missionary might not go, and though the foot of wliitc man, or the name of Jesus, liad never reached it before, he might pro- claim his entire message, not only with safety to liis person, but with the certainty of commanding respect for his ' Taliiti lias IGOO. - Coiiiimted at 100,000. MV CIliCUIT 190 doctrines. There never was before the Church such a field. To leave it untilled is shortsighted and scandalous neglect. When we turned northward, the thought was appalling ; it was like facing an ocean. Between us and the limit of India, the vale of Cashmere, lay about fifteen hundred miles of the finest and best-peopled country in the world ; but, drawing a line direct north from Guljbi, it did not touch a single missionary post but at Bellary. Hundreds of miles to the east of this line, a few stations were lying far scattered. To its west were some at Bombay, Poonah, and Guzerat; but, taking the city of Nagpur as a centre, we could sweep a circle of three hundred miles' radius without touching one post, except a solitary American missionary at Jalna. From Nagpur to Jaipur, another capital, is quite five hundred miles, in Avhich Avhole course is no missionary ; and round this centre, again, you can draw the same terrible circle of six hundred miles' diameter, including only the single station of the Church JNIissionary Society at Agra.' • Such was my circuit, and so situated : its freedom from the interruptions incident to a European settlement, its exclusive intercourse with the natives, its unequalled facilities for studying them, and its boundless opportunities for spreading the gospel, all combined to make it just such a field as a 3''oung missionary might rejoice in ; and if there were a feeling in his heart to be stirred, that field would stir it. The people are courteous and civil, subjects of our own Government, bowing to us as the most powerful, and con- fiding in us as the wisest of nations. They receive us with frankness and treat us with respect. Their towns and villages are as open to the missionary as to the Brahman. ' [This description, terribly tnie sixty years ago, is happily now no longer true. In all the wide areas indicated, missions have beau established; and are vigorously at work. Nevertheless, thtro is .still an almost desperate disproportion between the masses to be reached and the labourers available to roach then).] 200 A .MISSION TO THE MYSORE He may come at any hour, stand in any place, handle any subject. Business will make room for liim in the market ; amusement will yield to him in the feast ; devotion will not hunt him from the temple ; he may stand at its door and illustrate his argument by the idol they are then worship- ping. Close by the idol car he may proclaim Him who sitteth on the circle of the heavens : by the fire where they are performing penance, or the altar wdiere victims are yet reeking, he may tell of the one Atonement. Everywhere, not only safety, but respect, awaits him. There never has been, in the history of the Church, a field so perfectly open in the midst of a great heathen country ; there never can be another field more open ; and there never can be but one so xtensive — China. On this field meets every element of exciting interest : it is a field where a beautiful country is defaced with obscene idols, where gentle manners are de- formed by rank depravity, and keen intellects are stultified by drivelling superstitions. The intelligence, polish, and gentleness of the people make the darkness of their souls a thousand times more frightful. There is no savage congruity between their superstitions and their manners. You are shocked by the alliance of education and darkness, of polish and debasement. A man makes an elegant bow, pays a graceful compliment, discusses metaphysics, writes poetry, calculates an eclipse — and worships a snake ! The abrup- tion is horrible ; the shock far greater than to see a similar act done by a savage who never wore a robe nor saw a letter. In the one case, Satan stalks as a marauder ; in the other, sits as a king, with liteiature, science, and antiquity adorn- ing bis throne. This civilised, lettered, accomplished idolatry is the most startling thing on earth, man's worst curse, Satan's highest triumph. It should thrill and rouse us. To see naked, tatooed savages, with fiendish yells, holding a cannibal feast on some wild island would be horrible, yet it would be consistent ; but who could bear to see courtly ladies, in the aisle of a catlioilral, and (o the sound of MY CIRCUIT 201 Handel's music, eating liuiuan limbs? The darkness of the Hindus demands the gospel ; their accessibleness invites it. It is true that by castes and by families they are in firmly concreted masses ; but they lay bare the surface to our opera- tions, and already a quivering passes throughout the entire bulk which attests it, that nothing is needed but a strong and continuous shock, and it will all rend. But to give and sustain that shock ought not to be left to the hands of a few. The labourers are few — lamentably, shamefully few, — but they faint not. They sigh that they are few, not because they have a single fear of ultimate failure, but because, from their fewness, tens of millions must die before they have once been reached. This makes them mourn ; it bows their strength ; it tears their hearts ; it shortens their days ; it makes them indignant with money-clutching Christians ; ic makes them cry to God. But as the faint labourer, with the wide field round him, kneels and lifts up his weary, trem- bling hand, there comes upon him a kind of assurance that the day of redemption draweth nigh, such as no other can feel, and such as no doubt can encounter. The prayer of a missionary, with thick masses of benighted souls on every hand, is the most poignant, but the happiest, of prayers. A hundred griefs pierce him ; but every wound makes entrance for a new balm. I am sure i\Ir. Jenkins will never forget the feelings we used to have, when, meeting every afternoon to plead together with God, on behalf of the poor souls that were sitting in the shadow of death before our eyes. There was heaviness and bleeding of heart; but oh, there was with it an assurance as bright as heaven, that God's good Word would accomplish its mission, and that truth and righteousness, peace and mercy, would one day overspread the land that was now so mournful. CHAPTEE VT OUR WORK The essential preliminary to the entrance of a missionary on his work, is the acquisition of the language spoken by the people among whom he is called to labour. IMany have adopted, as a substitute for this, the 'plan of preaching through an interpreter ; but that expedient has never been resorted to in our Kanarese mission, a fact which proves that it is not indispensable. INIany grave objections lie against it : it is cumbrous ; it leaves every truth uttered dependent, for its correct transmission, on the talent or fidelity of the interpreter; and, by cherishing in the mission- ary a habit of self-distrust and reliance upon another, places him in danger of contracting an incurable embarrassment. It also removes the powerful motive to study, which would be supplied by the feeling on his part, that, till sufficiently acquainted with the language to preach, he is utterly useless ; and thus, though appearing to anticipate the time of commencing his public ministry, it really postpones, and that indefinitely, the time of his doing so in the only way that can be either happy to himself, or eflective for his purpose. Let two men of equal talents begin at the same time in the same language, the one by using an interpreter, the (jther by deferring all attempts to preach till his progress enables him to venture, and it will be found that, at the end of three years, the; latter has delivered far more sermons than the former ; and not only so, but acquired a freedom and command which it is doubtful wliether the 202 OUU WORK 208 uLher will evci' gain. Except tu ii man uf genius, ur ol' indouiitable energy, any lengthened use of an interpreter is a certain entail, for life, of hesitating ami (le[)endent incapacity. The habit of reading sermons is also unknown in our Kanarese mission. ]\Iuch may be said in favour of a beginner, before he lias sufficiently mastered the language to speak extemporaneously, composing and then reading a discourse. V>y this means he may bring the truth before a congregation, when otherwise he must have been silent. On the other hand, every one knows that even in an audience accustomed all their days to hear sermons read, only the thinking portion can ordinarily keej) up their attention throughout, unless the reader has the attractions of a pleas- ing or forceful deliver}'. But none of us would ever think of expecting that a congregation of persons not accustomed either to read themselves, or to hear discourses read, should give sustained attention to a lecture composed by a German, or a Frenchman, in still', ungainly English, and read with the hesitancy of inexperience, and the indistinctness of a strong foreign accent. Such an audience could neither understand nor remember such a diatribe. Yet such, for the most part, are the congregations the missionary has to address in India ; and such, at the outset, his condition to interest them. Again : every thnc the preacher trusts to his manuscript, he increases within himself a dread of extemporaneous elfort ; and, from this circumstance, many men, of passable talents, have spent more than half their lifetime, and wasted all their energy, before they dare venture to go out among the people, and, wherever they found them, call them, like heralds of God, to repentance. It is hard to conceive a position more distressing than that of a good man living amid a swarming population of heathen, and wishful to bring them to God, who yet, by a vicious training, has rendered himself incompetent to preach to any of them, but the paltry modicum that may l)e minded, at a 204 A MISSION TO THE MYSOEE stated time, to come within the walls of a place of worship. To any Hindu audience, except such as long usage may have trained, ten minutes of animated extemporaneous address would convey more knowledge, and make upon them a deeper impression, than a read discourse half an hour long. It should also be especially remembered, that the missionary Avho speaks extemporaneously for ten minutes this week, has overcome a difficulty and acquired a power that will fit him to speak, with equal ease, for fifteen next week ; and a few such efforts, made nfter careful preparation, will introduce him to the delightful liberty of addressing the people at will, on any topic present to his mind. A young missionary, by a few well-studied and bold attempts at the first, will escape many a day of vexatious inaction. Without an early and a resolute beginning, he need not hope for first-rate success. Every missionary ought at the very outset to determine that, by the help of God, he will preach to the people in their own tongue as well as if he were a native. To fix an aim lower than this, is suicidal to his own respectability and influence. The attainment of it is not hopeless, if he give his life to his work, and grudge no time nor pains to complete his preparation for its calls. To preach like a native, four things are necessary, — a perfect knowledge of the grammatical and idiomatic structure of the language, a copia verhorum, a power to write and speak fluently, and a correct pronuntaa- tion. A perfect acquaintance with the gi'animar of the Kanarese is not to be obtained without close study; but will infallibly reward any one who takes that pains. The orthography is simple, the etymology compact and easily mastered ; but there is a novelty in the syntax, and a complexity in the I)i'osody, wliich render patient application indispensable to that complete mastery of them, withitut which elegance of style is an impossil)ility. In the first stages of this depart- iiiciit (if study, llic assistance of ii l-'airnpciin is most desir- OUR WORK 205 able, aiiil, witliout that, the student must rely chiefly on himself ; for, in the niceties of grammar, he will receive little aid from native munshis. The idioms can become familiar only by extensive reading and extensive conversation. Respecting a copia verhorum, it is most necessary to avoid the impression, that if a man lias only acquired a great stock of words, he is therefore furnished. A rojna verborum is not merely a crowd of words, but a number of words in use among every class of the people, adequate to intercourse with that class ; and a number of words on every subject, adequate to the discussion of that subject. In copious languages, like those of South India, it requires an extended vocabulary to reach this standard ; but, generally speaking, the number of primitive words in a language is not near so great as people, in their dread of study, suppose ; and when once master of the root, you easily acquire the derivatives. A person with five thousand roots, gained from various sources, is not despicably furnished : and who would be frighteneil at the prospect of learning that number of words ? After the first live thousand, the rest come as of themselves. From Mr. Pope I adopted a plan that proved of incalculable service : every new word that occurred in reading was written down, Avith its derivation and chief meanings ; then, each evening, all acquired during the day were transferred to an alphabetical vocabulary. Thus, at the cost, it is true, of some patience, every word once sighted was permanently housed in the mind.^ The natives say, that to read a word once, is worth liearing it three times, and to write it once, worth reading it seven times ; and no one can doubt but that their opinion has some foundation in fact. But the reason of this is not, as it seems to me, correctly stated either by them, or by Colibett and other ' [The iilau is excellent ; but it is at least ctpially necessary tliat the student should promptly register and carefully learn evei-y iicic idiom. A large vocabulary is a very imperfect achievement without a pure idiom.] 206 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE English writers, to rest in the fact, that the eye is a better remembrancer than the ear, and the hand than the eye. Eye, ear, and hand, are all equally innocent of efforts of memory. The process by which the mind is detained for tlie greatest length of time on a new word when presented to it, is the process that will most serve to fix it in the memory ; and the more frequently the new word is recalled within a short period of its first appearance, the more certain does its ultimate retention become. A boy who has seen Sully's name in a sliort account of St. Bartholomew's massacre may, and most likely will, forget it; but if he read the history of France, he never can ; not because" he emploj^s a different remembrancer, for it is the eye in both instances, but because in the one case the new name was just looked at, and passed instantly, while, in the other, it was kept before the mind for a considerable time, and re- called again and again. After the failure of my sight, which rendered reading and writing equally impossible, it proved that by getting a munshi to read, pronouncing every new word after him, mentally repeating it several times, then, after a short interval, recalling it, and again repeating, all mnemonic purposes were as well secured as by writing. It is very doubtful, however, whether this would have been, the case at an earlier stage of acquaintance with the language. Fables and stories, as replete with the language of every- day life; pur anas and poems, as exhibiting the higher styles of diction ; and the Scriptures, as the grand repository of theological terms, must be the sources Avhence the missionary will gather into his treasury things new and old. Except the Bible, no composition but what has come from a native author, ought to be looked at until the student, by much writing, and much speaking, has, to some extent, acquired a style of his own. But did a man read every book in the language, that alone Avould not replenish him for all the intercourse necessary to a success- ful mission. Without conversation on all subjects, with all OUR WOKK 207 grades of people, daily prosecuted, and studiously varied, his "cistern" may be full, l)ut lie -will lack "the wheel," whereby alone its waters can be dispensed over the land. My study door, which looked into the verandah, was always open, and wlioever came was welcome. They were encouraged to talk on whatever subject happened to be uppermost in their minds, and thus led to exhibit their modes of thinking, their village and household usages, and their views on all sorts of subjects, as also their familiar idioms, and the peculiar accents of different localities. Frequently a dozen strangers, or more, Avould be thus present at a time ; and, on some occasions, it was easy to raise a discussion between parties belonging to different sects, by wdiich means were obtained at the same time a valuable lesson in the language, a view of their exact shades of religious opinion, and an exercise in their method of controversy. Their coiiversational style ranges, according to the grades of society, from the vulgar through the passable, the respectable, and the elegant, up to the ornate. The difference does not lie wholly in gradations of propriety, but in a free use, among the lower orders, of words belong- ing to the old Kanarese, which, like our Saxon, forms the basis of the modern dialect ; while the educated classes introduce a profusion of terms borrowed from the Sanskrit. To express the idea of falsehood, the Brahman uses the M'ord ahaddha ; the tradesman, sidla ; the lov/ ryot, sat/ ; and in numbers of equally familiar words the same diversity is observable. Feeling that an intimacy with the dialect of the ryots was essential to that familiar intercourse which is the surest way to confidence, I determined on acquiring it ; and, among other means, requested my munshi to converse in it for an hour each day. To this he stoutly demurred, saying that it was an indignity to a learned Brahman, to be asked to speak the vulgar and broken Kanarese of the ryot ; but, on being threatened with having a ryot munshi placed by his side, he first laughed heartdy at the idea of a ryot 208 A MISSION TO THE MYSOEE luimshi, and then said lie always thought the purpose of education was to gain polish, not vulgarity ; but that if I were not content witii a Brahman's education, without that of a ryot in addition, why then he could become a ryot, or anything else I pleased. After a while, he caught the spirit of my design, and, with consummate tact, threw himself into the character of a ryot, personating, in turn, every class of villager, and exhausting the Avhole round of rural incident. The advantages of this exercise soon became apparent in conversing with the ryots. To acquii'B the power of fluent writing and speaking, it is imperative that the missionary should make a commencement in both as soon as he can put three words together. Cases have been lamentably frequent in which, after years of study, the writing is uncouth, and the conversation insufferably foreign. Indeed, I have known those who would not converse till they could do it correctly ; and the consequence was, they never did so at all. It is absurd to attribute this to the impossibility of mastering the language ; no such impossibility exists : persons not remarkable either for native genius or academical aids, are to be found in India, who, by sheer dint of hard work and common-sense plans, have gained a perfect command of the most diflicult languages. It is dangerous to begin composition, in a new language, by translating from a language previously known. It may do well enough to teach the art of " making Latin " ; but it is not the way to gain the free, natural, and vigorous style, which a man ought to possess in a language he must use every day, and for the most important purposes. On that method, every word you write, instead of being the ex- pression of one of your own thoughts, is only the equi\'alent of another foreign word ; and each repetition of this process, surely, and most injuriously, induces a habit of interposing a second language between your mind and the words in which it is seeking to express itself. Attempts at com- municating your sentiments through a certain medium. OUR WORK 209 though at first completely unsuccessful, give the mind a tendency to act through that medium, and habit soon strengthens this tendency into a power, which will command its appropriate facilities. No man will form a correct, much less an elegant, style, without writing; but he will reap tenfold the advantage from putting down sentences originated in his own mind, and such as his stock of words enables him to construct, that would accrue from an equal effort of his wits, and a greater outlay of his time, made to render into Kanarese a sentence previously cast in a mould utterly dis- similar. If he fail in attempting to express any fact or sentiment, he has two methods of procedure : the one, to avail himself of the help of a lexicon ; the other, and by far the better, to leave his sentence unfinished, keep the fragment in his mind, and be on the constant watch for the M'^ord or phrase he wants ; a few days, at most, Avill bring it : once gained in that way, it will never be lost again ; and, in the search for it, he will have found many others. Conversation alone must not be trusted to as the means of learning to speak with facility : nothing can be worse for a missionary, than to imagine that all is right because he can converse fluently with the people in the bazaar without being laughed at. Laugh at him they will not, even though in every sentence he perpetrate outlandish idioms, barbarous grammar, and ridiculous pronunciation ; but in that case he cannot do much good ; for the uneducated have but a misty view of his meaning, and the educated regard his efforts with con- tempt. Correct striicture of sentences is not more necessary to the refinement that will delight the learned, than to the lucidness that will be intelligible to the vulgar. On the other hand, if a man defer his attempts to converse till he has formed his style by composition, he must either be of a most happy genius, or his powers of conversation will be always feeble. The two exercises must go togethei'. As soon as a man can say, " How do you do ? " let him begin ; and then, through all the mortifications of false accent, false 14 210 A MISSION TO THE MYSOEE grammar, false idiom, false pronunciation, misplacements, hesitations, repetitions, blunderings, failures, absurdities, and impossibilites, let him flounder on, laugh at his own mistakes, try to do better, fail, laugh again, and combat the embarrass- ment till he surmount it. It is essential to have a munshi who does not know a word of English. N^or let this frighten the student : during the first month his temper and per- severance will be well tried ; his hope will often faint away ; but at the end of that time it will begin to revive, and never droop again. He need not fear being laughed at : the Hindus are too polite. Sometimes, Avhen striving in vain to make myself understood, I have said, " How is it you do not laugh at me?" "Laugh at you !" they would reply: " you are a foreigner, anut Avhy should you be at the trouble of walking over the mud?" ""Why? because we could not otherwise reach the water." "(Jli, that is a mistake: is not the water all-dill'used through the mud?" "Yes, to be sure; or else it would be hard and dry." "Very well ; wlicn you get to the innd, why should you not say, ' There is no use in going farther, the water is all-diffused through the mud : I will therefore say to the mud (for water is here), T}w7i art irater, and thus save myself the trouble of going farther, and bathe in the mud ? ' " They enter into such discussions with exceeding zest ; and when the disputant is so unfortunate as to be overtaken by a redudio ad almirdum, all the crowd, though supporting his opinions, join in a laugh at his discomfiture. They generally argue with perfect good liumour; and if such were 220 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE the missionary's object, he could at any time raise a hearty laugh at the expense of the gods. It is only necessary to satirise their impotency, their uselessness, their fabulous histories, or their crimes, to excite a degree of merriment which clearly shows that although the power of custom binds these dark people to the altars, yet the gods have no deep hold on their reverence. Sometimes, however, when any particular god is assailed, some zealous votary will become his champion, and boldly defend him through every passage of a flagitious history. The grounds usually taken on such occasions are, that what is sin in a man, is not sin in a god ; that a god can do what he pleases ; that some of the crunes were committed on a scale so grand as to be in themselves proofs of divine power ; and some will even contend, that, in the gods, the most flagrant immoralities are not only virtuous, but profitable.^ Their mode of putting this is well exemplified in the following passage from " Mora Bhatta," and found in his Verification of the Hindu Religion, published Avith Dr. Wilson's invaluable Exposure : — " ' Krishna's committing theft Avith the cowherds, and playing the adulterer with their wives; Shiva's spreading death and destruction by his curses, and behaving indecently with Parvati ; Brahma's looking on his own daughter with the eye of a paramour ; Rama's crying out, ' Sita, Sifa ! ' and embracing the trees in a frenzy . . . such abominable ^ [It should be remembered — and it is a curious fact — that Hindus recognise no invariable and universal moral standard. "What is right and necessary for one may be wrong and imendurable in another. Every one — man or God — is under obligation to conform to some law, but that law differs in each individual and is peculiar to each. Practically the right to do a thing is conditioned Ity the power to do it successfully — that jiower having been gi-antcd by the Supreme as a l)oon for some deed of merit, done probably in a forgotten birth. Supi)orted by views like these, communities have i-esigned themselves to the caprices of inhuman tyrants, and have felt no sense of revolt against the oliscene orgies of, say, the Vamacharis of Bengal. Under the influence of these views it is easy for men to reconcile themselves to the sensualities of Krislina.] OUR WORK 221 transactions as these, too bad. to be even mentioned, — are these,' you will say, ' what you adduce, and place on a level with the good acts of Christ? Wliat merit will accrue to you from listening to the tale that narrates them? And as for purity of heart, not the least of it can be obtained by means of them. As by listening to love-songs, lust is inflamed ; and by hearing of the feats of Sindhia and Holkar, the spirit is stirred ; so, by hearing of the deeds of the gods formerly referred to, men will only be prompted to wicked- ness.' Regarding this objection, we maintain, agreeably to the word of God, that all these deeds are so many virtuous actions in the gods that performed them. We maintain, further, that, by hearing and speaking of them, the ignorance of the imprisoned spirit, and its consequent subjection to passion, are removed ; and that thus they have as much power as image-worship itself, to create in the soul pure and holy dispositions." To see a man, with animated and intelligent countenance, look you right in the eye, and avow these monstrous opinions as his solemn creed,— and to hear a whole assembly concur in the declaration, — would make even an infidel thank God for Christianity ! The service on Friday evening was generally of a con- versational character. Selecting a shop that seemed to promise a good auditory, we would enter, and, making our salaam, familiarly take our seat on the floor beside the shopkeeper and his customers. They received us courteously, and even when busy would desist ; not, however, without an occasional remonstrance on the inconvenience of being interrupted. But this was generally waived on our saying kindly, that we should be glad to see them whenever they would favour us with a visit ; and that, besides, religion was of so much greater importance than business, that it was quite right the latter should be set aside now and then, in order to give the other due attention. If no such remonstrance were made, we would at first spend a little time in general conversation ; but very soon turn to religion. Our most ordinary plan of 222 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE introducing religious topics with a stranger was, to ask him who was his god. To this I have seen very respectable men reply, by patting their person, and saying, Idu nanage devaru, hofte, "This is my god, my belly." Others would lift up their hand with some rupees, and, shaking it till the mone}' chinked, would say, Idti nanayi' devaru, nqxnji, " This is my god, my rupees." Dthers, again, would look you in the face, and, with an obeisance in which respect rose to veneration, w^ould say, Swdmi, nam nanage devaru, "Swdmi (God), you are my God." It may be easily conceived how we received such declarations ; but they would coolly defend themselves in this strain : " What is the office of God 1 To rule all things : and what does not the belly rule 1 What is the office of God 1 To rule all things : and does not money govern the world ? What is the office of God ? To govern and protect : and do not you (meaning the English) govern us all and protect us all? Therefore you are our God." The grand heresy of man is a vicegerent godship. This is the first and most prolific of all idolatries ; and the state of mind indicated in the remarks just quoted is only its legitimate issue. When fairly left to work its own results, it brings the mind to regard any person, or indeed anything, from whom benefit is derived, or to wliom deference is due, as so far God : the monarcli to his subjects, — as we have gracefully insinuated in the Sapphics of Horace, and broadly stated in the pastorals of Virgil,- — the husband to his wife, the father to his child, the priest to his disciple, all are, by virtue of their office, gods vicegerent. How completely this is the case with the husband, the following extract will sufficiently show : — " Let the Avife who wishes to perform sacred ablution, wash the feet of her lord, and drink the -water ; for a husband is to a wife greater than iShankara or Vishnu. The husband is her god, and giiru, and religion, and its services ; wherefore, abandoning everything else, she ought chiefly to worship her husband." ^ ^ Skain/a Puriina, quoted liy Dr. "Wilson. OUR WOKK 223 The devotion is not less prostrate in tlic case of a disciple toward his priest. They tell a tale illustrative of the principle, that even a silly or worthless guru ^ is, by virtue of his order, all in all to his disciple. During the rainy season, a guru and his disciple, on a journey, came to a river so swollen that there was no possibility of crossing. The disciple, however, strong in faith, cast himself into the water, and crying out, Nanna guruvina pmlcwe gati, " My priest's feet are salvation," he was borne safely to tlie other side. Seeing this, the guru became elated with a like faith in his own powers, and casting himself into the river, he cried lustily, Nmina pddave gaii, " My feet are salvation " ; but, to the consternation of the devoted follower who had just made such marvellous proof of his virtue, he was borne down by the stream and lost. They add, he ought to have used the same invocation as his disciple, " My priest's feet are salvation " ; for while he was as God to his disciple, his priest was as God to him. Is not this identical with a dogma familiar in Europe, that a wicked priest can absolve a disciple, but cannot absolve himself 1 In our conversation we freely discussed any topic of religion or morality which might arise. Nor did I deem it right to refuse to enter, occasionally, on general subjects ; for to please the people by attending to their inquiries Avith regard to England, or public events, or points of science, conciliated their kindly regards. The vulgar talk among writers on India about the people being incapable of gratitude, is sheer nonsense : even a little polite deference to their wishes will soon show that they are not inaccessible to that gentle virtue. When the conversations became con- troversial, they were generally conducted on their part with perfect good humour; but we often came in contact with one Brilliman of intense bigotry and explosive temper, with whom it was impossible to discuss without bringing on yourself cataracts of insolence. This, though no way grate- ' [A ix'ligious toapber.] 224 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE ful to one's feelings, was not at all dangerous to our argu- ments ; for the Hindus appear generally to hold, that when a disputant becomes angry, he casts the cause into the hand of his opponent, and both loses and deserves to lose. They take lively pleasure in a discussion conducted with skill and good temper. The logical acumen of the Brahmans has been much extolled. No doubt they have at least an average amount of natural reasoning power, and by force of volubility, readiness at illustration, mastery of quibbles, and unscrupu- lousnesSj they are very unmanageable, if not very formidable, opponents. But of any fair logic they are perfectly innocent. As all men who reason at all must do, they frequently throw out the rough form of one kind of syllogism or another ; but it is done without any knowledge of the general laws which would enable them to refer it to its class, or to guard it against flaws ; and in five cases out of ten, a conclusion no way consequent on the premises is announced with a profound complacency, which a very little logic would disturb. They have no notion of the principles of deduction, nor of any compact categorical formula, and as much of analyzing an intricate argument as a Brazilian-mine slave has of analyzing diamonds. They never dream of reasoning fairly. A sophism among Brfdimans is like theft among rogues, a crime not as per- petrated, but as detected. An illustration will always pass for an argument ; and your only resort is to give it some turn in your own favour. They raise subtle questions, seize readily on a weak point, illustrate profusely, mystify admirably, and dogmatize to perfection. But there is far more rhetoric than logic. The figures of the latter have no chance beside those of her more showy sister ; Barbara is tame in the presence of Hyperbole ; and Camestres insipid in comparison with Prosopopoeia. It must be acknowledged, however, that they readily catch the points of a case, and, when an argument is clearly put, do not manifest the con- OUR WORK 225 fidence liabitiial to those who arc incapable of being jjlaced in a difliculty, because incapable of perceiving sequences ; but, on the contrary, they sliow that confusion and desire to shift the ground, which are the proofs of a conscious dilemma. When you have any important point to carry, the safest way of reasoning with them is to begin by getting their adherence to general principles, from which your conclusion may be clearly deduced. In most cases this may be done ; for general truths commend themselves to all. Few dialectic exhibitions are more amusing than the discomfiture of a pert, highdieaded Brahman, who has confidently entangled him- self in mesh after mesh of this Socratic net, when he is suddenly arrested and dragged to a conclusion the most repugnant to his feelings. We lived among the people on terms of the most perfect familiarity, making it an object to invite their approaches. Many of them were in the habit of visiting us, which we were careful to encourage, as it gave us the opportunity both of conciliating their good feeling, and of conversing at large on religious subjects. These visits also enabled us to judge of the state of feeling in the town with regard to our proceedings. Sometimes we had evidence of bitter opposi- tion ; but it was manifest that many were no longer at ease in idolatry, and that the public sentiment, with respect to it, was passing from profound veneration to dubious regard. We found, also, that as the heathen cannot conceive of a person devoting himself to live in a strange country merely from benevolence towards its inhabitants, they at first regarded us as servants of the government, enjoying a handsome stipend. We were most careful to convince them that we stood wholly discunuected from the Company, without their instriictions, their pay, tlieir sympathy, or other benefit from them, except that they would protect us as they would protect any parties residing in their dominions. Our vouchers were at hand, — the absence of retinue, of power, of communication with the government; and all the 15 22G A MISSION TO THE MYSORE intelligent classes soon became satisfied that we were simply what we professed ourselves. One day shortly after my arrival at Gwbbi, and when Mr. Jenkins was from home, an intelligent young Brahman came into the A'erandah, and waited till my munshi had taken leave. He told me that he lived at Kadaba, a few miles distant, and had some time before made several visits to the mission-house, where Mrs. Jenkins had kindly given him lessons in English. No sooner were we alone than he began to converse on religious subjects ; and, after glancing round timidly, as if to be assured that no one overheard him, he said he wanted to know if I could tell him how to obtain forgiveness of sins, saying, he was con- vinced that idols were no gods, and had a strong desire to walk in our way. He then inquired, with mueli solicitude, whether, if he joined our caste, he must wear European costume and eat meat. I put into his hands the fourteenth chapter of Komans, and, as well as I could (for at the time my acquaintance with the language was very slight), explained the real demands of Christianity ; after which he declared that he was most anxious to serve God in the Christian way, but added, that if he did so, his friends would beat him, cast him out, and leave him destitute of subsistence, and asked whether we would not, in that case, give him "rice and cloth." I declined to make any promise to that effect, assuring him that he must bo willing to suffer persecution for the Lord's sake, and that if he exposed him- self to want, trusting in God, no evil would befall him. The next morning, about sunrise, he came again, and declared, with increased earnestness, that he was in deep sorrow for his sins, and thirsting for forgiveness ; that he had utterly abandoned idols ; that he now prayed to the one God through Christ; and, moreover, that he was perfectly willing to lose father, mother, brothers, and sisters, and to endure any amount of jtersecution, if he might only rely on having rice and cloth. This was the point of trial. I knew OUR WORK 227 well, iliat to become a Christian was, to him, certain destitu- tion, and was fully determined that, in such a case, he sliouM not want while rice and cloth were within our reach ; l)ut it was most desirable to prove to the utmost his dis- interestedness, and therefore I avoided making any promise, simply assuring him that, if he cast himself on the Lord, He would protect him, and that God's people would gladly help. To this he replied, that it was easy for me, who had a good house over my head, with food, clothes, and friends, to say this; but what had he to fly to? This, and the importunity which followed it, were very moving; but I resolved not to make any promise which might prove to him a temptation to decide in favour of Christianity from worldly hopes, or to us, in case he joined us, to suspect his sincerity ; or which might lead others to believe that the profession of Christianity was the way to a temporal provision. After some time, he repeated his visit, avowing the same feelings ; but after that we could hear no more of him, and were led to fear that he had been suspected by his family, and removed to a relative residing at a very great distance, and high in office under government. One morning while Mr. Jenkins Avas preaching in the shop of a very respectable money-changer, I observed that the owner of the shop evinced symptoms of strong internal emotion. We had not been at home more than half an hour, when he came to the mission-house, frankly acknow- ledging that he had been following false gods, that our word was true, and that he felt he ought to walk in our way. His whole air gave the strongest indications of a wounded conscience. But, though really earnest to enter on the way which he believed would lead to peace, he felt the power of those tender entanglements with which every man is surrounded by the family system of India. He said, that as to the mere matter of caste, he could make up his mind to part with that; but that he lived in the house of his eldest brother, the yajamana (highest hereditary official) 228 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE of the town ; that all his capital was in his brother's hand, every anna of which would be retained if he became a Christian ; that his wife and children were under his brother's roof, and would be denied him if he forsook the family faith. These considerations held him irresolute. He trembled at the spiritual consequences of remaining a heathen; and yet shrank from the temporal consequences of becoming a Christian. He more than once repeated his visit, evidently under deep anxiety of mind, and apparently meditating some plan of escape ; but still he came to no decision. After the lapse of several weeks, I met him alone coming out of the gate of the town, and asked him what he intended to do. With an air of melancholy and shame, he replied : " I have made up my mind to walk a Avhile longer in the bad way." Though the people of Gubbi treated us with uniform respect, they did not regard our operations without some alarm. Some of the elder and more influential men fre- quently besought me to desist from preaching, and leave them to follow, undisturbed, the way of their fathers. Toward the latter part of my stay, these requests increased in frequency and earnestness, and were sometimes backed by appeals to my love of peace. The yajamana, and a younger brother of his, pressed this point, on several occasions, with an anxious importunity that convinced me they were not wholly ignorant of their brother's leaning toward Christianity. They would .put the matter thus : "Does not your religion teach you to promote peace?" "Certainly." " Well, then, if you are faithful to your own religion, you will cease to preach ; for various opinions are springing up, from which serious misunderstandings follow ; and if you persist, it is hard to know what amount of division may be the result. You, — if you continue in a course that will breed contention, when your religion teaches you to be a peacemaker, — you are not true to your own religion." They were surprised to learn that OUR WORK 229 tlii.s statement was to me a strong encouragement to per- severe. On all those mornings of the week which were not devoted to Gubbi, we visited one or other of the adjacent villages ; for we deemed it wrong for a missionary to allow any sun to set without having seen him preaching the gospel. We always left home in time to reach our appointed place shortly after sunrise, at which time the people are stirring, and about to proceed to their duties in the fields. Leaving our horses outside, we entered, and generally found some of the elders sitting in the gates ; and there we took our stand, unless the village offered a more advantageous place, in the shape of a school, or open temple. In some villages our congregations regularly comprised a considerable portion of the males, and now and then several females Avould join them, though in the towns none ever ventured to do so, except very old women, or those of the lowest character. "We began by reading a portion of God's word, and then preached. During the sermon, the people would freely express their concurrence, dissent, or any other feeling which might be awakened. If remarks likely to lead to controversy were offered, we did not usually stop to answer them, judging it more desirable to give the people a state- ment of the truth, than to engage in a discussion which might consume all our time, and oblige us to leave without having communicated any definite view of the scope of our message. After making good our exposition of the gospel, we would freely enter into the consideration of any objections they might choose to raise. AVhen, in the course of a sermon, we have alluded to their idols, sometimes you would see a frown on some countenances ; while others would laugh ; and others cry, " They are nothing ! " and I remember cases in Avhich they have said, " You need not talk to us any more about the images : we know they are of no use : we will trust them no longer." This, coming from plain ryots in secluded villages, was a welcome, not to say 230 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE "Wonderful, sign of slow, but resistless, conviction. (Jn the other hand, an opponent would sometimes set himself for- ward, and contend with a confidence bearing little pro- portion to his logic. Objections coming from ryots were generally of the simplest order; — they could not Avalk in another way than that in Avhich their fathers walked ; the ancients had been far wiser than they, and it would be folly to imagine they could improve upon their customs ; they could not pray without an image, — that might do for scholars, but ignorant people must have something to look at ; it was a bad thing for a man to change his religion ; the gods would be incensed, and punish or kill them, if they did them dishonour. But on no argument did the ryots more frequently insist, than on this : " The Company are far the wisest rulers we ever had in this country, and understand tilings well : now tliey support the gods by money and ofi'erings " (for what our authorities would call " presents," they ahvays regard as offerings, not made to amuse the votaries, but to propitiate the deity) ; " and if the gods were not powerful, Avould the Company do honour to thepi?" Wiien we reiilicd, that the Company supported the gods not at all because they trusted in them, but only because they wished to please the people, they would rejoin, " Then, if they know that the gods are no good, is it not sinful for them to make ofllerings'?" This we were not prepared to deny ; and sometimes they have added, with keen point, "You ought first to teach your own people not to honour false gods, and then come and teach us." It was very common for them to deny that lying and libertinism were sins ; not that they are su))ported in such a denial by the authority of the Shastras ; but l)ecaiise these l)ractices are so universally allowed, thai it was strange tu hear them accused as criminal, 'i'licir notions of moral guilt in general are exceedingly vague. They feel that sin is punishable ; but it is rather a feeling than a conviction ; rather a conscience independent of all teaching or reflection. OUK WORK 231 than a definitive conclusion of the understanding, drawn from recognised premises. Their definite ideas of moral turpitude seldom go farther than the blame attachable to the violation of ceremonial prescriptions, or of social rights ; which blame is removed by a ceremony, or a restitution, as the case may be. Hinduism has not the revelation of a God who disapproves of everything impure, unjust, untrue, or unkind, because his own nature is of such goodness that he cannot look upon such things but with disapprobation. The toils of many Hindus after pardon sufficiently show that an inward voice, which their creeds cannot translate, apprises them of an awful displeasure impending over their sins, — a displeasure of Avhich they have sufficient apprehension to deprecate it with the most painful tottures. But all this is clouded and inexplicable feeling : they have no great principle of truth in view by which to account for it ; no idea of a good Creator, to whom every act of evil must as necessarily be displeasing as deceitfulness in a child to a good father, or dishonesty in a subject to a good king. To give them this idea, to make them feel the eye of God on their hearts, was our first object in preaching. We believed that they were likely to be brought to Christ much sooner by a sense of their sins, than by a mere conviction that idols were only blocks. Nor is it so difficult to convey this idea as has been represented. It is utterly and unaccountably incorrect to say, as some very respectable men have said, that they have no conscience. A man without a conscience would be a demon : God would not suffer him to live. A nation without a conscience is a physical impossibility ; society could not cohere. The Hindus have not the well- taught tender conscience of a Christian ; but they have that light from God in Christ which enables them, and enables "every man that cometh into the world," in spite of the ] (reference given ])y his depraved affections to evil above good, to iliscern in good a beauty, and in evil a stain, which makes the choice of the latter defiling. There is quite 232 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE enough of common ground Ijctween the conscience of the missionary and that of his hearers, to enahle him, in every "accusing" of evil, or "excusing "of good, to awaken an echo in their hreasts. Mr. Buyers, who thoroughly under- stands his subject, and writes with a common sense which, had it always been used in the works of missionaries on India, would have done no small service, makes the follow- ing statement Avith regard to a Hindu on this very point :— " His conscience accuses or excuses ; and though he some- times has recourse to the doctrines of fatalism, or even of atheism, to defend himself against imputations of personal guilt, he rarely, if ever, has a solid belief in such theories as destroy moral responsibility.^ He may be addressed by a preacher in nearly the same way as ungodly men amongst ourselves," One might take it for granted beforehand, that ^ [Yet it must not be forgotten tliat large niunbers of the people are Pantheists, and that Indian Pantheism does these two things : — it throws all emphasis on man's meta])lij'sical relationship to God, and treats Avith comparative inditterence his moral relationship ; it also invests with unreality everything outside God, including that which we call right or wrong, and throws back all responsiliility upon Him of whom these things are passing manifestations. Then again, all the Hindu peoples believe in transmigration. Noav that doctrine teaches that "whatsoever a man sowetli that shall he also reap," and means, therefore, moral responsibility. But it does nothing really to waken or develop conscience. For the sufferings of the present arc the penalty of deeds done in a past birth of which I have no sort of knowledge, and for which, therefore, it is impossible that I should feel a sense of guilt and repent. I may regret these sufferings, or resent them, or resign myself to them, but they simply make no appeal whatever to the conscience. On the other hand, transmigration tells me that the former birth or births fixed the character and ercnfs of the jn-csenl birth beyond evasion or control — which lands me in sheer fatalism. Once again, Hindus are almost universally persuaded that the decisions of the community, as expressed thiough caste, are of more binding authority than the sugi^estions of any individual con- science, and that in case of conflict caste must triumph. Pantheism, transmigration, caste — these three pinion conscience in India, inter- feriug with its dcvelopuient and preventing its free exercise.] OUR WORK 233 if he were to address to a heathen audience a statement of religious truth, in set order and well-translated theological terms, they would not readily sympathise with his morality, because they would not understand it. It is not fair to talk to Hindus in the Sanskrit terms Avhich best translate your English or Greek ones ; and because they do not con- cur in your views, deny them a conscience. INIany a good man in England would hesitate to say that "furtive acquisi- tion " was criminal, who would at once pronounce it sinful ** to steal " ; and many a worthy housewife would plumply deny that it was any duty of hers to " supervise the domestic economy," who would at once own that she was bound to " see to the house." Let the missionary only make himself familiar with the people's modes of thinking, and he will be fully convinced that if he talk to them in theological fashion, they will not comprehend him ; but as fully convinced that it is quite possible to convey to their minds every Christian truth. The most glorious themes in the gospel are ex- pressed by words for Avhich their language has no proper equivalent, though furnished with etymological synonyms. Their languages (and it is a sad thing to say) have no Avord that conveys a true notion of atonement, intercession, justi- fication, regeneration, or resurrection. They have terms that will translate your terms ; but that is not the thing. The heathen have not the ideas which these awaken in our minds ; and consequently a mere word, no matter how correctly it translates our word, cannot give them our ideas. But this does not close the medium of communication. A native will not understand what you mean by "justification " ; but will fully understand what you mean by a man having all his sins forgiven. He will be confounded by the term " regeneration," but will readily comprehend when j^ou speak of making a bad man good. Thus, by speaking of the thing, rather than harping on the term, the missionary may easily give the people his own ideas, and place himself in a position to use them in an appeal to the conscience. 234 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE On the question of moral guilt, I have seen a village audience deeply affected. They have very strong views of the filial duties. The niissit^nary, talking advantage of this, asked them, " What would you think of a son who had a very good father, and was frequently in the habit of refusing to obey him?" They instantly replied, "He would be very Avicked." " Suppose he regularly, every day, broke some commandment of his father's ? " " He ought to be turned out of doors." " ]5ut suppose he made a practice of dis- regarding all his father's commands, and doing the very opposite?" "Why, such a fellow would not be fit to live." The missionary then, applying the illustration, showed that God was our Father, — wiser, kinder, more Avorthy of obedience than any earthly father ; that all kinds of sinful acts were in direct disobedience to his will ; and asked, if such blame lay on a child for systematic contempt of his father's authority, what weight of blame was upon him Avho, for many years together, never spent a day without several times breaking the commandments of his great Father in heaven. As he proceeded in this strain, they listened with the eager attention of men drinking in a new and startling truth ; and presently, some of them striking their mouths with the palm of the hand, as is their hal)it in astonish- ment or grief, cried out, Ahah ! abaJi / yrnii madabcku ? (" Ah ! ah ! Avhat must we do 1 ") On another occasion, such was the impression made by a similar strain of remark, that some, as they would do uuiler any urgent need, or sudden calamity, began to "call upon the name of their gods." To a Christian minister, telling sinners of their guilt, with the intention of pointing them to the Lamb of (lod, it sounded harsh to hear just before him an invocation of the abominable 81iiva ; yet it satisfied him not only that his argument was understood, but that tlie people were brought to feel that their condition demanded superhuman aid. Witliin sight of the mission-house, but distant above a OUR WORK 235 mile, stood llic village of Singonahalli, with a ieniplc to Ilanga, on a knoll a few hundred yards from the gate. About the time of my arrival, the inhaljitants of this place declared that they had abandoned idolatry and would no more honour the temple of Ranga. To test their sincerity, Mr. Jenkins one morning asked them, whether we might go to the temple. " Oh, by all means ! " " Might we enter 1 " " Yes, go where we liked." " Might we enter without taking off our shoes 1 " " Certainly ; we don't care who goes, or how : we have given up the idol." This was strong proof that their old feelings had vanislied ; and, accordingly, at the temple we found no obstacle to our entrance. Shod and covered, we passed up through the outer apartment to the sanctuary, Avhere sat the grim image of lianga, incrusted in the congealed oil and ghee of many anointings, with the lightless lamp before him, faded garlands hanging round his neck, loads of dust settled on his person, and part of the roof falling in directly above. No room remained for doubt. The faith which once adored Ranga had changed into contempt; and we rejoiced over that forsaken idol, as an earnest of better days. (3n afterwards inquiring what induced them to withdraw tlie confidence they had so long reposed in Ranga, they answered, " You " (meaning the missionaries) " told us that the god did not ju'otect us, but that we protected the god ; that if we only left him alone, we should see that he could not take care of himself ; and if he could not take care of himself, how could he take care of us? Now we thought that was a buddhi mdtu ('a word of sense,') and so we resolved to see whether he could take care of himself or not ; for we felt certain that if he could not take care of himself, it was out of the question that he Could take care of us. Accordingly, we discontinued ^ji/^/'a. A\'"e soon found he could not keep the lamp burning, nor the garlands fresh, nor the temple clean, nor do a single thing for himself. The lamp went out, the flowers withered, the temple became dirty ; and then," they added, laughing. 236 A MISSION TO THE MYSOKE " the roof fell in just over his head, and there he sat summane ('tamely') under it; so we saw very well he could not take care of himself." Notwithstanding all this, we had some fears that the return of their annual feast-day would revive their love for heathenish merry-makings, with a force too strong for their new convictions. The day came, and Ave watched the village narrowly. There was no car, no procession, no music ; and, when night came, no tomtom was beaten, no rocket sent up, nor any other sign that it was the day of Eanga. One morning, when preaching in the village, I observed that the old man who used to conduct the services of the temple was not in the congregation ; and feeling, for the moment, a suspicion lest he should have returned to his former occupation, I asked, "Where is ih& pfijdriV A young man instantly replied, smiling, and patting his person, " Oh, he is gone to the fields with the cattle : now that the temple is given up, he must do something for his stomach." Their abandonment of idol - worship seemed complete, and not a few of them averred that they now oflfered prayer to the one true God ; yet they evinced no disposition to embrace the profession of Christianity. This they accounted for by saying, " AVere we to do so noAv, Ave should be persecuted ; Ave should lose our lands and our village : but if Ave Avait a Avhile longer, all the people Avill be of the same mind, and then Ave can all become Christians together, Avithout the risk that would attend such a step at present." This ansAver I, at first, regarded simply as one of those adroit subterfuges in Avhich a Hindu never fails ; but Avhen I heard it repeated in different neighbourhoods, and by persons between Avhom collusion Avas impossil)le, it satisfied me thai, though they had not those poignant con- victions of sin Avhicli Avould impel them to decision at all risks, a persuasion Avas groAving upon their minds that the day drew nigh Avhen our doctrines must prevail. I Avell remember one old man in Singonahalli, Avho Avas very OUR WORK 237 seldom in our congregations, and showed a remarka1)lo unwillingness to hear us preach. Yet that man, with his wife and three sons, has been the first to come out, and, in the face of considerable opposition, to embrace the gospel of Christ. This took place about two' years ago ; and of his present character the missionaries on the spot give this account : — " Daniel, the father of the family, is really an interesting man. He is in the constant habit of collecting the people of his village, to read and to pray with them. Although he cannot himself read, he has, through his sons, obtained such a knowledge of tlie gospel, and of many parts of the Old Testament, as makes him an efficient man in discussion with his countrymen." It sometimes happened, in visiting a village, that the people were either so busy or so careless, that a congregation could not be obtained. At such times we would look round for some person who happened to be so employed that he need not be interrupted by our conversation ; and, attaching ourselves to him, would enter at once on religious topics. In this way we have often spent an hour with a knot of weavers, plying their art under the open air, and on simple machines with which their European brethren would deem it almost impossible to produce any fabric ; or by the wheel of the potter, who, maintaining the whirl, and dexterously shaping his wares, gave, at the same time, attention, and perhaps frequent response, to our discourse. With the shepherd watching his fold, the ryot measuring his corn, the pedagogue surrounded by his pupils, the tax-gatherer collect- ing his dues, the old woman spinning her cotton, the housewife grinding at her mill, we have familiarly talked about the things of God. It was pleasant work : we were constantly rejoiced with the conviction that we were doing good in the name of the Lord, and laying the foundation of an imperishable edifice. No heart need wish for a happier feeling than that of a lonely missionary, who has just been talking about Jesus to the simple people of a heathen 238 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE village ; and, in offering up the prayer in which no one joins, feels a divine assurance that the work he is so feebly beginning will be advanced by the power of the Highest, till the whole scene around is created anew. At that moment, far above any other, his feelings approach to the rapt anticipations of Isaiah. One morning, on entering a village a little to the west of Gubbi, we discovered a man in the act of rising from the floor of a chatram} where he had been resting for the night. AVe foxmd that he had come from a long distance to the westward, and was on a pilgrimage to the temple of Yenkatramana, at Tirupati. In the meantime his wife had risen from the floor, with an infant on lier side. She looked weak and ill ; and, persuaded that she was not fit to undertake a journey of more than two hundred miles, I asked her if she were not unwell. The husband sulkily reminded me that I ought to speak to him, and not to his wife : for a married woman is expected not to converse with any man but her own husband ; unless, indeed, he be a very near relative, and then but sparingly. Turning to him, I insisted that his wife seemed utterly unfit for the journey they had before them ; but he was not in the least disposed to hear such representations. At length the poor woman, unable to restrain herself longer, exclaimed, in a piteous way, " Indeed, sir, I am very ill ; this child was born only last night upon the road, and I am not fit to go on." The fellow seemed much provoked that his wife had dared to speak. I kindly urged him, as he valued her life, and that of his child, to rest for at least a do}' or two. I'.ut, no ; he muttered, " I am going to make the sight of th& great god, and the season is far advanced " ; and so saying, he sullenly walked away, casting a look of angry command to his poor wife, who with slow and fainting step began to follow him, supporting her infant on her side. I thought, "And tliis is the pilgrimage to Tirupati, from which a ' [A native rest-house] OTTU worjv 239 Christian govornment derives large revenues ! " Thank God, that such gokl no longer pollutes the treasures of Britain ! One morning, in proceeding to a pretty sequestered village, called Udaliir, we were surprised to meet numhers of the Gubbi people returning from it. On inquiring what had taken them to Udalur so early, we were informed that they had spent the night there, at a feast in honour of Mariamma, the goddess of disease. Outside the gate we found large numbers of persons, who informed us that the solemnity had been one in which several individuals lately restored from dangerous illness, by the clemency of Mariamma, passed two or three times through a fire, in fulfilment of a vow to that effect made during their sufierings. Just inside the gate was placed a wooden image of the goddess, before which lay ofterings of plantains and flowers, with a small censer burning. Mr. Webber, who was with me, addressed the people at length on the subject of these wretched penances. A large audience closed round him, and heard with deep attention. A gaily-dressed temple-girl, with a retinue of fantastically-painted musicians, came just by, and danced her most enticing dance, while her suite exhausted all the powers of instrumental discord ; but they did not succeed either in interrupting the preacher, or distracting his congregation. In India it is not wise to be exposed to the heat of the sun later than eight o'clock in the morning, or sooner than from half-past four to five in the afternoon. In visiting towns too distant to admit of our returning in good time, we took with us a little tent, and returned in the cool of the evening, or in some cases stayed all night, and went to another place the next day. At I>idare, where a large market offered an advantageous opportunity of preaching, we frequently spent a day. We had a school in the town ; and, on arriving, our first duty was to examine the boys in the Scriptures, and in our Catechisms. During the examination, 240 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE several respectable men would come in and sit down, while a still larger number gathered round the open front of the school. Immediately on concluding with the boys, we preached to those assembled. Outside the wall of the town was a miserable group of huts, inhabited by the out-castes. Hither we proceeded from the school ; and, in perhaps two or three places, gathering a few of these degraded beings round us, would in a familiar way explain to them the salvation of the gospel. By this time our tent would be pitched, whither we gladly retired for shade and refresh- ment. On one occasion, while at breakfast, we heard a Bnlliman outside reading, to a circle of natives, a tract he had just received. After breakfast, we found the people assembling, and arranging their wares. The most weighty commodities were grains, such as rice, rngi, and gram (PJiaseohis radiatus), a valuable legumen used by the English to feed their horses, but by the natives as an article of diet. These were carried to market in sacks, slung over the back of a bullock, one hanging on each side, and balancing each other. Coffee, also, was becoming an article of some traffic, and they were anxious to ascertain its use (for they do not drink either coffee or tea), inquiring whether we used it because it intoxicated ? or was it good for the stomach ? or good for the blood ? or did it cool the body 1 or did it warm it ? And they seemed puzzled to judge why we should lay out money for a beverage not distinguished by any of these properties. The other articles on sale were spices, plantains, cocoa-nuts, unripe (for the sake of their milk, which is good only at that stage), ripe (for the nut as an article of food), and dried (for the manufacture of oil), tobacco, onions, various fruits and vegetables, with sweetmeats, earthenware, cloths, ornaments, and idols. The stalls consisted of a piece of cloth spread on the ground, on which the goods were displayed, the vendor sitting by. Women frequently had charge, especially of fruit-stalls, and those devoted to ornaments for the person. These latter were various, — rings, OUR WORK 241 necklaces, and bracelets, with many minor decorations ; Imt none of them appeared so much in request as a bracelet formed of a ring of coloured glass, large enough for the arm. A village-damsel, after a due length of time spent in select- ing, would negotiate a tedious bargain, and then, sitting down, hold out her hand to the seller, and) with inimitable patience, submit to the torture of having the ring forced over her hand^ The process took several minutes, and required no little adroitness in the lady performing it, to avoid breaking the fragile decoration. Some have a dozen or more of these glass bracelets on an arm, both above and below the elbow, coloured red, green, or yellow, according to taste ; and, if possible, interspersed Avith a few of silver. The commerce of a Hindu market is not so urgent as to prevent a missionary from gaining attention. The shade of some trees standing in the market-place enabled us to preach in the open air at any hour of the day. When only a small group assembled, we gave a short address ; wlien a large congregation, we discoursed at length. The anxiety manifested for our books suggested a plan for gaining patient attention. When preaching in the busiest part of the day, I placed a pile of books on my left arm. However lengthened the discourse, this chained the auditory ; for every one hoped to secure a book at the close. ISTo sooner was the sermon concluded, than an amusing contest began, every one striving to distinguish himself by forcible appeals, or lofty compliments. The strength of their desire for books was forcibly manifested by one circumstance. According to Hindu law, contact with a dead animal is polluting. Leather is part of a dead animal; and, consequently, unclean. It may not be touched Avithout defilement ; hence it is that none work in leather but the dregs of the out-castes ; that all shoes are made with the heel down, capable of being slipped on and off" without touching them with the hand ; that they must be left outside a temple or a friend's door, — to carry them in, being in the one case an irreverence, in the i6 242 A MISSION TO THE MYSOEB other an insult ; and that no indignity is so outrageous as to be struck with a shoe. Owing to this, when books bound in leather were first offered for distribution, many regarded it as an attenipt upon tlieir caste, and indignantly refused. It was consequently found necessary to have the greater part done up in cloth. Notwithstanding this, toward the latter part of my stay it was frequently demanded, Charmada pustaka helm, " ^Ye must have a leather book." "Why a leather book % " I would reply : " is it not contrary to your caste?" Houdayija, ndarc hahala hoitu 7nllufade, "Yes, sir; but it stands a long time." And to obtain a book that would stand a long time, they were willing to contract a little defilement. In the intervals of preaching, we frequently walked round the market, entering freely into conversation with groups or individuals ; thus both winning their confidence, and familiarly explaining the truths they had heard us announce. When in our tent, the door was open, and a tempting pile of books lying on the table. We were seldom without a visitor ; and thus, in one way or other, almost every moment of the day was turned to account. A few miles from Bidare, on a commanding hill, and overlooking a rich landscape, stood Chelur. Persons from this town asked us to establish a school there, before we had ever visited it. This was done ; and shortly afterwards Ave left home one morning, long before daylight, and arrived before the town about sunrise. When entering the gate, we met several women carrying their water-pots, to draw water. ]\Iost probably they had never seen white men before ; and either terrified, or doubtful what the appari- tion might signify, they drew their garments over their faces, turned round, and hurried ])ack into the town. Some men soon made their aj^pearanco, who gave us a polite welcome, and led us to the school. In a town where a Christian had never dwelt, it was no unwelcome thing to find a number of fine boys, Avith a Brfdiman for their master. OUR WORK 243 reading our Lord's Sermon on the INIount. (_)ur appearance soon attracted a concourse : tlie ]5r;'ihmans, and more respect- able men, came into the schoolroom, and sat down; the others stood in front. We examined the boys in the Scriptures, and the Conference Catechism. This excited marked interest among the bystanders. At its close, selecting from the chapter they had read the Avords, " Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God," and referring to their constant demand to he shown our God, I insisted that to take part of a tree or stone, give it a certain shape, and call it "god," no more enabled us to see God, than to take another part of the same tree or stone, give it a different shape, and call it " soul," would enable us to see the soul ; and then described that spiritual com- munion with God in this life, and that vision of His glory hereafter, which alone can be rationally viewed as seeing God. This opened the way to show that persons of impure heart could have no such blessedness ; that our nature was deeply tainted ; that it was impossible for such a nature to maintain friendship with a IJeing wholly good ; that we are unable to effect its renewal ; and, finally, to declare, that through Christ that renewal might be obtained, the vilest mind be sanctified, and the soul, where before no goodness had existed, be replenished with every virtue. They heard these novel doctrines with profound attention, and appeared favourably impressed. When I concluded, a Brahman said, " This is a good word ; no doubt it is true ; what you say about obtaining purity is good. For you, it is a good way to obtain purity through Christ; but it is not the only Avay ; there are other ways for us. You find purity through praying to Jesus Christ ; but we find purity by other means, such as j^/ya, bathing, penance, contemplation, and pil- grimage." To this we replied, " You are a man of years, and doubtless of observation. You are quite aware, that when the heart is pure, the life is pure : now, Avill you say whether a case ever came under your notice, in which, by 244 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE any of the means you have named, a man who had long been known as a bad man was changed into a good man ; say, a cheat into a man of integrity, or a liar into a man of truth, or a miser into a man of benevolence 1 " He stared in pure amazement ; and the others stared at him, to see how he would answer so strange a question. Aware how utterly novel must be the idea of such a transformation, I said, " Perhaps you are thinking of the Shloka " (text of the Shastras), " which declares that ' a confirmed sinner cannot be reformed, even though he were to wash in the Ganges*'" " Yes," he replied, evidently relieved ; " and how could you, knowing that Slilnka, ask such a question?" "I do ask the question : Did you ever know a case of the kind ? " " Of course I did not : how could I ? It would be contrary to the scriptures." " I knew what you must sa3^ You never knew a case in which the means you have named succeeded in purifying the life ; which abundantly proves that they do not purify the heart. I^ow, mark Avhat I say : I have known many cases in which, by faith in that Jesus whom I preach to you, the worst of men have been suddenly changed into the best of men." This called forth looks of surprise from all. The Brahman observed, " You do not mean that you hneii: such cases : you heard of them." " ]S^o, no ; I have known the thing to occur again and again ; known the persons and their character, both before and after the change. And, what is more, I am willing to stake all my reputation among you — to stake my name for truth, and my character as a padre — on this, that if there is amongst you any one who in his soul is sorry for his sins, and anxious to be cleansed from them, if he will this day trust with his whole heart in Jesus, though he were the worst man in Ch^lur, Jesus will this day change him into a good man!" This declaration, made with the air which sincerity always gives, evidently produced a deep impression. The Brahmans were here confronted with a power before unthouglit of, — a power to purify the human soul ; not by OUR WORK 245 occult washings, tliat leave all appreciable defilement un- touched ; but by an actual change of corrupt into lioly affections, attested by an appropriate change of life. This real, obvious, demonstrable regeneration Avas to them a terra inroijnita ; they had no sophism prepared to meet it, no hereditary dictum whereby it could be touched. It was a simple fact stated on credible evidence ; and they could only hear the testiuKiny with undisguised astonishment. Some would gravely question the discretion of thus at once unfolding to the heathen the peculiar characteristics of the gospel. They would judge it more prudent first to shake their confidence in pretended revelations, and then advance the claims of the true ; to make them ashamed of the idol, before you turn their eye to the cross. There is something feasible in such a view ; but perhaps only feasible. It is more easy to expel an old sentiment by the introduc- tion of a new one, than by a simple assault. AVe might be wrong ; but it did not strike us that the plan which would postpone the cross to the demonstration was suggested either by wisdom or faith. We did not deem it more desiraljle simply to make the impression that we disapproved of their customs, than to tell them of that salvation which they would recognise as above all things desirable ; which their system had not to offer ; and the knowledge of which, with the mode of its attainment, was the most precious deposit we could leave in their minds, — a deposit which, even though they should never see us again, might prove to them an in- corruptible treasure. Our little tent was pitched just outside the gate. Here we spent the heat of the day, receiving visitors. One of these showed himself well acquainted with a tract which he had received at a distant place. In the afternoon we again entered the town ; but not a Brahman was to be seen, and the labouring men were all out. Numbers of women stood in the doors, watching us with lively curiosity ; but to attempt a conversation would have been imprudent ; for 246 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE while Hinduism, less severe than Muhammadanism, per- mits them to be at large, it makes all their respectability to depend on the most punctilious reserve. After having nearly made the circuit of the town, we came ti) the .sh^''/i'(far's cliouUrij (police magistrate's ottice), and found there seated a group of Brrdrmans, numbering not less than thirty. In front of the group, and a short distance from each other, sat two Bnlhrnans, face to face. The junior of the two had a book open on his lap ; the other was expa- tiating, in ra[tid eloquence, to the assembled Br;1hmans, who hearkened to his oratory with countenance attent. Thus to hear one of their number, who has adopted the profession of improvisatore, enlarge in extemporaneous (though not, like his Italian brother, poetical) comment on some celebrated work, is one of the most popular entertainments of the Brahmans. A junior attends the pandit to read, when he pauses, a portion, to furnish him with matter for additional harangue. They were at present thus engaged ; and their assembly gladdened us, as forming an admirable congrega- tion. Advancing to the front of the choultry, we made a low salaam, and politely inquired after their health. They returned our salaam in silence, gracefully intimating that they must attend to the learned man. We made several attempts to engage them in conversaticm ; but no, they signified that they must not be interrui)ted. At length the pandit paused, and his junior began to read. We had already observed that the book was the Pancliatantra,'^ the most popular of their non-sacred writings. An acquaintance witli it is essential to a foreigner who learns their language. Repeated readings had made me familiar with it; and while the Bnlhman was reading, I resolved, rather than lose such a congregation, to venture upon a temerity. When the reader had ceased, and while the pandit was drawing himself up to re-commence with due stateliness, I tried to look un- ' The oiii^inal of tlic licttiT kiidwii IIi/u/i(i(h'sa, a ri)llc('tion of fablrs, (iMiislati'il IVoiu Saiiskiit hit" Imi^^HsIi liy Sir William ,I(Hies, OUR WORK 247 conscious of a breach (re liim ; life is uncertain; with a tiiJasl twij^ wliidi lias lircii ilijipcil in water. Tliat is, in fact, the Vai.sluiavite form of e.xtrenie unetioii. But nearly all Ikahiiiaiis grow the plant in the courtyaids of their houses, and the women offer worship to it. The AMie Duljois has an interesting account of it in his hook.] 256 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE before another opportunity lie may l^e dead, or they may be dead, lie must warn them while he has time. It is true, the effort may close his life ; but that he must leave with God. Under such feelings many a missionary hastes to an early grave. It must be so, while the proportion between the harvest and the labourers continues such as it is at present. Hoarse and weary, I again took my stand close by the fire. A large audience closed round me. The train of painted men rushed by with an exulting shout. I turned and addressed them particularly. Several stood to hear. Entreating them to consider whether a being who could delight to see them tread the hre, were worthy of worship or of execration, and whether the ascription of such disposi- tions to God were not most sinful, I urged them, with bold earnestness, to abandon a design so foolish, — a design which could only make them more than ever obnoxious to the displeasure of the Almighty. They uttered not a word ; but stood like men convinced and ashamed. When called upon to justify their conduct, they only said, that they had made the vow, and it must be fulfilled. iSTight was falling ; they had not trodden the fire ; but we were obliged to leave. Preaching the gospel to the heathen we regarded as our great work ; but viewed the establishment of schools as an auxiliary not only legitimate, but important. We deemed it neither expedient nor lawful to merge the evangelist in the schoolmaster ; and deemed a public announcement of the gospel both the most apostolic and the most direct way of bringing it to act upon the public mind. At the same time we could not sympathise with those who think that a missionary has nothing to do with schools, who expect no good from them, and who (provoked, it must be admitted, by assumptions neither reasonable nor modest) decry the labours of those who judge themselves called to that and to no higher sphere. We felt that, however defective, if standing alone, a system of mere school-keeping, and how- OUR WORK 257 ever inconsiderate the way in which it liud been advocated, yet that, viewed in connexion witli other existing agencies, those excellent men who devoted themselves to that work were performing a service of prime importance to Christianity in India. To rescue youth from the deleterious education given in Hindu schools, and to store their mind with scrip- tural truth, is indubitably a benefit to their country, and a work acceptable to God. Situated as we were, among a population exclusively heathen, the alternative lay between very unsatisfactory schools and no schools at all. "We deemed it well to bring the youth under our influence, to the extent of which our circumstances admitted. Accord- ingly, at a small monthly salary, we retained a master, stipulating that no instruction should be given but such as we approved ; that the Scriptures should be read daily ; that the Catechisms, with Scripture proofs, should be committed to memory ; that we should visit and examine the school at pleasure ; and that all the boys above a certain age should, once a month, be brought to the mission-house, to be examined with those of the other schools. One such school we established in every village offering encouragement. Many of the masters, and also the pupils, were Bnlhmans ; and, though occasional difficulties arose from admixing the castes, matters proceeded more satisfactorily, in the main, than might be anticipated. Many of our monthly examina- tions were highly interesting, the boys of various castes vying with each other in their knowledge of the Scriptures, and of the invaluable digest of truth contained in the Catechisms. AVe felt that the perfect committal to memory in boyhood of these manuals, with the frequent examinations, in which the grand truths of religion, with their proofs, were enlarged, must, at least, so tattoo the things most essential to be known upon the memory, that they could not be effaced by any after-process. Another important branch of operations was, the distribu- tion of books. The INIadras Bible Society liberally supplied 17 258 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE US with the Gospels, Acts, Psahiis, Genesis, and other portions of Scripture, bound separately ; for, as the entire Bible occupies four large volumes, it may be supposed that it is not possible to distribute it gratuitously to any great extent. The Bangalore Tract Society readily answered our calls for tracts. For both classes of books we met with a reception not only ready, but joyful. Many a stranger left our house bearing wath him, to some distant town, the first record it ever received of God's love to sinners. We were publicly employed three evenings out of the seven, besides the services every morning. On the other evenings, I was in the habit of walking on the highway, and entering into conversation with the first passenger. This led to many most interesting opportunities of explaining Christianity to persons from various districts, and of all classes : now a merchant returning from a distant market ; now a family removing ; now a religious mendicant hasting to some new harvest ; now a pair of itinerant Brabmans, coming to regale the imagination, and try the liberality, of their brethren ; now an old woman, whose age made conversation with her permissible; now the milkman, leading home his kine ; now a group of playful boys ; now a pilgrim on his weary march ;— in fact, every order in turn received familiar instructions in the way to God. One evening, on accosting a fine old man, he said, with much vivacity, " I never before was spoken to by an Englishman in my own language : this is a pleasure ! When we go to the sirdars (government officers), they say, Knn hat ? Now, that is not our language, it is the Turks' language ; ^ and we do not like to be talked to as if we were Turks." He went on to say, that he knew I must be the Gubbi padre ; and that he was a gamja from Mfdvanaikanakote, a place many miles distant. After some conversation on religion, he said, " Some time ago, one of our people Avent to your house : you took him into your room, and said a great deal ^ Hindustani, spoken by the Musalinans. OUR WORK 259 of sense to him, ami gave him a hook. He brought it home. It was the first book^ that had ever been in our town, and we were all delighted. We assembled, and read it together. It was certainly a very wise book, but had one fault tliat much surprised us all." Oi course, I requested to know wliat the fault was. " Oh, I must not tell you ; for you would be angry." A Hindu will trust to anything about an Englishman sooner than his temper. They readily confide in his courage, or justice, or truth ; but his patience is in sad discredit. It is much to be doubted whether this opinion has arisen from an excess of amiability on the part of our countrymen. Having repeatedly assured the good man that he need not fear, he at length said, but not without a look askance, to see if my countenance grew stormy, "The fault was this : it would not allow of any God but one ! Now, wliat do you say to that ? " He evidently regarded this, the first truth of all truths, as a grave blemish in a book other- wise distinguished by wisdom. Thus we pursued our work, every morning and three evenings in the week preaching to the heathen, visiting them in their shops and at their doors, receiving them into our studies, mingling in their markets and feasts, walking with them on the highwaj^ teaching their children the truths of grace, and circulating those truths in a printed form. The servants of God find many happy duties, but none to equal those. Years have passed since I preached my last Kanarese sermon, I was eri route to embark for England, with the sentence of the doctors over me, that, on pain of blindness, 1 must never again enter the tropics. The feeling that I had then, returns now, — the feeling that God removed me from the most blessed office that man can hold, because I was unworthy. Those parents who consign their sons, who have the heart for a higher calling, to a life spent in making ' That means, the first printed Look, to describe wliich, as distinguished from their own nianusciipt works, they have adopted our word. 260 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE bargains, or plodding lawsuits, or swaying with gentlemanly satisfaction the small sceptre of some decent neighbourhood, little know the treasures of grand emotion from which they shut them out, — treasures to be found only in preaching Josus to the heathen, and for one year's enjoyment of which any man with faith to look to lieaven would cast to all the winds the most grateful respectabilities of private life, the most pompous commercial success, or the most flattering professional distinctions. He whose heart once heaved with the desire to live and die preaching Christ, but who, by a preference on his own part, or that of his parents, for the things precious in this life, has been withheld from the work, may sit him down and weep. He has lost what he will never regain. He lives a poorer man (for wealth consists not in what a man has, but in what he is), he will die with an undergrown soul, and to all eternity will lack joys and honours that others, mayhap less fitted to win them, will wear with glorious triumph. In immortality there will be no secrets. Every man will know the whole of his historj^ and the causes whereby its com})lexion was decided. Full many a Christian father may take to his soul the assurance — that the son of his doting love will know, that he is for ever and ever abridged in rewards in consequence of the influence under which he preferred, to the toil of Jesus' ministry, comforts the very names of which have perished, pomp that has been swept from the universe of God, and pelf that was burnt up with vulgar clay. He will know that to this influence he owes it that he is behind others, behind what he might have been ; and owes it, that he dwells in heaven as a refugee, when he might have mandied among the princes of God ; that he glimmers in nebulous distance, when he miglit have shone "as the sun in the kingdom of his Father." Many a lofty motlier will be well humbled when she sees her peerless boy, who was too good to resign to (Jod, too precious to be spent for Christ, too tender to toil for s nils, placed, and that irrecoverably, far behind the son of a OUR WOllK 261 lowly neighbour ; when she sees hardships, and studies, and torrid heats, the lonely dwelling, the unshared anxiety, the xintended sickness, all transmuted into illustrious forms of ornament and joy, enhancing the bliss of him who suffered them, and of her who, for Jesus' sake, yielded him up to suffer ; Avhile station and revenues, mansions and equipage, the stare of the vulgar and the smiles of the elite, have long, long ago, ceased to give either satisfaction or excitement. Let every mother, to whom the Lord has given a son Avith a mind capable of a better life than one of barter, know that she can take no step that will so certainly impoverish and abase him, as to pervert his aspirations from pursuits that lead straight to " glory, honour, and immortality," into those Avhich are competent to the most vulgar intellect or the most selfish heart. Xext to the hour that brought me to the love of Christ, I shall ever most bless that hour when she who loved me most said, " From the Lord I reccrived thee, and to the Lord I give thee up." I wept at that parting; but I wept far more when parting from the work that had become dearer than all earthly things. My missionary race was short. God made it so. But, looking back this day, I would not for the universe have that brief space blotted from my existence. The people of India resemble their own banyan. View- ing their distinctions of nation, language, and manners, you would deem them (like the stems of that noble tree) stand- ing clearly apart ; but you find that, as those stems have sprung from the same root, and are pervaded by the same sap, so a common literature, a common religion, and, above all, the institution of caste, give to those several nations a remarkable unity, — a unity which serves to transmit through the whole some effect of an impression produced on any part. Imperceptibly, but infallibly, every blow dealt on one point of the Hindu structure affects the entire pile. The impulse given in Tinnevelly vibrates to the Himalaya ; the shock felt in Ijemral thrills to Travancore. The whole 262 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE population is cemented. No individuality exists. Each family and each caste is impacted in itself, and concreted with all the others, each person forming but a particle of the mass. A man's mind consists of the traditions of the ancients, the usages of his caste, and the dogmas of his sect : independent principles, independent convictions, in- dependent habits, he has none. He is neither more nor less than an atom of the public mind, bearing the type impressed by those with whom he is in contact. Such he is, and such he deems it wise to be. He is an integral part of a mental system, vast by the sweep of nations, solid by the action of ages, and ponderous by countless accretions. You cannot move him Avithout disintegrating the mass. It is no light work. A Hindu mind is not dissevered from the system, but by the application of vast forces. Slowly and painfully it disengages itself, it halts, and heaves, and writhes before finally parting : — and many (even some missionaries) treat this as an obstacle to the spread of Christianity in India. Is it so 1 Most indubitably, if the object of Christianity be to gain, in a few years, a given number of converts. But if her object be to pervade all the regions* of Hindustan, to imbue with her truths the people of every hamlet on those oceanic plains ; then the social bonds which at first retard individual conversions, so far from being obstacles to a universal revolution, are but agencies which infallil)ly conduct to the remotest depths of the country the impression made by the missionary at the surface. He may be impatiently thinking that the solidity caused by these bonds has reflected into vacant space the impulse he had applied ; while, in fact, by that very means it is transmitted through many a region unseen by him, and is even then vibrating at the core of the mass. It does seem clear, that when you have a moral force equal to effect the change designed, the more close the mutual dependency of those to be acted upon, the more wide the influence exerted by every application of that force. Where OUR WORK 263 the population is limited, and the relations of society are loose, it is, humanly speaking, comparatively easy to convert a man to Christianity. His conversion is of iinspeakable importance ; it saves a soul from death. But what relation has this event to the stability of Satan's empire in the continents that contain more than half the human family ? Scarcely any. A jewel has been snatched from destruction, but no stone struck from the foundation of the citadel of evil. ]S"ot so with the conversion of one forming part of a system which embraces a continent. His escape rends a link in a chain whereby millions upon millions were bound. Every individual who, overcoming the restraints of Hinduism, embraces Christianity, effects, however unconsciously, an achievement by which Asiatic superstition is one degree weakened, and the way to grace made, for the people of nations, one degree easier. Little undertakings have speedy issues. Great undertakings are of slower consummation ', but a large soul would rather eifect the feeblest service towards the ransom of multitudinous people, than reap the hasty delights of a small achievement, begun and ended in a lifetime, but, when ended, leaving the great interests of the human kingdom as they were before. To one who thinks for the present only, the peculiar features of Hindu society Avill appear most formidable obstacles ; to one who thinks for a century, they will appear the most certain instruments of universality in the ultimate triumph. It would be an undertaking of appalling magnitude to attempt the conversion by units of two hundred millions of souls. The ties that bind them together more increase the hope of universal regeneration, than they diminish the facilities of partial change. All that we lose in velocity, we gain in power. In no country will individual conversions, in a given locality, be sIoAver at first than in India ; in no country will the abruption of masses from the " great mountain " be so vast or so rapidly successive. vSome time ago, this would have been called " speculation." The 264 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE events of the last seven years prove these views to be just. The thousands who have lately embraced Christianity in neighbourhoods long under missionary culture, are so many witnesses in their favour ; witnesses, also, that the im- patience that would decry a great continental mission, if its conversions be not so rapid as in little islands of savages, is the result, in some cases, of unbelief, and in others of ignorance as to the character of the enterprise ; an ignorance which frequently consists, even in its highest degree, with what is called " intelligence." Around Gubbi appeared many signs of that gradual change of public opinion which must precede every re- volution. Things ancient and venerable Avere losing their influence ; startling questions were broached in private circles ; the gods were not dreaded or trusted as before ; and, above all, the whole people avowed a belief that their religion would pass away. KSeveral times, when I have said, to persons declaring themselves resolved to die in the paths of the ancients, " All the idols shall perish, and every knee shall bow to the Lord Jesus," they have replied, in a tone of pensive assent, Idditu, " It will be so." CHAPTER VII INDIA ; WHAT IS IT ? India is a region more than twenty times as large as England and Wales, and equal to the united extent of France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Turkey in Europe, Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, all the minor German States, with Belgium, Holland, and Denmark. Its people are divided into thirty- five different States, speaking thirty different languages.^ They number two hundred millions ; ^ a population equal to that of the whole continent of I^urope, and comprising at least one-sixth, probably one-fifth, of the entire human race.^ China excepted, India is the most populous country in the world. Its ijhysical outlines deserve a word. That magnificent mountain-chain which runs eastward from the Caspian Sea, traversing Asia, is interrupted as it approaches the vale of ^ These languages, tliough, like the tongues of Europe, having close affinity one with another, are quite as widely separated as they, and in some cases more so. ^ [The census of 1891 showed a population of more than 287,000,000. It is now (1901) little less than 300,000,000.] ^ In a Lecture on the "Extent, etc., of tlie British Eniiiire," I have said, "For proof tliat this, and not the common estimate of 130,000,000, and sucli like, is correct, see the works of the Count Bjornstjerna and Montgomery Martin. The latter shows that the population of 422,990 sijuare miles, tlie only portion of India for which there are correct returns, is 89, .577, 206 ; but the entire area of India is 1,128,800 sipiaro miles, consequently these 89,000,000 are the poi>ulation of little more than a third of the country, which must therefore contain considerably above 200,000,000. 2U5 266 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE Kashmir by an opening which parts the Hindu Kiish on the west from the Himalaya on the east. Through this opening the Indus descends from the plains of Thibet, and, separating India from Afghanistan and Beluchistan, forms its western boundary, i On the north, for a length of fifteen hundred miles, an uninterrupted barrier is formed by the gigantic Himalaya; while the Brahmaputra, rounding the further extremity of that chain, marks the eastern frontier. The two sides of the triangular peninsula which constitutes its southern termination rest respectively on the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal. Starting from the Indus, and proceeding eastward, every stream encountered for about four hundred miles takes the direction of that great river, and runs southerly towards the Arabian Sea. The whole tract covered by this geological level is called the Plain of the Indus, and includes the Punjab, Sind, and neighbouring states. Further eastward than the above limit, all the streams are found to take the same direction aS the Ganges, flowing toward the Bay of Bengal. The tract covered by this level, although extending over a length of about one thousand two hundred miles, with a l)readth of six hundred, is called the Plain of the Ganges, and includes most of the Bengal provinces. On the southern limit of the Plain of the Ganges, or six hundred miles south of the Himalaya, you encounter a lofty range called the Vindhya INIountains ; and south of these a great river (the Nerbudda) flows to the west, having a second range of mountains (the Satpura) on its southern bank ; beyond these you find a second noble river (the Tapti), flowing also to the west, while southward of it rises a third chain of mountains. But having ascended these, instead of finding a ready descent to carry you down on the other side, you discover a plain, level with the summit of the hills, and stretching in gentle undulations beyond the southern horizon. ' Tliis liver is said to discharge in tlie dry season eighty thousand cul)iu feet per second. INDIA: WHAT IS IT ? 267 Proceeding in that direction to discover a descent from this wide-topped mountain, you travel eight hundred miles before passing from the elevation to the same level as that from which you started. This elevated tract, varying in breadth from one hundred to five hundred miles, forms a third geological level, inclining strongly from west to east, as is indicated by the course of all its rivers : it includes the Mysore, Ceded Districts, Hyderabad, Berar, and IMahratta territories. A person will form a tolerable conception of the relation which the countries lying on this plateau occupy to the rest of India, if he just think, — The Island of Great Britain stands up from the sea at a certain elevation : now, suppose that elevation increased till every cliff round the coast were as high as Snowdon, the whole surface of the country being proportionally raised, then our fields would hold the same position toward the beach, as the kingdoms just named do to those lying at the foot of the Ghats ; while the mountainous heights up which one ascending from the lieach must climb, would exactly represent the Ghfits themselves. A tract of table-land is in fact the very same natural phenomenon as an island, only that the one is surrounded by land, the other by the sea. The Plain of the Indus, the Plain of the Ganges, the central mountainous district, and the grand plateau, are the leading physical divisions of India. It is an error to take India as a Avhole for a tropical country. It is true that part of it lies within eight degrees of the equator ; but then such is its magnitude that another part lies more northerly than Jerusalem, and little more than a degree south of Gibraltar. So far from being all a tropical country, in starting from the northern limit of Kashmir you travel nearly seven hundred miles before entering the tropics. Lahore, the most northerly capital, and Trichin- opoly, the most southerly, are two cities as far apart as Stockholm and Naples, and Avith climates equally diverse. Thus, while in some of the kingdoms of India snow has 268 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE never been known, in others it comes with every winter ; and the name of that matchless chain which embattles its northern frontier signifies " the dwelling-place of snow." ^ Again, from the circumstance that so large a portion of tropical India is tableland, a climate . is secured many degrees milder than if it lay at the natural level. This diversity of climate gives rise to a great diversity of produce : India rears crops of rice and of wheat,^ of maize and barley, with equal variety in fruits and vegetables. Let it, then, be remembered that India is not one State, but thirty States ; not a country of one language, but of thirty languages ; not a tract of uniform heat, but a region of various climates ; not a residence of one tribe, but of a sixth of all the men that live. These things must not merely be read as statements. They must be viewed, dwelt upon, felt, as facts. Much depends on this : the share of your benevolence given to India will be ruled by your conception of what it is. Your heart will never kindle with an interest appropriate to its claims, until you carefully and clearly set it out before your mind, as a large family of populous nations, which comprises one-sixth of all the hearts that are now throbbing. The productions of India nearly exhaust the catalogue of things precious in the mineral, vegetable, and animal ^ Him-dlaya. It has been thought that all land above ten thousand feet high was perpetually covered with snow : but this opinion is completely contradicted by our knowledge of the Himalaya. It is observed also that on the northern side of this range the line of per- petual snow lies at a much greater height than on the southern or more sunny side, a result just the reverse of what might be antici- pated. The Count Bjonistjenia remarks, that "the cause of this must be the greater purity of the atmosphere" on the northern face of the chain. It would be much more natural to ascribe it to the fact that the land of Tliibet on the north of the chain lies at an immense elevation above Hindustan on its south, consequently its heat alfects the mountains to a point corresponding to its own height. - It is not generally known that Indian wheat is a)i article of import in England, being used principally for glair in manufactures. INDIA : WHAT IS IT ? 269 kingdoms. The trader looks at the mercantile worth of its spices, jewels, grains, sugars, cotton, silk, indigo, tobacco, woods, ivory, drugs, and perfumes. The naturalist pores enamoured over its fauna, its flora, and its mineralogy. But no eye looks so wondering on those productions as that of the philosophic or the Christian historian, who traces the power they have in all ages swayed over the social state of the world ; the ways innumerable in which that power is now pervading all civilised life ; and the certainty, every day growing clearer, that hence will spring changes which, for the magnitude of the spheres affected, the value of the benefits conferred, and the splendour of the consequent career, will shine without parallel in the annals of man. This, though perfectly intelligible to those versed in the history of the connexion between the West and the East, requires, for others, some explanation. The strongest tie used by Providence to preserve the relation of people to people, is the craving of men for pro- ductions not indigenous to their own climate. Had all nations found at home everything necessary and agreeable, it is impossible to conceive to what extent their mutual alienation might have proceeded. China and Japan help us to an idea of that which, in such a case, would have constituted nationality. But while God gave to all men the capacity to enjoy every good thing the earth yielded, lie mercifully appointed its productions so that each individual should receive many of his gratifications at the hand of his brother who bore a foreign tint and spoke a foreign tongue. Each was constituted co-heir of all the riches of the family estate : but he could inherit only by virtue of a family com- pact. Hence arose international commerce ; and, as its necessary result, intercourse between distant people, the knowledge of each other's tongues, and the formation of mutual interests. The productions natural to India excited from the earliest 270 A MISSION TO THE MYSOKE times the desires of all nations lying to the west ; while their portability facilitated transport even before the exist- ence of those means of carriage required by the unwieldy commerce of the present day. Spices, jewels, perfumes, and silk, while the very articles certain to be craved for, were yet such that a camel-load formed a considerable investment. Persia and Arabia first received these luxuries, and com- municated the taste for them to their western neighbours. The Phoenicians, when no longer content to receive this commerce at second-hand, launched upon the Red Sea, brought their merchandise direct from the ports of India, and, conveying it across the Isthmus of Suez, re-shipped it at Khinocalura on the Mediterranean ; hence they carried it to Tyre. The wealth which they derived from this traffic so impressed Alexander when he became their captor, that, in order to divert it into another channel, he founded a city at the mouth of the Nile, to which cargoes could be easily conveyed from the Red Sea, and from which they could again be distributed round the European ports. He had calculated justly : the new city soon became the entrepot of the Indian trade, and, deriving from it the same advantages as Tyre, won eminent wealth and power. Throughout the revolutions of many ages, Alexandria preserved, by its position, the regular flow of this traft^ic, with all its lucrative results ; nor did this cease till the Muhammadan conquest cut it off from the intercourse of Europe. In the meantime another branch of the same trade had raised up in the Syrian desert Palmyra, which, growing upon the wealth that trade ever conferred, reached great magnificence and political power ; but, after a long struggle, fell under the all-humbling arms of Rome. When the ]\[usalmans had conquered Persia, observing the advantages which this trade brought with it, they founded Bosrah with the same views as had dictated the building of Alexandria; and the new city rose into note with a rapidity little less remarkable than INDIA : WHAT IS IT ? 271 that of its Egyi)tiaii predecessor. At this point we first observe a religious reaction upon the East from those whom its produce had led to its shores. The Muhammadans, urging their way to the eastward of India, where neither the Tyrians, the Egyptians, nor the Romans had ijonctrated, founded settlements on the shores of the great Archipelago, whence arose the extensive diffusion of their doctrines, now observable in those regions. A day was to come when the same material channel should convey to those shores a spiritual power both milder and more potent. The wars of Islam for a time closed Alexandria to the nations of Europe ; but so unconquerable was the desire for the commodities they had hitherto received through that port, that, notwithstanding the difficulties of overland carriage, such was found. The merchandise of India was now borne across the rugged countries lying between the Indus and the Oxus, and forwarded from the latter river to the Black Sea. Constantinople thus became the emporium of the Indian trade ; and thence acquired an allluence by which she was enabled to maintain her political existence much longer than she could otherwise have done. The tendency of this trade to aggrandise whatever people happened to possess it, was forcibly illustrated when the inconsiderable reiiublic of Venice, gaining the traffic between Constantinople and the rest of Europe, rapidly attained to splendid opulence and formidable power. Genoa also, for a time supplanting Venice at Constantinople, gained an eminence very surprising for its limited extent and unsettled government. The Crusades carried to the Levant some of the inhabitants of every considerable country in Europe. There they became acquainted with the productions of India : many now saw sugar, cotton, silk, antl various kinds of spice, for the first time. The warriors returning home carried back a relish for these commodities, and inflamed the desire for them in the minds of their countrymen. Hence the Indian trade 272 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE increased beyond all precedent, and raised Venice to a height of power and magnificence that moved the envy of all Europe. Every eye turned covetously toward the region whence flowed these streams of wealth. Attempts to share the advantages were made, hut rendered abortive either by the power of Venice, or by the unfriendliness of the Musalmans, who held every path of access to India. At the same time the descriptions of that region given by Marco Paulo inflamed to feverish excitement the desire to reach its shores. Amid the general devising of projects to arrive at India, Columbus, arguing from the earth's sphericity, concluded that country might be found by sailing to the west. He made the attempt ; and, in failing, discovered a new world. At the same time the Portuguese were led to coast along the African continent, in hope of discovering a passage to the land of so many real treasures, and so many fabled wonders. They found it. With these two discoveries a new era opened on Eiirope, afl"ecting with the most important changes her politics, her commerce, her manufactures, and even her social manners ; while revolutions not less signal hastened in every other region of the world. As we look at those revolutions in their past developments and future promise, and ask, What was their cause? the answer is. Under Providence, the productions of India. Portugal possessed for nearly a century a monopoly of the commerce with India, reaping the wealth that had ever been its fruit. In the meantime England, searching in the north-west for a passage to the same region which the ]^ortuguese had reached by the south-east, formed relations with Xorth America, from which important effects have flowed both in our own history and that of the new continent. As if destined, by elevating inconsiderable States, to demonstrate the real magnitude of its influence, the eastern commerce passed from tlie Portuguese to the Dutcli, then a people in feeble infancy. It raised them to India : witAT is it ? 273 the head of the marine powers ; but the stream, turning from them to our own shore, has steadily flowed thither during the last century, swelling our affluence to a height never before seen in the tide of human afl'airs.^ During that period has arisen the most wonderful of all the phenomena resulting from the influence of India's produce. Attracted to her shores, and contending for her treasures, the nations of Europe gradually became mixed up with Indian politics^ Hence it has followed that a European empire is estab- lished over two hundred millions of Asiatics, that they have been trained in the European art of war, that their institutions have been ameliorated by the spirit of British law, that scriptural Christianity has commenced her action upon their mind, and that a boundless prospect is opened of grand regenerative changes. A moment's reflection on this hasty summary of facts will show how deeply universal history has been affected by the productions of India. They gave Tyre its fame, and made its merchants princes. They raised Solomon's " Tadmor in the wilderness " to the Palmyra of stately palaces and potent armaments. They created Alexandria, and filled its port for ages with the merchants of Greece and Rome. They sustained the sinking empire of the East, enriching and adorning its capital long after her western sister had fallen. They, during the middle ages, enabled petty Italian republics to outshine even great kingdoms. They stirred the genius of European enterprise to fret against the limits that had caged her so long, until at last, breaking forth, she made the circuit of the world, and brought back to her children wealth gathered from every land. No people on earth have been wholly free from the effects of this influence. The few hapless Carribbs that linger in the AVest Indies, when they ^ The best account of this interesting branch of history is in Robertson on India, in which the course and the effects of this trade are most ably traced. Every man who wishes to understand tlie history of commerce ought to read that book. i3 274 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE think of the wrongs their fathers sank under, and see the invader rejoicing over all their isles, may ask, " What first brought our destroyers here ? " The reply must be, " India." The Eed Man, as he sees the forests of his tribe turned into a garden for the stranger, may ask, " What brought them first across the great waters?" "India." The Esquimaux, seeing our sailors shiver in their snows, or the Indian of Labrador selling us his furs, may ask, " What first led them to lands so chilly 1 " and he must be told, " The search for India." The Negro seized for slavery, the Hottentot staring at civilised industry, the Kafir ravaging the white man's homestead, the New Zealander fighting for his field, or hearkening to the gospel, all may put the same question, " What first led white men to our shores 1 " And to all the reply must be, " India." That country has been the means of most powerfully affecting the state of all this world. Her productions have been the most influential physical cause in modern history. To make more palpable the part India lias taken in the history of modern nations, let us consider for a moment her influence on England. Take our shipping. The vessel that first brought the produce of the East direct to England, that in which Drake had circumnavigated the world, was of one hundred tons' burden ! The length of the voyages which the new discoveries made necessary, the magnitude of the demand for the foreign productions, the necessity in times of war to join defence to carriage, all led the conductors of the Indian trade to a style of shipbuilding hitherto unknown ; and from the example of their magnificent fleets the will lie marine of the country eidarged its proportions. In our cor.oNiES, again, we have a system by which our own condition has been materially aiFected, and new States created on other shores. This system wholly issued from the discoveries made in seeking various paths to India. To reach India we went westward, and found the West Indies and America. To reach India we went northward, INDIA: WHAT IS IT ? 275 and found Labvadov. To reach India wc rounded the termination of 8outh America, and found the South Seas, where lie Austraha and New Zealand.^ To rcacli India, the coast of Africa was explored. To enable them to command the trade with India, the Dutch colonised the Cape of Good Hope ; and for the very same reason we drove them from that possession. Our TRADE, not less than our shipping or colonies, testifies to the power of India. Those articles which strike all as the most lucrative are either such as originally came from India, or to which that country first introduced us. Tea, for instance, though the production of China, became known to us only through our Indian trade ; and perhaps those who are ready to imagine that without that beverage daily comfort would be impossible, will be surprised to learn that no mention of it occurs in the records of the East India Company till sixty-seven years after it had been char- tered. Only then Avas their factor at Bantam instructed to procure " 100 lb. u-eight of the best tay he could geit." The sugar-cane, again, had been transplanted from India to western Asia, where it was unknown in earlier times ; there it was seen by Europeans during the Crusades, thence brought to different parts of the ]Mediterranean, thence introduced to Madeira and the Canaries, finally to the "West Indies and I'razil.- Hence arose the extensive use of that tempting luxury, hence the slave-trade, hence our missions to the West, hence the noblest strife of philanthropy, hence the sublimcst record of colonial legislation. Cotton also originally came to us from India.^ By the trade which the Romans maintained with that region through Alexandria, this ^ These various routes were sought, because the Portuguese claimed an exclusive riglit to that which they had discovered ; and had their claim forfeited by the Pope's authority. - Some think that the sugar-cane was indigenous to Soutii America ; but I believe all are agreed that for the manufacture of sugar from the caue we are wholly indebted to India. ■* Baines's llislorn of the Cotton Mttnu/aclonj. 276 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE light and agreeable fabric was first made known 'to Europeans, and became valued among the luxuries of the imperial city. During the middle ages the Venetians supplied enough to create a desu-e for more. The Moors introduced the plant itself into Europe, and thus the way was prepared for its general reception. When a direct commerce was opened with India, cotton was imported from Calicut ; and hence the name " calico." Silk Avas first introduced to India from China (as cotton was introduced to China from India) ; but for many ages it was supplied to Europe wholly through India. With these facts before us, it is altogether unnecessary to remark that our manufactures have not less felt the influence of India, than the other branches of our national activity. To estimate the influence which, through all these channels, India has exerted on our national character and domestic habits, is a sheer impossibility. The changes that have passed upon our homes by the introduction of silk, cotton, tea, sugar, and spices, are now too distant and too many to permit accurate enumeration. Strike these articles from our imports for a single year, and you will produce a revolution that would help to illustrate the magnitude of their influence ; but yet even that would not conduct us back to the same manners, the same modes of thought, and the same physical condition Avhich began to depart when these new comforts entered, and have since been gradually yielding to softer and more luxurious habitudes. These articles have metamorphosed both our persons and our tables : we neither dress nor eat as did our ancestors. They have entered not only the highways, but every bye-path of society, which marches not a step but in their companionship. Take our remotest homestead ; and though the inhabitants have no knowledge of foreign parts, and never considered themselves debtors to India, yet on every male and female you will find articles of clothing, and at almost every meal cither food, beverage, or condiment, INDIA: WHAT IR IT? 277 which were unknown in their hamlet before the way to India was opened. The debt to India is universal ; no man in the community is free from it ; it contributes to the comforts of all. Everything we look upon testifies to the grateful influence of its productions, — the luxuries of the most refined, the comforts of the most economical, the garments of all. We do not survey a room, we do not enter a shop, we do not take a meal, we do not look upon the dress of a child, without encountering some memento of the universal debt to India. In the saloons of our nobles, the mansions of our gentry, the houses of our tradesmen, the cottages of our workmen, and the chambers of our sick, we find India contributing helps to comfort or ameliorations of pain. Who then can look with a well-instructed eye on the present state of the British nation, without being amazed at the influence that has been exerted upon us by a country so far away ; and a country the people of which never meddled with our concerns ? India never sent an expedition to our shores, and yet it has diffused its influence through. every vein of our national life. We see it in our refined clothing and our sumptuous boards, in the stir of our ship- yards, in the magnitude of our nuirine, in the splendid heritage of our colonial possessions, in the manifold issue of our factories, and in the ubiquitous commerce with which we are pervading the world. Ifor have we been alone : changes have passed over the condition of man from Italy to Scandinavia, while newly discovered tribes have shared in the universal impulse. Let no one, then, regard the productions which form the chief articles of commerce as created to gratify foibles, or make fortunes. They are the ties by which the All-wise has held together the most distant races of men, provided for the general diff"usion of local blessings, and finally called forth the nations on whom His truth shone, to enlighten their brethren who sat in darkness. 278 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE The influence of India has scarcely presided less over man's intellectual than over his material history. To take a very obvious proof : every one feels the prodigious benefit of being able to express the endlessly diversified records of arithmetic by only ten ciphers. Into what consternation would all the counting-houses and all the observatories of Europe be thrown, were a decree to reach them that their accounts must be kept, and their calculations made, accord- ing to the Roman model, in the letters of the alphabet ! Yet, only a few centuries ago, this was their method ; for no language of Europe, or of Western Asia, furnished a more compendious arithmetical notation. The Hindus had invented, in very early times, the system now in universal use ; from them it had been adopted by the Persians and Arabs ; and it is matter of dispute whether it reached Europe before Leonardo of Pisa,^ in the thirteenth century ; but it seems more probable that it was brought to Spain by the Moors. Its progress among men of business was very slow. Had it not been for this invention, the rapidity with ■vvhich the largest commercial transactions are now executed would have been impossible ; and if the calculations of astronomy could have been conducted at all, it would have been with immense difhculty.- It must be felt that the nation who took the lead in astronomical science would gain immense influence over ^ He made known the S3\stein of algebra, also a Hindu invention. [See the articles "Aritlnnetic " and ''Algeljra" in Chamheva'a Encydo- pa'dia]. 2 Take the quantity 333, and l>y the Roman notation you liave just treble the nunil)er of figures, and those more complex, cccxxxiii. The principle of the Hindu invention is to increase tenfold the value of a ciplier for every time it is removed from the final digit of the series. There cannot be a doubt that the possession of this unequalled vehicle for numbers tempted the Brahmans into those extravagances by which they play, in their sacred books, with billions of years. Archimedes is said to liave written a book for the purpose of proving tliat it was possil)le to express such numbers as were familiar to every Brahman in India. INDIA: WHAT IS IT ? 279 the mind of other ancient people. Though the controversy on this subject cannot be fairly said to have yet led to a conclusive decision, yet it has established the fact that Chaldea, Egypt, and China are to be set aside, and that the whole of what deserves the name of science lies between Greece and India, With tlieni only has been discovered knowledge that could servo as a basis to the stupendous fabric of modern times. In comparing the system of these two nations, the Hindu astronomy has been found to be more correct, as regards the precession of the equinoxes, the length of the tropical year, and the synodic periods of the moon. Add to this their unquestionable antecedency to the Greeks in civilisation ; their great superiority in arithmetic ; their sole possession, at first, of algebra ; with their habitual indisposition to receive instruction from foreign nations ; and it can scarcely fail to appear that probability leans rather toward the precedence of the Hindu, than the Greek, astronomy,^ Perhaps when we have become as familiar with the history of science in the East, as we are with its history in the West, this probability will ripen to demonstration. The early progress of the Hindus in logic, ethics, poetry, and metaphysics, is uni- versally acknowledged ; and enabled them largely to infl\i- ence the literatiire of other civilised nations. But the most gigantic effects produced on the world by India, have been in the field of religion. The extent to which the Greeks and Romans, and through them all Europe, borrowed religious usages and tenets from the Egyptians, is matter of universal notoriety. Even some of ^ This is further confirmed by the fact, that while the Greeks sent their sages to study in India, we have no account of Hindu sages seeking light in Greece ; and though it may be true that the Greeks did not commence this piactice till after the solid founda- tion of the science had been laid by Hijiparchus, yet it could oidy have begun after Hindu learning had been long and highly prized by their philosophers. This whole subject is well treated in the Penmj Cydopxdia, article " Vija Ganita," 280 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE the superstitions now prevalent in Christendom can be traced, through mediaeval and Roman modifications, to an Egyptian original. When India and ancient Egypt began to be known, a remarkable similarity was observed in their rites and institutions. The mutual divisions of castes, hereditary trades, the worship of the ox, the resemblance between the linga and the plialJus, the agreement of the mundane egg with the Hindu doctrine of creation, all attest a close connexion. The question arose. Which nation had taught the other. It was very natural that Europeans should at first attribute the precedency to the country from which the earliest lights of civilisation had reached their own regions. But with the advance of knowledge opinion has gradually changed; and now the accurate author of the Theogony of the Hindus appears to have set the question at rest, adducing proofs, that amount to all but demonstration, that Egypt derived from India, and not India from Egypt.^ This point once conceded, we view a prodigious field, on which the mind of India has moulded the character of man. The prevalence, in times of authentic history, of the Hindu doctrine of metemp- sychosis, is a forcible proof of their religious ascendancy ; for they not only impelled that dogma through the schools of Greece, but even into the credence of the Jews them- selves. Whether we adopt the views of Mr. Higgins with respect to the " Celtic Druids," or place that remarkable ^ His proofs are: 1, It is testified by Herodotus, Plato, Solon, Pythagoras, and Philostratns, tliat tlie religion of Egypt proceeded from India. 2. The monuments of Egypt testify that the religious system gradually descended from tlie south towards the north. 3. The chronicles recorded by Josephus and Eusebius state that the religion of Egypt came from India. 4. Asia was first peopled. 5. Tradition marks central Asia as the first home of man ; consequently, India \yould be peopled before the valley of the Nile. 6. We liave history to this effect. 7. The Abyssinians have a tradition, that the first inhabitants of their country came, by way of the Red ^ea, from a remote country in the south. INDIA : WHAT IR IT ? 281 hierarchy in the more sober position assigned to it by the author of the Religion of Ancient Britain, and whether or not we join the Count Bjcirnstjerna in affiliating the Edda^ of Scandinavian mythology to the Veda of India, we cannot doubt that at the time of our Lord's appearing, every civilised people in the world, except (perhaps) the Chinese, held religious doctrines adopted more or less directly from the Hindus. kSince then a still more signal illustration has been given to their religious power. Shortly after the opening of the Christian era, Fo carried into China Buddhism, — a religion which had sprung up in India as a reform of Br;1hmanism. Such has been its spread, that, according to some high authorities, it has now three hundred millions of disciples in that country ; while, I believe, none would demand a larger deduction from this number than fifty millions. When to these are added the Buddhists of Thibet, Tartary, Burmah, Siam, Japan, and Ceylon, we arrive at the unquestionable conclusion, that this creed far surpasses any other in the number of its adherents. If we take the Buddhists at three hundred and fifty millions (thirty millions less than they are estimated in the Tlieogony of the Hindus), and the adherents of Bnthmanism at one hundred and fifty millions, we liave then five hundred millions of the world's existing population under the power of creeds originated in India. Nor will any one attentively survey the countries over which these systems extend, and compare them with the whole world, without concluding, that, M'hether these numbers be too great or too small, at least one-half of the human race are worshipping at the altars of Buddhism and Brahmanism, Until within the last eight centuries the Hindus enjoyed a singular exemption from foreign rule. The ancient ' The Edda, though not composed till the eleventh or twelfth century, is supposed to embody the tenets introduced by the second or third Wodin before the Christian era ; in wliich tenets the learped (Jou;it discovers Buddhism. 282 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE Persians held, for some time, a province on their north-west frontier ; across the same frontier, Alexander made a short inroad, which has not left even a trace in their histories ; but their whole career, np to the above period, had been free from any grand conquest by a foreign power. ^ Hence much of their maturity in political and literary civilisation ; for, in domestic civilisation, which Christianity alone creates, they have always been, and still remain, exceedingly back- ward. In the beginning of the eleventh century, the scimitar of Islam inflicted the first severe wound upon the independence of Hindustan. After the princes of that fierce faith had been established for about seven centuries, the whole of India might be regarded as subdued, under the sceptre of Aurangzib. By a succession of events, without any parallel in history, and without any explanation, but in the will of the supreme Ruler, those nations, so long exempt from conquest, and over which even Musalman ardour so slowly won dominion, have passed one after another, until they are all now united, under the British power. This conquest, uni(^ue in its rapidity, has been not less unique in its results. The ordinary efiect of conquest is to abase the vanquished, to abridge their liberty, check their enterprise, and preclude all improvement. In this case it has been just the reverse. The conquered have augmented their liberty, recruited their commerce, received a new impulse in literature, and had cast into their lap many of the fruits of western civilisation. ]}y this conquest, India, so far from being reduced in moral influence, has been raised to a position from which she will lead Asia in the modern march of civilisation, as she did in the old. By its means, she, of all Asiatic countries, Ih-st receives the true philosophy, first knows freedom of person, freedom of commerce, freedom of conscience, and freedom of the press. She will also be ' I do not liciv toucli tlie perplexed (|np.stioii, whctlicv the Bifdini^ns tlifiiiselves wero not a race of iuvadcr^. INDIA : WHAT IS IT ? 283 the first oil which the steaiu-engiiie and the railway will confer their prodigious influence. These things give lier advantages to which none of her neighbours can pretend, and by whicli she will excite the emulation of them all. Geographically, slie occupies the very focus of Asiatic power and refinement, liaving on the one hand and on the other the countries most important to be influenced, and most accessible to amelioration. The Bu(hlhist of eastern Asia looks to her as the fatherland of his faith ; the Musalman of western Asia, as tlie region wliere sparkled the most gorgeous monarchy of Islam ; while on her plains are the co-religionists of the one and of the other, to carry out a grand mission when a regeneration shall have blessed them- selves. Up to the present day, Jerusalem, Rome, and Mecca, usually held to be the chief springs whence religious influences have gone forth upon the world, have not all of them together commanded the faith of so many human beings as Hindustan. The history of the past not only warrants, but demands, the expectation that the conversion of that country will bring results on a scale far grander than any that have yet been witnessed. It is strange with what coolness even well-informed persons speak and write of the few nations of Europe, as if they constituted the world. True, others are known to exist ; but, in the usual thinking of most persons, " all the world" is at peace, wlien Europe reposes; "all the world" in pangs, when Europe is at war; and Wellington and Napoleon are celebrated "all over the world." Alas! how little is the world of most minds ! how far short of the wide, wide field, all over which the hearts of men are throbbing ! Far more than half the world never heard Napoleon's name ; far more than half the world neither know nor care what are the relations of our potentates ; far more than half the world could not tell you Avhether Europe is one country or many. We are not a quarter of the world's population ; and yet, because we have received from Christianity elements 284 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE of greatness that lift us above our fellows, wc are ready to regard them as but distant retainers of the human family, we only constituting its circle. From the soil of Asia man was formed, in Asia he had his Eden, on a hill in Asia rested the ark that saved hinx in the day of ruins, in Asia he spent his early years, in Asia he has always had his chief dwelling, and on Asia dropped the blood that bought his ransom. The eye that watches all the world has ever seen in Asia far most hearts beating, far most mothers rejoicing over their newly-born, far most houses mourning for their dead. If any section of the earth might call itself the world, Asia would be the world : Eiirope does not contain half so many human hearts. The merchant sees the world where he sees trade, the literatus where he sees readers, the soldier where he sees renown, the man of fashion where he sees refinements, the politician where he sees power, and the unreflecting of all nations see the world in the sphere bounded by their own interests. But when the Christian would see the world, he looks for one thing, — hearts, human hearts ! These are the world to him, these are the seat of conflicts like to his own, these the field on which are decided the issues of eternity, on which is battled the cause of his God. Asia is the largest assem- blage of human hearts : thither, then, should the human heart most affectionately turn. The darkness of Asia glooms more hearts than that of all the world beside, and its sunrise will gladden more. While Asia is alien from Christ, more than half the world is far away ; but when Asia shall be brought nigh, it will indeed be the fulness of the Gentiles. Asia is Satan's stronghold, and wide and proud is the empire over which he boasts. The lessons of the past, the movements of the present, and the indications of the future, all unite in pointing us, for the key of Asia, to Hindustan. Let it be won to Christ, and it will win the tribes surround- ing. And, wonderful Providence ! the whole of that vast land from the Himalaya to Cape Comorin, and from the INDIA: WHAT IS IT ? 285 Indus to tlie Brahmaputra, is o})cii to Christianity ! Head of God's ransomed Church ! why hast Thou placed before Thy people this yawning door, through which wc hear, coming from the valley and shadow of death, the wail of so many souls 1 What then is India 1 The region Avhich of all upon earth has most affected the history and the habits of every other ; the region to whose influence are traceable the most striking characteristics of ancient civilisation, the most notable feats of modern enterprise ; the region whence sprang the creeds that even now command the largest number of souls ; the region that ofi"ers the best medium for transmitting moral influences throughout Asia ; the region that embraces in her arms a host of human hearts, comprising at least one out of every six that beat, and, holding them up to the eye of Christian pity, tells her they are all open to her approach, and susceptible of her action. Oh that God would give His Church a heart large enough to feel the sublimity of this call ! Think, Christians, think on the state of the world. Dream not of the gospel as already known everywhere. Feel, oh feel, when you pray, that one-half of your brethren never heard of your Redeemer ! Bone are they of your bone, flesh of your flesh, conflicting, sighing, bending to the grave, like you ; but crown for their conflicts, comforter in their sighs, hope in their grave, they see none. Think of every land where Satan has his seat, and give to them all a part in your prayer. But oh, think long on the land where the throne, whose sway you love, has heathen subjects outnumbering sevenfold the Christians of the British isles ! Think long, long on the fact, " I belong to an empire where seven to one name not the IS^ame that is life to me ! " Think that yonder, under the rule of your own queen, a full sixth of Adam's children dwell ! Take a little leisure, and say, " Of every six infants, one first sees the light there : To what instruction is it born 1 Of every six brides, one offers her vows there : To what aff"ection is 286 A MISSION TO THE MYSOKE she destined ? Of every six families, one spreads its table there : What loves unite their circle 1 Of every six widows, one is lamenting there : What consolations will soothe her 1 Of every six orphan girls, one is wandering there : What charities will protect herl Of every six wounded con- sciences, one is trembling there : What balm, what physician, does it know ? Of every six men that die, one is departing there : What shore is in his eye 1 " CHATTER VIII INDIA : ITS PEOPLE In thinking of the people of India, you must dismiss the ideas of jet-black skin, thick lips, flat nose, and woolly hair, which we too readily associate with all natives of the tro})ics. None of these belong to the Hindu ; he bears not the African, but the Caucasian type. Keep him before your mind as he was described in our chapter on iNladras, — a man about the middle size, of slender person and graceful carriage, with good features, a soft black eye, a mild expres- sion, and a complexion varying from straw-colour to a deep dusky lirown, almost black. Instead of the stiff black cylinder that surmounts the European head, he has a muslin turban of bright colours and graceful folds ; for shirt, vest, and coat, he has a simple frock-coat of white calico, or, in country districts, a long piece of the same cloth, which he folds so as to cover, at pleasure, a greater or less part of the person ; for trousers he substitutes a flowing robe of calico. The female has no other head-dress than her long, black, glossy hair ; and for all other garment, a single robe and a simple bodice. When a Hindu honours you with a visit, he leaves his shoes at some distance from the door, and enters barefooted, for stockings he has none ; but he wears his turban : for it would be as disres})ectful to appear before you with his head bare as with his feet covered. Thus, his politeness and yours are directly opposed. He approaches with an air at once self-possessed and respectful, ami, bowing low, lifts 287 288 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE his hand in a graceful sweep, till the fingers touch the front of the turban, saying, at the same time, Salaam ai/i/a, or Salaam sahib, according to the language he may employ, Should your rank, or his circumstances, incline him to still humbler obeisance, the head is more profoundly bowed, and the turban touched with both hands. In this case, a differ^ ence is obvious between those who adopt the " double salaam " of the Musalmans, and those who retain the Hindu namasJiura. In the former case the hands are brought to the forehead open, as in a salutation ; in the other, they are laid together, and raised as in the attitude of prayer. This latter salute, when offered by the poor, is painfully abject ; but even that does not always suffice for their profound politeness. I have seen a man of six feet high bow slowly down till his forehead touched the floor, leaving you astounded equally at his humility and his suppleness. If he come to pay you a formal visit, he is required by etiquette to bring some present, as all well know Avho have had patience to read the narrative of the visits and return-visits of Lord Valentia. The gifts presented in ordinary polite- ness are very simple : a few limes, plantains, oranges, or pineapples ; but if the visitor have an important favour to demand, or is approaching a dignified personage, the present is valuable, and sometimes magnificent. The judges in native courts were generally favoured with a call from the suitors on both sides of every weighty cause, before the hearing came on ; and all were supposed to learn from the judgment delivered which had been the more liberal. The same politeness was plentifully accorded to those of our own countrymen who first undertook the administration of justice ; but the government at length felt that such habits were incompatible with purity, and therefore wisely forbade their servants to receive presents of value. Though the natives are aware that this regulation was made for their benefit, they hardly know how to be pleased with it, for it grievously interferes with immemorial usage. To be led INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 289 before a judge whom you have not conciliated with a hand- some present, is for them a rude, point-blank way of going to law. I was told of a case in which the rule was ingeni- ously evaded, by presenting the lady of a judge with some fruit on a richly-wrought silver dish, shaped like a leaf, and then refusing to receive back " the leaf on which the fruit lay." A Hindu visitor is of easy manners and fluent conversa- tion : a propriety and deference the most flattering mark his address. If he asks you where you are going, his politeness couches the question thus : " What place are you going to favour ? " If he desires you to tell him anything, he says, " Give your command " ; if himself desirous of making an observation, he says, " I will make my petition " ; and thus in various ways he insinuates a delicate politeness into common-place remarks. If he be little acquainted with Europeans, and at the same time looking for a favour, he will greet you with titles the most sonorous, and overlay you with compliments the most resplendent. To be called Maha- rajah, "a great king," is a common matter; while "Prince of the earth," " Lord of the four worlds," and " Lord of the fourteen worlds," are titles at which my unaccustomed ears have often laughed, when the countenance dare not for shame keep them company. The lower classes frequently address you as Siodmi, " God " ; and the lowest as Devaru, a still more sacred appellation of Deity. One day a fine young man came up to me, and, after the most profound salaams, opened with a swell and pomp of adulation that might have proclaimed him captain-general of compliments : " Great king, governor of the earth, lord of the fourteen worlds, your fame is universally diff"used. I have heard it at Bellary, and am come thence" (a distance of two hundred miles) "just to make the vision of your countenance." "Indeed," rejoined T, trying to preserve a sober face ; "I was not aware that I had done anything to spread my fame as far as Bellary : may I ask what it is for which I am so celebrated 1 " 19 290 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE With perfect coolness and complacency lie replied, " You are the ruler of the country, and the benefactor of the people. You are making roads, and building bridges, and digging wells, and constructing tanks, and planting groves, and, in fact, doing everything munificent." " Really," said I, with all gravity, " I was not aware that I was j)er- forming such great works : would you have the goodness to tell me where one could find the roads I have made, the bridges I have built, and the groves, tanks, and wells of which you speak 1 " He looked puzzled ; for he had never imagined that any one would .be so dull as to treat those magnificent flights of oratory in the vulgar, matter-of-fact way ; he meaning by his expressions nothing at all, but that he wished to be understood as intending all the civilities under the sun. After a second of embarrassment, he recovered his self-possession, and said, " Why, your people " (the English) " are doing all this, and that is just the same thing ! " The whole of this display was only to introduce a request that I would interest myself to procure him a situation. These excesses of flattery are not found among natives who have had much intercourse with Europeans ; their compliments are often really delicate ; and even the lowest of the people, when assured by a frank and kindly bearing, soon lay aside their servility, and become frank and candid in their turn. Having now glanced at the person and address of a Hindu, we shall look at his residence. This will not be correctly fancied, without some care to divest your mind of European ideas. It is not a building of many stories and many windows, nor a red-brick cottage, nor a cottage with stone walls and slated roof, nor with leaded windows and thatch. Though the Hindus have long known glass, they have not learned to emi)loy it for the purpose of introducing broad day within thick walls, and of happily uniting shade and sun. Set, then, before your eye a small cabin, seven or eight feet high, without a single window ; the walls white- INDIA : ITS PEOPLE 291 washed, at the base a broad stripe of red or brown, with a flat roof, or perhaps a sloping one, of tiles. If the owner be poor, the house contains two apartments ; if rich, it forms a small quadrangle, open in the centre to the sky, with apartments lying on each side of the square opening. Entering this house, you find no boarded floor, no papered walls, no chairs, no tables, no mantel-pieces, no grates, no delf or china-ware, no mirrors, no hangings, no time-pieces, no book-shelves, no toilet-tables, and (except among the great) no carpets or bedsteads. In the nations of the north, a modest substitute for the latter might be found. In fact, all your ideas of a home are at fault. You have bare walls and a bare floor ; you are among a people to whom a house is nothing more than a cover from the weather and the public gaze. A severe climate, rendering more than mere shelter essential to ease, multiplies the household inventory ; and domestic happiness prompts us to adorn the scene of the most select enjoyment. From these two causes have sprung the endless comforts of an English home : but the Hindu has not felt either of them ; his native breezes are ever mild, his family relations ever chill; and thus, while the gifts of his clime and the works of his hand have been enriching distant homes, he has continued to dwell within the same earthen walls, to sleep on the same earthen floor, and to employ only the same apparatus of brazen pots which served his fathers three thousand years ago. Difference of wealth or rank causes little change in the character of the dwelling : the same simplicity exists until you go as high in society as a petty Kajah. It must, however, be distinctly borne in mind, that this statement, and those of this chapter generally, do not include that small fraction of the people who, inhabiting large cities, have learned in many things to imitate the English, and of whose mongrel habits some authors speak, as if they were those of the Hindus at large. The Hindu families are often very numerous. Several 292 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE sons may be married, and each have children, yet, while the father lives, it is not unusual for them all to continue under his roof, and subject to his authority. Ctenerally they do not receive any separate provision until after his death ; and even then they sometimes continue to reside together, the elder brother succeeding to the father's power, and to a large extent holding the capital of the others in his hands. The mother-in-law is supreme over the females, and strangely deems it part of her duty to prevent great tenderness between her sons and their wives, — an obligation in the discharge of which she often wounds so deeply the feelings of the daughter-in-law, that the latter betakes her- self to her father's roof, and will not return till after negotiations and apologies. Not even caste itself more tends to compact Hindu society than this family system ; for a man may arrive at middle age, or more, before he has a house of bis own ; his wife and children are liable to be taken from him in any dispute which would alienate himself from the family circle. Xot a few, when they contemplate embracing Christianity, are menaced by this trial, in addition to others. All the people freely claim the right of home in the house of a relation. If a man be in flourishing circum- stances, his brothers, uncles, cousins, and other near kin, will live upon him without scruple, nor concern themselves to obtain an independent livelihood, so long as he retains his means ; and I believe the case is rare in which their claim, however unreasonable, is rejected. The private scenes of Hindu life are covered from all but members of the same caste ; and, as Europeans do not belong to any of the castes, all family circles are closed against them. A European may live for years in a town, and on the most friendly terms with the people ; but he is debarred their homes. For the most part he never enters the door ; and, if he do, it is only to a conversation in the outer apartment witli the males of the family, or to some great entertainment, with nothing domestic in its character ; and INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 293 this, instead of showing liim thoir family life, only shows how far they can succeed, upon an occasion, in laying out a table in English style. True, they manage, by garlands, scents, and dancing-girls, to give the matter a native air ; but though this enables travellers of a certain class to talk of entertainments at the houses of natives, to one really desirous of studying their inner life, it. only gives painful evidence of the care with which it is covered from his view. jNTuch knowledge, however, is gained by daily intercourse with them, and careful observation of their allusions to in- door acts. The number of their meals is usually two. The first duty of the morning is, for the females to proceed to the well to draw Avater. And as the men may not partake of the morning meal before they have performed their ablutions, they go to the tank, bathe leisurely, wash their clothes, put carefully on their foreheads the marks of their sect, and repeat forms of prayer. In these duties the Brahmans are specially strict, and the Sudras almost totally negligent. These ceremonies, and others of a re- ligious character, performed at home, being terminated, the first meal is taken, about ten o'clock ; the second, which is also preceded by ablutions, is taken about sunset. " He who eats," says the Vishnu Puraua, " without per- forming ablutions, is fed in hell with lilth ; and he who repeats not his prayers, Avith matter and blood. . . . Let the householder, having l)athed, and offered libations to the gods and manes, and decorated his hands "with jewels, proceed to take his meal. . . . He must not eat with a single garment on, nor with wet hands and foot, but dressed in clean clothes, perfumed, and wearing garlands of ilowers : he. niust not eat with his face to any intermediate point of the horizon, but fronting the east or the north : and thus with a smiling countenance, happy and attentive, let him partake of food of good quality, Avholesome, boiled with clean water, pro- cured from no vile person nor by improper means, nor 294 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE improperly cooked. . . . The man who commences his meal with fluids, then partakes of solid food, and finishes with fluids again, will ever be strong and healthy. In this manner let him feed without fault, silent and contented with his food; taking, without uttering a word, to the extent of five handfuls, for the nutriment of the vital principle. Having eaten sufficiently, the householder is then to rinse his mouth, with his face turned towards the east or the north, and, having again sipped water, he is to wash his hands from the wrist downwards. With a pleased and tranquil spirit, he is then to take a seat, and call to memory his tutelary deity ; and then he is thus to pray : ' j\Iay fire, excited by air, convert this food into the earthly elements of this frame, and in the space afibrded by the ethereal atmosphere cause it to digest, and yield me satis- faction ! May this food, in its assimilation, contribute to the vigour of the earth, water, fire, and air of my body, and afford unmixed gratification ! May Agasti, Agni, and sub- marine fire, eff'ect the digestion of the food of which I have eaten ; may they grant me the happiness which its con- version into nutriment engenders ; and may health ever animate my form ! May Vishnu, who is the chief principle of all invested with the bodily structure and the organs of sense, be propitiated by my faith in him, and influence the assimilation of the invigorating food which I have eaten ! Vov verily Vishnu is the eater, anil the food, and the nutri- ment; and through this belief, may that which I have eaten be digested ! ' " The Brahmans, the Linga worshippers, and large sections of the other castes, do not touch animal food ; and the statements made by Montgomery Martin and others, respect- ing beef-steaks at Brilliman's tables, and similar things, can be received only as proof that, in the centres of English influence, a few individuals Ijcgiu to despise the sacred laws of their caste ; for it must not l)c for a moment supposed that such offenders are other than the rarest, and, to the INDIA: ITS PEOrLE 295 people at large, the most disgusting exceptions.^ Of the many millions who compose those castes, not one, from birth to death, tastes anything that has lived, fish included, and even eggs. They loathe all animal food, as "\ve do human flesh ; and they profess to know a flesh-eater by his scent. In some of the northern countries, where caste-laws are in general less stringently maintained than in the south, many of the Brahmans eat fish, calling it a sea-vegetable. Even those castes who allow animal food, never let beef cross their lips ; that enormity is left to the out-castes alone; nor do tliey kill the cow in order to obtain it, but only take the carcases of such as have died. The staple food of the Hindus varies with the climate of their different countries : rice, Indian corn, ragi, and some other grains, are each, in diiferent places, the staff of life. ]\Iilk, in its various preparations, is an essential article of food ; curds are highly esteemed ; but clarified butter in a liquid state elicits their most dilated praise. It is called ghee, and affirmed to be quite as much in favour among the gods as among mortals. As corpulency is indicative of respect- ability (for all poor men are thin), and as ghee is supposed to assist in obtaining it, those who can afford to indulge their vanity use it in large quantities, and sometimes drink it pure. With their food they freely use spices, Avhich, mixed and pounded, form curry, the delicious accompaniment of their boiled rice or other food. This curry, as eaten by the natives, is frequently so hot, that no European palate, ex- cept one long accustomed to it, could bear more than a few spoonfuls. Our countrymen universally eat and highly prize it, but in milder forms. It must be remembered that ^ [The muiiber of those who break their caste laws in the matter of eating and drinking has largely increased, chiefly among Englisli- edueated Brahmans. Still, what is done in this way is mostly done not regularly but as a special and occasional indulgence, and it is always understood that those who are allowed to become aware of it shall carefully keep their own counsel.] 296 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE spices are the only stimulants of the natives at meals ; for even those who do allow themselves to taste exciting drinks never make them a beverage at table — if we may speak of a table, where none exists. A curry generally contains ginger, limes, onions, salt, coriander-seed, cloves, pepper (red, and perhaps black), turmeric, citron, saffron, and garlic ; with cocoa-nut milk, tamarinds, and other ingredients : these are mixed with vegetables fried in ghee, and form a condiment capable of being varied in endless ways, and in all its varieties pleasing.^ Temperance is the most striking virtue of the Hindus. The laws both of the Brahmans and the Lmga worshippers proscribe all drinks that inebriate ; and the use of these is confined to the lowest orders, except in rare and monstrous exceptions. Among respectable persons drunkenness is held in the utmost detestation ; and in their eyes Europeans have been more degraded by intemperance than by all other causes combined ; because in this vice they were obviously below themselves. Such is their horror of spirituous liquors, that when in fear of cholera, and Avilling to accept medicine prepared by Europeans, I have known them to declare they would not touch it, unless satisfied of its freedom from brand}'. Several divisions of the Sudra caste use toddy and arrack, and so do all the out-castes ; but even these latter, though more infected with the vice than any other class, are not universally chargeable Avith drunkenness. I doubt, indeed, whether any class of tlie people, can, as a class, be called drunkards, unless it be in some large cities where they have long had our example. In the matter of temperance, both Hindu and jNluhammadaii, with j)i'i(le and derisinii, bnast their superiority to tlie Chris- tian ! Nor is our shame lessened })y alleging numerous defections among these two classes, when it is sadly ^ Those wlio are curious on Hindu cookery will fiml a tract on that sul)jc'ct in the " Mi.scullancou« Translations" of the Oriental Trans- lation Fund. INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 297 manifest that such apostasies are often due to our presence.^ Toddy is the juice of the pahn. In every palm-grove you see trees with small pots attached to thorn in different places : these are affixed to an aperture caused by boring, and receive the exuded juice. They are changed every morning ; and the liquid, when fresh, is said to be delicious, and not in- toxicating; but it is seldom drunk till after fermentation. Arrack is a strong spirit, distilled from rice, and also from several other substances. The vendor of these drinks raidvs amongst the most disreputable professions. Their temperance is not equally commendable in food as in drink. Though many avoid animal food, such abstinence does not necessarily imply moderation. Taking but two meals a day, they sit down with a sharp appetite ; and Avhen they rise, their lightly covered person displays the elfects of the repast. A Brahman, on seeing me return to my study after dinner, looked at me, and said, " What is the use of your going to dinner? You come back just as you went away." I assured him that my visit to the table was of very essential utility. " ]]ut," said he, patting his person, as they always do on any allusion to gastric operations, " one cannot see that dinner makes the least alteration in your appearance : you are just as you Avere before ! " A native after dinner bears symptoms as plain as a colt coming from a Held of clover. Of cooks and epicures the Brahmans claim to be the firstborn. It is their birthright, as gods of the earth, especially to enjoy the fruits of their domain. AVhen perfectly at home, and set upon the theme, they descant ^ [Government of India returns show that during tlie last twenty years alone the net excise and customs revenues on liquors and (hugs consumed in India have more than douhled. This increase is due in part to improved excise administration and the restricted use of illicit intoxicants ; but it is also undoubtedly due in part to enhanced consumption in a growing population whose earnings liave been increasing. In the Mysore country there luis been a great develop- ment of toddy-drinking during the last twenty-five years.] 298 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE with luscious eloquence on their peerless skill in dressing and enjoying food. They boast much of their ability to fast ; and when in another humour, boast as loudly, though less haughtily, of their ability to feast. They will smile, and quote the Sliloka : — " Dear to Vislniu is veneration ; Holy unction is dear to Shiva ; To the Sun adornments ai'c dear, And to the Brahman food." They tell of most extravagant gourmand feasts by members of their own fraternity. " Oh," said a panting Brahman, after an entertainment, " I am choking with thirst." " Why not take a little water?" asked a friend. "Bah! you simpleton; don't you think, if I had room for water, I would have taken another sweetmeat V I do not mean to charge the people generally with gluttony, though they mis- represent themselves if they are not easily tempted to eat to excess ; and I should have regarded the above statements respecting the Brahmans as slanderous, had they not come from themselves. The service of a Hindu meal is primitive as can be. In Europe, we summon all nature and all art to wait iipon us at dinner, and to do us honour. The forest yields its costly woods ; the mine its steel, silver, copper, and tin ; the field its fine linen ; the hard flint appears in delicate porcelain ; the tusk of the elephant presents our cutlery in smooth cases ; and the sand of the sea comes in crystal goblets to moisten our lips. Then, how turner and joiner, weaver and miner, cutler and silversmith, potter and glass-worker, have shown their skill ! But none of this elaboration is known in India. A good man just sits down upon the floor ; a few leaves sewn together contain his food ; and with his own fingers he conveys it to his mouth, as satisfactorily as if all Shefiield had been at his service. When the repast is over the leaf-plate is thrown away, and another provided as the next meal is preparing. INDIA : ITS PEOPLE 299 But the simplicity of a Hindu meal is not more striking than its loneliness. In all the length and breadth of vast Hindustan, a family-board is not known ! We look on that simple thing, a family-board, as an indifferent, almost an unavoidable, accident of family life ; but go to India, and you have it not. Let all the homes of that wide continent open to your eye to-day, and in every one you see a man sitting down alone, eating in silence ; his wife serving, then taking away the food, and silently eating in a separate apartment. You may then exclaim, " Is it possible that even my family-board is another of the boons for which I am indebted to the gospel 1 " The furniture of a Hindu home is not more inferior in comfort to that of an English one, than are its domestic relations in joy. There the heart is ruled by another code than that which warms our hearths. Amongst all the unaccountable things said about India in Europe, perhaps, considering the character and opportunities of Sir Thomas Munro, the most unaccountable is that which he said before a committee of the House of Commons, in 1813, respecting the domestic character of the Hindus : — " A treatment of the female sex full of confidence, respect, and delicacy." What that most respectable man could mean by these words, I cannot even conjecture ; unless that, having lived in India from boyhood, he, in his laudable attachment to the natives, — an attachment to which they gave a merited return, — had learned to appreciate the Hindu treatment of females, not by the just standard of Christianity, which he had seen applied in Scotland when a boy, but by the detestable oppression of Muhammadanism, which had been under his notice through- out his active life. The Hindu woman is not, like her more unhappy jNIuhammadan neighbour, doomed to perpetual prison : she is privileged like other animals to see the sky, and to breathe the free air. On this, therefore, may she congratulate herself ; but in view of the rights given her of God, she has much ground to complain. Her husband is 300 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE taught in the popiilar ranchatantra, that one essential quality of a great man is severity to women. Wickedness, deceit, impurity, and baseness, are pronounced inseparable from her nature ! " Let the wife," says the Skancla Purdna, quoted by Dr. Wilson, " who Avishes to perform sacred ablution, wash the feet of her lord, and drink the water ; for a husband is to a Avife greater than Shankara or Vishnu. The husband is her god, and gurn, and religion, and its services ; wherefore, abandoning everything else, she ought chiefly to worship her husband." From the Padma Purdna, Dubois cites the following and similar passages : — " Let him " (the husband) " be choleric and dissipated, irregular, a drunkard, a gambler, a debauchee ; suppose him reckless of domestic aflairs — even agitated like a demon ; let him live in the world destitute of honour ; let him be deaf or blind ; his crimes and his infirmities may weigh him down ; but never shall his wife regard him but as her god. ... In every stage of life a woman is created to obey. At first she yields obedience to her father and mother. When married, she submits to her husband, and her fatlier and mother-in-law. In old age she must be ruled by her children. . . . When in the presence of her husband, a woman must not look on one side or the other. She must keep her eyes on her master, to be ready to receive his commands. . . . Her husband may sometimes be in a passion ; he may threaten her ; he may use imperious language ; nay, he may unjustly beat her ; but under no circumstances shall she make any return but meek and soothing words." These startling extracts show the principles inculcated upon Hindu husbands by the most venerable authorities; but one would suppose that they would make nature revolt, and thus prove their own antidote. I often questioned men on this subject ; and, amongst those who were unaware of the icay in vliirlb Christians feel, invariably found concurrence in the abominable sentiments of the Shastras. A respectable man said, in rejjly to such interrogations, " The most fatal error INDIA : ITS PEOPLE 3 1 one can commit is to treat his wife affectionately. From the day he exhibits tenderness towards her, his independence and his peace are gone. She will dread him no longer ; all the vices of her nature will break forth ; his home is no more his own ; and he must bear with her tongue and her temper all his days. If," added he, — and I shall never forget the words, — " if you bear affection to a parent, a brother, a child, or even a servant, you may display it ; but if you love your wife, you must never allow her to suspect that it is so ; or farewell to peace ! " This calamitous sentiment could never be carried into practice where marriage is a voluntary contract between persons of mature age. But in India the bride is probably not older than five or seven : she may be as young as three. She most likely has never seen her lord before the wedding- day, and possibly may see him no more for years. Affection, on the one part or the other, has no place in originating the union ; and that, to any tender extent, it should arise out of it, at least on the part of the husband, he is taught to regard as weak and uiiseemly. 'No wonder Dubois should have ground to say, " During the long period of my observ- ance of them and their habits, I am not sure that I saw two Hindu marriages that closely united the hearts by a true and inviolable attachment." A family of cold hearts and chill intercourse is always an unwelcome scene. But how sad is it to review the homes of an entire continent, and see every husband, like an irrational animal, eating silent and lonely ; and every wife humbly attending at the beck of her lord ! So it is in India. Perhaps only a week ago that couple became united for life : no matter, this great gulf lies between them. Perhaps they have spent half a century in union : no matter, the ice that parts them yields not either before the ardour of youth, or the mellowness of age. " "What Avoman would think of eating till her lord had had his fill ? " asks the author of the Padma Purdna; and the same authority 302 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE graciously adtls, "When he" (the husband) "goes abroad, if he bids her go with him, she shall follow." And follow she does ; but accompany, never. The woman who would dare to walk side by side with her lord, would be thought as much out of her place as a fishwoman at a royal drawing- room ; and the man who would allow his wife to take his arm, Avould be universally scouted as a weakling. JSTo, no ; she must "follow," and that at a respectful distance. The same vehicle on which the dignified person of her master is borne is forbidden to her, except in case of a very long journey, when necessity conquers pride. ^ Another striking feature of domestic life is the denial of education to females.^ Except the hapless girls destined to the profession of temple-women, no female is permitted to learn to read or write. Needlework, also, is out of the question ; for their own dresses, except where they adopt a very small bodice, are without seam, or hook, or button, or pin, or other imaginable fastening or joining ; being formed, as already stated, of one long piece of silk or muslin cloth. The same is the case with the dresses of all children, and also of the men, except those who wear the frock-coat, which, though apparently of modern introduction, is now '[In towns "educated" men may be seen sometimes taking out their wives for a drive. This is a sign of an advanced Hindu.] - [The statements immediately following, true fifty-five years ago, may now be greatly modified. The education of women and gii-ls lias fairly begun, if it is not far advanced. At the census of 1891 one in eight of the men and boys and one in 117 of the women and girls of Mysore was either learning or was already able to read. When the results of the last census (1901) are published, still better figures will be forthcoming. The Christians are easily first in education. Among them every third woman or girl can read ; but among Musalmans only one in 26, and among Hindus only one in 220, can do so. Some of the schools include English in their curriculum, while needlework and music (sometimes instrumental as well as vocal) are very generally taught. Most of the girls' schools are missionary institu- tions, but Government gives generous aid and follows a most en- fightened policy in the matter.] INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 303 very general. Besides, to sew would be to adopt the pro- fession of a tailor ; to embroider a piece of muslin would soem, to a Hindu lady, as much out of her province as, to an English one, would driving a waggon. Of musical instruments, or other accomplishments, they know nothing. Then the Hindu housewife has no furniture to keep in order, and the washing falls of right to professional hands. Thus they are left without any pastime, or any employ- ment, save only the spinning-wheel. I have sometimes asked, " How do your women employ themselves during the length of the day 1 " — " Dress their hair, and sleep, and talk nonsense." And, with the exception of cooking two simple meals, waiting upon her husband, and occasionally spinning, the occupations of respectable Hindu females are described in the dull summary, " to dress her hair, to sleep, and to talk nonsense." The wives of persons eminent in rank are, of course, relieved from culinary duties ; but I believe none of them despise wholly the exercise of the spinning-wheel. Among the labouring classes, the women assist the men ; and from the statements of many credible writers, we must believe that, in several Indian countries, they endure an oppressive share of the toil ; but, from my own observations, I should say, that in the Mysore they have scarcely a larger proportion than falls to women of the same class at home. That which struck me as the greatest severity, was, that when families travel, you have the father walking light and free, with the wife behind, carrying a child slung upon her back, and their household goods in a bundle on her head. It is frequently stated, that the men, to account for and justify the denial of instruction to women, pronounce them to be destitute of soul and incapable of learning. This statement must be erroneous ; for Hinduism, so far from considering woman destitute of a soul, teaches that a soul is possessed by all living things ; and the rewards of paradis^ ever invite woman to her husband's funeral pile. For my 304 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE own part, I never once heard this reason assigned. On the contrary, they nsi;ally spoke of women as gifted with much quickness and strength of intellect ; so that, if only per- mitted to overhear the discussions of the learned, they rapidly gained knowledge. With me, they advocated the non-education of women, not on the ground of mental feebleness, but of moral perversity. Woman is, according to them, a compound of all the vices. The following passage, cited by Mill, accurately expresses (notwithstanding the remarks of Professor Wilson) the estimate of woman generally given by the natives in familiar conversation : — " Infidelity, violence, deceit, envy, extreme avariciousness, a total want of good qualities, with impurity, are tlie innate faults of womankind." " To teach a woman," they have said to me, " would be to give a serpent milk ; she would turn her knowledge into venom." And, again : " Keep our women at what distance we may, it is hard to govern them ; but did we make them our equals, by teaching them to read and write, farewell to the hope of ruling our homes ! " Even the gentlemen at the court of Ahasuerus were not more jealous than the meanest Hindu of tlie right of men to " bear rule in their own house." They also profess great alarm for the moral consequences of female education, asking, — " If it be almost impossible in the present state of things to preserve a family from intrigues, how would it be if the women could send and receive notes 1 " In addition to all this, the connexion that has long existed betAveen an educated and a disreputable woman enlists the prejudices even of the females themselves against their own elevation. The coolness with which our writers usually handle this subject is astounding. They treat it rather as a curious peculiarity of Hindu society than as a bold wickedness, and an execrable deduction from the lawful sum of human happiness. There is an animal philanthropy, never awaken- jjiig but at the cry of oppression, or the lash of the slave-whip ; there is an intellectual philanthropy, moved to see a mind INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 305 groping in tlie caverns of an unknoAvn universe ; and, more noble and more tender still, there is a spiritual philanthropy, which kindles to find a soul wandering through shades and pollutions to a hapless end. The first, as the most gross, is the most common ; we need only the instinct of the gregarious animals to echo the cry of a smitten man. But the darkness that bewilders an intellect is a heavier evil than the chain that binds a limb ; and the sin that dyes a soul ought to make us shudder more than the blood that stains a brow. The public would be moved by a tale of a thousand women driven in captivity across a desert, or barbarously flogged, more than by the statement that all the women of India, numbering a hundred millions, are, from generation to generation, doomed to perfect intellectual darkness, to perfect spiritual delusion. Yet this latter is ten thousand thousand times a greater calamity to the human race. The eyes that weep will soon be closed ; the limbs that toil Avill soon rest ; the frames that bleed will soon moulder ; and, as they pass to their repose, they do not unavoidably bequeath their agonies. But the mind that errs never ceases to think, and, from generation to generation, the follies it left upon earth are preserved and made fruitful ; the soul that sins never ceases to feel ; and from generation to generation, the stains it bore are handed down. Oh, If we had fully the spirit of that religion Avhich repugns every wrong, and takes part with every suff'erer, Ave should con- front, with a wrath that could neither be appeased nor mitigated, the system that parts humanity into two different natures; that makes the sister her brother's inferior, the wife her husband's slave ; that shuts up myriads of intellects from all culture ; that dooms families to despotism ; and that sweeps from many nations a domestic board. "We cannot too often repeat, nor too deeply ponder, the fact, that, though India is so wide, none of its homes knows a family circle. Desolate England, to-morrow, of her house- hold boards, and not a son of England would care to remain 306 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE on her shores. Her fields might smile, and her streets glitter ; but her heart would then be cold. Our first fear of God, our warmest throbs of patriotism, our morning rays of knowledge, our gentlest emotions of benevolence, and the most softening culture our hearts ever receive, are all due to that glorious creation of the gospel, a happy home. Few children of Christianity duly estimate the boon she gave to human society, when she said : " Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honour to the wife as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life." Who that has any relish for human bliss — that catches any peace from a home of love, any joy from a merry child, — that has one tender remembrance of motherly teaching or sisterly attachment, does not raise his heart to Him, in whom are to be blessed all the families of the earth, and vow to spread afar the knowledge of His name 1 It is well and timely that some English ladies have thought upon their sisters in the East, and have devoted, to their elevation, the intelligence and influence put by Christianity into their own hands. They have already effected much ; their opportunities are growing ; and the interests of humanity in Asia loudly demand that they should be enabled, by increased support, to keep pace with the increase of facilities. That increase will be rapid ; for, the usage of ages once violated, and the prejudice of ages once con- fronted, right will assert its claims, and wisdom enforce its lessons.^ ^ I allude, of course, to the Society for Promoting Female Education in the East, which has existed tl)irteen years, and sent out nearly sixty agents. Incorrect statements have been published as to the number of those agents who liavc honourably fulfilled their term of service. So far from being only a fraction of the whole, those who have failed are but a fraction ; and even of them the greater part, having married missionaries, continued as much to promote female education, after their nominal removal from the service of the society, as before. Last year (1846), twenty-one of their agents were actually at their post, of whom one had served for eleven years, two for eight, INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 307 Being now in the family, we may notice the chief " domestic occurrences." A birtli, if it be that of a son,^ is hailed with unbounded pride and joy. " By a son," says Manu, " a man obtains victory over all people ; by a son's son he enjoys immortality ; and afterwards by a son of that grandson, he reaches the solar abode." These prodigious benefits from male offspring are owing to the fact, that they only can duly sacrifice to the ancestral manes ; a rite so essential, that if one be not able to present to the Brahmans on behalf of his ancestors " land, conveyances, wealth, or any valuable presents," not even " food," or " unboiled grain," or "sesamum seeds," rather than not sacrifice at all, "he must go to a forest, and lift up his arms to the sun and other regents of the spheres, and say aloud, — ' I have no money, nor property, nor grain, nor anything whatever fit for an ancestral offering. Bowing, therefore, to my ancestors, I hope the progenitors Avill be satisfied with these arms tossed up in the air in devotion.'" If, however, his lot be more propitious, the sacrifice actually accomplished is attended two for seven, five for five, and all but five for above three years. Tliis conqiletely disjn-oves the statement, that these ladies invariably embrace the earliest opportunity of settling in life. Then, it ought to be stated, that the society does not restrict its aid to schools con- ducted by its own agents, but readily helps all plans of female ini' provement, conducted by any Christian 2Krson, and in connexion with any evangelical church. I knew of an application made on behalf of a school at Bangalore, the lady conducting which had no connexion with the society ; and a liberal grant was instantly accorded. The si)here of the society embraces Western and Southern Africa, the Levant, India, and the Eastern Archipelago. Their income is only some £1500 per annum ; a sum wholly unworthy of their object, and inadequate to their opportunities. All religious bodies are interested ill their success ; for all arc impartially aided from their funds. [In these days every Christian Church at Avork in India has its con- tingents of women-workers, and the value of their infiuence is beyond expression.] ^ [The Sanskrit name for son is 'pidra, which means "one who saves [xQ\\\ iml" or hell — the hell to which childless men are said to be condemned.] 308 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE "witli this prayer : " May my father, grandfather, and great- grandfather, in the persons of these Bralimans, receive satisfaction ! jMay my father, grandfather, and great-grand- father derive nutriment from these oblations to fire ! May my father, grandfather, and great-grandfatlier derive satisfac- tion from the balls of food placed by me upon the ground ! . . . ^lay my maternal gi-andfather, his father, and his father also enjoy contentment from my otierings ! iMay all the gods experience gratification and all evil being perish ! " {Vishnu Purcina.) It is easy, from this, to comprehend how the failure of male offspring is looked upon as a curse from the gods, and how a son is a crown of joy. The birth of a daughter causes no pseans ; but it is better than a want of issue ; and some fathers have told me, sub rosd, that they even preferred daughters, because they produce something when sold to a husband, whereas it is expensive to buy wives for sons. A name for the neAV-born child is selected carefully out of what the Abbe Dubois rather naively calls " the calendar of their saints " ; and Avhen the child is tAvelve ^ days old, the relatives assemble, Avlien the father, taking a plate of rice, marks upon it the intended name, and, after some ceremonies, calls the child by it three times. Children are taught blind submission to parental will : just as a wife, at the bidding of her lord, does right in committing the greatest sins, even to violation of her vows ; so the son, at the bidding of his father, must do any deed whatever, without once suspecting it to be wrong ; and should he even see his father commit murder, he must not judge it a sin. P^xcept in cases where religious rites — as for instance, sail — violate nature, I do not think that a lack ' Tlic Vishnu Funhia says — "Ten days after the birth, let tlie father give a uaTrie to his cliild, tlio first term of wliieli sliall be the aiipellatioii of a gofl, tile second of a mail. . . . A name should not be devoid of meaning ; it should not be indecent, nor absurd, nor ill- omened, nor fearful ; it should consist of an even number of syllables ; it should not be too long, nor too short, nor too full of long vowels, but contain a due proportion of short vowels, and be easily articulated." INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 309 of filial regard is generally chargeable on the Hindus : high authorities have given a different opinion ; but my own observation leads me to distrust the accuracy of theirs. Contempt of either parent is held to bo a frightful crime ; and affection for the mother seems deep and universal. It has been quoted to me as a maxim, that the grief of a father (occasioned by the death of a father) lasts six months ; the grief of a son a year ; that of a wife, till a second marriage ; and that of a mother, till death. Marriage is a high honour, a signal virtue, and a religious duty. No parent can perpetrate a greater crime tlian to allow a daughter to gain maturity without having endeavoured his very utmost to procure her a husband. The same obligation rests upon him to present each of his sons with a Avife. When a boy has reached seven, and a girl three, parental anxiety becomes wakeful for their settlement. The festivities of marriage are tedious and costly : presents must be liberally distributed, and the bride must be bought Avitli a sum pro- portioned to the wealth of the family. This usage of selling wives has not the sanction of the Shastras, and perhaps is not practised in all the nations of India ; but I believe it is universal in the south, except among the Nairs, where one wife has a plurality of husbands. ^ The costliness of the marriage ceremony probably arose as a natural corrective to polygamy, and operates as an important check to that evil ; for, though it is permitted by the Shastras, few men are found who have more than one wife, because few can afford the outlay of more than one wedding. The only considera- tion previous to a marriage is, how the sum necessary for the expenses can be raised. That obtained at any interest, or on any terms, no thought is given to other difficulties. To ^ See Forbes's Oriental Memoir. Tlie same habit prevails among some of tlie Hill tribes of Northern India. [The selling of daughters is not " universal " ; it can hardly be said to be the prevailing practice. But it is very common, and is one of those customs against which flindu social reformers 3,re striving.] 310 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE consummate the union is the one idea ; and no one thinks of asking whether the young people have the prospect of providing for a family. Honour and happiness consist not in providing for a family, but in having one. On no account is celibacy permitted to a woman ; and every single man is contemptible ; for it is well known that he would not be so, were he not so destitute of credit that no one will lend him money, or so vile in reputation that no one will give him his daughter.^ Honour and pocket-picking united in the same person is not a conception more impossible to us, than is that of celibacy and virtue to them. "Are you married 1 " is one of their first questions to a missionary ; and if he answer in the negative, they, unless familiar with our habits, judge him accordingly. A father, having selected a girl for his son, sends an acquaintance to sound her father as to whether the alliance would be agreeable. If so, he goes in person, formally proposes, and ofiers his price for the bride. The directions given by the sage Aurva for the choice of a wife are sufficiently characteristic to merit quotation. " He must select a maiden who is a third of his age ; one who has not too much hair, but is not without any ; one who is not very black nor yellow-complexioned, and who is not from birth a cripple, or deformed. He must not marry a girl who is vicious, or unhealthy, of low origin, or labouring under disease ; one Avho has been ill brought up, or who talks improperly, or who inherits some malady froui father or mother ; one who has a beard, or has a masculine appear- ance ; one who speaks thick or thin, or who croaks like a raven ; one who keeps her eyes shut, or has the eyes very prominent ; or who has hairy legs, or thick ankles ; or who has dimples in her cheek when she laughs. Let not a wise and prudent man marry a girl of such a description : nor let a considerate man wed a girl with a harsh skin, or with white nails, or with red eyes, or with very fat hands ' Mdiiks arc, of course, an exception, celibacy being tlieir vow. INDIA : ITS PEOPLE 311 and feet ; or wlio is a dwarf, or very tall ; or whose eyebrows meet, or whose teeth are very far apart, and resemble tusks." He further prescribes that he select one who is " in kin five degrees remote from his mother, and seven from his father." Some native author, whose name T cannot recall, prescribes that the lady shall have a gait resembling that of a young elephant. Preliminaries arranged, a day must be fixed. Properly speaking, this ought to be either in March, April, May, or June ; for they only are lucky marriage months ; but the other parts of tlie year are often ventured upon. In this case, however, the astrological observations, which decide the propitious day, have to be taken with such care, that much delay and anxiety are inevitable. The day at length fixed, the guests assemble at the house of the bride's father.^ Outside the door is erected a portico Avith twelve wooden pillars. Under this is placed the hideous image of Vighnesh- vara, the god of difficulties, who, if not duly honoured, Avould assuredly cast some impediment before the hymeneal car. Here also the bride and bridegroom are seated, on a small mound of earth, with their faces to the east. The married women, bearing on a copper plate a lamp made of rice-paste, and lighted, then approach, and holding this as high as the heads of the happy pair, make several circuits around them. This, called the sacrifice of Arati, averts the influence of an evil eye, and is a leading rite in all solemnities. After this, the whole three hundred and thirty millions of gods are earnestly invited to come to the wedding, and to stay throughout the five days during which it lasts; the ancestor gods are honoured with the same invitation, and are entreated to bring Avith them the still more distant pro- genitors. A sacrifice is then offered to Brahma, the creator. On the second day, the bridegroom makes large presents to the Brahmans in expiation of his faults. After this, he feigns a desire to make a pilgrimage to Benares, to wash in ^ la tlie sxicceeding details I closely follow Dubois, 312 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE the sacred Ganga • he equips himself for a journey, takes a supply of provisions, and turning his face towards the holy city, takes his departure in the fashion of an actual pilgrim, preceded by musical instruments, and accompanied by friends. He has not proceeded far on his pious journey, which would probably be fifteen hundred miles long, before he is met by his intended father-in-law, who inquires where he is going, and, on being informed, offers, if he will return, to reward him with the hand of his beautiful daughter. The pilgrim is not obstinate ; and on his rejoining the party, the ceremonies commence anew. With much pomp, a piece of saffron is tied round the wrists of the youthful pair. The bridegroom is then placed with his face to the east, and the father-in-law steadily contemplates him, till he fancies that in his countenance he sees the divine Vishnu, upon which he presents him with a sacrifice. Next he places him with both his feet in a dish filled with that very sacred substance, cow-dung, and then, uttering mantras, washes his feet first with water, afterwards with milk, and again with water. This done, he profoundly meditates on the three hundred and thirty millions of gods unitedly, and invokes by name all whom he can recollect ; after these, he invokes the seven rishi$, " sages," the five virgins, the ancestor gods, the seven mountains, the woods, the seas, the eight cardinal points, the fourteen worlds, the year, the season, the month, the day, the minute, — praying them all to bless the marriage ; then solemnly taking his daughter's hand, he places it, in sign of surrender, within that of the bridegroom, ^nd pours water over them both.^ The young couple are now surrounded by a number of the attendants, reciting mantras, and invok- ing the gods and their wives. While this is proceeding, enters a salver neatly graced with flowers, and bearing a small golden ornament, with the image of a god engraved upon it, and having attached a cord composed of a hundred and eight extremely fine threads. To this ornament incense ^ [This ceremony is the kanyA ddna — " the gift of a virgin."] INDIA : ITS PEOPLE 313 is offered, and each of the persons present touches it, invok- ing blessings upon it.^ The bride then turns to the east, and the bridegroom, taking the ornament thus consecrated, places it in front of her neck, and ties the cord behind, This is called the tali, it is their wedding-ring; but, contrary to the usage with us, it is removed in case of widowhood. Fire is now introduced ; on this the bride- groom offers a sacrifice ; then, taking the bride's hand, they walk thrice round it; thus ratifying their union by the witness of that element which they hold to be divine. When all the great ceremonies are concluded, the attendants sprinkle with rice the heads of the newly-married pair. In some cases they are placed each standing in a bamboo basket, and each is furnished with a vessel of pounded rice. The bridegroom pours the contents of his on the head of the bride, who returns the comi)liment ; and this they several times repeat. The significance of this ceremony, as emblematic of plenty, is obvious. On the fourth day of the nuptials both bride and bridegroom eat off the same plate; and Dubois says, " Well may the woman now continue to eat what the husband leaves, and after he has done ; for they will never again sit down to a meal together." The whole is closed by a torchlight procession, in which both are carried in a decorated palanquin ; they are hailed by their neighbours with gifts and gratulations, while fireworks and music complete their honours. We may add that the wife may well enjoy this ride ; for never again, except in case of a tedious journey, may she mount the same vehicle with her lord, The girl thus pompously married is always of inamature age,^ and, after the ceremony, remains in her father's house 1 [The blessing of an old woman whose husband still lives is particularly valued, as likely to ensure a long married life for the couple.] - [The Mysore Census Report for 1891 showed that 74 girls under one year qld, 349 lender two years ohl, 2347 under three years old, 31.4 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE for a shorter or longer term, as the case may be. AVhen deemed fit to be united to her hnsband, she is led to his residence, on which occasion ceremonies are renewed, but on a much smaller scale. Though we should hold the original ceremony only a betrothment, they hold it a marriage. From that moment the man has all the rights of a husband, the girl all the obligations of a wife ; and should he die, though she may never have left her father's roof, she is his widow ; and his widow all her days she must remain. The tnli is removed from her neck ; then, one by one, her articles of jewellery ; her dress changed for a widow's robe, and her rich black hair shaved, to be allowed to grow no more. From that day she commences a life of .shame. Her lot is not regarded as an affliction to which all are liable, and which entitles the sufferer to universal sympathy, but as a retribution for the vices of a former birth. The gods hold her unworthy of the joys and honours of marriage. The liusband's relatives do not scruple to charge the loss of their kinsman on her sins. Their religion teaches that the only atonement she can make, the only path whereby she can escape days of infamy and woe, is self-destruction. She ought to burn Avitli the clay of him whom she had never seen but at the wedding, or under whom she had lived in bondage for years. The benign spirit of Christianity has now averted this final stroke ; but the life thus spared is a life of sorrow and shame. The world scorns her; and the care of her own family is to keep her steps so watched, her spirits so broken, ami her frame so weak, that she may not bring disgrace xipon them. Should their endeavours fail, her crime cannot make her condition much more severe. With us, a widow's weeds are the signals of charity, inviting commiseration and respect; in India, they are the brand of justice, inspiring and 8387 under four years old had had tlieir destiny finally fixed by marriage. The total number of married girls under fourteen years of age was G.')8,832.] INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 315 horror. Xo human being is more to be pitied than a young Hindu widow. Then it is to be remembered that this class is far more numerous in India than amongst us : for, first, every man, Avithout exception, marries and may remarry as often as he likes ; secondly, every bride is a young girl — a child ; thirdly, every female once widowed continues a widow for life. From these three causes, widows in India must be at least twice as numerous as in England ; ^ and when it is remembered that the population of India is sevenfold that of the British Isles, it will be seen what a multitude of breasts are pierced by Hinduism with continual sorrows. When a death is approaching in a family, certain ceremonies are practised which need not be noticed here, as they belong rather to the head of religion than of manners. Care is taken that the dying man shall not be surprised upon his bed, nor even upon a mat ; for in such a case, his soul, upon entering another body, would have to carry with it this cumbrous appendage. To save him this burden, a clean cloth is spread upon the floor, and there he is laid. When death has taken place, the assembled relatives mourn aloud ; and the widow, if one be left, is, as well she may be, violent in her sorrows. She passionately reproaches the deceased for having abandoned her, screams, tears her hair, and gives every testimony of despair. Among the Brahmans the corpse is carried on a bier, placed on a pile, and burned. Among some of the other castes the same usage prevails ; but in others it is buried, being carried to the grave dressed as in life, and in a ^ [The proportion is as 8 to 18. In the Mysore, which has tlie worst recoi'd in India in this respect, the proportion of widows to women and girls is 21 per cent. ; in Enghmd it is 7 per cent. In otlier words, every fifth woman in the Mysore or every foiu-th Brahman woman, is a widow. Omitting from our reckoning the little girls not yet given in marriage, there are half as many widows as there are wives in the Mysore. Of these Mysore widows, 3554 were xmder ten years of age.] 316 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE sitting posture. Headstone, tomb, or inscription, they use none. The upward-pointing stone tells of a resurrection which their faith knows not. From their homes and domestic life we pass to their villages and towns,^ Small groups of huts are occasionally found on the open plain ; but they are few, and inhabited only by the very poor. Xo considerable village and no town is found without a high, thick wall of mud, except in those districts Avhich have long enjoyed the security conferred by British government. In the villages the houses are closely grouped together, without any attention to order or to airiness, and frequently with less cleanliness than could be desired. This is much owing to the practice of bringing within the walls every night all their cattle, which are very numerous ; and their presence leaves effects, even after all their droppings have been carefully gathered, either for fuel, or to wash out the houses. The men of the village Avear, for the most part, nothing but a few hand-breadths of cloth ; but the women are always modestly covered, except, indeed, in those parts of India where it is the usage for all females, except the immodest, to go uncovered from the waist up ; a custom which, strange as it is, they hohl so sacred, that it is said that a queen of Malaya-la once ordered a Avoman to have one of her breasts cut oft', because, on returning from a distant country, she followed the practice, held by her majesty to be insufferably foreign, of covering her chest. The Hindus have a very complete organisation for village government. The smallest village has its head- man, Avho leads their councils, arbitrates in disputes, and is the responsible medium of all communication with the government. Every town has a regular staff of officers, comprising the head-man, the accountant, the tax-gatherer, ^ [India is pre-eminently a country of villages. Ninety per cent, of its population is rural. In the Mysore 44 ]ier cent, of the total population is to be fouml in hanilefs of less tliap 500 inhabitants each,] INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 317 the astrologer, the irrigator, tlic poet, the schoohnastcr, and the watchman; besides whom, the blacksmith, the joiner, the barber, and the goldsmith, are often included ; and some add the washerman, the cowkeeper, the potter, and the dancing-girl. These officers, having each his defined sphere, preserve perfect order in local affairs, and much ligliten the duties that would otherwise devolve on the central government. For years after the Mysore was taken under our administration, each division of the kingdom, including, perhaps, a population of a million, was super- intended by a single gentleman, without one European assistant. A fact like this, as indeed the ease with which all India is governed, strongly illustrates the value of the village system. Plach little community has a head responsible for its good order ; and every one of these head-men holds an office venerable by immemorial tradition. Even the Musalman governments did not violate these ancient corporations ; and by the English they are fully recognised. Over ten head-men is placed a superior officer, and the native model of rank graduated from authority over one to authority over ten, a hundred, or a thousand towns. This complete and simple plan of local government, Mr. Mill, resolved at all risks to establish his amusing theory, that the Hindus were barbarians, characterises as " unskilful and rude." Among the natural effects of this system, is the profound deference for authority universal among the Hindus. Accustomed, even in the remotest villages, to see I^ersons govern merely by virtue of office, they are trained to venerate power, and too often carry that veneration to servility. The village system is adapted to protect the ryots from the severity of a harsh government ; but it is also adapted to prevent them from reaping all the benefits of a mild one ; for as all matters are transacted through local officials, these are under strong temptations to turn their office to personal account. It cannot be doubted, that in our own territories many villagers suffer exactions wholly 318 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE unauthorised ; but it is better to submit than to incur the resentment of the official men and their clique. Such a number of these villages as any Kajah could bring under subjection formed a kingdom. But it would not appear that the limits of a monarchical territory ever remained long settled ; every petty war producing changes. Nor did such changes materially affect village interests. " The inhabitants," say the Parliamentary Committee of 1800, with much truth, " give themselves no trouble about the breaking up and division of kingdoms : while the village remains entire, they care not to what power it is transferred, or to what sovereign it devolves ; its internal economy remains unchanged." Petty officers, intrusted with the rule of a few towns, and called polygars {pahjagdra, literally, " village man "), took every opportuiuty of gaining in- dependence, and in unsettled times were never held by the Kajah but with a loose and doubtful allegiance. The Rajah was always lord of the soil, and to him were paid all the rents. Each village community, through its head, rendered a certain share of its produce, generally in kind. Manu authorises the king to take of grain " an eighth part, or a sixth, or a twelfth " ; but these terms are far milder than those found in actual use. The committee just quoted report, that a third, and even a half, of the produce, was frequently taken by the king ; and that under the jNEuham- madan governments, the poor cultivator " seldom retained more than a fifth " of his produce. This report is founded on the evidence of Place, Munro, and others, whose authority is conclusive.^ The Musalmans also introduced a system of farming to Zemindars the revenues of a certain district. They paid to the king a stipulated sum ; and, though frequently restrained by conditions as to the terms they would impose on the ryots, generally burdened the latter with intolerable exactions. Lord Teignmouth unhappily established this system in many of our provinces : it still ' Mill, vol. i. INDIA: ITR PEOPLE 319 exists, and has many advocates ; but I never conversed with a native in the rural districts who did not testify towards its lively abhorrence, and earnestly deprecate all second parties between the cultivator and the government. I cannot con- ceive of such a system existing in any country, and, above all, in an Asiatic country, without exposing the husbandman to numerous and oppressive wrongs. The more immediately our government deals with the mass of the people, the more clearly will be known the equity of their principles, and the mildness of their intentions. All interposition is detrimental at once to the interests of the cultivator and to the popularity of the rulers.^ The Hindus have never known any but despotic govern- ments. " A king," says Manu, " is formed of particles from the chief guardian deities, and consequently surpasses all mortals in glory. Like the sun, he burns eyes and heart ; nor can any creature on earth even gaze on him. He is fire and air ; he, the god of criminal justice ; he, the genius of wjealth ; he, the regent of waters ; he, the lord of the firma- ment. A king, even though a child, must not be treated lightly, from the idea that he is a mere mortal : no, he is a powerful divinity that appears in human shape. In his anger, death." But, notwithstanding these extravagant con- cessions to royalty, the king has always been required to hold the Brahmans as his natural council, while laws, in some cases wise and benign, were instituted to guide his conduct. On the whole, tyranny has been the rule, and a paternal king a very rare exception. Each subordinate ruler exercised in his own province absolute authority ; but his office and his ^ [In the Mysore all Goverumeiit lands are held on kanddyam, i.e. a fixed money assessment. An hereditary right of occnpatiou is attached to all such lands. As long as the holder pays the Govern- ment dues he has no fear of displacement, and virtually possesses an absolute tenant right as distinct from that of propiietorship. If Government needs the land for public purposes, he is always paid compensation, fixed either by mutual consent or under the Land Acquisition Act. See Rice's Gazetteer of Mysore and Coorrj.'] 320 A Mission to the Mysore head were always at the disposal of the king, unless, indeed, he were protected by his power, or by troublous times. Revenue and legal authority were constantly vested in the same officers. Trial by jury was in use ; the number of jurors consisting of not less than five ; or whatever might be the number, it was always odd, in order that, on a division, there might be a majority, the verdict of the majority holding good.^ In observing any department of Hindu life, one soon perceives that all its relations are pervaded by a reigning peculiarity. Besides the distinctions of ancestr}', Avealth, and education, which everywhere graduate society, here exists an artificial order, by which persons close in neigh- bourhood, and equal in fortune, are rendered incapable of domestic intercourse. This thick barrier, caste, is held to be of divine origin. "Formerly," as the sage Parasara teaches, " when the true-meditating Brahma was desirous of creating the world, there sprang from his mouth beings especially endowed with the quality of goodness ; others sprang from his breast pervaded by the quality of foulness ; others from his thighs, in whom foulness and darkness pre- vailed ; and others from his feet, in whom the quality of darkness predominated. These were in succession beings of the several castes, Brahmans, Kshatriyas, Yaisyas, and Siidras, produced from the mouth, the breast, the thighs, and the feet of Brahma."- The popular account describes ' [Tlie pancMyat, or triljunal of five (or more), is still much resorted to in village disputes, and is very useful as a local court of arbitra- tion. For the rest, there is, everywhere in India, an elaborate system of judicature ; and courts of varying powers, civil and criminal, are conveniently available.] - [This is an echo of the Puruslia-sakla, the Hymn of Man, which occurs in the Rig Veda, and from which caste is supposed to derive divine sanction. This allegorical passage suggests occiqmtion as the Iiasis of caste distinction : the Briihman, sprung from the mouth, being the wise man and teacher ; the Kshatriya, sprung from the arras, being the warrior ; and so on. But the constant name in INDIA : ITS PEOPLE 321 the Kshatriya as born fnjm the creator's arm. These castes have thus distinct origins, and natures equally distinct. They repel the doctrine that " God made of one blood all men to dwell upon the face of the earth " ; and, in opposition to it, maintain, that the different castes of men have natures as dissimilar as the difierent castes of grain, fruit, or animals. Caste is their word for species. Wheat, rice, and Indian corn are dilferent castes of grain ; mangoes, bananas, and tamarinds, different castes of fruit; tigers, camels, and elephants, dilferent castes of animals ; and Urahmans, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas, and Sudras, diil'erent castes of men. " You may say, if you please," they will observe, " that Bnlhmans and Sudras are both men. They are both men, if you will, just as a horse and an ass are both animals ; but as you never can make an ass of a horse, nor a horse of an ass, so you can never make a Brahman of a Svidra, nor a Siidra of a Brahman." The idea that the out-castes are yprung from the same stock as the rest of mankind is scouted with disgust. Into these four divisions, then, is society parted ; each being a separate commonwealth, with its own heads, its own prejudices, its own pursuits and its own laws. The various castes may not eat together, may not intermarry, may not reside in the same house, and may not assume each other's professions. Thus they are really wider apart than if separated by national distinctions, or even than races alien Sanskrit for caste is varna^colour ; and this, too, may be au indica- tion as to the origin of the institution. The Aryans were a fair race, the aborigines of India mucli darker. Professor Maedonell says: '•The gulf between the two races need not have been wider tlian that wliicli, at the present day, in the United States, divides the wliites from the negroes. When the latter are described as men of 'colour,' the identical term is used which, in India, came to mean 'caste.'" Thus caste may be described as tlic outcome of "etlinic variations and trade -guilds," but it early took to Itself the strongest religious sanctions, and tlireatens disobedience to its rules with the direst spiritual penalties.] 21 322 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE in blood and complexion. Again, the calling is transmitted from father to son, and it passes on through indefinite genera- tions. The design of this was doubtless to secure perfection in the various departments of trade. Whether it has done this or not, it has certainly established professional genea- logies. " Old houses " and " ancient families " are common things in India. Every tailor may confidently reckon that his sires clipped and fitted since before the days of the Caesars, and every barber can boast an ancestry of barbers who shaved in remote antiquity : the weaver, too, the joiner, the potter, the Avasherman, and the blacksmith, may each pride himself that the line of his fathers stretches up through long centuries. How far this has contributed to the progress of the arts appears in the fact, that for ages the arts have made no progress. This system would, in an unsettled state of society, prevent arts from being lost, and for some generations would promote advancement ; but in the lapse of ages, stagnation must result ; because natural adaptation is violated, and a settled order of pro- ceeding formed, which all are trained from infancy to revere, and which no one thinks of breaking. Great nicety in manual execution might be expected from hereditary artisans ; and this has been attained in India, perhaps, more than in any other country, — but at the price of all originalit3\ AVith the rude implements used fifty generations since, the Hindu weaver, carver, or goldsmith executes most delicately; but he wotdd deem it presumptuous to think of improving on the plans of the ancients, who were far wiser than men of modern days. The duties of the several castes are thus dclined in the Vishnu Purdna : " The Brahman should make gifts, should worship the gods with sacrifices, should be assiduous in studying the Vedas, should perform libations and ablutions with water, and should preserve the sacred flame. For the sake of subsistence he may offer sacrifices on behalf of others, and may instruct them in the Sh(hfnts ; and he may accept INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 323 presents of a liberal description. . . . The man of the warrior-tribe (Kshatriya) should cheerfully give presents to the Brdlinians, perform various sacrifices, and study the Scriptures. His especial sources of maintenance are arms, and the protection of the earth. The guardianship of the earth is, indeed, his especial province : by the discharge of this duty a king attains his object, and realises a share of the merit of all sacrificial rites. By intimidating the bad, and cherishing the good, the monarch who maintains the discipline of the ditferent castes, secures whatever region he desires. Brrdima, the great parent of creation, gave to the A^aisya the occupation of commerce, and agriculture, and the feeding of flocks and herds, for his means of livelihood ; and sacred stud}', sacrifice, and donation, are also his duties, as is the observance of fixed and occasional rites." "Attendance on the three regenerate castes ^ is the province of the Sudra ; and by that he is to subsist, or by the profits of trade, or the earnings of mechanical labour. He is also to make gifts ; and he may offer the sacrifices in which food is presented, as well as obsequial offerings." The Bnlhmans, the beings who, " especially endowed with the quality of goodness," sprang from the creator's mouth, are ranged under two divisions ; the one sacred, the other secular. Those of the former class can accept no employment but one strictly religious or literary ; the latter may maintain themselves by any honourable calling not involving commerce or menial duties. The Vaidika, or sacred Bnlhmans, form the Gurus, or religious teachers ; the Puruhitas, or priests, ofiiciating at high solemnities, as also the more ordinary temple Brclhmans, and astrologers. The LauMlia, or secular Brahmans, form accountants, magistrates, and other officers of government ; are employed as munshis by fuiropeans, and even enrol themselves, at least in Bengal, in the British army. I knew one case of a Brilhman being engaged in commerce ; but his brethren did ^ [Called the dwijant, or twice-boin.] 324 A MISSION TO THE MYSOEE not hear it mentioned without evident pain.^ They would not, however, consider it improper to have an interest either in agriculture or commerce, which did not require personal services of an undignified kind. All Erahmans, though dishonoured by trade or labour, deem begging no degradation : indeed, being gods of the earth, it is their special right to receive gifts from all men, and in so domg they only receive their own. " Whatever exists in the universe," says Manu, "is all in effect, though not in form, the wealth of the Brahman, since the Brahman is entitled to all by his primogeniture and eminence of birth. The Brahman eats but liis own food, wears but his own apparel, and bestows but his own alms. Through tlie benevolence of the Brilliman, indeed, other mortals enjoy life." The dignity claimed for this caste is in keeping with the usual extravagance of Hindu imaginations. " When a Brahman springs to light, he is born above the world, the chief of all creatures." And again : " All the universe is subject to the gods, the gods are subject to the mantras,^ the mantras are under the power of the Brahmans, and the Brahmans are therefore our gods." And right Avondrous are the feats which some of these illustrious terrestrials have performed. One of them, in old time, swallowed the sea at three sips ; another turned the moon into a cinder ; and a third manipulated and reduced the sun. The person of a Brahman is sacred : whatever be his crimes, he must not be put to death. It required some nerve in our authorities, at first, to set aside this exemption ; but they did it firmly, and with success. So far from punishing a Brahman murderer, he who laments the victim of a priestly hand is required, for so doing, to make an atonement. A person of inferior caste who strikes a Bnlhman, with the design of hurting liim, " shall be whirled about for a century in hell." ^ [Such instances are luuuh more numerous in these days, though still few.] - [Certain forms of prayer.] INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 325 Beside tlie division of Brrdimans into sacred and secular, they are subdivided into castes. Of these, four are called after the four Vedas ; but that division is refined upon, in consequence of sectarian distinctions : Vishnu Brahmans, of two sects, and several divisions of Shiva Brahmans, contend for the pre-eminence. Most of these sub-castes will not intermarry or eat together. All the other castes are in the same manner split up into sections, each section holding itself in seclusion from all the others. In common parlance, you scarcely ever hear of four, but always of eighteen, castes ; and even that number is far short of the reality. In fact, no one can tell into how many of these unsocial detachments the Hindus, taking all their nations together, have separated themselves.^ The Brahman, having sprung from the creator's mouth, is naturally the teacher of all other men. He alone may read the holy Vrda ; for should one of inferior caste dare to scan even the title of those celestial tomes, his head would split in twain. The Brahman, then, is the depositary of knowledge ; to him alone are confided the mysteries of religion, and the deep teachings of astronomy, logic, ethics, and all higher sciences. Every Brahman receives an educa- tion: with some it does not proceed beyond the simplest elements ; and I remember one who had difficulty in reading, but only one. They invariably know more tongues than their own ; and many of them can fluently speak and write three or four languages, and perhaps speak, without writing, two or three more. Of Sanskrit the common order know nothing but a few prayers, or selections from sacred books, which they cannot translate. But every man who makes the least pretension to respectable attainments, knows some- thing of the sacred tongue. Celtd^rated pandits found schools to which students resort, and with wondrous patience 1 [The Mysore Census of 1891 sliowed tliat the Hindus of that Province were distributed over 75 "recognised main caste divisions," each separated from the other by an inipassalile gulf.] 326 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE commit to memory grammars, lexicons, texts, and treatises. It is positively astounding to hear a Brahman, when asked the meaning of any Sanskrit word, rhyming over synonym after synonym, and counting by his fingers as he goes, till he has reached perhaps twenty, or more ; and this he will do with any important word that occurs. I do not mean that every Brahman who knows Sanskrit can do so ; for tliat is not likely : all heads cannot carry a lexicon through the world ; but it is more frequent than we should imagine possible. The study of language is the one good point in Hindu education ; all the training this gives to the taste, memory, and judgment, the educated Brahmans enjoy ; and it is this, not any studies of logic or metaphysics, which gives them the mental acuteness for which they are remark- able. Of their logic, such as it is, few, very few, know anything ; and their metaphysics are not sufficiently studied to form the general mind. Poetry is an essential part of polite education. No man pretends to learning who cannot make verses. Their rules of composition are very complex, and the styles of versifica- tion manifold. Rhyme takes place, not on the last syllable, as with us, but either on the first or second. The poetical genius of the Hindus is, perhaps, generally ranked too high. Their imagination is active, and frequently bold ; but their knowledge of nature, whence alone the imagination can draw her materials, is limited, and, consequently, their similes, metaphors, and allusions are confined to a narrow range. In modifications endless, the arched eyebrow is presented to you as a bow, and the flashing eye as a resist- less arrow. The lotus usurps the place of all flowers ; its hues, its shape, its scent, and its watery dwelling, figure in ways so numerous as to surprise you at the poet's art, but to leave a painful sense of his poverty. In Hindu poetry, as in all others, the sun and moon shine with frequent and glorious appearances ; and old Ocean, enamoured of the lunar beauty, heaves high his breast for joy, when he sees INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 327 the silver coiintenance turned fully on him, or beginning to reappear after having been averted. The lion, too, though long extinct in India, still appears in every creation of her poets with all his wonted majesty and dread. The groves of India know not the joy of singing-birds ; but the bringa, a musical insect, is made the most of, and his drowsy hum introduced as frequently as if it had all the strings of that sylvan harp on which our summer delights to play. Turgid, grotesque, and sometimes admirably ridiculous images are paraded with great musical display ; but, for a European, harmonious numbers flow in vain to dignify the march of a sun with his head in a blanket, or' a monkey making a pyramid of his tail ! One of the finest passages in the Vishnu Purana is that describing the birth of Krishna, where Dcvaki, his mother, is compared to the dawn and he to the sun. Professor Wilson's prose translation is easily cast into the following form : From Devaki, a fair and glorious dawn, Th' Imperishable, earth's protector, lotus eyed, Arose t' expand the petals of Creation's flower. The day of that high birth, joy tlie horizon decked, As when bright moonbeams gild th' entire sphere. When the Birth-Giver near'd our mortal air, Strange pleasure glowed in breasts of holy men. The strong winds-held their breath, And silent lingered the expectant streams. Then murnuired the rude sea harmonious strains. And to his music new, the spirits bright. And nym[)hs celestial danced for joy and sang. The gods, walking the radiant sky, poured downward flowers, And altar fires had in their scented flame A strange and tender mellowness. In the deep midnight, when the stay of all Was nigli to birth, tlie clouds made music low, And rained a rain of flowers. Until very lately the Hindus could scarcely be said to have a prose literature ; and consequently they had no 328 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE trustworthy history. The absence of prose has this advantage for missionaries, that in many of the languages they will be the founders of that style of writing which, as knowledge advances, must SAvay the public mind. In Kanarese, a good prose style is already formed ; the Brahmans using just that of polite conversation. Authorship, though principally exercised among the Brahmans, is not confined to them : many works have issued from anti-Brahmanical pens ; and not a few from those of men of the inferior castes. The only books in general circulation are scraps of the Purdnas, and collections of fables. But few of the Brahmans profess astronomy. It is confined to the Jotishas ; each town has its wise man, who computes nativities, names the fortunate day for marriages, and the hour when a journey or other enterprise may commence under auspicious stars. The dread of unlucky days, which even among ourselves is sometimes grotesquely combined with general intelligence, reigns in India over all classes, from the highest to the lowest; and perhaps over the highest most firmly. Friday is a very unlucky day. Augury also is associated with astrology : the chief bird of omen being r/arufja, the sacred vulture. The raven is unlucky ; and the house on which an owl lights ought to be forsaken. Lizards and serj)ents are also in the secrets of Fate ; nor are foxes and hares denied a share of her con- fidence. A journey is often postponed, or a day's work aljandoned, because a kite, a snake, or a fox has taken a position that warns of unseen danger. When a man is asked to give his daughter in marriage, he Avaits till he hears a lizard chirp, and when this oracle has pronounced in favour of the proposed alliance, he accepts it. In everytliiug that constitutes general information tlie Bnlhman is utterly deficient. He is taught languages, jxietry, metaphysics, mythology, and possibly the elements of astronomy ; but of the world, its people, and every subject in natural science, he remains in the most complete, and the INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 329 most contented, ignorance. No liistory acquaints him with the past; no travels, with the homes of other people; no maps enable him to carry in his mind a picture of the world ; no geography, to judge of the position, the produc- tions, and the climate of places with outlandish names ; no periodical press informs him of passing events ; and no science unfolds the relations of external nature.^ By his very education he becomes more ignorant ; for ignorance consists not merely in the absence of all ideas on a subject, but also in the presence of false ones. The savage who has no idea at all as to the size of the earth, is less ignorant, and less obstinately so, than the Brahman who thinks he has divine authority for. believing it to be forty thousand times larger than it is. Thus it is with everything he learns. Were he let alone, he might at least form some notion of the size of India : but having once read the Punhias, he is ever after assured that it is twenty-seven thousand miles long, or con- siderably more than the circumference of the whole globe ! So also he learns that the sun travels in a chariot three thousand miles long, with a pole of six thousand ; that mountains are placed on the earth to keep it steady ; that earthquakes result from the yawning of the god-serpent, who upholds the world on his head ; that the Creator " formed birds from his vital vigour ; sheep from his breast : goats fn>m his mouth ; kine from his belly and sides ; and horses, elephants, sarabhas, gayals, deer, canieks, mules, antelopes, and other animals, from his feet ; Avhilst from the hairs of his body sprang herbs, roots, and fruit." Further, that on four mountains, around the grand mount ]\Ieru, grow four trees, each " spreading over one thousand one hundred ' [Eilinatioii (HI European hues is cliaiigiiif; all this. In tlic schools of India, luylhology is cxcludeil in favour of history ; the geograjihy of the West lias displaced the eccentric gcograpliy of the Puianas ; sucli sciences as chemistry, physiology, and astronomy are discrediting the traditional science-teaching of India ; and Brahmans have been the first to avail themselves of thr new learning.] 330 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE yojanas (five thousand five hundred miles)/ and towering aloft like banners on the mountains " ; and that one of these " has apples that are as large as elephants; Avhen they are rotten, they fall on the crest of the mountain, and from their juice is formed the Jambu river." Of that pleasant phenomenon, " a sunshiny shower," he learns the following explanation, which he is bound to consider as true, as we will own it is poetical : — " The water that the sun has drawn up from the Ganga of the skies (the Milky Way), he quickly pours doAvn with his rays, and Avithout a cloud : and men who are touched by this pure rain are cleansed from the soil of sin, and never see hell ; this is called celestial ablution. That rain Avhich falls when the sun is shining, and Avithout a cloud, is the Avater of the heavenly Ganges (Milky AVay), shed by the solar rays." iS^or are his thoughts of rain in general much more cleared by Puranic enlightenment. " The sun, with his scorching rays, absorbs the moisture of the earth, and Avith them nourishes the moon. The moon communicates, through tubes of air, its deAvs to the clouds, Avhich being composed of smoke, lire, and Avind, can retain the Avaters Avith which they are charged : they are therefore called ahhras, because their contents are not dispersed. When, hoAvever, they are broken to pieces by the Avind, their Avatery stores descend, bland, and freed from every impurity by the sweetening process of time " ( Vishnu Piirdna). The Ramdyana teaches that Ceylon is not accessible to mortals ; and this is firmly lielieved by thousands Avho arc not five hundred miles from it. ]>eing crowded with such absurdities on every subject, the mind of a r.ri'diman is not so much a dark void chamber, Avhere light and furniture are lacking, as a dark, thronged lumber-room, Avhere a sound idea cannot enter without wounding itself against some store chest, or losing its eye against some splinter of Puranic lore. Their ignorance of the actual Avorld is perfect. Of the ^ [A yojana is varioiislj' calculated as = i'onr or five or nine miles.] INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 331 covintries bordering on Tiidia they have none but the most foggy ideas. Until our late war with China, many of them had scarcely heard its name. Of England their traditions are choice. " When you go from Madras upon the sea, what do you find beyond the sea '? " once asked a respectable banker, in a crowd ; " is it a single town or an extended country 1" " An extended country certainly," "Then you have fields 1 " " Of course." " And who cultivates them ? " " Persons who follow that calling." " Yes ; but wliat kind of people are they? are they black or white 1 " "White, to be sure." " What ! white like yourself ? " " Yes, certainly." " And do they labour in the fields like ryots 1 " " That they do, and far harder, too." " Only think," they all cried out, with laughter and astonishment ; " only think of Englishmen working in the fields like ryots ! " They had never seen an Englishman, but as a soldier or a gentleman. Curiosity was whetted by this discovery, and he proceeded : " Then what grows in your fields'? rice?" " ISTo." "What! no rice?" "Xo." " :N''ot in the whole country?" "Not an ear." They looked at each other with wide eyes, and cried, " Abah / abaJi / how queer ! a country without rice ! " My examiner, returning to the charge, said : " Well, but if you have no rice, you have at least ragi?" "No; we have no ragi." " No ragi ! neither rice nor ragi ! Who ever heard of a country without either rice or ragi?" Had I told them of a country without either soil or sky, they could not have stared more exquisitely. " Ah ! " exclaimed a youth, less able than the rest to conceal his thoughts, "I always knew how it was; originally they were inhabitants of this country, but a curse drove them away ; and now they are trying to return." The men who were taking part in the conversation glanced at me to see if I were offended, but did not seem disposed to difter with their indelicate neighbour. Not wishing to leave our nation in so low esteem, I said, " I will tell you a tale out of one of your own books." They always relish a tale ; and forthwith I 332 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE had every ear. "A wliite crane was one day fisliing by a tank, when, looking up, he saw a swan, and, struck with his phimage, thought he must be a relation of his own. ' Stranger,' he cried, ' whence do you come, and whither are you bound V 'I come,' said the swan, ' from Satyaloka ' (the heaven of Brahma, whose chariot is drawn by swans), 'and to Satyaloka am I returning.' 'And, pray, what kind of a place is Satyaloka 1 ' ' Oh, it is the dwelling of the glorious Brahma ; I could not make you understand what kind of a place it is.' ' But you must tell me ; I desire to know.' ' Well, if you will know, it is a gorgeous place : for stones, we have jewels ; for sand, gold dust ; for watet, ambrosia ; and everything equally superb.' ' But,' asked the crane, little excited by such fineries, 'have you any frogs there ? ' ' Frogs there ! ' rejoined the swan ; ' no ; Ave have no frogs there.' 'Then,' observed the crane, 'you may go back to Satyaloka, if you are in the mind ; but I have no notion of a country without frogs.' " Ever apt to catch the moral of a fable, they laughed, pointed to the youth, and said : " He, then, is the crane, for thinking your country was cursed, because you have no rice or ragi." Then followed a crowd of questions, as to what we lived upon. On one occasion, a Brrdiman, who had long resided in Bangalore, asked me to give him some account of England. Before doing so, I required him to tell me just what he had hetxrd. He said : " The common belief among us is, that when you get beyond the sea, you find Londonpafna, ' London city ' ; and that one city is the whole of England : it has eighteen streets ; each street is inhabited by one caste ; each caste is distinguished from the other by a peculiar head-dress ; and over all these is the kingw///o/v' ! " Though the word " Company " is constantly on their lips, as designating the power by which they are ruled, scarcely any of them, beyond the limits of the Presidencies, has the least idea of its meaning. Whether it be man, woman, or child, a country, king, or army, they cannot tell ; and very, very INDIA : ITS PEOPLE 3 3 3 few of the luillioiis who bow before that potent name, are aware that it denotes a handfiil of peaceable merchants. Many, in the neighbourhood of English settlements, are said to be under the impression that the Company is an old woman, who never dies ; but this is very likely to have originated with some wag among our own countrymen.^ Taking, then, the entire mental condition of an educated Hindu, — tliat is, of the better order of Erahmans, — it is very peculiar, lie has mucli mental culture, the culture of early and close study, of consideraljle acquirements in language, of an acquaintance with elaborate productions, and of poetry as studied, as committed to memory, and as attempted, if not actually composed. These qualifications, with some turn for metaphysics, and considerable practice in familiar argument, present a mind far advanced in refine- ment. But in all its movements you see the fatal effects of the instruction it has received. It has studied, and in studying has grown quick and acquisitive ; but the facts it has learned are nonsense and absurdity. It is an eye trained to see in a cavern ; remarkably quick to discover objects in its own dim light, but unable to bear the day. The Hindu mind is slow to receive new facts : leave it among polemics, poesy, speculation, and language, it is at home ; but every fact that bursts upon it from the universe without dazzles and annoys ; and if you place before it the great field of knowledge, it cannot endure the blaze, closes before it, and confidently declares it a wild, meteoric flash. Power of application, vigour of memory, quick discernment, and rich fancy, are the good points of the Brahmanical mind ; its vice is narrowness, — a narrowness the most tight and incurable ; but this is the vice not of natural defect, but ^ [Tliese paragraphs may be greatly modified. To say notliing more of the schools, the vernacular ncwspajier is becoming a very influential means of popukiv enliglitenment. Matters toucliing the doings of Ciovernment are eagerly read and discussed ; nor are the people slow to interest themselves in foreign, and especially Britisli, news.] 334 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE of educational perversity. The Brahman has the learning of a scholar, with the ignorance of a child, and the super- stition of a savage.^ The second caste in rank, the Kshatriya, or warrior-tribe, sprang from the breast or arrj of Br;lhma, and were, as will be remembered, " pervaded by the quality of foulness ; being thus inferior to the Brahman, who was ' endowed with the quality of goodness.' " From this caste all kings ought to be chosen ; but even the prince is, in birth, second to the meanest Brahman in his realm. The Brahman will fawn upon him with hyperbolical flatteries, and cringe before him with abject servility : but he M'ould not sit down at his board, or drink from a cup offered by his hand. Did he do so, he would lose his caste. It is now matter of doubt whether the Kshatriya caste is not extinct ; but the Rajputs claim to be its representatives, as do also some ancient dynasties. From all the glimpses which the native writings afford of military character as existing in this caste, and from ^ [A dilTerent descri[)tioii is required now. Since Mr. Arthur's time the English language and learning have invaded India, and the Brahmans have been the first to avail themselves of the new opportunity. Mathematies, science, history, law — in all these branches of knowledge Brahmans liave proved themselves both eager and competent. University graduates and undergraduates are numerous and are increasing astonisliingly, while "failed matriculates" are a large class by themselves! The vernacular scliools also are now wholly different from those of Mr, Arthur's time. They too, like the High Schools and Colleges, are shaped, 7nutaiis mutandis, after Western models, and teach the knowledge of tlie West. I have in my possession now vernacular books on Indian History, Physical Geography, Astronomy, and Chemistry — all written by Brahmans ; and the schools always have a full proportion of Brahmans. Even the members of priestly (Faidika) Brahman house- holds attend school in large numbers and take their jilacc in the various examinations appointed by Government. So this wide-awake class are adding knowledge to natural abtuteness, and are preparing themselves to become, wlien caste will let them, citizens of the world. Needless to add, this new knowledge cannot leave their suiierstitions untouched ; but they die hard.] INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 335 much still observable among tlie nobler Raji)uts, it is not to be doubted that they were often animated by high martial daring. As a soldier, the Hindu is underrated among us. In their early wars, the chariot and the elephant figured largely. The variety of their weapons is great, and frequently tlie workmansliip exquisite. Among their more ancient arms are the bow ; swords, knives, and spears of the finest steel ; and coats of mail, described as admirably wrought. At present tliey produce every description of firearm, from the finest brass cannon down to the most clumsy matclilock. Tliey also manufacture gunpowder, and are expert at fireworks. The success of the English in India has been altogether so marvellous, that, to account for it, the Hindus are repre- sented as having been in all ages despicable poltroons. A diff'erent oi-inion, liowever, is expressed by those who Avrite more recently, and who have better weighed their history. They do not indeed describe them as possessing, in general, that " bull-dog courage," of which our armies boast ; but they acknowledge, that in every war where their sympathies are engaged, tliey entitle themselves to high respect as soldiers. No one can read the narrative of Arrian, Avithout feeling that even Alexander, and his conquering jihalanxes, found the Hindus anything but despicable foes. In the first great battle, after he crossed the Indus, we are told that nearly all the Indian cavalry Avere cut in pieces, on the field ; that the infantry did not retreat till they saw their cavalry destroyed, and the elephants in hopeless confusion ; that two princes, and all the commanders of both hifantry and cavalry, AA'ere among the slain ; and that the defeated king, Porus, retreated Avith a fierce calmness, Avhich the Greek historian contrasts Avith the conduct of the King of Persia, and Avhich so moved Alexander, that he took much pains to save and to conciliate him. Arrian, Avhile he states the fact, that Alexander, Avith all his ability and habitude of conquest, only subdued a country including tAvo thousand 336 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE towns, certainly leaves the impression that in no part of Asia did he meet more formidable enemies, or run greater risks. Again, if we take Ferishta, also a liistorian belonging to an invading nation, we find statements that raise Hindu courage to the loftiest points of the heroic. The first Rajah was not defeated till after "an obstinate battle," and then burned himself alive. Another fought desperately for four days, then took refuge in a town, and finally " turned his sword against himself," whereupon "most of his adherents were slaughtered in attempting revenge." In another battle "five thousand IMusalmans in a few minutes drank the wine of martyrdom " ; another Rajah " drew his sword against his own wife and children, and, having despatched them, turned it in despair against himself." Again : " One of the forts called Munge held out for twenty-five days, being full of Rajputs; but when they found the place no longer tenable, some ruslied through the breaches among the enemy, and met that death which they no longer desired to avoid. Some threw themselves headlong from the walls, and were dashed to pieces; while others burned themselves in their houses with their wives and children; so that not one of the garrison survived this fatal catastrophe." At Somnath, the fame of whose gates Lord Ellenborough so gratuitously revived, the Musalmans, who came to destroy the cele- brated idol of the place, commenced their attack while the inhabitants were praying to their god for help, and at once effected an entrance. But they were rushed upon with such fury that "from the time. the king of day expelled the darkness, till the moon, fair bride of the night, illuminateil the heaven with paler rays, the flames of war were not quenched with blood. The Musalmans, wearied out with fatigue, were obliged to abandon all their advantages." The next day was spent in a continuous assault, which proved "more unsuccessful than the first." On the third day the Hindus gave battle in the open field, when Ferishta INDIA: ITS TEOrLE 337 adds: "The firos of adverse ra.Lje illuminated the gleaminf,' field, and death stalked with such power and execution around, that Time, trembling for his empire, wept." These records are not those of cheap victory over an imbecile foe. Our own career in India has elicited, both in our service and against us, displays of native daring which, had they occurred in Grecian history, would be on the lips of all. Heroism Avas never bolder nor nobler than in Clive's sepoys at Arcot. At Bhartpflr, the Indian liadajos, when the gallant 75th recoiled, a sepoy regiment faced and overbore the danger.^ The native needs the leading of his white officer ; but he very seldom fails to do him honour. Cases of panic have occurred, as in Frazer's memorable charge at Perwunt Durrah ; - but, in all the daring strokes of his Indian career, Lake was never so disgracefully forsaken by sepoys as he had been by British troops at Castlebar. The various nations of India differ much in bravery, as in everything else. The iidiabitants of the low countries on the coast are far inferior to those in the tablelands, the hilly districts, and especially to those of the north-Avest provinces. Had the places chiefly resorted to by Europeans hiin in the Mysore, the Mahratta country, Rohilkhand, or Delhi, they would have brought aAvay a different impression of Hindu courage. Were not this view of native character intimately con- nected with important moral considerations it would be to me a matter of comparatively little interest. We shall feel more or less deeply our obligation to benefit India, in proportion as we do or do not see tlie hand of God in bringing it and us into the singular relation we now sustain. When we see Clive at Arcot with eighty English and a hundred and twenty sepoys repulsing ten thousand men ; in Bengal, defeating, with three thousand, the Subadhar at the head of fifty-eight thousand ; acquiring tlie sovereignty ^ See Wilson's Xotes to Mill. - BuUer's Peep at Kurdis/haii. 22 338 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE of thirty millions of souls, when only nine huncbed English- men had yet landed among them ; and, fifteen years after he had been an obscure clerk in Madras, disposing at will of the transcendent empire of the Great ^Mughal : when we see crown after crown fall before us as by enchantment, Tipu vanquished and slain ; the Pindaris annihilated ; the Mahrattas tamed, the Gurkhas humbled, Scindiah sub- jugated, Burmah divided with us, the Panjilb laid at our feet ; and all •within the memory of man, — all, indeed, while one of the leaders in the last assault on Tipu (Wellington) still lives : when we see all this, if we ascribe it only to the dastardly soldiership of the natives, then the review brings no other feeling than national pride. But Avhen we re- member that never before did Asiatic or European win over these nations such miraculous victories ; and that every feat of our countrymen in this race of conquest has been emulated by native auxiliaries ; then the impression is resistless, that the unmatched empire, now reposing under our eye, has been given to us by what Professor Wilson (a historian not addicted either to the marvellous or the spiritual) calls, in reference to the Mahratta war, " an overruling destiny." Yes, never in human afiairs was an overruling destiny more conspicuous. Never, since the world began, was so vast and so civilised a population brought with like speed to be a consolidated and peaceful empire under foreign sway. Of the campaign of the Sutlej, Lord Gough said, that " the hand of God was never more manifest." This may well be applied to our whole Indian career, from the day when a thunderstorm put us in possession of Arcot,^ to the day when the Sutlej swallowed up the strength of the Panjab. God's liand has surely been manifest: whither does it point? Whether the military caste be extinct or not, their peculiar glory is lost. Nearly all the modern kings are indis])utably of lower origin ; recent armies liave been ^ See Oruie. INDIA: ITS PEOPLE 339 composed mainly of Sildras, and in our service the castes are all blended. The third caste, tlie Vaisya, or merchant, springing from the Creator's thigh, and being pervaded by the qualities of foulness and darkness, takes rank below the Kshatriya. This caste usually receive an education sufficient for com- mercial purposes ; and some of them push their way into elegant literature. Xone of them is ever found unable to write and keep accounts, except in case of very deep poverty. Their commercial system is far advanced. Shops of all descriptions abound ; weekly markets are as common as among ourselves ; the religious festivals serve for fairs ; and banks exist everywhere. Their rate of interest is usurious, graduating from one to five per cent, per month. Their circulating medium is gold, silver, and copper money, coined in moulds that will bear comparison with those of some of our continental neighbours. Their pieces descend to the fourth of a farthing. In some Indian countries cowries (a species of small shell) circulate. They have a system of making bargains by signs ; so that buyer and seller can put their hands under a cloth, and, without being observed, can debate and conclude the sale by touches of the fingers. This suspicious mode of dealing is not confined to Hindustan, but is known also in Persia. Their commerce is most defective in means of transport. Kxce[)t upon a few of the great rivers, nearly all carriage is efi'cctcd on the backs of bullocks : where the English have made roads, small bullock-carts are in Tise ; but in the greater part of the country they have only native roads, which in the finest weather are scarcely passable for Avheels, and in the rains are utterly impracticable. The ox toils alone in the work of conveyance ; the elephant and camel are for kings ; the horse is used only as a steed ; the ass is resigned to the Lambani and the washerman ; the mule (although, as shown in a preceding extract, the Vishnu Purana gives an account of their creation as a separate species) is little known ; and the day of locomotives 340 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE is to come.^ The commencement of that day -swll mark a new era in the commercial history of India, and will be fertile of results in universal commerce. It will disclose unthought-of resources, and stir drowsy communities to wakeful enterprise. It will tend more than any other material cause to break up the monotony of Hindu life, and to carry all things onward with unheard-of progress. Xor could we easily overrate its tendency to complete the stability and consolidation of the British government, and to aid the diffusion of that light before which superstition hides. Marine commerce offends the genius of Hinduism. It is impossible to be long at sea without violating ceremonial laws essential to purity. Hence considerable difficulty has been found in prevailing on some native regiments to embark ; and no Brahman of sound caste feeling would undertake a long voyage. With them, as with the ancient Persians, this prejudice has much checked naval enterprise : yet a large amount of shipping exists ; but its character is far below the ingenuity of the Hindus. That immobility into which the system of hereditary callings freezes the whole stream of art, has held naval architecture in precisely the same place where it stood long centuries ago. But a new spring is now warming their land, and signs of progress appear. Ships built on our models are increasing in number ; and at Bombay, as is well known, they have produced, both for our Indian trade and for the navy, vessels of the highest order, far exceeding those built at home in strength and durability. The fourth caste, the Sudra, springing from the foot of the Creator, and pervaded by the quality of darkness, is bum to toil and to contempt. To this class belong all labourers in agriculture, and in arts, either the useful or ' [Tlierc are now about 20,000 miles of railway oi)en ; over 30,000 miles of irrigation canals liave been constructed ; while in all tlie provinces wide metalled roads liave been and are still being extensively made.] INDIA : ITS TEOrLE 341 the fine. Among them ediif!ati itch to steal, but from a want of moral principle. This is singularly illustrated by the fact, that at Trichinopoly no English family can keep their property safe without taking into pay a professed thief ; but from the moment he enters their service, all they have is tabooed ; he is not only honest (as to his patron) himself, but he is guarantee for his brethren, prociiring again any article they may pilfer. At housebreaking they are most adroit, ^^^ithout any noise they bore through the mud-wall of a native house, and carry off ever}' article from the very apartment where the family are asleep. " In the dark they dig through houses, which they had markeil for themselves in the daytime" (Job). 360 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE Perhaps no country lias furnished such powerful troops of brigands as India. The Pindaris, a band of robbers, who lived without wives, and recruited their ranks by capturing boys and training them, once mounted thirty thousand men. The Mahrattas, too, were only nations of organised and magnificent robbers. It is also a familiar fact, that, in many, if not all, native states, bands of ruffians had license from the authorities to plunder, on condition that they observed certain limits, and paid a tax upon their booty ! The horrors of daliaiti or gang robbery arc portrayed by jMill, with a minuteness which shows that no savages on earth can perpetrate more cold or violent cruelties than the mild Hindu. Even to the present day our OAvn government has much difficulty to suppress, in the northern countries, this cherished remnant of former times. But of all the organisations to which Hindu brigandism gave birth, the most startling is that of the Thugs. These are a fraternity, composed both of Hindus and Musalmans who agree to worship the goddess Kali, and to spend their lives in presenting to her the greatest possible number of human sacrifices. They usually travel in gangs under the guise of merchants. In their noviciate they practise first as grave-diggers, disposing of the corpses of victims, and afterwards as entrappers, leading parties into the company of the gang. After due time they are initiated into the more honourable order of strarigJers, who at a given signal cast over the head of the victim a noose formed on a handkerchief and dispatch him in an instant. Higher than the strangler ranks the guru, who instructs novices in the art of strangling ; and each gang has its sirdar, or captain. They proceed in all things by religious laws ; never start on an expedition without favoi;rable omens ; and every murder is followed by a sacrifice to their goddess. The c'ntrapi)ors having led victims into the snare, a favourable place is chosen for a halt; the grave-diggers prepare the holes ; the stranglers in the meantime take their stations; at the signal the noose INDIA: ITS PEOPLE .''Ol is thrown, and in a few minutes the bodies are so neatly buried that only a practised eye would suspect a grave. The existence of this fearful confederacy, which spread over all India, can be traced as far back as the eiglith century. The confessions of some ca])tur('d Thugs have been most astounding ; not only as regards the number and address of their murders, but also for the firm con- viction that their calling was religious, and that their trouble came only because they had neglected some rules of their sacred ritual. ^ Benevolence is little understood by the Hindus, except in the form of hospitality to members of the same caste, and in that of aid to poor relatives ; two points in whicli they are worthy of imitation, " A guest," says the VL'^Jmu Purdna, " disappointed by a housekeeper, who turns away from his door, transfers to the latter all his own misdeeds, and bears away all his religious merits." So that the worse the character of the person refused hospitality, the worse for him who refuses. And again : " He who feeds himself, and neglects the poor and friendless stranger in want of hospitality, goes to hell." Throughout India a man travel- ling may count on a reception in the house of those of his own caste. Almsgiving also is strongly recommended in the Shastras, and luuch ])ractised. But it is always for the benefit of the Bnihmans, or those wandering monks Avho " subsist upon alms, and lead an erratic life of self-denial. They wander over the world to see the earth, and perform their ablutions, according to rules prescribed by theVedas.'' All alms are reserved for those gentlemen who choose the pleasures, or, as the Shastra has it, the "self-denial," of a ^ A clear and interesting account of Thuggee will be foniul in the Edinburgh lievietv, Number cxxx. : as also in the works of its tlistingnislied enemy, Colonel Sleenian. [The Tiuig organisation is finally dispersed, and the s]iecial doiiartiuent of the criminal administration created to deal witii that and IkikaiH ceased its operations many years ago.] 362 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE life at once vagrant and sacred. But to those who are poor by birth or by misfortune— to the widow, the orphan, the infirm, or the blind, charity is rarely extended. If the parties be of the same caste, they may have a claim ; but within that limit sympathy is bound up ; and to all suffering beyond it, the Hindu heart is deathly callous. A Brahman would, without moving a muscle, pass an out- caste dying by the roadside, nor would he give him a drink of water to save his life. He would rather let the filthy wretch die, than pollute himself with his touch. The fact is stale, that while you find Bnthmans supporting hospitals for animals and reptiles, you find nothing of the kind for men. The Hindu has little active cruelty. He would seldom inflict pain for the sake of inflicting it : he would not, like Domitian, take the trouble of catching the fly for the pleasure of killing it. But he has an apathy which enables him to look on the most harrowing miseries without a pang. This natural apathy is increased by the joint influence of the caste system, the doctrine of transmigration, and their barbarous penances. Caste severs the cord of brotherhood, by which every suffering man can draw the Christian heart to himself. " Who is that dying in the to^ie of cholera'?" *' Oh, it's a Siidra." This is quite enough : to say it was an eagle or a dolphin would not more ettectually disengage the sympathies. Transmigration again shuts the heart against all sufferings from natural defects or heavy mis- fortunes : these occur only as judgments for the vices of a former birth : if i)eople are crippled, or blind, or bereaved, or left penniless, it is because they deserve so to be. These are just the infamous marks branded, by Providence, on those who ought to be abhorred. Their penances also often exhibit voluntary torments to us all but incredible, familiarity with which, and admiration of them, deaden the com- passion for less severe, though involuntary, pains. Then the Hindu is remarkably impassive. Scarcely any other INDIA : ITS PEOPLE 363 human being can bear fatigue, hunger, and pain as he can. Bearers will carry a heavy traveller, in a heavy palanquin, forty miles in one night, and commence afresh the next evening. All these causes make the Hindu remarkably cold of heart. He will not go out of his way to torture human beings ; but, if revenge or the hope of gain stimulate him, he will do so to the utmost pitch, and as unmoved as if he were cutting sticks. His revenge once roused is unsparing and unquenchable. Coolly and yet furiously he pursues his victim : he will spend his last farthing at law rather than fail to ruin him ; and many cases have occurred in which, to bring upon him public odium, he has starved himself to death. On their matrimonial morality it is neither necessary nor desirable to enlarge. It is such as might be expected from those Avhose sacred books are feculent, whose divinities are patterns of license, some of whose rites are Bacchanalian, and some of whose idols are "a shame even to mention." The pictures of society usually given by the natives them- selves are truly deplorable. Honour and purity, in any such sense as we understand them, they regard, if existing at all, as only the attributes of rare and transcendent characters.^ Actual blamelessness they know to be frequent, but ascribe it not at all to principle, but wholly to surveillance. With the settled axiom, that evil is prevented only by lack of opportunity, society is so framed that one cannot but wonder ^ [This was written more tluDi fifty years ago by a missionary. Last year (1901) Mr. Meredith Townsend, not a missionary, wrote as follows in an article on India: — "Asiatics care . . . nothing about purity . . . holding that lust, like hunger, is neither evil nor good, but a mere appetite, the gratification of whicli, under regulation, is entirely legitimate. They are, therefore, tolerant of lustful sugges- tions even in their religious books, care nothing about keeping them out of their literature and art. . . . But as regards the actual inter- course of the sexes Asiatics are not lax. Tiie incontinence of the young is prevented by a careful systcTU of 1)etrothals and early marriages."] 364 A MISSION TO THE MYSORE how the icy peace left by such a system can ever be broken. But a few hours' familiar talk M'ith the people of any country town will painfully demonstrate that the prevalent disorder full often overleaps those Avails within Avhich conscious guilt seeks to preserve, for its own pride, com- pulsory innocence. The temper of the Hindu is generally even. He lacks vivacity and fire. He is seldom giddy, seldom gloomy ; for the most part, sedate and mild ; but it is the mildness of apathy, not of benignity. He is avaricious of money ; greedy to seize it, firm to hold : but little given to care. His apathy protects him from anticipatory troubles. With Europeans the warmth of domestic anxieties, and the changes in their social standing made by prosperity or reverses, are the springs of many cares. But as to the Hindu, his social position was immutably fixed at birth, and his family affections are moderate. Care therefore loses its sting. An eccentric prodigality chequers their habitual avarice. They will sometimes give amazing sums to erect or adorn a temple, to feast the Brahmans, or to reward the address of an expert flatterer. They have also a passion for fame, and are there- fore sensitive to praise, and captivated with any project that Avill make men " mention their name." The good points of Hindu character are mildness, temper- ance, hospitality, and submissiveness ; the bad points are falsehood, duplicity, apathy, selfishness, avarice, sensuality, and dishonesty. In point of gratitude, and a capability of becoming attached to their masters, the Hindus have been much belied. Considering their religious and moral instruc- tion they are not below other nations in these particulars. The Hindu mind is patient, fertile, and astute ; close in application, prolific in fancy, and keen in discernment. It lacks breadth and fire. Its c