THE HOLY CITY OF INDIA. THE Golden Temple was crowded with naked devotees, sacred cows, begging Brahmans, &c., and was a nasty wet place. We had to give the priests a fee of a rupee apiece, in return for which they put a garland of flowers about our necks. This Mundră is the property of a hereditary corporation, and its income is said to be a lakh of rupees, or £10,000 a year. Leaving the court of the temple, we went into an adjacent enclosure, which contains the sacred well, into which flows the water that has been poured over the Mahadeo* in the adjoining temple. The well being a mere sink, is of course putrid, but is, notwithstanding, worshipped with great reverence. There is a stone platform around it, about fifty feet by forty, covered by a solid stone roof, supported on rows of columns. The temple which I have described was formerly on the other side of the well, on what was the most sacred spot in the world. The old location was, however, unfortunately defiled by that violent Mussulman, the Emperor Alum Geer, and the gods and temple were transferred to their present position. One of the goddesses, however, who inhabited the old temple, is said to have been dissatisfied with the change, and to have plunged down this well, where it is thought she still is. The platform around the well was filled with devotees and pilgrims men of different races, dress, and appearance. There was one old Yogee (Hindoo religious mendicant), who squatted on the ground, with his back to a column, and his hands on his knees, silent and motionless. He had made a vow never to move or speak, nor to eat, unless food was put in his mouth. By this process he had attained to * Mahadeo, in whom Seewa is venerated. The form is by means of offerings, which are washed away (?) by a stream of Ganges water. great sanctity, but very poor condition. His head and body had been liberally anointed with cow-dung and Gangesmud by some of his admirers, and I saw many persons saláming and making obeisance to him, but no one seemed to feed the poor wretch. I gave a bystander a few annas, with which a most bountiful meal was purchased. The old fellow ate it with much appetite, but an expression of countenance which seemed to say, "I despise it while I enjoy it." In old times, this place was a great resort for performers of self-imposed penances of which we read so much in tracts; but the practice of self-torture is gradually, but steadily, dying out in Northern India; a great change having been effected by the abolition of the Churruk-poojah by government. This was a festival in which men were swung in the air, supported by iron hooks run under the muscles of the back. The performers used generally to intoxicate themselves by smoking opium. We have all read in missionary tracts of people throwing themselves under the Car of Juggurnath, of men with their limbs fixed in unnatural positions, the nails growing through their hands, &c., but suicide in the Ganges off Benares used to be committed by hundreds every year, of those who wished to die within view of that holy city, and thus secure an immediate transition to eternal felicity. All these barbarous practices, however, are now fast disappearing; and suttees, with the various other forms of self-immolation, were long since prohibited and abolished by the Honorable Company. Both Hindooism and Mahommedanism would seem to be gradually breaking up in the Company's territories; not that there has yet been any great impression produced upon the mass of the population, or that any better creed is being substituted; only there are numerous signs to show that neither of the old religions is in as vigorous a state as it was some years ago, or as Hindooism, at least, is still, in the dominions of some native princes. The musjeeds are mostly out of repair, and in many instances fast going to ruin, ex cept some of them which are kept up by Government. The Mussulmans in India have long abandoned the purity of their old faith, and become more or less infected with Hindoo superstitions, and the great bulk of them rarely go to the mosques, or observe those daily prayers which are so striking to the traveller in other Moslem countries. Among the Hindoos the change is seen more in the graduallyincreasing disregard of caste. A few years ago a Brahman would have been polluted for the day by the touch of a lowcaste man, and would as soon have thought of wearing leather shoes, eating beef, or drinking spirits, as of killing his mother, eating her flesh, and drinking her blood. Now, however, patent leather pumps are very fashionable among those in the cities; the higher classes, whose wealth and position enable them to despise public opinion, eat and drink what they like; and the pollution by touch, if remarked at all, is too inconvenient to be long remembered. It must not be supposed, however, that this disregard of caste is yet at all general. Among the lower classes, that maxim, so general among oriental nations, that "that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man" is still universally and scrupulously observed, and any deviation from the rules of caste is severely punished. Even the more enlightened are in many instances so hampered by the prejudices of their youth, that they would not eat at the same table with one of another caste, or drink water from his cup. Minturn. HINDOO SELF-MUTILATION. ONE morning, as I was about to quit my tent, which was pitched a short distance without the walls of Delhi, in a fine tope of tamarind trees, I perceived a victim standing with his back against a broken pillar, and at a short distance from me. He had assumed that attitude which betokened an expectation of receiving something more tangible than mere courtesy from the benevolence of myself, or any other person whom he might thus silently condescend to supplicate; for with these devotees the social order of things is frequently inverted,-they consider the recipient the benefactor when of their own community, or the giver the beneficiary when of any other. As I came near him, I perceived that he had a thick iron rod passed through his cheeks, riveted at each end, from which a circular piece of iron depended, inclosing the chin. Though the rod passed quite through the tongue, it did not materially affect the articulation; he spoke with some difficulty, but was nevertheless perfectly intelligible. He was an elderly man, of gentle manners and mild aspect, without being offensively filthy, as the members of this strange tribe so frequently are. I invited him to enter the tent, which he immediately did, and to my surprise was very communicative. The iron through his tongue and cheeks had been a penitential infliction to which he had submitted in consequence of the breach of a vow. He declined my invitation to seat himself, but stood erect with his back against the pole of the tent, and entered freely into conversation upon the strange events of his life, answering all my questions with the most perfect readiness; and he appeared gratified at giving me any information, either respecting himself, or the singular customs of the religious fraternity to which he belonged. He stated that he was then under a vow to remain erect for the space of fifteen years. During thirteen of this time he had either stood or walked; yet he suffered little or no inconvenience, sleeping every night in the jungul with his back against a tree, as soundly as the most voluptuous man could upon a bed of down. He confessed, however, that some time after he had commenced the performance of this strange vow he was obliged to be supported with cords when inclined to sleep, and his feet swelled to such a painful degree that he could scarcely stand or walk. After a time, however, this inconvenience ceased, when the performance of his penance became no longer either a pain or a grief to him. This was not the only infliction to which he had voluntarily subjected himself; the fingers of his left hand were so completely bent upwards from the palm, as to form a right angle with the back of the hand, and were thus rendered entirely useless. He further told me that he had been suspended from the branch of a tree during three hundred and sixty-five revolutions of the earth, as he expressed it, or a whole year. He was suspended by a cord with a strong bamboo crossing the end, upon which he sate, while a strap confined him to the rope, and thus prevented his falling: this he described as the severest infliction to which he had ever submitted. I gave him a trifling gratuity, with which he departed perfectly satisfied. The self-tortures inflicted by those fanatics are entirely voluntary; they are merely acts of supererogation*, and are not necessarily enjoined in the Hindoo ritual, as will appear from the Mahabbarat, a work esteemed almost of divine authority among the Hindoos. "Those men who perform severe maceration of the flesh, not authorised by the Sastra †, are possessed of hypocrisy and pride; they are overwhelmed with lust, passion, and tyrannic strength. Those fools torment the spirit that is in the body, and myself who am in them." Oriental Annual. * Supererogation, performance of more than duty requires. |