From Adam's Peak to Elephanta — Text and Context

. PAGES The Suez Canal--Port Said--Gulf of Suez--The Red Sea-- Colombo--Its streets and population--Picturesque glimpses--Tommy Atkins in a jinrickshaw--The Tamils and the Cinghalese--Costume and Character--Language and Literature--The British and the Eurasians--Social arrangements and amenities--“Spicy gales”--The coco-nut palm--A catamaran 5–25

KANDY AND PEASANT LIFE.

Primitive habits of the Cinghalese--“Ajax” arrives from England--A peasant-cabin near Kandy--Marriage-customs-- Devil-dancing--Kalua and Kirrah--Their rice-fields and mode of life--The great Buddhist temple at Kandy--The tooth-relic--Ancient MSS.--A Librarian-priest--The talipot palm--The British and the natives--The “oyster”-- Nuwara Ellia 26–39

Cinghalese views on Politics--Kornegalle--The Elephant-rock--The general landscape in Ceylon--Tanks and irrigation--The Paddy tax--Modern Commercial policy--Poverty of the people--The village bath--Decorum and passivity in manners--The bazaar and the shops--My friend the opium-seller--The policeman--The gaol and the prisoners--A Tamil official and his mode of life--The Bungalow--Mosquitos--Vegetable curries--The Hindu priest in the household--Native servants, their relation to British masters--The pariahs, and our slum-dwellers 40–59

ADAM’S PEAK AND THE BLACK RIVER.

Ascent of Adam’s Peak--A night on the summit--The unclad natives endure the cold--Advantage of sun-baths--A society for the encouragement of nudity--Moonlight view from the summit of the Peak--History of the mountain-- Sunrise--The shadow on the mist, and other phenomena-- Adam’s foot-print--The pavilion on the summit, and the priests--Caliban doing _poojah_--Descent by the pilgrim-track--The great woods--Fauna and Flora-- Ratnapura, the city of jewels--Boat-voyage down the Kaluganga to Kalutara--Descent of rapids--Kalua enjoys the voyage--A tea-planter at home--Wage-slavery on the tea-plantations--The tea-factory--Letters from “Ajax” about the coolies 60–85

BRITISH LAW-COURTS AND BUDDHIST TEMPLES.

The courts a great centre of popular interest--A means of wreaking personal revenge--The district court--A case of burglary--The British ideal of life does not appeal to the natives--A Tamil student of philosophy--To Dambulla in a bullock-cart--A coterie of Eurasians--The cave-temples of Dambulla--A boy-priest and his cook--Other Buddhist temples 86–97

ANURÁDHAPURA: A RUINED CITY OF THE JUNGLE.

A night in the “mail-coach”--The present village of Anurádhapura--“Pools of water and a habitation for the bittern”--The remains of the Brazen Palace--The oldest tree in the world--Ruins of enormous _dágobas_--Specimens of early sculpture--Temples, porticos, stone troughs, cisterns, bathing tanks--A fine statue of Buddha--The city as it was in the 7th century--Its history--View to-day from the Abhayagiria dágoba--Moral and sentimental reflections 99–115

A NIGHT-FESTIVAL IN A HINDU TEMPLE.

The festival of Taypusam--The temple, the crowd, and blowing up of trumpets in the full moon--Image of Siva, the raft and the sacred lake--Hymns and offerings to the god-- Fearful and wonderful music--Temper of the crowd, and influences of the ceremonial--Interior of Temple--The _lingam_ and the worship of sex--The bull Nandi--Great procession of the gods round Temple--Remindful of Bacchic processions--The Nautch girls, their dress, and dances-- Culmination of the show--Revelation of Siva 116–134

_A VISIT TO A GÑÁNI._

Two schools of esoteric teachers, the Himalayan and South Indian--A South-Indian teacher--Three conditions for the attainment of divine knowledge or _gñánam_--The fraternity of Adepts--_Yogam_ the preparation for _gñánam_--The _yogis_--Story of Tilleináthan Swámy--Democratic character of his teaching--Compare stories of Christ-- Tamil philosophy and popular beliefs concerning Adepts-- The present teacher, his personality and habits--“Joy, always joy” 137–152

CONSCIOUSNESS WITHOUT THOUGHT.

What is the nature of a Gñáni’s experience? Answer given in modern thought-terms--Slow evolution of a new form of consciousness--Many a slip and pause by the way--A consciousness without thought--Meaning of “Nirwana”-- Phenomena of hypnotism--Theory of the fourth dimension-- The true quality of the soul is Space, by which it is present everywhere--Freedom, Equality--The democratic basis of Eastern philosophy 153–163

METHODS OF ATTAINMENT.

Physical methods adopted by some of the _yogis_-- Self-mesmerism, fasting, severe penance--The _Siddhi_ or miraculous powers--Mental methods, (1) the Concentration, and (2) the Effacement of Thought--Difficulties of (1) and (2), but great value for the Western peoples to-day--Concentration and Effacement of Thought are correlative powers--They lead to the discovery of the true Self--Moral methods, gentleness, candor, serenity-- Non-differentiation--The final deliverance--Probable difference between Eastern and Western methods of attainment--Through the Will, and through Love 164–182

TRADITIONS OF THE ANCIENT WISDOM-RELIGION.

Difficulty of giving any concise account of Indian teaching-- Personal _rapprochement_ to the Guru, but alienation from the formalities of his doctrine--Mediæval theories of Astronomy and Geology--Philosophy of the Siddhantic system--The five elements, five forms of sensation, etc.-- The twenty-six _tatwas_, and the Self which stands apart from them all--Evolution and Involution--The five shells which enclose the soul--Death and Birth--Crudities of Astrology, Physiology, etc.--Double signification of many doctrines--Resemblance of modern Guru to a Vedic Sage--His criticisms of the English and of English rule-- Importance to the West of the Indian traditions 183–203

THE SOUTH INDIAN TEMPLES.

Colombo to Tuticorin--The plains of the Carnatic--Thirty great Dravidian temples--The temple at Tanjore--Colossal monolithic bull--The pagoda, a fine piece of work-- “It casts no shadow”--Subsidiary temples and frescoed arcades--A regiment of _lingams_--The Tanjore palace-- The temple at Mádura--The _Choultrie_, the Eastern gate, and the Hall of a thousand Columns--Crowds in the temple precincts, gloom and stillness of the interior--Juggernath cars in the streets--The Temple of Chidámbaram, a goal of pilgrimage and a den of Brahmans--The weird hall of a thousand columns, haunted by bats--A cranky Brahman-- Goldsmiths at work for the Temple--A truculent pilgrim 209–226

The streets of Madras--Comparison with Ceylon--Impositions of drivers, boatmen, hotel managers, etc.--A straggling dull city--A centre however of Hindu political and literary life--Visit to Adyar and the Theosophist headquarters--Blavatsky curios--Scenes of native life-- The river Hooghly--Calcutta city and population-- Festival of bathing in the Ganges--A Circus--Poverty of the people--Meeting of the Dufferin Fund--British philanthropy in India--A native school--A group of Bengalis--Their love of long yarns, and of music--Panna Lall and his gymnast friends--Chundi Churn performs on the _sítar_--The Indian music 227–251

The plains of the Ganges--The crops, and the peasant life-- Sentiment of the great expanse--Sacredness of the river-- Far-back worship of Siva--Benares a centre of Hindu life-- The streets and shops--The Golden Temple--The riverside, characteristic scenes--A spring festival--A talk with a yogi--The burning ghauts--Panna Lall wants to bathe-- Religious ablutions--A self-mutilated fakir 252–267

THE ANGLO-INDIAN AND THE OYSTER.

Allahabad--Difficulty of really knowing India--The great gulf of race-difference--The Hindu does not understand “Duty”--The duty-loving Englishman does not understand the Hindu--Race-divisions in the United States--We came to India as conquerors--The gulf remains, and will remain-- Criticisms by an educated “oyster”--Aligarh affords an instance of friendly feeling between the two sections-- The M.A.O. College--A convivial dinner-party--Sir Syed Ahmed and the Mahomedan influence--Horse-fair at Aligarh-- Cabulees, and a native wrestling-bout 268–281

Approach to Delhi--The Fort and the old Palace--The town and population--The Jumma Mosque--The environs of Delhi, a waste of ruined cities--The Kutab Minar and the old fortress of Lalkab--Agra, the Fort and the Palace--The Jessamine Tower--Lovely marble and mosaic--The Taj at twilight--A fairy scene--Flocks of green parrots-- Moonlight on the Jumna--“Do we not respect our women?”-- A coterie of professors--The population of Agra--Scenes at the railway stations--A favorable specimen of Young India--An incident in the train 282–298

The native Bombay a wonderful spectacle--Workshops, saleshops, opium dens, theatres, temples, mosques--The population, Mahrattas and Parsees--The modern city and the manufacturing quarter--The Parsee nose--Justice Telang, a Mahratta--The Bunya Caste--Tribhovan Das at home--View from the Malabar Hill--A Bunya wedding--Native theatres-- The Salvation Army--Across the harbor to Elephanta--The great cave-temple--Sculptured panels, the Hindu Trinity-- The human-divine life of Siva--Impressive effect of the whole--An opium den--Various sorts of “ecstasy” produced by these and other drugs--The proletariat at home--Music and conversation--Dream of a “United India”--Bombay at night--On the way to Aden--A calm and starlit ocean--A beautiful panorama. 299–324

_THE OLD ORDER AND THE NEW INFLUENCES._

THE OLD ORDER: CASTE AND COMMUNISM.

Remarkable social movement in India--Complexity and corruption of Caste system--The Brahmans--Defence of caste from native point of view--Specimens of caste regulation--Caste tyranny--Story of a widow re-marriage-- Pharisaism of respectability--Caste in its other aspect as a Trade-Guild--Tempering competition--Instances of this--Communism, the second great feature of social life-- Village, Caste and Family communism--The last still flourishing--Anecdotes--Old sanctions being destroyed by commercialism--Sacredness of Family tie 327–344

THE NEW INFLUENCES: WESTERN SCIENCE AND COMMERCIALISM.

Great spread of Western education--Euclid and Political Economy at Tuticorin--Schools and Colleges throughout India--Cricket and golf--Young India--“We are all Agnostics now”--Similar spread of Commercialism--Interior of a cotton-mill at Bombay--Large profits, conditions of labor--Numerous trading posts and clerkships--The National Indian Congress--Its ideals and influence-- Disliked by the British--The social gulf again--Our future in India--The break-up of village life--Problem of pauperism, Sir Henry Maine--Incongruity of Commercialism with the genius of India--Probable ascendancy of the former for a time--But only for a time 345–363

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE SEASHORE NEAR COLOMBO _Frontispiece_

PLOUGHING IN THE RICE-FIELDS 32

BUDDHIST LIBRARIAN-PRIEST 34

KANDY, GENERAL VIEW 36

NATIVE STREET, WITH SHOPS 47

VEDDAHS, ABORIGINES OF CEYLON 56

RICE-BOATS ON THE KALUGANGA 76

GROUP OF TAMIL COOLIES 80

TAMIL GIRL PLUCKING TEA 83

BULLOCK-HACKERY, OR LIGHT CART 87

CINGHALESE COUNTRY-CART 92

JETAWANARÁMA DÁGOBA 98

A RUINED BATHING-TANK, ANURÁDHAPURA 108

SMALL GUARDIAN FIGURE, BUDDHIST SCULPTURE 113

GREAT PAGODA AT TANJORE 208

TEMPLE AT TANJORE, GENERAL VIEW 211

TEMPLE AND TANK AT MYLAPORE 224

WOMAN PLAYING SÍTAR 248

THE GHAUTS AT BENARES 260

THE DEWAN KHAS AT DELHI 283

THE JUMMA MUSJID AT DELHI 285

MARBLE SCREEN-WORK 289

STREET IN BOMBAY, NATIVE QUARTER 300

THE GREAT CAVE AT ELEPHANTA 311

PANEL SCULPTURE, SIVA AND PARVATI 314

INTERIOR SHRINE AT ELEPHANTA 316

SIDE-CAVE, ELEPHANTA 322

FROM ADAM’S PEAK TO ELEPHANTA.

Imagine a blue-green ribbon of water some 60 yards wide, then rough sandy dunes 10 or 20 feet high, and then beyond, the desert, burning yellow in the sun--here and there partly covered with scrub, but for the most part seeming quite bare; sometimes flat and stony, sometimes tossed and broken, sometimes in great drifts and wreaths of sand, just like snowdrifts, delicately ribbed by the wind--the whole stretching away for miles, scores of miles, not a moving form visible, till it is bounded on the horizon by a ridge of hills of the most ethereal pink under an intense blue sky. Such is the view to the east of us now, as we pass through the Suez Canal (19th October, 1890). To the west the land looks browner and grayer; some reeds mark a watercourse, and about 10 miles off appears a frowning dark range of bare hills about 2,000 feet high, an outlying spur of the hills (Jebel Attákah) that bound the Gulf of Suez.

In such a landscape one of the signal stations, with its neat tiled cottage and flagstaff, and a few date palms and perhaps a tiny bit of garden, is quite an attraction to the eye. These stations are placed at intervals of about 6 miles all along the canal. They serve to regulate the traffic, which is now enormous, and continuous night and day. The great ships nearly fill the waterway, so that one has to be drawn aside and moored in order to let another pass; and though they are not allowed to go faster than 4 miles an hour they create a considerable wave in their rear, which keeps washing down the banks. Tufts of a reedy grass have been planted in places to hold the sand together; but the silt is very great, and huge steam-dredges are constantly at work to remove it. Here and there on the bank is a native hut of dry reeds--three sides and a flat top--just a shelter from the sun; or an Arab tent, with camels tethered by the leg around it. At Kantarah the caravan track from Jerusalem--one of the great highways of the old world--crosses the canal; there are a few wood and mud huts, and it is curious to see the string of laden camels and the Arabs in their unbleached cotton burnouses coming down--just as they might be coming down from the time of Father Abraham--and crossing the path of this huge modern steamship, with its electric lights and myriad modern appliances, the _Kaiser Wilhelm_ now going half-way round the globe.

The desert does not seem quite devoid of animal life; at any rate along the canal side you may see tracks in the sand of rabbits and hares, occasional wagtail-like birds by the water, a few crows hovering above, or a sea-gull, not to mention camels and a donkey or two, or a goat. Near Port Said they say the lagoons are sometimes white with flocks of pelicans and flamingoes, but we passed there in the night. It was fine to see the electric light, placed in the bows, throwing a clear beam and illuminating the banks for fully half a mile ahead, as we slowly steamed along. The driven sand looked like snow in the bluish light. The crescent moon and Venus were in the sky, and the red signal lights behind us of Port Said.

The canal is 90 miles long, and a large part of it follows the bed of a very ancient canal which is supposed to have connected the two seas. It appears that there is a very slight movement of the water through it from south to north.

We are now nearing Suez, and the heat is so great that it reverberates from the banks as from a furnace; of course the deck is under an awning. The remains of a little village built of clay appears, but the huts have broken down, split by the fierce sun-rays, and some light frame-houses, roofed and walled with shingles, have taken their place.

_Gulf of Suez._--The town of Suez is a tumbledown little place, narrow lanes and alleys; two-storied stone houses mostly, some with carved wooden fronts, and on the upper floors lattice-work, behind which I suppose the women abide. Some nice-looking faces in the streets, but a good many ruffians; not so bad though as Port Said, where the people simply exist to shark upon the ships. In both places an insane medley of Arabs, fellahs, half-castes and Europeans, touts, guides, donkey-boys, etc., and every shade of dress and absurd hybrid costume, from extreme Oriental to correct English; ludicrous scenes of passengers going on shore, ladies clinging round the necks of swarthy boatmen; donkey-boys shouting the names of their donkeys--“Mr. Bradlaugh, sir, very fine donkey,” “Mrs. Langtry,” “Bishop of London,” etc.; fearful altercations about claimed _baksheesh_; parties beguiled into outlying quarters of the town and badly blackmailed; refusals of boatmen to take you back to the ship while the very gong of departure is sounding; and so forth. Suez however has a little caravan and coasting trade of its own, besides the railway which now runs thence to Cairo, and has antique claims to a respectability which its sister city at the other end of the canal cannot share.

Now that we are out in the gulf, the sea is deep blue, and very beautiful, the rocks and mountains along the shore very wild and bare, and in many parts of a strong red color. This arm of the Red Sea is about 150 miles long, and I think not more than 20 miles wide at any point; in some places it is much less. We pass jutting capes and islands quite close on the west of us--great rocky ravine-cut masses absolutely bare of vegetation. On the east--apparently about 10 miles distant, but very clear--stands an outlying range of Sinai--Jebel Sirbal by name--looks about 5,000 or 6,000 feet high, very wild and craggy, many of the peaks cloven at the summit and gaping as if with the heat; farther back some higher points are visible, one of which is probably Jebel Musa. A most extraordinary land; at some places one can discern--especially with the aid of a glass--large tracts or plains of loose sand, miles in extent, and perfectly level, except where they wash up in great drifts against the bases of the mountains. Across these plains tall dark columns can be distinguished slowly traveling--the dreaded sand-clouds borne on eddies of the wind.

_Indian Ocean, Oct. 25th._--Much cooler now. In the Red Sea, with thermometer at 90° in the cabins, heat was of course the absorbing topic. Everybody mopping; punkahs in full swing. I believe the _water_ there frequently reaches 90° F., and sometimes 95°; but here it is quite cool, probably not much over 60°, and that alone makes a great difference. It is a queer climate in the Red Sea: there seems to be always a haze, due to dust blown from the shores; at the same time the air is very damp, owing to the enormous evaporation, clothes hung up get quite wet, and there are heavy dews. When the wind is aft the oppression from the heat is sometimes so great that ships have to be turned back and steamed against the breeze; but even so casualties and deaths are not uncommon. Owing to the haze, and the breadth of the Red Sea which is as much as 200 miles in parts, little is seen of the shores. A few rocky islands are passed, and a good many awkward reefs which the passengers know nothing of. The Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb are curious. The passage between the Island of Perim and the Arabian mainland is quite narrow, only a mile or two wide; tossed wild-looking hills on the mainland, 3,000 or 4,000 feet high, with French fortifications. The island itself lower and more rounded, with English fort and lighthouse; but looking very black and bare, though owing to the moisture there is some kind of stunted heathery stuff growing on it. There are a few English here, and a native town of waggon-like tents clustered round the fort; some little fishing and sailing boats along the shores. Turning eastwards along the south coast of Arabia the same awful land meets the eye as in the Gulf of Suez. A continual cloud of dust flies along it, through which one discerns sandy plains, and high parched summits beyond. There must however be water in some parts of this region, as it is back from here in this angle of Arabia that Mocha lies and the coffee is grown.

_Colombo._--I fear that the Red Sea combined with mutual boredom had a bad effect on the passengers’ tempers, for terrible dissensions broke out; and after six days of the Indian Ocean, during which the only diversions were flying-fish outside and scandal-mongering inside the ship, it was a relief to land on the palm-fringed coast of Ceylon. The slender catamarans--or more properly outrigged canoes--manned by dusky forms, which come to take you ashore, are indeed so narrow that it is impossible to sit inside them! They are made of a “dug-out” tree-trunk (see frontispiece), with parallel bulwarks fastened on only 10 inches or a foot apart; across the bulwarks a short board is placed, and on _that_ you can sit. Two arms projecting on one side carry a float or light fish-shaped piece of wood, which rests on the water 8 feet or so from the canoe, and prevents the vessel from capsizing, which it would otherwise infallibly do. Impelled by oars, or by a sail, the boat bounds over the water at a good speed; and the mode of traveling is very pleasant. There is no necessity however to embark in these frail craft, for respectable civilised boats, and even steam-launches, abound; we are indeed in an important and busy port.