Far Off Part 9

FOOD.--The most common food is rice; and with this curry is often mixed to give it a relish. What is curry? It is a mixture of herbs, spices, and oil.

Very poor people cannot afford to eat either rice or curry; and they eat some coa.r.s.e grain instead. A lady who made a feast for the poor provided nothing but rice, and she found that it was thought as good as roast beef and plum pudding are thought in England. The day after the feast some of the poor creatures came to pick up the grains of rice that were fallen upon the ground.

The rich Hindoos eat mutton and venison, but not beef; this they think it wicked to eat, because they worship bulls and cows.

A favorite food is clarified b.u.t.ter, called "ghee," white rancid stuff, kept in skin bottles to mix with curry.

Water is the general drink, and there could not be a better. Yet there are intoxicating drinks, and some of the Hindoos have learned to love them, from seeing the English drink too much. What a sad thing that Christians should set a bad example to heathens!

PRODUCTIONS.--There are many beautiful trees in India never seen in England, and many nice fruits never tasted here.

The palm-tree, with its immense leaves, is the glory of India. These leaves are very useful; they form the roof, the umbrella, the bed, the plate, and the writing-paper of the Hindoo.

The most curious tree in India is the banyan, because one tree grows into a hundred. How is that? The branches hang down, touch the ground, strike root there, and spring up into new trees--joined to the old. Under an aged banyan there is shade for a large congregation. Seventy thousand men might sit beneath its boughs.

There is a sort of gra.s.s which grows a hundred feet high, and becomes hard like wood. It is called the bamboo. The stem is hollow like a pipe, and is often used as a water-pipe. It serves also for posts for houses, and for poles for carriages.

There are abundance of nice fruits in India; and of these the mangoe is the best. You might mistake it for a pear when you saw it, but not when you tasted it. Pears cannot grow in India; the sun is too hot for grapes and oranges, excepting on the hills.

The chief productions of India are rice and cotton; rice is the food, and cotton is the clothing of the Hindoo: and quant.i.ties of these are sent to England, for though we have wheat for food, we want rice too; and though we have wool for clothing, we want cotton too.

RELIGION.--There is no nation that has so many G.o.ds as the Hindoos. What do you think of three hundred and thirty millions! There are not so many people in Hindostan as that. No one person can know the names of all these G.o.ds; and who would wish to know them? Some of them are snakes, and some are monkeys!

The chief G.o.d of all is called Brahm. But, strange to say, no one worships him. There is not an image of him in all India.

And why not? Because he is too great, the Hindoos say, to think of men on earth. He is always in a kind of sleep. What would be the use of worshipping him?

Next to him are three G.o.ds, and they are part of Brahm.

Their names are--

I. Brahma, the Creator.

II. Vishnoo, the Preserver.

III. Sheeva, the Destroyer.

Which of these should you think men ought to worship the most? Not the destroyer. Yet it is _him_ they do worship the most. Very few worship Brahma the creator. And why not? Because the Hindoos think he can do no more for them than he has done; and they do not care about thanking him.

Vishnoo, the preserver, is a great favorite; because it is supposed that he bestows all manner of gifts. The Hindoos say he has been _nine_ times upon the earth; first as a fish, then as a tortoise, a man, a lion, a boar, a dwarf, a giant; _twice_ as a warrior, named Ram, and once as a thief, named Krishna. They say he will come again as a conquering king, riding on a white horse. Is it not wonderful they should say that? It reminds one of the prophecy in Rev. xix. about Christ's second coming.

Did the Hindoos hear that prophecy in old time? They may have heard it, for the apostle Thomas once preached in India, at least we believe he did.

Why do the people worship Sheeva the destroyer? Because they hope that if they gain his favor, they shall not be destroyed by him. They do not know that none can save from the destroyer but G.o.d.

The Hindoos make images of their G.o.ds. Brahma is represented as riding on a goose; Vishnoo on a creature half-bird and half-man; and Sheeva on a bull.

Sheeva's image looks horribly ferocious with the tiger-skin and the necklace of skulls and snakes; but Sheeva's _wife_ is far fiercer than himself. Her name is Kalee. Her whole delight is said to be in blood.

Those who wish to please her, offer up the blood of beasts; but those who wish to please her still more, offer up their own blood.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SWING.]

Her great temple, called Kalee Ghaut, is near Calcutta. There is a great feast in her honor once a year at that temple. Early in the morning crowds a.s.semble there with the noise of trumpets and kettle-drums. See those wild fierce men adorned with flowers. They go towards the temple. A blacksmith is ready. Lo! one puts out his tongue, and the blacksmith cuts it: that is to please Kalee: another chooses rather to have an iron bar run through his tongue. Some thrust iron bars and burning coals into their sides. The boldest mount a wooden scaffold and throw themselves down upon iron spikes beneath, stuck in bags of sand. It is very painful to fall upon these spikes; but there is another way of torture quite as painful--it is the swing. Those who determine to swing, allow the blacksmith to drive hooks into the flesh upon their backs, and hanging by these hooks they swing in the air for ten minutes, or even for half an hour. And WHO all these cruel tortures? To please Kalee, and to make the people wonder and admire, for the mult.i.tude around shout with joy as they behold these horrible deeds.

THE CASTES.--The Hindoos pretend that when Brahma created men, he made some out of his mouth, some out of his arms, some out of his breast, and some out of his foot. They say the priests came out of Brahma's mouth, the soldiers came out of his arm, the merchants came out of his breast, the laborers came out of his foot. You may easily guess who invented this history. It was the priests themselves: it was they who wrote the sacred books where this history is found.

The priests are very proud of their high birth, and they call themselves Brahmins.

The laborers, who are told they come out of Brahma's foot, are much ashamed of their low birth. They are called sudras.

You would be astonished to hear the great respect the sudras pay to the high and haughty Brahmins. When a sudra meets a Brahmin in the street, he touches the ground three times with his forehead, then, taking the priest's foot in his hand, he kisses his toe.

The water in which a Brahmin has washed his feet is thought very holy. It is even believed that such water can cure diseases.

A Hindoo prince, who was very ill of a fever, was advised to try this remedy. He invited the Brahmins from all parts of the country to a.s.semble at his palace. Many thousands came. Each, as he arrived, was requested to wash his feet in a basin. This was the medicine given to the sick prince to drink. It cost a great deal of money to procure it; for several shillings were given to each Brahmin to pay him for his trouble, and a good dinner was provided for all. It is said that the prince recovered immediately, but we are quite certain that it was not the water which cured him.

In the holy books, or shasters, great blessings are promised to those who are kind to a Brahmin. Any one who gives him an umbrella will never more be scorched by the sun; any one who gives him a pair of shoes will never have blistered feet; any one who gives him sweet spices will never more be annoyed by ill smells; and any one who gives him a cow will go to heaven.

You may be sure that, after such promises, the Brahmins get plenty of presents; indeed, they may generally be known by their well-fed appearance, as well as by their proud manner of walking. They always wear a white cord hung round their necks.

But we must not suppose that all Brahmins are rich, and all sudras poor; for it is not so. There are so many Brahmins that some can find no employment as priests, and they are obliged to learn trades. Many of them become cooks.

There are sudras as rich as princes; but still a sudra can never be as honorable as a Brahmin, though the Brahmin be the cook and the sudra the master.

But the sudras are not the _most_ despised people. Far from it. It is those who have no caste at all who are the most despised. They are called pariahs. These are people who have lost their caste. It is a very easy thing to lose caste, and once lost it can never be regained. A Brahmin would lose his caste by eating with a sudra; a sudra would lose his by eating with a pariah, and by eating with _you_--yes, with _you_, for the Hindoos think that no one is holy but themselves. It often makes a missionary smile when he enters a cottage to see the people putting away their food with haste, lest he should defile it by his touch.

Once an English officer, walking along the road, pa.s.sed very near a Hindoo just going to eat his dinner; suddenly he saw the man take up the dish and dash it angrily to the ground. Why? The officer's shadow had pa.s.sed over the food and polluted it.

If you were to invite poor Hindoos to come to a feast, they would not eat if you sat down with them: nor would they eat unless they knew a Hindoo had cooked their food. Even children at school will not eat with children of a lower caste,--or with their teachers, if the teachers are not Hindoos.

There was once a little Hindoo girl named Rajee. She went to a missionary's school, but she would not eat with her schoolfellows, because she belonged to a higher caste than they did. As she lived at the school, her mother brought her food every day, and Rajee sat under a tree to eat it. At the end of two years she told her mother that she wished to turn from idols, and serve the living G.o.d. Her mother was much troubled at hearing this, and begged her child not to bring disgrace on the family by becoming a Christian. But Rajee was anxious to save her precious soul.

She cared no longer for her caste, for she knew that all she had been taught about it was deceit and folly; therefore one day she sat down and ate with her schoolfellows. When her mother heard of Rajee's conduct, she ran to the school in a rage, and seizing her little daughter by the hair of the head, began to beat her severely. Then she hastened to the priests to ask them whether the child had lost her caste forever. The priests replied, "Has the child got her new teeth?" "No," said the mother. "Then we can cleanse her, and when her new teeth come she will be as pure as ever. But you must pay a good deal of money for the cleansing." Were they not _cunning_ priests? and _covetous_ priests too?

The money was paid, and Rajee was brought home against her will. Dreadful sufferings awaited the poor child. The cleansing was a cruel business.

The priests burned the child's tongue. This was one of their cruelties.

When little Rajee was suffered to go back to school, she was so ill that she could not rise from her bed.

The poor deceived mother came to see her. "I am going to Jesus," said the young martyr. The mother began to weep, "O Rajee, we will not let you die."

"But I am glad," the little sufferer replied, "because I shall go to Jesus. If you, mother, would love him, and give up your idols, we should meet again in heaven."

An hour afterwards Rajee went to heaven; but I have never heard whether her mother gave up her idols.

THE GANGES.--This beautiful river waters the sultry plain of Bengal. G.o.d made this river to be a blessing, but man has turned it into a curse. The Hindoos say the River Ganges is the G.o.ddess Gunga; and they flock from all parts of India to worship her. When they reach the river they bathe in it, and fancy they have washed away all their sins. They carry away large bottles of the sacred water for their friends at home.

But this is not all; very cruel deeds are committed by the side of the river. It is supposed that all who die there will go to the Hindoo heaven. It is therefore the custom to drag dying people out of their beds, and to lay them in the mud, exposed to the heat of the broiling sun, and then to pour pails of water over their heads.

One sick man, who was being carried to the water, covered up as if he were dead, suddenly threw off the covering, and called out, "I am not dead, I am only very ill." He knew that the cruel people who were carrying him were going to cast him into the water while he was still alive: but nothing he could say could save him: the cruel creatures answered, "You may as well die _now_ as at any other time;" and so they drowned him, pretending all the while to be very kind.

It is thought a good thing to be thrown into the river after death. The Ganges is the great burying-place; and dead bodies may be seen floating on its waters, while crows and vultures are tearing the flesh from the bones. There would be many more of these horrible sights were it not that many bodies are burned, and their ashes only cast into the river.

Some foolish deceived creatures drown themselves in the Ganges, hoping to be very happy hereafter as a reward. The Brahmins are ready to accompany such people into the water. Some men were once seen going into the river with a large empty jar fastened to the back of each. The empty jar prevented them from sinking; but there was a cup in the hands of each of the poor men, and with these cups they filled the jars, and then they began to sink. One of them grew frightened, and tried to get on sh.o.r.e; but the wicked Brahmins in their boats hunted him, and tried to keep him in the water; however, they could not catch him, and the miserable man escaped. There are villages near the river whither such poor creatures flee, and where they end their days together; for their old friends would not speak to them if they were to return to their homes.