CHAPTER XI. MONGHYR TO BUXAR. Cattle swimming across the River - Brahmin Labourers-Patna-Bankipoor-GranaryHackeries - Dinapoor-Cantonment -Digah Farm-Chupra-Floating Shops-FortNative Christians-Schools-Curreem Musseeh-Varieties of Complexion. seemed, from a sand-bank in the river, and full of monstrous ant-hills, looking at a little distance like large hay-cocks. The peasant had just finished threshing his barley, and was busy burying it in the dry soil. A small shed, as usual, stood to watch where the straw with the grain in it had been collected. The high ground of Peer Puhar above Monghyr was still in sight. Just before we stopped, a very large crocodile swam close to the boat, and showed himself to the best advantage. Instead of being like those we had seen before, of a black or dusky colour, he was all over stripes of yellow and brownish black like the body of a wasp, with scales very visibly marked, and a row of small tubercles or prominences along the ridge of his back and tail. He must, I should think, have been about fifteen feet long, though under the circumstances in which I saw him, it was by no means easy to judge. My cabin was extremely in AUGUST 16.-There was no wind this morning till near twelve o'clock, but we had then just enough to help us out of the eddy of Monghyr and across the river to the other side, along which our boatmen had a painful day's tracking against a fierce stream. The Curruckpoor hills on the left hand continued to offer a very beautiful succession of prospects. A chain of marshy islets seemed to extend nearly across the river towards the end of our course, by the aid of which a large herd of cattle were crossing with their keepers. The latter, I conclude, had been ferried over the principal arm, but when I saw them they were wading and swimming alternately by the side of their charge, their long grey mantles wrapped round their heads, their spear-like staves in their hands, and, with loud clamour joined to that of their boys and dogs, keeping the convoy in its proper course. The scene was wild and interesting, and put me in mind of Bruce's account of the pas-fested with insects this evening, partisage of the Nile by the Abyssinian army. cularly with a large black beetle, which The bank at the foot of the hills seemed was very beautiful, having a splendid fertile and populous as well as beauti- mixture of jet, copper-colour, and emeful; that along which we proceeded is rald about it. I had also a pretty green very wretched, swampy, without trees, lizard, which I carefully avoided inand only two miserable villages. Seve- juring, knowing it to be an enemy to ral alligators rose as we went along, ants and cockroaches, both of which but I saw none basking on the many plagues are increasing, and unfortureedy islets and promontories, which, nately do not now seem to check each during the hot months, are said to be other. Yet I was a little perplexed their favourite resorts. Mr. Lushing-how the "honest man should have ton's budgerow kept up with my pin- found his way into my closet." nace extremely well, but the Corries were far behind. We moored for the night adjoining a field of barley, the first I had seen in India; the ground was recovered, as it August 17.-We had a fine breeze part of the day, and stood over to the other bank, which we found, as I had expected, really very pretty, a country of fine natural meadows, full of cattle, he believed the doctrine to be a gloss of Buddh, striking his staff with much anger on the ground at the name of the The Brahmin labourers are now resting after their toil, and their groups are very picturesque. The ploughman, after unyoking his oxen, coulter, a large knife shaped like a horn, wiped and gave it to a boy, then lifted up the beam and yoke on his own shoulders, and trudged away with it. These Brahmins, I observe, all shave their heads except a tuft in the centre, a cuswhich not many Hindoos, I think, besides them observe. and interspersed with fields of barley, wheat, and Indian corn, and villages surrounded by noble trees, with the Curruckpoor hills forming a very in-heresiarch. teresting distance. If the palm-trees were away (but who would wish them away?), the prospect would pretty closely resemble some of the best parts of Eng-lifted up his simple plough, took out the land. In the afternoon we rounded the point of the hills, and again found ourselves in a flat and uninteresting, though fruitful country. The last beautiful spot was a village under a grove of tall fruit-trees, among which were some fine walnuts: some large boats were build-tom ing on the turf beneath them, and the whole scene reminded me forcibly of a similar builder's yard which I had met with at Partenak in the Crimea. Many groups of men and boys sate angling, or with spears watching an opportunity to strike the fish, giving much additional beauty and liveliness to the scene. I have been much struck for some days by the great care with which the stock of fruit-trees in this country is kept up. I see everywhere young ones of even those kinds which are longest in coming to maturity, more particularly mangoes and the toddy or tarapalm (the last of which, I am told, must be from thirty to forty years old before it pays anything), planted and fenced in with care round most of the cottages, a circumstance which seems not only to prove the general security of property, but that the peasants have more assurance of their farms remaining in the occupation of themselves and their children than of late years has been felt in England. The village near which we brought-to for a short time in the evening belonged to Brahmins exclusively, who were ploughing the ground near us, with their strings floating over their naked shoulders; the ground was sown with rice, barley, and vetches, the one to succeed the other. Abdullah asked them to what caste of Brahmins they belonged, and on being told they were pundits, inquired whether "a mixture of seeds was not forbidden in the Puranas?" An old man answered with a good deal of warmth, that they were poor people and could not dispute, but Having a good wind, we proceeded a little further before sunset; we passed a herd of cows swimming across a nullah about as wide as the Dee ten miles below Chester, the cowman supporting himself by the tail and hips of the strongest among them, and with a long staff guiding her in a proper direction across the stream. We soon after passed a similar convoy guided by a little boy, who, however, did not confine himself to one animal, but swam from one to another, turning them with his staff and his voice as he saw proper. So nearly aquatic are the habits of these people, from the warmth of the climate, their simple food, their nakedness, and their daily habits of religious ablution. I saw a very smartly-dressed and rather pretty young countrywoman down to the ghât at Monghyr to wash. She went in with her mantle wrapped round her with much decency and even modesty, till the river was breast high, then ducked under water for so long a time that I began to despair of her reappearance. This was at five o'clock in the morning, and she returned again at twelve to undergo the same process, both times walking home in her wet clothes without fear of catching cold. The ancient Greeks had, I am convinced, the same custom, since otherwise the idea of wet drapery would hardly have occurred to their statuaries, or, at least, would not have been so common. come We again brought-to about seven o'clock, by a field just ploughed ready for the rising inundation; we are now not quite half way from Monghyr to | they are not Hindoos who thus mangle Patna. The women here are still more and violate the sacred tree of Siva. adorned with trinkets than those in Bengal. Besides the silver bracelets, their arms are covered with rings of a hard kind of sealing-wax which looks like coral, and another ornament either of silver or bright steel is common, in shape something like a perforated discus; it is worn above the elbow. August 18. This morning, after leaving the nullah, we proceeded with a fine breeze along the left-hand bank of the river, which is very fertile and populous, with a constant succession of villages, whose inhabitants were all washing themselves and getting on their best attire, it being the Hindoo festival of Junma Osmee. The day was a very brilliant one, and, though hot, rendered supportable by the breeze, while the whole scene was lively and cheerful, all the shops having their flags hoisted, - little streamers being spread by most of the boats which we passed, and a large banner and concourse of people being displayed at a small pagoda under the shade of some noble peepul and tamarind trees. The river is all this time filled with boats of the most picturesque forms; the peasants on the bank have that knack of grouping themselves, the want of which I have heard complained of in the peasantry of England. Two novel circumstances were seen this morning; the one the appearance of considerable herds of swine, of a small kind resembling the Chinese breed, which were grazing near most of the villages; the other a system of planting tara-palms in the trunks of decayed peepul-trees. The first which I saw I supposed had been sown there by accident; but I soon found that the practice was frequent, and that the peepul thus treated had generally the greater part of its branches and all the top cut away, to favour the intruding plant, which stands as if it were in a rude flower-pot. The hollow part of the tree must, I suppose, be previously filled with earth. A very excellent fence is thus obtained for the young tara-plant; but I conclude that Towards noon the banks became again, though not rocky, high and precipitous, and full of holes for the muenas' nests. We are fortunate in having a breeze, for the towing here would be dangerous, the bank being crumbling and undermined, and the stream flowing with great rapidity. A friend of Mr. Corrie's had two dandees drowned in this place last month. I was astonished when he told me this, since it seemed almost as possible to drown an alligator as men of their habits. I was answered, however, that the poor fellows were worn out with towing, and that the current washed them under the boats, whence they had not strength to recover themselves. Two dervises, strange antic figures, in many-coloured patched garments, with large wallets, begged of us to-day. I gave a trifle to the elder, a venerable old man, who raised his hand with much dignity and prayed for me. At Bar, where I dined, is an old ruined house, with some little appearance of a palace, once the residence of the Jemautdar of the district, under the Mohammedan government. We broughtto about half-past six near an indigofield, which filled my cabin with bugs. The night was very hot and close. August 19.-Another intensely hot day, but made bearable by a breeze. I found a young scorpion in my cabin this morning among my books. It seems to prove that such pests are not so common in India as is often supposed, that I have now been ten months in the country without seeing more; and that, though I have walked a good deal, and never particularly avoided places where such things are to be looked for, I have only seen one cobra de capello. I had supposed scorpions to be black, and was surprised to-day to see an animal white and almost transparent. The pinnace got aground in passing from the chain of nullahs and jeels which we entered yesterday, into the main river, and we were obliged to call in the assistance of some fishermen to help her off; they laboured hard for near an hour, and were grateful for a gratuity of two pice; they were nine in number, besides a Brahmin, who came down from a village while we were just getting disengaged, and extending a basket-full of scarlet flowers, applied for a thank-offering to his god, in consideration of our escape from danger. I thought he was merely asking for alms, not quite hearing what he said, but Abdullah explained his meaning. However, he had obtained his request. Our halting place was on a pleasant open shore, opposite to Futwa, but still short of Patna. The country round is bare of wood, but well cultivated and very populous: the land laid out in alternate patches of grass-fallows, covered with cows, buffaloes, and swine, and fields of millet and Indian corn, among which appear also some patches of the castor-oil plant, which, now that the coco-nut is no longer found, is the usual supply for their lamps. I walked about a good deal, the evening being pleasant, and was much interested. The buffaloes were all buried in the water, scarcely showing more than their noses and horns above its surface; but as the sun went down they came out, sleek, black, and glossy; too wild and timorous to suffer an European to approach them, but showing no degree of fierceness. The pigs are small, black, and shaggy, of a very wild appearance. At the nearest village to which I walked were two or three cottages, which, though mere hovels of mud and thatch, yet from the size of their out-buildings, and the treading of many cattle all round them, I should conceive were really the residences of tolerably wealthy farmers. One of these, an old man, was threshing out a small kind of millet, by driving axen over it round and round in a circle. They were just leaving off work as I came up, and a hind was bringing a large bundle of green Indiancorn, weeded from the thick crop, for their provender. I observed, however, that the animals, during their previous employment, were not muzzled, according to the Scriptural rule, at the same time that they were kept so constantly moving that a few mouthfuls were all that they could get. While I was ex | amining this heap of grain, and asking the old man some questions, his cows came up for the evening, and I pleased him exceedingly, when the cowman ran forward to beat them from my path, by forbidding him to strike them. "Good! good!" he said, with an air indicative of much satisfaction, "one must not beat, cows." It seems to me that the tender mercies of the Hindoos towards animals are exhausted on cows only; for oxen they have no pity,they are treated with much severity, but I have not here seen them show such marks of cruelty as those near Calcutta. Comfortable, on the whole, as this village seemed, many of the houses must soon be rendered uninhabitable, if, as seems by no means impossible from present appearances, the river rises a single cubit higher. Their round granaries, however, are all raised considerably above the other buildings, and must, I should suppose, be tolerably safe. When I asked what was to become of the others if the river rose, the answer was, they hoped it would not rise more than a few inches higher, which would be sufficient for their fields, without starving their cattle. Futwa, which was directly opposite to us, is a large and ancient town, on a river for which the people of the town seem to have no other name than "Futwa kee Nuddee." Futwa is famous for a very long and handsome old bridge (an object of some rarity in India), and a college of Mussulman law and divinity, the Moulavies of which are widely renowned. The night was very cool and pleasant. August 20. We arrived at the southeast extremity of Patna about nine o'clock; it is a very great, and from the water at some little distance, a very striking city, being full of large buildings, with remains of old walls and towers, and bastions projecting into the river, with the advantage of a high rocky shore, and considerable irregu larity and elevation of the ground behind it. On a nearer approach, we find, indeed, many of the houses whose verandahs and terraces are striking objects at a distance to be ruinous; but still in this respect, and in apparent prosperity, it as much exceeds Dacca as it falls short of it in the beauty and grandeur of its ruins. As we approached, I proposed slacking sail to give the Corries time to come up; but Mohammed said that opposite the old castle was one of the most rapid and difficult passages of the river between Hurdwar and Saugor, and that if we did not use the fine wind we now had, we might be kept for weeks. We, therefore, proceeded along this noble expanse of water, which I really think grows wider instead of narrower as we advance, and which here, between wind and stream, was raised into waves little less than those which the Mersey sometimes exhibits below Liverpool; my boat for this sort of service is really a very fine one. At the eastern extremity of Patna is a large wood of palms and fruit-trees, pointed out to me as the gardens belonging to a summer palace, built and planted by the Nawab Jaffier Ali-Khân. They are renowned for their beauty and extent, being two or three miles in circuit. We also passed a large and dilapidated palace, which had been the residence of the late Nawâb of Patna, Abbas Kouli Khân, a splendid and popular person; he left no successor, but his nearest heirs are two very intelligent young men, who are said to hold some lucrative employment under the English Government, and to be much in its confidence. The houses of the rich natives which we passed pretty much resemble those of Calcutta. They have, however, the advantage of immediately abutting on the river; and I saw one which, beneath its Corinthian superstructure, had a range of solid buildings of the Eastern Gothic, with pointed arches and small windows, containing a suite of apartments almost on a level with the water,-uninhabitable, I should suppose, from damp during this season, but which must be coolness itself during the hot winds. The continued mass of buildings extends about four miles along the river, when it changes into scattered cottages and bungalows, interspersed with trees, till some more large and handsome buildings appear about three miles further. This is Bankipoor, where are the Com | pany's opium warehouses, courts of justice, &c. &c., and where most of their civil servants live. I had an invitation from Sir Charles D'Oyley, and stopped my boat literally at the gate of his house, which stands very pleasantly on a high bank above the river. I met here a Franciscan friar, a remarkably handsome and intelligent-looking little man, whom I immediately and rightly guessed to be the Italian Padre, "Giulio Cesare," of whom so much mention is made in Martyn's "Life." I found great amusement and interest in looking over Sir Charles's drawing-books; he is the best gentleman-artist I ever met with. He says India is full of beautiful and picturesque country, if people would but stir a little way from the banks of the Ganges, and his own drawings and paintings certainly make good his assertion. The D'Oyleys offered me very kindly a bed-room on shore, which, as my boat was under the shelter of a high bank, I found much cooler than the cabin. Soon after I arrived I received a large packet of letters, and, thank God, a more comfortable account of those dearest to me. The wind and the sea, for the river really deserves the name, continued to rise during the greater part of the day, so that the Corries, it was very plain, could not get past the rock on which the fort stands. Indeed we afterwards heard that at Dinapoor, where the stream is also usually violent, a budge row, and even a pinnace, had been very nearly lost, and the latter actually almost filled with water, and driven ashore. After dinner Lady D'Oyley took me round the only drive which is at this time of year practicable, being, though of a smaller extent, much such a green as the race-ground at Barrackpoor. We passed a high building, shaped something like a glass-house, with a stair winding round its outside up to the top, like the old prints of the Tower of Babel. It was built as a granary for the district, in pursuance of a plan adopted about thirty-five years ago by Government, after a great famine, as a means of keeping down the price of grain, but abandoned on a supposed |