Burning Ghat, Benares
Benares, Thursday night, 7:20.
I posted my letter after tiffin at the post office & hope you will receive it.
We started this morning about 7:30 & drove to the river side (Ganges). The city is on the left bank & extends for a distance of 3 miles along the side where are built many (has been) magnificient [sic] palaces, owned yet by wealthy people, princes & others to where they come at intervals to bathe in the sacred river. Ghats or steps where the people bathe & wash go down to the water & extend into the water, & here hundreds were doing their devotions & drinking the dirty polluted water, into which I saw 2 bodies thrown & the ashes of some also. Oh, this religion!! What sights are to be seen & what devotees they are. From far & near they come, & after that a pilgrimage of nearly 50 miles, out & back here, after which they present themselves to the priest who certifies their pilgrimage & a merit received. What lots of old men & women there are, & these never return to their homes but stay here to die & go straight to heaven. This goes on daily, morning, noon & night. The drinking of the sacred water is a repulsive sight as close by is an open mouthed sewer & out of it rushes the vilest compositions, & into the river every animal that dies is cast. I saw a girl throw in a dead mangoose [sic], & close to where scores were bathing & drinking, but worse than that the burning ghats are on the river side & everything that remains of the pyre & body is cast into the river & this too amongst the devotees. Children, holy men, lepers & smallpox victims are never burnt but taken out into the middle of the river in a boat & thrown in, as I said, I saw 2 incidents [2:51] & both within 30 yards of where our boat was laying. Then the burning, a very horrible sight. 18 were burned while we looked on, not 20 yards of our boat. The corpse is first brought to the river edge, wrapped in cloth (men white, women red), laid on a spar bier, put into the Ganges & let remain a while, then water thrown over it, & meantime the wood pyre is being erected, & when so far piled they lift the body from the river edge onto the pyre not 5 yards off the river. One was not a yard off. Then the nearest relative places special wood on the top of the body, after which the “Domes”, as they call the fire men, pile on more wood. Then some butter is spread over or scattered here & there, & again the nearest relative – one an old father & very decriped [sic] sets it “a[g]low” walking around the pyre 5 to 7 times, & retires a little distance while the Domes flame the blaze & all is over till the ashes remain which are now viewed by the relatives & cast into the river. One poor soul, a tall skeleton of a man who was a beggar & had died on the street, was fetched & thrown down on the ground near the ghat, no friends at all, & we saw he had not stiffened as when they put his body on the pyre they bent his knees under him & fired away at once, no ceremony at all. The government pays for the wood in such cases. Then a great commotion began, band, accompanying this was a mother of 2 young men & the relative of a king, & she had a little more ceremony but the end the same. We watched the process from beginning to end, & in other 3 boats were[1] [2:52] 15 men of the Black Watch looking on. I spoke to some of them, & Thursdays is a holiday & they were viewing. Every man was a treat to look at: clean, bright, intelligent looking men, & a credit to any country. The boats are specially adapted, double deckers, & we sat on upper deck in chairs while the rowers ply gently up & down the front of ghats. We were 3 hours on the river & shall always remember that sight. We then visited the observatory, which also over looks the river & the view looking down was grand. Then we visited temples, chiefly the Monkey Temple[2] & this was a sight. Monkeys in dozens, sacred here, & we fed them. Birds & dogs came to share. Oh, the filth & dirt. It’s disgusting. In the afternoon we drove again to the river & ferried across to the Maharajah of Benare’s palace. We saw there a monster tiger,[3] also his fine rooms, pictures &c., but this was not worth the time. It took us an hour to ferry up to it, same back, & 4 men pulled us up river for nearly 2 miles before we crossed over, ropes from top of mast, then we set a feeble sail & crossed. The Marajah was away to his jungle with visitors, shooting, else he is always most courteous to any visitor & pleased when any one goes over. We got back to hotel at 6:30 & I am going to retire soon as it is very exhausting in the sun between 11 & 4.
We purpose starting at 8:30, sight seeing again in the morning, & leave for Calcutta at 1:50 p.m., & due at 5:45 Saturday morning. Good night!
[2:53]
[1] Inserted on facing page: “Benares:
Burning ghats.
Bathing ghats.
Saw 2 adult corpses and on[e] child taken out mid river & thrown in.
(Nepaul Temple)
18 bodies all on burning ghat and one apart this, a king’s relative.
Visited the Holy Man (Ascetic).
Counterfeit of the great Jaugernut Car.
Palace of Marajah of Benares opposite of river – taken across by native boat – part of way towed by natives, rope attached to top of mast – saw throught palace. Marajah away tiger shooting in a near jungle – saw one trophy a great tiger caged, & keeper infuriated the beast, a fearsome sight in its anger.”
[2] The Monkey Temple, also known as Durga Mandir, is a Hindu temple built in the 18th century.
[3] Inserted on facing page: “I took a photo of tiger”.