Modern India

This volume contains a series of letters written for _The Chicago Record-Herald_ during the winter of 1903-04, and are published in permanent form through the courtesy of Mr. Fr...

The docks of Bombay are the finest in Asia, and when the extensions now in progress are carried out few cities in Europe can surpass them. They are planned for a century in adva...

All visitors who intend to remain in Bombay for any length of time are expected to call upon the governor and his wife, but it is not necessary for them to drive out to Malabar...

Every upper servant in an Indian household has to have an under servant to assist him. A butler will not wash dishes or dust or sweep. He will go to market and wait on the table...

The whole of southern India, according to the geologists, was once covered by a great forest, and indeed there are still 66,305,506 acres in trees which are carefully protected....

The chief source of revenue in India from ancient times has been a share in the crops of the farmers. The present system has been handed down through the centuries with very lit...

Soon after we were seated there was a stir on the outside and the groom appeared arrayed in the whitest of white linen robes, a turban of white and gold silk, an exquisite cashm...

The death rate in Bombay is very large. The bubonic plague prevails there with a frightful mortality. Hence cremation is safer than burial. In the province of Bombay the total d...

The present form of government in India was adopted in 1858, after the terrible Sepoy mutiny had demonstrated the inability of the East India Company to control affairs. By an a...

Lord Curzon has taken a deep interest in these institutions. He usually attends the graduating exercises and makes addresses to the students in presenting prizes or diplomas; an...

As we were about starting upon a tour that required several thousand miles of railway travel and several weeks of time, the brilliant idea of avoiding an risks and anxiety by se...

A board of geographic names, similar to that we have in Washington, is badly needed in India to straighten out discrepancies in the nomenclature on the maps. I was told that onl...

He is fond of horses and has 300 breeding mares and stallions kept in long stables opening upon the paddock in which they are trained. Each horse has a coolie to look after it,...

While we were waiting at a railway station one morning a solemn-looking old man, who, from appearances, might have been a contemporary of Mahomet, or the nineteenth incarnation...

Although a pagan and without the light of the gospel, Akbar recognized the merits of Christianity and exemplified the ideals of civil and religious liberty which it teaches, and...

The gem of the architectural exhibition at Agra, always exempting the Taj Mahal, is the "Pearl Mosque," so called because it is built of stainless white marble, without the slig...

You pass under a noble arch one hundred and forty feet high and one hundred and ten feet wide, which is guarded by a group of Moslem priests and a squad of native soldiers who p...

The residences of the women of the court and the ministers and other high officials were of corresponding splendor and beauty. There is nothing on our side of the world or in Eu...

One of the several thrones used by the Moguls on occasions of ceremony was a stool eighteen inches high and four feet in diameter chiseled out of a solid block of natural crysta...

The most interesting classes among the many kinds of priests, monks and other people, who make religion a profession in India, are the thugs, fakirs and nautch girls, who are su...

There is a similar clan of organized robbers and murderers known as Sonoriaths, whose special business is to steal cattle, and the Mina tribe, which lives in the district of Gur...

The fort is the center of activity. The ancient citadel has been adapted to modern uses and conveniences at the expense of its former splendor. The palaces and mosques, the bath...

"But the most notable feature of the famine of 1900-01 was the liberality of the public and the government. It has no parallel in the history of the world. For weeks more than s...

The system of allotment of land may be interesting. As the area under irrigation was entirely open and unoccupied, few difficulties were met with, and the engineers were perfect...

South of Afghanistan, and the westernmost territory under British control, is Baluchistan, whose western boundary is Persia and the Arabian Sea. It was formerly a confederation...

"The surgeons of the service will tell you, and their reports contain the details, that the largest amount of disease and the worst cases are due to contact with natives in the...

The story of Cawnpore has no parallel in history. It might have been repeated at Peking two or three years ago, for the conditions existed there. In the summer of 1857 sixty-one...

There has been some improvement in the condition of women in India, and it is due almost entirely to the Christian missionaries who have brought about reforms which could not ha...

By the late census it appears that there were 2,590 publications in the native Indian languages during the year 1900, as against 2,178 during the previous year; 1,895 were books...

There is a lively dispute among geographers, topographers and other learned pundits of the scientific bureaus of the Indian government as to whether Everest is really the king o...

Occasionally some reformer appears who endeavors to rebuke the depravity and appeals to the thinking members of the Brahmin sect to restore the ancient philosophy and morality o...

From the Sparrow Hills at Moscow one who has sufficient patience can count 555 gilded and painted domes; from the cupola of St. Peter's one may look down upon the roofs of palac...

India contains some of the most sublime and beautiful of all the non-Christian religions, and perfect systems of morals devised by men who do not believe in a future life. More...

The industry in India and Ceylon, however, is in a flourishing condition, the area under cultivation has expanded 85 per cent and the product has increased 167 per cent during t...

Calcutta is a fine city. The government buildings, the courthouses, the business blocks and residences, the churches and clubs are nearly all of pretentious architecture and imp...

The palace is managed by a comptroller general, who has 150 servants under him, and a stable of forty horses, and relieves Lady Curzon from the cares of the household. Lord Curz...