Part 16

"Those are the tombs of the men of the Cameronians, sir. These graves are all uniform, as you observe. Fever made sad havoc with that regiment. They lost some three companies in all. Behind them are the tombs of the men of the Buffs, and behind them the tombs of the men of other Royal Regiments of Infantry--all uniform you see, sir; but those of each regiment rather differently shaped. To the right, flanking the Infantry tombs, are the tombs of the men of the Cavalry, 8th and 11th Dragoons, and 16th Lancers. In the rear of the Cavalry are the tombs of the Horse and Foot Artillerymen--all uniform you see, sir. Egad! if they could rise just now, what a pretty little army they would form, of all ranks, some thousands of 'em, and well officered, too, they would be; and here a man to lead them. This is the tomb of Major-General Considine, one of the most distinguished men in the British army. He was the officer that the Duke of Wellington fixed upon to bring the 53rd Foot into good order, when they ran riot in Gibraltar some years ago. This is the tomb of General Considine, rotting and going rapidly to decay, though it was only built in the year 1845. A great deal of money is squandered in the churchyards in India. Tombs are erected, and at a great expense frequently. After they are once put up it is very seldom that they are visited or heeded. Tens of thousands of pounds have been thrown away on the vast pile of bricks and mortar and stone that you now see within this enclosure, and with the exception of a few all are crumbling away. A Hindoo--a sweeper--said to me the other day in this graveyard, 'Why don't you English burn your dead as we do, instead of leaving their graves here, to tell us how much you can neglect them and how little you care for them? What is the use of whitening a few sepulchres amidst this mass of black ruin?' I had no answer to give the fellow, sir; indeed the same thought had often occurred to me while at work in this wilderness. Do you not think, sir, that the government, through its own executive officers, ought to expend a few hundred pounds every year on these yards, in order to avert such a scandal and disgrace? I do not speak interestedly. I have as much already on my hands as I can perform, if not more; but I do often think that there is really some reason in the remarks of that sweeper. All these graves that you see here so blackened and left to go to ruin, are the graves of men who have served their country and died in its service. Very little money would keep the yard free from this grass and these rank weeds, and very little more would make all these tombs fit to be seen; for neither labour nor whitewash is expensive in this part of the world. One would hardly suppose, on looking about him just now, that the sons and daughters of some of the best families in England are buried here, and that in a very short time no one will be able to distinguish the spot where each is lying; so defaced and so much alike will all the ruins become. What, sir, I repeat, is the use of throwing away money in building tombs, if they are not kept in repair? Instead of laying out fifty or a hundred pounds on a thing like this, why not lay out only five pounds on a single head-stone, and put the rest out at interest to keep it up?"

"Or a small slab with an iron railing round it?"

"Ah, sir; but then you would require an European to remain here, and a couple of native watchmen to see that the railings were not carried off by the villagers. As it is, they never allow an iron railing to remain longer than a week, or so long as that. They watch for an opportunity, jump over this low wall, and tear them down, or wrench them off and away with them."

"But surely there is some one to watch the yard?"

"Yes, two sweepers--men of the lowest caste of Hindoos. And when it is found out that a grave has been plundered of its railings, or that the little marble tablet, which some have, has been taken away, they deny all knowledge of the matter, and are simply discharged, and two others of the same caste are put into their places. It would not be much to build a comfortable little bungalow for an European--a man like myself, for instance--and give the yard into his charge, holding him responsible for any damage done, and requiring him to see that the grave of every Christian--man, woman, and child--is kept in good order. But horrible as is the condition of this churchyard--looking as it does, for the most part, more like a receptacle for the bodies of felons than those of good and brave soldiers and civilians, and their wives and children--it is really nothing when compared with the graveyard of Kernaul. Kernaul, you know, sir, was our great frontier station some twenty years ago. It was, in fact, as large a station as Umballah now is. It had its church, its play-house, its barracks for cavalry, infantry, and artillery, its mess-houses, magnificent bungalows, and all the rest of it. For some reason or other--but what that reason was I could, never discover, nor anybody else to my knowledge--the station was abandoned with all its buildings, which cost the government and private individuals lacs and lacs of rupees. You may be pretty sure that the villagers were not long in plundering every house that was unprotected. Away went the doors and windows, the venetians, and every bar, bolt, nail, or bit of iron upon which they could lay their fingers; not content with this, the brutes set fire to many or nearly all of the thatched bungalows, in the hope of picking up something amongst the ruins. The church--the largest and best in the Upper Provinces, with no one to take care of it--was one of the first places that suffered. Like the other buildings, it was despoiled of its doors, windows, benches, bolts, nails, &c., and they carried away every marble tablet therein erected, and removeable without much difficulty. And the same kind of havoc was made in the burial-ground--the tombs were smashed, some of the graves, and especially the vaults, opened; and plainly enough was it to be seen, that the low caste men had broken open the coffins and examined their contents, in the hope of finding a ring, or an ear-ring, or some other ornament on the person of the dead. I went there a year ago on some business connected with the grave of a lady, whose husband wished her remains to be removed to Meerut, and placed in the same vault with those of his sister, who died here about eighteen months since. I was not successful, however. There was no trace of her tomb. It was of stone, and had been taken away bodily, to pave the elephant shed or camel yard, perhaps, of some rich native in the neighbourhood. Looking around me, as I did, and remembering Kernaul when it was crowded with Europeans, it seemed to me as though the British had been turned out of the country by the natives, and that the most sacred spot in the cantonment had been desecrated out of spite or revenge. And it is just what they would do if ever they got the upper hand."

[Whilst I write, it has just occurred to me that this old soldier and his family perished in the massacre at Meerut on the 10th of May. He was in some way related to, or connected by marriage with, Mrs. Courtenay, the keeper of the hotel, who, with her nieces, was so barbarously murdered on that disastrous occasion.]

"Why, bless my soul!" exclaimed the old man, stooping down and picking up something, "if the old gentleman hasn't shed his skin again! This is the skin of a very large snake, a cobra capella, that I have known for the last thirteen years. He must be precious old from his size, the slowness of his movements, and the bad cough he has had for the last four or five years. Last winter he was very bad indeed, and I thought he was going to die. He was then living in the ruins of old General Webster's vault and coughing continually, just like a man with the asthma. However, I strewed a lot of fine ashes and some bits of wool in the ruin to keep him warm by night, and some fine white sand at the entrance, upon which he used to crawl out and bask, when the sun had made it hot enough; and when the warm weather set in he got all right again."

"Rather a strange fancy of yours, to live upon such amicable terms with the great enemy of the human race?"

"Well, perhaps it is. But he once bit and killed a thief who came here to rob a child's grave of the iron railings, which its parents, contrary to my advice, had placed round it, and ever since then I have liked the snake, and have never thought of molesting him. I have had many an opportunity of killing him (if I had wished to do it) when I have caught him asleep on the tombstones, in the winter's sun. I could kill him this very day--this very hour--if I liked, for I know where he is at this very moment. He is in a hole, close to the Ochterlony monument there, in that corner of the yard. But why should I hurt him? He has never offered to do me any harm, and when I sing, as I sometimes do, when I am alone here at work on some tomb or other, he will crawl up, and listen for two or three hours together. One morning, while he was listening, he came in for a good meal which lasted him some days."

"How was this?"

"I will tell you, sir. A minar was chased by a small hawk, and in despair came and perched itself on the top of a most lofty tomb at which I was at work. The hawk, with his eyes fixed intently on his prey, did not, I fancy, see the snake lying motionless in the grass; or if he did see him he did not think he was a snake, but something else--my crowbar, perhaps. After a little while the hawk pounced down, and was just about to give the minar a blow and a grip, when the snake suddenly lifted his head, raised his hood, and hissed. The hawk gave a shriek, fluttered, flapped his wings with all his might, and tried very hard to fly away. But it would not do. Strong as the eye of the hawk was, the eye of the snake was stronger. The hawk for a time seemed suspended in the air; but at last he was obliged to come down, and sit opposite to the old gentleman (the snake) who commenced, with his forked tongue, and keeping his eyes upon him all the while, to slime his victim all over. This occupied him for at least forty minutes, and by the time the process was over the hawk was perfectly motionless. I don't think he was dead. But he was very soon, however, for the old gentleman put him into a coil or two, and crackled up every bone in the hawk's body. He then gave him another sliming, made a big mouth, distended his neck till it was as big round as the thickest part of my arm, and down went the hawk like a shin of beef into a beggarman's bag."

"And what became of the minar?"

"He was off like a shot, sir, the moment his enemy was in trouble, and no blame to him. What a funny thing nature is altogether, sir! I very often think of that scene when I am at work here."

"But this place must be infested with snakes?"

"I have never seen but that one, sir, and I have been here for a long time. Would you like to see the old gentleman, sir? As the sun is up, and the morning rather warm, perhaps he will come out, if I pretend to be at work and give him a ditty. If he does not, we will look in upon him."

"Come along," said I.

I accompanied the old man to a tomb, close to the monument beneath which the snake was said to have taken up his abode. I did not go very near to the spot, but stood upon a tomb with a thick stick in my hand, quite prepared to slay the monster if he approached me; for from childhood I have always had an instinctive horror of reptiles of every species, caste, and character.

The old man began to hammer away with his mallet and chisel, and to sing a very quaint old song which I had never heard before, and have never heard since. It was a dialogue or duet between the little finger and the thumb, and began thus. The thumb said:

"Dear Rose Mary Green! When I am king, little finger, you shall be queen."

The little finger replied:

"Who told you so, Thummy, Thummy? Who told you so?"

The thumb responded:

"It was my own heart, little finger, who told me so!"

The thumb then drew a very flattering picture of the life they would lead when united in wedlock, and concluded, as nearly as I can remember, thus:

THUMB. "And when you are dead, little finger, as it may hap, You shall be buried, little finger, under the tap."

LITTLE FINGER. "Why, Thummy, Thummy? Why, Thummy, Thummy? Why, Thummy, Thummy--_Why_?"

THUMB. "That you may drink, little finger, when you are dry?"

But this ditty did not bring out the snake. I remarked this to the old man, who replied: "He hasn't made his toilet yet--hasn't rubbed his scales up, sir; but he'll be here presently. You will see. Keep your eye on that hole, sir. I am now going to give him a livelier tune, which is a great favourite of his"; and forthwith he struck up an old song, beginning

"'Twas in the merry month of May, When bees from flower to flower did hum."

Out came the snake before the song was half over! Before it was concluded he had crawled slowly and (if I dare use such a word) rather majestically, to within a few paces of the spot where the old man was standing.

"Good morning to you, sir," said the old man to the snake. "I am happy to see you in your new suit of clothes. I have picked up your old suit, and I have got it in my pocket, and a very nice pair of slippers my old wife will make out of it. The last pair that she made of your rejected apparel were given as a present to Colonel Cureton, who, like myself, very much resembled the great General Blücher in personal appearance. Who will get the pair of which I have now the makings, Heaven only knows. Perhaps old Brigadier White, who has also a Blücher cut about him. What song would you like next? 'Kathleen Mavourneen?' Yes, I know that is a pet song of yours; and you shall have it."

The old man sung the melody with a tenderness and feeling which quite charmed me, as well as the snake, who coiled himself up and remained perfectly still. Little reason as I had to doubt the truth of any of the old man's statements, I certainly should have been sceptical as to the story of the snake if I had not witnessed the scene I have attempted to describe.

"Well, sir," said the old man, coming up to me, after he had made a salaam to the snake and left him, "it is almost breakfast-time, and I will, with your permission, bid you good morning."

I thanked him very much for his information, and suffered him to depart; and then, alone, I wandered about that well-filled piece of ground. I have always had a melancholy pleasure in strolling from tombstone to tombstone, and reading the various epitaphs, and on that morning, after all that I had heard from the old pensioner, I was just in the humour for gratifying this morbid desire.

Some miles to the northward of Meerut is the station of Burnampore. No troops are quartered here; it is what is called in India a purely civil station, containing only a magistrate (who is also the collector of the revenue), an assistant (a covenanted civilian), the establishment of the office, and a small police force. To these two gentlemen and their few subordinates were entrusted the care and the collections of a district as large as Lancashire or Yorkshire, and containing, possibly, as many inhabitants. The idea of two gentlemen keeping in order a district of such dimensions was simply absurd; but they did their best, and that was all that could be expected of them. I remained four days and nights at Burnampore, and during that time was a guest of the assistant magistrate, whose acquaintance I had made at Meerut. Anything more monotonous and dreary than the existence of a gentleman stationed at such a place it would be very difficult to imagine. My host assured me that if it were not for an occasional visit paid by some traveller on his way up or down the country, both himself and his superior officer would have died of ennui. "If it were not for the shooting, which is very good in this district," he added, "I would rather be a permanent passenger on board ship, or the inmate of a debtors' prison in London, or any other part of England--in either case, one would have something like company, and one would have, at all events, a somewhat cooler and more congenial climate."

In the district of Burnampore there are a great number of wolves, and during my short stay, even, two were brought in, and the Government reward (two rupees a-head) claimed upon them. These ferocious creatures often carry off the young children of poor people and devour them. It was in this district that "a wolf child," as the natives of India express it, was found some years ago, and taken to Meerut, where it was exhibited as a curiosity. "There can be no question," said my friend and host, when I spoke to him one morning on this subject, "that the male wolf, in all these cases, seizes and runs off with the infant, and that when he has carried it alive to the den, the female, especially if she happens to have cubs at the time, instead of killing and devouring, suckles and fosters the little human being. So, after all, the story of Romulus and Remus may not be a mere fable."

"No," said I. "But what is that Greek epigram from the Anthology of Bland and Merivale? The she-goat that suckled the whelp of a wolf, which wolf, when she had no more milk to give it, killed her and eat her. Something about

'Be kind, be gentle, and do what you will, A stubborn nature will be nature still.'"

"Yes," replied my host. "I do remember something about it; and by and bye we will talk the matter over, and refer to the volume, which I have amongst my books; but at present you must excuse me, for I have a duty to perform. You may come with me and witness the operation, if you like; but understand me, I shall not be offended if you decline to do so."

"What operation?"

"That of hanging."

"What? Hanging! Hanging what?

"A man--a culprit--a murderer. Is is a part of my duty to see this operation performed. Come," he added energetically, and slapping me on the shoulder. "Come, be a sort of Selwyn for once in your life."

Whilst I was hesitating, the magistrate approached in his buggy. He had been taking his morning drive, and had dropt in upon his assistant to have some friendly conversation. He had forgotten all about the forthcoming execution; and, on hearing that we were just about to start for the spot, he very kindly offered to take us there--an offer which was accepted by his assistant with many thanks. So, off we drove, three in a gig, like so many men going to witness a pugilistic encounter in England during the beginning of the present century.

When we had arrived at the place of execution, a field some distance from the gaol, in which had been erected a temporary gallows, I was surprised at not finding a mob. There was no one there but the culprit--who was eating as much rice as he could, and as fast as he could--a couple of native policemen with drawn swords guarding him; the gaoler, who was a Mahommedan, and a Bengalee writer (clerk), who stood with pen, ink, and paper in hand, ready to dot down the official particulars of the scene, preparatory to their being forwarded to Government, according to a certain regulation.

"Is everything ready?" said the assistant magistrate to the gaoler.

"Yes, Sahib," he replied; "but he has not yet finished his breakfast."

"In one minute, Sahib," cried the culprit, who overheard the conversation; and hastily taking into his stomach the few grains of rice that remained upon the dish, and drinking the remainder of his half-gallon of milk, he sprang up, and called out the word "Tyear!" signifying "I am ready." He was then led up to the scaffold, the most primitive affair that I ever beheld. It was only a piece of woodwork resembling a large crock or crate in which a dinner-service is packed for exportation. Upon this crock, which was placed under the beam, he was requested to stand. Having obeyed this order, the rope was adjusted around his neck. The assistant magistrate then called out to him in Hindostanee, "Have you anything to say?"

"Yes, Sahib," was the reply. And he began a long story, false from beginning to end, but every word of which the Bengalee writer took down. He spoke, and with vehemence, for about thirty-five minutes, when, having stopped, either finally, or to take breath, the assistant magistrate gave the signal to the gaoler, by waving his hand. The crock was then pulled from under the culprit by the two policemen, and down dangled the culprit's body, the feet not more than eighteen inches from the ground.

They are not adepts in the art of hanging in India; it took the culprit at least ten minutes to die. At times I feared, so desperate were his struggles, that he would break the beam, snap the rope, or bring down the whole apparatus. In the days of Henry Fielding, the vulgar used to speak of hanging as "dancing on nothing," and this horrible idea the Indian culprit on that morning amply realised. The reader must not, however, sympathize with his sufferings. He had been justly convicted, and was justly put to death for murdering, in that very field where he expiated his offence, a little girl of seven years of age, in order to possess himself of a single bangle she wore--a bangle valued at one rupee four annas--half-a-crown of English money. I cannot accuse myself of a cruel or brutal disposition; but, if the monster whom I saw hanged had had a thousand lives instead of one, I could have witnessed the taking of every one of them without a single atom of a desire to save him.

The cutting down of the culprit, as soon as it was discovered that life was extinct (for as there was no crowd of pickpockets and vendors of cakes and ginger-beer to take a moral lesson, the prescribed hour was unnecessary) was quite as primitive as the foregoing part of the operation. One of the native policemen with his blunt sword, severed the rope by sawing it just above the tie, and down came the corpse. I was tempted to jump out of the buggy in which, sitting between the magistrate and his assistant, I had witnessed the execution, and examine, or rather look attentively at, the deceased. A finer head, in a phrenological point of view, I had never seen, and across the naked chest was suspended the sacred thread, indicating that the culprit was a Brahmin.

"Is it not very odd," said I, on my return to the buggy, "that most of the diabolical crimes committed in this country are committed by Brahmins?"

"Not at all odd," replied my host. "Do you not know that they believe nothing can hurt their pure souls after death; and hence their comparative recklessness in this world? There was a Brahmin hanged here, about a year ago, who, just before he was turned off, made a speech such as that made by Napoleon on paper to Sir Hudson Lowe--'You may convict me of what you please; you may make me a prisoner; you may, if you like, shackle these limbs, and consign me to a dungeon; but you will find that my soul will be just as free, just as proud, as when it awed all Europe!'"

"Ah, but that was the emanation of ----"

"What the deuce is that?" cried the magistrate, who was driving us rapidly towards home. "See! That thing in the road." And coming up to it, he reined in the horse.