Part 14 (1/2)
After the fakir had lived here a while I went to call upon him, and squatted down beside the tomb. A tall slender bamboo, which in such cases is usually adorned with a little flag, marked the spot. He had a small lantern burning at night, which I used to see glimmering when I closed the church door after Compline. His other property consisted of the crutch-stick, which is the emblem of his profession; a bra.s.s bowl for water; a piece of sacking and an old blanket for his bed. There was also a large acc.u.mulation of ashes from the wood fire on which he prepared his food.
When I called he was just rekindling his fire, with the help of a match-box and some splinters of wood which somebody had given him. He was warmly dressed, considering that it was the middle of the hot weather, in an old cloth jacket and a coloured _dhota_, rather scanty but of thicker material than is usual in our part of India. He had long black hair, which he said had never been cut. He seemed rather proud of it, and often dressed it with a little comb. It was parted neatly in the middle and fell in locks over his shoulders, and glistened with oil. He wore moustache and beard, the former cut very short. In the neatness and cleanliness of his person he was a great contrast to the Hindus of the same type, who are called _gosavies_, and whose heads are purposely left to nature, the result of which may easily be imagined.
He told me that it had taken him one and a half months from Delhi, a distance of nearly a thousand miles, and that he had travelled all the way on foot, and that he meant to remain for two months by this tomb, and then he would go to Delhi. He had been in all parts of India and Burma, and had lived this life ever since he was a child. He knew nothing about the particular fakir whose tomb he was honouring, but it was sufficient that he had been a mendicant like himself.
[Ill.u.s.tration: DOWD PHERIDE, THE EGG-MERCHANT'S SON.]
An egg-merchant is the only Mohammedan living in Yerandawana, and I fancy that the fakir was rather a tax on him, although a few Hindus gave him small contributions. I asked him how he lived, and he said that he ate what people gave him, and that if they did not give he went without. I asked how he managed in the rainy season. He replied that if people offered him shelter he accepted it, but that if there were no offers of hospitality he sat in the rain. He said that he had no books and that he could not read. The true fakir, he added, has no books; his mind is his book, and all that he ought to know about G.o.d is written there. I asked him whether he considered his life a useful one. He said, ”Yes, certainly; I pray.” ”For yourself?” I asked. ”No, for others,” was his reply. I saw he was anxious to get on with his cooking, and so I brought my visit to a close.
Unfortunately the fakir did not improve the longer he stayed with us.
The Mission children were at first inclined to make game of him. Their att.i.tude to the religions to which some of them once belonged is generally one of intense contempt, and they do not always exercise discretion in their way of expressing their feelings. The so-called ”ascetics” are feared in India, but not respected, and our children, no longer fearing them, are apt to show their scorn. The fakir did not accept with humility the disrespect of the children, and I first became aware that they had been calling after him rudely, when he turned and faced them with fierce rebukes.
But they were not the only people with whom he quarrelled. Both on the road, and at his station by the tomb, I often heard him pouring out torrents of angry eloquence, sometimes to the rather numerous women who visited him, bringing him offerings of food. I was not near enough to understand whether he was wroth because the offerings were not to his taste. Also, little luxuries began to gather round him. With the arrival of the rains came an umbrella. A smart new lamp to mark out his encampment at night took the place of the shabby old one. He usually returned from his frequent visits to the Mohammedan egg-merchant enjoying one of the cheap smokes which Indians love, and he began to put up the framework of a shanty as a shelter over himself and the tomb. The materials for the shanty came in but slowly, so that it was some time before the fakir could be said to have a roof over his head. Perhaps the faithful did not altogether approve of the diminis.h.i.+ng austerity in the ascetic life.
His shed was completed at last, and he could no longer be said to be quite homeless. But though his new house could not be called luxurious, his life had lost the edifying element of the complete poverty of his shelterless sojourn by the side of the tomb. Nor, when his time was up, did he show any inclination to resume his wanderings, and it seems not unlikely that he will remain in his quarters at the tomb till _his_ turn comes to die, and then the kindly egg-merchant will erect a whitewashed sepulchre over his remains, and he will be reckoned among the saints.
Members of a large and peculiar religious community of Hindus are often to be met with in the Bombay Presidency. Their habit resembles the ordinary dress worn by Hindus, but a good deal amplified, and dyed a slate colour. It is a rather successful adaptation of everyday dress to religious purposes. They travel generally in large companies and stay a long time in one spot, where, as a rule, they form a camp of temporary huts. But sometimes they take a house for a while. Small detachments from the main body wander round the villages, lodging in an empty house, or taking possession of the village rest-house. They remain till the charity of the village is exhausted, and then they move on.
They beg on a large scale. The ”one _pice_,” or farthing, which the ordinary beggar asks for, does not at all represent their idea of charity. They expect any fairly well-to-do person, such as a shopkeeper, to give sufficient food for the whole community for one day, and they sit in his house till they get it. They do not stand at the door and salaam and cringe, like the ordinary mendicant. They boldly enter in uninvited and demand alms. They are much disliked on account of the largeness of their wants. But they are also feared on account of the terrible nature of their denunciations if they do not get what they ask for. They profess to be celibates, but a peculiarity of their const.i.tution is that the community consists of both males and females, and they camp close to each other. The small detachments who travel round the villages are also mixed companies.
There are a large number of children attached to the community, who are brought up to follow the same life and wear the same slate-coloured habit. So also do the women, who receive an education, contrary to the custom so prevalent in India, and are said to spend a good deal of their time teaching the children. Their explanation of the presence of children in their midst is that they are orphans, or that they have been given to them by parents in fulfilment of a vow.
One of the small sub-sections of the community took up their quarters in the verandah of a shut-up house in Yerandawana. Pa.s.sing through the village one evening, I came upon them just as they were about to sit down to their evening meal. I asked a rather pleasant-looking, middle-aged woman whether the several children that I saw playing about went to school. She replied, ”No. _I_ teach them.” A tall, not very attractive-looking old man came out of the verandah, and asked who I was. When I gave him my name, he said that his name was ”Krishna _Padre_”--the latter being the popular t.i.tle given in India to a clergyman. He was the _Guru_, or religious teacher, to the community.
I said that I was the Christian _Guru_ of the place. He asked me the usual questions as to what pay I got, and who gave me my food and clothing, and the meaning of the knots in my girdle. Then he asked me if I ate meat, and when I said that I did, he took a large pinch of snuff, saying that I was not a true _Guru_, because a true _Guru_ never eats meat. Someone then called him away to supper. I invited him to come and see the church next day, but the following morning they all moved on to the next village. The Yerandawana people were thankful to be rid of them, and a.s.sured me that the _Guru's_ a.s.sertion that he never took meat was not true; as also another of his a.s.sertions, that they never wors.h.i.+pped idols, because they carried one about with them and the old _Guru_ wors.h.i.+pped it daily.
CHAPTER x.x.x
THE INDIAN WIDOW
Exaggerated statements about widows. Easterns naturally demonstrative in their grief. The conservative widow.
Influential and wealthy widows. Remarriage of widows. Hindu Widows' Home; its aim and object; a visit to the Home; the daily routine; impressions made by the visit. The True Light. The future of the widows. Custom a hindrance to progress. The effect of caste. The Indian daughter-in-law; not necessarily in bondage. A kind-hearted mother-in-law.
There has been a good deal of false sentiment expended, and exaggerated statements made, concerning the condition of widows in India. The condition of a widow is of necessity a trying one in any country. She often has to exchange a position of affluence and importance for one of poverty and obscurity. The Indian widow is at any rate sure of a home and support from her relations, which is not always the case with the English widow. The stripping of the ornaments, the shaving of the head, the shabby garments, the meagre food, the hard work, and the despised position of the Indian widow has often been described in moving terms. But the Western widow also lays aside her ornaments during her time of mourning, and the shaving of the head is a natural Eastern outward symbol of sorrow. The Hindu man, who invariably wears a moustache, shaves it off when he loses some near relation, such as a parent or a brother. The plain white garments which the Indian widow usually wears have nothing of the dreary severity of the garb of the veiled English widow, to whom also scanty food, hard work, and humble station often becomes her portion from necessity.
Easterns are always demonstrative in their expressions of grief. Hence the removal of the ornaments, the cutting off the hair, etc., is performed in a demonstrative way. But the Hindu widow would not wish it otherwise; and although all the ceremonies may not be exactly congenial to her, she is at any rate a person of importance even in her humiliation, and that is a great compensation to her. If she has money--and some Hindu husbands leave all their wealth to their wives--she will find herself surrounded by affectionate relations, all of them ready to undertake the management of her property, and each of them warning her of the necessity of being on her guard not to trust any of the others.
At a Hindu Widows' Home, to be described presently, the inmates dress as they like, wear what ornaments they please, and let their hair grow. Someone visiting the Home was surprised to see a widow with her head shaved, and wearing the unadorned white garments. On inquiry, it transpired that this woman refused to avail herself of her freedom, and that she preferred to bear the outward marks of widowhood out of respect to the memory of her husband.
One of the most influential of the residents in Yerandawana village is a widow, and she is much looked up to. She is well-dressed, wears a good deal of gold jewellery, and her white hair sets off her wrinkled brown face. She was photographed in a group with her grandsons; and her relations and other villagers not unfrequently call at the Mission bungalow and ask to see the photograph.
The real hards.h.i.+p for the young Hindu widow is that she cannot marry again. In spite of much talk amongst so-called Hindu ”reformers” about the advisability of allowing the remarriage of widows, very little practical progress has been made in this direction. Many young girls are thus condemned unwillingly to lead unmarried lives, their widowhood having often begun in actual childhood. The result of this is, as might be expected, in too many cases disastrous.
Many of the attempts of Hindus to establish charitable inst.i.tutions, such as orphanages, have been definitely in opposition to Christian efforts in the same direction, and they did not deserve to prosper, and few survive. But there is one inst.i.tution, which was founded with a genuine desire to ameliorate the position of young Hindu widows, which has not only held its ground, but has steadily enlarged its sphere of usefulness.
[Ill.u.s.tration: SARLA KALU WITH HER GREAT-GRANDSON.]
This Hindu Widows' Home is out in the country, two or three miles beyond our own village Mission. Its aim and object, as expressed in their report, published in English as well as Marathi, is as follows:--”To educate young widows from the higher castes that do not allow widow remarriage, so as to enable them to earn an honourable living and to cultivate their minds.” The work, begun on a small scale several years ago, has gradually developed. The inmates of the Home number eighty or more, and nearly all of these are Brahmin widows. But even Brahmins are divided into sections, and although in the Home they are all able to eat in the same room, they sit in different groups according to the section to which they belong.