Modern India by William Eleroy Curtis

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The amount and fineness of embroidery upon the border and in
the corners of shawls give them their value, and sometimes there
is an elaborate design in the center. The shawl itself is so
fine that it can be drawn through a finger ring or folded up
and stowed away in an ordinary pocket, but it has the warmth
of a Scotch blanket. Shawls are woven and embroidered in the
homes of the people of Cashmere, and are entirely of hand work.
There are no factories and no steam looms, and every stitch of
the decoration is made with an ordinary needle by the fingers
of a man. Women do not seem to have acquired the accomplishment.

A great deal of fun used to be made at the expense of Queen Victoria,
who was in the habit of sending a Cashmere shawl whenever she was
expected to make a wedding present, and no doubt it was rather
unusual for her to persist in forcing unfashionable garments
upon her friends. But there is another way of looking at it.
The good queen was deeply interested in promoting the native
industries of India, and bought a large number of shawls every
year from the best artists in Cashmere. Up there shawl-makers
have reputations like painters and orators with us, and if you
would ask the question in Cashmere any merchant would give you
the names of the most celebrated weavers and embroiderers. Queen
Victoria was their most regular and generous patron. She not
only purchased large numbers of shawls herself, but did her best
to bring them into fashion, both because she believed it was a
sensible practice, and would advance the prosperity of the heathen
subjects in whom she took such a deep interest.

The arts and industries of India are very old. Their methods
have been handed down from generation to generation, because
sons are in the habit of following the trades of fathers, and
they are inclined to cling to the same old patterns and the same
old processes, regardless of labor-saving devices and modern
fashions. Many people think this habit should be encouraged;
that what may be termed the classic designs of the Hindus cannot
be improved upon, and it is certainly true that all purely modern
work is inferior. Lord and Lady Curzon have shown deep interest
in this subject. Lord Curzon has used his official authority and
the influence of the government to revive, restore and promote
old native industries, and Lady Curzon has been an invaluable
commercial agent for the manufacturers of the higher class of
fabrics and art objects in India. She has made many of them
fashionable in Calcutta and other Indian cities and in London,
Paris and the capitals of Europe, and so great is her zeal that,
with all her cares and responsibilities, and the demands upon
her time, she always has the leisure to place orders for her
friends and even for strangers who address her, and to assist
the silk weavers, embroiderers and other artists to adapt their
designs and patterns and fabrics to the requirements of modern
fashions. She wears nothing but Indian stuffs herself, and there
is no better dressed woman in the world. She keeps several of
the best artists in India busy with orders from her friends, and
is beginning to see the results of her efforts in the revival
of arts that were almost forgotten.

The population of Delhi is about 208,000. The majority of the
people, as in the other cities of northwestern India, are
Mohammedans, descendants of the invaders of the middle ages, and
the hostility between them and the Brahmins is quite sharp. The
city is surrounded by a lofty wall six miles in circumference,
which was built by Shah Jehan, the greatest of the Moguls, some
time about 1630, and the modern town begins its history at that
date. It has been the scene of many exciting events since then.
Several times it has been sacked and its inhabitants massacred.
As late as 1739 the entire population was put to the sword and
everything of value within the walls was carried off by the Persians.
In the center of the city still remains a portion of what was
probably the most splendid palace that was ever erected. It is
surrounded by a second wall inclosing an area 3,000 feet long by
1,500 feet wide, which was at one time filled with buildings of
unique beauty and interest. They illustrated the imperial grandeur
of the Moguls, whose style of living was probably more splendid
than that of any monarchs of any nation before or since their
time. Their extravagance was unbounded. Their love of display
has never been surpassed, and while it is a question where they
obtained the enormous sums of money they squandered in ceremonies
and personal adornment, there is none as to the accuracy of the
descriptions given to them. The fact that Nadir Shah, the Persian
invader, was able to carry away $300,000,000 in booty of jewels
and gold, silver and other portable articles of value when he
sacked Delhi in 1739, is of itself evidence that the stories
of the wealth and the splendor of the Moguls are not fables.
It is written in the history of Persia that the people of that
empire were exempt from taxation for three years because their
king brought from Delhi enough money to pay all the expenses
of his government and his army during that time. We are told
that he stripped plates of gold from the walls of the palace
of Delhi and removed the ceilings from the apartments because
they were made of silver, and the peacock throne of itself was
of sufficient value to pay the debts of a nation.

A considerable part of the palaces of the Moguls has been destroyed
by vandals or removed by the British authorities in order to make
room for ugly brick buildings which are used as barracks and
for the storage of arms, ammunition and other military supplies.
It is doubtful whether they could have secured uglier designs and
carried them out with ruder workmanship. Writers upon Indian
history and architecture invariably devote a chapter to this
national disgrace for which the viceroys in the latter part of
the nineteenth century were responsible, and they denounce it as
even worse than the devastation committed by barbarian invaders.
"Nadir Shah, Ahmed Khan and the Maratha chiefs were content to strip
the buildings of their precious metals and the jeweled thrones,"
exclaims one eminent writer. "To the government of the present
Empress of India was left the last dregs of vandalism, which
after the mutiny pulled down these perfect monuments of Mogul art
to make room for the ugliest brick buildings from Simla to Ceylon.
The whole of the harem courts of the palace were swept off the
face of the earth to make way for a hideous British barrack,
without those who carried out this fearful piece of vandalism
thinking it even worth while to make a plan of what they were
destroying, or making any records of the most splendid palace
in the world. Of the public parts of the palace, all that remain
are the entrance hall, the Nobut Khana, the Dewani Aum, the Dewani
Khas and the Rung Mahal, now used as a mess room, and one or two
small pavilions. They are the gems of the palace, it is true,
but without the courts and corridors connecting them they lose
all their meaning and more than half their beauty. Being now
situated in the midst of a British barrack yard, they look like
precious stones torn from their settings in some exquisite piece
of oriental jeweler's work and set at random in a bed of the
commonest plaster."

It is only fair to say that no one appreciates this situation
more keenly than Lord Curzon, and while he is too discreet a
man to criticise the acts of his predecessors in office, he has
plans to restore the interior of the fort to something like its
original condition and has already taken steps to tear down the
ugly brick buildings that deface the landscape. But something
more is necessary. The vandalism still continues in a small way.
While we were being escorted through the beautiful buildings by
a blithe and gay young Irish soldier, I called his attention to
several spots in the wall where bits of precious stone--carnelian,
turquoise and agate--had been picked out and carried away as
relics. The wounds in the wall were recent. It was perfectly
apparent that the damage had been done that very day, but he
declared that there was no way to prevent it; that he was the
only custodian of the place; that there were no guards; that
it was impossible for him to be everywhere at once, and that
it was easy enough for tourists and other visitors to deface
the mosaics with their pocket knives in one of the palaces while
he was showing people through the others.

The mosaics which adorn the interior marble walls of the palaces
are considered incomparable. They are claimed to be the most
elaborate, the most costly and the most perfect specimens of the
art in existence. The designs represents flowers, foliage, fruits,
birds, beasts, fishes and reptiles, carried out with precious
stones in the pure white marble with the skill and delicacy of a
Neapolitan cameo cutter, and it is said that they were designed
and done by Austin de Bordeaux, the Frenchman who decorated the
Taj Mahal, and it was a bad man who did this beautiful work.
History says that "after defrauding several of the princes of
Europe by means of false gems, which he fabricated with great
skill, he sought refuge at the court of the Moguls, where he
was received with high favor and made his fortune."

The richest and the loveliest of the rooms in the palace is the
Diwan-i-Khas, or Hall of Private Audience, which is built entirely
of marble and originally had a silver ceiling. The walls were once
covered with gold, and in the center stood the famous peacock
throne. Over the north and south entrances are written in flowing
Persia, characters the following lines:

If there be a Paradise on Earth
It is This! It is This! It is This!

The building was a masterpiece of refined fancy and extravagance,
and upon its decorations Austin de Bordeaux, whose work on the Taj
Mahal pronounces him to be one of the greatest artists that ever
lived, concentrated the entire strength of his genius and lavished
the wealth of an empire. Mr. Tavernier, a French jeweler, who
visited Delhi a few years after the palace was finished, estimated
the value of the decorations of this one room at 27,000,000 francs.

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 crystal. M. Tavernier
asserts that it was the largest piece of crystal ever discovered,
and that it was without a flaw. It was shattered by the barbarians
during the invasion of the Marathas in 1789. But the peacock
throne, which stood in the room I have just described, was even
more wonderful, and stands as the most extraordinary example
of extravagance on record.

[Illustration: HALL OF MARBLE AND MOSAICS IN THE PALACE OF THE
MOGULS AT DEHLI]

A description written at the time says: "It was so called from its
having the figures of two peacocks standing behind it, their tails
being expanded, and the whole so inlaid with diamonds, sapphires,
rubies, emeralds, pearls and other precious stones of appropriate
colors as to represent life. The throne itself was six feet long
by five feet broad. It stood upon six massive feet, which, like
the body, were of solid gold, inlaid with rubies, emeralds and
diamonds. It was surrounded by a canopy of gold, supported by
twelve pillars, all richly emblazoned with costly gems, and a
fringe of pearls ornamented the borders of the canopy. Between
the two peacocks stood a figure of a parrot of the ordinary size
carved out of a single emerald. On either side of the throne
stood an umbrella, one of the emblems of royalty. They were formed
of crimson velvet, richly embroidered and fringed with pearls.
The handles were eight feet high, of solid gold thickly studded
with diamonds."

This throne, according to a medical gentleman named Bernier, the
writer whose description I have quoted, was planned and executed
under the direction of Austin de Bordeaux. It was carried away by
Nadir Shah to Teheran in 1739, and what is left of it is still
used by the Shah of Persia on ceremonial occasions. The canopy,
the umbrellas, the emerald parrot and the peacocks have long
ago disappeared.

The same splendor, in more or less degree, was maintained throughout
the entire palace during the reign of the Moguls. The apartments
of the emperor and those of his wives, the harem, the baths,
the public offices, the quarters for his ministers, secretaries
and attendants were all built of similar materials and decorated
in the same style of magnificence. Some of the buildings are
allowed to remain empty for the pleasures of tourists; others
are occupied for military purposes, and the Rung Mahal, one of
the most beautiful, formerly the residence of the Mogul's favorite
wife, is now used for a messroom by the officers of the garrison.
A writer of the seventh century who visited the place says: "It
was more beautiful than anything in the East that we know of."

At one end of the group of the buildings is the Moti Majid, or
Pearl Mosque, which answered to the private chapel of the Moguls,
and has been declared to be "the daintiest building in all India."
In grace, simplicity and perfect proportions it cannot be surpassed.
It is built of the purest marble, richly traced with carving.

It is within the walls of this fort and among these exquisite
palaces that the Imperial durbar was held on the 1st of January,
1903, to proclaim formally the coronation of King Edward VII.,
Emperor of India, and Lord Curzon, with remarkable success, carried
out his plan to make the occasion one of extraordinary splendor.
It brought together for the first time all of the native princes
of India, who, in the presence of each other, renewed their pledges
of loyalty and offered their homage to the throne. No spectacle
of greater pomp and splendor has ever been witnessed in Europe or
Asia or any other part of the world since the days of the Moguls.
The peacock throne could not be recovered for the occasion, but
Lord and Lady Curzon sat upon the platform where it formerly
stood, and there received the ruling chiefs, nobles and princes
from all the states and provinces of India. Lord Curzon has been
criticised severely in certain quarters for the "barbaric splendor
and barbaric extravagance of this celebration," but people familiar
with the political situation in India and the temper of the native
princes have not doubted for a moment the wisdom which inspired
it and the importance of its consequences. The oriental mind
is impressed more by splendor than by any other influence, and
has profound respect for ceremonials. The Emperor of India, by
the durbar, recognized those racial peculiarities, and not only
gratified them but made himself a real personality to the native
chiefs instead of an abstract proposition. It has given the British
power a position that it never held before; it swept away jealousies
and brought together ruling princes who had never seen each other
until then. It broke down what Lord Curzon calls "the water-tight
compartment system of India."

"Each province," he says, "each native state, is more or less
shut off by solid bulkheads from its neighbors. The spread of
railways and the relaxation of social restrictions are tending
to break them down, but they are still very strong. Princes who
live in the south have rarely ever in their lives seen or visited
the states of the north. Perhaps among the latter are chiefs who
have rarely ever left their homes. It cannot but be a good thing
that they should meet and get to know each other and exchange ideas.
To the East there is nothing strange, but something familiar and
even sacred," continued Lord Curzon, "in the practice that brings
sovereigns together with their people in ceremonies of solemnity.
Every sovereign in India did it in the old days; every chief in
India does it now; and the community of interest between the
sovereign and his people, to which such a function testifies and
which it serves to keep alive, is most vital and most important."

And the durbar demonstrated the wisdom of those who planned it. The
expense was quite large. The total disbursements by the government
were about $880,000, and it is probable that an equal amount
was expended by the princes and other people who participated.
That has been the subject of severe criticism also, because the
people were only slowly recovering from the effect of an awful
famine. But there is another point of view. Every farthing of
those funds was spent in India and represented wages paid to
workmen employed in making the preparations and carrying them
into effect. No money went out of the country. It all came out of
the pockets of the rich and was paid into the hands of the poor.
What the government and the native princes and nobles expended in
their splendid displays was paid to working people who needed
it, and by throwing this large amount into circulation the entire
country was benefited.

The extravagance of the Viceroy and Lady Curzon in their own
personal arrangements has also been criticised, and people complain
that they might have done great good with the immense sums expended
in dress and entertainment and display, but it is easy to construe
these criticisms into compliments, for everyone testifies that both
the viceroy and his beautiful American wife performed their parts
to perfection, and that no one could have appeared with greater
dignity and grace. Every detail of the affair was appropriate
and every item upon the programme was carried out precisely as
intended and desired. Lord and Lady Curzon have the personal
presence, the manners and all the other qualities required for
such occasions.

Dr. Francois Bernier, the French physician who visited the Mogul
court in 1658, and gives us a graphic description of the durbar
and Emperor Aurangzeb, who reigned at that time, writes: "The
king appeared upon his throne splendidly appareled. His vest was
of white satin, flowered and raised with a very fine embroidery
of gold and silk. His turban was of cloth of gold, having a fowl
wrought upon it like a heron, whose foot was covered with diamonds
of an ordinary bigness and price, with a great oriental topaz
which may be said to be matchless, shining like a little sun. A
collar of long pearls hung about his neck down to his stomach,
after the manner that some heathens wear their beads. His throne
was supported by six pillars of massive gold set with rubies,
emeralds and diamonds. Beneath the throne there appeared the
great nobles, in splendid apparel, standing upon a raised ground
covered with a canopy of purple with great golden fringes, and
inclosed by a silver balustrade. The pillars of the hall were
hung with tapestries of purple having the ground of gold, and for
the roof of the hall there was nothing but canopies of flowered
satin fastened with red silken cords that had big tufts of silk
mixed with the threads of gold hanging on them. Below there was
nothing to be seen but silken tapestries, very rich and of
extraordinary length and breadth."

XVII

THE TEMPLES AND TOMBS OF DELHI

Seven ancient ruined cities, representing successive periods
and dynasties from 2500 B. C. to 1600 A. D., encumber the plains
immediately surrounding the city of Delhi, within a radius of
eighteen or twenty miles; and you cannot go in any direction
without passing through the ruins of stupendous walls, ancient
fortifications and crumbling palaces, temples, mosques and tombs.
Tradition makes the original Delhi the political and commercial
rival of Babylon, Nineveh, Memphis and Thebes, but the modern
town dates from 1638, the commencement of the reign of the famous
Mogul Shah Jehan, of whom I have written so much in previous
chapters. About eleven miles from the city is a group of splendid
ruins, some of the most remarkable in the world, and a celebrated
tower known as the Kutab-Minar, one of the most important
architectural monuments in India. You reach it by the Great Trunk
Road of India, the most notable thoroughfare in the empire, which
has been the highway from the mountains and northern provinces
to the sacred River Ganges from the beginning of time, and,
notwithstanding the construction of railroads, is to-day the
great thoroughfare of Asia. If followed it will lead you through
Turkestan and Persia to Constantinople and Moscow. Over this
road came Tamerlane, the Tartar Napoleon, with his victorious
army, and Alexander the Great, and it has been trodden by the
feet of successive invaders for twenty or thirty centuries. To-day
it leads to the Khyber Pass, the only gateway between India and
Afghanistan, where the frontier is guarded by a tremendous force,
and no human being is allowed to go either way without permits
from the authorities of both governments. Long caravans still
cross the desert of middle Asia, enter and leave India through
this pass and follow the Grand Trunk Road to the cities of the
Ganges. It is always thronged with pilgrims and commerce; with
trains of bullock carts, caravans of camels and elephants, and
thousands of pedestrians pass every milestone daily. Kipling
describes them and the road in "Kim" in more graphic language
than flows through my typewriter. In the neighborhood of Delhi
the Grand Trunk Road is like the Appian Way of Rome, both sides
being lined with the mausoleums of kings, warriors and saints in
various stages of decay and dilapidation. And scattered among
them are the ruins of the palaces of supplanted dynasties which
appeared and vanished, arose and fell, one after another, in
smoke and blood; with the clash of steel, the cries of victory
and shrieks of despair.

In the center of the court of the ancient mosque of Kutbul Islam,
which was originally built for a Hindu temple in the tenth century,
stands a wrought-iron column, one of the most curious things
in India. It rises 23 feet 8 inches above the ground, and its
base, which is bulbous, is riveted to two stone slabs two feet
below the surface. Its diameter at the base is 16 feet 4 inches
and at the capital is 12 inches. It is a malleable forging of
pure iron, without alloy, and 7.66 specific gravity. According
to the estimates of engineers, it weighs about six tons, and it
is remarkable that the Hindus at that age could forge a bar of
iron larger and heavier than was ever forged in Europe until a
very recent date. Its history is deeply cut upon its surface in
Sanskrit letters. The inscription tells us that it is "The Arm
of Fame of Raja Dhava," who subdued a nation named the Vahlikas,
"and obtained, with his own arm, undivided sovereignty upon the
earth for a long period." No date is given, but the historians
fix its erection about the year 319 or 320 A. D. This is the
oldest and the most unique of all the many memorials in India,
and has been allowed to stand about 1,700 years undisturbed.
An old prophecy declared that Hindu sovereigns would rule as
long as the column stood, and when the empire was invaded in
1200 and Delhi became the capital of a Mohammedan empire, its
conqueror, Kutb-ud-Din (the Pole Star of the Faith), originally
a Turkish slave, defied it by allowing the pillar to remain,
but he converted the beautiful Hindu temple which surrounded
it into a Moslem mosque and ordered his muezzins to proclaim
the name of God and His prophet from its roof, and to call the
faithful to pray within its walls.

This Hindu temple, which was converted into a mosque, is still
unrivaled for its gigantic arches and for the graceful beauty
of the tracery which decorated its walls. Even in ruins it is
a magnificent structure, and Lord Curzon is to be thanked for
directing its partial restoration at government expense. The
architectural treasures of India are many, but there are none
to spare, and it is gratifying to find officials in authority
who appreciate the value of preserving those that remain for
the benefit of architectural and historical students. It it a
pity that the original Hindu carvings upon the columns cannot be
restored. There were originally not less than 1,200 columns, and
each was richly ornamented with peculiar Hindu decorative designs.
Some of them, in shadowy corners, are still almost perfect, but
unfortunately those which are most conspicuous were shamefully
defaced by the Mohammedan conquerors, and we must rely upon our
imaginations to picture them as they were in their original beauty.
The walls of the building are of purplish red standstone, of
very fine grain, almost as fine as marble, and age and exposure
seem to have hardened it.

In one corner of the court of this great mosque rises the Kutab
Minar, a monument and tower of victory. It is supposed to have
been originally started by the Hindus and completed by their
Mohammedan conquerors. Another tower, called the Alai-Minar, about
500 feet distant, remains unfinished, and rises only eighty-seven
feet from the ground. Had it been finished as intended, it would
have been 500 feet high, or nearly as lofty as the Washington
monument. According to the inscription, it was erected by Ala-din
Khiji, who reigned from 1296 to 1316, and remains as it stood at
his death. For some reason his successor never tried to complete
it.

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