Modern India by William Eleroy Curtis

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The great attraction of Amritsar is "The Golden Temple" of the
Sikhs which stands in the middle of a lake known as "The Pool of
Immortality." It is not a large building, being only fifty-three
feet square, but is very beautiful and the entire exterior is
covered with plates of gold. In the treasury is the original
copy of the "Granth" and a large number of valuable jewels which
have been collected for several centuries. Among them is one
of the most valuable strings of pearls ever collected.

The Punjab is a province of northern India directly south of
Cashmere, east of Afghanistan and west of Thibet. It is one of
the most enterprising, progressive and prosperous provinces,
and, being situated in the temperate zone, the character of the
inhabitants partakes of the climate. There is a great difference,
morally, physically and intellectually, between people who live
in the tropics and those who live in the temperate zone. This
rule applies to all the world, and nowhere more than in India.
Punjab means "five rivers," and is formed of the Hindu words
"punj ab." The country is watered by the Sutlej, the Beas, the
Rabi, the Chenab and the Jhelum rivers, five great streams, which
flow into the Indus, and thence to the Arabian Sea. Speaking
generally, the Punjab is a vast plain of alluvial formation,
and the eastern half of it is very fertile. The western part
requires irrigation, the rainfall being only a few inches a year,
but there is always plenty of water for irrigation in the rivers.
They are fed by the melting snows in the Himalayas.

The City of Lahore, the capital of the Punjab, is a stirring,
modern town, a railway center, with extensive workshops employing
several thousand men, and early in the nineteenth century, under
the administration of Ranjit Singh, one of the greatest of the
maharajas, it acquired great commercial importance, but the buildings
he erected are cheap and tawdry beside the exquisite architectural
monuments of Akbar, Shah Jeban and other Moguls. The population
of Punjab province by the census of 1901 is 20,330,339, and the
Mohammedans are in the majority, having 10,825,698 of the
inhabitants. The Sikhs are a very important class and number
1,517,019. There are only 2,200,000 Sikhs in all India, and those
who do not live in this province are serving as soldiers elsewhere.
The population of Lahore is 202,000, an increase of 26,000 during
the last ten years.

When you come into a Mohammedan country you always find tiles.
Somehow or another they are associated with Islam. The Moors
were the best tilemakers that ever lived, and gave that art to
Spain. In Morocco today the best modern tiles are found. The
tiles of Constantinople, Damascus, Smyrna, Jerusalem and other
cities of Syria and the Ottoman Empire are superior to any you
can find outside of Morocco; and throughout Bokhara, Turkestan,
Afghanistan and the other Moslem countries of Asia tilemaking has
been practiced for ages. In their invasion of India the Afghans
and Tartars brought it with them, and, although the art did not
remain permanently so far beyond the border as Delhi, you find
it there, in the rest of the Punjab and wherever Mohammedans
are in the majority.

Lahore is an ancient city and has many interesting old buildings.
The city itself lies upon the ruins of several predecessors which
were destroyed by invaders during the last twelve or fifteen
centuries. There are some fine old mosques and an ancient palace
or two, but compared with other Indian capitals it lacks interest.
The most beautiful and attractive of all its buildings is the
tomb of Anar Kali (which means pomegranate blossom), a lady of
the Emperor Akbar's harem, who became the sweetheart of Selim,
his son. She was buried alive by order of the jealous father
and husband for committing an unpardonable offense, and when
Selim became the Emperor Jehanjir he erected this wonderful tomb
to her memory. It is of white marble, and the carvings and mosaic
work are very fine. In striking contrast with it is a vulgar,
fantastic temple covered inside and out with convex mirrors.
In the center of the rotunda, upon a raised platform is carved
a lotus flower, and around it are eleven similar platforms of
smaller size. The guides tell you that upon these platforms the
body of Ranjit Singh, the greatest of the maharajas, was burned
in 1839, and his eleven wives were burned alive upon the platforms
around him.

The Emperor Jehanjir is buried in a magnificent mausoleum in the
center of a walled garden on the bank of the river five miles
from Lahore, but his tomb does not compare in beauty or splendor
with those at Agra and Delhi. There is a garden called "The Abode
of Love," about six miles out of town, where everybody drives
in the afternoon. It was laid out by the Mogul Shah Jehan in
1637 for a recreation ground for himself and his sultanas when
he visited this part of the empire, and includes about eighty
acres of flowers and foliage plants.

Modern Lahore is much more interesting than the ancient city.
The European quarter covers a large area. The principal street
is three miles long, shaded with splendid trees, and on each
side of it are the public offices, churches, schools, hotels,
clubs and the residences of rich people, which are nearly all
commodious bungalows surrounded by groves and gardens. The native
city is a busy bazaar, densely packed with gayly dressed types
of all the races of Asia, and is full of dust, filth and smells.
But the people are interesting and the colors are gay. It is
sometimes almost impossible to pass through the crowds that fill
the native streets, and whoever enters there must expect to be
jostled sometimes by ugly-looking persons.

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 baths and halls
of audience of the Moguls have been converted into barracks,
arsenals and storerooms, and their decorations have been covered
with whitewash. The only object of interest that has been left is
an armory containing a fine collection of ancient Indian weapons.
But, although the city has lost its medieval picturesqueness, it has
gained in utility, and has become the most important educational
and industrial center of northern India. The university and its
numerous affiliated schools, the law college, the college of
oriental languages and the manual training school are all well
attended and important, and the school of art and industry enjoys
the reputation of being the most useful and the best-managed
institution of the kind in the East, probably in all Asia, which
is due to the zeal and ability of J. L. Kipling, father of Rudyard
Kipling, who has spent the greater part of his life in making it
what it is. He was also the founder of the museum or "Wonder-House,"
as the natives call it. It has the finest collection of Indian
arts and industries in existence except that in South Kensington
Museum, which Mr. Kipling also collected and installed. It was
under the carriage of one of the great old-fashioned cannon that
stand in front of this museum that "Kim" first encountered the
aged Llama, and Kipling's father is the wise man who kept the
"Wonder-House" and gave the weary pilgrim the knowledge and
encouragement that sustained him in his search for The Way.

[Illustration: "KIM," THE CHELA, AND THE OLD LAMA WHO SOUGHT THE
WAY AND THE TRUST AND THE LIGHT]

Rudyard Kipling was born in Bombay, where his father was principal
of an art school, and was brought to Lahore when he was a child,
so that he spent most of his younger life there. He was educated
at the Lahore schools and university; he served for several years
as a reporter of the Lahore newspaper, and there he wrote most
of his short stories. "The Plain Tales From the Hills" and the
best of his "Barrack-Room Ballads" were inspired by his youthful
association with the large military garrison at this point. Here
Danny Deever was hanged for killing a comrade in a drunken passion,
and here Private Mulvaney developed his profound philosophy.

Lahore is the principal Protestant missionary center of northern
India. The American Presbyterians are the oldest in point of
time and the strongest in point of numbers. They came in 1849,
and some of the pioneers are still living. They have schools and
colleges, a theological seminary and other institutions, with
altogether five or six thousand students, and are turning out
battalions of native preachers and teachers for missionary work in
other parts of India. The American Methodists are also strong and
there are several schools maintained by British societies. Fifty
years ago there was not a native Christian in all these parts,
and the missionaries had to coax children into their schools by
offering inducements in the form of food and clothing. Now by
the recent census there are 65,811 professing Christians in the
Punjab province, and the schools and native churches are nearly
all self-supporting.

Lahore is an important market for native merchandise, and the
distributing point for imported European goods as well as the
native products, while Amritsar, the neighboring city, is the
manufacturing center. Here come Cashmeris, Nepalese, Beluchis,
Afghans, Persians, Bokharans, Khivans, Khokandes, Turcomans,
Yarkandis, Cashgaris, Thibetans, Tartars, Ghurkhars, and other
strange types of the human race in Asia, each wearing his native
dress and bringing upon caravans of camels and elephants the
handiwork of his neighbors. The great merchants of London, Paris,
Vienna, New York and Chicago have buyers there picking up curious
articles of native handiwork as well as staples like shawls from
Cashmere and rugs and carpets from Amritsar. The finest carpets
in India are produced at Amristar, and between 4,000 and 5,000
people are engaged in their manufacture. These operators are not
collected in factories as with us, but work in their own homes.
The looms are usually set up in the doorways, through which the
only light can enter the houses, and as you pass up and down the
streets you see women and men, even children, at work at the looms,
for every member of the family takes a turn. As in China, Japan
and other oriental countries, arts and industries are hereditary.
Children always follow the trades of their parents, and all work
is done in the households. The weavers of Amritsar to-day are
making carpets and shawls upon the same looms that were used
by their great-grand fathers--yes, their progenitors ten and
twenty generations back--and are weaving the same patterns, and
it is to be regretted that modern chemical dyes made in Paris, the
United States and Germany are taking the place of the primitive
native methods which produced richer and permanent colors.

The trade is handled by middlemen, who furnish materials to the
weavers and pay them so much for their labor upon each piece.
The average earnings seem to us ridiculously small. An entire
family does not receive more than $3 or $4 a month while engaged
in producing shawls that are sold in London and Paris for hundreds
of pounds and rugs that bring hundreds of dollars, but it costs
them little to live; their wants are few, they have never known any
better circumstances and are perfectly contented. The middleman,
who is usually a Persian Jew, makes the big profit.

Winter is not a good time for visiting northern India. The weather
is too cold and stormy. The roads are frequently obstructed by
snow, and the hotels are not built to keep people up to American
temperature. We could not go to Cashmere at all, although it is
one of the most interesting provinces of the empire, because
the roads were blocked and blizzards were lurking about. There
is almost universal misapprehension about the weather in India.
It is certainly a winter country; it is almost impossible for
unacclimated people to live in most of the provinces between
March and November, and no one can visit some of them without
discomfort from the heat at any season of the year. At the same
time Cashmere and the Punjab province are comfortable no later
than October and no earlier than May, for, although the sun is
bright and warm, the nights are intensely cold, and the extremes
are trying to strangers who are not accustomed to them. You will
often hear people who have traveled all over the world say that
they never suffered so much from the cold as in India, and it
is safe to believe them. The same degree of cold seems colder
there than elsewhere, because the mercury falls so rapidly after
the sun goes down. However, India is so vast, and the climate
and the elevations are so varied, that you can spend the entire
year there without discomfort if you migrate with the birds and
follow the barometer. There are plenty of places to see and to
stay in the summer as well as in the winter.

We arrived in Bombay on the 12th of December, which was at least
a month too late. It would have been better for us to have come
the middle of October and gone immediately north into the Punjab
province and Cashmere, where we would have been comfortable. But
during the entire winter we were not uncomfortably warm anywhere,
and even in Bombay, which is considered one of the hottest places
in the world, and during the rainy season is almost intolerable,
we slept under blankets every night and carried sun umbrellas in
the daytime. At Jeypore, Agra, Delhi and other places the nights
were as cold as they ever are at Washington, double blankets were
necessary on our beds, and ordinary overcoats when we went out
of doors after dark. Sometimes it was colder inside the house
than outside, and in several of the hotels we had to put on our
overcoats and wrap our legs up in steamer rugs to keep from
shivering. At the same time the rays of the sun from 11 to 3
or 4 in the afternoon were intensely hot, and often seriously
affect persons not acclimated. If we ever go to India again we
will arrange to arrive in October and do the northern provinces
before the cold weather sets in.

It's a pity we could not go to Cashmere, because everybody told
us it is such an interesting place and so different from other
parts of India and the rest of the world. It is a land of romance,
poetry and strange pictures. Lalla Rookh and other fascinating
houris, with large brown eyes, pearly teeth, raven tresses and ruby
lips, have lived there; it is the home of the Cashmere bouquet,
and the Vale of Cashmere is an enchanted land. Average Americans
know mighty little about these strange countries, and it takes
time to realize that they actually exist; but we find our fellow
citizens everywhere we go. They outnumber the tourists from all
other nations combined.

I notice that the official reports of the Indian government give
the name as "Kashmir," and, like every other place over here,
it is spelled a dozen different ways, but I shall stick to the
old-fashioned spelling. It you want to know something about it,
Cashmere has an area of 81,000 square miles, a population of
2,905,578 by the census of 1901, and is governed by a maharaja
with the advice of a British "resident," who is the medium of
communication between the viceroy and the local officials. The
maharaja is allowed to do about as he pleases as long as he behaves
himself, and is said to be a fairly good man.

The people are peaceful and prosperous; politics is very quiet;
taxes are low; there is no debt, and a surplus of more than
$3,000,000 in the treasury, which is an unusual state of affairs
for a native Indian province. The exports have increased from
$1,990,000 in 1892 to $4,465,000 in 1902, and the imports from
$2,190,000 in 1892 to $4,120,000 in 1902. The country has its
own coinage and is on a gold basis. The manufacturing industries
are rapidly developing, although the lack of demand for Cashmere
shawls has been a severe blow to local weavers, who, however,
have turned their attention to carpets and rugs instead. Wool
is the great staple, and from time immemorial the weavers of
Cashmere have turned out the finest woolen fabrics in the world.
They have suffered much from the competition of machine-made
goods during the last half-century or more, and have been growing
careless because they cannot get the prices that used to be paid
for the finest products. In ancient times the making of woolen
garments was considered just as much of an art in Cashmere as
painting or sculpture in France and Germany, porcelain work in
China or cloisonne work in Japan, and no matter how long a weaver
was engaged upon a garment, he was sure to find somebody with
sufficient taste and money to buy it. But nowadays, like everybody
else who is chasing the nimble shilling, the Cashmere weavers are
more solicitous about their profits than about their patterns
and the fine quality of their goods. The lapse of the shawl trade
has caused the government to encourage the introduction of the
silk industry. A British expert has been engaged as director of
sericulture, seedlings of the mulberry tree are furnished to
villagers and farmers free of cost, and all cocoons are purchased
by the state at good prices. The government has silk factories
employing between 6,000 and 7,000 persons under the instruction
of French and Swiss weavers.

XX

FAMINES AND THEIR ANTIDOTES

Famine is chronic in India. It has occurred at intervals for
centuries past, as long as records have been kept, as long as
man remembers, and undoubtedly will recur for centuries to come,
although the authorities who are responsible for the well-being
of the empire are gradually organizing to counteract forces of
nature which they cannot control, by increasing the food supply
and providing means for its distribution. But there must be hunger
and starvation in India so long as the population remains as dense
as it is. The reason is not because the earth refuses to support
so many people. There is yet a vast area of fertile land untilled,
and the fields already cultivated would furnish food enough for
a larger population when normal conditions prevail, although
there's but a bare half acre per capita. There is always enough
somewhere in India for everybody even in times of sorest distress,
but it is not distributed equally, and those who are short have
no money to buy and bring from those who have a surplus. The
export of grain and other products from India continues regularly
in the lean as well as the fat years, but the country is so large,
the distances so great, the facilities for transportation so
inadequate, that one province may be exporting food to Europe
because it has to spare, while another province may be receiving
ships loaded with charity from America because its crops have
failed and its people are hungry.

The health and happiness of three hundred million human souls in
India and also of their cattle, their oxen, their sheep, their
donkeys, their camels and their elephants are dependent upon
certain natural phenomena over which neither rajah nor maharaja,
nor viceroy, nor emperor, nor council of state has control, and
before which even the great Mogul on his bejeweled throne stood
powerless. It is possible to ameliorate the consequences, but
it is not possible to prevent them.

Whether the crops shall be fat or lean, whether the people and
the cattle shall be fed or hungry, depends upon the "monsoons,"
as they are called, alternating currents of wind, which bring
rain in its season. All animal and vegetable life is dependent
upon them. In the early summer the broad plains are heated by
the sun to a temperature higher than that of the water of the
great seas which surround them. In parts of northern India, around
Delhi and Agra, the temperature in May and June is higher than
in any other part of the empire, and is exceeded in few other
parts of the world. This phenomenon remains unexplained. The
elevation is about 2,100 feet above the sea; the atmosphere is
dry and the soil is sandy. But for some reason the rays of the
sun are intensely hot and are fatal to those who are exposed
to them without sufficient protection. But this extreme heat
is the salvation of the country, and by its own action brings
the relief without which all animal and vegetable life would
perish. It draws from the ocean a current of wind laden with
moisture which blows steadily for two months toward the northwest
and causes what is called the rainy season. That wind is called
the southwest monsoon. The quantity of rain that falls depends
upon the configuration of the land. Any cause which cools the
winds from the sea and leads to the condensation of the vapor
they carry--any obstacle which blocks their course--causes
precipitation. Through all the northern part of India there is a
heavy rainfall during April, May and June, the earth is refreshed
and quantities of water are drained into reservoirs called "tanks,"
from which the fields are irrigated later in the summer.

The quantity of rainfall diminishes as the winds blow over the
foothills and the mountains, and the enormous heights of the
Himalayas prevent them from passing their snow-clad peaks and
ridges. Hence the tablelands of Thibet, which lie beyond, are
the dryest and the most arid region in the world.

As the sun travels south after midsummer the temperature falls,
the vast dry tract of the Asiatic continent becomes colder, the
barometric pressure over the land increases, and the winds begin
to blow from the northeast, which are called the northeast monsoon,
and cause a second rainy season from October to December. These
winds, or monsoons, enable the farmers of India to grow two crops,
and they are entirely dependent upon their regular appearance.

Over 80 per cent of the population are engaged in farming. They
live from hand to mouth. They have no reserve whatever. If the
monsoon fails nothing will grow, and they have no money to import
food for themselves and their cattle from more fortunate sections.
Hence they are helpless. As a rule the monsoons are very reliable,
but every few years they fail, and a famine results. The government
has a meteorological department, with observers stationed at
several points in Africa and Arabia and in the islands of the
sea, to record and report the actions of nature. Thus it has been
able of late years to anticipate the fat and the lean harvests. It
is possible to predict almost precisely several months in advance
whether there will be a failure of crops, and a permanent famine
commission has been organized to prepare measures of relief before
they are needed. In other words, Lord Curzon and his official
associates are reducing famine relief to a system which promotes
economy as well as efficiency.

It is an interesting fact that the monsoon currents which cross
the Indian Ocean from South Africa continue on their course through
Australia after visiting India, and recent famines in the latter
country have coincided with the droughts which caused much injury
to stock in the former. Thus it has been demonstrated that both
countries depend upon the same conditions for their rainfall,
except that human beings suffer in India while only sheep die
of hunger in the Australian colonies.

The worst famine ever known in India occurred in 1770, when Governor
General Warren Hastings reported that one-third of the inhabitants
of Bengal perished from hunger--ten millions out of thirty millions.
The streets of Calcutta and other towns were actually blocked
up with the bodies of the dead, which were thrown out of doors
and windows because there was no means or opportunity to bury
them. The empire has been stricken almost as hard during the
last ten years. The development of civilization seems to make
a little difference, for the famine of 1900-1901 was perhaps
second in severity to that of 1770. This, however, was largely
due to the fact that the population had not had time to recover
from the famine of 1896-97, which was almost as severe, although
everything possible was done to relieve distress and prevent
the spread of plagues and pestilence that are the natural and
unavoidable consequences of insufficient nourishment.

No precautions that sanitary science can suggest have been omitted,
yet the weekly reports now show an average of twenty thousand
deaths from the bubonic plague alone. The officials explain that
that isn't so high a rate as inexperienced people infer, considering
that the population is nearly three hundred millions, and they
declare it miraculous that it is not larger, because the Hindu
portion of the population is packed so densely into insanitary
dwellings, because only a small portion of the natives have
sufficient nourishment to meet the demands of nature and are
constantly exposed to influences that produce and spread disease.
The death rate is always very high in India for these reasons.
But it seems very small when compared with the awful mortality
caused by the frequent famines. The mind almost refuses to accept
the figures that are presented; it does not seem possible in the
present age, with all our methods for alleviating suffering,
that millions of people can actually die of hunger in a land
of railroads and steamships and other facilities for the
transportation of food. It seems beyond comprehension, yet the
official returns justify the acceptance of the maximum figures
reported.

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