The Exertions Of The Performers
Never Appear To Relax, And By Night Or Day, It Is All The Same; They
Make Themselves Heard At Any Distance, Parading Along The Roads For
The Sole Purpose, It Should Seem, Of Annoying The More Peaceable
Inhabitants.
Certainly, the sister arts of music and painting have
yet to make their way in India, the taste for both being at present
perfectly barbarous.
The European bands, when playing on the Esplanade, attract a very
considerable number of natives; but whether congregated for the
purpose of listening to the music, or merely for the sake of
passing the time, seems very doubtful. A few, certainly, manifest
a predilection for "concord of sweet sounds," and no difficulty is
experienced by band-masters in recruiting their forces from natives,
the boys learning readily, and acquitting themselves very well
upon instruments foreign to the country. There is, however, no
manifestation at present of the spread of a refined taste, and many
years will probably elapse before any thing like good music will be
common in this part of Asia.
The great variety of religions extant in Bombay, each being
distinguished by numerous festivals, all celebrated in the same
manner - that is, by noise and illuminations - sufficiently accounts
for the perpetual recurrence of lamp-lighting and drumming in all
directions. Every week brings round the anniversary of some day of
rejoicing of the Mohamedans, Hindus, Parsees, Jews, Roman Catholics,
or Armenians, and Bombay may therefore be said to present one
universal holiday.
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