During the hot season in Hyderabad the thermometer
reaches ninety-eight degrees Fahrenheit in the shade, and the
temperature of the water in the Indus is the temperature of the
blood. As to Upper Sindh, where the dryness of the air, and the
extreme aridity of the sandy soil reproduce the Sahara in miniature,
the usual shade temperature is one hundred and thirty degrees
Fahrenheit. No wonder the missionaries have no chance there. The
most eloquent of Dante's descriptions of hell could hardly produce
anything but a cooling effect on a populace who live perfectly
contented under these circumstances.
Calculating that there was no obstacle to our going to the Bagh
caves, and that going to Sindh was a perfect impossibility, we
recovered our equanimity. Then the general council decided that
we had better abandon all ideas of a predetermined plan, and travel
as fancy led us.
We dismissed our elephants, and next day, a little before sunset,
arrived at the spot where the Vagrey and Girna join. These are
two little rivers, quite famous in the annals of the Indian mythology,
and which are generally conspicuous by their absence, especially
in summer. At the opposite side of the river, there lay the
illustrious Bagh caves, with their four openings blinking in the
thick evening mist.
We thought of crossing to them immediately, by the help of a ferry
boat, but our Hindu friends and the boat-men interposed. The former
said that visiting these caves is dangerous even by daytime; because
all the neighborhood is full of beasts of prey and of tigers, who,
I concluded, are like the Bengali Babus, to be met with everywhere
in India. Before venturing into these caves, you must send a
reconnoitring party of torch-bearers and armed shikaris. As to
the boatmen, they protested on different grounds, but protested
strongly. They said that no Hindu would dare to approach these
caves after the sun set. No one but a Bellati would fancy that
Vagrey and Girna are ordinary rivers, for every Hindu knows they
are divine spouses, the god Shiva and his wife Parvati. This, in
the first instance; and in the second, the Bagh tigers are no
ordinary tigers either. The sahibs are totally mistaken. These
tigers are the servants of the Sadhus, of the holy miracle-workers,
who have haunted the caves now for many centuries, and who deign
sometimes to take the shape of a tiger. And neither the gods, nor
the Sadhus, nor the glamour, nor the true tigers are fond of being
disturbed in their nightly rest.
What could we say against all this? We cast one more sorrowful
look at the caves, and returned to our antediluvian carriages. The
Babu and Narayan said we must spend the night at the house of a
certain "chum" of the Babu, who resided in a small town, three
miles further on, and bearing the same name as the caves; and we
unwillingly acquiesced.
Many things in India are wonderful and unintelligible, but one of
the most wonderful and the most unintelligible, is the geographical
and the topographical disposition of the numberless territories of
this country. Political conjunctures in India seem to be
everlastingly playing the French game casse-tete, changing the
pattern, diminishing one part and adding to another. The land
that only yesterday belonged to this Raja or that Takur, is sure
to be found today in the hands of quite a different set of people.
For instance, we were in the Raj of Amjir in Malva, and we were
going to the little city of Bagh, which also belongs to Malva and
is included in the Amjir Raj. In the documents, Malva is included
in the independent possessions of Holkar; and nevertheless the
Amjir Raj does not belong to Tukuji-Rao-Holkar, but to the son of
the independent Raja of Amjir, who was hanged, "by inadvertence"
as we were assured, in 1857. The city, and the caves of Bagh,
very oddly belong to the Maharaja Sindya of Gwalior, who, besides,
does not own them personally, having made a kind of present of them,
and their nine thousand rupees of revenue, to some poor relation.
This poor relation, in his turn, does not enjoy the property in
the least, because a certain Rajput Takur stole it from him, and
will not consent to give it back. Bagh is situated on the road
from Gujerat to Malva, in the defile of Oodeypur, which is owned
accordingly by the Maharana of Oodeypur. Bagh itself is built on
the top of a woody hillock, and being disputed property does not
belong to any one in particular, properly speaking; but a small
fortress, and a bazaar in the centre of it are the private possessions
of a certain dhani; who, besides being the chieftain of the Bhimalah
tribe, was the personal "chum" of our Babu, and a "great thief and
highway robber," according to the assertions of the said Babu.
"But why do you intend taking us to the place of a man whom you
consider as a thief and a robber?" objected one of us timidly.
"He is a thief and a brigand," coolly answered the Bengali, "but
only in the political sense. Otherwise he is an excellent man,
and the truest of friends. Besides, if he does not help us, we
shall starve; the bazaar and everything in the shops belong to him."
These explanations of the Babu notwithstanding, we were glad to
learn that the "chum" in question was absent, and we were received
by a relation of his. The garden was put at our disposal, and
before our tents were pitched, we saw people coming from every
side of the garden, bringing us provisions. Having deposited what
he had brought, each of them, on leaving the tent, threw over his
shoulder a pinch of betel and soft sugar, an offering to the
"foreign bhutas," which were supposed to accompany us wherever we
went.
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