Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L. E. L.) in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1838/The Ganges
62
THE GANGES ENTERING THE PLAINS NEAR HURDWAR.
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THE GANGES.
On sweeps the mighty river—calmly flowing,
Through the eternal flowers,
That light the summer hours,
Year after year, perpetual in their blowing.
Over the myriad plains that current ranges,
Itself as clear and bright
As in its earliest light,
And yet the mirror of perpetual changes.
Here must have ceased the echo of those slaughters,
When stopped the onward jar
Of Macedonian war,
Whose murmur only reached thy ancient waters.
Yet have they reddened with the fierce outpouring
Of human blood and life,
When over kingly strife
The vulture on his fated wing was soaring.
How oft its watch, impatient of the morrow,
Hath mortal misery kept,
Beside thy banks, and wept,
Kissing thy quiet night-winds with their sorrow.
Yet thou art on thy course majestic keeping,
Unruffled by the breath
Of man's vain life or death,
Calm as the heaven upon thy bosom sleeping.
Still dost thou keep thy calm and onward motion,
Amid the ancient ranks
Of forests on thy banks,
Till thou hast gained thy home—the mighty ocean.
And thou dost scatter benefits around thee:
Thy silver current yields
Life to the green rice-fields,
That have like an enchanted girdle bound thee.
By thee are royal gardens, each possessing
A summer in its hues,
Which still thy wave renews,
Where'er thou flowest dost thou bear a blessing.
Such, O my country! should be thy advancing—
A glorious progress, known
As is that river's, shown
By the glad sunshine on its waters glancing.
So should thy moral light be onwards flowing—
So should its course be bound
By benefits around,
The blessings which itself hath known bestowing.
Faith—commerce—knowledge—laws—these should be springing
Where'er thy standard flies
Amid the azure skies,
Whose highest gifts that red-cross flag is bringing.
Already much for man has been effected;
The weak and poor man's cause
Is strengthened by the laws,
The equal right, born with us, all respected.
But much awaits, O England! thy redressing;
Thou hast no nobler guide
Than yon bright river's tide
Bear as that bears—where’er thou goest, blessing!
Will General Fagan permit me to quote an expression of his which struck me most forcibly? "We have," said he, "been the conquerors of India: we have now to be its benefactors, its legislators, its instructors, and its liberators."
THE GANGES NEAR HURDWAR—p.33
The Ganges (called by the natives Ganga, the river,) takes its rise among the loftiest of the Himalayan peaks, and, after winding for a hundred and fifty miles through a stupendous labyrinth of mountains, enters the plains of Hindostan through an opening in the mountains of Hurdwar. It exchanges the character of a raging torrent for that of a clear broad stream, and glides tranquilly, for a distance of twelve hundred miles, to the ocean. The Brahmins of India venerate the Ganges much, and pretend to believe, that its first descent from heaven was designed to fill up the "hollowed, but then empty, bed of ocean itself;" and all Hindoos imagine that it springs up at the feet of Brama. The distant hill, in the illustration, is the Chandnee Pahar, (or Silver Mountain,) on the summit of which, an elevation of six thousand feet, a white temple to Mahadeva is erected, to whose altar the pilgrims, after performing their ablutions in the river, repair to fulfil their devotions. In the British-Indian courts of justice, the water of the Ganges is used for swearing Hindoos, as the Bible is for Christians.