Works of Jules Verne/Round the World in Eighty Days/Chapter 12
CHAPTER XII
IN WHICH PHILEAS FOGG AND HIS COMPANIONS VENTURE THROUGH THE FORESTS OF INDIA, AND WHAT FOLLOWS
The guide, in order to shorten the distance to be gone over, left to his right the line of the road, the construction of which was still in process. This line, very crooked, owing to the capricious ramifications of the Vindhia mountains, did not follow the shortest route, which it was Phileas Fogg's interest to take. The Parsee, very familiar with the roads and paths of the country, thought to gain twenty miles by cutting through the forest, and they submitted to him.
Phileas Fogg and Sir Francis Cromarty, plunged to their necks in their howdahs, were much shaken up by the rough trot of the elephant, whom his mahout urged into a rapid gait. But they bore it with the peculiar British apathy, talking very little, and scarcely seeing each other. As for Passepartout, perched upon the animal's back, and directly subjected to the swaying from side to side, he took care, upon his master's recommendation, not to keep his tongue between his teeth, as it would have been cut short off. The good fellow, at one time thrown forward on the elephant's neck, at another thrown back upon his rump, was making leaps like a clown on a spring-board. But he joked and laughed in the midst of his somersaults, and from time to time he would take from his bag a lump of sugar, which the intelligent Kiouni took with the end of his trunk, without interrupting for an instant his regular trot.
After two hours' march the guide stopped the elephant and gave him an hour's rest. The animal devoured branches of trees and shrubs, first having quenched his thirst at a neighboring pond. Sir Francis Cromarty did not complain of this halt. He was worn out. Mr. Fogg appeared as if he had just got out of bed.
"But he is made of iron!" said the brigadier general, looking at him with admiration.
"Of wrought iron," replied Passepartout, who was busy preparing a hasty breakfast.
At noon, the guide gave the signal for starting. The country soon assumed a very wild aspect. To the large forests there succeeded copses of tamarinds and dwarf palms, then vast, arid plains, bristling with scanty shrubs, and strewn with large blocks of syenites. All this part of upper Bundelcund, very little visited by travelers, is inhabited by a fanatical population, hardened in the most terrible practices of the Hindoo religion. The government of the English could not have been regularly established over a territory subject to the influence of the rajahs, whom it would have been difficult to reach in their inaccessible retreats in the Vindhias.
They were descending the last declivities of the Vindhias. Kiouni had resumed his rapid gait. Towards noon, the guide went round the village of Kallenger, situated on the Cani, one of the tributaries of the Ganges. He always avoided inhabited places, feeling himself safer in those desert, open stretches of country which mark the first depressions of the basin of the great river. Allahabad was not twelve miles to the northeast. Halt was made under a clump of banana trees, whose fruit, as healthy as bread, as succulent as cream," travelers say, was very much appreciated.
At two o'clock, the guide entered the shelter of a thick forest, which he had to traverse for a space of several miles. He preferred to travel thus under cover of the woods. At all events, up to this moment there had been no unpleasant meeting, and it seemed as if the journey would be accomplished without accident, when the elephant, showing some signs of uneasiness, suddenly stopped.
It was then four o'clock.
"What is the matter?" asked Sir Francis Cromarty, raising his head above his howdah.
"I do not know, officer," replied the Parsee, listening to a confused murmur which came through the thick branches.
A few moments after, this murmur became more defined. It might have been called a concert, still very distant, of human voices and brass instruments.
Passepartout was all eyes, all ears. Mr. Fogg waited patiently, without uttering a word.
The Parsee jumped down, fastened the elephant to a tree, and plunged into the thickest of the undergrowth. A few minutes later he returned, saying:
"A Brahmin procession is coming this way. If it is possible, let us avoid being seen."
The guide unfastened the elephant, and led him into a thicket, recommending the travelers not to descend. He held himself ready to mount the elephant quickly, should flight become necessary. But he thought that the troop of the faithful would pass without noticing him, for the thickness of the foliage entirely concealed him.
The discordant noise of voices and instruments approached. Monotonous chants were mingled with the sound of the drums and cymbals. Soon the head of the procession appeared from under the trees, at fifty paces from the spot occupied by Mr. Fogg and his companions. Through the branches they readily distinguished the curious personnel of this religious ceremony.
In the first line were the priests, with miters upon their heads and attired in long robes adorned with gold and silver lace. They were surrounded by men, women, and children, who were singing a sort of funeral psalmody, interrupted at regular intervals by the beating of tam-tams and cymbals. Behind them on a car with large wheels, whose spokes and felloes represented serpents intertwined, appeared a hideous statue, drawn by two pairs of richly caparisoned zebus. This statue had four arms, its body colored with dark red, its eyes haggard, its hair tangled, its tongue hanging out, its lips colored with henna and betel. Its neck was encircled by a collar of skulls, around its waist a girdle of human hands. It was erect upon a prostrate giant, whose head was missing.
Sir Francis Cromarty recognized this statue.
"The goddess Kali," he murmured; "the goddess of love and death."
"Of death, I grant, but of love, never!" said Passepartout.
"The ugly old woman!"
The Parsee made him a sign to keep quiet.
Around the statue there was a group of old fakirs jumping and tossing themselves about convulsively. Smeared with bands of ochre, covered with cross-like cuts, whence their blood escaped drop by drop—stupid fanatics, who, in the great Hindoo ceremonies, precipitated themselves under the wheels of the car of Juggernaut.
Behind them, some Brahmins in all the magnificence of their Oriental costume, were dragging a woman who could hardly hold herself erect.
This woman was young, and as fair as a European. Her head, her neck, her shoulders, her ears, her arms, her hands, and her toes were loaded down with jewels, necklaces, bracelets, earrings, and finger rings. A tunic, embroidered with gold, covered with a light muslin, displayed the outlines of her form.
Behind this young woman—a violent contrast for the eyes—were guards, armed with naked sabers fastened to their girdles and long damaskeened pistols, carrying a corpse upon a palanquin.
It was the body of an old man, dressed in the rich garments of a rajah, having, as in life, his turban embroidered with pearls, his robe woven of silk and gold, his sash of cashmere ornamented with diamonds, and his magnificent arms as an Indian prince.
Then, musicians and a rear guard of fanatics, whose cries sometimes drowned the deafening noise of the instruments, closed up the cortege.
Sir Francis Cromarty looked at all this pomp with a singularly sad air, and turning to the guide, he said: "A suttee?"
The Parsee made an affirmative sign and put his fingers on his lips. The long procession slowly came out from the trees, and soon the last of it disappeared in the depths of the forest.
Little by little the chanting died out. There were still the sounds of distant cries, and finally a profound silence.
Phileas Fogg had heard the word uttered by Sir Francis Cromarty, and as soon as the procession had disappeared, he asked, "What is a suttee?"
"A suttee, Mr. Fogg," replied the brigadier general, "is a human sacrifice, but a voluntary sacrifice. The woman that you have just seen will be burned to-morrow in the early part of the day."
"Oh, the villains!" cried Passepartout, who could not prevent this cry of indignation.
"And this corpse?" asked Mr. Fogg.
"It is that of the prince, her husband," replied the guide, "an independent rajah of Bundelcund."
"How," replied Phileas Fogg, without his voice betraying the least emotion, "do these barbarous customs still exist in India, and have not the English been able to extirpate them?"
"In the largest part of India," replied Sir Francis Cromarty, these sacrifices do not come to pass; but we have no influence over these wild countries, and particularly over this territory of Bundelcund. All the northern slope of the Vindhias is the scene of murders and incessant robberies."
"The unfortunate woman," murmured Passepartout, "burned alive!"
"Yes," replied the general, "burned, and if she was not you would not believe to what a miserable condition she would be reduced by her near relatives. They would shave her hair; they would scarcely feed her with a few handfuls of rice; they would repulse her; she would be considered as an unclean creature, and would die in some corner like a sick dog. So that the prospect of this frightful existence frequently drives these unfortunates to the sacrifice much more than love or religious fanaticism. Sometimes, however, the sacrifice is really voluntary and the energetic intervention of the government is necessary to prevent it. Some years ago, I was living at Bombay, when a young widow came to the governor to ask his authority for her to be burned with the body of her husband. As you may think, the governor refused. Then the widow left the city, took refuge with an independent rajah, and there she accomplished the sacrifice."
During the narrative of the general, the guide shook his head, and when he was through, said: "The sacrifice which takes place to-morrow is not voluntary."
"How do you know?"
"It is a story which everybody in Bundelcund knows," replied the guide.
"But this unfortunate did not seem to make any resistance," remarked Sir Francis Cromarty.
"Because she was intoxicated with the fumes of hemp and opium."
"But where are they taking her?"
"To the pagoda of Pillaji, two miles from here. There she will pass the night in waiting for the sacrifice."
"And this sacrifice will take place———?"
"At the first appearance of day."
After this answer, the guide brought the elephant out of the dense thicket, and jumped on his neck. But at the moment that he was going to start him off by a peculiar whistle, Mr. Fogg stopped him and addressing Sir Francis Cromarty, said: "If we could save this woman!"
"Save this woman, Mr. Fogg!" cried the brigadier general.
"I have still twelve hours to spare. I can devote them to her."
"Why, you are a man of heart!" said Sir Francis Cromarty.
"Sometimes," replied Phileas Fogg simply, "when I have time."