I watched the young idea learning surf rafting—a study fascinating enough for a whole day—a tiny imp with a great pointed log, and the white breakers for playthings. He sat on its stern, his knees and toes on the sand, and held its stem seawards till the inrush of shallow white-laced water was deep enough to float it and take his little anatomy a voyage of a few yards on the sloping outrush, then he jumped off and waited tillthe surf brought his black ship back. With what quickness he noted the exact moment to run in and catch its stem, and slew it round so that it would broach ashore on its side, and how neatly he avoided being caught between it and the sand. The fishermen's boats, or catamarans as they are called here, though they have no resemblance to the Colombo catamaran, are made of four of these pointed logs tied side by side. I suppose this little chap was playing at his future work. He had made a little collection on the dry sand of two or three shell-fish and beasts that burrow in the sand, and whenever he went to sea, three crows stalked up to these, when he would leave the log and scamper after them, then run back all over dry sand and tumble into the surf again, to come up laughing and wet and shining like copper—I should say it was nicer than being at school.
Two of his clothless seniors came in, as I sketched, from the deep swell outside the surf, through the breakers slanting-wise. It was a treat to see them paddling their four logs, almost side on to the breaking surf, where our boats could not safely venture; one knelt behind on the thick ends of the two prolonged middle logs, the other amidship—their heads only showed above a breaker, the next moment they were on its crest, the surf foaming over their knees—down again intoanother hollow, then up, and with a surge the lumber drove its nose on the sand, the stern threw up, and the two nipped into the water at either end; another surge swung the stern round, and shoved the raft broadside on far up the sand, and they were landing their nets—all done as easily as you could pull up a dog-cart and step out! Of course they are not inconvenienced with clothes, and the water and sands are both comfortably warm; the little difficulty must be to jump at the right time and place, so as to avoid being thrown off, and getting rolled under the logs. Bow seemed to hop off in front and to the outside a little, just before she touched, and Stroke a half a second later, but the manœuvre was too quick for me to follow more than one of the men's actions exactly.
Whilst I watched this extremely rapid landing, my acquaintances of yesterday were pulling at the long ropes from either end of the Seine net, which was extended very far out at sea. When the ends were within fifty yards of the shore the knowing old seniors went tumbling through the surf, and kept swimming and splashing to frighten the fish from the mouth of the V shape into the bag in the middle; the women folk and children tailed on to the ropes along with the men, joking and laughing, for their men out in the water told them there were lots of fish! You did not need to know Tamil or Telugu to learn this, the delight was so evident—It was evidently to be the catch of the season! The excitement and movement grew splendid as the bag, still a few yards from shore, was throttled in some way under water. First a small outer bag was pulled ashore, then a bigger one holding the day's catch, a Scotch cartload of fish—a bumper bag. They were all so pleased and jolly, and were puffing and panting and wet with the last struggle to get the fine-meshed bag through the surf. When it was opened like a great brown purse, there lay the wealth of the Bay of Bengal! in silver and blue and rose andyellow. About half the fish were pure silver, the rest violet, emerald green, pure blue, and some red like mullet, with lemon yellow fins, and the colour of the brown men and the women's faded draperies round the glittering haul was delicious. The wrangling, not Billingsgate at all—milder even than Parliamentary—was loud enough, and continuous. I left them taking away the fish in baskets, and freshly minted money never looked so beautiful. How they divided I couldn't tell; it seemed as if each helped himself or herself as each thought fit.
I must note the afternoon of this delightful day, though noting these "first impressions" of India seems rather a big order; for each day seems so full of delightfully new experience, and fascinating sights, that I am sure you see in one day here—at least anouveaudoes—more interesting things than one could in a week in Europe.
… Our civil servant friend, who paints like Sam Bough, asked us to see his bungalow on the Adyar River, also to look at sketches. We drove three miles on a broad road under banyan trees and palms with patches of corn and native huts, and an occasional bright dress and brass bowl of a woman showing between the dark stems, and pulled up at half-a-dozen bungalows by mistake, and left cards at others, to the owners of which we had introductions, and after a considerable hunt turned up at the bungalow we aimed at. Here were open views, in front the Adyar River and the many-arched Elphinston Bridge, and palm groves, and down the river to the left, the sand bar across its mouth, andtothe right views of the river's many windings in palm groves. Such a place, with the feeling of the sea being within reach, would make me, I think, tolerate living in Madras for a little. We had a great causerie over pictures of home scenes, and of many places in India. Then we got into a double-scull Thames boat and slipped away down towards the bar with wind and current—extremely delightful, Ithought it, getting into such a well-appointed boat on such a pretty piece of river. As we sailed fish played round us; some, like bream or silvery perch, skipped out of the water in a series of leaps like miniature penguins! The wind fell and we rowed, down to the sand spit and heard the surf on the other side and got out and felt that we were at last actually on "India's Coral Strand." There were pretty delicately coloured shells, and here and there a pale pink convolvulus growing low, with grey-green leaves. The river just managed to cut its way through the sand-bar into the surf; beyond it, three or four miles to the north, we could see the two spires in Madras above the palms, St Thomé's and St Mary's in the Fort; to the south-west, the sand and palms and the line of surf stretched in perspective till they faded together on the horizon.
As the sun got low the sky became gorgeous red—what tropical colour there was—the hard sand flushed and paled, yellow to brown in a long waving ribband at the edge of thereceedingwave, then turned lavender laced with dull foam, as the first of the following breakers came running up, wetting the sand again to renew thegolden glow. The outer sea and the horizon were purple and the white of the surf seemed almost green against the orange and red of the sky. Our friends told me they often came to this beach; and as they are artists, that is not to be wondered at: and I suppose some Madras people occasionally come down the river from the boat club a mile or two above, to picnic. I saw two men in flannels and two ladies—very fair ladies they were too—in the flattering twilight; when a white dress turns the colour of a violet shell, and muslins die like a dream into the soft colours of the sand, and pale faces flush with the golden glow of the setting sun. We lost no pity on those exiles and their wandering on this foreign strand. A native or two passed; nice and easy it is for them getting along the coast to Madras! They just walked up the river a few yards and walked in, swam across and down stream, waded out on the far side, and never as much as shook themselves.
We shoved off again when the sky was positively burning with colour, hoisted our sail, and with a light sea breeze went up river towards the darkening groves of palms, guiding ourselves by the afterglow and the glint of a new moon, and lights from the few bungalows on shore.
As we sail we plan to return some day and do up one of these old Arabian Night bungalows. They look almost palatial with their terraces and flight of steps from the river and white pillars showing in the pale moonlight with dark palms and trees over them. They at the same time suggest something of Venice, and of the Far East. They would need repair, but rents are low.
It gets darker and we have difficulty in picking up marks—first the rock on our right from which we go dead across stream, to the high palm just visible against the night sky; then up stream a bit, and across to avoid shoals. We row, for the wind has fallen away. Every now and then our blades touch gravel, and twice we goright aground and have to shove off. Fish jump round us; two come in forward, pretty little silvery fellows with a potent smell of herring, one big fellow surges nearly ashore. As the boat-house and club lights appear we go hard and fast on to a bank, and a native wayfarer fording the river in the dark, whom we mistake for a Club servant expecting us, is ordered to shove us off, which he does and goes on his way without a word—"the gentle Hindoo" again.
The Club boat-house is a perfect treat! By the lamplight I am sure I saw a score of double sculls, sixes, and possibly eights, and skiffs and punts—all sorts of river boats, and as far as I could see, all in order; the men who have both such a Club and boat-house are to be envied. The Club-house was a dream of white Georgian architecture, veiled in moonlight amongst great trees and palms. There were high silvery white pillars (Madras is famous for its marble white stucco) and terraces and wide steps and yellow light coming from tall open jalousies under verandahs. Winding paths led up to it, and along one of these we followed a native, who swung a lamp near the ground in case of snakes. In the Club were rooms for dining, reading, and dancing, all in the same perfect Georgian style.
I would have liked to stay, to see the dance that was going to begin, but it was late, and we were in flannels, and were three miles from home. The ball-room was entirely to my taste, an oval, with white pillars round it reflected in a light-coloured polished floor, overhead a domed roof withchrystalchandeliers, and smaller crystal lights round the sides.
On the road home we met motors, dog-carts, and men and ladies going to the dance; the motor dust here is twenty times thicker than at home; for half-a-mile after you pass a motor you see nothing—can't open your eyes in fact—then came a series of Rembrandts, in wayside lamplit stalls, and home to mosquitoes and late dinner.
31st December, Sunday.—Spent forenoon writing letters and working up sketches, and to make all smooth went to two churches and two temples in the afternoon; a fairly good ending to the year. The first temple, a pile of architecture of debased wedding-cake style, thick with innumerable elastic-legged, goggled-eyed, beastly, indecent Hindoo divinities. Thence to a Roman Catholic church in St Thomé, the old Portuguese quarter—very pretty and simple in appearance. The half near the altar full of veiled European nuns in white and buff dresses. Nearer the door, where we sat, were native women and children, mostly in red, a few of them with antique European black bonnets and clothes; and in their withered old faces you could imagine a strain of the early Portuguese settlers. The altar was, as usual, in colours to suit the simple mind; the Madonna in blue and white and gold with a sweet expression of youth and maternity, her cheeks were like china, and she dandled the sweetest little red-haired baby in a nest of gold rays, all against a rocky background. How telling the fair Viking type of baby must be to these little black-eyed, wondering worshippers, far more fascinating and wonderful, I am sure, than their miraculous six-armed gods. There were real roses too, such numbers of them, and altogether a good deal of somewhat gim-crack effect, but the whole appealed to me, for at least the idea of material beauty was recognised, and for a minute I forgot all the ugliness (= Evil) that our churches have caused, and the good (= Beauty) they have destroyed, and bowed and crossed myself like my neighbours. Then we drove to another church near the sea, St Thomés. The bones of St Thomas of the New Testament are said to be buried here. We only looked into it; it was finely built, and inside at the moment was almost as empty as a Protestant church on a week-day. There was but one devotee, a black woman, confessing to a half-black man. We shuddered and escaped, and drove a few yards and saw "The seasthat mourn, in flowing purple of their Lord forlorn,"—the wide long stretch north and south of white sand, and the log surf rafts, and the dark fishermen going up and down on the blue swell—and didn't we draw a breath of relief of God's pure air.
There was a log craft at the surf edge, with a kid playing beside it, his reflection perfect in the long backwash. His father talked in a strange tongue to me, and I looked at the swell and considered, and saw black men out beyond the surf, and none of them apparently drowned, or in fear of sharks, so I left shoes and socks with G. and our coachman to look after her, and the syce to look after the carriage, and tucked up trousers and away we went together, my heart in my mouth! What joy—bang into and over the first breaker. I'd nearly to stand upright to keep my waist dry, and down and up again—the movement quick and exhilarating; over two other breakers and we were away on the open rollers, and able to look round to the distant shore, where G. sat with my sketch-book and a gallery of brown figures. We paddled along to another craft out at sea that had pulled up its net. Two men were in it, and we made fast to it till they cleared the fish out of the net, and we took them in a matting bag on to our raft, where the water washed over them, and we took them ashore. It was curious to see how neatly and ably these men could haul a net and clear it of fish on four submerged logs—they could move about, stand and walk from one end of the logs to the other with freedom. With the net on board the logs were almost entirely submerged. Running ashore is the most sporting part of the procedure; we paddled along slanting towards the beach, waiting for the ninth wave to pass, then went straight for the sand for all we were worth, and got in in great style; I must say I nearly lost my balance landing, there were so many natives wading out to bear a hand that my eye wandered—but what a craft for thepurpose! I vow no boat I ever saw of the size could come on to hard sand with such a surf behind and not break and throw you out. It is really a sport with a capital S, though, as far as I can hear, white people don't go in for it, perhaps because it is said—on what authority I do not know—that the sharks prefer white people to the natives! The natives who swim in the surf apparently are not touched by them, yet you see no Europeans bathing on what I should think would be a delightful shore for bathing once you had got accustomed to diving through the surf. If I go surf-logging again I will take a change of trousers—Got on shoes, the natives standing three deep to see the Sahib get sandoffhis feet, extremely curious but quite polite. The rupee I gave my man pleased him very much, and the others all wanted to take me out again, or at least to have a rupee too. They were a nicer, bolder-looking lot of men than those in the town by a very long chalk.
We then went to another temple that was also worth seeing. There is a tank near it that would be beautiful, but for a monumentally ugly iron railing that has recently been put round it. It is distinctly British—who on earth did it? We were fortunate, for just before coming to the tank and temple, a christening party of Hindoos in their best clothes, with yellow flowers in black hair, and priests with long chanters and tom-toms playing, came out of some houses as we were passing. In a loosely formed procession they proceeded very slowly to the temple, the principals in a closed brougham in the middle. It was just like one of Tadema's pictures on the move—barring the brougham! The players led the way in white, with the dark wood chanters mounted with silver bells and mouthpieces, and made music with a little of the twang of our pipe chanter, but without the continuity and lift or crisp grace-notes. Young girls, with their faces tinted yellow with saffron, followed in dull red dresses. Behind the procession were classical-looking houses, and overthese appeared palms and banyan trees; but in the middle was the prosaic old Waler, and the hired brougham, which was very distressing, for otherwise the subject was evidently "artistic," and combined just the proportions of sentiment and positive colour, which would have insured for its faithful depiction, a warm reception at any of our Royal Academical Exhibitions—the man in the street could see that!
Then home by the wide Marina, and the promenading Eurasians, and well-to-do traders in carriages. The official peoplemustall be at the Club and Gymkhana, or at Church. For choice I like the beach in the morning, the wide sweep of ocean, the full sun on the endless sandy shores, and the solitude.
This is a jotting, reduced by reproduction, of a native fishing in the surf—all that I have "creeled" to-day.
… By Jove—it's ten minutes to the New Year—time to think of our friends and relations, who will be sitting down to lunch and thinking of us; and toasting us for a certainty. So, in the words of the song, of which these are all I know—
"Here's another kind love,Here's another kind love,Here's a health to everybody."
"Here's another kind love,Here's another kind love,Here's a health to everybody."
But first we must toast "Relations and Friends," and then "The Memory of the Dead and the Health of the Living," which being done, properly and in order, we may go to the window to hear the bells of St Giles and the cheering at the Cross.… Ah! but it is too far.
1st January1906
We have "seen the New Year in," in a way, perhaps not quite so jollily as at home, but well enough however. And as we went to sleep, we did hear a little cheering, some jovial north country soldiers, I suppose; and the dogs were howling, and the moon shining, and the mosquitoes singing. They got their fill last night—came through a hole in the mosquito curtains, and our raid on them in the morning ended eight of their lives; but we were desperately wounded! G. got eight bites on one hand, which is serious, and means poulticing.
Various natives hung about this morning, and gave us each a lime and many salaams, and we are supposed to return the compliment in coin. It is rather an ingenious plan, and it is a dainty little yellow present, and costs them nothing, and flatters you; at least it does if you are a newcomer, and a very small tip pleases them.
Called at Government House on this first day ofA.D.1906, and signed Lord and Lady Ampthill's great newvisitors' volumes. Then we prowled round the Fort, and the Canon of St Mary's kindly left his work and showed us records and plate of the Company days, dated 1698, and some of which was given to the Church by the Governor Yale, afterwards the benefactor of Yale College of the United States of America. We saw Clive's marriage in the church records, with Wellesley's signature, and on the walls of St Mary's church saw the names of many Scots and English and Irish whose bones lie here and there in Indian soil, all lauded for "courage, devotion, and care of their men." Truly, "warlike, manly courage and devotion to duty" seem the flowers that flourish hereaway. We saw the old colours of the Madras Fusiliers, now the Royal Dublin Fusiliers, the first British regiment of the East Indian Company, and in which Sir John Malcolm, Sir Harry Close, and Lord Clive served.
In afternoon went a long rickshaw ride through Blacktown to the North Beach. There saw a number of well dressed Eurasians, boys and girls, paddling so timidly, they let the water come over their toes and no more; also saw a net lifted outside the surf, full of fish like spent herring. What a scramble there was for them on the beach by all classes—what fun and laughter, each onerobbing the other. The fish were out of condition and not of market value. I saw one blow struck but it was not returned, the man hit merely looked dreadfully offended, and the jabbering and laughing went on in a second. What a pity it is the railway spoils the north shore—it is the same in Bombay, Dundee, Edinburgh, and Madras, the best parts of our towns sacrificed. I believe if we owned Naples we would put a railway round the Bay.
I had the satisfaction of seeing the surf log-rafts at work again, and also saw one put together. When not in use the logs lie apart, to dry I suppose, and acquire buoyancy. It took not more than eight minutes to pull the four legs into position and string them together. The roping was done with a thin one-inch coir rope quickly and neatly, not so tight as to make all quite rigid. The actual roping took about two minutes. Here is a jotting of the way they are made. The logs at longest are about seventeen feet. It is as well to take note of these sort of things; you never know when your turn at the desert island may come, and young relations have desert islands at home. Or again, such a craft might come in handily in some out-of-the-way Highland or Norwegian loch, withoneboat on it, and the trout rising in the middle.
1st January—continued.—This is a terribly long yarn for one day and it is not done yet! We went to the Government House reception in the evening in our best war paint. It is a yearly reception, I believe, given to all and sundry to keep them loyal, the very thing to do it too! and I know another country, north and west, where such shows might have this effect—if it is not too late—Drove there in our hired victoria in the hot dusk, and dust, in a rout of carriages, gharries, rickshaws, dog-carts, and every sortof wheeled craft imaginable; nabobs and nobodies, spry young soldiers in uniform, minus hats, driving ladies in chiffons and laces, natives, civilians, eurasians, now one ahead then the other, till we met in a grand block at the great gates, and then strung out orderly-wise and went on at a walk.
As we drove up the park we saw through great trees with dark foliage, the white banqueting hall with its very wide flights of steps and tall Ionic pillars bathed in moonlight, and closer, found there were two lines of native lancers, in dull red and blue, lined up the centre of the steps. The carriages pulled up three at a time, and the guests went flocking up the steps in the greenish silvery light to the top, where the warm yellow light met them from the interior, also an aide-de-camp as friend and guide to strangers, such as ourselves. Inside all was highly entertaining and splendid, and Western with a good deal of the Orient thrown in—I don't suppose any other country in the world could give a show a patch on this—not even Egypt; the banqueting hall is splendidly large and well proportioned;[17]with white pillars down the sides supporting galleries. At the far end there is a raised dais with red satin and gold couches and chairs, and mirrors and palms; above these, white walls, and the King's portrait in red and blue and framed in gold: and round the sides, under the pillars, are more full-length portraits of Governors and their wives, Lord Elphinstone, Lady Munro, The Marchioness of Tweedale, Wellesley, Napier, and Ettrick, Grant Duff, Connemara, and others. Excepting the King's they all looked rather dark against so much marble-white wall space. Overhead, I am told, there was once a line of crystal chandeliers, which must have given a perfect finish to the room; but these have been improved away for rather insignificant modern lights, and all over the roof are these hideous whirling electric fans which spoil the whole effect of the classic Georgian style—theswinging punkah can at least be good to look at, and even tolerable, if it is far enough off.
[17]80 feet long, 60 feet broad. Built to commemorate the fall of Seringapatan.
[17]80 feet long, 60 feet broad. Built to commemorate the fall of Seringapatan.
80 feet long, 60 feet broad. Built to commemorate the fall of Seringapatan.
But here is a sketch of what I remember; the guests divided up the room, blacks on one side, whites on the other, whether by accident or by design I know not, I should think and hope by intention. (So sorry this is not reproduced in colour.)
Lord and Lady Ampthill then came in, and preceeded by aides-de-camp in various uniforms, four abreast and at arm's length, marched up the length of the room to the dais, with measured steps, not too short and not too slow—a very effectively carried out piece of ceremony, for the principals suited their parts well. Lord Ampthill is exceptionally tall, he wore a blue Court coat, well set-off by the white knee-breeches and stockings; and Lady Ampthill is taller than other ladies and is very gracious. Perhaps you can make out in my sketch Lord Ampthill on the dais talking to some of the house party, and the tall lady on the right, talking to some of our party may stand for Lady Ampthill, escorted by Major Campbell.
The fireworks after the reception were, in my humble opinion, very fine indeed, but I confess my experience of these displays is extremely limited. The effect was enhanced by the soft colourfulness of the Eastern night, framed by great white arches round the verandah, and the groups beneath these, of ladies, fair, and dark, in soft raiment.
As we came away the wide steps were covered with groups of ladies, officers, and natives, standing and sitting, with arms and jewels, white gloves, silks and laces glittering in moonlight or lost in shadow; above on the terrace the glow of lamps from the hall shone on the last departing guests, and the tall moonlit pillars led the eye up to the blue night sky. I daresay five men out of six would have found the whole show a bore, possibly even more tiresome than this account of it, but our friend and his wife enjoyed it all, for they paint, and see things, which makes all the difference.
2nd January.—Drove to Binney's for last time, and secured tickets to Rangoon. The berths are not allocated till you get on board, a cheerful arrangement: and theyaredear! Loafed about harbour watching many cargoes and many people; tried in Blacktown to get women's draperies such as I'd seen in Bangalore and Dharwar, but all we saw were more crude in colour and overdone with patterns—couldn't get the simple blues or reds with yellow or blue margins. Not an eventful day, but in the afternoon we drove again to the sands at the mouth of the Adyar to collect shells and we saw more than we could carry away in memory, watched the crabs scuttling over the sands like mice, and into regular burrows in the sand, collected seeds from various trailing plants, and saw a glorious sunset—someone told me Indian sunsets were poor things! and made a jotting or two, too hasty to be of use to the world in general.
3rd.—Painted, and wrote these notes in spite of mosquitoes and these three times cursed crows.
4th.—Half-an-hour's drive across the town brought us to the harbour, and then we had a hot walk to the end of the wharf. Such a struggle there was at the slip down to the small boats; four or five boats were trying to land natives, and at the same time as many were trying to take passengers and natives off. It would have been impossible for a single lady. The native police in neighbourhood were of no use. I'd have thought British port authorities would have done something better. We rowed out to the steamer in the middle of harbour, our four rowers bucking in for a place, and scrambled on to the ship's gangway, without any attention from anyone on board. Other boats with native passengers trying to scramble over us required a shove and a heave or two on my part to keep them off. I'd made a great effort to secure berths clearly and distinctly at the British India S. S. Agency, made various expeditions to the agents to see that all was right, but when we got to our cabin some young men were also allotted berths in it. They were most polite, but all the same it was uncomfortable for them and for us to have all their belongings moved.
… Four was the hour to sail. Now it is six and no sign of up anchor. But why hurry? There is life enough to study for weeks, the main deck a solid mass of natives, all sitting close as penguins or guillemots, each family party on a tiny portion of deck, with their mats and tins and brass pots beside them, and what a babble! and pungent smell of South Indian humanity.
The sun goes down and Madras resolves itself into a lowcoast line, purple against streaks of orange and vermilion: some palms and a few chimney stalks break the level of houses and lower trees. TheRenownlies near us waiting to go for the Prince to convoy him to Rangoon; its white hull looks green against the orange sunset.
There was nothing but necessity made the old settlers drop anchor here; a bend of the Silvery Cooum[18]gave them slight protection inland, but there was nothing in the way of roads or shelter. The sandy coast is dead straight. They did not know the qualities of the surf at first. Two experienced men were sent ashore from the "Globe" in 1611, and were promptly swamped and one nearly drowned; that was further up this Coromandel coast, when the Company was only beginning to try to find footing here. It was not till 1639 that they bought the land where Madras stands to-day, for the Company. These old fellows coming back to-day from the sea would not see any great change in the appearance of the land; the trail of smoke going levelly south-west from a tall smoke stalk would be the most conspicuous change.
[18]The Cooum is silvery to look at, but it is by its smell that people remember it.
The Cooum is silvery to look at, but it is by its smell that people remember it.
Two steamers lie near us, just heaving perceptibly, as if breathing before taking the high road. Outside it blows a very little, a warm, damp wind; there will be a roll in the Bay of Bengal and we will head into it, and the natives' jollity will change to moans. I should think the ship'sboats in emergency could hold a sixth of them. I hear there are some 2500, the three decks are choked with them fore and aft. Our tiny saloon and cabins are right astern and to port and starboard, and forward of it, are these natives; we are only separated from them by a board or two with a port-holes in it, and, the difference of fare! We pay ninety rupees each to Rangoon and they pay one each; if we open our port we might as well be all together, except that they get the first of the air. Unless we keep the blind pulled, night and day, we are subjected to "their incorrigible stare," which the Portuguese pioneers found so remarkable; their odour and noise is intolerable. For myBoyI've paid twelve rupees, and he has the same deck space as the other natives, that is, barely sufficient room to lie down in. The only deck space we first class passengers have, is above the saloon, where the second class deck is, on the P. & O., a nice enough place if it wasn't overlooked by the natives amidship, and over-smelt by the whole 2500 coolies. Fortunately to-day, the 6th, there's a lovely north-east breeze which takes away some of the monkey-house smell and noise. We count that there are forty natives in each of the two alleyways on either side of our cabins, so eighty rupees (a rupee is 1s. 4d.), less profit to the Company, and we could all have been decently comfortable. But even without moving them, one A.B. told off to keep them quiet would have allowed us to sleep at night.
Sunday morning.—All night, all day, whiffs of pure north-east air, and solid native; alternating, and all the time rising and falling, shouting, singing, arguing, quarrelling.
Heaven be thanked we have a pleasant enough company among ourselves, and the natives don't intrude more than parts of their bodies into the saloon doors and ports when the squeeze at the outside gets very strong, but they gaze stolidly on us at meals through the ports and doors!
It is pleasant enough on deck this Sunday afternoon under the awning. We have a piano in the middle of thedeck, and a Captain in the East Yorks is playing—he was one of the men who so politely, in fact anxiously, vacated the cabin he found occupied by a married couple; four men play bridge near us, and as we are not a large company we have all got to know each other—the common infliction of the native crowd makes a bond of sympathy.
A young Englishman beside me is overhauling Madras B. A. Exam, papers, and works hard, so that he may have a clear holiday in Burmah. He hands me some of the papers to read, essays on Edwin Harrison's "Life of Ruskin." They are both funny and pathetic; we laughed at the absurd jumble of ideas in some, and felt sorry that natives should have to study the thoughts and sayings of a man, who, after all, did not himself understand the very simple beauties of a Whistler. Then I dropped on an essay, eight pages foolscap, in scholarly handwriting, with perfect grasp of subject, and concentrated, pithy expression. I could with difficulty accept the assurance that it was written by a Madrassee and not by some famous essayist! So, perhaps, if one Eastern can grasp Ruskin's best thoughts it may be worth the effort of trying to teach thousands who can't? Is it not folly, this anglicising of the Indians, Irish, and Scots by the English schoolmaster, who knows as little of Sanscrit as of Erse Scottis or gaelic; calls England an island! and wishes to teach everyone "The ode to a Skylark," "Silas Marner,"[19]and "Tom Browne's Schooldays." (My own dear countrymen you will not be taken in by this chaff for ever, will you?) Why not study Campbells tales in gaelic, or Sir David Lindsay, or the Psalms by Waddell or Barbeurs Bruce.
[19]Prescribed by Indian university curriculum.
Prescribed by Indian university curriculum.
Just to make the groups on deck complete we ought to have children playing, but there are none with us, their route lies always westwards; they would be a pretty foil to the serious restfulness of the deck scene. Now a lady sings "Douglas tender and true," and sings it so well, we could weep were we not so near port; a group in the stern beside the wheel watches a glorious sunset, which fills the space wesit in under the awning with a dull red and across the light a missionary paces, aloof and alone; a melancholy stooping silhouette against the glorious afterglow—to and fro—to and fro—a lanky, long-haired youth, his hands behind his back, looking into his particular future, a life devoted to convert the gracious, charitable followers of Gautauma Buddha to—his reading of Christ's simple teaching.
Rangoon Gymkhana
January7th.—We danced—I danced with ladies in Gainsborough hats, their feathers tickling my eye, in pork pie hats, and Watteaus, and picture hats like sparrows' nests; and there were little dumpy ladies and tall, stately, Junos,i.e., compared with Eastern women. And it was so funny to see men in suits of blue serge, tweeds, or tussore silk, whirling round with ladies in muslins of every lovely colour. If the men had only worn bowlers and smoked cigars, how it would have taken me back to student days in Antwerp at Carnival time, not so jolly of course, but very differentfrom anything at home. And how stately are the club-rooms—really they are well off these relations of ours "Out East"—don't believe their groans altogether! it is hot now, they say, but look at the fun they have, especially ladies. There are ladies' billiard-rooms, card-rooms, music-rooms, reading-rooms inside, and outside, lawns and flowers and attendants to fetch and carry, and swains to admire them, and they have latest dresses, dances, balls, riding, tennis all the time, and Royalties and Viceroys at intervals. Compare this to the humdrum life of our women in Scotland with their brothers and cousins, "A wede awa" to the uttermost ends of the Empire, and never a Viceroy or Royalty of any description to show above their level horizon—that is intolerable.
Then home to dinner, very full of interest and wonder at the sights of the day, and scribbled the above dance scene, and dressed and walked over the way in the soft dust in the soft moonlight and dined with friends and relations, and talked in the dark teak-wood bungalow of other friends and relations and home things, and looked at curios and sketches; and little lizards looked out at us from the walls, and a huge piebald fellow up in the shadows of the wooden roof, a foot and a half long if an inch, aChuck-Tu, didn't frighten our hosts in the least! Then across the strip of moonlit, to sleep my lone, under the hospitable teak roof-trees of "a Binning!"
Here there seems to be a hiatus in these notes of mine—it is rather a jump from the British India steamer to a Gymkhana dance? But such a break gives relief to the mind, and has sometimes even a dramatic effect. I have twice observed such breaks in journals; the first in Edinburgh, in the journal of the City Clerk. The break occurs when the Provost and Clerk lay cold on Floddon Field, and the entries are taken up in a new hand with a minute which begins—"Owing to a rumour of a disaster in the south." The second break, I saw the other day in the Madras records. It occured whenthe French called at Fort George in 1746. The break in my journal is simply the result of yesterday being so full of interest that I did not write up till this forenoon, after a pause for rest and refreshment.
So to hark back. The landing at Rangoon and coming up the river was the best part of the journey from Madras. For descriptions of coming up the Rangoon river see other writers. G. and I had been kept awake for several nights by the natives[20]and finally had to shut our port and snatched an hour or two of sleep without air so as to be without noise,—this after various expeditions to try and quiet the beasts outside, but nothing but drowning would have stopped their horrid exuberance.
[20]Native in Burmah stands for native of India, not a Burman.
Native in Burmah stands for native of India, not a Burman.
The peace that you feel in Iona seemed to lie over the country as we came up the Rangoon river.
The Golden Pagoda stands up very simply and beautifully above the flat country, and beneath it palms and ship's masts look very lowly things indeed. It seems a perfect conductor of thought from earth to sky; the gentle concave curves of its sides are more natural lines of repose than those of our challenging spires. I had been prepared for little—pictures and photographs have dwarfed the thing—they do not give the firmness and delicacy in form and the sentiment that it inspires. It is like the Burmans religion; there's a sense of happiness in the way its wide gold base amongst nestling green palms and foliage of trees gradually contracts till the point rises quietly against the blue and fleecy clouds, where the glint of gold and flash from jewels seems to unite heaven and earth.
The spire is 372 feet, two feet higher than St Paul's, but the terrace from which it rises is 166 feet from the level of the ground, and as lower Burmah is very flat, it is visible twenty-two miles from Rangoon.
It was unmitigatedly hot when we got from thetender to the wharf. Relatives who met us said it was their hottest weather, so we hugged the shade. But this was unseasonable, it ought to be fairly cool at the time of year. We drove in gharries a mile or two to the bungalow, through crowds ofnativesof India—how ugly they look compared with the Burmese! Though why one should compare them at all is beyond reason, for the Burman is to an Indian as a Frenchman to a Hottentot.
After dividing ourselves and baggage between two bungalows on either side of Tank Road, we drove with Mrs E. to see the lake and her favourite views of the Pagoda; and—I was about to contradict myself! Have I not said India was the most perfectly fascinating country for picturesque scenes of people and streets, and trees and parks and colour! Now, I withdraw; for Burmah puts India quite in the shade!
So you, my artist friends, who have no Academical leanings (you are few), come here, right away, though you have to work your passage on a B.I., or have even to travel first on that line as we did! You can come direct by the Henderson line for £36, sailing from Glasgow or Liverpool—£36 for a month on the blue sea, on a comfortable ship with lots of deck-room. This line gives specially reduced fares forbona-fidemissionaries, so artistsshouldbe taken free—over page is one of their liners.
In Madras I saw Mr Talbot Kellie's book on Burmah and thought Burmah had been "done," and it was futile for other artists to try to paint anything new there. But thanks be, we are each given our own way of seeing things, though perhaps not the same patience to put them down; so when I saw the wide stairs and the arcades up to the Pagoda, and the terrace or platform from which it rises, it was new as could be to me, and as if it had never been painted or described before.
Here follow notes I see about painting—much talk and little done, owing to the novelty and variety ofsights, and the relaxing damp warmth of the climate. The mean temperature yesterday was 90° with damp air and a stuffy, thunderous feeling and the dust hanging in the air under bilious looking clouds, which made people talk of earthquakes—we perspire, we melt—we run away in rivers, and our own particular temperature is 100°. How annoying to feel unfit to paint when there is so much to do at hand.… Started fairly early this morning for the Pagoda, and sat outside it in a gharry pulled up opposite the entrance porch and steps. It takes courage to attempt to sketch such a scene of shifting beauty! These architectural details, carvings in gold and colour, ought to be ground at till the whole is got by heart—then brush and colour let go, with a prayer to the saints.