Daily does it grow upon one as a wonder in this Hindoostanee travel that little Great Britain can be the master of this bigly big India! Were all the natives of the caste-divided and non-combatant Hindoo faith, there might be same reason for it all in that; but the fact is not so. The Mohammedan faith is a fighting one, and of that Church-militant sort that believes in adding to one's chance of salvation by sending others by the sword to heaven. Of these Mohammedans there are, as stated, 36,000,000 in India, all of whom believe in spreading their faith, and that by soldiery, in place of missionaries. Those of that faith are all of one,-or rather, of nocaste, and could therefore combine for one object. In this dilemma of doubt I have come to the conclusion, either that no native leader has arisen for these men to follow, or that the climate is inimical to patriotism.

Ere leaving Allahabad, I had serious thoughts of joining in the ceremonies going on there, as I had hitherto complied elsewhere with the customs of the country. To that end I would have had my hair cut on the river bank, and dropped a handful of the clippings into the water at the sacred junction. My host, however, dissuaded me. The Hindoos might take offence at it; and not for anything would I cause that feeling, after seeing what I had seen of Hindoo vengeance at Cawnpore. It was a hard thing to tear one's self away without so investing in this "Allahabad Grand Junction Eternal Life Insurance;" but I left without effecting the floating policy. We all have our remorse at the lost chances to be seen in looking back over a lifetime, and this uncompleted visit to India's City of God is one of such regrets. If, however, I saved choking a few fishes by such neglect, that may balance the account after all.

CHAPTER XIV.

WITH THE THUGS.

BETWEEN two and three hundred miles from Allahabad I get tired of the train, and stop at Jubbulpore. It is, perhaps, the grand-looking station that tempts me to do so; or maybe it is the changed character of the scenery, which has become most picturesque during the last hour or so now that I am come into the valley of the Nerbudda―a noble river of this land of India.

Jubbulpore has an admirably made railway to it. The Indian railways have been constructed by the help of British capitalists, to whom a certain percentage in the shape of dividend is guaranteed by the Government. I never saw such natty stations anywhere as there are on this line. At all those I have been lately passing there is printed the station's name, in pretty flowers, in their well-kept gardens, fronting the line of rails. I withstand all their fascinations, however, until I reach the handsome Jubbulpore terminus, and here I come to a dead stop. There may be better things ahead, but the attractions about here are very satisfactory.

My belief of there being anything to swear by in spelling gets a shock in this word "Jubbulpore." I never saw it spelt twice in the same way. I adopt the spelling I saw at this railway station, because everything here looks so fine that it must be correct. In the last published map I read it as "Jabalpar," and I can remember about fifty other forms of it. It is all like that. If I knew anything, I thought it was the spelling of "Juggernaut "-a deity of the Madras district,

celebrated for his triumphal car and its uses. I find this spelt now as "Jagannáth;" Cashmere is "Kashmir," Delhi is "Delli," or "Dehli," and Mogul is "Mughal." Any Eastern proper name can be used like to that of Mahomet, which you can spell how you like, and with the certainty of not being wrong Mahmood, Mahmet, Mahmud, are all at choice, with other ninety variations. Spelling is altogether as changeable as fashions. Words have their Roman falls, Alexandrian limps, and Grecian bends-the fulness of crinoline at one time, and the contracted skimpiness of the pin-back mode at another.

Jubbulpore is under the Sautpore Hills or North Ghauts, which means a high table-land. high table-land. It is a thousand feet above the level of Allahabad, to which the railway toils through cuttings, and the scenery is all the better for it. It is a city of some 60,000 folks, not reckoning the nine Thugs, the last of their race, who are here in gaol. There is something painfully interesting in the last of a race. How the "Last of the Mohicans" interests one for that reason! In Hobart Town I was shown the last of the Tasmanians—a poor old lubra, that looked as wretched as the last apteryx, a New Zealand wingless bird, believed to be extinct, that I saw exhibiting once in Melbourne, and which interested me as much as does Campbell's "Last Man."

I find this city to be a sort of Indian Cheltenham or Bath in its clean and highly respectable appearance. It' must have a good city council, I fancy, otherwise I cannot account for its fine and well-kept streets, its perfect drainage, pleasant distribution of greensward, gardens, and trees; also its fine shops and houses, tastily designed and well built. It is as well not to believe in the unnatural, and therefore maybe Jubbulpore has no city council at all, but has devised a better scheme of town management-supposing such to be possible. There has evidently been some master-mind here who has done for Jubbulpore in one way what Beau Nash did for Bath in another. Colonel Sleeman is credited with much of it, and if I knew other names to whom similar honour of mention is due, they should have it.

Martyr-murderers.

165

Out of evil springs good. The Jubbulpore School of Industry, now one of the sights of the place, and celebrated for its manufactures of carpets, canvas, and other like fabrics, was originally set up to provide occupation for the imprisoned Thugs and their wives and families. The families can still labour here, but the survivors of their fathers are beyond industrial work-old men living on the recollections of their past lives, and many murders. I will leave the busy scene of this school of industry, to which I can return, and go see these old murderers before they all die. My host of the hotel here inspires me to do so by saying that royalty, when lately here, specially visited these ancient martyrs, so that it must be the respectable thing to do, and settles for me the question that might so trouble the genteel-“ Ought we to visit them?"

The sect of the Thugs was discovered about forty years ago, up to which time they had pursued their religious duties very quietly. They were not a numerous sect, which is welt to be understood when the difficulties are all considered that lay in the way of their working out their salvation. It was attended with much fear and trembling, as their goddess, Calicut, was only to be propitiated by human sacrifices. A method of justification by such works as that led to constant dread of the hangman, and the necessity for secrecy. Every assassination of an unbeliever so made was believed to add his probability of life to that of the Thug's term in Paradise, the blood of the victim meanwhile cleansing the sins of the assassin. On the discovery of this exterminating creed, its believers were sought out by the Government of the time, and they were all taken to Jubbulpore, and there shut up for their lives. As they thus suffered for the faith to which they bore witness, they are really and truly martyrs—martyrmurderers!

The destruction of human beings for the propitiation of the Deity, is not, unfortunately, confined to the Thugs. More of poor humanity has been sacrificed on that score than any other. It is a grounded belief with the zealous sectarian

that those of another faith are better dead. The Mohammedans are especially of that way of thinking. For that cause only they murdered, but a few years ago, about 11,000 of the believers in Christianity dwelling in the villages I passed through in the Lebanon and in Damascus. The mistake of the Thugs was doing assassination in a retail way. Massacres on religious grounds, like those of the Huguenots, should be done, if done at all-which may be questionable-in a wholesale manner. It is always in this mismanaged world the little criminal only who suffers punishment. Murders, swindles, and robberies on a large scale are called by other names, and recognized as legitimate doings.

The hanging of all these Thuggee believers was out of the question. There was no legal proof against them, and they might have been considered lunatics. They had not also any malice against their victims, which is an essential to the crime of murder. In Othello's words,

"Nought did they in hate, but all in honour,”

of their deity. Hence, shutting them up for life was considered the proper punishment for what they might have done in the past, and also a preventive against their future doings. As it was not their fashion to throttle each other, they were allowed to associate, and like to Goldsmith's old soldier, to sit at eve, and tell each other of their doughty deeds, patiently waiting the death that alone could set them free.

Imprisoned for forty years or so, nearly all of them have now been liberated by that aid. Of the original stock there are but the nine survivors whom I was allowed to interview. I looked upon these hoary-headed venerable old assassins, and hoped that there were no more of them about outside-overlooked by the Government. As I here learn of their system of sacrifice, I see that I might have been one of their victims as likely as not-might, in fact, have perished by the hands, the blood-red hands, of any of these old martyrs, had they