something;
scene two shows the fat goodakoo merchant advanced midway between his own
and his adversary's premises, capering about, gesticulating, and uttering
dire threats; scene three finds him retreating and the valorous man of
dhal held in check by his wife to prevent him following after with
hostile intent. The men seem boiling over with rage and ready to chew
each other up; but, judging from the supreme indifference of everybody
else about, nobody expects anything serious, to happen. This is
mentionable as being the first quarrel I have seen in India; as a general
thing the people are gentleness personified.

Several tattooed Hindoo devotees are observed this afternoon paying
solemn devotions to bel-trees streaked with red paint, near the road.
Many of the trees also shelter rude earthenware animals, and
hemispherical vessels, which are also objects of worship, as representing
the linga. The bel-tree is sacred to Siva the Destroyer, and the third
person in the Hindoo Triad, whom Brahma himself is said to have
worshipped, although he is regarded as the Creator. In the absence of
Siva himself, the worship of the bel-tree is supposed to be as
efficacious as worshipping the idol direct.

Soon I overtake an individual doing penance for his sins by crawling on
his stomach all the way to Benares, the Mecca of the Hindoo religion. In
addition to crawling, he is dragging a truck containing his personal
effects by a rope tied about his waist. Every fifty yards or so he stands
up and stretches himself; then he lies prostrate again and worms his
wearisome way along the road like a snake. Benares is still about a
hundred miles distant, and not unlikely this determined devotee has
already been crawling in this manner for weeks. This painful sort of
penance was formerly indulged in by Hindoo fanatics very largely; but the
English Government has now all but abolished the practice by mild methods
of discouragement. The priests of the different idols in Benares annually
send out thousands of missionaries to travel throughout the length and
breadth of India to persuade people to make pilgrimages to that city.
Each missionary proclaims the great benefits to be derived by going to
worship the particular idol he represents; in this manner are the priests
enriched by the offerings presented. Not long since one of these zealous
pilgrim-hunters persuaded a wealthy rajah into journeying five hundred
miles in the same manner as the poor wr