lling. At the mela of
1840 the weather was good, and there was no indication of disease among
the people. Some years afterwards we were travelling towards Allahabad
at an early period of the mela, and met crowds fleeing from it on
account of the outbreak of cholera. Here and there we saw corpses at the
side of the road, occasionally without one person near, at other times
with a weeping group around, who were preparing to carry off the body to
some rivulet to have it burnt, or, as it often happens, to have it
scorched, and then left to be devoured by jackals and vultures. Some had
held on their way with weary limbs till the fell disease seized them,
and then they succumbed, lay down, and died. We remember stopping where
a young man was dying, with two or three sorrowful ones around him. We
spoke to him, but got no reply. His glazed eye told he was beyond all
human help.

One of the first things I saw at this Allahabad mela was a quantity of
human hair, and was told that it had been cut off after the fulfilment
of vows, reminding one of a custom to which we find frequent reference
in both the Old and New Testaments. I also saw a very disgusting
sight--men in stark nudity, sitting in a very composed dignified
fashion, and women approaching them with folded hands, and paying them
profound homage. These were deemed men of great sanctity, whose blessing
brought signal benefit, while their curse entailed terrible calamities.
At an early period of our residence at Benares we sometimes met these
naked creatures in the streets; but for many years they have
disappeared, as there is a magisterial order that they be flogged for
their indecency, however loud may be their pretension of sanctity. At
Allahabad there were many devotees with their tangled hair, besmeared
bodies, and _very_ scanty clothing--if what they had on could be called
clothing. These are yet seen all over the country. The time has not yet
come for stringent orders in these cases.

[Sidenote: HINDU SOCIAL FEELING.]

On the occasion of a gathering such as that of Allahabad a stranger sees
no sign of the separating influence of caste. The people move about and
mix with each other as freely as people do in Europe when assembled in
large numbers. There is nothing in caste to prevent people conversing
with each other and being on friendly terms; but the friendliness must
not go the length of eating together or of intermarriage. There are
indeed large classes deemed s