21836337-Occult-Science-in-India

respected the sacred city of their conquered foe, which seemed to inspire them with a mysterious terror.

The Brahmins claimed that Benares had been built by Siva, in order to serve as an asylum to the righteous, when the earth should be overrun by crime and sorrow; and that it would never experience any of those vicissitudes to which all earthly things are subject.

Aurengzeb, to humiliate their pride, destroyed one of their oldest and most venerable pagodas, and erected in its stead the splendid mosque that bears his name, whose slender spires, covered with leaves of gold, inform travellers that the city is at hand, long before they can see it. To-day, numerous Mussulman temples rise by the side of Hindu pagodas, and the Brahmins witness, without being able to prevent it, but with horror that they are powerless [p. 228] to conceal, the slaughter of cattle for sacrificial or culinary purposes in the holy city, which had been polluted by the killing of no animal since the Mogul invasion.

In spite of the vandalism which has destroyed some of the oldest and handsomest monuments in India, and although in other countries subject to their laws the Mussulmans have used every means and shrunk from nothing in order to convert the Hindus to the faith of the Prophet, the Mogul sovereigns always used the largest tolerance at Benares for the religious beliefs, manners, and usages of their conquered foe. It is for this reason, no doubt, that the two nations are on the best of terms in this part of Bengal. However, until I had seen it I would never have believed that the Mussulmans and Hindus would ever consent to perform their religious ablutions in the same place.

In the south of India, a Mussulman who should bathe in the sacred tank of a pagoda would be put to death on the spot.

When I arrived at Benares, I intended to remain there a couple of months. That was by no means too long a stay, in view of the inquiries I desired to make regarding the antiquities of the country, but it was too long to put up at a hotel or bungalow. I therefore determined to hire a house of my own and to go to housekeeping at once. To have a home of one's own in the East, and especially in the far East, is almost one of the first necessaries of life.