Round the Wonderful World Part 14

The missus is romping round getting your beds aired and pinning up curtains in your honour!"

[Ill.u.s.tration: RUANVELI DAGOBA AT THE "BURIED CITY."]

CHAPTER XVI

A SACRED TREE

Do you remember that just about this time last week we were crouching in a hole in a muddy bank waiting for the thunderstorm to pa.s.s on? How different now, though we are still in Ceylon and, as crow flies, not so many miles from the Hunters' mountain-side. It is a gorgeous tropical afternoon, the bits of sky we can see through the feathery-leaved trees are of the deepest blue, and we are resting, because it seems too hot to move a limb. In front of us there stretches a sheet of limpid water which might be a lake except that it is surrounded by a raised bund, or bank, artificially made, with hewn granite slabs as steps going down at one end. We are glad of the shade of the trees falling across the short turfy gra.s.s, and we are seated on some broken blocks of granite, keeping a sharp look out for snakes. They will hardly be likely to trouble us here, but in that jungly bit behind it wouldn't be at all safe to rest like this. Even to sit on the short gra.s.s might be unpleasant, as there are all sorts of unknown insects here which bite and sting and stab, but we are safely raised on stones and are wearing thick boots. Examine that slab of granite there beside you; do you see that it has a most wonderfully carved snake upon it--a cobra with seven heads? It is so clear-cut it might have been done yesterday, yet it is part of the ruins of a mighty city, a city as large as London, which once stretched its busy streets over this quiet glade. The cobra was a sacred beast to the Hindus, and a seven-headed one was peculiarly so, seven being a mystic number.

What a glorious b.u.t.terfly! Its body is as big as a small bird, and its great velvety wings are the sharpest black and white. No, I don't for a moment suppose you'll catch it, so it is no use getting hot! I'm glad you can't, for we have no proper apparatus here, and it would only be a crushed ma.s.s to take home. Don't go headlong into the tank, though, in your frantic efforts; it might be awkward. No, I don't think there are any crocodiles, only a few sacred tortoises perhaps. Look! there is a tiny one--that small yellow thing that is walking away with the melancholy dignity of a retired general. Pick it up if you like certainly, see it wag its head and legs helplessly. I wish we could take it home. As you replace it, it continues its grave walk in the same direction as if it had never been rudely interrupted. At that instant a hare darts across an open glade and disappears in the thick undergrowth.

What a country! aesop's Fables in real life, where hares and tortoises live together!

"Was this city here at the same time as Rameses II. was living?"

No. Egypt was past its best days before this city, which was called Anuradhapura (Anaraj.a.pura), was built, and you must remember Rameses II.

was by no means one of the earliest kings of Egypt, he came quite late on in his country's history. His date was about thirteen hundred years before Christ, and it must have been about eight hundred years after that, though still you notice, 500 B.C., that this city was founded by some Cingalese who are supposed to have come over from India. That makes it between two thousand and three thousand years old, which we should think ancient enough if we hadn't visited Egypt first. Anuradhapura flourished for centuries as the capital of the Cingalese kings, who often carried on savage battles with the Tamils when they came over from India also.

Turn round now and examine that hill you wanted to climb a little while ago and tell me if you can see anything peculiar about it. No, I don't mean that large grey monkey who has just peeped at us in an impudent way and then swung himself into hiding, though I admit he is very interesting. I mean something odd about the hill itself. It is covered with trees and jungle scrub certainly, as any ordinary hill might be, but it is oddly steep and the sides rise very sharply from the ground.

It is an even shape too, more like an inverted bowl than a hill; or, better still, just try to imagine some giant cutting off the dome of St.

Paul's and setting it down here in the jungle, wouldn't it look something like that?

You don't quite agree, for you say that this has trees and bushes growing on it and St. Paul's dome would be bare. That is so, but if St.

Paul's dome had been left for many hundreds of years in a country where vegetation grows as fast as it does here, wouldn't it probably be grown over too?

Yes, I _do_ mean it. That isn't a hill at all, but a huge brick building called a dagoba, made by the same race of men who dug out this tank, and whose descendants to-day, with tortoise-sh.e.l.l combs in their hair, wait on us in the Colombo hotels.

[Ill.u.s.tration: LARGE GREY MONKEY.]

We will go back now to the place where we left that native cart and driver and we'll find a dagoba which has been stripped of its trees, so that we can see what it really looks like.

Hus.h.!.+ Do you hear that curious singing like a chant? Wait; there is a procession of pilgrims. They come swinging round the corner of the road in their picturesque flowing garments, and just at the turn they stop and kneel with their hands held palms together before their faces, and they bow repeatedly before marching on again. Let us go and find out what it was that stopped them. We soon come to it and find that it is the seated figure of a man with one hand falling over his knee and the other on his lap, while his legs are crossed tailor-wise. It is painted white and it is not very much larger than life. This is Buddha, of whom you heard in Kandy, and all over here, and in Burma, and in a less degree in India, you will find images of him set up to remind his followers of the precepts he left for them to follow.

Our driver is dead asleep under a tree, but we manage to wake him and soon we are rattling along a tree-shaded road in the queer little cart to Ruanveli, the best known of all the dagobas. When we arrive in full view of it we dismiss the driver and climb on to a slab of stone that is raised from the ground and tilted slightly like a table with two legs higher than the others. Here we can gaze upon this extraordinary monument which rises about one hundred and fifty feet into the air, and is about two and a half times as much across, just the shape of a pudding basin, you see. It is not a temple, not even a tomb, as the Pyramids are, but a solid block built of millions and millions of bricks with a tiny chamber inside containing an infinitely precious relic, nothing less than a few of Buddha's hairs. So they say! Only the priests were allowed to go into this sacred chamber, with the exception of one king, who had this priceless privilege granted to him. It is not very many years since mighty monuments were rediscovered, because the jungle had grown up all around them and no one knew even where Anuradhapura had stood; but now there are men who spend their whole time uncovering and preserving them, just as many men are working at the excavations in Egypt; and the trees and overgrowth have been stripped from Ruanveli, which stands forth sharp and clear-cut against this beautiful sky.

Men are very much alike all the world over! This great dagoba was put up by one of the Cingalese kings, Dutugemunu, to celebrate his great victory over the Tamils, just as Rameses II. put up the inimitable temple of Abu Simbel to celebrate his victory over the Syrians. Before Dutugemunu came to the throne the Tamils had usurped all power and made one of their own men, called Elala, king, and the young prince, exiled from his capital city, met them in battle outside the walls. He fought with great bravery, and in the end the issue of the day was decided by a single combat between him and Elala, both mounted on huge elephants.

That must have been a fight indeed! Dutugemunu killed Elala and regained the throne of his fathers, but he must have been a singularly enlightened prince for his age, for he not only buried his fallen foe with great honour but he gave orders that henceforth all music should cease when bands were marching past his tomb, and that royalties were to alight from their horses or palanquins and walk past on foot to do honour to the mighty dead. Even in the nineteenth century one of the princes from Kandy, who was flying from capture, obeyed the order and would not allow himself to be carried past the spot! So the memory of Elala and the great fight he made were kept alive as Dutugemunu had intended they should be.

On this very slab where we are now sitting it is said that Dutugemunu died. If not the actual stone, it is probably the spot. It was about 140 B.C., and when he knew he was dying he gave orders that he should be carried out here, that his fast failing eyes might look their last on the greatest monument of his reign. In the midst of his great city, with its fine buildings and the great tanks he had caused to be made to give the people water, he thought most of all of Ruanveli, partly because of the sacred relic enclosed, but partly also because he had done a wonderful thing in paying for all the labour that was used in its building, instead of forcing his subjects to work for nothing, as was the custom in his time.

There is much to examine in Ruanveli; we can see the casing of granite running up the sides, we can examine a statue of the king himself and many wonderful carvings; around the dagoba runs a magnificent granite platform wide enough for six elephants to walk abreast, as no doubt they did many times in the gay processions on festival days.

Behind the dagoba, not far off, is an immense lake, or tank, much larger than that we saw this morning. It was considered a peculiar work of merit for kings to make these tanks so that water could be stored up for the use of the people, and they are found all over Ceylon; there is one twenty miles in length!

The sun has fallen low by the time we pa.s.s on to the Brazen Palace. At first, when we near it, we see merely a forest of columns with nothing brazen about them; they are not very high, about twice the height of a man perhaps, and they are set in rows very near together. Altogether there are one thousand six hundred of them! There is no roof now, but in the days of its glory this great house, which was built for the priest, had nine, and was finished by a sheet of burnished copper which caught the sun's rays and flashed far and wide beneath the clear blue sky. The walls were decorated with glittering stones and the fittings were of the most costly and beautiful kind. The wonder is how the priests found room to walk about between those mult.i.tudinous columns which so filled the s.p.a.ce in their halls.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE BRAZEN PALACE, CEYLON.]

One more sight in this city of ancient glory. Do you see across that park-like s.p.a.ce of short gra.s.s some fires glimmering weirdly in the dusk which has now fallen round the most sacred object in Anuradhapura; I won't say what it is. Come nearer. A heavy scent, like that of tuberoses, greets us as we approach; it comes from the white waxy blossoms of the frangipani lying in that cardboard saucer with all the heads put outwards like the spokes of a wheel. In the centre is a pink blossom. Those flowers are sold as offerings in this sacred place. Don't stumble over that dark bundle, it is a sleeping child. Step cautiously between the bright-eyed people who watch, furtively alert, like shy woodland creatures, as they crouch low over their fires, for the evening has suddenly become chilly with the loss of the sun. These are pilgrims come from afar, and they will lie down to sleep just as they are in the open. There are very few at this time of the year; but in June and July, which are the princ.i.p.al months, thousands and thousands arrive here, having crossed weary leagues to come. It is strange how the world is linked up by its pilgrimages. We saw the pilgrims in the Holy Land coming from afar to the Christian shrines, humble and devout, believing all that was told them and carrying out in their poor lives much of Christ's teaching; we saw them in crowded and uncomfortable s.h.i.+ps journeying from Mecca, the shrine of Mohammedanism; and now we see them here reverently drawn to the only sacred place they know, there to pray to something unseen and unknown, that they may be helped by a power stronger than themselves. In all ages and all races man yearns for a G.o.d, and if he knows not G.o.d he still wors.h.i.+ps dimly any strange G.o.d he hears of.

We cross some brick pavement, and climb up a few worn steps on to a platform surrounded by a railing. Out of the middle of it there grows a gnarled and ancient tree with crooked boughs splitting asunder with hardly any leaves on them.

_Now_ do you see?

You only see monkeys looking like little black demons against the afterglow still lingering in the sky as they leap from the tall palm trees near, but this tree is not a palm.

Suddenly a leaf, shaped like that of a poplar, but much larger, floats down, and in an instant a slight dark figure, tied up in a bundle of loose clothes, falls upon it, and holding it between the palms of the hands bows again and again. That leaf is a precious relic, for this is the sacred Bo tree, said to be at least two thousand years old!

[Ill.u.s.tration: SWAYING ITS LEAN UNLOVELY BODY TO AND FRO IN TIME WITH THE TUNE.]

After the Cingalese had come over from India and settled here, a monk came and converted them to Buddhism; he was followed by his sister, a princess, as he was a prince, and she brought with her, so it is said, a branch of the actual tree under which Buddha sat when he considered all the problems of life and found an answer to them, which he left to his people. This branch, being planted, became a tree itself. So the story goes; and that there has been a tree here wors.h.i.+pped for untold ages is true, and if that is so, whatever its origin, this also to us is a sacred spot, hallowed by the thousands of poor souls who, knowing not the light, yet have come here with yearnings towards the light and to the "unknown G.o.d."

After dinner we wander out again into the tree-shaded road near, and a sight of extraordinary splendour startles us. Every tree is brilliantly illuminated as if by a million points of electric light. You have seen an arc-light which seems to scintillate rays? These lights might be very tiny arc-lights, for each one vibrates in the intensity of its luminousness. We can see the outlines of the trees clearly. It is a wonderful evening for fire-flies. No one knows why on some nights they appear like this in countless thousands, and on other nights, apparently the same, there is not one to be seen. It looks almost as if they had parties and agreed to do their best on certain occasions. They have evidently done their best for us to-night, for the other people following us out of the hotel, who have been here longer than us, are entranced.

"Never saw anything like it, not even in the West Indies," says one man.

"Puts a Christmas tree in the shade," remarks another.

Catch one, he doesn't burn; don't grab him so as to hurt him, just take him gently; that is right; bring him into the light and open your hand a little. You see he is a flat, greenish beetle, with head set on a funny hinge so that he could nod it violently if he liked. Half shut your hand and turn away from the light; now you see two round green eyes glowing like emeralds. He doesn't seem embarra.s.sed by all this attention, but you might let him go back to his party!

When we have let him go we will walk down the avenue of living light, where is one thing more to see to-night. It is only ten minutes' walk and as we near it it gleams in the dim light of the brilliant stars, a ghostly white object. As our eyes grow accustomed to the light we see a building like a snow-white bell. It is small compared with the gigantic dagobas we have examined already to-day, for the very tip of the pinnacle, rising above the bell-shaped part, is only sixty-three feet, but it is very graceful and is considered the most sacred of all the dagobas, for it was built to enshrine Buddha's collar-bone!

We haven't seen the half of Anuradhapura yet, and there are numbers of other ancient cities in Ceylon to explore, to say nothing of rock-temples with strange paintings and carvings; but we mustn't be here too long or we shan't get through India and Burma before the hot weather comes, which no European can endure.

The white coating of this dagoba is a stuff called chunam, a kind of lime. It is startlingly white and looks beautiful at night, but otherwise it is just a sort of whitewash, clean enough but not particularly attractive. There are numbers of the same square-cut granite columns that we saw at the Brazen Temple falling about near the dagoba, some this way and some that. A good place for snakes, that is why we came round by the road and walked so carefully.

Hullo! There is one! Keep still! Did you see him wriggle across among the interlacing shadows of the trees? A large one too! Thank goodness he has gone harmlessly! I wonder what sort he was? We ought not to have come out, let us get back as quickly as we can.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A BULLOCK CART.]

CHAPTER XVII

UNWELCOME INTRUDERS

India at last!

We have come up the west coast from Ceylon and are now approaching Bombay. It is night-time, and far ahead we see a great yellow light which appears and disappears, and is visible for twenty miles out at sea. It seems to blink at us in greeting, peeping every few seconds to see if we are still there. Then at last we ride into the harbour, and such a harbour! We cannot see it now at all, and even if it were daylight we couldn't see more than a very small part of it, for it is fifteen miles one way by four or five the other, and a harbour that size cannot be taken in at one glance.

We have to sleep on board, for there are some formalities to be observed before we go ash.o.r.e. There is our heavy baggage to get out of the hold, for instance, and to pa.s.s through the Customs. That can wait until to-morrow.

Our first impression of Bombay is therefore a city of lights. There are lights sprinkled about anyhow and anywhere; some in chains, some separate, some low, and some apparently slung high up in mid-air. These are on the hill above the town, which itself stands on an island.