CHAPTER XII.

TWO MARRIAGES.

THE first visit of Isa Dás to Ditu's home was by no means the last. The family were full of gratitude for the preservation of Tara, and he who had risked his life to save her was always sure of a welcome.

It was a great pleasure to Isa Dás to open his heart to a Christian countryman. He conversed freely with Ditu on the former events of his life, on past trials which he had, as it were, hitherto kept in a locked-up chamber. That chamber was indeed full of painful memories. I will give a brief record of the early days of Shiv Dás, the Hindu, that the reader may contrast them with those of Isa Dás, the Christian.

Shiv Dás was married when he was but seven years old. The child's wedding took place with all the ceremonies which Hindus deem suitable, and all the show in which they delight. The bridegroom's procession extended for nearly a quarter of a mile; loud was the sound of the tom-toms (drums); and enough of money was spent on feasting and fireworks to have fed the family for years. Many pice were given to beggars, many rupees were bestowed on the priests. All present declared that such a tamasha (show) had never before been seen in that town. The little bride-child was loaded with jewels, and the cost of her outfit left her father in debt to the day of his death!

And what followed the grand wedding? Even as the most brilliant fireworks leave but a few ashes, and, perhaps, an evil savour behind, so was it with the marriage of Shiv Dás. The boy and girl thus wedded never cared for each other. They had but been joined together with a gilded chain; the gilding wore off, the weight of iron remained behind.

Shiv Dás grew up a thoughtful youth with a cultivated mind; he delighted in study. Lachmi was a silly creature, with scarcely a thought beyond what finery she should wear, what jewels she should put on. But she had a sharp tongue and an evil temper. Her presence was to her husband as that of a swarm of wasps who buzz and who sting.

One little girl was born in the house when Shiv Dás was about twenty years old. The child was an object of love to her father, but was utterly neglected by Lachmi, who was grievously disappointed that she had not given birth to a boy.

About two years afterwards, Lachmi set her heart on going to the great Hurdwan melá, and bathing in the sacred Ganges.

Shiv Dás, unlike his more ignorant wife, had little faith in the holiness of the Ganges. He foresaw great trouble and expense, and possible danger, from attending the melá, Hurdwan being at a great distance from his home.

But Lachmi gave her husband no peace till she had wrung from him an unwilling consent. Shiv Dás had to leave his situation and spend all his savings to gratify the wish of his superstitious and pleasure-seeking wife. He took Lachmi and her little one, both adorned in jewels, in a covered bullock-gari to the great melá, at which many hundreds of thousands of Hindus assembled.

That time Shiv Dás could never remember without horror. At first he was dazzled by the show and the glitter, the banners, the music, and the processions, which seemed to be endless. Then Shiv Dás saw things from which his soul revolted, even though he had been brought up as a Hindu.

"Can even the Ganges wash away such sins as I see around me?" he said to himself.

Soon followed what was to Shiv Dás a grievous misfortune. He had gone a short distance to buy some sweets for his child, and a pair of gugurus (anklets, with bells) for her slender feet. What was the father's grief, on his return, to find his little one missing! Perhaps she had been lost in the crowd; perhaps murdered for the sake of her jewels!

In vain, during the rest of that miserable day and the whole of that following night, poor Shiv Dás searched for his lost one amidst that surging mass of human beings. In vain, he made offerings to idols. He never saw his darling again.

More misery was to follow. Lachmi, who felt the loss of her child far less than did her husband, pursued her design of bathing in the holy river. But the rush of thousands and thousands of pilgrims, all bent on the same object, was so terrific, that in spite of the efforts of the police, hundreds were pushed by their companions over a ravine, and miserably perished. Amongst this number was Lachmi; she had had her heart's desire, and it had cost her her life.

Shiv Dás, desolate and almost beggared, attempted to return to his home. But the frightful crowding together of multitudes of pilgrims had produced its natural effect. Disease broke out among the crowds; cholera spread. Shiv Dás, on his homeward way, was attacked by agonising pains, happily near a town, or he would have died, as so many do, uncared for and untended. Being in an hospital, and possessed of a strong constitution, Shiv struggled through the disease, and so was not numbered among the numerous victims to attendance at the great melá.

From that time Shiv Dás altogether lost all faith in the Hindu creed. "The religion which leads men to believe that bathing in a river can remove sin, and so leads to an appalling amount of disease, misery, and vice, cannot be from a good God, but from some wicked spirit, enemy of man!" he exclaimed.

A few years afterwards, as we have seen, Shiv Dás, the Hindu, became Isa Dás, the Christian.

After telling the story of his sorrows one evening to his friend Ditu, after a silent pause the convert remarked, "I had suffered so much from my first marriage that I resolved never to contract a second; and after my baptism the seeming impossibility of finding a Christian partner confirmed me in my resolution. But oh! my brother, since I have entered your home, my resolution has disappeared like dew under the rays of the sun; and I now ask from you the only blessing needed to complete my earthly happiness."

From that hour Isa Dás became the affianced husband of Tara.

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The second marriage of the convert was as unlike the first as anything could possibly be. Without any pomp or show, in a little mission church, Isa Dás was united to the zemindar's daughter. The bride's dower was her purity and piety, her ornaments "a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price" (1 Pet. iii. 4). No treasures were spent at the wedding; the bride herself was a treasure, which year by year her husband found increasing in worth. Solomon's description of a good wife might have been the description of Tara,—"Her price is far above rubies; the heart of her husband doth safely trust in her. She openeth her mouth with wisdom, and in her tongue is the law of kindness" (Prov. xxxi.).

So Isa Dás and Tara walked on their heavenly course together, happy in mutual trust and love, happy to see their little ones growing up around them. And they had deeper sources of joy even than these. They were happy because they both had received from the Saviour the pardon of sins; because they were fellow-heirs of His glorious kingdom, where all the children of God—from the north and the south, the east and the west—shall meet together and rejoice together in bliss that never shall end.

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NOTE ON HURDWAN FAIR.

To show that the above description of the great Hindu melá is far from being coloured, it is only needful to give a few extracts from a description of the last one which appeared in a Calcutta paper, 24th April, 1879:—

"The multitude which came in at last baffled all calculation. It is now believed that the melá must have numbered between 750,000 and 1,000,000 of souls . . . Bathing at Hurdwan, during such a melá, may be said never to cease. All day on the 11th the police were obliged to be present up to eleven o'clock P.M. They were on the ground again at two o'clock A.M. on the 12th, and from that time till ten o'clock at night they were obliged to remain at their posts. It is said that several of the brave men who worked so hard at the melá have died . . ."

Writing of the Bairagis, the correspondent goes on:—

"These mustered over 10,000 strong. During their passage over the bridge an accident, which was accompanied with serious consequences to some of themselves, occurred. Unable to restrain their enthusiasm, a large number, from 200 to 300 of them, leaped from the bridge into the main current of the canal. Most of those who could swim were taken up at the nearest bridge; but it is feared that a considerable number sank before they could reach it . . .

"Just before this took place, another still more serious accident occurred at one of the barriers. This outer barrier stood at the end of a masonry bridge that spans a deep ravine . . . The ravine below the bridge is dry, and about thirty feet in depth . . . The crowd gathered in overwhelming numbers behind this outer barrier, and notwithstanding the efforts of the police to keep them back, kept surging to and fro, till at last the front ranks were pressed outwards through the wooden fence, and some 300 persons were driven headlong into the ravine . . .

"But the worst was yet to come. The evening of the 12th, though it witnessed a general exodus from Hurdwan of many who had bathed in the morning, yet witnessed among those who remained a fresh outbreak of cholera . . . Many died during the night . . . The disease did not stop there, and I fear it is still following the retiring pilgrims into all parts of the country."

THE END.