Le Juif errant. English

  CHAPTER XXI. THE RUINS OF TCHANDI. To the storm in the middle of theday, the approach of which so well served the Strangler's designs uponDjalma, has succeeded a calm and serene night. The disk of the moonrises slowly behind a mass of lofty ruins, situated on a hill, in themidst of a thick wood, about three leagues from Batavia.

  Long ranges of stone, high walls of brick, fretted away by time,porticoes covered with parasitical vegetation, stand out boldly from thesheet of silver light which blends the horizon with the limpid blue ofthe heavens. Some rays of the moon, gliding through the opening on oneof these porticoes, fall upon two colossal statues at the foot ofan immense staircase, the loose stones of which are almost entirelyconcealed by grass, moss, and brambles.

  The fragments of one of these statues, broken in the middle, liestrewed upon the ground; the other, which remains whole and standing, isfrightful to behold. It represents a man of gigantic proportions, witha head three feet high; the expression of the countenance is ferocious,eyes of brilliant slaty black are set beneath gray brows, the large,deep mouth gapes immoderately, and reptiles have made their nest betweenthe lips of stone; by the light of the moon, a hideous swarm isthere dimly visible. A broad girdle, adorned with symbolic ornaments,encircles the body of this statue, and fastens a long sword to its rightside. The giant has four extended arms, and, in his great hands, hebears an elephant's head, a twisted serpent, a human skull, and a birdresembling a heron. The moon, shedding her light on the profile of thisstatue, serves to augment the weirdness of its aspect.

  Here and there, enclosed in the half-crumbling walls of brick, arefragments of stone bas-reliefs, very boldly cut; one of those in thebest preservation represents a man with the head of an elephant, and thewings of a bat, devouring a child. Nothing can be more gloomy than theseruins, buried among thick trees of a dark green, covered with frightfulemblems, and seen by the moonlight, in the midst of the deep silence ofnight.

  Against one of the walls of this ancient temple, dedicated to somemysterious and bloody Javanese divinity, leans a kind of hut, rudelyconstructed of fragments of brick and stone; the door, made of wovenrushes, is open, and a red light streams from it, which throws its rayson the tall grass that covers the ground. Three men are assembled inthis hovel, around a clay-lamp, with a wick of cocoanut fibre steeped inpalm-oil.

  The first of these three, about forty years of age, is poorly clad inthe European fashion; his pale, almost white, complexion, announcesthat he belongs to the mixed race, being offspring of a white father andIndian mother.

  The second is a robust African negro, with thick lips, vigorousshoulders, and lank legs; his woolly hair is beginning to turn gray;he is covered with rags, and stands close beside the Indian. The thirdpersonage is asleep, and stretched on a mat in the corner of the hovel.

  These three men are the three Thuggee chiefs, who, obliged to fly fromthe continent of India, have taken refuge in Java, under the guidance ofMahal the Smuggler.

  "The Malay does not return," said the half-blood, named Faringhea, themost redoubtable chief of this homicidal sect: "in executing our orders,he has perhaps been killed by Djalma."

  "The storm of this morning brought every reptile out of the earth," saidthe negro; "the Malay must have been bitten, and his body ere now a nestof serpents."

  "To serve the good work," proceeded Faringhea, with a gloomy air, "onemust know how to brave death."

  "And to inflict it," added the negro.

  A stifled cry, followed by some inarticulate words, here drew theattention of these two men, who hastily turned their heads in thedirection of the sleeper. This latter was thirty years old at most. Hisbeardless face, of a bright copper color, his robe of coarse stuff, histurban striped brown and yellow, showed that he belonged to the pureHindoo race. His sleep appeared agitated by some painful vision; anabundant sweat streamed over his countenance, contracted by terror; hespoke in his dream, but his words were brief and broken, and accompaniedwith convulsive starts.

  "Again that dream!" said Faringhea to the negro. "Always the remembranceof that man."

  "What man?"

  "Do you not remember, how, five years ago, that savage, Colonel Kennedy,butcher of the Indians, came to the banks of the Ganges, to hunt thetiger, with twenty horses, four elephants, and fifty servants?"

  "Yes, yes," said the negro; "and we three, hunters of men, made a betterday's sport than he did. Kennedy, his horses, his elephants, and hisnumerous servants did not get their tiger--but we got ours," he added,with grim irony. "Yes; Kennedy, that tiger with a human face, fell intoour ambush, and the brothers of the good work offered up their fine preyto our goddess Bowanee."

  "If you remember, it was just at the moment when we gave the last tug tothe cord round Kennedy's neck, that we perceived on a sudden a travellerclose at hand. He had seen us, and it was necessary to make away withhim. Now, since that time," added Faringhea, "the remembrance of themurder of that man pursues our brother in his dreams," and he pointed tothe sleeping Indian.

  "And even when he is awake," said the negro, looking at Faringhea with asignificant air.

  "Listen!" said the other, again pointing to the Indian, who, in theagitation of his dream, recommenced talking in abrupt sentences;"listen! he is repeating the answers of the traveller, when we toldhim he must die, or serve with us on Thuggee. His mind is stillimpressed--deeply impressed--with those words."

  And, in fact, the Indian repeated aloud in his sleep, a sort ofmysterious dialogue, of which he himself supplied both questions andanswers.

  "'Traveller,' said he, in a voice broken by sudden pauses, 'why thatblack mark on your forehead, stretching from one temple to the other? Itis a mark of doom and your look is sad as death. Have you been a victim?Come with us; Kallee will avenge you. You have suffered?'--'Yes, Ihave greatly suffered.'--'For a long time?'--'Yes, for a very longtime.'--'You suffer even now?'--'Yes, even now.'--What do you reservefor those who injure you?'--'My pity.'--'Will you not render blow forblow?'--'I will return love for hate.'--'Who are you, then, that rendergood for evil?'--'I am one who loves, and suffers, and forgives.'"

  "Brother, do you hear?" said the negro to Faringhea; "he has notforgotten the words of the traveller before his death."

  "The vision follows him. Listen! he will speak again. How pale he is!"Still under the influence of his dream, the Indian continued:

  "'Traveller, we are three; we are brave; we have your life in ourhands--you have seen us sacrifice to the good work. Be one of us, ordie--die--die! Oh, that look! Not thus--do not look at me thus!'" As heuttered these last words, the Indian made a sudden movement, as if tokeep off some approaching object, and awoke with a start. Then, passinghis hand over his moist forehead, he looked round him with a bewilderedeye.

  "What! again this dream, brother?" said Faringhea. "For a bold hunter ofmen, you have a weak head. Luckily, you have a strong heart and arm."

  The other remained a moment silent, his face buried in his hands; thenhe replied: "It is long since I last dreamed of that traveller."

  "Is he not dead?" said Faringhea, shrugging his shoulders. "Did you notyourself throw the cord around his neck?"

  "Yes," replied the Indian shuddering.

  "Did we not dig his grave by the side of Colonel Kennedy's? Did we notbury him with the English butcher, under the sand and the rushes?" saidthe negro.

  "Yes, we dug his grave," said the Indian, trembling; "and yet, only ayear ago, I was seated one evening at the gate of Bombay, waiting forone of our brothers--the sun was setting behind the pagoda, to the rightof the little hill--the scene is all before me now--I was seated under afigtree--when I heard a slow, firm, even step, and, as I turned round myhead--I saw him--coming out of the town."

  "A vision," said the negro; "always the same vision!"

  "A vision," added Faringhea, "or a vague resemblance."

  "I knew him by the black mark on his forehead; it was none but he.I remained motionless with fear, gazing at him with eyes aghast. Hestopped, bending upon me his
calm, sad look. In spite of myself, Icould not help exclaiming: 'It is he!'--'Yes,' he replied, in his gentlevoice, 'it is I. Since all whom thou killest must needs live again,' andhe pointed to heaven as he spoke, 'why shouldst thou kill?--Hear me! Ihave just come from Java; I am going to the other end of the world, to acountry of never-melting snow; but, here or there, on plains of fire orplains of ice, I shall still be the same. Even so is it with the soulsof those who fall beneath thy kalleepra; in this world or up above, inthis garb or in another, the soul must still be a soul; thou canst notsmite it. Why then kill?'--and shaking his head sorrowfully, he went onhis way, walking slowly, with downcast eyes; he ascended the hill ofthe pagoda; I watched him as he went, without being able to move: at themoment the sun set, he was standing on the summit of the hill, his tallfigure thrown out against the sky--and so he disappeared. Oh! it washe!" added the Indian with a shudder, after a long pause: "it was nonebut he."

  In this story the Indian had never varied, though he had oftenentertained his companions with the same mysterious adventure. Thispersistency on his part had the effect of shaking their incredulity, orat least of inducing them to seek some natural cause for this apparentlysuperhuman event.

  "Perhaps," said Faringhea, after a moment's reflection, "the knot roundthe traveller's neck got jammed, and some breath was left him, the airmay have penetrated the rushes with which we covered his grave, and solife have returned to him."

  "No, no," said the Indian, shaking his head, "this man is not of ourrace."

  "Explain."

  "Now I know it!"

  "What do you know?"

  "Listen!" said the Indian, in a solemn voice; "the number of victimsthat the children of Bowanee have sacrificed since the commencement ofages, is nothing compared to the immense heap of dead and dying, whomthis terrible traveller leaves behind him in his murderous march."

  "He?" cried the negro and Faringhea.

  "Yes, he!" repeated the Hindoo, with a convinced accent, that made itsimpression upon his companions. "Hear me and tremble!--When I met thistraveller at the gates of Bombay, he came from Java, and was goingtowards the north, he said. The very next day, the town was a prey tothe cholera, and we learned sometime after, that this plague had firstbroken out here, in Java."

  "That is true," said the negro.

  "Hear me still further!" resumed the other. "'I am going towards thenorth, to a country of eternal snow,' said the traveller to me.The cholera also went towards the north, passing throughMuscat--Ispahan--Tauris--Tiflis--till it overwhelmed Siberia."

  "True," said Faringhea, becoming thoughtful:

  "And the cholera," resumed the Indian, "only travelled its five or sixleagues a day--a man's tramp--never appeared in two places at once--butswept on slowly, steadily,--even as a man proceeds."

  At the mention of this strange coincidence, the Hindoo's companionslooked at each other in amazement. After a silence of some minutes,the awe-struck negro said to the last speaker: "So you think that thisman--"

  "I think that this man, whom we killed, restored to life by someinfernal divinity, has been commissioned to bear this terrible scourgeover the earth, and to scatter round his steps that death, from which heis himself secure. Remember!" added the Indian, with gloomy enthusiasm,"this awful wayfarer passed through Java--the cholera wasted Java. Hepassed through Bombay--the cholera wasted Bombay. He went towards thenorth--the cholera wasted the north."

  So saying, the Indian fell into a profound reverie. The negro andFaringhea were seized with gloomy astonishment.

  The Indian spoke the truth as to the mysterious march (stillunexplained) of that fearful malady, which has never been known totravel more than five or six leagues a day, or to appear simultaneouslyin two spots. Nothing can be more curious, than to trace out, on themaps prepared at the period in question, the slow, progressive course ofthis travelling pestilence, which offers to the astonished eye all thecapricious incidents of a tourist's journey. Passing this way ratherthan that--selecting provinces in a country--towns in a province--onequarter in a town--one street in a quarter--one house in astreet--having its place of residence and repose, and then continuingits slow, mysterious, fear inspiring march.

  The words of the Hindoo, by drawing attention to these dreadfuleccentricities, made a strong impression upon the minds of the negro andFaringhea--wild natures, brought by horrible doctrines to the monomaniaof murder.

  Yes--for this also is an established fact--there have been in Indiamembers of an abominable community, who killed without motive, withoutpassion--killed for the sake of killing--for the pleasure of murder--tosubstitute death for life--to make of a living man a corpse, as theyhave themselves declared in one of their examinations.

  The mind loses itself in the attempt to penetrate the causes of thesemonstrous phenomena. By what incredible series of events, have men beeninduced to devote themselves to this priesthood of destruction? Withoutdoubt, such a religion could only flourish in countries given up, likeIndia, to the most atrocious slavery, and to the most merciless iniquityof man to man.

  Such a creed!--is it not the hate of exasperated humanity, wound up toits highest pitch by oppression?--May not this homicidal sect, whoseorigin is lost in the night of ages, have been perpetuated in theseregions, as the only possible protest of slavery against despotism? Maynot an inscrutable wisdom have here made Phansegars, even as are madetigers and serpents?

  What is most remarkable in this awful sect, is the mysterious bond,which, uniting its members amongst themselves, separates them from allother men. They have laws and customs of their own, they support andhelp each other, but for them there is neither country nor family; theyowe no allegiance save to a dark, invisible power, whose decrees theyobey with blind submission, and in whose name they spread themselvesabroad, to make corpses, according to their own savage expression.(6)

  For some moments the three Stranglers had maintained a profound silence.

  Outside the hut, the moon continued to throw great masses of whiteradiance, and tall bluish shadows, over the imposing fabric of theruins; the stars sparkled in the heavens; from time to time, a faintbreeze rustled through the thick and varnished leaves of the bananas andthe palms.

  The pedestal of the gigantic statue, which, still entire, stood on theleft side of the portico, rested upon large flagstones, half hidden withbrambles. Suddenly, one of these stones appeared to fall in; and fromthe aperture, which thus formed itself without noise, a man, dressedin uniform, half protruded his body, looked carefully around him, andlistened.

  Seeing the rays of the lamp, which lighted the interior of the hovel,tremble upon the tall grass, he turned round to make a signal, andsoon, accompanied by two other soldiers, he ascended, with the greatestsilence and precaution, the last steps of the subterranean staircase,and went gliding amongst the ruins. For a few moments, their movingshadows were thrown upon the moonlit ground; then they disappearedbehind some fragments of broken wall.

  At the instant when the large stone resumed its place and level, theheads of many other soldiers might have been seen lying close in theexcavation. The half-caste, the Indian, and the negro, still seatedthoughtfully in the hut, did not perceive what was passing.

  (6) The following are some passages from the Count de Warren's verycurious book, "British India in 1831:" "Besides the robbers, who killfor the sake of the booty they hope to find upon travellers, there is aclass of assassins, forming an organized society, with chiefs of theirown, a slang-language, a science, a free-masonry, and even a religion,which has its fanaticism and its devotion, its agents, emissaries,allies, its militant forces, and its passive adherents, who contributetheir money to the good work. This is the community of the Thugs orPhansegars (deceivers or stranglers, from thugna, to deceive, andphansna, to strangle), a religious and economical society, whichspeculates with the human race by exterminating men; its origin is lostin the night of ages.

  "Until 1810 their existence was unknown, not only to the Europeanconquerors, but even to the native governme
nts. Between the years 1816and 1830, several of their bands were taken in the act, and punished:but until this last epoch, all the revelations made on the subject byofficers of great experience, had appeared too monstrous to obtain theattention or belief of the public; they had been rejected and despisedas the dreams of a heated imagination. And yet for many years, at thevery least for half a century, this social wound had been frightfullyon the increase, devouring the population from the Himalayas to CapeComorin and from Cutch to Assam.

  "It was in the year 1830 that the revelations of a celebrated chief,whose life was spared on condition of his denouncing his accomplices,laid bare the whole system. The basis of the Thuggee Society is areligious belief--the worship of Bowanee, a gloomy divinity, who is onlypleased with carnage, and detests above all things the human race. Hermost agreeable sacrifices are human victims, and the more of theseher disciple may have offered up in this world the more he will berecompensed in the next by all the delights of soul and sense, by womenalways beautiful, and joys eternally renewed. If the assassin meets thescaffold in his career, he dies with the enthusiasm of a martyr, becausehe expects his reward. To obey his divine mistress, he murders, withoutanger and without remorse, the old man, woman and child; whilst, to hisfellow-religionists, he may be charitable, humane, generous, devoted,and may share all in common with them, because, like himself, they arethe ministers and adopted children of Bowanee. The destruction of hisfellow-creatures, not belonging to his community--the diminution of thehuman race--that is the primary object of his pursuit; it is not as ameans of gain, for though plunder may be a frequent, and doubtless anagreeable accessory, it is only secondary in his estimation. Destructionis his end, his celestial mission, his calling; it is also a deliciouspassion, the most captivating of all sports--this hunting of men!--'Youfind great pleasure,' said one of those that were condemned, 'intracking the wild beast to his den, in attacking the boar, the tiger,because there is danger to brave, energy and courage to display. Thinkhow this attraction must be redoubled, when the contest is with man,when it is man that is to be destroyed. Instead of the single facultyof courage, all must be called into action--courage, cunning, foresight,eloquence, intrigue. What springs to put in motion! what plans todevelop! To sport with all the passions, to touch the chords of loveand friendship, and so draw the prey into one's net--that is a gloriouschase--it is a delight, a rapture, I tell you!'

  "Whoever was in India in the years 1831 and 1832, must remember thestupor and affright, which the discovery of this vast infernal machinespread through all classes of society. A great number of magistrates andadministrators of provinces refused to believe in it, and could not bebrought to comprehend that such a system had so long preyed on the bodypolitic, under their eyes as it were, silently, and without betrayingitself."--See "British India in 183," by Count Edward de Warren, 2 vols.in 8vo. Paris, 1844.--E. S.