Slowly Down the Ganges by Eric Newby

Author:Eric Newby [Newby, Eric]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780007508211
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2013-02-21T06:00:00+00:00

The sun was sinking as we floated down towards Singhirampur. It was a calm evening. The only sounds were the melancholy cawings of crows in the distant trees, and the voices of some men who were clustered together on the foreshore close to the fire on which a body was burning. It was a grisly spot by normal western standards; but we were becoming inured to such sights. Whitened skulls stood in the water and, on the foreshore, the lines of black ash left by the falling river were dotted with the heads of marigolds. On the bank scavenger birds waited, more or less patiently, for the mangy dogs to have done with two imperfectly burned corpses which were stranded close by. It was too much even for the burning party, and one man got to his feet and began to wallop the dogs with a bamboo pole. Reluctantly they slunk away and, dropping one by one into the river, began to swim across it in line ahead. When they reached the other side they stood close together for a bit like a party of revellers wondering where to go next, and then loped off into the sands to the eastward.

The sun went down behind Singhirampur. Ahead now was a small village, partly shielded from view by tall grasses. From it came the sound of children playing a game. We had looked forward to spending the night in a village, but we already knew enough about the habits of boatmen on the Ganges to know that this would not happen. The current took the boat out in a wide sweep away from the village towards the sands and it was here, on the edge of them, where the current was sluggish and the water was covered with a thick and horrible froth that, perversely, they decided that we should make our camp.

I asked Lalta Prasad why we could not stop on the other bank where the water was deeper and cleaner and there were some amenities; and where we might even be able to do a little shopping. ‘Sahib,’ he said. ‘We do not know these people.’

‘But this is a holy place. It is a great place for bathing. The book says so.’

‘Holy it may be,’ he said, stoutly, ‘but we for our part, will remain here.’

I found this mistrust of people whom one had never seen depressing; but it was useless to argue – besides he was most probably right. We did prevail on him, however, to take the boat further downstream to a place where the water had a little less body to it.

The sky turned to deep bronze. Downstream the river seemed to stretch away for ever. Fish rose. A large brown bird like a heron with shining white wings, flew upriver with slow wing beats. Ram Baba said it was an Andha Bagla – a Paddybird. From the village, doubly inviting now that we knew we would never get there, came the deep, warm sounds of animals lowing in the byres, an occasional angry voice, and the cries of small children.

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