Chapter XX

“If you listen to him, my lord, the old man will weary
out the stars in telling tales of the days of his youth.
Come this way, and heed him not.”

HINDOO DRAMA.

Chunder having stated that Zeinedeen was engaged in deep discourse with three strange dervishes, as he supposed them to be, who had recently arrived in Cashmere from the islands of the west, led Jehangire and his companion to an inner chamber, where mattresses were already spread for their reception. Chiboques and coffee were immediately presented to them by two negro slaves, after which a repast, consisting chiefly of hot cakes, fowls, and rice, was served with lemonade, which the pilgrims found particularly acceptable after their long ride across the mountains.

Auzeem, desirous of learning, if he could, what preparations were going on in the province, with a view to the maintenance of the civil war, questioned Chunder upon the subject as soon as the other slaves had been dismissed.

“I do not find, Chunder, that so many pilgrims, as I had expected, have assembled to visit the shrine of Mahadeo.”

“No--nothing like the numbers that used to come in old times. I remember the days when the whole of these mountain sides were covered with them--their staffs making a moving forest as they crowded to the entrance of the temple yonder.”

“How does it happen that they are now so few?”

“Infidels--Mahometans as they are called--have, in these times, been teaching some nonsensical things about houris, and prophets, and other follies, and the silly people are led away to other places--to gingerbread houses with round chimnies stuck up on one side, on the tops of which sooty urchins cry out to them to come to their prayers. And then they kneel down on a bit of carpet, and go to sleep for a while, and when they get up, they kneel down again, and then they stand and bawl, as if the world was coming to an end.”

Jehangire could not repress a smile at Chunder’s irreverent description of the religion of the prophet.

“And it is for these childish novelties that the people have deserted the fine old temples built by the hands of the gods, that in the elder days were spread over the land. Why, I well recollect, that when I was once at Bokla, upon the shore of the great sea, there came a storm which lasted twenty days, and every day the sea rose higher and higher, until every house in the town and in the country round, was swallowed up. But the temples of the gods rose as mountains above the raging waters, and afforded dry footing to all the inhabitants. What would have become of them then, I should like to know, if they had only pots turned upside down, and chimnies of whitened mud to fly to?”

“If ever you go to Agra, my friend,” said Jehangire, “you will see that the mosques there are not quite so insignificant as you imagine.”

“Pshaw! simpleton! Have you seen the temple of the Sun in Guzerat?”

The emperor was obliged to confess that he had not.

“Nor the fortress of Kebeer, who built the temple, and in which fortress the subah of Cashmere now resides?”

“No; except from the tops of these mountains.”

“Then you have seen nothing; you are but a poor pilgrim, just come, I suppose, out of Thibet. They say that that madman, that up-start, Bochari, who leads the sultan, his master, by the nose, is coming hither with a large army to attack the fortress. He might as well have staid at Lahore--and much better--and spent his time, as his father did before him, in daubing pictures of old women.”

Auzeem, who saw that the conversation was assuming a turn he had not intended, eagerly interposed with an inquiry whether the fortress was not strongly garrisoned.

“Garrisoned! The fortress of Kebeer garrisoned! I am sure I know not whether there be many soldiers within the walls, if that be what you mean by a garrison; but this I do know, that ten or twenty men could easily defend it from all the armies that the painter’s son can bring against it.”

“May I ask,” added Auzeem, “who this Kebeer was, of whom you speak?”

“What? Have you never heard of Kebeer? Ha! ha! ha! Well, you are a pair of the most ignorant pilgrims I ever met. There is not a child in Cashmere who could not have told you the story of Kebeer.”

“We should be glad to hear it from you,” said Auzeem, “if you could spare the time to tell it.”

“It is soon told; but I must have a pipe and a cup of coffee first.”

Chunder going to the door of the chamber, called aloud to the negroes in his husky voice, who immediately made their appearance, and supplied the vice-hermit, as he might be styled, with the necessaries he required. Then settling himself on a mattress, which he had directed to be brought in for the purpose, and assuming an air of more than ordinary importance, he thus proceeded with his tale.

“A poor cobbler, who lived in Cyrinagur, as the capital of Cashmere was called in the old times, used to go out frequently in the hard days of winter, with his ass and his hatchet, to the woody hills above the town, to collect fuel to keep his wife and his little family warm in their cottage, while he hammered away in his stall. One day he happened to light upon the tough stump of a brambly tree, which he attempted to chop into small fragments; but his hatchet turning aside from the wood, struck against a stone and was splintered. ‘No more chopping for you to-day,’ said he, looking at his hatchet. ‘It was only yesterday you came back from that lazy blacksmith, Kebeer, and now you must go again to get a new edge. Why; how is this? It is not my own--the robber--he has given me an old hatchet of copper, instead of my own bright steel, which I have had all my life. I warrant me, I’ll have him before the Cadi!’

“The cobbler, you must know, was but an ignorant old man; and so, when he took the hatchet to Kebeer, the latter saw, with the eye of a lynx, what had occurred. ‘Ah! very true,’ said he, ‘this hatchet is not yours, it belongs to another customer, and was sent to you in a mistake. I can’t find your own just now; but no matter, here is a new one, take it and keep it, until I get you your own. By the by, it must have been a very hard tree you were trying to cut, when you splintered this in the way you have done. I should like to see it.’

“‘It was not the tree,’ said the cobbler, ‘as I told you before; but a stone, against which it struck, when I missed the stump.’

“‘A stone, was it? Well, the hatchet you now have, will cut through stone as well as wood.’

“The cobbler laughed heartily at the idea of a hatchet cutting a stone, upon which Keeber said, ‘If you do not believe me, I’ll go with you to-morrow morning to the place where you said you splintered this old hatchet; and if, at the first blow, I don’t cut in two, with the hatchet I have lent you, the identical stone you struck, I shall make you a present of all the hatchets in my shop!’

“The cobbler laughed again and again, much more heartily than before; well pleased to think how rich he should become, for the shop was full of new hatchets; and how fortunate he was in dealing with so shallow a fool. He then went away, saying that he would return the next morning at day-break, and take the blacksmith to the very spot in the wood where the stone was.

“The cobbler could hardly sleep all night, for joy that he should no longer have occasion to mend old shoes. He rose before dawn, and hastening to the blacksmith’s shop, awoke him. They both went together to the wood, and having reached the place where the half-chopped stump still remained, the cobbler pointed out the stone.

“‘Now give me the hatchet,’ said Kebeer. The cobbler placed it at once in his hand. Kebeer, grasping the handle of the instrument with both his hands, and raising it high above his head, struck the stone with all his might. But, instead of splitting the stone, he broke the hatchet in two, when both parts turned at once from a bright steel colour to a deep yellow. The cobbler jumped about, transported with gladness. He danced, and sung, and whistled, half mad with his joy, that had no bounds.

“‘Unhappy simpleton, that I am,’ exclaimed Kebeer, ‘to have made the promise I have made--but it shall be kept. Go, take possession of my shop, and all that it contains. I am too much ashamed of my folly ever to shew myself there again. All my neighbours would laugh at me, and say--there goes the ass, Kebeer! and they would make long ears with their hands. I’ll betake me to some foreign country.’

“The cobbler did as he was told, and from that day he had no occasion to mend shoes any more.

“As soon, however, as the cobbler was out of sight, Kebeer picking up the pieces of the broken hatchet, and uncovering the stone, which was partly buried in the earth, he took it out of the ground, and carefully concealed it under his jacket in the folds of his girdle. He then hastened out of the wood, and proceeding towards the high road, travelled into Hindostan, until he reached Lahore. He there found no difficulty in selling the fragments of his hatchet, for they were of the purest gold, the stone being the celebrated talisman that could turn into gold all things it touched, which was possessed by a Bengalese magician in the olden times--by him, after working numberless miracles, buried, in a fit of anger, where the cobbler struck by accident against it, and so discovered once more, after the lapse of many thousand years.

“Kebeer forthwith purchased a great quantity of iron, which he locked up safely in a large storehouse; he then changed it into gold, but when he beheld his growing riches, he began to fear that he should be robbed. He, therefore, hired numbers of armed men, whom he clothed in sumptuous coats of mail; and to whom, on the condition of guarding his treasures, he assigned yearly pensions of such an amount, that some of the greatest omrahs and rajahs, and many of the most learned and illustrious men in the empire, were glad to be enrolled in his service.

“Kebeer had now an ambition to found cities, and erect temples to the gods, by whom he had been so highly favoured. Attended by his great men, he went about travelling. One day, being in the province of Guzerat, while he was standing on a lofty peninsula, that overlooked the ocean, he beheld an eagle dive into the water. The bird, having thus washed its body, returned to the land, and, perching on a rock, made obeisance to the sea. Kebeer, astonished at this sight, consulted his learned men, desiring to be informed why the eagle adored the waves.

“One of these, who was acquainted with the language of birds, asked the bird what it was to which he paid his homage. The eagle answered, that while diving in the sea he had struck against the long-lost statue of Sumnaut, the general judge of the dead, and that he, therefore, bowed down before it.

“Search having been made by expert divers, the precious image was discovered, and Kebeer resolved, that there should be erected to the honour of the god, on the summit of the peninsula, a temple, such as human eye had never seen before.

“Artificers in masonry and wood, in gold, silver, and ivory, having been collected from all parts of the world, the temple was speedily raised; since called, from its exceeding beauty and magnificence, the Temple of the Sun. It is in the interior larger than the whole town of Cyrinagur. Its walls are one hundred and fifty cubits high, and nineteen cubits thick. There are three entrances to it; and, at one of the entrances, are two figures of elephants, in white marble, each with a man seated on his trunk. You would think they were living, and about to move in another direction. At another entrance are two surprising figures of horsemen, completely armed, and mounted on bronze horses, of marvellous workmanship; at the third, is a figure of a dead lion in brass, with two tigers, of the same material, standing over it, as if about to devour the slain monarch of the forest. The wonder is, that they do not devour it.

“Over the temple is spread a dome of gold, in the interior of which the sun is represented by a myriad of diamonds, that blaze in torch-light like the day. Around it, in various kinds of precious stones, are the planets, and many stars, the whole encircled by a wide border, in which are minstrels, men kneeling in prayer, females dancing and beating tambourines, horses racing against each other, warriors fighting, wrestlers and gladiators, and birds and beasts, all most truly awful to behold; for though they are plainly seen to be living, they are too far off to be heard.

“When that infidel warrior, Mahomet of Ghazni, invaded Guzerat, and took possession of the peninsula of Sumnaut, he found that there were assigned, for the support of the temple, two thousand villages, all purchased by the blacksmith; three thousand priests were constantly in attendance upon the shrine of the god, whose ancient golden image remained unchanged; but in the interior of the figure he discovered precious stones, deposited in it by Kebeer, to such an amount, that he took them as an adequate ransom for the whole province which he had captured, and quitted the country, leaving the temple untouched, and also five hundred golden statues of inferior deities, by which Sumnaut still remains surrounded.”

“It must, indeed,” exclaimed Auzeem, “be a marvellous structure.”

“Well, you may suppose that a man of such unbounded wealth became at last anxious to enjoy repose, and to secure some place of strength, where he might preserve himself and his treasure against any power that might cause him fear. So returning to Cashmere, he fixed upon the woody hills near Cyrinagur, where he found the talismanic stone. Upon careful examination, they were found to be surrounded, on all sides, by a chain of rocks, which he had fashioned, with great labour, like a wall; immediately beneath it he caused a ditch to be excavated, into which he led whole rivers, until the deep abyss was filled up, and then the country about it, for a considerable distance, whether rock or earth, he caused to be levelled, so that the fortress now resembles a mountain in itself, starting up from a plain. It communicates with that plain, only by a single bridge, which may be drawn up or let down, as the people in the fortress may think fit. It contains within itself, abundant wells of pure water, temples, castles, towers, houses of every description, groves, gardens, fields, pastures, granaries, always filled with provisions for five years, and when you see it, I think you will say that the son of the portrait painter, if he tells the emperor that he can take it by force, deserves to have his head lifted on a pole for all his army to laugh at.”

This intelligence was by no means pleasant to the ear of the imperial pilgrim. He could not, however, forbear from inquiring what had become of the talisman with which all these wonders had been wrought.

“By the time the fortress was finished, as you may easily suppose, the fortunate blacksmith had become a great sovereign, and had a harem full of the most beautiful women, and many sons and daughters. Emperors and kings from all parts came to his palace, among the rest, the sultan of Burhanpour, who, upon beholding the exceeding beauty of Kebeer’s eldest daughter, asked her hand in marriage for his son. The union having been agreed upon, the sultan returned home, full of expectation that the bride would be sent to Burhanpour, with a dowry such as the world never saw before. She was, however, equipped in a very frugal manner; but for her dowry, because she was Kebeer’s favourite daughter, he presented her with a sealed purse of cloth of gold, in which was contained the talismanic stone. He desired her to say to the monarch of Burhanpour, when presenting him with the stone, that a single scruple of it was worth, at the least, a hundred elephant-loads of gold. He then explained to her its miraculous properties.

“The princess, attended by a retinue of her father’s people, and an ambassador, set out for Burhanpour, and proceeded as far as the river Nerbuddah, within four days’ journey from that city. She was there met by the sultan, with a numerous escort of his nobles, and sumptuous tents were fitted up for her reception. Having made her the usual presents of gold, and beautiful palanquins and horses, he was not a little disappointed when, in return, the princess laid on the floor of her tent only the sealed purse, containing, as she said, a jewel equal in value to the revenue of a hundred provinces. The sultan, on opening the bag, and perceiving nothing in it but what appeared to him to be an ordinary stone, became angry, believing that it was intended by Kebeer as a mark of his contempt for the sovereign of a district, not in itself very wealthy. Taking up the stone indignantly, he flung it into the river, and from the same spot sent back the princess to her father.

“Kebeer, in return for this insult, contented himself with writing and despatching a letter to the sultan of Burhanpour, in these words:--‘The article which I sent thee by my daughter, and of which thou hadst not the common sense to understand the value, would have produced thee, every day, gold by the horse-load. But thou hast cast it into the Nerbuddah, whence it can never more be recovered.’ You may well imagine the grief of the foolish sultan, when he read this letter. He immediately caused the bed of the river to be searched, but the stone was never met with again.”

“Except upon one occasion,” added Jehangire, “for I remember hearing my father, Acbar, now in paradise, say, that when he set on foot an expedition against a subsequent sultan of Burhanpour, one of the elephants in the imperial train had a ponderous iron chain attached to his fore-leg, as a check upon his furious and intractable temper. In passing the Nerbuddah, the chain came in contact with something, which must have been the very stone in question, that turned it into gold. The circumstance was made known to the emperor, who employed a number of people in searching the river for the talisman, but without success.”

Chunder, lifting his withered hands to his eyes, rubbed them, as if he had awoke from a lethargy, and gazing at the emperor, his mouth distended with astonishment, knew not what apology to make for the manner in which he had hitherto addressed the two pilgrims. Auzeem, however, relieved him at once from his embarrassment on that point, and lifting the old man from his mattress, desired him to conduct them to the hermit’s tower.

END OF VOLUME II.

PRINTED BY STEWART AND MURRAY, OLD BAILEY.

TRANSCRIBERS’ NOTES

A Table of Contents was created and added to the beginning of the text.

Small caps have been changed to all caps. Italics have been marked with _underline_.

Minor typographical errors such as missing periods, commas used instead of periods, etc. have been silently corrected.

Spellings and punctuation reflecting period or local usage have been retained as printed; however, probable printer’s errors have been corrected. The corrections made are listed below:

Page 21: “she had often pondered i th delight” changed to “she had often pondered with delight”

Page 144: “they would find it imposible to settle” changed to “they would find it impossible to settle”

Page 144: “the blessings of his gracions providence” changed to “the blessings of his gracious providence”

Page: 152: “the insterstices being filled with figures of birds engaged in flight” changed to “the interstices being filled with figures of birds engaged in flight”

Page 188: “and ran foward eagerly to meet him” changed to “and ran forward eagerly to meet him”

Page 193: “with provisions o every kind” changed to “with provisions of every kind”

Page 288: “from he mulberry-tree” changed to “from the mulberry-tree”

Page 316: “mounted on a grey rabian courser” changed to “mounted on a grey Arabian courser”

Page 319: “as he suposed them to be” changed to “as he supposed them to be”

Page 329: “erected to th honour of the god” changed to “erected to the honour of the god”

Page 336: “lifting the ld man” changed to “lifting the old man”