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JUNE, 1882.)
PANDHARPUR
151
alteration was this-the first company we came centuries since yatrás and melds commenced, to on the second evening was addressed by one of their most characteristic features, it woman. We were told she was a widow named cannot be passed over in silence. At the time SAlubai. She might have been fifty years of I refer to there were no sanitary regulations age. She had no band of assistants with her. enforced at yatrás by Government. The conseShe had a viná on her shoulder; but did not quence was that, in two or three days, the air play nor sing; she simply spoke in a mild, yet became poisoned-sickening, almost pestilendistinct voice. She was explaining a passage of tial. So it used to be at all the great religious the celebrated poem the Jnaneswari (or, as the gatherings I have seen; and knowing what was Marathâs pronounce it, Dnyaneswart), which to be expected, I had always to pass through is a commentary on the Bhagavad Gita. A | a mental struggle before I could attend a yátraBrahman would have called her pronunciation a scene, in many respects, most interesting, yet, and accent vulgar. We caught her meaning in this one respect, unutterably disgusting. with difficulty; but we remained some time, Pandharpur contains about 16,000 inhabitants. admiring the quiet self-possession of the woman. The great yâtrá, which is held twice a year, There was no gesticulation--little animation; brings generally about 120,000 pilgrims. Overbut she had the full sympathy of her audience. crowding and infinite discomfort are inevitable She uttered the words, often used as a mantra or in such a case; -disease is frequent. But let spell, Ráma Krishna Hari; and instantly the us quit the unsavoury subject. well-known sound was caught up by the The cry was still, they come. Every mornhearers, and loud and long-continued was the ing, as we rode out to the sands we noted shout, Rama Krishna Hari. People at last held bands of pilgrims arriving. They crossed at two up their hands, and called out, Hush ! and Salu- fords, in endless succession; men, women, bât, in her mild persuasive tones, cried Aiká children; some on foot, many on ponies, mábáp-Listen, good friends. There were about bullocks, or buffaloes, or in carts. They rested a hundred and fifty people attending with on the sandy-trying to find a decently clean evident interest to the female preacher.
place; then generally they went to bathe, and We go on. Here is an audience exceeding
stood shivering in the cold water, till we some400, addressed by a man with great vehemence, times pleaded with them to get their ablutions who has preached himself quite hoarse. Who over more quickly. After their humble meal, is he? He is speaking fair Marathi, but may they moved up into the town to gaze on Vithoba. probably be from the Gangetic valley. We " upright on the brick." We ourselves tried find he is no disciple of our Marathâ school, to penetrate into the temple. We got as but a follower of the celebrated Kabir, or Kabir far as the entrance, which is from a narrow, Swâmî as they call him. And here is a man crowded street; but permission to go farther addressing a small company in Hindî. He turns was politely, yet peremptorily, refused. We out to be a follower of Swami Narayan, who certainly were anxious to see that particular was a teacher—to some extent a reformer- image. We were told it had not been fashioned that has exercised considerable influence in by human hands but was svayambhrt, i.e. selfGujarat, though not in Maharashtra. The man produced. We were further informed that in holds that the supreme divinity is specially the morning it looked like a child ; at noon revealed in Krishna; but he says little or like a full-grown man, in the evening like an nothing about Vithoba. He has come here old man. All day long crowds were passing apparently to proselytize; and no one hinders into and out of the temple. The image is in him. There is large toleration exercised at a small dark apartment which is lighted by a Pandharpur.
lamp. The temple with its aisles, courts, &c. But this evening we already begin to perceive covers a large space of ground. Part of it is & most disagreeable odour in many places on very old and much decayed. Some thirty the sands; indeed, it drives us away from some years ago, however, important repairs were of the companies when we would gladly have executed at the expense of a Poona Sardar. stayed. It is a disagreeable subject to men- It is often asserted that caste is disregarded tion; yet, as having been, throughout all the at Pandharpur; but we found that Mhårs were
