We set off on our way again and the party on the floor proceeded to settle itself for the evening meal and after that to sleep. The tiffin carrier disclosed endless pieces of meat and chicken bones, which, with chapattis, they proceeded to eat with their fingers. After that there were sundry other things and a drink of water all round from the earthenware pot which satisfied the family. The mother then rummaged in the holdall and produced two gaudily embroidered pillows, something that looked like a curtain, over which she spread a large mat, then several light eiderdown things and a woollen shawl or two. The children fidgeted and whined a bit but at last settled down to sleep. The mother reclined among the debris and refused my offer of the upper berth. She spoke English quite well and seemed a nice little soul unlike the rest of her relatives. She was most attentive to the children all through the long cold night. The little schoolmistress and I discoursed upon this and that; she had a lively tongue and I let her chatter on until we came to Cawnpore.
After that I tried to get some sleep, with my feet tucked under me in the corner of the seat. There was no room to unpack my valise and get out my blanket but oh how cold it was and how I longed for Tundi, where I was to change for Agra. I had been told by different guards at different stations that we would arrive at 6am, 2am, and 4am, 3am or 5am. All said helpfully that the train was two hours late but even that didn’t cover the discrepancy in the time of arrival. But the Indian mind is philosophical and a few hours are neither here nor there and one is helpless against such an attitude and at length one accepts the situation and retires. I eventually got out at 5.25 after hanging out of every station en route and asking, ‘Is this Tundi?’ At Tundi I found a waiting room and the Ayah spread out my bedding roll for me on a couch and after some tea and toast I got down to it and slept until 7.30. We left about 8am and ambled into Agra cantonment at about 9.30.
There are positively no taxis in Agra so one uses a tonga everywhere and in that manner I arrived at Laurie’s hotel. It looked a delightful place to stay but unfortunately there was no accommodation available and I had to go on to the Imperial. Only by luck did I get a room here – the occupant it appears is in hospital – and I am quite comfortable although it’s nothing to rave about. There is hot and cold water however and baths are a treat to me, who in Calcutta, had to be content with two buckets of water at the bottom of the bath. I went to the Taj Mahal on the first afternoon. I was scarcely in the mood for it, being tired after the previous night, but the Taj would overcome all moods. One goes through a native area by car en route and then through the national park. The dome can be seen from afar, but it is now, alas, covered with scaffolding – some repairs taking place. But one forgets that at the first breathtaking sight, through the lovely arches of the gateway. What can one say of it that would not seem banal and prosaic? It is far lovelier than I dreamed of – most exquisite and most perfect in detail and in setting. I shan’t begin to describe it as I shall see it in my mind’s eye for all time: the nebulous pearl colour of its marble, the delicate lace-like screen, the flowers inlaid in the marble – jasmine, lily, rose, fuchsia or lotus – set in topaz, agate, jade, onyx and black marble collected from all over India; the graceful dome and arches, the exquisite carvings on the marble columns and walls, the tomb of Shah Jahan and his beloved queen – the Persian Princess Mumtaz Mahal; all these shall remain, as will the lovely garden, with its cypress trees and fountains and the reflections in the marble basin below. One could and should sit for hours and gaze upon the utmost perfection of it all, so full of peace it is – at one with past loves and glories, as with all time to come. Here in the garden are trees and shrubs from all over India: mango, paw paw, peepal (the holy tree), cypress, fir, eucalyptus, and silk oak, cactus, pittosporum and tamarind and others I know not. Cannas bloom riotously alongside hibiscus, poinsettias, syringa, jasmine, gaudy bougainvillea and many English flowers such as verbena, sweet peas and phlox as well as beds upon beds of roses and of course lilies, which are depicted among the mosaic work.
I went again next morning and Major Robertson, whom I met here, rooted me out while it was yet dark and we went again by tonga and stood above the lovely gateway and watched the first morning light rest upon the marble, bringing it to life and warmth again. So lovely it was in that first light with no one about at all and the dew still silver on the grass. A week later and I would have seen it by moonlight, when it is most lovely of all, but I shall miss that.
After breakfast I tonga’d again along the same route and to Akbar’s fort of red sandstone with castellated walls, a moat and drawbridge; it covers a large area and the walls are a mile and a half in circumference. It was built early in 1500 and it must have been an amazing spectacle in its heyday, complete in itself with mosques and palaces and council chambers and bazaars. The guide told me that 10,000 people had lived therein. Here it was that poor old Shah Jahan was imprisoned for the last seven years of his life by his son Jehangi,65 who was impatient for him to die. There in the lovely Jasmine Tower while the Jumna flowed below, he could see the Taj Mahal and the tomb of his dear Mumtaz Mahal, and there it was that he died an old man.
The Pearl Mosque is most exquisite, plain and dignified and unornamented except for the glorious carved archways and columns and the marble shines like mother of pearl, unspoilt, perhaps only more beautiful with time. Then the private audience chamber and the public one, where the king sat on his marble throne and addressed his subjects, and the palaces, one for his Hindu wife, and one for his Mohammedan wife. Then a sort of outdoor concert hall with a marble platform for the king and one opposite for the jester and below the walls alongside the Jumna, but still enclosed in the fort grounds, the arena, where wild beasts fought as they did in Rome – elephants and tigers and so on. The lovely Jasmine Tower, where the king died, looks over the river to the Taj. Here is another of those most exquisite marble screens. Whole windows are carved out of solid pieces of marble; the light filtering through on all sides gives the impression of delicate lace which lights up the semi-precious stones of the inlaid flowers in the walls. There is a bathroom with a marvellous roof studded literally with thousands of tiny mirrors and when it is lit up with magnesium wire, the whole effect is brilliant and bizarre. There are numerous other baths in the various courtyards with fountains playing – marble beautifully curved and carved – sometimes with seats around them. Apparently they were fond of bathing and in public under the blue sky. The guide told me that they had hot and cold water and that rain water was supplied from the roof. The special bath for the queen, where she washed her hands and face before eating, was always filled with fresh rose water. There are niches in the walls where fresh flowers were put every day. Then the floor of one courtyard was inlaid as a game – similar to ludo – and the king and queen and their court sat around and played with dice and called out the numbers. We were told that the pieces were children dressed in different coloured clothes.
During the mutiny of 1857 the fort was used as a hospital and 30,000 British were housed within but it was never besieged.
In the afternoon I went with Major Robertson to Dayalbagh a few miles out. Here a temple or memorial is slowly being raised to the founder of this comparatively new faith, Radha Soami. He is buried within. The major took me to see an old Dutchman who lived in the cottage of the grounds and who, after trying every religion once, has at last found peace in this one. The model of the memorial, which he showed us, is a most stupendous and amazing piece of work, or rather it suggests it will be when completed. Already the workmen have been working for 25 years or so and only the foundations and up to the first floor are completed. It is also of solid white marble with columns of 12 sides, most amazingly carved with fruit and leaves and flowers at their tops: great sunflowers and mangoes and creeping ivy and exotic lily – all the Indian flowers and fruits. There are slender columns between of pink and black and a lovely green marble, all from different parts of India. The founder’s tomb is on the first floor of marble and inlaid like the tombs i
n the Taj with flowers and semi precious stones. The archway and ceilings are delicately carved and curved.
When it is complete it will comprise almost every type of architecture – Gothic, Norman, Doric, Moorish, Byzantine and Mogul. It sounds an awful hotchpotch but it is so immense and the work so amazing that I feel it will be worth seeing when completed – although I hardly think at the present rate of progress it will be in my day. It can never hope to have the infinite grace of the Taj; it is too heavy and too ornate but the marble itself can never be anything short of beautiful and I think it will succeed. Most of the workmen give their free time for love of the founder and here around the grounds they cut and saw and carve the huge blocks of marble that come from 150 miles away by oxen cart. So must the scene have been, at the building of Solomon’s temple, the great cathedrals and mosques of antiquity; the same sounds of chipping and sawing, the same primitive tools and workmen with the same love of their ancient handicrafts. It was a solemn and immense thought – actually to watch the building of this future work of art, to walk on its walls and watch the huge corner stones and archways being slowly hauled up by human hands, for there is no sound of machinery and nothing to jar in the making of it all. There are the same inlaid flowers in precious stones set in marble as are found at the Taj, but there is more elaborate carving here around the massive pillars and altogether it will be more ornate.
There is an adjacent model village belonging to the same estate, where leather goods are made and cloth is woven and shoes are made, everything done by hand. I was so interested in it all and may have missed it so easily, for it is not generally spoken of or even known about, by the casual tourist.
Yesterday morning I went out to Akbar’s Tomb – old Akbar the great Mogul emperor who united almost the whole of India in the 16th century while Elizabeth reigned in England. It is the same lovely red sandstone, wonderfully carved, and the four gateways are inlaid with coloured marble in intricate designs. Inside many of the gold paintings are worn away, or have been looted through the centuries, but the marble work remains as lovely as ever. Here Akbar is buried and many of his relations also. The grounds are spacious and beautiful and one should really spend the whole day here. There was no one else at all in that vast enclosure and it was sunny and clear and infinitely peaceful.
In the afternoon I went out to see Itimad-ud-Daulah’s tomb, across the Jumna. It is a perfect little gem, similar to the Taj but much smaller. There are again the inlaid flowers in the marble. Almost the entire walls here are inlaid and the marble screens, which form the windows and the beautiful balustrade of marble around the roof, are more delicate and lovely than words can describe.
The ride there, by tonga, was something to remember, through many bazaars and villages. It must have taken us quite half an hour each way to cross the bridge that spans the river. What an amazing spectacle it was: such a conglomeration of human beings and animals and vehicles one could find nowhere on earth but in India. Tongas and oxen carts, many with painted horns and gay garlands of flowers or coloured beads round their necks; tiny donkeys, laden with panniers of stones or firewood or anything at all, picking their way on their incredibly dainty feet in and out of the medley; boys on bicycles; an odd motor car; army lorries; carts with cage-like tops drawn by skinny underfed horses; women in gay saris or, more usually here about, full gathered skirts and tight shawls; naked or half naked children. In fact every variety of Indian and animal passed with us, at length, at long length, over the Jumna Bridge.
On the roadside: all the vendors squatting easily in the sun: the local barber shaving his clients; the scissor grinder; the dursie cutting his cloth; women delousing each other’s hair; dhobis and women washing in the river with their garments spread out to dry on any nearby fence or the bare ground itself; the oxen cart carrying great loads of stones or bricks or hides or bales of cloth – their brass bells clanging as they ambled along; dogs barking, children playing in the sun, women walking wearily along with great bundles of washing or fire wood on their heads – so gracefully they walk; old men with faces one would like to paint and young men with grave intelligent expressions. This is the real India rather than the India of the cities, more colourful, more varied and much more interesting.
And so I leave Agra this morning for Calcutta. It has been so full of pleasant lovely things and I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. I should like to go to the Taj again this morning to say farewell, but there is no time. Perhaps one day I shall come back again – who knows – I hope I shall.
January 17th 1943
Calcutta
Major Robertson saw me off at Agra armed with a packet of cream crackers and a tin of gorgonzola cheese, together with some Christmas cake, chocolates and golden halva – an Indian dessert made of sugar, walnuts and ghee – which I find delicious having a depraved taste; he evidently didn’t mean me to starve. The train obligingly stopped for quite twenty minutes quite near the Taj so that I could feast my eyes once again, before going on my way. I looked out of the carriage window until it was just a blur on the horizon and then I could see it no more. Vale Agra and so much that was beautiful!
Despite my booking a seat three days previously nothing had been done about it, as usual, and as the solitary ‘ladies first’ was occupied by two females, I got myself into an empty four-berth first compartment, only to be followed two seconds later by a Cingalese gentleman. He was as sorry as I was about it, but there was nothing that could be done, so the guard said. At Allahabad I spotted a major in the IMS on the platform so I went up to him and asked if I should go to bed as usual or what! He was highly amused and asked me if I would feel safer with him! Well of the two I think the Cingalese gentleman would have been the more reliable. However, he went along and spoke to the occupants of the ‘ladies’ and found that one was getting out at midnight so that I could transfer my things then, which I did, and all was well. As I was leaving two British officers arrived, so it would have been three to one; not that it matters in India, but it was much better for all concerned as things were. My travelling companions had lived in Burma for six years and had a small boy at school in Simla. They had lost everything of course in the Burma evacuation, having time only to bury their silver.
I had a good night’s sleep and the day passed at length, rather wearily, and so we arrived at Calcutta at 7.25 and ON TIME. This was simply and solely because the Swami of Assam was on the train in a special white coach, and all along the way police with red pagris66 guarded the stations. What awful deferential rot really in these days! I arrived at the hospital gates only to be told that the taxi must not go in because we were in quarantine – smallpox having broken out. We had been in quarantine before we left and we had all been vaccinated, but this fresh outbreak was new to me. However, it transpires that it wasn’t as bad as it sounded, though there are some cases and some of the wards are definitely in quarantine. A lovely pile of letters to greet me including six from Mother from whom I hadn’t heard for many weeks. It is reassuring to know she is well and strong again except for that awful dermatitis which still persists. A letter from Bob suggesting that I meet him at STO office in Bombay and a letter cable saying, ‘Proceeding via Killarney. Wait my arrival!’ It arrived on the 14th – re-addressed via the bank but in Calcutta on the 10th and according to the date, it left Basrah on the 9th – which doesn’t seem possible when they normally take at least eight or nine days or longer. I reckon that if it left on the 10th or 11th, he might normally be expected to reach Karachi about the 14th–16th. The train journey I am not sure of, but it would take almost three days, I fancy. So all things being equal he should arrive on Tuesday, possibly even tomorrow. Sometimes when I re-read the cable I wonder if he meant me to go to Karachi and wait at the Killarney, although this didn’t strike me at first. Even if I had done that next day (16th) I think I would have missed him, passing each other en route. I can only hope that everything will turn out without any unexpected hitches. As it is, I feel I daren’t leave the mess
in case a message comes through, or the gentleman himself arrives. It is almost six months since we were in Basrah – how hot it was and how far away and long ago. But now I wait.
February 10th 1943
On the morning of the 19th I had a telegram to say that Bob was arriving on the 20th. I had packed most things and was cleaning out drawers and generally tidying up when Deacon came up to say that Bob had arrived. It seems that he had sent a second telegram from Lahore, which I hadn’t received, so unfortunately I wasn’t at the station when he arrived. It was unbelievable that he had actually come and now, of course, he is gone again. We went into town at once to arrange accommodation for the night and got our tickets and reservations for the train for Darjeeling the following evening. There was an air raid that evening which cut short our dinner at the Grand but we went to the cinema later and saw a film, without further incident. We just caught the train the next evening with scarcely a minute to spare and settled ourselves for the night, arriving at Siliguri next morning at 6am and took breakfast at the station.
Then the long ascent up to Darjeeling with the great valleys below us, and mountains towering above us on either side. Tea plantations everywhere, on neat terraces, and luxurious tropical-cum-alpine vegetation: hibiscus, bougainvillea, poinsettias, ageratum, eucalyptus, tree ferns, acacias and all manner of other shrubs that I know not. We stopped occasionally at some funny little station, while the train took in water or coal or both. We wound in and around bends and puffed and climbed our way ever upwards the whole of the 7,000ft to Darjeeling. Since Siliguri the whole nature of the countryside has changed, and the people too – now distinctly Mongol in type – Tibetans. The women do all the chores and the men sit around smoking and generally enjoying life; the women carried everything on their backs, including their children, who look for the entire world like little Chinese dolls that I remember from my extreme youth. They seemed happy and contented and oddly naive and unselfconscious. Most of them wore shawls and highly coloured beads and sometimes a version of the Indian sari. Apparently one can wear exactly what one fancies as regards a hat. They were delightfully varied and cosmopolitan throughout.
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