NOTE ON HURDWAN FAIR.
Reading edition
To show that the above description of the great Hindu melá is far from being coloured, it is only needful to give a few extracts from a description of the last one which appeared in a Calcutta paper, 24th April, 1879:—
"The multitude which came in at last baffled all calculation. It is now believed that the melá must have numbered between 750,000 and 1,000,000 of souls . . . Bathing at Hurdwan, during such a melá, may be said never to cease. All day on the 11th the police were obliged to be present up to eleven o'clock P.M. They were on the ground again at two o'clock A.M. on the 12th, and from that time till ten o'clock at night they were obliged to remain at their posts. It is said that several of the brave men who worked so hard at the melá have died . . ."
Writing of the Bairagis, the correspondent goes on:—
"These mustered over 10,000 strong. During their passage over the bridge an accident, which was accompanied with serious consequences to some of themselves, occurred. Unable to restrain their enthusiasm, a large number, from 200 to 300 of them, leaped from the bridge into the main current of the canal. Most of those who could swim were taken up at the nearest bridge; but it is feared that a considerable number sank before they could reach it . . . "Just before this took place, another still more serious accident occurred at one of the barriers. This outer barrier stood at the end of a masonry bridge that spans a deep ravine . . . The ravine below the bridge is dry, and about thirty feet in depth . . . The crowd gathered in overwhelming numbers behind this outer barrier, and notwithstanding the efforts of the police to keep them back, kept surging to and fro, till at last the front ranks were pressed outwards through the wooden fence, and some 300 persons were driven headlong into the ravine . . . "But the worst was yet to come. The evening of the 12th, though it witnessed a general exodus from Hurdwan of many who had bathed in the morning, yet witnessed among those who remained a fresh outbreak of cholera . . . Many died during the night . . . The disease did not stop there, and I fear it is still following the retiring pilgrims into all parts of the country."
THE END.