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CHAPTER I

At the Estuary of the Ganges.

Nearly two hundred and fifty years have passed away since the grey hours of one Magh morning saw a passenger-boat making her way up the river on her voyage back from the Saugor Islands. It was usual at that time for such boats to sail in strong parties on account of the scare of the Portuguese and other pirates. But these passengers had no companion-boats. The reason was that a thick fog had overspread the horizon towards the latter part of the night. The crew, having lost their bearings, drifted a far long way from the little flotilla. Now there was no knowing which direction she was making for. Most of the people on board were asleep. Only an old man and a youth lay awake, the former conversing with the latter. The former for a moment broke off and addressed one of the crew: "Boatman, what distance can you cover this day?"

​"I can hardly say" replied the boatman after a short indecision.

The interrogator took offence and began railing at the boatman. "What is in the hands of Providence, Sir" chipped in the youth, "can't be foretold by the wise, far less by a simpleton. You must not bother over that."

"Not bother!" echoed back the other furiously. "What do you mean? The fellows forcibly cut away paddy from some twenty odd bighas of my land and what my children would live upon the whole year?"

This news he received from the fresh arrivals not before he had come out to the Saugor Islands. "So I observed already" rejoined the youngman, "when you have none other guardian left home, it was wrong of you to venture out."

"Not venture!" snapped the old man as sharply as before. "Three quarters of my life have been spent and only the fourth is left. Now or never to work for one's next life."

"If I have read the scriptures aright," added the youth, "the merits of pilgrimages accruing to after-life are equally within the reach of those who stay at home."

"Why did you stir out then?" returned the old man. "So I told you at the very outset", replied the other, "I had a great mind to have a look at the sea. So I came". Then he exulted half to himself "Ah! what a sight! This is never to be forgotten in ages of the soul's migrations".

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"From afar, as on a wheel of iron, slender^[1] All blue with tamarisks and palms extended, Outshines the briny oceans' margin yonder, Like streak of rust-mark with the wheel-rim blended."

The elderly man's ear was not following the poetry but he was listening raptly to the conversation passing among the crew.

"Eh, brother, our folly is looking the bigger" spoke one of the crew to the other "Are we out on the open sea now, or in what corner of the globe the boat has got to, can't understand" The speakers voice had the ring of a great fright. The old man scented some danger ahead and nervously enquired "Boatman, is anything the matter?" The man addresssed to did not answer. But the young blood waited not for the reply. He came out into the bare open and saw the day was dawning. The heavy pall of a thick mist lay over everything. The stars, the moon, the sky, the coast-line were all blotted out. He understood that the crew had lost all directions. They were not certain which way they were steering the boat. They feared they would perish in the boundless open sea.

A screen hung out in front as cold protector and the passengers were quite in the dark about all this. But the young man knew the plight and explained to the old man the whole thing in detail. Then arose a great uproar aboard. Of the female passengers some awoke at the sound of the conversation and no ​sooner had their ears caught the remark than they set up a loud wail. "Row shoreward, row shoreward, row shoreward," vociferated the elderly man.

The youth smiled softly and put in "where is the shore? If we could but know this, how would the danger arise?"

Now louder grew the hub-bub. The youth quieted them down somehow and said "Have no fear. The day has broken and the sun rises within two odd hours. The boat can never sink by that period. Now stop rowing and let her go adrift. Next when the sun breaks through, we would lay our heads together".

The crew approved of this bit of advice and acted accordingly.

All boathands sat stockstill. The passengers ate their hearts out in an agony of suspense. The wind blew a gentle sigh. The shake of the boat was scarcely felt on account of the smooth glassy sea. However, they felt sure that their last hour had struck. Silently did men say their prayers and loudly did women raise a babel of cries uttered in vocal contortions of different keys. One of them had given a watery grave to her babe in the deep water of the Bay—she had dropped her child but could not rescue it—she of all others did not weep.

While in this nervous mood of expectancy, they guessed it to be nine o'clock. At that time the crew all on a sudden shouted out at the top of their lungs the names of the five Pirs of water and kicked up a row. All on board burst in one voice "What, what is up?" ​All the boathands cried out in a chorus "The sun has appeared. Land ahoy." Every body crawled out into the open space and began to observe the locality and the surroundings. They saw the sun had come out and the mist rolled away like a curtain before the sun revealing all sides in their naked clearness. The sun shone pretty above the horizon line. The water on which the boat floated was not the sea but the estuary of a river though the same expanse was scarcely observable any where else. One side of the river was within easy reach—it was twenty-five yards more or less from where the boat lay. But the coast-line was hardly visible on the opposite side. Every other way besides, shimmered the wild waste of water in the glare of the brilliant sun and sweeping off immeasurably melted into the misty sky-line. The adjacent water had a turbid appearance as is usually noticeable in river water though the same looked blue at a distance. They felt certain that they had drifted down into the deep blue sea. But by some stroke of good luck they were pretty near the land. So they screwed up some courage. They calculated the direction from the sun's position. The fringe of the frontal ground was easily concluded to be the western seaboard. At a close range from where the boat floated was the mouth of another river pouring its gurgling flow of gold into the channel. Innumerable water-birds of diverse description were playing joyously on the broad patch of sand that lay on the southern side of the estuary. This stream now takes the name of the Rasulpur river.

1 ↑ From Robi Dutt. (Mistake in footnote: This verse is actually from Kālidāsa's Raghuvaṃśa; original here.)