Book: The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition

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The ragged crew actually laughed at me-such laughter I hope I may
never hear again. They cackled, yelled, whistled, and howled as
I walked into their midst; some of them literally throwing
themselves down on the ground in convulsions of unholy mirth. In
a moment I had let go Pornic's head, and. irritated beyond
expression at the morning's adventure, commenced cuffing those
nearest to me with all the force I could. The wretches dropped
under my blows like nine-pins, and the laughter gave place to
wails for mercy; while those yet untouched clasped me round the
knees, imploring me in all sorts of uncouth tongues to spare them.

In the tumult, and just when I was feeling very much ashamed of
myself for having thus easily given way to my temper, a thin, high
voice murmured in English from behind my shoulder:-"Sahib!
Sahib! Do you not know me? Sahib, it is Gunga Dass, the
telegraph-master."

I spun round quickly and faced the speaker.

Gunga Dass, (I have, of course, no hesitation in mentioning the
man's real name) I had known four years before as a Deccanee
Brahmin loaned by the Pun-jab Government to one of the Khalsia
States. He was in charge of a branch telegraph-office there, and
when I had last met him was a jovial, full-stomached, portly
Government servant with a marvelous capacity for making had
puns in English-a peculiarity which made me remember him
long after I had forgotten his services to me in his official capacity.
It is seldom that a Hindu makes English puns.

Now, however, the man was changed beyond all recognition.
Caste-mark, stomach, slate-colored continuations, and unctuous
speech were all gone. I looked at a withered skeleton, turban-less
and almost naked, with long matted hair and deep-set codfish-eyes.

But for a crescent-shaped scar on the left cheek-the result of an
accident for which I was responsible I should never have known
him. But it was indubitably Gunga Dass, and-for this I was
thank-full-an English-speaking native who might at least tell me
the meaning of all that I had gone through that day.

The crowd retreated to some distance as I turned toward the
miserable figure, and ordered him to show me some method of
escaping from the crate?. He held a freshly plucked crow in his
hand, and in reply to my question climbed slowly on a platform of
sand which ran in front of the holes, and commenced lighting a
fire there in silence. Dried bents, sand-poppies, and driftwood burn
quickly; and I derived much consolation from the fact that he lit
them with an ordinary sulphur-match. When they were in a bright
glow, and the crow was nearly spitted in front thereof, Gunga Dass
began without a word of preamble:

"There are only two kinds of men, Sar. The alive and the dead.
When you are dead you are dead, but when you are alive you live."
(Here the crow demanded his attention for an instant as it twirled
before the fire in danger of being burned to a cinder.) "If you die at
home and do not die when you come to the ghat to be burned you
come here."

The nature of the reeking village was made plain now, and all that
I had known or read of the grotesque and the horrible paled before
the fact just communicated by the ex-Brabmin. Sixteen years ago,
when I first landed in Bombay, I had been told by a wandering
Armenian of the existence, somewhere in India, of a place to
which such Hindus as had the misfortune to recover from trance or
catalepsy were conveyed and kept, and I recollect laughing heartily
at what I was then pleased to consider a traveler's tale.

Sitting at the bottom of the sand-trap, the memory of Watson's
Hotel, with its swinging punkahs, white-robed attendants, and the
sallow-faced Armenian, rose up in my mind as vividly as a
photograph, and I burst into a loud fit of laughter. The contrast was
too absurd!

Gunga Dass, as he bent over the unclean bird, watched me
curiously. Hindus seldom laugh, and his surroundings were not
such as to move Gunga Dass to any undue excess of hilarity. He
removed the crow solemnly from the wooden spit and as solemnly
devoured it. Then he continued his story, which I give in his own
words:

"In epidemics of the cholera you are carried to be burned almost
before you are dead. When you come to the riverside the cold air,
perhaps, makes you alive, and then, if you are only little alive, mud
is put on your nose and mouth and you die conclusively. If you are
rather more alive, more mud is put; but if you are too lively they
let you go and take you away. I was too lively, and made
protestation with anger against the indignities that they endeavored
to press upon me. In those days I was Brahmin and proud man.

Now I am dead man and eat"-here he eyed the well-gnawed breast
bone with the first sign of emotion that I had seen in him since we
met-"crows, and other things. They took me from my sheets when
they saw that I was too lively and gave me medicines for one
week, and I survived successfully. Then they sent me by rail from
my place to Okara Station, with a man to take care of me; and at
Okara Station we met two other men, and they conducted we three

on camels, in the night, from Okara Station to this place, and they
propelled me from the top to the bottom, and the other two
succeeded, and I have been here ever since two and a half years.

Once I was Brahmin and proud man, and now I eat crows."

"There is no way of getting out?"

"None of what kind at all. When I first came I made experiments
frequently and all the others also, but we have always succumbed
to the sand which is precipitated upon our heads."

"But surely," I broke in at this point, "the river-front is open, and it
is worth while dodging the bullets; while at night"-I had already
matured a rough plan of escape which a natural instinct of
selfishness forbade me sharing with Gunga Dass. He, however,
divined my unspoken thought almost as soon as it was formed;
and, to my intense astonishment, gave vent to a long low chuckle
of derision-the laughter, be it Understood, of a superior or at least
of an equal.

'~You will not"-he had dropped the Sir completely after his
opening sentence-"make any escape that way. But you can try. I
have tried. Once only."

The sensation of nameless terror and abject fear which I had in
vain attempted to strive against overmastered me completely. My
long fast-it was now close upon ten o'clock, and I had eaten
nothing since tiffin on the previous day-combined with the violent
and unnatural agitation of the ride had exhausted me, and I verily
believe that, for a few minutes, I acted as one mad. I hurled myself
against the pitiless sand-slope I ran round the base of the crater,
blaspheming and praying by turns. I crawled out among the
sedges of the river-front, only to be driven back each time in an
agony of nervous dread by the rifle-bullets which cut up the sand
round me-for I dared not face the death of a mad dog among that
hideous crowd-and finally fell, spent and raving, at the curb of the
well. No one bad taken the slightest notion of an exhibition which
makes me blush hotly even when I think of it now.

Two or three men trod on my panting body as they drew water, but
they were evidently used to this sort of thing, and had no time to
waste upon me. The situation was humiliating. Gunga Dass,
indeed, when he had banked the embers of his fire with sand, was
at some pains to throw half a cupful of fetid water over my head,
an attention for which I could have fallen on my knees and
thanked him, but he was laughing all the while in the same
mirthless, wheezy key that greeted me on my first attempt to force
the shoals. And so, in a semi-comatose condition, I lay till noon.

Then, being only a man after all, I felt hungry, and intimated as
much to Gunga Dass, whom I had begun to regard as my natural
protector. Following the impulse of the outer world when dealing
with natives, I put my hand into my pocket and drew out four
annas. The absurdity of the gift struck me at once, and I was about
to replace the money.

Gunga Dass, however, was of a different opinion. "Give me the
money," said he; '~all you have, or I will get help, and we will kill
you!" All this as if it were the most natural thing in the world!

A Briton's first impulse, I believe, is to guard the contents of his
pockets; but a moment's reflection convinced me of the futility of
differing with the one man who had it in his power to make me
comfortable; and with whose help it was possible that I might
eventually escape from the crater. I gave him all the money in my
possession, Rs. 9-8-5-nine rupees eight annas and five pie-for I
always keep small change as bakshish when I am in camp. Gunga
Dass clutched the coins, and hid them at once in his ragged loin
cloth, his expression changing to something diabolical as he
looked round to assure himself that no one had observed us.

"Now I will give you something to eat," said he.

What pleasure the possession of my money could have afforded
him I am unable to say; but inasmuch as it did give him evident
delight I was not sorry that I had parted with it so readily, for I had
no doubt that he would have had me killed if I had refused. One
does not protest against the vagaries of a den of wild beasts; and
my companions were lower than any beasts. While I devoured
what Gunga Dass had provided, a coarse chapatti and a cupful of
the foul well-water, the people showed not the faintest sign of
curiosity-that curiosity which is so rampant, as a rule, in an Indian
village.

I could even fancy that they despised me. At all events they treated
me with the most chilling indifference, and Gunga Dass was nearly
as bad. I plied him with questions about the terrible village, and
received extremely unsatisfactory answers. So far as I could
gather, it had been in existence from time immemorial-whence I
concluded that it was at least a century old-and during that time no
one had ever been known ti escape from it. [I had to control
myself here with both hands, lest the blind terror should lay hold
of me a second time and drive me raving round the crater.] Gunga
Dass took a malicious pleasure in emphasizing this point and in
watching me wince. Nothing that I could do would induce him to
tell me who the mysterious "They" were.

"It is so ordered," he would reply, "and I do not yet know any one
who has disobeyed the orders."

"Only wait till my servants find that I am missing," I retorted, "and
I promise you that this place shall be cleared off the face of the
earth, and I'll give you a lesson in civility, too, my friend."

"Your servants would be torn in pieces before they came near this
place; and, besides, you are dead, my dear friend. It is not your
fault, of course, but none the less you are dead and buried."

At irregular intervals supplies of food, I was told, were dropped
down from the land side into the amphitheatre, and the inhabitants
fought for them like wild beasts. When a man felt his death
coming on he retreated to his lair and died there. The body was
sometimes dragged out of the hole and thrown on to the sand, or
allowed to rot where it lay

The phrase "thrown on to the sand" caught my attention, and I
asked Gunga Dass whether this sort of thing was not likely to
breed a pestilence.

"That." said he. with another of his wheezy chuckles, "you may see
for yourself subsequently. You will have much time to make
observations."

Whereat, to his great delight, I winced once more and hastily
continued the conversation :-"And how do you live here from day
to day? What do you do?" The question elicited exactly the same
answer as before coupled with the information that "this place is
like your European heaven; there is neither marrying nor giving in
marriage."

Gunga Dass had been educated at a Mission School, and, as he
himself admitted, had he only changed his religion '~like a wise
man," might have avoided the living grave which was now his
portion. But as long as I was with him I fancy he was happy.

Here was a Sahib, a representative of the dominant race, helpless
as a child and completely at the mercy of his native neighbors. In
a deliberate lazy way he set himself to torture me as a schoolboy
would devote a rapturous half-hour to watching the agonies of an
impaled beetle, or as a ferret in a blind burrow might glue himself
comfortably to the neck of a rabbit. The burden of his
conversation was that there was no escape 'of no kind whatever,"
and that I should stay here till I died and was "thrown on to the
sand." If it were possible to forejudge the conversation of the
Damned on the advent of a new soul in their abode, I should say
that they would speak as Gunga Dass did to me throughout that
long afternoon. I was powerless to protest or answer; all my
energies being devoted to a struggle against the inexplicable terror
that threatened to overwhelm me again and again. I can compare
the feeling to nothing except the struggles of a man against the
overpowering nausea of the Channel passage-only my agony was
of the spirit and infinitely more terrible.

As the day wore on, the inhabitants began to appear in full strength
to catch the rays of the afternoon sun, which were now sloping in
at the mouth of the crater. They assembled in little knots, and
talked among themselves without even throwing a glance in my
direction. About four o'clock, as far as I could judge Gunga Dass
rose and dived into his lair for a moment, emerging with a live
crow in his hands. The wretched bird was in a most draggled and
deplorable condition, but seemed to be in no way afraid of its
master, Advancing cautiously to the river front, Gunga Dass
stepped from tussock to tussock until he had reached a smooth
patch of sand directly in the line of the boat's fire. The occupants
of the boat took no notice. Here he stopped, and, with a couple of
dexterous turns of the wrist, pegged the bird on its back with
outstretched wings. As was only natural, the crow began to shriek
at once and beat the air with its claws. In a few seconds the
clamor had attracted the attention of a bevy of wild crows on a
shoal a few hundred yards away, where they were discussing
something that looked like a corpse. Half a dozen crows flew over
at once to see what was going on, and also, as it proved, to attack
the pinioned bird. Gunga Dass, who had lain down on a tussock,
motioned to me to be quiet, though I fancy this was U needless
precaution. In a moment,

and before I could see how it happened, a wild crow, who had
grappled with the shrieking and helpless bird, was entangled in the
latter's claws, swiftly disengaged by Gunga Dass, and pegged down
beside its companion in adversity. Curiosity, it seemed,
overpowered the rest of the flock, and almost before Gunga Dass
and I had time to withdraw to the tussock, two more captives were
struggling in the upturned claws of the decoys. So the chase-if I
can give it so dignified a name-continued until Gunga Dass had
captured seven crows. Five of them he throttled at once, reserving
two for further operations another day. I was a good deal
impressed by this, to me, novel method of securing food, and
complimented Gunga Dass on his skill.

"It is nothing to do," said he. "Tomorrow you must do it for me.
You are stronger than I am."

This calm assumption of superiority Upset me not a little, and I
answered peremptorily;~"Indeed, you old ruffian! What do you
think I have given you money for?"

"Very well," was the unmoved reply. "Perhaps not to-morrow, nor
the day after, nor subsequently; but in the end, and for many years,
you will catch crows and eat crows, and you will thank your
European God that you have crows to catch and eat."

I could have cheerfully strangled him for this; but judged it best
under the circumstances to smother my resentment. An hour later
I was eating one of the crows; and, as Gunga Dass had said,
thanking my God that I had a crow to eat. Never as long as I live
shall I forget that evening meal. The whole population were
squatting on the hard sand platform opposite their dens, huddled
over tiny fires of refuse and dried rushes. Death, having once laid
his hand upon these men and forborne to strike, seemed to stand
aloof from them now; for most of our company were old men, bent
and worn and twisted with years, and women aged to all
appearance as the Fates themselves. They sat together in knots and
talked-God only knows what they found to discuss-in low equable
tones, curiously in contrast to the strident babble with which
natives are accustomed to make day hideous. Now and then an
access of that sudden fury which had possessed me in the morning
would lay hold on a man or woman; and with yells and
imprecations the sufferer would attack the steep slope until,
baffled and bleeding, he fell back on the platform incapable of
moving a limb. The others would never even raise their eyes when
this happened, as men too well aware of the futility of their
fellows' attempts and wearied with their useless repetition. I saw
four such outbursts in the course of the evening.

Gunga Dass took an eminently business-like view of my
situation, and while we were dining-I can afford to laugh at the
recollection now, but it was painful enough at the time-
propounded the terms on which he would consent to "do" for me.
My nine rupees eight annas, he argued, at the rate of three annas a
day, would provide me with food for fifty-one days, or about seven
weeks; that is to say, he would be willing to cater for me for that
length of time. At the end of it I was to look after myself. For a
further consideration-videlicet my boots-he would be willing to
allow me to occupy the den next to his own, and would supply me
with as much dried grass for bedding as he could spare.

"Very well, Gunga Dass," I replied; "to the first terms I cheerfully
agree, but, as there is nothing on earth to prevent my killing you as
you sit here and taking everything that you have" (I thought of the
two invaluable crows at the time), "I flatly refuse to give you my
boots and shall take whichever den I please."

The stroke was a bold one, and I was glad when I saw that it had
succeeded. Gunga Dass changed his tone immediately, and
disavowed all intention of asking for my boots. At the time it did
not strike me as at all strange that I, a Civil Engineer, a man of
thirteen years' standing in the Service, and, I trust, an average
Englishman, should thus calmly threaten murder and violence
against the man who had, for a consideration it is true, taken me
under his wing. I had left the world, it seemed, for centuries. I was
as certain then as I am now of my own existence, that in the
accursed settlement there was no law save that of the strongest;
that the living dead men had thrown behind them every canon of
the world which had cast them out; and that I had to depend for my
own life on my strength and vigilance alone. The crew of the
ill-fated Mignonette are the only men who would understand my
frame of mind. "At present," I argued to myself, "I am strong and
a match for six of these wretches. It is imperatively necessary that
I should, for my own sake, keep both health and strength until the
hour of my release comes- if it ever does."

Fortified with these resolutions, I ate and drank as much as I could,
and made Gunga Dass understand that I intended to be his master,
and that the least sign of insubordination on his part would be
visited with the only punishment I had it in my power to
inflict-sudden and violent death. Shortly after this I went to bed.

That is to say, Gunga Dass gave me a double armful of dried bents
which I thrust down the mouth of the lair to the right of his, and
followed myself, feet foremost; the hole running about nine feet
into the sand with a slight downward inclination, and being neatly
shored with timbers. From my den, which faced the river-front, I
was able to watch the waters of the Sutlej flowing past under the
light of a young moon and compose myself to sleep as best I
might.

The horrors of that night I shall never forget. My den was nearly
as narrow as a coffin, and the sides had been worn smooth and
greasy by the contact of innumerable naked bodies, added to which
it smelled abominably. Sleep was altogether out of question to one
in my excited frame of mind. As the night wore on, it seemed that
the entire amphitheatre was filled with legions of unclean devils
that, trooping up from the shoals below, mocked the unfortunates
in their lairs.

Personally I am not of an imaginative temperament,-very few
Engineers are, -but on that occasion I was as completely prostrated
with nervous terror as any woman. After half an hour or so,
however, I was able once more to calmly review my chances of
escape. Any exit by the steep sand walls was, of course,
impracticable. I had been thoroughly convinced of this some time
before. It was possible, just possible, that I might, in the uncertain
moonlight, safely run the gauntlet of the rifle shots. The place was
so full of terror for me that I was prepared to undergo any risk in
leaving it. Imagine my delight, then, when after creeping stealthily
to the river-front I found that the infernal boat was not there. My
freedom lay before me in the next few steps!

By walking out to the first shallow pool that lay at the foot of the
projecting left horn of the horseshoe, I could wade across, turn the
flank of the crater, and make my way inland. Without a moment's
hesitation I marched briskly past the tussocks where Gunga Dass
had snared the crows, and out in the direction of the smooth white
sand beyond. My first step from the tufts of dried grass showed
me how utterly futile was any hope of escape; for, as I put my foot
down, I felt an indescribable drawing, sucking motion of the sand
below. Another moment and my leg was swallowed up nearly to
the knee. In the moonlight the whole surface of the sand seemed to
be shaken with devilish delight at my disappointment. I struggled
clear, sweating with terror and exertion, back to the tussocks
behind me and fell on my face.

My only means of escape from the semicircle was protected with a
quicksand!

How long I lay I have not the faintest idea; but I was roused at last
by the malevolent chuckle of Gunga Dass at my ear "I would
advise you, Protector of the Poor" (the ruffian was speaking
English) "to return to your house. It is unhealthy to lie down here.
Moreover, when the boat returns, you will most certainly be rifled
at." He stood over me in the dim light of the dawn, chuckling and
laughing to himself. Suppressing my first impulse to catch the
man by the neck and throw him on to the quicksand, I rose sullenly
and followed him to the platform below the burrows.

Suddenly, and futilley as I thought while I spoke, I asked -"Gunga
Dass, what is the good of the boat if I can't get out anyhow?" I
recollect that even in my deepest trouble I had been speculating
vaguely on the waste of am-munition in guarding an already well
protected foreshore.

Gunga Dass laughed again and made answer:-"They have the boat
only ir, daytime. It is for the reason that there is a way. I hope we
shall have the pleasure of your company for much longer time. It is
a pleasant spot when you have been here some years and eaten
roast crow long enough."

I staggered, numbed and helpless, toward the fetid burrow allotted
to me, and fell asleep. An hour or so later I was awakened by a
piercing scream-the shrill, high-pitched scream of a horse in pain.
Those who have once heard that will never forget the sound. I
found some little difficulty in scrambling out of the burrow. When
I was in the open, I saw Pornic, my poor old Pornic, lying dead on
the sandy soil. How they had killed him I cannot guess. Gunga
Dass explained that horse was better than crow, and "greatest
good of greatest number is political maxim. We are now Republic,
Mister Jukes, and you are entitled to a fair share of the beast. If
you like, we will pass a vote of thanks. Shall I propose?"

Yes, we were a Republic indeed! A Republic of wild beasts
penned at the bottom of a pit, to eat and fight and sleep till we
died. I attempted no protest of any kind, but sat down and stared at
the hideous sight in front of me. In less time almost than it takes
me to write this, Pornic's body was divided, in some unclear way
or other; the men and women had dragged the fragments on to the
platform and were preparing their normal meal. Gunga Dass
cooked mine. The almost irresistible impulse to fly at the sand
walls until I was wearied laid hold of me afresh, and I had to
struggle against it with all my might. Gunga Dass was offensively
jocular till I told him that if he addressed another remark of any
kind whatever to me I should strangle him where he sat. This
silenced him till silence became insupportable, and I bade him say
something.

"You will live here till you die like the other Feringhi," he said,
coolly, watching me over the fragment of gristle that he was
gnawing.

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