“It looks very strange to us,” added the lady.

“It is the custom of the country.  The British government does not interfere unnecessarily with matters interwoven into the religion and habits of the people, though it has greatly modified the manners of the natives, and abolished some barbarous customs.  The ‘suttee,’ as the English called the Sanscrit word sati meaning ‘a virtuous wife,’ was a Hindu institution which required that a faithful wife should burn herself on the funeral pyre with the body of her deceased husband; or if he died at a distance from his home, that she should sacrifice herself on one of her own.”

“How horrible!  I have read of it, but hardly believed it,” added the lady; and others who were listening expressed the same feeling.

“It was a custom in India before the time of Christ.  Some of your American Indians bury the weapons of the dead chief, food, and other articles with him, as has been the custom of other nations, in the belief that they will need these provisions in the ‘happy hunting-ground.’  The Hindus believed that the dead husband would need his wife on the other shore; and this is the meaning of the custom.”

“It is not wholly a senseless custom,” said Mrs. Woolridge, “barbarous as it seems.”

“In 1828, or a little later, Lord William Cavendish, then Governor-General of Bengal, determined to abolish the custom, though he encountered the fiercest opposition from the natives, and even from many Europeans, who dreaded the effect of his action.  He carried a law through the council, making it punishable homicide, or manslaughter, to burn a widow.  In 1823 there were five hundred and seventy-five of them burned in the Bengal Presidency; but after the enactment of the law, the number began to decrease.  The treaties with the Indian princes contained a clause forbidding it.  The custom is really discontinued, though an occasional instance of it comes to light.”

The dancing had been renewed, and this conversation continued till later.  At this wedding Lord Tremlyn met a gentleman whom he introduced to some of his party as Sahib Govind.  This gentleman had just invited him to visit a theatrical performance at a private house, such as a European can very rarely witness.

“I never went to a theatre in my life!” protested Mrs. Belgrave.

“But this is a representation in connection with the religious traditions of the Hindus,” argued his lordship.

It was decided to go, the scruples of the Methodists being overcome by the fact that it was a religious occasion, and not at all like the stage performances of New York.  The carriages conveyed them to the house indicated by Sahib Govind, and they were conducted to a hall, at one end of which was a stage, with a thin calico curtain in front of it.  The performance was just beginning.

A Brahmin came out in front of the curtain, with some musicians, and set up an image of Ganesa, the god of wisdom; then he prayed this idol to enlighten the minds of the actors, and enable them to perform their parts well, which was certainly very untheatrical, the Americans thought, when Sir Modava had translated the substance of the invocation.  The Brahmin then announced that the subject of the play was the loves of the god Krishna.