THE TOUR 319 



excited. In this feeling the head policeman did not 

 share. He entertained for the man and his class the 

 utmost contempt. He described them one and all as 

 an idle, worthless, drug-eating set of vagabonds ; and 

 his opinion was only what I have heard other natives 

 frequently express. 



The fakirs of India have always been regarded as 

 one of the great curiosities of the country. Some brief 

 account of them may perhaps be not uninteresting to 

 the English reader. 



The ordinary fakir, the one most commonly met 

 with, wears a yellow dress, and has long yellow hair. 

 The hair is plaited and coiled round his head, and when 

 thus coiled has much the appearance of a turban. The 

 yellow colour is, of course, the result of a dye, though 

 Ibn Batutu, the early Mahomedan traveller, supposed 

 that it was natural and was caused by excessive fasting. 

 The yellow is of an ugly brick-dust tint, and the hair 

 itself has a dead, withered appearance. The extra- 

 ordinary length of the hair of some of the fakirs used 

 to excite my astonishment till I learnt that the greater 

 part of it was artificial. Some is picked up at the bath- 

 ing-places, where the pilgrims shave their heads ; some 

 is their own hair, which has fallen or been combed out 

 and twisted in again ; while the very long strands have 

 been procured from the tails of horses. 



The faces of these fakirs are always more or less 

 painted, and their eyes have that dull, glassy look which 

 arises from the excessive use of narcotics. The appear- 

 ance of the ordinary fakir is certainly not attractive ; 

 but it is almost beauty compared with that of many of 



