110 ROUGHING IT IN SOUTHERN INDIA 



hardly believe possible, but so it was. Not for the world 

 would these women bathe thus in public unless they knew 

 themselves to be perfectly hidden, each under her mat, 

 for they are as shy as mice. There was quite a flotilla of 

 them, interesting me much when I knew them to be some- 

 thing more than floating mats. And never a one troubled 

 about crocodiles either — a state of things altogether we 

 should hardly have believed to exist unless we had seen it. 



India was new to me then, to my grown days at least, 

 and many scenes passed before my wondering eyes, some 

 of surpassing interest and beauty, others of a hideousness 

 often coarse or grotesque. All my experiences in those 

 unfrequented places were such as had never entered my 

 imagination before. 



The women of Poolpadi, and other places on the canal- 

 side, so regardless of the peril at their doors, and going 

 freely about between their villages* for business or pleasure, 

 are equally fearless when taking longer journeys — either 

 singly or in twos and threes — through a bit of gloomy 

 forest or tangled thicket — afraid of nothing except the 

 dreaded pishashas (devils) that they believe to be every- 

 where about them, and that must be propitiated with all 

 sorts of things laid here and there in crevices, sacred stones, 

 and hollow trees. The fear of these pishashas holds sway 

 all over India. I once, just to try him, asked a servant of 

 ours to get for me a bunch of plantains, placed, as I knew, 

 for this very purpose, offering him treble its value in annas 

 (about fourpence). With deep salaams he begged pardon 

 for disobeying my command, and I held out quite a large 

 bribe in vain. No bribe has any effect in a question of 

 religion, even among the very poorest. Though our Hindu 

 or Mussulman servants and these country people were of 

 varying beliefs, all were one in their respect for the rights of 

 the pishashas, who could revenge themselves on every one 

 infringing them, in ways that each would best feel — blighting 



