1870 .] 
4:27 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
3!OT§ & (SUMS’ ®wm 
Queer I B eople. 
BY “ CAItLETON.” 
There ore some very queer people iu the world. I dare 
say that if I were to go through the country I should find 
In every town somebody whom the people call “ queer,” 
who have some crotchet or other in their heads. I knew 
a man once who thought there was a bottle attached to 
his nose by a string, and when he was walking through 
the street held his hands before him to protect it. “ Be 
careful of my bottle,”—he would say when he was in a 
crowd. It was a reality to him. He could see it. It was 
no use to tell him that it was a whim. It was no use to 
take a pair of scissors and cut the string, for it would in¬ 
stantly grow together again. Ho doctor could remove it. 
I never knew how the bottle came there in his imagina¬ 
tion, nor what use it was to him, but he came to consider 
it as a part of himself and was loath to part with it. He 
was an old man and the children used to call him “Old 
Bottle.” He was a monomaniac. He was all right on 
every other subject but insane on that. But there are 
people in the world who are queer without being insane. 
Some of the queerest people, that I ever saw, live in 
India, and are called Jains. They build asylums for cows, 
horses, donkeys, cats, and dogs, just as we build them 
for sick folks, for orphan children, and for old people. 
If you ever visit Bombay, you will find one of their estab¬ 
lishments there, consisting of sheds built around a large 
square containing several acres of ground. At first sight 
you might think it was a cattle show—the sheds being 
arranged like the cattle pens, horse stalls, and poultry 
coops, at our State and County fairs. Or you might think 
it a market-place for the sale of live-stock. Walking 
around the inclosure you will see some poor old cows, so 
thin that you can almost look through them—nothing but 
skin and bones. They do not give milk—they arc too 
old for that. In some of the other pens, you will see a 
lot of old horses—knock-kneed, spavined, foundered, 
blind, wheezy—so old and poor that it is a wonder they 
do not knock them on the head and give them to tne 
crows. Farther along you will find hens and roosters. 
The hens are too old to lay eggs, and the roosters so old 
and tough that it is doubtful if you could ever cook the 
toughness out of them. In other pens you see hundreds 
of mean, mangy curs, full of fleas, snapping and snarling 
at each other ; you will think that a premium has been 
offered for the meanest instead of the best dog, and that 
the people have brought in all the ugliest puppies in the 
country. And so with the cows, horses, and chickens. 
But it is not a cattle show such as we have in this coun¬ 
try, although it is a showing of stock such as you can find 
no where except in the East. It is an asylum—a hospi¬ 
tal—not a place, however, to cure diseased animals, but 
an establishment where they are taken care of through 
life—not because the horses have been good roadsters, 
or the curs faithful dogs, but because the people who have 
built the establishment are a queer set. I have heard 
Jhat they also have hospitals for insects, though I did not 
see them. But I saw the cattle, fowls, and horses. The 
Jains never kill any thing—not even a mosquito, if they 
can help it. They may do it by accident, but never in¬ 
tentionally. A swarm of mosquitoes might present their 
bills and take their fill of blood out of the veins of these 
queer people, and they would not give them a slap for 
fear of hurting their grandfathers or grandmothers or 
somebody else ! I dare say that you do not quite under¬ 
stand this, but it is true nevertheless. 
These people have a strange belief—quite as strange as 
that of the old man who thought he had a bottle on his 
nose; they think that when a human being dies his soul 
goes into the body of an animal, bird, reptile, or insect, 
and that if they kill any thing they will be hurting some¬ 
body who once lived in this world. If they should give 
a donkey a kick, who knows that it might not be a kick 
at their grandfather ? or that a blow given with a stick or 
stone at a hen might not fall on their grandmother 1 They 
never brush down the cobwebs from the corners of their 
rooms, nor drive the spiders away, for fear of disturbing 
their relatives in the other world, who come back and spin 
their webs in the houses where they once lived, to be 
near those whom they loved. The fleas that hop and 
skip so nimbly, and tickle you so delicately, may be old 
schoolmates 1 If you catch them it will not do for you 
to pinch their heads, for possibly you may have your 
head pinched by and by 1 Some of these queer people, 
when they walk along the streets, look very carefully for 
fear of stepping on ants;—not only the little busy workers 
iu the sand, but their aunt Rachel, Mary or Lucy or 
somebody else’s aunt. Of course, if you believed as these 
poor people do, you would not want to do so ungallant a 
thing as to crush them beneath your feet, not even if they 
did pull your hair when they combed it, or made you 
walk straight in childhood. 
I saw in one of the asylums a great baboon that grinned 
when I came near him perhaps he recognized me as a 
man and a brother 1 There were half a dozen* fat hogs 
snoozing in their pens—like grandfathers taking a nap 
after dinner. Roosters were smoothing out their feath¬ 
ers and strutting round the yard, reminding me of dandies 
who are continually feeling of their neckties or looking 
at their kid gloves to see if they are all right. The sight 
was not near so pleasant as it is to see a cattle, horse, and 
poultry show. That is real pleasure, but this was pain¬ 
ful ; for the poor creatures who set up this hospital did it 
from religious motives, and they tended the old and yelp¬ 
ing puppies as a religious duty. They believed that it 
would add to their pleasure in this world and secure their 
happiness in the future life. How much better it would 
be, if instead of keeping the breath of life in old don¬ 
keys, or taking care of sick pigs, they were to do what 
they could for their fellow creatures who are not able to 
help themselves 1 Iu visiting these asylums you see the 
incalculable difference between this religion and Chris¬ 
tianity. The one spends its efforts in taking care of ani¬ 
mals, to the neglect of human beings, and the other goes 
out to the poor, the degraded, the sick, and dying, and 
bestows its blessings everywhere. 
You find other queer people in the East—some who 
never pare their finger nails, but let them grow as long 
as they will, just as you sometimes see peculiar persons 
in this country who never cut their hair. Those Eastern 
fanatics think that to have one or two long finger nails is 
genteel. They do not let them all grow long, for, were 
they to do so they would not be able to use their hands. 
Only one or two on the left hand are allowed to grow, 
and you sometimes see them ten or twelve inches long. 
These fellows do not work, but live a genteel life, 
giving pretty much all their time to the cultivation of 
their nails. There is another set of queer people who 
think that they are very holy. They sit by the road side 
with ashes and dirt daubed on their faces and bodies and 
beg of the passers by. They make long pilgrimages, 
crawling on their hands and knees, with the idea that it 
is a meritorious act. Some of them climb up into a tree 
and hang head downwards by the hour together, until the 
blood is ready to burst from their temples. Others pro¬ 
vide themselves with a small cup, dip it full of water and 
carry it hundreds of miles to sprinkle it on the head of a 
hideous image. I do not wonder that you laugh at their 
absurdities, but they have their laugh at us. They think 
it very queer that men and women in this country should 
walk arm in arm. Such a thing was never seen in the 
East. They think it very strange that we wear stove-pipe 
hats and kid gloves, and swailow-tailed coats. But the 
strangest of all to them is our changes of fashion. In 
their country, fashions never change; but we are such a 
changeable people that we must have a new fashion al¬ 
most every day. I once heard of a farmer who bought a 
bonnet for his wife, and drove home just as fast as he 
could. His wagon made such a racket that everybody 
rushed out to see what was the matter. They thought 
somebody was sick and lie was after the doctor. “ Is 
your wife sick ?”—shouted a neighbor “ No. I’ve got 
a new bonnet for my wife and I am hurrying home for 
fear it will be out of fashion before I get there I” But in 
Eastern lands the fashions are the same to-day that they 
were a hundred years ago. Judging from some of the 
old buildings and monuments that we see there, which 
are covered with figures, it would seem as if the fashions 
had not changed much for two or even three thousand 
years. What queer people! I do not wonder that you 
say so. I do not know as I should want to dress as my 
grandfather did, or as the people did a thousand years 
ago ; and I dare say that many girls think that their grand¬ 
mothers in their frilled lace caps and short waisted dress¬ 
es were perfect frights. It would not be strange if some¬ 
body by and by said the same about us. 
New Pimzles to I»e Answered. 
No. 395. Illustrated Rebus .—Good advice which would 
save much trouble if followed. 
No. 39(5. niustrated Rebus .—Giving a maxim which 
cannot be too often repeated, nor too carefiuly heeded, 
HOSPITAL FOR SICK ANIMALS IN INDIA. 
