[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Indian literature](https://indike.org/pramana/in) › [Dark Ages](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages) › [Travellers (1500–1858)](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel) › [Les six voyages de Jean-Baptiste Tavernier](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier) › [Travels in India (Ball)](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball) › 14.2 # Travels in India (Tavernier) 14.2 Travels in India (Ball) 14.2 - **Language:** English ### [14.2.1](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2.1) The Banians have a great veneration for monkeys, and they even feed them in some pagodas where they go to worship. There are in Ahmadabad two or three houses which serve as hospitals, especially for cows and oxen, for monkeys, and other sick and disabled animals, and they convey there all that they are able to find, in order to feed them. It should be stated that on every Tuesday and Friday all the monkeys in the neighbourhood of AhmadAbAd, of their own instinct, come together to the town, and ascend the houses, each of which has a small terrace where the occupants sleep during the great heat. On each of these days they do not fail to place upon these little terraces rice, millet, sugar-canes in their season, and other similar things ; for if by chance the monkeys did not find their food on the terraces, they would break the tiles with which the rest of the house is covered, and cause great damage. It should be remarked that the monkey eats nothing which he has not first well smelt, and before swallowing anything he makes his store for future hunger, filling his two cheeks with provisions, which he keeps for the following day. ### [14.2.2](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2.2) I have said that the Banians have an especial veneration for the monkey, and this is an example in point among several others which I could quote. Being one day at AhmadAbAd, at the dwelling of the Dutch, a young man of that nation, who had arrived but a few days to serve in the office, and who was ignorant of the customs of the country, having perceived a large monkey upon a tree which was in the courtyard, wished to give an example of his skill, or rather of his youth, by slaying it with a shot from his gun. I was at the time at table with the Dutch Commander, and we had scarcely heard the shot before we heard a great uproar among the Banians in the service of the Dutch Company, who came to complain bitterly of him who had slain the monkey. They all wished to resign, and it was with much trouble and many apologies that they appeased them and induced them to remain. In the neighbourhood of Ahmadābād there are a great number of monkeys, and it may be said that in the places where there are many of these animals there are few crows. For when the latter have built their nests and laid their eggs, the monkeys climb the trees and throw the eggs down on the ground. One day, returning from Agra, and having left Ahmadābād with the Chief or President of the English, who had come there for some business, and was returning to Surat, we passed, at four or five leagues from Ahmadābād, a small grove of those trees which they call mangoes. ### [14.2.3](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2.3) We saw overhead numbers of large monkeys, male and female, and several of the latter carried their young ones in their arms. We each had our carriage, and the English President stopped his in order to tell me that he had an excellent and curious gun which the Governor of Daman had presented to him, and, knowing that I was a good shot, he asked me to prove it upon one of these monkeys. One of my attendants, who was of the country, having signed to me not to risk it, I sought to dissuade the President from his intention, but it was impossible, and taking his gun he slew a female monkey, which remained extended between two branches, letting her young ones fall to the ground. There followed at once what my attendant, who had signed to me, had foreseen. All the monkeys which were on the trees, to the number of more than sixty, descended immediately, in a rage, and jumped on the carriage of the President, and would have strangled him, but for the prompt assistance that some gave by closing the windows, and the crowd of attendants who were present drove them off. Although they did not come to my carriage, which followed at some paces distant from that of the President, I nevertheless feared for myself the fury of these monkeys, which were both large and powerful, and they pursued the carriage of the President for nearly a league, so much were they enraged. ### [14.2.4](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2.4) Continuing our route from Surat to Agra. From Amadabat to Panser (Paunsir) . 13 coss. ,, Panser to Masana (Mesana) . . 14 ,, „ Masana to Chitpour (Sidhpur) . 14 „ Sidhpur is a fairly good town, so named on account of the great trade which it does in those coloured cottons which they call chites, and at four or five hundred paces on the south side there flows a small river. ### [14.2.5](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2.5) Arriving at Sidhpur, on one of my journeys, I was encamped under two or three trees at one of the ends of a great open space which is near the town. A short time afterwards I saw four or five lions appearing, which they brought to train, and they told me it generally took five or six months, and they do it in this way. They tie the lions, at twelve paces distance from each other, by their hind feet, to a cord attached to a large wooden post firmly planted in the ground, and they have another about the neck which the lion-master holds in his hand. These posts are planted in a straight line, and upon another parallel one, from fifteen to twenty paces distant, they stretch another cord of the length of the space which the lions occupy, when arranged as above. These two cords which hold the lion fastened by his two hind feet, permit him to rush up to this long cord, which serves as a limit to those outside it, beyond which they ought not to venture to pass when harassing and irritating the lions by throwing small stones or little bits of wood at them. A number of people come to this spectacle, and when the provoked lion jumps towards the cord, he has another round his neck which the master holds in his hand, and with which he pulls him back. It is by this means that they accustom the lion by degrees to become tame with people, and on my arrival at Sidhpur I witnessed this spectacle without leaving my carriage. ### [14.2.6](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2.6) The following day I had another experience, which was a meeting I had with a party of Fakirs, or Muhammadan Dervishes. I counted fifty-seven of them, of whom he who was their Chief or Superior had been master of the horse to Shah Jahangir, having left the court when Sultan Bolaki, his grandson, was strangled by order of Shah Jahan, his uncle, as I shall relate elsewhere. There were four others who, under the Superior, were Chiefs of the band, and had been the first nobles of the court of the same Shah Jahan. The only garment of these five Dervishes consisted of three or four ells of orange-coloured cotton cloth, of which they made waistbands, one of the ends passing between the thighs and being tucked between the top of the waistband and the body of the Dervish, in order to cover what modesty requires should be concealed, both in front and behind. Each of them had also a skin of a tiger upon the shoulders, which was tied under the chin. They had eight fine horses, saddled and bridled, led by hand before them, three of which had bridles of gold and saddles covered with plates of gold; and the five others had bridles of silver, and the saddles also covered with plates of silver, and a leopard's skin on each. The other Dervishes had for their sole garment a cord, which served as a waistband, to which there was attached a small scrap of calico to cover, as in the case of the others, the parts which should be concealed. ### [14.2.7](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2.7) Their hair was bound in a tress about their heads, and made a kind of turban. They were all well armed, the majority with bows and arrows, some with muskets, and the remainder with short pikes, and a kind of weapon which we have not got in Europe. It is a sharp iron, made like the border of a plate which has no centre, and they pass eight or ten over the head, carrying them on the neck like a ruff. They withdraw these circles as they require to use them, and when they throw them with force at a man, as we make a plate to fly, they almost cut him in two. Each of them had also a sort of hunting horn, which he sounds, and makes a great noise with when he arrives anywhere, and also when he departs, and also a rake, or instrument of iron, made something like a trowel. It is with this instrument, which the Indians generally carry in their journeys, that they rake and level the places where they wish to halt, and some, having collected the dust in a heap, make use of it as a mattress and bolster in order to lie more comfortably. There were three of these Dervishes armed with long rapiers, which they had received, apparently, from some Englishman or Portuguese. Their baggage consisted of four boxes full of Arabian and Persian books and some cooking utensils, and they had ten or twelve oxen to carry those among the troop who were invalids. ### [14.2.8](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2.8) When these Dervishes arrived at the place where I was encamped with my carriage, having then with me fifty persons, both people of the country, whom one engages, as I have said, for travelling, as also my ordinary servants, the Chief or Superior of the troop, seeing me well accompanied, inquired who that Aga was; and asked me subsequently to give up to him the position I occupied, it being more commodious than any other about the place for camping with his Dervishes. As they informed me of the quality of this Chief and the four Dervishes who followed him, I was willing to do them a civility, and to yield that which they asked with a good grace; and so I ceded the place to them, and took another which suited me as well as it. Immediately the place was watered with a quantity of water, and made smooth and level, and, as it was winter and was somewhat cold, they lighted two fires for the five principal Dervishes, who placed themselves between them in order to warm themselves both before and behind. During the same evening, after they had supped, the Governor of the town came to pay his respects to these principal Dervishes, and during their sojourn in the place sent them rice and other things which they were accustomed to eat. ### [14.2.9](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2.9) When they arrive in any place the Superior sends some of them to beg in the towns and villages, and whatever food they bring, which is given them out of charity, is immediately distributed to all in equal portions, each being particular to cook his own rice for himself. Whatever they have over is given every evening to the poor, and they reserve nothing for the following day. --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.tavernier~en-ball.14.2) · Pramāṇa