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And the attitude of this individual was fairly representative. Landlookers came, saw; but, instead of remaining to conquer the soil, the majority of them went elsewhere. This was hard on Sleeman. He was a good salesman, and he had a good proposition; but he was handicapped by conditions not of his creating and beyond his control.
Sleeman threatened to enforce his order, and punish severely any man who assisted; and he placed a police guard to see that no one did so. From the early morning the old widow of sixty-five had been sitting on the bank of the sacred river by her dead, waiting through the long hours for the permission; and at last the refusal came instead.
By the iron rule of ancient custom, if she should now choose to live she could never return to her family. Sleeman was in deep trouble. If she starved herself to death her family would be disgraced; and, moreover, starving would be a more lingering misery than the death by fire. He went back in the evening thoroughly worried.
Sleeman says that it was usual to play music at the suttee, but that the white man's notion that this was to drown the screams of the martyr is not correct; that it had a quite different purpose.
Sleeman raved like a madman, and came near resigning; said if the boy was shot he would at once resign. As soon as the judgment of the Court was known, Jackson took a leave of absence for ten days and left on the train that evening for home. He came, and on his arrival was looking like a ghost. All ran to him to welcome him.
A Thug, of polished manners and great eloquence, being asked by a native gentleman, in the presence of Captain Sleeman, whether he never felt compunction in murdering innocent people, replied with a smile that he did not. "Does any man," said he, "feel compunction in following his trade? and are not all our trades assigned us by Providence?"
"I cannot better give you an idea of this horrible sect, than by transcribing here some lines from the introduction of a report by Colonel Sleeman, who has hunted out this dark association with indefatigable zeal. The report in question was published about two months ago.
Samuel Sleeman this was the Superintendent's name appellant against Isaac Adamson, drunk and disorderly; Ditto against Duncan McPhae, drunk and disorderly; Ditto against Henry James Walters, drunk and disorderly; Ditto against Selina Mary Wilkins, drunk on licensed premises; Ditto against Mary Curtis, drunk on licensed premises; Ditto against Solomon Tregaskis, drunk on highway. . . . There were no less than twenty-four names on the list; and each was the name of a retainer or pensioner of Sir Felix those aged Arcadians of Kirris-vean.
A hurt look crept into Mr. Quilty's eyes of faded blue. "I regret that I have no messages for ye, sor," said he. "The comp'ny's land agent, Mr. Sleeman, will take ye wherever ye want to go in his autymobile. Ye will see his sign as ye go uptown. But, speakin' as man to man, Mr. Farwell, and havin' the interests of thim that pays me to heart, I w'u'd venture on a little advice."
Before the ground was moved, Captain Sleeman expressed some doubts; but Feringeea, after looking at the position of some neighbouring trees, said be would risk his life on the accuracy of his remembrance. The workmen dug five feet without discovering the bodies; but they were at length found a little beyond that depth, exactly as the Thug had described them.
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