43
to support them under intense physical exertions
as Kahars and Baudanis. Some take hemp for the
pleasurable sensations it excites ; some to drown
care ; others because they have got into the habit.
Hemp is only smoked with tobacco, and the ques-
tion cannot be considered apart from the tobacco
habit. Who could say why 75 per cent. of modern
Englishmen smoke tobacco? "Because they like
it" is the most rational answer. A number of
people who suffer from painful diseases, such as
stone in the bladder, hernia, etc., eat or smoke
hemp to relieve their pain. Hemp is the most
wonderful anodyne in existence.
29. Bhang is only mixed with water, sugar, and
spices. Majum, a preparation of bhang, with
flour, butter, sugar, and spices. Occasionally
dhatura is mixed with majum by special order.
But then, according to the first authority on
"Hindu Materia Medica," U. C. Dutt, confections
of bhang are used as a vehicle for a great number
of drugs. Dhatura is used with ganja to allay
cough or an asthmatic tendency ; also to add to
the strength of hemp drugs. Smoking dhatura
could be substituted for hemp smoking. Aconite
(root of Aconitum ferox) and the seeds of strychnos,
nux-vomica, are sometimes mixed with hemp drugs
as nervine tonics.
30. Hemp smoking is a social habit, the pipe
being passed round a group of people. Bhang is
taken in company at wedding feasts, etc. On the
whole the hemp habit is practised in company,
though there are exceptions. Hemp smoking is of
great-antiquity, and was practised in India long
before the introduction of tobacco. Ganja and
charas are largely smoked by the Dards in Kashmir
and right through Afghanistan. The Afghans, who
smoke hemp, are in point of physique second to no
race in the world, and this shows that the habit
can be generally adopted with impunity.
31. No easier than any other habit—the to-
bacco habit, the spirit habit, the cocaine habit, the
tea habit. Bhang does not establish the same
craving for repetition as alcohol, and is an infinite-
ly more æsthetic, cleaner, and less injurious habit
both with regard to person and property than al-
cohol. Both bhang and ganja to the credit of
the people of India are generally used in mode-
ration.
32. The use of hemp is intimately associated with
the Hindu religion. It is one of the five sacred
plants mentioned in the Vedas as liberators of sin.
In fact, it has been supposed to be the Soma
itself ; the Soma was possibly, as indicated by Dr.
Watt, an ephidra. Bhang is by some Brahmins
considered necessary to obtain mental abstraction.
Dutt says it is incumbent on the last day of the
Durga Puja to offer visitors a cup of bhang. The
popular Hindu deity, Krishna, was reputed to be
constantly intoxicated with bhang, and its use has
the sanction of religion. Its prohibition would be
resented as far as possible. Hemp is used instead
of alcohol for fifteen days at Pithar paksh (worship
of the Manes of ancestors) and on the Shivratri
festival.
33. There is no odium whatever attached to the
use of bhang even in excess. Hemp smoking,
though not considered right in a Brahman, is not
considered to be disreputable or inconsistent in an
ascetic. In fact, hemp smoking is considered
necessary to the formation of his character. It
must, however, be admitted that hemp smoking
is not generally held in the same repute among
churchmen as the use of bhang. No more was the
use of tobacco among our own clergy. In fact,
the pious Brahmin sets an example of self-denial
vol. v.
in abstaining from tobacco and all liquor, which
it would be well for our clergy to imitate. But
the Brahman uses bhang largely at wedding feasts,
particularly where it is fashionable to try and kill
a Brahmin by over-feeding him. Under the in-
fluence of bhang he will, after a full meal, eat
cakes and sweets at 8 annas or 1 rupee each.
Death from rupture of the stomach has been
known to occur in these cases, but nature generally
relieves the holy man.
34. Certainly mendicants who constantly visit
Native States would smuggle the drug, and it is
doubtful if more than 10 per cent. would really
abandon the habit. The law could be easily evad-
ed. This would be about as reasonable or as
practicable as to prohibit the Anglo-Saxon race
from indulging in beer. In each case the popu-
lace would defy the law, and Native States would
form foci for the use, growth, and illicit trade in
the drug.
35. Quite impossible without a preventive army
like the old salt customs line on the northern and
southern borders of the province, and a special
staff in every district, of the North-Western Pro-
vinces to prevent the illicit growth of the drug.
As regards political danger, the present time is
the most unfortunate that could be selected for
such an experiment. The sacerdotal class to a
man are opposed to British rule, and secretly plot
to subvert it. They would be discontented at the
measure. Finally, it would certainly lead to an
increased use of alcohol and dhatura smoking,
it would further lead to a loss of revenue, and
possibly a decrease in the efficiency and numbers
of the British troops in India, which at the present
time should be doubled in the opinion of all loyal
and patriotic subjects. Hemp when grown in
"arhar" or cotton in small quantities can rarely
or never be detected. Cajanus arhar, Gossypium
herbaceum, and, lastly, Hibiscus canabinus resem-
ble it closely. The last derives its name from
its resemblance to the hemp plant. 1 have de-
tected it (hemp) in this situation in many districts.
36. Yes ; among English educated natives, who
soon learn to appreciate the superior comfort of
the English style of living, but I only know two
such men in the Allahabad district out of the
town of Allahabad). The change to alcohol is
due to the essentially different idea of physical
comfort and gentility possessed by Europeans and
Natives, and the gradual adoption of the European
idea by natives. A native's ideal of physical
bliss and gentility is to remain seated passively
without moving a feature or a muscle, and wrapt
in contemplation the livelong day. Hemp indu-
ces this condition. The hardy descendants of the
old Norsemen love beef, marrow bones, and the
cleaver, the wine cup and beer barrel ; violent
physical exertion in all shapes, hunting, boating,
skating and shooting, and tennis are his ideal of
earthly bliss and the vigour and rapidity of his
movements, and bustle in business are secretly
envied by the educated native, who wisely, I
think, tries to copy them. The use of alcoholic
stimulants favours bodily activity ; the use of hemp
drugs and opium, mental activity. Though equal
to Europeans in the conception of abstract ideas,
natives are as a rule much interior to Englishmen
and their descendants of mixed race in their
knowledge of things. If proofs are needed as to
the substitution of alcohol, I may mention that
some of the best and ablest native officers I know
are given to drinking a bottle of brandy or whiskey
a day (English imported spirit). Some of the
leading native gentlemen in the capital of the
K 2