The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1876-02-26 00:00:00

A WILD AND GROTESOUE SCENE.

The Special Correspondent of the Standard, writing from
Lahore, describes the following scene :

In the evening the Prince and some fifty other
guests dined at the Maharajah's palace, to which all
the other guests were invited to come after the banquet
to view the dance of the Llama priests and the display
of fireworks in the palace square. The palace con-
sisted of a large number of buildings, some of them of.
very great magnificence, in the form of a square. I
was not at the dinner and can say nothing about that
portion of the palace, but the reception afterwards took
place in a very large and newly decorated hall. There
was nothing particularly noticeable in the hall itself,
but at either end were drawing-rooms very handsomely
got up, and with their roofs covered with delicate and
beautiful mirror work. Here, after dinner, the guests
assembled, and after a few presentations by the
Maharajah of some of his principal nobles, several
natives of different provinces entered with animals pre-
sented by the Maharajah to the Prince. Here were
two men, in woollen garments and skull caps, leading
a magnificent deer; there were two others with
grand Thibetan dogs, black and tan in colour,
long and soft in coat, much heavier and more
powerful than Newfoundland dogs, with something
of the heavy jowl and deep eye of the mastiff—
grand animals, and, we were warned, doubtful in
temper—but, at any rate, upon this occasion they sub-
mitted tranquilly to being patted and made a good
deal of. Here, too—and never before should I imagine
such visitors in a Royal dining-room—were a whole
flock of sheep and goats, who seemed excited and
scared at the unusual scene. When these had retired
the Prince and Maharajah took their seats at one end
of the room, and the rest of the guests ranged them-
selves down the sides in readiness for the Llama dance,
the drawing room at the opposite end being given to
them as a robing room.

I hesitate at even attempting a description of the
scene which followed—so wild, so strange, so gro-
tesque, and yet so singularly thrilling was it. First
came a party of priests with the broad high Ramallies
bats, the others with bonnets of upright plumes like
those of a Darrib chief. Then came the musicians with
brass basins to clap together like cymbals, with flutes,
tom-tom, and with enormous trumpets which folded
up telescope fashion to a length of five feet, but which
were twice that length 'when drawn out and nearly
foot in diameter at the mouth. These, with the ex-
ception of the men with the plumed head-dress, who
appeareil to be heralds, sat down on the ground
at one side of the hall, ivhile the heralds returned
to the room and reappeared again preceding the
dancing priests. Of the aspect of these men, some ten
in number, it is impossible to give an idea. They word
broad steeple crowned hats and black garments reach-
ng to their knees and belted in at the waist. From
their shoulders hung like a mantle stripes of various
coloured materials, and upon the breast of each was
embroidered a huge skull. To the enchanting soft
music of the band they entered, and, forming a sort of
circle began gravely to dance, hopping and twirling
now on one foot, now on the other, waving their arms
the while, but always slowly and gravely, keeping per-
fect time to the music. It looked like a Walpurgis
night, a wierd dance of high-hatted witches, at which
we were assisting. Then they retired to the dressing-
room, and the notes of the music grew louder, deeper,
and wilder. The trumpet roar was deep and sonorous
as the deepest note of an organ, the flutes played loudly
and wildly, the cymbals clashed, and near the door of
the waiting-room several loud, shrill, powerful whistles
were sounded. All was at once discord and harmony,
I had not imagined that native music could be in-
spiring—this was immensely so—more inspiring, more
weird, more thrilling than any operatic music with
which I am acquainted, but which reminded me
somewhat of the demon scene in DC7* Freischutz.
The effect here, in a well-lighted drawing-room, was
intense, and in a dimly-lighted Elindoo Temple,
with strange monsters and wild grotesque figures
only half revealed in the lights, it must be almost
terrifying. Now the priests advanced again. This
time the flying strips are gone, gone the short petti-
coats, and they wore dark closely fitting garments.
On their heads they had hideous pantomimic masks,
some with the heads of men, others with those of oxen,
and then they danced round and round, with strange
gestures, to the wild, strange bursts of the music. An-
other retreat, another outburst and roar of the music,
and they came again with other masks this time each
surmounted with a ceronet of small shuns, Altogether
there were five entries, each differing slightly from the
other. The spectacle, although wild, was extremely gro-
teeque when they were present, and the dance differed
very slightly from that which, while I write, the demons
in attendance must be performing round their monarch
at one "or other of the London pantomimes, but the
entries more thrilling and excitin ~ from the extra-
ordinary music, and from the uncertainty of what was
about to follow, than anything I ever witnessed upon
the stage.