The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1907-10-19
THE ORDEAL BY FIRE
A Hindoo Ceremony That Puzzles
the Uninitiated.
WALK OVER GLOWING GOALS.
The Participants In the mystifyin9
Spectacle Play With the Fiery En-
bers as Children Play With Sand
and Emerge Unframed.

and Emerge Unnamed.
once witnessed a most remarkable
ordeal by fire at Benares, India. 1t
was held on the grounds of villa on
the outskirts of the city, and among
US were some of the most prominent
men and women of official and social
life in British India. Army and navy
officers touched elbows with French
savants, all more than glad to accept
an invitation that might at least offer
opportunity either to catch some cleW
toward solving the mystery of the In
dian fire ordeal or else catch the priest
ly performers in a nice trap at cOnsum-
mate and age long deception. success
fully worked among a superstitious
and oyercredulous people like the Hin
docs.
Seats had been arranged for our par
ty out on the spacious lawn, where a
trench had been dug sixteen feet long,
six feet wide and four feet deep. The
fire in the trench was lighted before
noon, but the ordeal itself was not to
come off until after sunset. The trench
was filled with kindling wood and logs
and was set afire by the attendants,
who kept up a blaze as hot as blast
furnace all day long, until the trench
by sunset was filed three feet deep
with a compact, glowing bed of red
hot Goals.
We were escorted to our seats at
about $50, and we were not inclined
to question the reality of that fire from
the moment we sat down within twelve
feet of it. Whatever else might be
fraud or hypnotism in this Indian fire
ordeal, we could not for moment
doubt the realism of that scorching
heat that made our eyes smart and
grow bloodshot. We, who had come to
scott and doubt, were soon realizing
| that the managers of the Benares fire
ordeal had already gained rs points out
of 100 in favor of their honesty and of
| their power over the mighty element
of fire, that figures so largely in orien-
tai philosophy as one of the three or
four primal elements of the physical
! universe.
A great commotion and babel OF
I voices soon proclaimed the coming of
! the procession of priests, headed by
the arch priest Brahmapoots, carrying
a huge Indian sword, followed by the
two minor priests who were destined
to walk unframed through that yard
thick fiery bed, scintillating in the in
creasing darkness and lighting up the
dark faces of the hundreds of gaping
Hindoos standing behind us. While
we Europeans and Americans, always
hypercritical and given to scientific re
search, were awaiting the coming OF
the moment when our TO per cent OF
credulity was either to be shattered OF
rounded out to the fullness of com
pleted and abiding faith in HindoC
control and mastery of the devOuring
element Of fire, our HindOo fellow on
lockers, on the other hand, We're antici
pating the ordeal with all the simple
ity of credulous children. Ours was an
almost terrifying heart tension. and we
almost wished that we were not occi
dental skeptics. always bent on doubt
ing things OF an extraordinary nature.
The priests marched about the trench
chanting and performing mystic mean
tations. carrying along a glass reliqu
airy, or shrine, in which was seen the
image of the god silva, who, in the
Hindoo religious system, is one of the
trinity and is worshiped as the de
stroyer, Brahma being the creator anG
Vishnu the preserver of the universe
We do not know to this day what those
priests said as they perambulatet
about that fiery trench, but we dc
know what soon followed, for, at the
end Of the incarnation, the two candi
dates for the ordeal plunged into the
redhot Goals and walked ankle deer
the whole length of the trench. back
ward and forward time and time
again. They played with that scintil
lating, glowing fire as children play
with the sands Of Coronado beach
kicking it with their feet and STOPPING
down to pick up handfuls of the glow
ing Goals, tossing them in the air. to
be blown by the rising evening breeze
all over our heads and our easily in
flammable clothing. We We're really
afraid No doubt about those spark:
and live, falling Goals.
When the two priests had walked W
and down alone through that fer,
trench unscathed and unscorched
then the whole Hindoo throng seemed
to suddenly catch the spirit of thei
priests. and, sure of their conquest owe
the power of fire. they began plungtnt
into the trench. Old men and youns
) children walked through that fiery fur
mace, forward and backward, ant
when they had tired of this playing
, with fire. they came out as they ha(
entered. not a hair or carmen
) scorched. not even the soles Of thet
feet blistered.
! Only males are allowed to so through
the fire ordeal
| Never yet has any scientific theor,
explained the power of the silva wor
, shippers over fire. We ourselves wer'
| absolutely convinced that trickery wa
not to be considered as an explana tiol
of what we had witnessed.-Los Ange
les Times.
A Caddie's Cadenza.