New Britain herald., 1930-04-16
4,500,000 PEOPLE FORM HUGE CROWD
Worlds Largest Gathering Takes
 Place at Auahabad, India

Washington, D. c, April 16.- When and where does the worlds greatest crowd assemble?
 American world series baseball and college football games; the English Derby; and the Czcchoslo- vakian sokol, each draw from 75,- 900 to 100000 people. But these cannot compete with certain re- ligious gatherings in India. News dispatches tell of the assembling at Allahabad recently of 4,5o0, 900 people.
 Where Two Sacred Rivers Meet
 Normally, Allahabad is city of 175,o00 people," says bulletin from the Washington, D. C. head quarters of the Ns tional Geographic Society. Tt lies in the V-shaped re- zion between the Jumna and Ganges Rivers, at the meeting place ot the two streams. It is this loca- ton that draws huge crowds to the towns annually; and, at twelve-yeai intervals, tremendous hordes. Both the Jumna and the Ganges arc sacred streams, and their meeting place is doubly sacred. The mystical Indian mind finds still a third req son for holiness: it is believed by the pilgrims that the Saraswati, q river which is swallowed up by the sands southwest of the Punjab cmerges at the junction point ci the Jumna and Ganges.
 Both the Ganges and the Jumna are coffee -colored streams, heavil, laden with silt. At low water in late winter large eSpanse of dusty sand is exposed below the Allaha- bad fort which stands on, the bluf1 ercrlooking the confluence. It is or this beach that the millions of pill grin,s assembled recently.
 Holy Men Wear Coats of Ashes
 The Indian police have thel, hands full during the great religion: fair or Kumbh Mela. All vehicles are excluded from the river plain and all efforts concentrated or maintaining order among the multi tude of men, women, and children that move about in the dust, slir on the wet clay near the stream banks, and attain merit by bathing in the murly waters.
 "A torrid sun beats down, and tt screen it's rays little shelters O rushes have been erected on tn, sands. Under these sit all mannel O. people wearing a minimum D clothing. Among them are hoi, men, their bodies smeared with gra, coats of ashes. Groups of idols ar. set up that the faithful may contri bute coins. Among the crowds 8; men carrying Nater-skins, sprin kling the water in an effort to la, the dust that millions of bare fec stir up.
 "The Kumbh Me1a is a mecca 10 moneymakers, and the principa ! thoroughfare IS lined with mat she, skops for the sale of sacrificia brassware. tiny brass idols. hoi | berries made into dark necklace: and shining brass water bottles zoned with mellow tinted copper, il which holy water can be taken ' remote parts of India by creduloI people. Here and there one find men with small furnaces full 0 heated pitch, sealing the water yes sells 50 that not a germ or an atoJl of holiness can escape.
 Mohamn>cdan Cnquerors Changes l Name
 "Allahabad is old. In the en closure of the fort is a pillar erect ed by Asoka, the great Buddhis King, during the third century E C. It may have been moved to tn spot later, however, so it is no conclusive evidence that a town cx isted on the site of Allahabad dur ing Asoka's region. The first tow known to history on this site Wa Prayag, about which a Chimes traveller wrote in TOO A. D. Tn Hindus still call the town Prayae the place of sacrifice It receive the name by which it is now know tc the world from it's Mohammed conquerors in 1575. The city is tn capital of the United Provinces second largest of the nine major di visions of British India"