From: Mysoreans Abroad — News from the Benighted West.
16: Sri Nripendra Rao to his esteem’d Father
London
7th December 1768
Beloved Bapu-ji,
Dhriti chastens me for distressing you during your long Illness. Had I known that Word of me, or rather its Absence, caused such Concern I would have bent all Efforts to inform you of my Fortunes, despite the Distances between us. Since that Time has already now passed, she charges me to be sure that that your Heart shall know the ease News of your Son will bring, and that my Sister need not berate me again for so failing in my Duty.
Nothing will bring me greater Pleasure than to tell you of the wondrous Events that have taken place in London of late, and your Son’s Part in them, and so it is I write to you.
My Fellows and I were returning to London from a social Occasion in the Country – Details of which I must leave for another Time – when the Driver of our Conveyance remarked a singular Effect of Light over the distant City. The Sky wore Stripes like Huli, shifting like his Muscles in three Shades. The middle Shade was the everyday grey of cold, wet, smoky London. You would not like it, it is dismal in the best of Weather. More unusual was bright, clear Light shining on a white City; and most unusual of all was the Darkness of Night, with not a Cloud to explain it.
We sought immediately to consult with ben Ezra, an aged Guru of the Hebrews Resident in London; but in his Wisdom he had already fled. We might have also, but as the Words of the Gita advise, we surrender our own Interests to the common Good when Brahma has written on our Foreheads an Opportunity to serve.
Shortly after ben Ezra’s we were overtaken by the shifting Rays, and passed unexpectedly from drear London to dusty, dark, ruinous London, upon which our Driver promptly lost Control of the Coach and overturned it. Before we had properly marshalled ourselves, a Change overtook us again and we found ourselves in the White City, where we were almost immediately set upon by clockwork Marionettes. (I believe these to be Avatars of Order and Place.) Evading them, we witnessed Wolves – usually a country Beast – chasing a Man through the Streets of the White City. We did not recognise him then, being somewhat out of his usual Place, but we later realised it had been the King! Who outdistanced us and, as we later found, the Wolves, for he was later restored.
In the absence of the Guru ben Ezra, we decided to inspect a protective Device known to him and us at The Monument, a holy Pillar sacred to the Memory of a terrible Fire. As the Pillar protects the Memory, so the Device inside it protects London from the incursion of other Influences onto the City, and so it seemed a likely Place to seek a restitution of Dharma. And so it appeared, for when we arrived we saw that the Summit of the Pillar was aglow – but a Glow of neither Nature nor Divinity.
With the Watchman’s acquiescence we clambered up the Interior, and by means of the Vishwakarma Engine I dispelled the unwanted intrusion of another Loka into the Bhuloka of Men. And all was Dark.
Not what we had hoped for. And yet it brought the Boon of stability.
Retiring once more to the Ground Floor, we sought Enlightenment amongst the Machinery as to what might have caused the Protection to fail. And there at last was a Message from Guru ben Ezra! Concealed in a Bottle within the Machinery – formerly the Abode of a filthy Gin – it said “Greetings : if you are reading this because London is lost see that Death walks in the correct Gardens.”
The British believe in only one Reincarnation. Before it, one may be a long time dead and suffering Punishments, so Death is not a Transition but something to be feared. This Belief manifests itself in the surrounding Loka here – which are not as we would expect them to be in Mysore – but of this we could be glad, because some few of us were instantly able to recognise what ben Ezra wrote of.
One such Loka, which can be entered through a Window in a known Place, contains Gardens superimposed one on another in Fashion I can best describe as a flattened Spiral. It can be followed Clockwise or anti-Clockwise; I think it alike in symbolism to the Shankha – here they call it the Conch – with each Clockwise turn (the Vamavarta form, Bapu-ji) taking one further from Bhuloka and the natural Law, and there, on a previous Occasion, we had encountered and fled from an Avatar of Death.
(There are small Shells of similar form on the Beaches here – far too small to be blown like the Shankha, or to bathe with – but as in so much, the English are blind to their Significance.)
Passing through the Window, we clambered down into the Graveyard Loka and rounded it clockwise. A first Circuit brought us to a Fountain in a small Grove of Trees, engraved (in the Language of the Western Brahmin Caste) with the Words “In the midst of Death, Life”. Knowing that we might face Death himself, several of us drank from it as something of a Precaution.
On a second Circuit, though by all Appearances we should have returned to the same Fountain, instead we arrived at a Second – that of a Goat-Man that the European Ancients associated with Fertility, with Water leaping directly upwards from his intimate Person. No-one drank from this Fountain, despite an Inscription saying “Bringing Life to Death”. Doubtless it was because of the slightly more ominous Tone of the Inscription. I was not properly prepared to perform Puja, but I put my Hand to the Lingayat at my Neck for Respect, before we moved on.
Continuing clockwise, a third Circuit brought us to the third Fountain. Here Something greeted us that was not only different from the previous Fountain, but from what we had seen here on our previous Visit to this Place. In this Place, closer to Death’s Realm, there was a Statue of skeletal Death emerging from the Ground held an Amphora (Western Brahmin for a Type of Matka Pot) over its Shoulder, surrounded by wasted, deathly Arms emerging from the Soil and with the Inscription “Living death”. When previously here, a Trickle of Water had come from the Amphora; on this Occasion no Water ran, for the good and simple Reason that the Amphora had been replaced with another – white, glossy, and completely solid with no Place for egress of the Water.
Not knowing what would meet us on the next Turn, we proceeded cautiously. When in this Place before, the next Circuit had brought us to a Place where what we had thought at First to be another Statue of Death began to advance towards us. The European Avatar of Death carries a Matchu, and when Trees began to fall to its Blade we feared to become the Harvest, and fled before him! However, on this second Occasion once more we discovered a difference: Death’s Garden was orderly, tidy and empty of Death.
It was clear now indeed that Death no longer walked in the correct Garden (as ben Ezra prompted us to ensure), but as yet no Possibility for Solution presented itself, so we continued to circumnavigate the Garden.
Previous Revolutions brought us to Places more Similar than different, with only the central Feature changing. Leaving Death’s Realm brought us to a larger Place that differed more greatly – larger than the Space between Houses that we had first entered through the Window, and which had surrounded us as we circled the Gardens. Now before us lay a rolling Hillside surmounted by a Tower of light Stone – quite unexpected in the sooty Heart of London.
We crossed the Hillside to the Tower as if on Horseback, or the Distance was less than it seemed. Archways cut through the Tower and passing by them – clockwise once more – and looking downwards, rather than across to the opposing Arch, showed us Views of London. At least, so we surmised after passing a few Arches – for the first View was of no more than the River passing through a Marsh, but subsequent Views showed a Village becoming ever greater, until at last we reached a Place where the Hillside through the Arch was clear once more, with three Paths leading away.
By some Nature of the Place, it was possible to see only one Path clearly at a Time, the Others becoming obscured as if they were not there. We chose the middle Way to explore (the other two seeming to fade out even when observed directly), and shortly came to a Place of Significance.
We passed between two Pillars typical of the White City and below us lay the City itself – surely a possible Future of London, given the Visions we had seen on the way. Of more import though, close to our Feet lay the Amphora from the Garden of living Death, its Water (now clearly of a mystical Source) trickling idly towards the City below – which seemed whiter yet and cleaner than we could recall from previous Glimpses.
This newly discovered Amphora was a Thing out of Place that we might remedy, and so my Companions Colonel Mustard (a Soldier) and Tonkin (a true Ek-hath) grasped it and by main Strength lifted it from where it lay. They came to no Harm, but wheresoever they walked, the Grass withered at their Feet.
Fearing Consequence of Delay we returned, following now the anti-clockwise Path like a Dakshinavarti Shankha, unwinding the Way we had come (with such a Presage it will not surprise you that so did we undo the Sin done, but I get ahead of myself).
On returning to the third Fountain and putting down the original Amphora, Mustard and Tonkin removed the solid one that had taken its Place. They then carefully returned the Original to the Shoulder of Death’s Statue, and the Water flowed again. It is difficult to know exactly what to make of this, for the Lokas are infused with Western symbolism. But if the Place were a Person, I wonder if this might be its Svadhisthana? A Place of Water, blocked by the Fear of Death, while in another Aspect it held the Goat-Man.
So far as the Eye could tell, we had done all we could to restore Things to how they were, but as a further Precaution I examined the solid Amphora and determining that it was of a mystical Nature, I chose to dispel the Magic upon it.
In this I was successful, but at once a most wonderful and awful Transformation occurred. A soft Colour flushed through the white Amphora until it was a Shade of Ivory. Swiftly Lines appeared on its Surface and widened until we saw that a Skull and long Bones had formed, and then unfolding himself Death emerged before us!
At this Point all might have been lost but for the quick Action of Colonel Mustard who triggered a Clockwork Device to banish the deathly Avatar; fortunately by its very Nature, this magical Act would return him to his proper Place, the very Thing we sought to achieve.
So we returned to the London of Bhuloka, and were greeted upon the Street by one wondering if that were Ned Mustard the Bloody Executioner he saw before him – a particular Surprise to us given our recent acquaintance with Death, but it turned out that this was the Result of some exaggerated Tales written by a Scribe of our previous “Engagement”, in which Colonel had had a prominent role.
Later we were intelligenced that at the Time we saw him in that other London the King had been ill, an interesting Correspondence in a Day replete with them.
Namaste,
Your dutiful Nripendra