Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 399

FORCING A RELUCTANT CONSENT
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perceive the slightest inclination on the part of the widow
to offer up her life, spare no means in order to convince
her and force her to a final determination. At times they
go so far as to administer drugs, which so far deprive her
of her senses that under their influence she yields to their
This inhuman and abominable method of wheed-
wishes.
ling a consent out of the unhappy woman is in their opinion
justified, because her tragic end would bring great honour
and glory to the whole of their family.
Some authors have maintained that this detestable
practice originated primarily either from the jealousy of
husbands, or rather, perhaps, from their fear that their
discontented wives might seek to get rid of them by poison.
As for myself, I have been unable, either in the writings of
Hindu authors, or in my free and familiar intercourse with
many persons well versed in the manners and customs of
the country, to discover any justification for either of these
two theories. And surely the lot of a wife, even when she
is doomed to suffer wrong at the hands of a cruel and
immoral husband, is far preferable to that of a widow, to
whom all hope of a re-marriage under happier conditions
It is hardly likely, indeed, that Hindu
is forbidden.
women would go to the length of committing a crime
At
which must render their lot much worse than before
the same time I am by no means inclined to attribute
these voluntary sacrifices to an excess of conjugal affection.
We should, for instance, be greatly mistaken were we to
allow ourselves to be deceived by the noisy lamentations
which wives are accustomed to raise on the death of their
husbands, and which are no more than rank hypocrisy.
During the long period of my stay in India, I do not recall
two Hindu marriages characterized by a union of hearts
and displaying true and mutual attachment l
!
.
When
a woman, after mature deliberation, has once
declared that she desires to be burnt alive with her deceased
1
It is impossible to regard the conclusion here drawn as anything but
greatly exaggerated.
The influence of women, ignorant and uneducated
as they are, is in many Hindu households exceedingly strong, and it is
an error to picture them as the mere slaves of the men, though the
ascendency of the latter is still a marked feature of Hindu sociology.
—Ed.