When Duli Sukul, the
Sihora[14] banker's father, died, the wife of a Lodhi cultivator of
the town declared, all at once, that she had been a suttee with him
six times before; and that she would now go into paradise with him a
seventh time. Nothing could persuade her from burning herself. She
was between fifty and sixty years of age, and had grandchildren, and
all her family tried to persuade her that it must be a mistake, but
all in vain. She became a suttee, and was burnt the day after the
body of the banker.'
'Did not Duli Sukul's family, who were Brahmans, try to dissuade her
from it, she being a Lodhi, a very low caste?'
'They did; but they said all things were possible with God; and it
was generally believed that this was a call from Heaven.'
'And what became of the banker's widow?'
'She said that she felt no divine call to the flames. This was thirty
years ago; and the banker was about thirty years of age when he
died.'
'Then he will have rather an old wife in paradise?'
'No, sir; after they pass through the flames upon earth, both become
young in paradise.'
'Sometimes women used to burn themselves with any relic of a husband,
who had died far from home, did they not?'
'Yes, sir, I remember a fisherman, about twenty years ago, who went
on some business to Benares from Jubbulpore, and who was to have been
back in two months.
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