Chapter XV: The Thug’s Dice

The Thug’s Dice—Execution of Eleven Thugs.

1830, _Oct._—Mr. S⸺, the acting magistrate, has sent me a present of the dice used by the Thugs; they were taken from a Thug in the magistrate’s office. There are three dice, made of brass roughly filed. In the sketch entitled “The Thug’s Dice,” (Fig. 3.) they are represented exactly of the size and shape of the originals, which are all of one size and shape. Two sides are perforated by a large hole that goes through the centre.

Two of the sides are marked with three small circles placed in a triangular form; one side has two circles, and four are on the other side.

On Stone by Major Parlby

فاني پارکس]

When the Thugs are going out on a strangling expedition, they throw these dice to see what days will prove lucky or unlucky.

_Oct. 16th._—In the Government Gazette of this evening is an account of the execution of eleven Thugs, in a letter from a man up the country to the editor: the account is so interesting, I cannot refrain from copying it.

“SIR,—I was yesterday present at the execution of eleven Thugs,
who had been seized in the neighbourhood of Bhilsa, convicted
of the murder of thirty-five travellers, (whose bodies were
disinterred as evidence against them at the different places
along the lines of road between Bhopaul and Saugor, where they
had been strangled and buried,) and sentenced to death by the
agent to the Governor-general, Mr. Smith.

“As the sun rose, the eleven men were brought out from the
jail, decorated with chaplets of flowers, and marched up to the
front of the drop, where they arranged themselves in line with
infinite self-possession.

“When arranged, each opposite the noose that best pleased him,
they lifted up their hands and shouted, ‘Bindachul ka jae!
Bhawānī ka jae!’ _i.e._ ‘Glory to Bindachul! Bhawānī’s glory!’
every one making use of precisely the same invocation, though
four were Mahomedans, one a Brahman, and the rest Rajpoots,
and other castes of Hindoos; they all ascended the steps, and
took their position upon the platform with great composure,
then, taking the noose in both hands, made the same invocation
to Bhawānī, after which they placed them over their heads and
adjusted them to their necks; some of the younger ones laughing
at the observations of the crowd around them.

“One of the youngest, a Mahomedan, impatient of the delay,
stooped down so as to tighten the rope, and, stepping
deliberately over the platform, hung himself as coolly as one
would step over a rock to take a swim in the sea! This man was
known to have assisted in strangling a party of six travellers
at Omurpatan, in the Rewah Rajah’s territories, in December
last, and closely pursued—to have gone off, joined another
gang, and, in less than a month, to have assisted in strangling
thirty more in Bhopaul; he was taken at Bhilsa, the last scene
of his murders. Omurpatan is 100 miles east of Jubulpore; and
the place in which the Thug assisted in strangling in the
Bhopaul territories, a month afterwards, is 200 miles west of
Jubulpore. Such is the rapidity with which these murderers
change the scene of their operations, when conscious of keen
pursuit! He was taken at Bhilsa by the very man whom he found
upon his trail at Omurpatan, 300 miles distant.

“On being asked whether they had any wish to express to the
magistrate, they prayed that for every man hung, _five convicts
might be released from jail_, and that they might have a little
money to be distributed in charity.

“Their invocation of Bhawānī at the drop, was a confession of
their guilt, for no one in such a situation invokes Bhawānī
but a Thug, and he invokes no other deity in any situation,
whatever may be his religion or sect. She is worshipped
under her four names, Devi, Kalee, Doorga, and Bhawānī, and
her temple at Bindachun, a few miles west of Mirzapore on
the Ganges, is constantly filled with murderers from every
quarter of India, who go there to offer up a share of the
booty acquired from their strangled victims in their annual
excursions.

“This accounts for the invocation—‘jae Bindachul!’ made use
of by these men in approaching and ascending the drop. These
pilgrimages to the temple are made generally at the latter end
of the rainy season, and whilst on their road from their homes
to the temple, nothing can ever tempt them to commit a robbery.
They are not, however, so scrupulous on their way back.

“The priests promise the Thugs impunity and wealth, provided
a due share be offered to the goddess. If they die by the
sword in the execution of murders, she promises them paradise
in all its most exquisite delights; if taken and executed, it
must arise from her displeasure, incurred by some neglect of
the duties they owe her, and they must, as disturbed spirits,
inhabit mid-air until her wrath be appeased. After they have
propitiated the goddess by offering up a share of the preceding
year, and received the priest’s suggestions on the subject,
they prepare for the next year’s expedition.

“The different members who form the gang assemble at the
village of the leader at a certain day, and, after determining
the scene of operations, they proceed to consecrate their
kodalee, or small pickaxe, which they use to dig the graves of
their victims, and which they consider as their _standard_.
They believe that no spirit can ever rise to trouble their
repose from a grave dug by this instrument, provided it be
duly consecrated, and they are fearfully scrupulous in the
observance of every ceremony enjoined in the consecration, and
never allow the earth to be turned with any other instrument.
It is a neatly made pickaxe of about four or five pounds’
weight, six or eight inches long, and with one point.

“They sacrifice a goat, and offer it up, with a cocoa-nut, to
Bhawānī; they then make a mixture of sandal and other scented
woods, spirits, sugar, flour, and butter, and boil it in a
cauldron.

“The kodalee, having been carefully washed, is put upon a spot
cleared away for the purpose, and plastered with cow dung,
and the mixture is poured over it with certain prayers and
ceremonies.

“It is now wiped and folded in a clean white cloth by the
priest, and the whole gang proceed some distance from the
village upon the road they intend to take, and stand until
they hear a partridge call, the priest having in his mind some
one as the bearer of the sacred deposit. If the partridge call
on the right, he places it in the hands of that individual,
and in a solemn manner impresses upon him the responsibility
of the charge. If a partridge call on the left, or one do not
call until the sun is high, they all return, and wait until
the next morning, when they proceed to another spot, and the
priest fixes his mind upon some other individual; and so every
morning, until the deity has signified her approbation of the
choice by the calling of the partridge on the right.

“If the kodalee should fall to the ground at any time, the
gang consider it as an evil omen, leave that part of the
country without delay, and select another standard-bearer. If
no accident happen, the man first elected bears it the whole
season; but a new election must take place for the next. The
man who bears it carries it in his waistband, but never sleeps
with it on his person, nor lets any man see where he conceals
it during the night, or whilst he takes his rest.

“All oaths of the members of the gang are administered upon
this instrument, folded in a clean white cloth, and placed on
ground cleared away and plastered with cow dung: I have heard
the oldest of them declare, that they believe any man who
should make a false oath upon it would be immediately punished
by some fatal disease. If any man be suspected of treachery,
they make him swear in this manner.

“The standard-bearer, immediately after his election, proceeds
across the first running stream in the direction of the country
to which the gang intend to proceed, accompanied by only one
witness, to wait for a favourable omen. When they come to the
Nurbudda, Jumna, or any other river of this class, the whole
gang must accompany him. A deer on the right of the road is a
good omen, especially if single, according to the verse—

“Leela Mirga daena—Suda daena Tas.
Kishunrut hark doo, bhule kure Bhugwan.”

“If a wolf is seen to cross the road, either before or behind
them, they must return, and take another road. If they hear a
jackal call during the day, or a partridge during the night,
they leave that part of the country forthwith. An old man once
told me, in proof of the faith to be placed in these signs,
that he was, in his youth, one of a gang of fifty, who were
sleeping under some date-trees, between Indore and Ojeya, when
a partridge was heard to call out of one of them about two in
the morning. They got up in great alarm, moved off instantly,
but about daylight met a party of horse going from Ojeya to
Indore. Some dispute took place between them, and they were
taken back to Indore.

“They had murdered the gooroo (or chief priest) of the Holcar
family and his followers; and their leader taking a liking to a
parrot of his, had brought it with them.

“On arriving at Indore the parrot began to talk, and was
almost immediately recognized by one of Holcar’s family as
the parrot of the gooroo who had gone off for Ojeya some days
before. One of the youngest of them was immediately tied up
and flogged, and after a couple of dozen, he confessed the
robbery and murder. The bodies were taken up and recognized,
and five-and-forty Thugs were blown off at once from the mouths
of cannon. He was one of the five who were pardoned on account
of their youth, and taken into service.

“The handle of the kodalee is made and put on when it is
required, and thrown away the moment the work is done, so that
it forms no essential part of the consecrated instrument.

“The investiture of the roomal (or handkerchief) is the next
religious ceremony performed. No man can strangle until he
has been regularly invested by the priest with the cloth with
which it is performed. Cords and nooses are no longer used. A
common handkerchief or cummerbund is all that men north of the
Nurbudda will now use, though it is said, that in some parts of
the Peninsula the cord and noose are still in use, owing to the
Thugs there being less liable to be searched.

“After a man has passed through the different grades, and shown
that he has sufficient dexterity, nerve, and resolution, which
they call ‘hard breastedness,’ to strangle a victim himself,
the priest, before all the gang assembled on a certain day,
presents him with the roomal, and tells him how many of his
family have signalized themselves by the use of it, how much
his friends expect from his courage and conduct, and implores
the goddess to vouchsafe her support to his laudable ambition
and endeavours to distinguish himself in her service.

“The investiture of the roomal is knighthood to these monsters;
it is the highest object of their ambition, not only because
the man who strangles has so much a head over and above the
share which falls to him in the division of the spoil, but
because it implies the recognition, by his comrades, of the
qualities of courage, strength, and dexterity, which all are
anxious to be famed for.

“The ceremony costs the candidate about forty rupees; and is
performed by a gooroo, or high priest of the gang, who is
commonly an old Thug, no matter whether Musulmān or Hindoo, who
has retired from service, and lives upon the contributions of
his descendants and disciples, who look up to him with great
reverence for advice and instruction, and refer to his decision
all cases of doubt and dispute amongst themselves.

“Many attain this degree of knighthood before the age of
twenty, having been taken out by their masters when young, and
early accustomed to assist by holding the hands of the victims
while the roomal-bearers strangle them; and a man must show
good evidence of the ‘kura chatee,’ or hard breast, before he
is admitted even to this office; some men never attain to this
honour, particularly those who have adopted the profession
late in life, and remain all their lives as decoys, watchmen,
grave-diggers, and removers of bodies. An attempt has been
made, and with some success, to impress Thugs with the belief
that the souls of their victims attain paradise, as in the case
of other human victims, offered in sacrifice to this goddess,
and become the tutelar saints of those who strangle them.

“This is, however, somewhat at variance with their notion, that
the spirits of those who have been buried with the consecrated
pickaxe can never rise from their graves; but it reminds me
of an opinion that prevails amongst the people in wild and
mountainous parts of India, that the spirit of a man destroyed
by a tiger, sometimes rides upon his head and guides him from
his pursuers.

“The person invested with the roomal has long used it in play
before the practised eye of his gooroo, and has been long
accustomed to see others use it in earnest; but it is still
thought necessary to select for him easy victims at first, and
they do not employ him indiscriminately, like the others, until
he has shown his powers in the death of two or three travellers
of feeble form and timid bearing. The maxim that ‘dead men tell
no tales’ is invariably acted upon by these people, and they
never rob a man until they have murdered him.

“In the territories of the native chiefs of Bundelcund, and
those of Scindia and Holcar, a Thug feels just as independent
and free as an Englishman in a tavern, and they will probably
begin to feel themselves just as much so in those of Nagpore,
now that European superintendency has been withdrawn. But they
are not confined to the territories of the native chiefs;
they are becoming numerous in our own, and are often found
most securely and comfortably situated in the very seats of
our principal judicial establishments; and of late years they
are known to have formed some settlements to the east of the
Ganges, in parts that they formerly used merely to visit in the
course of their annual excursions.

“I should mention that the cow being a form of Doorga, or
Bhawānī, the Mahomedans must forego the use of beef the moment
they enlist themselves under her banners; and though they may
read their khoran, they are not suffered to invoke the name of
Mahommed.

“The khoran is still their civil code, and they are governed by
its laws in all matters of inheritance, marriage, &c.

“Your obedient servant,

“H.[62]”

I have been greatly interested in the above account: there are numerous Thugs in and around Cawnpore; they never attack Europeans; but the natives are afraid of travelling alone, as a poor bearer with one month’s wages of four rupees has quite sufficient to attract them. They seldom bury them in these parts, but having strangled and robbed their victim, they throw him down a well, wells being numerous by the side of the high roads.

In 1844, I visited the famous temple of Bhawānī at Bindachun, near Mirzapore. See the portrait of the Devi, entitled “Bhagwan;” and the sketch of the “Temple of Bhawānī,” in the Second Volume.