The annual return of this festival in honor of the god Krishna, excites the religious feelings and superstitious frenzy of the Hindoos not only in Bengal but also in Orissa, Bombay, and in the Upper Provinces of India. From time immemorial, it has continued to exercise a very great influence over the minds of the people at large, so much so that what the Holi festival is in the Upper Provinces, the Doorga Poojah is in the Lower Provinces of Bengal, being by far the most popular and demonstrative in all their leading features. Though originally and essentially a Hindoo festival of a religious character, dedicated to the worship of a Hindoo god, it has subsequently assumed a jubilant phase, drawing the followers of a different creed to its ranks; hence not a few Mussulmans in Upper India observe it in a secular sense, quite distinct from its religious aspect or requirements.

In Bengal it is called Dole Jattra, or the rocking of the image of Krishna on its throne. It occurs on the day of the full moon in the Bengallee month of Falgoon or March, at the vernal equinox,—a season of the year when all the appetites, passions and desires of the people are supposed to be more or less inflamed, and they naturally seek outlets of gratification. In the Upper Provinces it is known by the name of Holi, or festival of scattering fhag or red powder among friends and others. On the previous night the people both here and in the Upper Provinces burn amidst music the effigy of an uncouth straw image of a giant named Maydhasoor, who caused great disturbance among the gods and goddesses in their hours of meditation and prayer. To put a stop to this unholy molestation the god Narayan or Krishna destroyed the giant by means of his matchless valor and skill, and thus restored peace in heaven as well as on earth. To commemorate this glorious achievement, the image of the above giant is annually burnt on the night previous to the Holi festival.

The religious part of the ceremony, irrespective of its idolatrous element, is performed in accordance with the original rules of the Hindoo ritual, which are free from all kinds of abominations. But the great body of the people, lacking the vital principle of a pure and true faith and following the impulse of unrestrained appetites, have gradually sunk into the depths of corruption,—the outcome of impure imaginations and of a vitiated taste. In Bengal, the observance of this festival is not characterised by anything that is violently opposed to the social amenities of life. Notwithstanding the many-featured phases and multitudinous requirements of the Hindoo creed, the peculiarities of this festival are mainly confined to the worship of the household image, and the entertainment of the Brahmins and friends. Daubing the bodies of the guests with red powder in an either dry or liquid state, and singing songs descriptive of the sports of Krishna with the milk-maids in the groves of Brindabun, form the constituent elements of the festival in Bengal. Offerings of rice, fruits and sweetmeats are made to the god, and its body is also smeared with red powder by the officiating priest, so as to render it one with that of its followers. At the close of the ceremony, the rite of purification is performed, which restores the image—either a piece of stone or metal—to its normal purity.

It is a noteworthy fact that in this festival, no new image made of clay and straw is either set up or thrown into the sacred stream, as is invariably the case with the other Hindoo gods and goddesses generally worshipped by the people of Bengal. Krishna, in whose honor this festival is celebrated, has many forms, one of which generally constitutes the household deity that is worshipped every morning and evening by the hereditary priest with all the solemnity of a religious service. A Hindoo who keeps an image of this god is esteemed more in a religious point of view than one who is without it. In the popular estimation he escapes many censures to which a godless Hindoo is often exposed. Nor is this at all singular. An orthodox Hindoo who offers up his daily prayer to his tutelar deity is at least more consistent in his principles, which, as Confucius very justly says, means Heaven, than one who is tossed about by a wavering faith in the indistinguishable whirl of life.

The festival of Dole Jattra or Holi in Bengal, commencing on the day of the full moon, varies, however, in its observance as to the day on which it is to be held. Some celebrate it on the first, some on the second, and some again on the third, fifth, seventh, ninth day of the dark phase of the moon. Generally Vaishnaws, or the followers of Krishna, observe it, though in some cases, the Saktos,—the followers of Doorga and Kalli—also celebrate it. No bloody sacrifices are offered on the occasion. Apart from the religious merit attributed to the ceremonial, it is comparatively a tame and undemonstrative affair in the Lower Provinces of Bengal when compared with the sensational excitement with which it is celebrated in the Upper Provinces. In Orissa too, it is kept up with great eclat before the shrine of Juggurnauth and its environs. Thousands and tens of thousands of pilgrims from a great distance congregate there on this occasion and offer their oblations to the "stumped" lord of the world. When the inhabitants of Bengal talk of their most popular festivals, they pronounce almost involuntarily the Dole and Doorgutsub, but the latter has long since completely eclipsed the former. Morally, socially and intellectually the enlightened Bengallees are assuredly the Athenians of Hindoostan. Their growing intelligence and refined taste,—the outcome of English education—have imbued them with a healthier ideal of moral excellence than any other section of the Indian population throughout the length and breadth of the land (the Parsis of Bombay excepted). It is owing to the influence of this superior moral sense that they do not abandon themselves to the general corruption of manners obtaining in Upper India during the Holi festival.

"Fools make a mock at sin" is a scriptural proverb which is especially applicable to the inhabitants of the Upper Provinces on the annual return of this festival. Unlike their brethren in Bengal they pay greater attention to the secular than to the religious part of the ceremony. A few days before the Holi, as if to enkindle the flame of a national demonstration of a sensational character, they return to the low, obscene old ballads which constitute a notable feature of the ceremonial. Week after week, day after day, and hour after hour, they pour them out almost as spontaneously as a bird, because they have a perverse propensity for the indulgence of impure thoughts, and rude, profane mirth, which is an outrage on common decency and a scandal to a rational being. Notwithstanding the vigilance of the Police and the stringency of the Penal Code, these ragamuffins stroll along the public streets in bands, dance antics and sing obscene songs with impunity, simply because the major portion of the Native constables come from the same lower strata of society. Of course before a European they dare not commit the same nuisance. Should a luckless female, even old and infirm, chance to come in their way, they unblushingly assail her with a volley of scurrilous and insulting epithets much too gross to be tolerated by a rational being having the smallest modicum of decorum about him. To give a specimen of the songs, vulgar as they unquestionably are, would be an act of unpardonable profanation. Even in the Burra Bazar of Calcutta, where the Up-country Hindoos mostly reside, excesses and enormities are committed, even in the full blaze of day, which alike belie reason and conscience, and ignore the divine part of humanity. Mirth, music and melody do not form the programme of their amusement, but a feverish excitement, originating in lust and leading to criminal excesses, is the characteristic of the scene. If a sober-minded man were permitted to examine the Cash Book of a country liquor shop, he would most assuredly be struck with the enormous receipts of the shopkeeper during the festive days on this occasion. Bacchanalianism in all its most detestable forms reigns rampant in almost every home and purlieu throughout the Upper Provinces. Every brothel, every toddykhannah, every grog shop, is crowded with customers from early morning to dewy evening and later on. An almost incessant volume of polluted and polluting outcries rises to the skies from these dens of sin, smirching and vulgarising the brilliant ideals of a holy festival. The endless chanting of obscene songs, the discordant notes of the inebriated songsters almost tearing their throats in excessive vociferations, the harsh din of music, their frightful gesticulations and contortions of the body, their frantic dance, their dithyrambic fanaticism in which every sense of decorum is lost, their horrid looks rendered tenfold more horrid by reason of their smearing their bodies with red powder, the pestiferous atmosphere by which they are encompassed, and their reeling posture and bestial intoxication, all conspire to make them "mock at sin."[84] Nor is this to be wondered at. The lives and examples of the Hindoo gods have, in a great measure, moulded the character of their followers: "Shiva is represented as declaring to Luckhee that he would part with the merit of his works for the gratification of a criminal passion; Brahma as burning with lust towards his own daughter; Krishna as living with the wife of another, murdering a washerman and stealing his clothes, and sending his friend Yoodhisthira to the regions of torment by causing him to utter a falsehood; Indra and Chundra are seen as the paramours of the wives of their spiritual guides." It is much to be lamented that the authors of the Hindoo mythology have unscrupulously held up the revels of their gods to the imitation of their followers.

It is but just to observe that the more respectable classes are restrained by a sense of honor from participating with the populace in the vicious pleasures of undisciplined passions. But their implied approval of such sensual gratifications tends, in no small degree, to fan the flame of superstitious frenzy. If they do not expose themselves in the highway, they betray their concupiscence within the confines of their own dwellings. They substitute opium and bhang (hemp) for spirituous liquors, and among the females of the house, some aunt or other is the butt of their rude, unseemly satire. Their lusts and want of inward discipline, stimulated by a false religion as well as by the demoralized rules of an abnormal conventionalism, have deadened, as it were, their finer sensibilities, and generations must pass away before they are enabled rightly to appreciate their social relations and their moral and religious duties.