A royal smuggler

The tragic end of the late Chief delayed us more than a week, for, as a matter of courtesy, we were obliged to remain till after the funeral. As, however, like his ancestors, he had died a Mahomedan, his obsequies—very different from others we were shortly to witness—were performed, after the manner of that religion, without ostentation. About the eighth day, when the new Chief considered it decent to admit strangers to his presence, he sent for Prabu.

“O servant of the patriot Pangeran,” he said, “it is thy most earnest desire to proceed to the palace of our royal master, the Rajah?”

“It is the command of my master, and if I live I must obey,” replied Prabu.

“Know then,” said the Chief, “it is the duty of the vassal to notify to his prince the death of his predecessor and his own accession: for this purpose, two of my principal chiefs proceed in my state-prahu with presents to the Rajah. Wilt thou accompany them?”

“Generous and gracious is thy offer, O Chief, and many are the thanks of thy servant,” replied Prabu; and so the next morning, horses being brought to our lodgings, we—at least all but Kati—had mounted and were about to set forth for the river, which led to the capital of the Rajah’s dominions, when Kati, after looking at his steed for a minute, drew his creese, and rolled his eyes about very fiercely.

“Great Heaven! Martin—Prabu,” I cried, “he is about running a muck;” and such, I believe, was his intention, had not his captain commanded him to sheath his weapon and declare his grievance.

“The dog—the son of a burnt mother!” he exclaimed (pointing to the slave who had brought the horses), “has sought to make me eat dirt—he has given me a lamed mare;” at which great cause of passion, Martin and I laughed. Not so, however, Prabu, who at once reprimanded the slave, and ordered him to bring another horse; for, as we then for the first time discovered, no greater disgrace can be offered to a man than a mare for a steed.

This little difficulty being got over, we rode forward through the jungle until we reached the river, where we found a prahu, and the two chiefs on board ready to receive us, which they did in a very friendly manner. This vessel, although not built, like ours, for long voyages, was large enough to hold, if necessary, nearly a hundred persons, and arranged into various rooms—in fact, a kind of floating house, in which the chief, attended by his retinue and the ladies of his household, could take their pleasure for days together. As for the two chiefs, men of very different ages, they were companionable, pleasant personages enough, except when speaking of the Dutch, then they were ferocious. Indeed, the eldest was one of the many natives of the island we had met, who chronicled a vendetta in his heart against their European conquerors.

It appeared that his father, a principal chief of one of the eastern provinces, having risen in arms against the Dutch, and being defeated and slain, he and an only brother, to whom he was passionately attached, had been sold as slaves to one of the merchants of Batavia. The merchant continuing, over a series of years, to treat the two youths very cruelly, one of them, the brother, had in a moment of desperation slain his master: for this crime he was condemned to death, and his brother compelled to stand by and witness the execution. It must have been a terrible sight, as indeed it must be a lasting disgrace to a nation, both European and Christian, who could have inflicted such a punishment. But let my readers judge for themselves by the very words of a Dutchman, who, having witnessed one of these executions, thus records it:—

“The punishments inflicted at Batavia are excessively severe, especially such as fall upon the natives. I saw an execution of this kind of a slave who had murdered his master, which was done in the following manner: The criminal was led in the morning to the place of execution, being a grass-plot, and laid upon his stomach, held by four men. The executioner made a transverse incision at the lower part of the body; he then introduced the sharp point of the spike, which was about six feet long and made of polished iron, into the wound, so that it passed between the backbone and the skin. Two men drove it forcibly upwards along the spine, while the executioner held the end and gave it a proper direction, till it came out of the neck and shoulders. The lower end was then put into a wooden post and riveted fast, and the sufferer was lifted up thus impaled, and the post stuck in the ground. At the top of the post, about ten feet from the ground, there was a kind of little bench, upon which the body rested.

“The insensibility or fortitude of the wretched man was incredible. He did not utter the least complaint, except when the spike was riveted into the pillar; the hammering and shaking occasioned by it seemed to be intolerable to him, and he then bellowed out with pain, and likewise, once again, when he was lifted up and set in the ground. He sat in this dreadful situation till death put an end to his torments, which, fortunately, happened the next day, about three o’clock in the afternoon. He owed this speedy termination of his misery to a light shower of rain, which continued for about an hour, and he gave up the ghost half-an-hour afterwards.

“There have been instances, at Batavia, of criminals who have been impaled in the dry season, and have remained alive for eight or nine days without any food or drink, which is prevented being given them by a guard, who is stationed at the place of execution for that purpose. One of the surgeons of the city assured me that none of the parts immediately necessary to life are injured by impalement, which makes the punishment the more cruel and intolerable, but that as soon as any water gets into the wound it mortifies, and occasions gangrene—which directly attacks the more noble parts, and brings on death almost immediately.”

Speaking again of the slave, the same writer continues:—

“This miserable sufferer continually complained of insufferable thirst, which is peculiarly incident to this terrible punishment. The criminals are exposed during the whole day to the burning rays of the sun, and are unceasingly tormented by numerous stinging insects. I went to see him again about three hours before he died, and found him conversing with the bystanders. This he did with great composure; yet an instant afterwards he burst out in the bitterest complaints of unquenchable thirst, and raved for drink, while no one was allowed to alleviate, by a single drop of water, the excruciating torments he underwent.”

These are the kind of punishments meted out to a subjected race by a Christian people—a people, too, who have themselves known the lash, the stake, the thumb-screw, and the thousand other devilish inventions of torture adopted by the Governors of the tyrant Philip, in the Low Countries, to suppress mental and political freedom. One would have thought that their own great sufferings would have taught them forbearance to others, but no! Scarcely had they burst their own bonds, than, voyaging to the East, their insatiate thirst for gold rendered them willing slaves to the strong, as in China and Japan—tyrants to the weak, as in the Archipelago. Taking advantage of the simple islanders, who received them with the warmest hospitality, they commenced a series of small conquests; but finding themselves called upon to exercise the functions of sovereigns and politicians, these rapacious adventurers—too weak and incompetent to undertake a conquest upon a grand scale, and by which it is possible the natives then, settled under so many petty despots, might have been benefited—had recourse to a policy of subtlety and intrigue, the consequence of which has been continued wars, waste of human life, and a mutual hatred between them and the natives, to the ruin and destruction of the islands, and the great misery of their inhabitants.

Equally blamable are the Dutch in having neglected to teach their Asiatic subjects the full value of their native soil and climate, and for their shortsighted policy in keeping from them a knowledge of American machinery, by means of which labor would have been made a hundred times more productive, and the people prosperous. This is especially exemplified, as we shall now see, in the present state of the cotton manufactures in these islands.

For the greater part of our journey, we found the banks upon both sides of the river covered with dense jungle: here and there, however, there were extensive tracts of cleared land, upon which hundreds of women were busily engaged.

“A glorious country for lazy men!—for it is only the women who labor in the fields,” said Martin.

“Aye, they are picking cotton,” replied Prabu; and afterwards we learned that Bali was famous for its production of cloth, and that the labors of the loom, and the whole operation which the raw material undergoes, from the moment it is brought from the field until it is fit for apparel, is performed by women only. It is not very gallant, truly, but then it only shows a rude state of society; for such was originally the case among the great nations of Asia—the Arabians, Persians, Hindoos, and Chinese, although, ages since, they have passed that era in the art. Then their process of weaving is so rude and unskilful, and consequently so expensive, that it is scarcely too much to say, that Nature’s rich gift of a soil to produce the raw material seems wasted upon them. But, as I have said, the shortsighted, avaricious Dutch are to blame for this, for they might have introduced the American processes, by which they would have no less enriched themselves than the natives. Picture to yourself, my reader, such a substitute for calico-printing as is described below, in a country over which Europeans have ruled for nearly two centuries and a half!—

Of calico-printing the Javanese are entirely ignorant, but they have a singular substitute. The part not intended to be colored, or that which forms the ground in a web of cloth, they daub over with melted wax. The cloth thus treated is thrown into the dyeing-vat, and the interstices take the color of the pattern; if a second or third color is to be added, the operation is to be repeated on the ground preserved by the first application of wax—more wax is applied, and the cloth is once, or oftener, consigned to the vat. The greater refinement attempted, the more certain seems to be the failure. Moreover, this awkward substitute for printing costs 100 per cent., at least, on the price of the cloth; but notwithstanding the unskilful manufacturing industry of the Javanese, it generally excels that of the other islanders. The natives of Celebes and the people of Bali are the only tribes besides that may be called considerable manufacturers of cloth.

But to return to my narrative. Upon reaching the capital, we were visited by a Bopartis, or governor. This dignitary ordered us to remain on board until he had reported our arrival, and its purport, to the Rajah. That same night, however, he returned to the prahu, with orders from the Rajah to conduct us to his own house, within the Karaton, until his highness should be pleased to grant Prabu an audience. But a few words about these buildings, for they are amongst the most notable of the antiquities of Java and the immediately adjacent islands.

These Karatons (residences of princes) are, in fact, walled cities;—the palace occupying the center of the town, and being surrounded on all sides by the habitations of the attendants, retainers, and followers of the prince and the members of his family. The empty spaces are occupied by the prince’s gardens, and by tanks and ponds. The area is intersected by an endless labyrinth of walls, the whole being concealed, at any considerable distance, by a profusion of ornamental and fruit trees. The great approach to the Karaton is to the north, and through a square or court of considerable extent, called the alun-alun, a constant appendage of every Javanese palace. It is in this open space that the sovereigns, once in eight days, in conformity to Oriental usage, show themselves to their subjects. Here all tournaments are exhibited; all public processions are formed; and here the retainers of the nobles wait, while the chiefs themselves pay their respects to the sovereign. A row of Indian fig-trees adorns the sides of the square; and in the center, each surrounded by a wall, are to be invariably seen two great trees of the same kind, the space between which is that allotted for public executions. These trees, by the way, are considered almost sacred, and may be looked upon as remnants of Buddhism; for the Indian fig-tree is consecrated by the followers of that sect. Wherever they are found, even in the most desolate parts of the country, we are able to trace the palace or dwelling of some ancient chief or prince.

After passing through the great square, we arrive at the Paseban, a place shaded by a canopy, supported on pillars, and intended to afford temporary accommodation to the nobility while they await to be summoned into the presence. From the Paseban, a spacious flight of steps brings us to the Sitingil, a handsome terrace, in the center of which is one of the usual Pandrapa. It is here the sovereign seats himself at all public festivals—occasions when a degree of barbaric magnificence is displayed, that approaches to those dreams of Eastern grandeur which the minds of Europeans imbibe from books, but which are soon dissipated by an experience of the tameness of the reality. From the Sitingil the visitor descends by another stair, parallel to that by which he has entered, and, by a variety of winding passages, is conveyed through a series of gates and brought in succession to the different palaces of the prince, each dignified by pompous epithets, drawn from the copiousness of an exuberant language.

Well, it was in a spacious residence belonging to the Bopartis, in the Karaton, that we found ourselves comfortably lodged and awaiting the promised audience. Upon the morning of the third day, as Prabu, my brother and I were squatting upon our mats partaking the morning meal, we were aroused by the most terrible discord—howling of women and men. Martin and I ran to the veranda: the open space before the house was filled with people—not a stationary crowd, but a moving throng, all groaning, shrieking, and screaming as they passed along.

“What on earth is the meaning of all this?” said I.

“Whose chimney is on fire? you mean, Claud. I’ll be bound it is not anything much more terrible,” replied Martin, with a laugh, which, by the way, was forced; for afterwards he confessed that he had some notion of a rebellion and general massacre—no very uncommon occurrence in the East.

“God is great!” exclaimed Prabu; “some sudden calamity has happened,” and he left the house to inquire. We followed, and coming up to a bevy of men and women, shrieking, crying, beating their breasts and tearing their hair, asked them the reason of the noise.

“Siva hath visited the city with vengeance for its sins! Our mother is called away.”

“Their mother!” said the incorrigible Martin to me. “The old lady must have had a large family!” But Prabu, overhearing the words, said, quite seriously:

“Truly, sahib, she had a large family; nearly the whole people of Bali were her children, and to them she was a good mother.”

“What mean you?” I asked; “that the Queen is dead?”

“Alas! sahib, it is so: the good and heroic Ratu Wandan Savi died suddenly during the night.”

“And so spoiled our breakfast,” replied Martin.

“Shame, brother! Speak not thus flippantly of so serious a matter,” said I, angrily.

“Why surely, old Claud, you wouldn’t have me, a Christian, go howling and shrieking about the streets, like a half-tamed wild beast, for the death of a person I never saw! You might as well expect me to go into mourning for a Queen of the Cannibal Islands. But,” he added, seriously, “Prabu, tell us who and what was this Queen, whom you call both good and great?”

“Towards the latter part of his reign, the late Rajah, being at war with the Prince of Gelgel, suffered a great defeat; and notwithstanding the bravery of his son, the present Rajah, who commanded the army, would have lost his dominions, for the Gelgel Rajah had already invaded them; but his niece, the Ratu, then a princess, presented herself before the troops accoutered as a warrior, spoke of the bravery of her ancestors, harangued them, distributed gifts, and put herself at their head. This reviving their courage and spirits, the soldiers fought like lions, and succeeded in destroying the invading army and taking the Prince of Gelgel and his family prisoners.”

“A plucky girl that!” said Martin—“a kind of Balinese Joan-of-Arc. Of course the Rajah married her; I would if I had been he.”

“The Rajah married her to his son, Sahib Martin,” said Prabu.

“A very proper promotion, too! I hope he deserved her.”

“He did: she has ever since been his chief wife and queen.”

“Well, that’s something, certainly; but if I had been the princess, I should have expected, after all I had done, to have been his only one. But, anyhow, it is a good story, if only for being the first I have heard in which the Dutch are not mixed up.”

“But they were, sahib,” said Prabu. “It was the Hollanders who incited the Prince of Gelgel to war against the Rajah of Blilling.”

“Well,” cried Martin, at random—for he was, as it were, caught in his own trap—“thank Heaven, I am no Dutchman!”

“Allah be praised you are not!—for then Prabu could not have befriended thee, even at thy utmost need,” replied our companion. “But, sahibs,” he added, “the good Queen’s death happening at this time is especially unfortunate.”

“Why more at this time than any other?” I asked.

“Because, sahib, the Rajah will grant no audience until after the funeral, and that cannot, according to custom, take place in less than one month and seven days.”

“Whew!” whistled Martin; “a pretty time to be cooped up here! How shall we pass our time?”

“Take to the woods or the river, and employ ourselves with our guns,” I suggested; and so we did, day by day, but for all that the time hung heavily upon our hands. As for Kati, Prabu sent him back to the prahu; for, for some reason unknown to us, he had no great faith in the honesty of the young chief Mahomed.

A few mornings after this, as my brother and I, accompanied by Prabu, were passing through the principal street on our way to the jungle, we encountered a procession that somewhat startled us—at least Martin and me. It consisted of twenty litters, in each of which sat a young woman attired in white, and accompanied by an aged attendant of the same sex. The appearance of the two was contrasted; for whereas the girls looked as joyful as if going to a wedding, the old ladies looked as dismal as if they were attending a funeral. There was also a band of musicians in the rear, playing a very lively air.

“Strange,” I remarked, “that such doings should be permitted at a time of public mourning!”

“Sahib, these women are the chief mourners for the late Queen: they were her slaves, devoted to her through life—they will accompany her in death. Yesterday, the whole of the Queen’s women sought the Rajah, and earnestly, and in tears, besought his permission to accompany their mistress to the next world: from among the applicants his Highness selected these.”

“Ah!” I exclaimed, with a shudder; “I had forgotten they are Hindoos.”

Of course my reader has heard of suttee or widow-burning, so long practiced in our Indian Empire, but now, to a great extent, suppressed by the English Government. Well, that inhuman rite has never prevailed on the continent of India to the same extent as among the islanders, amongst whom, indeed, it is supposed to have had its origin.

When a prince or princess of the royal family dies, their women or slaves walk around the body, uttering cries and frightful howlings, and all begging to die for their master or mistress. The Rajah, on the following day, designates, one by one, those of whom he makes choice for the privilege, as had been the case with the twenty poor creatures in that procession. From that moment to the last of their lives, they are daily conducted, at an early hour, without the town, to perform their devotions, having their feet wrapped in white linen; for it is no more permitted to them to touch the bare earth, because they are considered as consecrated. The old women who accompany them are for the purpose of fanning the flame of their enthusiasm, and to keep them from wavering as the hour of death draws nigh. The night before the day of execution these poor creatures are made to pass in continual dancing and rejoicing, without being permitted to close an eye. All pains are taken to give them whatever tends to the gratification of their senses, and from the quantity of wine which they take, few objects are capable of terrifying their imaginations. Besides, their minds are inflamed by the promises of their priests, and their mistaken notions of the joys of another state of existence. How strongly this reminds one of the Aztec festival, in honor of Tezcatlipoca (the Mexican Jupiter), only in the latter the ghastly mockery of state and happiness was kept up by the victim for twelve months before he was butchered upon the sacrificial stone, to be afterwards served up, with the rarest of condiments, at the tables of the priests and nobles!

But if, day after day, for the prescribed period of mourning, we were shocked at this procession, now that we knew its intent, how shall I describe our feelings at witnessing the sacrifices! But my readers shall judge for themselves. About noon, on the day appointed for the funeral, the procession started from the palace. First came the twenty doomed girls, in the order according to their rank in the deceased’s household, each in an elegantly-constructed badi or litter, bedecked with flowers, and followed by an aged woman, who would, from time to time, endeavor to fan the perhaps now dying flames of enthusiasm;—then, priests, bearing roasted viands, rice, and betelnut, as offerings to the gods, followed by musicians, playing triumphant tunes. So they moved onward, until they arrived at the place of sacrifice. Here there were twenty scaffolds, in the form of troughs, each raised upon four poles, and edged in on two sides with planks. The victims having arrived, they were thrice carried round a circle. After this, the sufferers were placed in troughs, which was the signal for the approach of a man and a woman to each: the former, snatching the flowers which bedecked the girls, held them above their heads with pieces of the offerings to the gods, which the women posted behind them snatched from their hands and threw upon the ground. Then a priest let loose a pigeon, as an emblem that their victims’ souls were on the point of taking their flight to the mansions of the blessed! At this moment there was a solemn and mournful silence; but amongst the victims, not a lip quivered, not a muscle moved; but you could see the bosoms heaving beneath the white robes, and, I fancied, could hear the beating of their hearts. There were wet eyes, and sobs, too; but it was from their relations in the crowd, whose natural affections could not be entirely subdued, even by these dire superstitions.

Suddenly, at a signal from the chief priest, four powerful men ran up to one of the victims, and divested her of all her garments but the sash; then two seized her arms, the other two her feet, so as to extend her form to its full length: a fifth drew his poignard. Simultaneously, the same terrible tragedy was being performed upon the other nineteen. But let me get over the sad story, made sadder by the mistaken heroism of these poor girls. During all this, none had their eyes covered. Some few, seeing the butcher draw forth his poignard, demanded it; receiving it in the right hand and passing it into the left, they respectfully kissed the weapon; then, having wounded their left arms, they sucked the blood, stained their lips with it, and made a point with the blood upon their foreheads. Then returning the daggers to their executioners, the latter stabbed them to the heart, and they died without a complaint escaping them. At this moment I felt my arm clutched convulsively—a slight shriek. Turning round, I saw that my brave, joyous brother Martin had fainted with horror.

“Water, water!—for heaven’s sake, water, Prabu,” I exclaimed; but there was no necessity for such a call. The people, the bystanders, who could look so cruelly, coolly upon that terrible scene, flocked around him, and, with the kindness of innocent natives, aided in restoring him.

“Claud, Claud,” he cried, coming to, “this is too sickly, too horrible! Let us go;” and, nearly as much overcome as himself, I led him away.

From hearsay, therefore, will I describe the rest of that horrible rite—even more horrible than those of the Aztecs; for among the latter the sacrifices were performed by priests, but in Bali by common executioners, who receive as a reward fifty pieces of copper money each.

After the death of the victims, their nearest relations present came forward, washed the bodies, and covered them with perfumed wood, in such a manner that the head alone remained visible. They were then placed upon the funeral pile and consumed to ashes.

About this time the body of the Queen—which, by the way, from a superstitious notion that it will cheat the devil (whom they believe lies in wait in the ordinary passage), had been brought from the palace through an aperture especially made in the wall—arrived at the funeral pyre. It was borne upon a superb badi, or litter, of a pyramidal form, consisting of eleven steps, and supported by a number of persons, proportioned to the rank of the deceased. At each side of the body were seated two women—one holding an umbrella, and the other a flapper of horsehair, to drive away insects. Two priests preceded the badi, in vehicles of a particular form, holding each in one hand a cord attached to the badi (as if giving to understand that they were leading the deceased to heaven), and ringing with the other a little bell; while such a noise of gongs, tabors, flutes, and other instruments was made, that the whole ceremony had less the air of a funeral procession than of a joyous village festival.

When the body had passed the funeral piles arranged in its route, it was placed upon its own, which was forthwith lighted, while the chair and couch used by the deceased in her lifetime were also burned. The assistants then regaled themselves with a feast, while the musicians, without cessation, struck the ear with a tumultuous melody, not unpleasing. This festivity continued till evening, when, the bodies being consumed, the relatives returned to their homes, leaving a guard for the protection of the bones—those of the Queen only, for the rest were gathered up and thrown away.

The next day the bones of the Queen were carried back to her former habitation, with a ceremony equal in pomp to that of the preceding day; there they remained for a month and seven days. Each day a number of men proceeded to the palace, with vessels of silver, brass, and earth, filled with water, and accompanied by a band of musicians and pikemen. There were also other attendants, carrying green boughs, the mirror, the vest, betel-box, and other domestic articles belonging to the deceased. Every day during the above period the bones were devoutly washed, after which, being placed in a litter, they were conveyed (accompanied by a similar retinue to that which had attended the corpse in its first removal from the palace) to a place called Labee, where they were entirely burned, and the ashes, being carefully collected in urns, were cast into the sea.

By the law of Bali, no woman or slave is obliged to follow this barbarous custom; yet even those who have desired to submit to it and have not been accepted, as well as those who have not offered themselves, are alike shut up for the remainder of their lives in a convent, without being permitted the sight of a man. If any one should find means to escape from her prison, and is afterwards taken, her fate is instantly decided; she is poignarded, dragged through the streets, and her body cast to the dogs to be devoured—the most ignominious form of inflicting death in that country. That, however, these unfortunate women do sometimes escape is evinced by the following anecdote, given by a Dutchman, who was sent as ambassador from the Governor-General of Batavia to the sovereign of Bali:—

“On the death of the reigning king, the whole of his wives and concubines, sometimes to the number of a hundred or a hundred and fifty, devote themselves to the flames. None of them are previously poignarded, a distinction confined to this occasion. As they are at such a time permitted to walk without restraint, it happened, at the funeral of the late King of Bali, that one of his women, as she was preparing to follow the example of her companions, lost her courage at the sight of the dreadful preparations. She had sufficient presence of mind, in approaching the bridge, to ask leave to withdraw for a moment on some common pretext, which being granted without any suspicion, she betook herself to flight with all possible speed. The singularity of the circumstance, rather than any motive of compassion, saved her life, and gave her her freedom. Afterwards, she was seen daily at the public market selling provisions; and although she was regarded by all persons of rank with the utmost contempt, she heeded neither looks nor words.

“Another object of contempt among the Balinese, and for a reason sufficiently singular, is the female slave to whose lot it falls to wash the dead body of her mistress, during the month and seven days before the funeral rites. It is, in fact, for the performance of this task that her life is saved, and liberty afterwards given to her to retire where she pleases into the country to earn her livelihood.”

The same writer gives us the following interesting account of the self-immolation of the princesses of the blood-royal:—

“At the funeral of the king’s two sons, who died a short time before, forty-two women of the one, and thirty-four of the other, were poignarded and burnt in the manner above described; but on such occasions, the princesses of royal blood leap themselves at once into the flames, as did at this particular time the principal wives of the princes in question, because they would look upon themselves as dishonored by any one laying hands on their persons. For this purpose, a kind of bridge is erected over the burning pile, which they mount, holding in their hands a paper close to their foreheads, and having their robe tucked up under their arms. As soon as they feel the heat, they precipitate themselves into the burning pit, which is surrounded by a palisade of cocoa-nut stems: in case their firmness should abandon them at the appalling sight, a brother, or other near relative, is at hand to push them in, and render them, out of affection, that cruel office.

“We were informed that the first wife of the younger of the two princes just alluded to, who was daughter to the king’s sister, asked her father, who was Prince of Couta, whether, as she was but three months married, and on account of her extreme youth, she ought to devote herself on the funeral pile of her deceased husband? Her father, less alive to the voice of nature than to the prejudices of his nation, represented to her so strongly the disgrace she would, by preferring to live, bring upon herself and all her family, that the unfortunate young woman, summoning all her courage, gaily leapt into the flames, which were already devouring the dead body of her husband.”