Max Freedom Long - The Teachings of Huna

"Well," he said grandly, "turn it on. See if you can believe what the camera got."

I pulled out a couple of chairs and threw in the switch. On the screen at the end of the projection-room lifelike shadows began to flicker and move.

"That," explained my new friend, "is the parade. It came before the service in the temple's courtyard. That bunch going past now are the candidates who had been getting ready for years to take the fire initiation of the Agni cult. Odd beggars, those brown people. See the funny looks on their faces. They all seemed to be thinking hard about something as they marched along. Never seemed to notice the crowd which had gone crazy with excitement just to see them. Seems everyone hopes some day to get ready to walk through the fire—great honor. Walk through once and you are set for life. You become some sort of priest or holy man. All the priests in the temple have had to walk through fire to get their jobs."

"How do they do it?" I asked as I watched the long parade move past with all its Oriental trappings.

"Wouldn't you jolly well like to know! And wouldn't I?"

"What do you think?" I urged.

"How should I know? I tried to get it out of the priests, but they spoofed me, I think. They said theirs was the one and only true religion and that the fire-walking proved it. Said no other faith could make it possible for the converts to walk through fire. What they wanted me to believe was that their god kept the feet of the pure and holy from being burned. Those who weren't quite pure enough got burned." He pointed suddenly to the screen. "See that chap? He's the priest I managed to get off to one side to talk to, at about the time the parade was done marching all over the city. Good sort. Really rather sporting. He was smart, too."

"How do you mean?" I asked.

"Not like most of the other beggars—suspicious and hating white skins. And by 'smart' I mean he was smart enough to pretend to believe me when I told him I'd studied his religion and wanted to join up. I thought he was going to laugh in my face at first, but I jingled money in my pocket and he began to take me seriously."

"Perhaps he did take you seriously," I suggested as I watched the parade continue to pass on the screen.

"He was no fool, not that one. He'd heard money. And when I told him I would join up and pay well if I could be allowed to see the fire-walking with my own eyes, he got my drift. I insisted on giving him a good donation for his church right there. He thanked me for it and told me to meet him in a little while at a side-door of the temple. Of course, I didn't say anything about bringing along my little movie camera."

The scene changed suddenly on the screen and the inner courtyard of the temple appeared. It was a large court surrounded by high walls. Below us and at one end was a long, high pile of burning charcoal which shimmered with intense heat. It was perhaps fifty feet long and about five feet high. Men were beginning to rake it out into a long, narrow platform of living coals as I watched.

"That's it!" cried my English friend. "I met my priest and got in with my camera case without his knowing what I was up to. He took me up to a balcony and hid me behind some bamboo screens. I paid some more church dues and he went off. In a minute I had a hole in the screen for the lens and one for the finder. My camera was all loaded and ready, so I had at it right away.

"I took the beginning and the end of the raking out of the coals," he continued as the scene changed. "See? Now they are all done and are smoothing down the bed. About six inches deep. The charcoal had been burning for ten hours, the priest told me. Hot as Hades! Made it so hot, even off there behind the bamboo screen, that I could hardly stand it. And see how the rakers have to keep their heads turned away and have to keep turning their bodies from side to side so they won't roast. Beastly hot!

"And now watch that gate in this scene. I began filming when I heard the noise outside. I knew the procession was about to come in. There they are! Priests in front and the candidates next. All men candidates—women are too sinful ever to get purified. Lots of the men are old. Forty-three I counted. And see their faces—look like they were going to afternoon tea—got on their most polite faces. Those big fellows in uniform are Sikh bobbies. Find them in all British possessions. They don't belong to the temple, but the authorities send them along to keep order. You'll see them keeping it right soon."

As I watched, the procession moved into the courtyard. The candidates gathered in a silent group at one end of the long bed of shimmering coals. Behind them gathered a mixed crowd of men, women and children, all greatly excited. The Sikhs moved slowly through the crowd, their clubs in hand. The priests had gone around the fire and met another group of six priests who had come from the temple and were taking their places at the opposite end of the bed of coals. In the hands of each of the six was a short whip with many lashes. Between them and the fire was a shallow water- filled indentation in the paving. It was about six feet wide, four inches deep and ten feet long, extending all across the end of the glowing platform.

"What are the whips for?" I asked. "Are they to keep the fire-walkers out of the water?"

"You'll see in a moment," was the hurried answer. "Seems that when they step out of the fire into the water, the priests have to beat them to keep their minds off their hot feet for a second. I asked the priest but didn't understand what he tried to tell me—something about an old custom."

"Do neither the whips nor the fire hurt them?" I demanded.

"The whips do. Lay their backs open sometimes. But keep your eyes on the picture. See? They are all praying now. Making a lot of funny gibberish. Praying to Agni to protect the pure and burn the impure. Gave me the creeps.…"

The camera moved back to the silent group of candidates. They were taking no part in the prayers, but simply waiting. They wore only loin-cloths. Then a bent old man raised his hand, as in greeting, to someone in the crowd behind. He turned and walked slowly to the pathway which danced and shimmered before him. Clasping his hands and lifting his face as if in appeal to Heaven, he walked calmly into the bed of fire. I caught my breath. With a firm, steady stride he went wading through the coals toward the priests who waited at the far end.

I scarcely breathed as I watched. His feet were leaving black tracks which closed over and were lost in a moment after he had passed. On and on he went, never changing his pace. Made slightly misty and unreal by the heat waves rising all about him, he seemed more an apparition than a man. As I stared, my amazement was tinged with doubt. What I was seeing was an impossibility. But the end of that dreadful pacing came at last. The old man stepped from the living fire into the water and was instantly taken by the arms on either side by two priests. Their cruel whips flashed three times, cutting into the bare brown back. The old man writhed with pain. Two more priests took him and hurried him off to a bench beside the wall. They examined a foot each, nodded, and hurried back to their places.

The camera flashed around and caught another candidate just as he stepped into the coals. He was a thin, middle-aged man. His face was turned to the waiting priests and his hands were clenched and swinging at his sides. With long rapid strides he began his ordeal. His pace quickened. His head went up and his face lifted as if away from the heat. He was half-way through and walking more and more rapidly. Suddenly his pace broke and he went on at a rapid trot. The trot increased to a run, and as he came to the end of the fiery bed he leaped frantically for the water. Hardly had he leaped before the whips fell. They fell in flashing blows that doubled the candidate as he strained in the strong grasp of the two priests.