Experiences of previous travellers

Late Mr Surendranath Banerjee had described in his biography, how difficult it was to go to England in his younger days and what was the mental attitude of those who dared to go to England. He wrote –
“ As I have observed I started for England on March 3rd 1868. Romesh Chandra Dutt and Beharilal Gupta were with me. We were all young in our teens and visit to England in those days was a more serious affair than it is now. It did not only mean absence from home but the grim prospect of social ostracism. We all three had to make arrangements in secret, as if we were engaged in some nefarious plot of which the world should know nothing. My father was helping me everyway but the fact had to be carefully concealed from my mother and when at last on the eve of my departure the news had to be broken to her she fainted away under the shock of what to her was terrible news”. (p10)
 
“A visit to England, however, was a new form of heterodoxy to which our country had not yet become accustomed. The anglicised habits of some of those who had come back from England added to the general alarm”. (p26)
 
“Some of our best men had fallen victims to the curse of drink. It was considered to be an inseparable part of English culture. A man who did not drink was hardly entitled to be called educated. The saintly Raj Narayan tells us how he himself meeting other friends called for a drink and how they were found all lying on the floor in a state of more or less inebriety.” (page7).
 
What happened after Banerjee returned from England?
Banerjee says, “Although I was taken back into the old home by the members of my family, the whole attitude of Hindu Society, of the rank and file, was one of unqualified disapproval. My family was practically outcasted. We were among the highest of Brahmins, but those who used to eat and drink with us on ceremonial occasions stopped all social contacts and refused to invite us.” (page 26).
 
Mr Surendranath also mentions how majority of “England Returned” leading gentlemen took to the European style of eating and drinking at home and some of them went to the length of throwing the leftovers of their meals, bones and flesh and all over their wall into the compounds of their orthodox neighbours just to spite their religious feelings.”
[Note – Suez Canal was opened only in 1869. Surendranath Banerjee had to travel to London via Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of South Africa, a journey of some 8,000 miles!! ]
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>