‘As Darwin pointed out so well, Homo sapiens was not evolved from the apes, nor from the Neanderthals. The process of evolution is like the growth of a tree. A branch sprouts out from the trunk, grows, blossoms and bears fruit — the apes. The trunk continues and another branch sprouts to become the Neanderthals. Yet another, the Homo erectus. And another, the Homo sapiens. Each branch gives off more branches and the trunk continues to grow further and further from its roots. Evolution is not restricted to living beings. It applies to ideas as well, and ideologies. Within the evolution of life lies hidden another kind of evolution, that of destruction. Destruction is also an ideology, continuously growing and evolving. One branch of it blossomed and resulted in us. Yet another became the thugs. Though they branched out after us, their development was arrested a few steps behind ours, mainly in the manner of the sacrifice of the victims. Ours went one step further and arrived at the concept of self-sacrifice. After the sacrifice of the victim came the sacrifice of the sacrificer himself. What will come next? Who knows. Who are we to predict the path of evolution? We can only wait and watch.
‘Speaking of evolution, the Franks who chanced to meet us during the crusades thought that we were an altogether new species, different from humans. But they still took us along with them on their crusades. Ironically, that meant that we were really fighting on both sides of the war between Islam and Christianity. For, our interests lay not in religion, but in destruction. It fell to the Mongols, who were running a much larger campaign of destruction, to finally suppress us. People of Sleeman’s race, who suppressed the thugs so efficiently, were also far ahead of their colonial victims in the art of destruction. Sleeman himself suspected that the thugs were biologically different from other humans. If you look at the chronological order, you will find that Sleeman’s campaigns occurred between the discoveries of Malthus and Darwin!
‘Sleeman had the heads of seven thugs cut off after they had been hanged and sent them to the Phrenological Society of Scotland so they could investigate if the shape of the skulls hinted at any biological differences from the normal humans. Modern anatomy schools were all the rage in Edinburgh in those days. Dr Henry Spry, who was doing comparative anatomical science there, and conducted the studies, wrote about it in his book Modern India published in 1837. He classified the thugs into the same category in which he placed the crews of slave ships and also the more desperate among soldiers. He defined them as men who individually were not quite so prone to cruelty, but who, when the circumstances presented themselves, felt little or no compunction in inflicting unimaginable cruelty. In other words, they fell into the same category as the white men of Europe. Martine van Woerkens, a French historian, in a recent work goes a step further to say that the experiments and observations of Sleeman, Spry and the Edinburgh Phrenological Society were the precursors of the Nazi ideology of the twentieth century. A Nazi theoretician apparently compared Jews to the thugs and praised Sleeman for his efficiency in exterminating the thugs. It was his considered opinion that any Jew who had not yet committed a crime was most probably going to commit one in future. Ironically, the label that belonged on his own skull was mistakenly stamped on his victims!
‘There is yet another fascinating story about the schools of anatomy in Edinburgh. During the time the Spry investigations were going on in the Phrenological Society, anatomy schools were facing a great scarcity of dead bodies for dissection. (Isn’t that true even today?) There is a book titled Death, Dissection and the Destitute set in this background, by a research scholar named Ruth Richardson. Richardson became interested in Britain’s Anatomy Act of 1832 quite by accident. She was working on a study of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and discovered that during their courtship Mary and Percy Shelley would secretly meet in the St Pancras churchyard, a well-known haunt of bodysnatchers and grave-robbers of London, where Mary’s mother was buried. Perhaps Mary Shelley got the idea for her mad scientist, Dr Frankenstein, who creates a monster from pieces of dead human bodies, there. Ruth Richardson, also inspired by the graveyard, embarked on a research on grave robberies during that period and uncovered some interesting facts such as the gruesome Burke and Hare murders which shook the conscience of the public in those days. Burke and Hare ran a cheap lodging house and when an aging lodger died, owing them money, they sold his corpse to an anatomist named Dr Robert Knox. They got seven pounds for it. This seeded the idea for a brilliant business venture. They would offer free lodging and boarding to beggars and the destitute, give them food and whisky and then smother them in their sleep and sell the corpses at a profit to the anatomists, who were ever-hungry for fresh corpses. Edinburgh, which then ranked at the top in medical education and research, thus got corpses not only of thugs from faraway lands but also of the victims of white thugs such as Burke and Hare. When the story came out Burke was tried by the courts and hanged and then publicly dissected. We don’t know if any phrenological studies were conducted on his skull! Hare escaped the same fate by turning King’s witness. Knox was not charged, but an incensed crowd burned his effigy on the streets.
‘You are probably wondering why I am taking you on these seemingly aimless meanderings. It will all become clear, be patient. It is time for breakfast and the bearer has just brought it in. Why don’t you enjoy your meal for now?’
Obediently, I did. And it was lavish, with fruits and coffee to round it off. Passengers were happy and expressed their satisfaction to each other. I was far from happy, and in spite of the near-certain possibility of becoming more unhappy, I returned to the letter.
‘Nothing like a hearty breakfast to revive one’s spirits! Now let us move on,’ Hasan continued. ‘Frankly, my knowledge is not trivial. When it comes to acquiring knowledge, assassins are not far behind lovers of humanity. One may even say that that is the point of convergence of these two streams. Both of us aid our prey in becoming the bloody flowers on the altars of our objects of worship, be they gods, causes or aesthetic ecstasy. As there is love inside us, there is cruelty inside the lovers of humanity. Stevenson, Mary Shelley and Bram Stoker are examples of your lovers of humanity. But inside them lay hidden Hyde, Frankenstein and Dracula. Homer, Valmiki and Vyasa are no different. Not just in cinema, literature or art, even in pop music we see plenty of evidence that it is fear and horror that brings guaranteed thrill and pleasure to the minds of the audience.
‘Like anyone among you, we hashishins too conduct business, provide for our families, bargain for vegetables and clothes at the market, nod our heads to the beat of music … And need I point out that people who are not hashishins but do exactly these same things also enjoy stories of violence in novels, cinema and newspapers? God is for all, to believe, to worship, to obey or to deny, as the occasion may be. While some carry the cross, others carry their dagger or pickaxe. Have you ever asked yourself why the cross, the dagger and the pickaxe have the same shape? They all bear the shape of the human body.
‘The cross was an instrument of torture. Ironically, Christians have adopted the image not of their God, but rather of the instrument of his pain and suffering as a divine symbol and made it an object of worship. They cast it in gold and embellish it with floral designs. Do what they will, can they cover its cruel impress? Unhesitatingly, they wear it around their necks, a symbol of service, with the power even to drive away evil spirits. Ameer Ali wrote about the hashishins being hunted by the people of Damascus in the city streets. The fedayeen of our day who carry out destruction on a much larger and grander scale than the Batinis are not hunted like that. People who become their prey look up to them with wonder and awe. Their sacrifice is recognized, albeit silently. That is evolution for you.