The Tower of Silence, on the heights of the Malabar Hill, is the
last abode of all the sons of Zoroaster. It is, in fact, a Parsee
cemetery. Here their dead, rich and poor, men, women and children,
are all laid in a row, and in a few minutes nothing remains of
them but bare skeletons. A dismal impression is made upon a
foreigner by these towers, where absolute silence has reigned for
centuries. This kind of building is very common in every place
were Parsees live and die. In Bombay, of six towers, the largest
was built 250 years ago, and the least but a short time since.
With few exceptions, they are round or square in shape, from twenty
to forty feet high, without roof, window, or door, but with a
single iron gate opening towards the East, and so small that it
is quite covered by a few bushes. The first corpse brought to a
new tower--"dakhma"--must be the body of the innocent child of a
mobed or priest. No one, not even the chief watcher, is allowed
to approach within a distance of thirty paces of these towers.
Of all living human beings "nassesalars"--corpse-carriers--
alone enter and leave the "Tower of Silence." The life these
men lead is simply wretched. No European executioner's position
is worse. They live quite apart from the rest of the world, in
whose eyes they are the most abject of beings. Being forbidden
to enter the markets, they must get their food as they can. They
are born, marry, and die, perfect strangers to all except their
own class, passing through the streets only to fetch the dead and
carry them to the tower. Even to be near one of them is a degradation.
Entering the tower with a corpse, covered, whatever may have been
its rank or position, with old white rags, they undress it and place
it, in silence, on one of the three rows presently to be described.
Then, still preserving the same silence, they come out, shut the
gate, and burn the rags.