2-979-714 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

A Swinging Festival in India, 1857. '...the infatuated native who was to be swung came in, amid the beating of Indian drums and the shouts of the people. The man had a wild expression of countenance, with his eyes glaring, being under the influence of bhang [narcotic], of which he had consumed great quantities...to deaden pain. The unfortunate native had two large iron hooks...thrust through his back...from which the blood streamed down...they pulled down the other end of the pole...and then ran round at a great speed for the space of a quarter of an hour . All this time the poor man was suspended in the air by the hooks in his back, and whirling round fifty feet from the ground; and from the manner in which he kicked about his legs he appeared to be suffering great agony. When he was let down, and the hooks taken out of his back, he was more dead than alive...'. From "Illustrated London News", 1857.