Round the World Part 12

Delhi at last--he Rome of Asia! Baber established his capital in Agra, a hundred and forty miles south, and therefore farther into India, but his son Humayun returned to Delhi because the summer heats of Agra were found to be insupportable. But it had before been the princ.i.p.al seat of the Pathans or Afghan kings, and, back of them, of several Hindoo dynasties. There are ruins of palaces and forts here dating to one hundred years before Christ, and for eighteen hundred years we have the ruins of the structures of the kings of Delhi and their most noted subordinates, comprising prime ministers, favorite slaves, barbers, architects, etc. For eleven miles along the Imperial Way, on both sides, these ruins stretch, ending in the Kuttub Minar, the glory of Delhi, as the Taj is of Agra. This is a tower standing alone, two hundred and forty feet in height, fifty feet in diameter at the base, and tapering to nine feet at the top. But pictures and photographs have made all familiar with this superb monument. It and the tomb of Humayun, father of the great Akbar, alone remain vividly impressed upon my memory. A ruin now and then is acceptable, but eleven miles of them in one or two days are rather embarra.s.sing, and it is impossible to examine them in detail and retain interest in the work; besides this, a great similarity pervades the ma.s.s. It seems to me the entire population must have been oppressed to the last degree, and every surplus penny secured in some way to be expended in the erection and maintenance of these palaces, and for the support of the cla.s.ses who occupied them.

One most important department of government in the management of a conquered race is that of its police and intelligence bureau, and this is admirably administered in India. A special department was organized years ago, and specially gifted officers of the army placed at its head. To the present chief, Major Henderson, whose face we see in all the photographs of the Prince of Wales's party, we are deeply indebted for Indian items. This department has almost succeeded in stamping out the Thugs, and it is very seldom that murders are now committed by these religious fanatics. Their G.o.ddess Kali demanded blood, but she was fastidious; nothing but human blood would meet her tastes, and so her devotees strangled and waylaid and shot the victims marked out for sacrifice. Some Thugs confessed to between seventy and eighty murders, and one to the incredible number of one hundred and ninety-two (what saints they would make!). The members of the sect-were cla.s.sified into spies, stranglers, and grave-diggers, the spies being in the first stage and not ranking with the two more advanced degrees. a.s.suming usually the garb of merchants or pilgrims, they often craved the protection of their intended victims. Their favorite instrument for strangulation was a handkerchief, in the use of which they were most expert. The secret that these wretches were linked together as a religious fraternity, bound by all the hopes of future bliss and the terrors of eternal d.a.m.nation as they satisfied or failed to satisfy the craving of their horrible G.o.ds for human blood, was not discovered until about a half century ago. The government purchased the secret with the names and address of every member and relative of a member of the sect, arrested them all in 1837 and colonized them at Jubbulpore, where they were taught trades. Their names and those of their descendants remain on the list of persons suspect, and should Thugism ever show its head again, the presence of any member near the scene of the offence would be held almost conclusive evidence against him.

The Major's department has on its records the names and descriptions of more than four thousand of these people, and also of nearly nine thousand professional gang robbers. Murder has been done when the booty did not exceed six cents. But the systematic hunting down of these dangerous cla.s.ses is fast ridding India of this curse. If a man will murder another for a sixpence he can be induced to betray his fellow-murderers for a moderate sum. Is it not a blessing for the race that evil disintegrates? Only for good ends can men permanently combine; then no feared betrayal works dismay. As great movements, whether for good or evil, require many supporters, society has its safe-guard; nothing really good can be destroyed by conspirators.

The fort at Delhi resembles in its general features that of Agra, but is famous as having been the receptacle of the Peac.o.c.k Throne, which was valued by a French jeweller at not less than six millions sterling, say thirty millions of dollars. On such a precious pedestal as this the Moguls sat and ruled this land. The throne was plundered of its jewels by the Persians, but its frame is still shown in the local museum. The fort remains in an unusually good state of preservation, making it by far the most satisfactory specimen of the gorgeous residences of the Moguls that we have seen. The walls are of marble, inlaid in the interior with genuine precious stones of various colors worked into the forms of vines and flowers for a height of about six feet. The floors are similarly decorated. The upper portions of the walls have the same patterns, but these are painted, not inlaid. Every part is gilded in the most elaborate manner, and, in short, here alone of all places that I have seen, one could fancy himself wandering through the resplendent wonders of the Arabian Nights.

Of course we did not neglect the many places rendered historical by the mutiny. These are seen upon every side in this district, but none was more interesting to me than the Cashmere Gate. The rebels held the fort, and it was determined to a.s.sault it. Here is the record of the men who volunteered to lay the train to the Gate:

"Salkfied laid his bags, but was shot through the arm and leg, and fell back on the bridge, handing the portfire to Sergeant Burgess, _bidding him light the fuse_. Burgess was instantly shot dead in the attempt. Sergeant Carmichael then advanced, took up the portfire, and succeeded in the attempt, but immediately fell mortally wounded. Sergeant Smith, seeing him fall, advanced at a run, but finding that the fuse was already burning, threw himself into the ditch."

The age of miracles is admittedly past, but it is certain that the age of heroes existed in 1857.

The finest mosque in Delhi, and one of the finest in the world, is the Jumma Musjid. We happened to visit it just as the priests were calling the faithful to prayer, which they do by ascending to the foot of the minarets and turning toward Mecca and there chanting the call. Numerous worshippers came, and having washed in the pool, went to the Mosque and began their worship on their knees.

Our guide was a Mohammedan, and I asked him what a good man is required to do daily in the way of external worship. Here is the programme as he gave it to me: Five times each day he washes hands and feet and prays; first in the morning when he rises, and then at one, four, after sunset, and before he goes to bed, repeating the prayer to Allah and some words from the Koran, and touching the ground with his forehead no less than thirty-eight times during the day. This must be done every day, Sat.u.r.day and Sunday alike. The prayers are simple exclamations reciting the greatness of G.o.d and the insignificance of his servants, and _ask for nothing_. How very close to their daily lives must this constant appeal at short intervals, through each day, bring the Unknown, unless, as is said to be the case, it becomes a more matter of form, familiarity breeding contempt.

SAUGOR, GREAT PENINSULAR RAILWAY, February 19.

We are now _en route_ to Bombay from Delhi, a distance of about thirteen hundred miles. We have been two nights in our sleeping-car, and shall spend the night on the line and reach Bombay in the morning. General Grant just pa.s.sed us going toward Calcutta, but there was no chance for us to get at him to shake hands in India. This is the Pacific Railway of India, connecting Calcutta and all the eastern portion with the western coast, upon which Bombay is situated. The time between Calcutta and England has been shortened almost a whole week by its construction. The railways of India, of which there are at present about nine thousand miles in operation, were princ.i.p.ally constructed under a guarantee of five per cent, by the Indian Government, and some of them yield more than that already. In a short time there will be none that will remain a charge upon the revenues. The government retained the right, at intervals of twenty or twenty-five years, to acquire possession and ownership of these lines upon certain terms, and at no distant day will enjoy large revenues from its railway property. If the days of guarantees and subsidies be not hopelessly gone with us, here is an idea worth considering by our government. Fancy what the ownership of the Union and Central Pacific lines would mean as recompense for the amounts advanced.

The government has established several model farms in different provinces, for the purpose of testing articles thought suitable for cultivation in India, and of diffusing among the natives improved methods of agriculture. Such farms under able scientific management must eventually bring to the country what it is best calculated to produce. The success attendant upon the growth of a subst.i.tute for cinchona is significant. India must have quinine in large quant.i.ties as a preventive of malaria. Experiments prove that while the genuine article does not thrive here, a kindred species, possessing nearly the same properties, although to a less degree, will grow well. This has been cultivated in large quant.i.ties, and I notice that the medical chief orders it to be used in all dispensaries where quinine has. .h.i.therto been required, although the medical officers are permitted in extreme cases to order the dearer drug.

We are now traversing a level plain, and as this region was blessed with rain in season, it seems much more fertile than some other portions of the country; but the poorest harvests I ever saw in any part of America would be rated as abundant here. We have seen everywhere herds of buffaloes, bullocks, and sheep grazing in fields which seemed to us entirely dest.i.tute of everything; not a green leaf of any kind to be seen, and we could not understand how animals could even get a mouthful of food in the brown parched lands. But I am told they do nibble away at the short stalks and roots of corn or sugar-cane left in the ground when the crop was cut, and in this way manage to eke out a scanty existence. They are at best little but skin and bone. When it is merely a question of keeping life in the body, man and beast alike prove that but little is required.

While everything about us partakes of a dusty clayey hue, we must not forget that we see the plains of India in the winter. Let the blessed Monsoon burst, and these fields, now so parched and dead, are covered at once "as if the earth had given a subterranean birth to heaven." As Roderick Dhu's host rose up at the blast of his bugle, vegetation springs forth, and the land we now wonder at is no longer barren, but teems with tropical luxuriance. Then come the snakes and insects to poison and annoy. Last year, sixteen thousand seven hundred and seventy human beings were reported killed by snakes, while eight hundred and nineteen only were killed by tigers.

One has difficulty in imagining such a change in any land as is implied by these startling figures, for to-day as we travel not a fly nor insect of any kind is to be seen. If it were not for the intense heat, which I know I could not endure, I should like to spend a summer in India, snakes notwithstanding, just to see so complete a reversal of conditions, for no matter what reflection may do to tell, as we see India only under winter conditions, we shall always have a bias to rate it as the miserable, barren land it appears to us. Travellers should be on their guard against this tendency, for it leads to many false conclusions. If both sides of a question need to be considered, all seasons of a country must be experienced before a true judgment can be pa.s.sed upon it. This is especially true of India, where the change is, as it were, from life to death.

We see wood-gatherers entering the cities, each with a bundle of sticks, or twigs rather, on his head, the result of the day's gathering--scarcely one of the sticks thicker than one's finger, and the great bulk of the bundle composed of mere switches, so closely is everything shaven in crowded Hindostan. To-day we stood and looked at a native who had led his goat into the country to pick up a meal. He bent the boughs of small trees one after another so that the goat could strip them of their leaves. The poor skeleton was ravenous. Nothing goes to waste in India, nor anywhere in the East. Garbage and sewage have value, and all is swept clean and kept clean in every hole and corner in consequence. This simplifies life very much. Our elaborate system of underground pipes, our sewers, drains, and modern conveniences of all kinds, and our sanitary arrangements which are of such prime importance to health, and to which we are fortunately giving so much more attention--these the East wholly escapes. We have to cure; they have prevention. Human labor at four or five cents per day (2 to 2 1/2d.) changes the conditions of existence. It pays to do so many things which, under our rates for labor, cannot be thought of. I have mentioned that in j.a.pan the refuse of all kinds from a residence is not only taken away at any hours each day one fixes, but a small sum is actually paid for it, which the servants of the establishment consider a perquisite.

BOMBAY, Thursday, February 20.

We reached this city on time this morning, feeling not in the least fatigued by our three nights in the train. In the evening we were fortunate enough to stroll down to the pier, where the band was playing. Nowhere have we seen so varied a concourse of people.

The drive at Calcutta has long been noted as excelling any other scene in the gorgeousness of its oriental coloring, but this of the pier at Bombay surpa.s.ses by far what we saw there. Calcutta can boast no wealthy native Pa.r.s.ees, who attend here in large numbers in fine equipages with servants in livery. The Pa.r.s.ee ladies especially are resplendent in jewels and color; and the rich turbaned Mohammedan adds to the variety. The a.s.semblage moved to and fro among the carriages and along the edges of the broad pier chatting gayly, while the music seemed to set everything in motion. Native boatmen in their picturesque garbs pa.s.sed now and then plying their trade, carrying a Sahib's portmanteau or a lady's bundle. I sat down and imagined myself in the midst of all that I had seen of pretty seaports in grand opera, the ship scene in L'Africaine, the landing of Desdemona in the Isle of Cyprus, the fishermen in Masaniello, and I thought I had never seen anything of this description so pleasing. I lost Vandy in the crowd, and sat drinking it all in till dark. Certainly among the fine things in the East is to be ranked the music upon the Apollo Bunder, Bombay.

FRIDAY, February 21.

We rose early, and were off before breakfast for a drive to the "Tower of Silence." This is the mountain top where the Pa.r.s.ees give their dead to be torn by the vultures. We shudder at cremation, but the sacred fire of the funeral pile as it flames to heaven has something awe-inspiring about it. Man sprung from the dust mingles at last with the purer element of fire, and "vanishes into air, into thin air," leaving no trace behind. But deliberately to throw our dead out to be torn in pieces and devoured by vultures--who can endure the thought! And yet many of the inhabitants here would be most unhappy if denied the consolation of believing that their bodies were to be served in this manner. Nor are these poor and ignorant; on the contrary, next to the English they are the best educated and the princ.i.p.al merchants in the city. It is simply that they have been taught in their youth that the earth must not be defiled by contact with the dead. They cannot bury, therefore, neither can they burn, because fire, one of the elements, is sacred; neither can they cast their dead into the sea, for it, too, is holy. There seems to them no way but this--of getting the birds of the air to come and take the flesh. We were received at the foot of the mound by a Pa.r.s.ee guide, who conducted us through every part. The towers, of which there are five, are approached by long flights of easy stairs. We entered a door at the top, and the first objects which struck our eyes were the vultures. They sat motionless, as close together as possible, on top of the wall of the round tower, with their tails toward us and their beaks toward the centre of the tower where the bodies are placed. The wall is about twenty feet high and fifty feet in diameter. There did not appear to be room for one more bird upon it, every inch of it being occupied, their bodies almost touching each other. What a revolting coping they formed to the otherwise plain round wall. More birds were perched on trees, and on the other towers; and indeed everywhere we looked these disgusting objects met our view. At ten o'clock every morning the dead are taken from the dead-house, rich and poor alike being previously divested of clothing; and were we to revisit the spot at that hour, we are told the quiet stillness which pervaded the grove would be found no longer. We inwardly congratulated ourselves that the dreaded heat of a Bombay sun had sent us to this place at so early an hour--ere the repast began--and rapidly withdrew. It isn't much, yet I would not be robbed of it--such a disposition of our dead as would still render it possible for us to say with Laertes:

"_Lay her i' the earth_; And from her fair and unpolluted flesh May violets spring."

Hard times are everywhere, and produce some strange changes. The Banyan caste of Suerah has just resolved to abolish caste dinners after funerals, but if a wealthy Hindoo still wishes to indulge in these affairs he is permitted to do so after one year has elapsed.

I fear many of the dear departed will never be honored by the feast after this interval. At marriages hereafter only one feast is to be given, instead of four, which were formerly considered the thing. Retrenchment is the word even where caste customs of long standing are involved.

I note that yesterday a native was fined ten rupees for driving a lame horse. What a singular race he must think these English!

Before their day he could have done what he liked with horse or servant, male or female, "because he bought them," and now he can't even be the judge when to use his horse. The more I see of the thoroughness of the English Government in the East--its attention to the minutest details, the exceptional ability of its officials as evinced in the excellence of the courts, jails, hospitals, dispensaries, schools, roads, railways, ca.n.a.ls, etc.,--the more I am amazed. I had before no idea of what was implied by the government of India. It would have been madness for any other people than the English to undertake it. Not that we have not in America a cla.s.s of men of equal organizing power, but these have careers at home open to them, and could not be induced to leave their own land. Even if this were not so, America requires an improved civil service to bring its ablest men forward. I am sure no such body of officials exists as that comprising the civil service of India, whether judged by its purity or its ability.

The British army has been reformed of late years in India to a degree beyond popular knowledge of the subject. Every one agrees in attributing the spread of the great mutiny to the fact that there were at two or three critical points superannuated veterans, unable to take before it was too late the most obvious measures for its suppression. In short, it was here just as it was in Washington when the Civil War began. I remember seeing General Scott, the commander-in-chief, when Bull Run was lost, carried or a.s.sisted from his carriage across the pavement to his office, he being too old and infirm to walk. There were others scarcely less feeble in charge of departments. It was just so in India; but now mark the change. No man can retain the command of a regiment in the British army more than five years, nor can generals serve longer. These officers retire on pensions, and the next in seniority takes his turn, always provided he pa.s.ses successfully the most searching examination at each successive promotion. I was told that upon a recent examination only two officers out of thirteen pa.s.sed. No favoritism is shown, and I have met young men related to the highest officials to whom it has been kindly intimated that another career than the army had better be sought.

I have met many officers, and the impression made upon me is an exceedingly favorable one. I do not believe that in case of war now the blunder of those in command would have to be atoned for by the superior fighting qualities of the rank and file, as was notoriously the case during the Crimean War. The promotion of General Wolseley means business. The Duke of Cambridge, because he is a royal duke, is allowed to reign, but Wolseley is to govern.

I was struck with the full length portraits of the real man and the sham in last year's Royal Academy. General Winfield Scott in all his glory was not more brilliant than the duke, military hat in hand with its white waving plumes, booted and spurred, his breast a ma.s.s of decorations, "Old Fuss and Feathers" over again.

Beside him was a man in plain attire, about as ornamental as General Grant; but this was the man of war, one of those very rare characters who does what there is to do--in Egypt as in Abyssinia--and never fails.

Bombay and Calcutta are again rivals for supremacy. Bombay Island, upon which Bombay City stands, another of the keys of the world, was given to Britain by Portugal as part of the dower of Catherine of Braganza when she married Charles II. Think of a woman giving anything for the privilege of marrying such a wretch! but so little was it esteemed that the government gave it in 1688 to the East India Company for a rental of 10 per annum. It was subsequently made the princ.i.p.al seat of their power, but it had no access to the interior, and Calcutta, which stands at the mouth of a river system of inland transportation rivalled only by that of our smoky Pittsburgh, soon eclipsed it. There was no chance for Bombay against this natural advantage, and she had to succ.u.mb; but now, since railways have penetrated the interior, and especially since the opening of the Suez Ca.n.a.l route has brought Bombay so very much nearer to Europe, the struggle for supremacy has begun anew. The European traffic now goes mainly to her, and Calcutta gets her portion by rail through her ancient rival. In 1872 the exports and imports of Bombay were 50,000,000, and those of Calcutta 54,000,000; so you see it is not going to be a walk over for Calcutta, though her population still exceeds that of her challenger by about a hundred thousand. It is water _vs_.

rail on a large scale, and the result will be looked for with interest. I think the former capital, once dethroned, will eventually regain the crown; but there is plenty of room for both, and the rivalry between them should be a generous one.

Bombay is by far the finest city in the East, but it has been inflated more than any other, and is now undergoing severe contraction. Its public buildings would do credit to any European capital. Government concluded to sell the land fronting on the bay, which had been used as the site of an antiquated fort, and such was the rage for speculation at the time that five million dollars'

worth of land was disposed of and enough retained to give Bombay a beautiful little park and a long drive along the beach. Government took the money and erected on part of the land retained the magnificent buildings referred to. We met one gentleman who had bought one hundred thousand dollars' worth of the new lots, for which he admitted he could not get today more than twenty thousand dollars. But Bombay is only learning the universal lesson which the world seems to need to have repeated every ten or twelve years. It is fortunate that this city is our last in India, because it so far excels any other. Nowhere else is such oriental richness to be seen.

The colors of the ma.s.ses as they move rapidly to and fro remind you of the combinations of the kaleidoscope. The native women of the lowest order work in gangs, and it is their dress which chiefly brightens the scene. A dark-green tight-fitting jacket, a magenta mantle festooned about the body and legs in some very graceful manner and reaching to the knees, the feet and legs bare to the knees, a purple veil on the head but thrown back over the shoulders--this is the dress as well as I can describe it. The habit of carrying loads upon the head makes them as straight as arrows, and as they march along with majestic stride they completely eclipse the poor-looking male, who seems to have had his manhood ground out of him by generations of oppression, while his companion has pa.s.sed through subjugation without losing her personal dignity.

It seems homelike to see street railways, of which there are several prosperous lines here. For this enterprise an American gentleman has to be thanked. All cla.s.ses ride together, and caste in Bombay gets serious knocks in consequence. From Bombay as a centre civilization is destined to radiate. A palpable breach has already been made in the solid walls which have hitherto shut India from the entrance of new ideas, and through this gate the a.s.saulting columns must eventually gain possession; but it will not be within the span of men now living, nor for several generations to come. The Sailors' Home and the hospitals of the city are highly creditable, and among the charitable inst.i.tutions I must not forget the Hindoo hospital for wretched animals, where some of each kind are tenderly cared for, to signify the reverence paid by this sect to all kinds of life, for the meanest form is sacred to them. We had a curious ill.u.s.tration of this while in Benares examining the richest specimens of the delicate embroideries for which that city is celebrated. A little nasty intruder showed itself on one of the finest, and a gentleman with us involuntarily reached forth to kill it, but the three Hindoos caught his arm at once, and exhibited great anxiety to save the insect. One of them did get it, and taking it to the window set it at liberty. It was Uncle Toby and the troublesome fly over again, as immortalized by the genius of Sterne: "Get thee gone, poor devil! there is room enough in the world for thee and for me,"

quoth Uncle Toby. And does not Cowper say--

"I would not enter on my list of friends (Though graced with polish'd manners and fine sense, Yet wanting sensibility) the man Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm."

Well, these Hindoos wouldn't do it either. Let them be credited accordingly, heathen though they be.

It begins to grow too hot here; I could not live one season in India--that I am convinced of. The tropical sun has no mercy, piercing through thick pith helmet, white umbrella, and driving one into the house. We are to leave none too soon. This evening we were surprised to see, as we strolled along the beach, more Pa.r.s.ees than ever before, and more Pa.r.s.ee ladies richly dressed; all seemed wending their way to the sea. It was the first of the new moon, a period sacred to these worshippers of the elements; and here on the sh.o.r.es of the ocean, as the sun was sinking in the sea, and the slender silver thread of the crescent moon was faintly shining in the horizon, they congregated to perform their religious rites. Fire was there in its grandest form--the sun--and water in the vast expanse of the Indian Ocean outstretched before them. The earth was under their feet, and wafted across the sea the air came laden with the perfumes of "Araby the Blest." Surely no time nor place could be more fitly chosen than this for lifting up the soul to the realms beyond sense. I could not but partic.i.p.ate with these worshippers in what was so grandly beautiful. There was no music save the solemn moan of the waves as they broke into foam on the beach,

"With their ain eerie croon Working their appointed work, And never, never done."

But where shall we find so mighty an organ, or so grand an anthem?

How inexpressibly sublime the scene appeared to me, and how insignificant and unworthy of the Unknown seemed even our cathedrals, "made with human hands," when compared to this looking up through Nature unto Nature's G.o.d! I stood and drank in the serene happiness which seemed to fill the air. I have seen many modes and forms of worship, some disgusting, others saddening, a few elevating when the organ pealed forth its tones, but all poor in comparison to this. Nor do I ever expect in all my life to witness a religious ceremony which will so powerfully affect me as that of the Pa.r.s.ees on the beach at Bombay. While I gazed upon the scene I stood conscious only that I was privileged to catch a glimpse of something that was not of the earth, but, as I sauntered homeward, Wordsworth's lines came to me as the fittest expression of my feelings. The pa.s.sage is too long to quote at length; besides I have to confess I cannot at this moment recall it all. But he tells first how in his youth Nature was all in all to him, "nor needed a moral sense unborrowed from the eye," but later the inner light came; and hear him in his maturer years:

"For I have learned To look on Nature, not as in the hour Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes The still, sad music of humanity, Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power To chasten and subdue. And I have felt A Presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man; A motion and a spirit, that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things."

"The still sad music of humanity!"--it was that I heard sounding in the prayers of those devout Pa.r.s.ees and in the moan of that mighty sea. Sweet, refreshing it was, though tinged with sadness, as all our more precious musings must be, "since all we know is, nothing can be known."

In one of my strolls along the beach I met a Pa.r.s.ee gentleman who spoke excellent English. From him I learned that the disciples of Zoroaster number only about two hundred thousand, and of those no fewer than fifty thousand are in Bombay. They were driven from Persia by the Mohammedans and settled here, where they have prospered.

They do not intermarry with other sects, believe in one G.o.d, and worship the sun, moon, earth, and stars only as being the visible angels of G.o.d, as he termed them. In themselves these are nothing, but are the best steps by which we can ascend to G.o.d. Good men will be happy forever; bad men will be unhappy for a long time after death, and very bad men will be severely punished. But I was delighted to be a.s.sured that no one will be punished forever, all life being sacred to G.o.d because he made it, and all life must eventually be purified, return to its Maker, and be merged in Him.

Pa.r.s.ees cannot burn the dead, because fire should not be prost.i.tuted to so vile a use. They cannot bury, because the earth should not be desecrated with the dead, neither should the sea; and therefore G.o.d has provided vultures, which cannot be defiled, to absorb the flesh of the dead. I said to him that the mere thought of violence offered to our dead caused us to shudder. "Then what do you think of the worms?" he asked. This was certainly an effective estoppel. "It comes to this," he continued, "a question of birds or worms." "You are right" (I had to admit it), I said; "after all, it's not worth disputing about." When I had asked him a great many questions, I suppose he thought turn-about was fair play, and he began to cross-examine me upon many points of Christian doctrine, which I did my best to put in the proper form. We finally agreed that no good men or good women of any form of religion would be eternally miserable, and upon this platform we said good-bye and parted.

On looking around, I saw that we had become the centre of quite a circle of Pa.r.s.ees, Hindoos, and Mohammedans, who had been attracted by our conversation, their earnest bronze faces, surmounted by the flaming red turbans, so very close to mine, forming with the gorgeous colors of their flowing robes, a picture I shall not soon forget. They opened a way of egress, and Sahib pa.s.sed out of the throng amid their salaams, evidently an object of intense curiosity.

Our excursion to the Caves of Elephanta was very enjoyable. They are decidedly worth seeing. Here is the strongest contrast to the grand open-air worship of the Pa.r.s.ees, for the Hindoos sought to hide their worship in caves which shut out the light of day, and to seek their G.o.ds in the dark recesses. The carved figures and columns of the Temple are fine, the princ.i.p.al idol being of great size--a huge representation of the Hindoo Trinity of Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, which make the three-headed G.o.d. The effect of such a monster, seen dimly by the lighted torch, upon ignorant natures, could not but be overpowering. When examined closely there is nothing repulsive in the faces; on the contrary, the expression of all three is rather pleasing than otherwise, like that of Buddha. It is evident that the G.o.ds of the Hindoos are good natured, kind, and disposed to forgiveness.

BOMBAY, Monday, February 24.

We sailed at six in the evening by the splendid Peninsula and Oriental mail steamer Pekin. The city was bathed in the rays of a brilliant sunset as we steamed slowly out of the harbor, and we bade farewell to India when it looked the fairest.