upon him yesterday, he just stood up, half-dressed, when they salaamed, and said, well, what do you want?' And when they answered only to pay our respects,' he growled out 'jow' (go)." This sort of rudeness is, indeed, but too common, and seems to excite the native ire as much as dancing, wine-bibbing, and eating the flesh of pigs. Even the highest person in the state is not exempt from the lampoons of these purveyors of scandal, as the following extract will attest: "The European king and his viziers, having heard that the governor-general is a fool, exceedingly slack in managing affairs, he is to be recalled, and a clever lord sent out to save Bengal."

Native opinion is held in great scorn, and set at defiance, by the European residents of India, who, with the solitary exception of a few, refusing to eat pork, out of deference to the prevailing prejudice, indulge themselves in every thing that appears to be most hateful to the surrounding multitude. But the excesses of which they are guilty would be excused, or overlooked, were they more anxious to make themselves popular by affability and kindness of demeanour. In India, public admiration is not an evanescent feeling, or liable to the mutations which attend it in Europe. The people of Hindoostan have no caprice in their affections, nor do they forget the benefits they have received. Instances have been known at Delhi of natives flocking to condole with a resident on his disgrace by the British Government, notwithstanding their hopes and expectations from his favour were at an end. And yet many persons, who have never for a single instant endeavoured to conciliate the people over whom they have been placed in authority, with power to render them happy, by accepting their services or courtesies with corresponding kindness, are loud in their invectives against native insincerity and ingratitude. It is precisely those, whose pride and insolence have rendered them objects of dislike, who thus animadvert upon the character of the people of Hindoostan.

Delhi is considered to be one of the hottest places in India, owing, probably to the arid nature of the country all around it, the immense quantity of buildings, which become so many reflectors, and the exceeding fury of the fiery simoom, which blows until ten o'clock at night, and sometimes does not subside during the twenty-four hours. This kind of weather lasts four months, and European residents must content themselves with in-door amusements the whole period of its duration. The rains and the cold season are both very agreeable; but there is one plague from which the city and its environs never are exempt, that of flies,- which come in armies similar to those which invaded Egypt in the time of Pharoah. In addition to the usual number of chicks, the blinds with which the doors and windows of English houses are furnished, the outer verandahs are carefully closed in with this pretty and useful manufacture of split bamboo, to secure the interiors from the hosts of winged enemies which would otherwise pervade the whole atmosphere. Persons living in tents, in the cold weather, are almost driven mad by the torments inflicted by these disgusting assailants. The natives wrap themselves up in a cloth, and lie down, preferring the chances

of suffocation, as the smallest evil of the two; but the European must either submit to the constant attendance of a domestic, with a chowrie, to beat them off, or arm himself with patience to endure.

These, however, and other inflictions of the climate, are amply compensated by the endless gratification afforded to intellectual minds by the number of interesting objects which greet the spectator on every side. A life might be spent in rambling over the ruins of old Delhi, and subjects for contemplation still remain. Next to the palace, the most striking building of Shahjehanabad is the Jumma Musjid, a magnificent mosque, erected on the summit of a rock of considerable height, ascended by three fine flights of steps. Three handsome gateways lead into a quadrangle of the noblest dimensions, paved with granite, inlaid with marble, and surrounded on three sides with an open cloister. Along this splendid area, which has a marble tank or reservoir of water in the centre, the visitor is conducted to another flight of steps, the ascent to the mosque, a superb hall, flanked with minarets, and entered by three lofty Gothic arches crowned with marble domes. From the interstices of the piazza of this fine square, very picturesque views are obtained; it has not the delicacy of finish of the pearl mosque at Agra, but its proportions are inuch finer, and its situation, upon so commanding an eminence, gives it a great advantage over other celebrated Moghul temples. The Jumina Musjid was the work of Aurungzebe, who, like many other usurpers, endeavoured to gain a reputation for piety; and the better to impose upon a credulous multitude, who might have attributed his desire to gain the throne, by the imprisonment of his father and the murder of his brothers, to ambitious motives, clothed himself in the rags of a faqueer, and in this humble guise sought the shrine of the Jumma Musjid, to pray for the success of his rebellious army. This mosque is kept in good repair by a grant of the English Government; it is much frequented by the faithful,`of whom many hundreds may be seen at a time, prostrate on the pavement. It is also the resort of numerous beggars, and the poorer classes of travellers, who find all the shelter which the climate renders necessary in the nooks and recesses of the building. There are other mosques which, from their antiquity or the historical circumstances connected with them, excite a good deal of curiosity; and the new suburb, called, after its projector, Trevelyanpore, under the village of Paharee, built to supply habitations for the increasing population of the city, is sufficiently interesting to attract a visit from strangers. The plan has been much approved for its elegant simplicity, though of course there are divers opinions concerning it. The centre, a large quadrangle, called Bentinck Square, is entered by four streets, opening from the middle of each side, and not at the angles, according to the usual European custom. The whole extent of the streets, which are ninety feet in width, and the façade of the square, present an unbroken front of Doric columns, supporting a piazza behind, in which are commodious shops and dwelling houses, ranged with great regularity. The four triangular spaces at the back, formed by the arms of the cross, are intended for stable and court-yards for the cattle and bullock-carts belonging to the inhabitants.

In the event of Trevelyanpore becoming a place of native resort, a plan for increasing its extent has been laid down, and a native gentleman of great wealth is constructing a magnificent gateway, of corresponding architecture, fronting the Lahore gate of Delhi, which will lead to a circus, the centre of which is to be adorned with a cenotaph to the memory of a young British officer, a friend of Mr. Trevelyan, the founder of this new quarter, which has not yet, however, been much sought after as a residence by the native population.

The grand object of attraction, in the neighbourhood of Shahjehanabad, is the Kootub Minar, a magnificent tower, 242 feet in height, which rises in the midst of the ruins of old Delhi, at the distance of nine miles south of the modern city. It is not known by whom or for what purpose this splendid monument was erected; and conjecture, weary of a hopeless task, is now content to permit its origin to remain in obscurity. According to the general supposition, it was erected in the thirteenth century; but this is not certain, nor can it be ascertained whether the founder was Moslem or Hindoo, though the majority of opinions inclines to the latter. The great architectural beauty of this wonderful building, the height of the column, supposed to exceed that of any other in the world, its amazing strength, the richness of the materials, and the magnificence and variety of its embellishments, combine to render it the surpassing wonder of a land abounding in buildings of the highest degree of splendour and interest. The extraordinary elegance and grandeur of this remarkable tower have preserved it from the ruin with which it has been lately threatened; the Government, anxious to preserve so valuable a relic of Indian antiquity, directed its restoration and repair,—a difficult and somewhat hazardous work, which has been admirably performed by Major Smith, of the engineers. From the summit, which is ascended by a spiral staircase, the view is of the most sublime description; a desert, covered with ruins full of awful beauty, surrounds it on all sides, watered by the snake-like Jumna, which winds its huge silvery folds along the crumbling remains of palaces and tombs. In the back-ground, rises the dark lofty walls and frowning towers of an ancient fortress, the stronghold of the Pytaun chiefs; and the eye, wandering over the stupendous and still beautiful fragments of former grandeur, rests at last upon the white and glittering mosques and minarets of the modern city, closing-in the distance, and finely contrasting, by its luxuriant groves and richly flowering gardens, with the loneliness and desolation of the scene beneath. The tomb of the emperor Humayoon, the father of Acbar, a monarch pre-eminent in misfortune, but of whom some fine chivalric tales are told, stands at a short distance from the Kootub Minar; there are other mausoleums also of great beauty and splendour, amid which that of Sufter Jung, a fortunate military adventurer, is worthy of mention. Another place of great interest in the neighbourhood is a gigantic astronomical observatory, supposed to be the work of Jey Sing, a Hindoo rajah, who flourished in the seventeenth century. The dial is still in good repair, a stupendous work, of which the gnomon, of solid masonry, is sixty feet

high. It is not possible to convey any idea by description of these enormous instruments, but persons desirous to make themselves acquainted with them have only to consult the splendid and accurate views taken by Mr. Daniell. The Pytaun fortress, which forms so conspicuous an object from every terrace in the neighbourhood, constitutes another of the lions of old Delhi; the lapse of seven hundred years has done little towards the reduction of the solid walls and massive towers of this fine old place, which is now chiefly celebrated for its tank or bowlee, embosomed within high picturesque buildings, which rise from twenty to sixty feet above the surface of the water,—a place of delightful coolness in the hot season, the sun not shining upon it for more than three hours a-day. It is deep as well as dark, and in the cold weather immersion cannot be very agreeable; yet the idle parties of young men, who frequent the spot, take perhaps greater delight in the exploits of a few poor creatures, who pick up a precarious subsistence by plunging into the flashing waters, than in more legitimate objects of interest. Some of these will venture, for the sake of a rupee, from a very perilous height, springing from the dome of a neighbouring mosque down to the abyss below, sixty or seventy feet, and disappearing frightfully, the waters resuming their tranquillity before these desperate adventurers can rise again to the surface. Of course, amongst Europeans, there will always be persons sufficiently inhuman to encourage these barbarous feats; the few intellectual pilgrims, who wander amidst the wrecks of by-gone splendour, must make up their minds to endure sights and scenes of the most incongruous nature:-pic-nic parties bivouacking in the tombs, and being entertained at their repasts by the performances of a set of nautch girls; young men amusing themselves with a game of quoits; and groups of flirting unimaginative women, speculating on the probabilities of getting up a quadrille.

WEDDING AMUSEMENTS OF THE JÁTS OF Bhurtpore.

MR. J. S. LUSHINGTON, who was present at the marriage of the present raja of Bhurtpore, in 1832, relates the following among the amusements of the bride and bridegroom, after the ceremony :

"One is the untying of the kankan, or bracelet of kúsa grass, which, previous to the marriage, is bound on the right hand of the bride and left of the bridegroom. Being seated opposite each other, they proceed to unravel the knots and mazes of their respective kankans. Should the husband succeed in undoing his wife's bracelet before she has untied his, the feat is considered typical of his future superiority in domestic life, and great rejoicings are immediately made by his relations; if, on the other hand, the lady should first unravel the bracelet, her friends celebrate her dexterity in noisy and triumphant songs. A curious game of chance also takes place between the newly-married couple. A large tub or cauldron of water is placed before them, and jewels, gold mohurs, and rupees are thrown into it. The bride and bridegroom plunge their hands into the basin, and whoever succeeds in extracting the largest quantity of jewels or money, at one dip, wins the game."

ACCOUNT OF THE JAIN TEMPLES ON MOUNT ABÚ.

BY LIEUTENANT BURNES.

THE mountain of Abú, Abují, or Abúghad, is situated near the 25th degree of north latitude and 73° 20′ of east longitude, in the district of Sekrúí and province of Márwár, about forty miles N.E. by E. of the camp of Dísa. The magnificent temples are erected at the small village of Dilwarra, about the centre of the mountain, which has an elevation of about 5,000 feet, where the summit is extremely irregular and studded with peaked hills. There are four in number, all of marble, and two of them of the richest kind. They are dedicated to Párasnáth, or "the principal of the deified saints, who according to their creed have successively become superior gods," and who are believed to amount to the number of twenty-four, or as some told me, to have appeared, like the Hindu gods, in twenty-four different Avatars.

These are the gods of the Jain, Shrawak, or Banian castes, who are a gloomy tribe of atheistical ascetics, not unlike the Budhists, "who deny the authority of God and a future state; believe that as the trees in an uninhabited forest spring up without cultivation, so the universe is self-existent; that the world, in short, is produced, as the spider produces his web, out of its own bowels; and that, as the banks of a river fall of themselves, there is no supreme destroyer." "They also deny the divine authority of the Védas, and worship the great Hindú gods as minor deities only:" but Mr. Colebrooke and other eminent scholars have already given the most minute description of this class of people and their worship. The above abstract of their tenets will at once show how little acceptable the followers of Párasnáth can be to orthodox Hindús; and the costly materials of Jain temples are therefore attributable, not to the holiness of the gods to whom they are dedicated, but to the riches that are to be so generally found among the Banians, their votaries.

Jain temples are to be met with in Guzerát, Kattywár, Cutch, and Parkur, as well as in other countries both in the southern and northern parts of the Peninsula; but next to those on Abú, the most celebrated ones on the western side of India are at Politana and Girnar in Kattywár, at both of which places also they have been built on the tops of hills. The antiquity of the schism between this and the Hindú sect is not accurately ascertained, but the oldest temple on Abú appears to have been built An. Vicramajit 1016 (A.D. 959), or something more than 800 years ago.

The temple now alluded to is dedicated to Rikabdeo (or, as Mr. Ward has it, "Rishubhu-devu "), the founder of the sect and first in order of their deified saints, and is known by the name of Adísurjí deval. The four temples are built in the form of a cross, and this is the most westerly. It is in the figure of an oblong square, forty-four paces long by twenty-two wide (or perhaps one hundred feet by fifty); within the building, and in the centre of the area so inclosed, stands the pagoda, in which the great image of the god is placed facing eastward. In front of this there is an octagon of twenty-four feet, supporting, on pillars and arches of marble, a cupola of the same. The pillars may be from twelve to fifteen feet high. The entrance to the temple is from a small door opposite this cupola, and the grandeur of the building is discoverable at once on entering it, and has a very imposing effect. On all sides of the area there is a colonnade, the long sides having a double row of pillars supporting small domes, within each of which are cells in the walls to the number of fifty-six, in all of which are marble images of the god. In the south-west