empire, the walls of the audience chamber looked as if they were recovering from a severe attack of smallpox. This hall is now being

repaired. The throne on which the kings of Delhi sat whilst giving public audience faces an open court looking out upon what is now a tree-grown park, but was at the time of the mutiny crowded with native houses, spread out at the feet of the monarch, as was the custom wherever a palace was reared.

The panels of marble covering the block on which the throne rests are amongst the finest carvings I have seen. Each carries alternately a lily and a sunflower of great growth and exquisite grace. The big heads droop as naturally as if they grew in garden mould, instead of sprouting in adamantine marble. An ugly iron railing of the kitchen-area order surrounds the base of the throne.

"Why is it padlocked?" I asked the guide. "The canteen's close by," he explained; "British soldier gets wines, then when tight comes and smashes stones."

The authorities check this misdirected energy by means of lofty railings, and the soldier, if he feels like smashing things after "getting wines," must needs knock his knuckles against the iron bars. With a fine disregard of historical and art associations, one

barrack canteen is really situated close by the throne, and beer-stained tables are spread where Moslems used to hold forth their hands to Mogul majesty.

The canteen displays a sort of time-table, so curious that I took a copy. It runs thus, the lines being set forth after the fashion of a railway time-table: "Extra beer, 8 till 9 a.m. Dinner beer, 12 to 12.45. First halfdram, 4.30 to 5.30. Extra beer, 5.30 to 6.30. Evening beer, 6.30 to 7.30. Second halfdram, 7.45 to 8.14.”

Thus is the British soldier's day portioned out by a kind of beery dial-face. At 8 o'clock his day begins, with the possibility of extra beer, and at 8.14 sharp it closes. Night and dulness fall illumined only by the reflection that half a dram is better than no drink.

Across the greensward, within view of the throne, is a venerable peepul tree, which, like others of its kind, was selected during the mutiny as the scene of an infamous act. Here fifty-three English women and children were put to the sword, with old Bahadur Shah, last and most impotent of the Mogul emperors, sitting on his jewelled throne and congratulating himself upon the return of the olden times when he was something more than a shadowy monarch surrounded by a mock

court. A little later another peepul tree, a larger one in the centre of the city, near the police court, bore fruit of another kind. Here, after the city was stormed, 250 mutineers, taken with arms in their hands, were strung up by the neck, half a dozen on a bough, till the stalwart tree bent under the weight of this unwonted harvest.

Not far from the palace is the Juma Musjid, counted the most beautiful mosque in India. It stands in a court 450 feet square, paved with red stone, and approached by handsome gates of sandstone. In the centre

is a marble basin full of water, in which the pious Moslem laves his feet before entering the holy place. The mosque is of immense size, surmounted by three cupolas of white marble, each crowned with spires of copper richly gilt. Two minarets, 130 feet high, flank it on either side. From these a splendid view is obtained of Delhi and of the ruins which for miles around mark the site of the earlier cities. The interior of the mosque is paved with slabs of white marble, each decorated with a black border. Some 1800 worshippers kneel at prayer here, and in the palmy days of Mahomedanism 50,000 more stood outside and joined in the service.

There is to this day on the top of the

flight of steps leading into the courtyard and immediately facing the Kibla and Mecca, a watch-tower, on which two mullahs stood and signalled to the mighty multitude outside the progress of the service. A hand uplifted, and the great congregation knew, though they could neither see nor hear, that the priest was reading; both hands raised, and they fell upon their knees with heads bowed to the ground, knowing that the priest was praying. There are still sufficient Moslems in Delhi to form a congregation for the mosque on Fridays, but the multitude in the courtyard has passed out, never to return.

In place of this magnificent and imposing demonstration Moslemism has now nothing to show but a few relics kept in a hut in a corner of the courtyard, and producible for the inspection of the unbeliever upon the jingling of the invincible anna. As usual, there are two men in charge of the show, one who displays the wares, and the other who stands by doing nothing, and asks for backsheesh after the first has been paid. The old Mussulman, diving into the recesses of the hut, produces a copy of the Koran, which he affirms is 1300 years old, and which he handles with a lack of reverence that sets the unbeliever at his ease. The precious volume is contained

in a shabby green velvet box, much the worse for constant handling. There is in another equally shabby box of tawdry green velvet a portion of the Koran writ by the hand of Mahomet's grandson. King Tamerlane, the showman says, brought these precious things from Medina.

Even of more absorbing interest is a red hair shown under glass in a mean little tin box, and looking at first sight like a cutting of stout thread. This is a hair from the beard of Mahomet, miraculously preserved through all these centuries. In another box is a stone with four very decided toe marks. This is the impress of Mahomet's foot. Looking at this bit of marble, and its deep imprint gravely held out to view by the hoary Mussulman in charge, it is borne in upon one that the Prophet was not a man in whose way it would be safe to stand. The hut in which these relics are kept is something like the dark room of a photographer, a similitude strengthened by the hasty manner in which the old Mussulman dives in, brings a relic out to the daylight, and when it has been duly examined, disappears in search of a second

one.

On a rail in front of the shed were tied bits of string and scraps of red and blue rag.