one side of the vault. The roof over the latter was a clumsy structure, and had been partly demolished to allow of the removal of the devotee. As usual in India, the only light admitted to the room was through the door, and the unsubstantial nature of the roof was not likely to attract the attention of the villagers. But I satisfied myself that the occupant of the vault might, with great ease, have demolished the covering which was supposed to shut him off from the world.

The vault itself was of course dark. I entered it in order to ascertain how much space had been allotted to the occupant. I found therein the rosary of the deceased, and the chaplet of flowers which he had worn before his self-immolation. There was sufficient room for me to sit in tolerable comfort. On one side of the vault I felt a small wooden plank apparently let into the wall, and on obtaining a light I found that a trap-door about a foot square had been ingeniously contrived to communicate with the other room of the house. The trap-door was so hung as to open inwards towards the vault, at the pleasure of the inmate. On going into the outer room, into which communication had thus been opened, I found that a row of the large earthen jars, which Horace would have called amphora, and which are used in India to store grain, had been arranged against the wall. The trap-door into the vault was effectually concealed by them, and the supply of air, food, and water to the impostor within thus cleverly provided for. The arrangement was neatly contrived, and was not likely to have attracted suspicion. Had the Bhat been a strong man, and in good health, he might, without any danger to life, and with only a minimum of discomfort, have emerged triumphantly after his six weeks' Samādh, and have earned a wide reputation. But the excitement and fasting were too much for him.'

As to the practice of self-torture this cannot be entirely prevented by our Government, but is rapidly dying out. Formerly it was possible for devotees,-with the object

of exciting admiration or extorting alms, or under the delusion that their self-torture was an act of religious merit, to swing in the air attached to a lofty pole by means of a rope and hook passed through the muscles of the back. Such self-inflicted mutilation is now prohibited.

Yet, even in the present day, to acquire a reputation for sanctity, or to receive homage and offerings from the multitude, or under the idea of accumulating a store of merit, all sorts of bodily sufferings, penances, and austerities, even to virtual suicide, are undergone the latter being sometimes actually perpetrated out of mere revenge, as its consequences are supposed to fall on the enemy whose action has driven the deceased to self-immolation.

Three Brahmans in a native State, who had their daughters forced from them by Muhammadans beyond the reach of justice, complained to the governor of the province; but finding no redress, they all swallowed poison and died at the door of his tent.

The practice of sitting in Dharna was once common, but was made punishable by Reg. VII. 1820. It was thus performed:-A person who wished to compel payment of a debt due to him, sat at the door of a debtor's house and observed a strict fast. If he died from want of food, the consequences of his death were supposed to fall on the debtor, and if the person sitting was a Brāhman, the terrible guilt of Brahmanicide was believed to be incurred.

I saw a man not long since at Allahabad, who has sat in one position for fifty years on a stone pedestal exposed to sun, wind, and rain. He never moves except once a day, when his attendants lead him to the Ganges. He is an object of worship to thousands, and even high-caste Brahmans pay him homage.

I saw two Urdhva-bahus-one at Gaya and the other at Benares-that is, devotees who hold their arms with clenched fists above their heads for years, until they be

come shrivelled and the finger-nails penetrate through the back of the hands.

Another man was prostrating himself and measuring every inch of the ground with his body round the hill of Govardhan when I passed. He probably intended continuing the painful process till he had completed a circuit of twenty miles one hundred and eight times.

In most of the cases I have described, the laudable humanity of our Government in endeavouring to preserve human life has given rise to fresh evils and difficulties.

In the first place, population is increasing upon us in a degree which threatens to become wholly unmanageable. Then widows never marry again; not even if their boyhusbands die, leaving them widows at the age of six. A woman is supposed to be sacramentally united to one husband, and belongs to him for ever. Every town, every village, almost every house, is full of widows who are debarred from all amusements, and, if childless, converted into household drudges. They often lead bad lives. life, like that of the lepers, is a kind of living death, and they would often cheerfully give themselves up to be burned alive if the law would let them. The spirit of Sati still survives.

Their

Only the other day in Nepal, where our supremacy is barely recognized, the widows of Sir Jung Bahadur became Satis, and burned themselves with their husband.

Then, again, the increase in the number of girls who cannot find suitable husbands is now causing much embarrassment in some districts. Even the lepers, whose lives we preserve, involve us in peculiar difficulties. These unfortunate creatures often roam about the country, exacting food from the people by threatening to touch their children. Here and there we have built leper-villagesrows of cottages under trees devoted to their use; and we make the towns contribute from local funds to support them, while charity ekes out the miserable pittance they receive.

Yet notwithstanding all the fresh evils which our philanthropic efforts have introduced into the country, no one will, I think, dispute my assertion when I maintain that the suppression of Samādhs, human sacrifices, selfimmolations, and self-tortures are among the greatest blessings which India has hitherto received from her English rulers.

THE TOWERS OF SILENCE, AND THE

PĀRSI RELIGION.

THE Parsis are descendants of the ancient Persians who were expelled from Persia by the Muhammadan conquerors, and who first settled at Surat between eleven and twelve hundred years ago. According to the last census they do not number more than 70,000 souls, of whom about 50,000 are found in the city of Bombay, the remaining 20,000 in different parts of India, but chiefly in Gujarat and the Bombay Presidency. Though a mere drop in the ocean of 241 million inhabitants, they form a most important and influential body of men, emulating Europeans in energy and enterprize, rivalling them in opulence, and imitating them in many of their habits. Their vernacular language is Gujarātī, but nearly every adult speaks English with fluency, and English is now taught in all their schools. Their Benevolent Institution for the education of at least 1,000 boys and girls is in a noble building, and is a model of good management. Their religion, as delivered in its original purity by their prophet Zoroaster, and as propounded in the Zand-Avastā, is monotheistic, or, perhaps, rather pantheistic, in spite of its philosophical dualism, and in spite of the apparent worship of fire and the elements, regarded as visible representations of the Deity. Its morality is summed up in three precepts of two words each-good thoughts,' 'good words,' 'good deeds;' of which the Parsi is constantly reminded by the triple coil of his white cotton girdle. In its origin the Parsi system is closely allied to that of the Hindu Aryans-as repre