HINDOO TOLERANCE OF ENGLISH MISSIONARY PREACHING.419

all that fell from him, and when in doubt requested an explanation. Their attendance was regular, and many whose countenances were marked, were ever the first in assembling. Thus, instead of exciting a tumult, as was at first apprehended, by attempting conversion at one of the chief sources of idolatry, Mr. Chamberlain, by his prudence and moderation, commanded attention; and I have little doubt, ere the conclusion of the fair, effected his purpose, by converting to Christianity men of some character and reputation."

As to the disadvantages under which the missionaries appear among the natives, without attendants, with the evident signs of being destitute of that wealth which the Hindoo adores, without any specific authority or protection from the government, in short, as we are told, "vagabonds," proposing a religion poor in attractions of external pɔmp,they would have been truly as foolish as their bitterest haters, or rudest scoffers have ever called them, if they had entered on their design without a firm presumption that the cause to which they devoted themselves would be accompanied by a power quite different from that of exterior show, and infinitely more than a compensation for its absence.

INHUMANITY OF THE HINDOOS.

The Hindoos seem devoid of humanity and natural affection. They can with all imaginable composure take their aged parents to the banks of the river, and suffocate them with mud. And when they can thus treat the living, it is not to be wondered at that they show a contempt totally unparalleled in other regions of the globe, of all decent attentions to the dead. We transcribe a description of what a voyager on the Ganges may expect to see in that sacred stream, especially near populous places on its banks:

Every hour passed on the rivers of India presents sights shocking to humanity, and sickening to the most apathetic. Crows and vultures are seen daily floating on half-eaten bodies, and glutting themselves with the entrails, the 'shreds and remnants' of mortality. Near the holy city of Benares I have had my boats surrounded with dead bodies, in every stage of decay, from those just committed to the water, to others in the most loathsome state of putrefaction. I have seen the oars of the boatman strike against the mangled carcases, and in the act of my servants drawing water to drink, have often cautioned them against the floating fragments of a human body. In extenuation of this disgraceful custom, the natives urge their

poverty; and I have not unfrequently had the happiness of contributing a rupee's worth of wood to the decent treatment of a parent, a sister, a brother, by reducing the corpse to ashes."

THE SUTTEE, OR THE BURNING OF WIDOWS.

In the Goorka territory, the Suttee, or burning of widows, is actually continued. One day, in a romantic scene, our traveller's attention was caught by many rude piles of stones, four and five feet high, erected in the simplest manner, and indicating various distances of time by their appearance. He was informed they were the monuments of women so sacrificed, and that in a few days there would be an opportunity for his enjoying, if he pleased, the spectacle of such a transaction. He saw, and thus describes it :—

"At ten in the morning the ceremony began. A pile of wood, about four feet and a half high, being previously erected, the mourner appeared, and having performed her ablutions in the Assan, a clear meandering stream which ran near, walked three times round the fatal pile, and taking a tender farewell of her family and friends, prepared for the last dreadful ceremony. She was a remote descendant of one of the hill princes; and though too short for a fine form, had a fair and interesting countenance. Her natural beauty, heightened by her resolution, would have affected a heart of adamant. Her glossy black hair hung dishevelled on her shoulders; and attired in a yellow sheet (the garment of despair), this infatuated widow ascended the fatal pile. The noise of drums and other native instruments now became deafening. Placing the head of her husband in her lap, she sat, seemingly unconcerned, and with the continued exclamations of Ram, Ram, witnessed the savage exultations of the Brahmins, as they eagerly applied torches to the pile. Ghee (clarified butter) and other inflammable substances, having been profusely spread on the lower parts of the wood, it ignited in an instant. Still was heard the cry of Ram, Ram: her chief ambition appeared to consist in invoking her god to the last. The flames had now ascended far above the sufferer, and her agony was very apparent in the agitation of the pile. But the Brahmins immediately threw on more wood, and buried both bodies from our sight. I shall not attempt to paint the spectacle which presented itself on the flames being extinguished: it was truly horrible. Their ashes were collected and thrown into the Assan; and shortly after, a pile of stones, similar to those before mentioned, was erected on the spot where the suttee had taken place."

AERIAL MONASTERIES OF METEORA.*

A

FROM the lofty desolation of the snowy Pindus our traveller descended into the beautiful valley of the Salympria, the ancient Peneus; which soon brought him to one of the most remarkable spectacles seen in all his peregrinations -the rocks of Meteora, surmounted with monasteries. number of rocks, insulated and perpendicular, standing up like towers or enormous columns, of the height of from one to three hundred feet, sustain on their summits, ancient monastic structures, built, in some instances, to the very edge of the crown of the rock, so that the wall carries upward the continuity of the face of rock.

"Four of the monasteries actually occupy the whole summit of the insulated rocks on which they stand; a perpendicular precipice descending from every side of the buildings into the deep-wooded hollows. The only access to these aerial prisons is by ropes, or by ladders firmly fixed to the rock, in those places where its surface affords any points of suspension; and these ladders, in some instances, connected with artificial subterranean tunnels, which give a passage of easier ascent to the buildings above. The monastery, called by distinction, the Meteora, which is the largest of the number, stands in the remarkable situation just described, and is accessible only in this method. Still more extraordinary is the position of another of these buildings. It is situated on a narrow rectangular pillar of rock, apparently about 120 feet in height; the summit of which is so limited in extent, that the walls of the monastery seem on every side to have the same plane of elevation as the perpendicular faces of the rock."

"The number of monasteries at Meteora, is said to have been formerly twenty four; but at present, owing partly to the wearing away of the rocks on which they stood, partly to the decay of the buildings themselves, only ten of these remain. Aios Stephanos, which we visited, is among the most extraordinary of the number; its height is upwards of 180 feet."

"A small wooden shed projected beyond the plane of the cliff, from which a rope, passing over a pulley at the top, descended to the foot of the rock. Our Tartar shouted loudly to a man who looked down, ordering him to receive us into the monastery; but at this time the monks were engaged in their

Travels in the Ionian Isles, Albania, &c., during the Years 1812 and 1813. By Henry Holland, M.D. 4to. 1815.

We were

chapel, and it was ten minutes before we could receive an answer to his order, and our request. At length we saw a thicker rope coming down from the pulley, and attached to the end of it a small rope net. The net reached the ground; our Tartar and a peasant spread it open, covered the lower part with an Albanese capote, and my friend and I seated ourselves in this slender vehicle. As we began to ascend, our weight drew close the upper aperture of the net, and we lay crouching together, scarcely able, and little willing, to stir either hand or foot. We rose with considerable rapidity; and the projection of the shed and pulley beyond the line of the cliff, was sufficient to secure against injury by striking upon the rock. Yet the ascent had something in it that was formidable. absolutely suspended in the air, our only support was the thin cordage of a net, and we were even ignorant of the machinery, whether secure or not, which was thus drawing us rapidly upwards. We finished the ascent, however, which is 156 feet, in safety, and in less than three minutes. When opposite the door of the wooden shed, several monks and other people appeared, who dragged the net into the apartment, and released us. We found on looking round us, that these men had been employed in working the windlass; and in observing some of their feeble and decayed figures, it was impossible to suppose that the danger of our ascent had been one of appearance only. Our servant, Demetrius, meanwhile, had been making a still more difficult progress upwards, by ladders fitted to the ledges of the rock, conducting to a subterranean passage, which opens out in the middle of the monastery.

"The monks received us with civility, and we remained with them more than an hour in their extraordinary habitation. The buildings are spread irregularly over the whole summit of the rock, enclosing two or three small areas; they have no splendour, either external or internal, and exhibit but the appearances of wretchedness and decay. Nevertheless the monks conducted us through every one of their dark and dilapidated rooms, and seemed to require a tribute of admiration, which, though little due to the objects for which it was sought, might conscientiously be given to the magnificent natural scenery around and beneath their monastery."

The two terrestrial visitants were led to each edge of the platform of this seclusion from the earth, after which they made a hasty repast of rice cooked in oil; a Turkish dish composed of flour, eggs, and oil; bread, and thin wine. There were only five monks, with a few attendants, resident at that time in the monastery: all of them miserable in

AERIAL MONASTERIES OF METEORA.

423

their exterior, and with conceptions as narrow and confined as the rocks on which they live. They were quite ignorant of the age of the foundation of their edifice, and appeared to possess no books of the smallest value. Their almost inaccessible situation has not availed them against the Albanian soldiers, who have often plundered the village and valleys below, where lies their little property, and whence their supplies are furnished, and sometimes compelled an admission for the same purpose into the monasteries themselves.

EXPERIMENTS ON THE GEYSER SPRINGS.*

THE author saw the column of the Great Geyser rise to a hundred and fifty feet. It was an exceedingly remarkable circumstance, that, by an experiment made in the first instance unthinkingly, he found it possible to provoke the New Geyser to a premature repetition of its thundering explosion, and with such an augmentation of its fury as to throw the boiling element to nearly double the most usual elevation of the column. Certainly, it were desirable there had been time to verify so strange a principle of its agency by a greater number of experiments; but the fact, taken only to the extent of the evidence afforded to Dr. Henderson, gives a strong presumption of such a law of operation as adds darker mystery to the subterraneous economy. We will give his own relation :

"The morning after my arrival I was awakened by its explosion about twenty minutes past four o'clock; and hastening to the crater, stood nearly half an hour contemplating its jet, and the steady and uninterrupted emission of the column of spray which followed, and which was projected at least a hundred feet into the air. After this, it gradually sunk into the pipe, and I did not expect to see another eruption till the following morning. However, about five o'clock in the afternoon, after a great quantity of the largest stones that could be found about the place had been thrown into the spring, I observed it begin to roar with

Iceland; or the Journal of a Residence in that Island, during the Years 1814 and 1815, By E. Henderson. 8vo. Two vols. 1818.