-

caves in Burmah. Lighting our torches, and each man taking one, we mounted the steep, tortuous, and slippery footpath of damp, green stones, through the thorny shrubs that beset it, to the low entrance to the outer cavern. Stooping uncomfortably, we passed into a small, vacant antechamber, having a low, dripping roof, perpendicular walls, clammy and green, and a rocky floor, sloping inward through a narrow arch to a long, double, transverse gallery, divided in the direction of its length, partly by a face of rock, partly by a row of pillars. Here were innumerable images of Guadma, the counterfeit presentment of the Fourth Boodh, whose successor is to see the end of all things, innumerable, and of every stature, from Hop-o'-my-thumbs to Hurlothrombos, but all of the identical orthodox pattern, with pendulous ears, one hand planted squarely on the knee, the other sleeping in the lap, an eternity of front face, and a smooth stagnancy of expression, typical of an unfathomable calm, the Guadma of a span as grim as he of ten cubits, and he of ten cubits as vacant as the Guadma of a span,- of stone, of lead, of wood, of clay, of earthenware and alabaster,—on their bottoms, on their heads, on their backs, on their sides, on their faces,-black, white, red, yellow, an eye gone, a nose gone, an ear gone, a head gone,-an arm off at the shoulder, a leg at the knee,—a back split, a bosom burst, Guadma, imperturbable, eternal, calm,-in the midst of time, timeless! It is not annihilation which the Boodh has promised, as the blessed crown of a myriad of progressive transmigrations; it is not Death; it is not Sleep,-it is this.

Our entrance awoke a pandemonium. Myriads of bats and owls, and all manner of fowls of darkness and bad omen, crazed by the glare of twenty torches, startled the echoes with infernal clangor. Screaming and huddling together, some fled under the wide skirts of sable, which Darkness, climbing to the roof in fear, drew up after her; some hid with lesser shadows between columns of great girth,

or in the remotest murky niches, or down in the black profound of resounding chasms; some, bewildered or quite blinded by the flashes of the co-eternal beam, dashed themselves against the stony walls, and fell crippled, gasping, staring, at our feet. And when, at last, our guides and servants, mounting to pinnacles and jutting points, and many a frieze and coigne of vantage, placed blue lights on them all, and at the word illuminated all together, there was redoubled bedlam in that abode of Hecate, and the eternal calm of the Boodh became awful. For what deeds of outer darkness, done long ago in that black hole of superstition, so many damned souls shrieked from their night-fowl transmigrations, 'twere vain to question there were no disclosures in that trance of stone.

For an experience of the oppressive awfulness of solitude, and all the weary monotony of waste, come now, with Kinglake, into mid-desert.

"As long as you are journeying in the interior of the desert, you have no particular point to make for as your restingplace. The endless sands yield nothing but small stunted shrubs; even these fail after the first two or three days; and from that time you pass over broad plains, you pass over newly reared hills, you pass through valleys that the storm of the last week has dug; and the hills and the valleys are sand, sand, sand, still sand and only sand, and sand and sand again. The earth is so samely, that your eyes turn toward heaven,- toward heaven, I mean, in the sense of sky. You look to the sun, for he is your task-master, and by him you know the measure of the work that you have done, the measure of the work that remains for you to do. He comes when you strike your tent in the early morning, and then, for the first hour of the day, as you move forward on your camel, he stands at your near side, and makes you know that the whole day's toil is before you. Then, for a while, and a long while, you see him no more; for you are veiled and shrouded, and dare not look upon the greatness

of his glory; but you know where he strides over your head by the touch of his flaming sword. No words are spoken; but your Arabs moan, your camels sigh, your skin glows, your shoulders ache; and, for sights, you see the pattern and the web of the silk that veils your eyes, and the glare of the outer light.

"Time labors on,—your skin glows, and your shoulders ache, your Arabs moan, your camels sigh, and you see the same pattern on the silk, and the same glare beyond; but conquering Time marches on, and by-and-by the descending sun has compassed the heaven, and now softly touches your right arm, and throws your lank shadow over the sand, right along on the way to Persia. Then again you look upon his face, for his power is all veiled in his beauty, and the redness of flames has become the redness of roses; the fair, wavy cloud that fled in the morning now comes to his sight once more,- comes blushing, but still comes on, comes burning with blushes, yet hastens, and clings to his side."

When one has been sufficiently disEuropized by remote travel, to become, as to his imagination, a child again, and receive a child's impressions from the strangeness that surrounds him, the grotesque and fantastic aspects of his situation afford him the same emotions, of unquestioning wonder and romantic sympathy, that he derived in the old time from the adventures of Sinbad the Sailor, the exploits of Jack the Giant-Killer, what Gulliver saw, or Munchausen did. Behold Belzoni in the necropolis of Thebes, crawling on his very face among the dusty rubbish of unnumbered mummies, to steal papyri from their bosoms. Fatigued with the exertion of squirming through a mummy-choked passage of five hundred yards, he sought a resting-place; but when he would have sat down, his weight bore on the body of an Egyptian, and crushed it like a bandbox. He naturally had recourse to his hands to sustain his weight; but they found no better support, and he sunk altogether in a

crash of broken bones, rags, and wooden cases, that raised such a dust as kept him motionless for a quarter of an hour, waiting for it to subside. He could not move from the place, however, without increasing it, and every step he took smashed a mummy. Once, in forcing his way through a steeply inclined passage, abo it twenty feet in length, and no wider than his body could be squeezed through, he was overwhelmed with an avalanche of bones, legs, arms, and hands, rolling from above; and every forward move brought his face in contact with the abhorred features of some decayed Egyptian.*

Behold Denham in the Desert of Dead Bones, where his sick comrades were constantly disheartened by the sight of the skulls and skeletons of men who had perished on those sands. During several days, they passed from sixty to ninety skeletons a day; but the numbers that lay about the wells at El Hammar were countless. Those of two women, whose perfect and regular teeth bespoke them young, perhaps beautiful, were particularly shocking. Their arms were still clasped around each other's neck, in the attitude in which they had expired, although the flesh had long since been consumed in the rays of the sun, and

the blackened bones alone were left.

Parkyns, among the little greenishgray monkeys of Tigré, enjoyed a treat to make the mouth of our young imagination water. He saw them conversing, quarrelling, making love; mothers were taking care of their children, combing their hair, nursing or "trotting" them; and the passions of all-jealousy, rage, love- were as strongly marked as in men. They had a language as distinct to them as ours to us; and their women were as noisy and as fond of disputation as any fish-fag in Billingsgate.

"On their marches, a few of the heedless youth occasionally lagged behind to snatch a handful of berries; sometimes a matron halted for a while to nurse her baby, and, not to lose time, dressed its hair while it took its meal. Now and Bayard Taylor.

*

According to Marco Polo, there have been among the monkeys, from time to time, certain Asiatic Yankees, who did a lively business in the manufacture of an article which would, no doubt, have found a ready purchaser at Barnum's Museum.

"It should be known," says the veracious old Venetian, "that what is reported respecting the dead bodies of diminutive human creatures or pigmies, brought from India, is an idle tale; such pretended men being manufactured in the island of Basman in the following manner. The country produces a species of monkey of a tolerable size, and having a countenance resembling that of a man. Those persons who make it their business to catch them shave off the hair, leaving it only about the chin. They then dry and preserve them with camphor and other drugs; and having prepared them in such mode that they have exactly the appearance of little men, they put them into wooden boxes, and sell them to trading people, who carry them to all parts of the world."

Not the least familiar of the aspects of the Barbaric are its actions and situations of horror. I could tell tales from the later, not less than from the older travellers, that would send my readers shuddering to sleepless beds: the ferocities of Tippoo reenacted in the name of Nena Sahib; the noiseless murders of Thuggee's nimble cord; the drunken diablerie of the Doorga Pooja; the monstrous human sacrifices of the Khonds and Bheels; the dreadful rites of the Janni before the gory altar of the Earth goddess; the indiscriminate slashing and stabbing of the Amok; the shuddering dodges of the

lonely duels of the French lion-killer under the melancholy stars; the carrionlike exposures of the Parsee dead; the nightmarish legends of the Evil Eye. But my hope is to part with them on pleasant terms; so rather would I strew their pillows with the consolations of this many-mooded Barbaric,-moss from ruins, and pretty flowers from the desert,— that beneficent botany which maketh the wilderness to blossom like the rose.

eye.

When Mungo Park, deserted by his guides, and stripped by thieves, utterly paralyzed by misfortune and misery, would have laid him down to die in a desert place, at that moment, of all others, the extraordinary beauty of a small moss in fructification caught his "I mention this," he says, "to show you from what trifling circumstances the mind will sometimes derive consolation; for, though the whole plant was not larger than the top of one of my fingers, I could not contemplate the delicate conformation of its root, leaves, and capsule without admiration. Can that Being, thought I, who planted, watered, and brought to perfection, in this obscure part of the world, a thing which appears of so small importance, look with unconcern upon the situation and sufferings of creatures formed after his own image? I started up, and, disregarding both danger and fatigue, travelled forward, assured that relief was at hand; and I was not disappointed."

Richardson, in the midst of Sahara, beheld with brimming eyes two small trees, the common desert acacia, and by-andby two or three pretty blue flowers. As he snatched them, to fold them in his bosom, he could not help exclaiming, Elhamdullah! "Praise be to God!"--for Arabic was growing second-born to his tongue, and he began to think in it and to pray in it. An Arab said to him, "Yakob, if we had a reed, and were to make a melodious sound, those flowers, the color of heaven, would open and shut their mouths."

Once, Mungo Park (the once too often

of telling this story can never come) sat all day, without food, under a tree. The night threatened to be very pitiless; for the wind arose, and there was every sign of a heavy rain; and wild beasts prowled around. But about sunset, as he was preparing to pass the night in the branches of the tree, a woman, returning from the labors of the field, perceived how weary and dejected he was, and, taking up his saddle and bridle, invited him to follow her. She conducted him to her hut, where she lighted a lamp, spread a mat on the floor, and bade him welcome. Then she went out, and presently returning with a fine fish, broiled it on the embers, and set his supper before him. The rites of hospitality thus performed toward a stranger in distress, that savage angel, pointing to the mat, and assuring him that he might sleep there with

out fear, commanded the females of her family, who all the while had stood gazing on him in fixed astonishment, to resume their spinning. Then they sang, to a sweet and plaintive air, these words: "The winds roared, and the rains fell. The poor white man, faint and weary, came and sat under our tree. Let us pity the white man; no mother hath be to bring him milk, no wife to grind his corn." Flowers in the desert! *

Flowers in the desert! And De Sauty shall spare them, though he botanize on his mother's grave. Borro-boolah-gah may know us by our India-rubber shirts and pictorial pocket-handkerchiefs; and King Mumbo Jumbo may reduce his rebellious locks to subjection with a Yankee currycomb; but these, our desert flowers, are All Right, De Sauty! * Leigh Hunt.

telegraph-wire when the insulation is perfect. I looked up, and detected a pink flush making its way browward on the lovely countenance across the table.

"I beg your pardon," said I, with much

concern.

"It was my fault, Sir; excuse me," said she, permitting the pink flush to deepen, rosily.

"Shall I pass you the buttered toast?" said I.

"Muffins, if you please," said she, and so sweetly that I was blinded to the absence of sugar in my second cup of coffee.

I was confused by this incident. Many men would have concealed their disquietude by an affectation of sudden appetite, or by bullying the waiter, or by abrupt departure from the scene. I did neither. I felt I had a right to be confused, and I gloried in it.

Very soon Miss Tarlingford withdrew,

and I experienced an aching void within, which chops and fritters had no power to replenish.

I opened a chambermaid's heart with a half-dollar, and the treasures of her knowledge were revealed to me. The beauty and her party were to remain a fortnight. Among her companions there were no males, except a youthful irresponsibility. Exultemus!

Later in the morning I heard the tinkling of the parlor pianoforte. Music has soothing charms for me, though I have not a savage breast. I drew near, and found Miss Tarlingford trifling with the keys, those keys which lock together so many chains of human sympathy. She rose, and gave out demonstrations of impending disappearance. I interposed,

"Pray, continue. I am famished for music, and came specially to listen.” "It is hardly worth while."

and a vacuum began to come under my waistcoat.

For three blissful days Miss Tarlingford and I were seldom separated. Her sister, a pale, sedate maiden, of amiable appearance, and her brother, a small, rude boy, of intrusive habits and unguarded speech, I consented to undergo, for the sake of conventional necessity. To the mother of the Tarlingfords additional respect seemed due, and was accorded.

Three blissful days of sunshine, meadowy rambles, forest explorations, the majestic tranquillity of Nature spiced with the sauce of flirtation, or something stronger. Sometimes we took our morning happiness on foot, sometimes our midday ecstasy served up on horseback, sometimes our evening rapture in an open wagon at two forty.

The puerile Tarlingford, interfering at

"I will play for you, then."

And she did. This was wonderful. Usually, a long and painful struggle precedes feminine acquiescence, on such occasions. Repeated refusals, declarations of incapacity, partial consent vouchsafed and then waywardly withdrawn, poutings, head-tossings, feebler murmurs of disinclination, and final reluctant yielding form the fashionable order of proceeding. The charm of it all is, that the original intention is the same as the ultimate action. Whence, then, this folly? Having been many times wretchedly bored by this sort of thing, I was now correspondingly gladdened by the contrast.

Miss Tarlingford played well, and I said so.

66

Pretty well," she answered, frankly; "but not so well as I could wish."

Shock Number Two. It is customary in good society for tolerable performers to disavow all praises, (secretly yearning for more,) and to assail with invective their own artistic accomplishments. Here was a young lady who played well, and had the hardihood to acknowledge This rather took away my breath,

it.

to equestrian distinctions, he wrought upon maternal indulgence, until, not without misgivings, maternal anxiety was stifled, and, with injunctions that we should hover protectingly near him, he was sent forth, a thorn in our sides. In half an hour he was accidentally remembered, and was found to be nowhere within view; so we pursued our way, well pleased. He had dropped quietly off, at the first canter, into a miry slough, and had returned sobbingly, covered with mortification and mud, to the arms of his parent. Keen questioning at dinner was the result.

"Why did you so neglect him?" demanded fond mamma, adding, reproachfully, "The child's life might have been sacrificed."