press, be kept in subjection by so small a force alien in race and character, in religion and culture. In our view the British domination in India rests upon a thin shell overlying a bottomless quicksand; and this shell is liable at any moment to give way.

We pass over the long list of princes, great and small, who had audience one by one on this day, closing with a very interesting group of picturesque personages, mostly in bare feet and fine turbans," who were admitted in a batch and dismissed, leaving the prince and his suite in a very much bored condition. Quite as wearisome were the balls and festivities which the poor prince, who was longing for a little quiet shooting, was forced to grace with his presence. "It was not given to every one," says Mr. Russell, "to have strength for these festivities. There were always absentees, or some who 'popped in and hopped out again.' Perhaps the Duke of

was apparently corded securely over his head, and the boy was jammed into the basket, which he seemed to fill completely. All at once sack and cloth were jerked out from the basket, whereat the juggler seemed to be in a towering rage. He jumped upon the top of the basket, crushed in the lid, and drove a stick through and through the wicker-work. He then removed the lid, and the basket was empty. But, perched among the branches of a tree close by, there was seen the boy, or one just like him.. The cloth which had been placed over the mango-seed was then lifted, and under it was a tiny tree covered with fresh fruit. All this was done by ordinary strolling performers, and without any of the complicated apparatus used by our own jugglers. How they managed to cheat the eyes of the spectators is a mystery.

After ten days or so at Bombay, the prince decided

Sutherland and Sir Bartle were among the latter, and certainly Canon Duckworth was of the former; but the prince was never known to disappoint expectations or to throw a chill over such gatherings by retiring early." No wonder that the prince tried to amuse himself now and then by searching for less formal sights, such as the performances of the street jugglers, when he could do so without being recognized by the crowds. On one of these occasions the performers were a withered, vivacious juggler, and a ragged, snake-charming confederate-chatty old fellows, whose skin hung on their bones as if it were cracked brown paper." A mango-seed had been placed in the ground in plain sight of all, and covered with a dirty cloth. Then a shallow basket three feet long and eighteen inches high was placed on the bare ground. A lad of twelve was bound hand and foot with strong twine; a sack of stout netting was slipped over his head, and the old fellow pressed him down on his haunches, and the sack

to visit the little gaekwar at Baroda, his capital, some two hundred and fifty miles northward. Perhaps the main inducement was that he might there find a little shooting; but, besides this, there was an opportunity of seeing a genuine native court, still flourishing within less than a day's journey by rail from one of the capitals of British India. At all events, he met with a purely Oriental reception in a city of one hundred thousand inhabitants which few Europeans. have ever reached. At the station was the little gaekwar and his regent, Sir Madhava Rao, waiting to receive him, and to escort him to the British residency hard by the native city. For the prince's riding was an elephant of extraordinary size, bearing a howdah, or canopied seat of silver gilt-some said of gold-with cushions of velvet and cloth of gold, fastened over an embroidered cloth which completely covered the form of the great beast. The cost of the trappings was said to have been four hundred thousand rupees. The head of the elephant was

painted a bright saffron-color, the ears of a light green, and the proboscis gayly ornamented with various fanciful devices. His tusks had been cut off to the length of three or four feet, and larger ones fastened by gold bands to the stumps. Upon his painted legs were thick coils of gold. A second elephant, painted in slate-color and red, with a howdah of burnished silver, and silver leglets and tusklets, was provided for the Duke of Sutherland; and a long file of others, each painted in a different manner, were ready for other attendants of the prince. Provided with a military escort, the cavalcade moved on. Every inch of the way was bordered by a light trellis-work of bamboos and palmleaves, hung with lamps, and festooned with green leaves and bright flowers, with grand arches and groups of banners at intervals. "The people seemed very comfortable, and there was no sign of the wretchedness we are so fond of attributing to native rule."

The prince was treated to an entertainment in the arena for wild-beast combats, which was, after all, a very commonplace affair. First came a bout of what we have learned to style "Greco-Roman wrestling." The athletes "were masses of brown muscle, a little abdominous perhaps, but still of enormous power. At first there were two, then four, then six animated Laocoöns, striving, writhing, and rolling about in the dust, in such knotted coils of arms and legs as baffled discrimination. They were matched so well that only once did the applause of the spectators announce a victory or a defeat-the great feat of strength by which one of the wrestlers, uprooting his antagonist from the ground, prizes him over his knee, and throws him over so that both shoulders touch the ground." Two elephants, their tusks sawed short, were brought forward. They met pacifically in the centre of the arena; but the attendants, by yells and prods, somehow got it into the heads of the creatures that, at least in appearance, they must be enemies. But Mr. Russell thought that "these sagacious creatures were only making believe. Certainly there was some hard hitting and tremendous head collisions; tusks rattled, proboscis met proboscis in intricate convolutions, and the vast hulls shook under the strain of combat." But just when they had got their trunks tied up in a tight knot, squibs were fired off under their bellies, whereupon they let go their hold, and went to their corners. The first round was over. In the second round one of the combatants got the choice of position, and butted his opponent on quarter and stern till he was brought up against the wall. Rockets and squibs were brought into play to separate the combatants, who were then dragged from the ring, neither having received any severe punishment. A couple of rhinoceroses were next brought in, grunting like pigs as they toddled up toward each other. "Two merchants could not be more amiable at their first introduction on 'Change. They came up nose to nose as if to exchange civilities;" but the attendants began to excite ill-feelings by alternately poking and patting them, until one of them, lowering his head

till his jaw touched the sand, made a thrust with his snout at his friend, which was returned at once, and then, to the infinite delight of the spectators, there was a quick succession of blows, until the one who had begun the difficulty turned tail and lumbered off toward the gateway, amid the reproaches of his backers, who managed to goad him back to where his friend was standing stupidly, as if wondering what the pother was all about; but a treacherous dig in the side convinced him that mischief was meant, and he went for his assailant. For a few minutes it looked very much like a fight; but the original aggressor got more than he had bargained for, and made off again, to the evident relief of the other, who showed no inclination to follow up his advantage. A couple of buffaloes next made their bows, and went briskly to work. But they were not evenly matched. At the first round the smaller one was tumbled clear over, and got a bad fall. He was on his feet again in a moment, and did his best to score a point, but came to grief. His seconds threw up the sponge, and he left the field in a somewhat demoralized condition. The exhibition was closed by a kind of free fight between a number of rams. These light-weights won all the glories of the day. "There was nothing of the timidity of the sheep in their engagements," says the chronicler; "the fury of their charges, the tremendous cracks with which their heads met together, were worthy of all praise; and I would certainly sooner see them than a couple of prize-fighters at home."

Next day the prince and his suite went out for a day's sport in the gaekwar's preserves a few miles distant. There were half a dozen cheetahs, or hunt ing-leopards, "standing upright on carts drawn by oxen, their eyes hooded, lashing their lank sides with their tails, hissing and purring by turns, like monster tabbies." It is gratifying to learn that "the prince inspected the cheetahs with interest: one was taken from the cart for closer inspection, at which it hissed savagely." There were also "uglylooking dogs, half greyhound, half deerhound, in leashes, and eight falconers with splendid peregrines and inferior, short-winged falcons on their wrists."

Mounted on ox-carts, the hunters set out in search of game. They had been told that the deer were accustomed to see these vehicles, and would not take alarm. But, though bucks enough were soon in sight, they evidently suspected mischief, and made off. "Perhaps it was owing to the novel costume of the hunters-helmets and London shooting-clothes -or the unusual length of the procession, which set them on the alert." Finally, after no little manoeuvring, they got within fifty yards of a herd, and a cheetah was let slip. He singled out a buck, which made off with amazing bounds, soon showing that he had the heels of his pursuer, who gave up the chase after a dash of some five hundred yards, which is said to be the longest run they ever make. In time they got near another herd. A couple of bucks were too and one busy fighting to notice what was going on, of them was pulled down by a cheetah, who got the blood as his reward. Soon another herd was ap

1

"The river," says Mr. Russell, “washes the remains

of a great city-an arsenal in ruins; palaces in ruins; quay in ruins; churches in ruins; all in ruins. Long would it take to repeat the stories of our friends concerning the places we passed. As one of them said: 'We were once great; we ruled vast provinces in this land; now you are the masters. Look and see what is left to us!' We looked, and saw the site of the Inquisition, the Bishop's prison, the grand cathedral, great churches, chapels, convents, religious houses, on knolls surrounded by jungle and trees, scattered all over the country. We saw the crumbling masonry which once marked the lines of streets and inclosures of palaces, dock-yards filled with

weeds, and obsolete cranes."

The cathedral is half a mile from the landingplace, and the only conveyance is a kind of litter, here called a mancheel, in which the prince and governor took their seats, while the others went on foot. The cathedral is plain and massive outside, but of vast and noble proportions within, with shrines and chapels, much gilding, fine old silver-work, and many tolerable pictures. There were but seven worshipers, all native women, and kneeling before a huge shrine. From the cathedral they went to the church of Bom Jesus, chiefly noted for the shrine of St. Francis Xavier, one of the most beautiful and one of the richest objects of the kind which can be seen anywhere; but it is placed in a very small, dark chapel, and can scarcely be conveniently examined. The treasuries, full of gold and silver cups for the sacred elements, were opened, and many curiosities were exhibited." Before the church a musical performance had been gotten up in honor of the visitors. The principal performer was a very tall native, whose attire consisted mainly of a huge drum suspended from his neck. With one hand he belabored the drum, while the other hand held to his mouth a brass instrument which produced a tremendous tooting. The minor performers were a couple of youths with smaller drums, and another with a pair of cymbals.

The coast of the island of Ceylon was sighted on the 1st of December, but the breezes from the shore were far enough from "spicy," blowing as they did over the heaps of oyster-shells, with their putrefying inhabitants, left on the shore by the pearlfishers; and, if the strangers were not warranted in pronouncing that "only man is vile," they certainly found the natives were very odd-looking, "the lower man being clad in petticoats, and the hair worn in massive rolls at the back of the head, where it was secured by large tortoise-shell combs."

Colombo, the capital of Ceylon, is not a very large place, and a carriage-road around the environs fully justified the old fragrant repute of the island. "It was in some measure like a promenade in the covered ways of a great horticultural exhibition. For miles cocoanut-trees, and again cocoanut-trees, the suburban villas surrounded by cinnamon-groves, and almost buried in the richness of real tropical vegetation." The beauty of the island was still more ap

would be well worth while to go from London to Ceylon to enjoy the scenery of that day's ride. "Underneath thick groves of cocoas, arecas and jaggery, and an extraordinary profusion of other trees-some bearing rich pink or crimson flowers, others presenting glowing masses of scarlet buds, others with white flowers and blossoms of purple or lilac-one caught sight of the hamlets in which dwell the cultivators of the sea-like expanse of rice." The situation of Kandy is especially beautiful. "In a deep ravine at one side of the plateau, or, more properly speaking, of the broad valley surrounded by hills, overlooking a still deeper depression, on which the town is situated, the Mahawelli River thunders in its rocky bed. The small lake, by the side of which part of the city is built, lends a charming repose and freshness to the scene which is mirrored in its waters.. Wherever the eye is turned rise mountain-tops, some bare masses of rock, others clothed with vegetation. There is no idea of a town or a city to be realized in what one sees: it is all suburb-verandaed pavilions and bungalows stretching in lines, bearing the names of streets; here and there the native houses, packed more closely, may be termed lanes; but the whole place is as 'diffused' as any of the rural quarters of the great metropolis. Public buildings, properly so called, there are none." But there is one drawback to the delights of wandering in the shady gardens where the air is heavy with the odor of strange flowers: a little black land-leech, hardly thicker than a pin, which swarms in uncounted myriads. "Go where one would, they came wriggling and jumping along the grass. They must smell one's blood. If you stood on the gravel-walk for a few moments you could see them making their way from all parts toward you as a common centre of interest. Most horrible of all their properties, they can stand erect on their tails and look out for what is coming." For protection against them, Europeans wear "leechgaiters," stocking-shaped bags of stout linen, which are pulled over the feet and fastened at the knee before the shoes are put on. Even his royal highness had to endue his noble extremities in these bags. At Kandy the prince was treated to a pera-hara, or procession of elephants, dancers, and priests, belonging to the Buddhist temples:

"It was exceedingly grotesque, novel, and interesting, and would task the best pen and pencil to give an adequate idea of such combinations of forms, sounds, and figures. The 'devil-dancers,' in masks and painted faces, were sufficiently hideous. Their contortions, performed to the tune of clanging brass, cymbals, loud horns, presented no feature of agility or grace which might not be easily rivaled by an ordinary dancing group nearer home. The elephants, plodding along in single file, carried magnificent howdahs occupied by the priests, and were covered with cloth of gold and silver and with plates of metal, which shone in the light of the torches. Most of these animals were exceedingly polite, salaamed, and uttered a little flourish through their probosces as they came opposite to the place where the prince was standing. Some knelt down and made obeisance before him; but the pro