y and benevolence
among all the people of his city, regardless of race or creed. The
Parsee gives liberally to charity on the occasion of weddings or of
deaths. The charity includes relieving the poor, helping a man to marry
and aiding poor children to secure an education. The influence of the
Parsee religion upon the literature and life of the people is very
marked. There is no room for atheism, agnosticism or materialism. Faith
in the existence of God and in the immortality of the soul is the
corner-stone of the creed, but the Parsee spends no money and no effort
in proselyting others.

Marriage is encouraged by the Parsee religion, because it encourages a
virtuous and religious life. The marriage ceremony is peculiar. It is
always performed in a large pavilion, whatever the wealth of the couple.
In the case of the rich many invitations are issued and a fine wedding
feast is spread. On the day set for the wedding, the bride and groom and
the invited guests assemble in the pavilion. The bride as well as the
groom is dressed in white. When the time comes for the ceremony the
couple sit in chairs facing each other and a sheet is held up between
them by friends, so that they cannot see each other. Then two priests
begin intoning the marriage service. After several prayers a cord is
wound around the two chairs seven times and the chairs are also bound
together with a strip of cloth. More prayers and exhortations follow,
both priests showering rice upon the couple. Finally the sheet is
withdrawn, they and their chairs are placed side by side, each is given
a cocoanut to hold that is bound to the other by a string, emblematic of
the plenty that may bless the new home, and they are declared man and
wife. Then they sign a document certifying that they have been united
according to the Parsee ritual and witnesses sign their names.

Far stranger than the wedding customs of the Parsees are their burial
rites. They believe that neither fire, earth nor water must be polluted
by contact with a dead body, so neither burial nor cremation is
permitted. Instead, they expose their dead to vultures which strip the
flesh from the bones within an hour. This occurs in conical places,
called towers of silence, which are shut off from human gaze. The Bombay
towers of silence are on Malabar head, a beautiful residence district
overlooking the city. Here, in a fine garden planted to many varieties
of trees and shrubs, are five circular towers,