nd those
who survived were often so crazed and shaken in their intellects, that they
never returned to their former state of mind.

Some traces of this kind of penance may be still perceived in the east,
where the followers of Mahomet have been found to adopt it. In the history
given by Hanway of the Persian monarch, Mir Maghmud, we have an account of
a process similar to that above, which this prince thought proper to
undergo. He was of a sour and cruel disposition, and had been greatly
dejected in his spirits; on which account he wanted to obtain some light
and assistance from heaven. [712]_With this intent Maghmud undertook to
perform the spiritual exercises which the Indian Mahommedans, who are more
addicted to them than those of other countries, have introduced into
Kandahar. This superstitious practice is observed by shutting themselves up
fourteen or fifteen days in a place where no light enters. The only
nourishment they take is a little bread and water at sun-set. During this
retreat they employ their time in repeating incessantly, with a strong
guttural voice, the word_ Hou, _by which they denote one of the attributes
of the Deity. These continual cries, and the agitations of the body with
which they were attended, naturally unhinge the whole frame. When by
fasting and darkness the brain is distempered, they fancy they see spectres
and hear voices. Thus they take pains to confirm the distemper which puts
them upon such trials_.

_Such was the painful exercise which Maghmud undertook in January this
year; and for this purpose he chose a subterraneous vault. In the beginning
of the next month, when he came forth, he was so pale, disfigured, and
emaciated, that they hardly knew him. But this was not the worst effect of
his devotion. Solitude, often dangerous to a melancholy turn of thought,
had, under the circumstances of his inquietude, and the strangeness of his
penance, impaired his reason. He became restless and suspicious, often
starting_.--In one of these fits he determined to put to death the whole
family of his predecessor, Sha Hussein; among whom were several brothers,
three uncles, and seven nephews, besides that prince's children. All these,
in number above an hundred, the tyrant cut to pieces with his own hand in
the palace yard, where they were assembled for that bloody purpose. Two
small children only escaped by the intervention of their father, who was
wounded in endeavouring to screen them.

[Il