beautiful
eyrie on top of the Kootub upon their pygmy forms, thronging the walks
and roads, brown and busy as swarms of ants.

It is a vast concourse of people, characteristic of teeming India; but
they are not, on this occasion, congregated to witness pagan rites and
ceremonies, nor to encourage iconoclastic Moolahs in smashing Hindoo gods
and chipping offensive Hindoo carvings off their temples; they are a
mixed crowd of Hindoos, Sikhs, and Mohammedans, who, having to some
extent buried the hatchet of race and religious animosities under the
just and tolerant rule of a Christian government, have gathered here amid
the ruins and relics of their respective past histories to enjoy
themselves in innocent recreation.

Descending from the Kootub Minar, I am resting beneath the shade of the
dak bungalow hard by, when a gray-bearded Hindoo approaches, salaams, and
hands me a paper. The paper is a certificate, certifying that the bearer,
Chunee Lai, had performed before Captain Somebody of the Fusileers, and
had afforded that officer excellent amusement. Before I have quite
grasped the situation, or comprehended the purport of the tendered
missive, several men and boys deposit a miscellaneous assortment of boxes
and baskets before me and range themselves in a semicircle behind them.
The old fellow with the certificate picks out a small box and raises the
lid; a huge cobra thrusts out its hideous head and puffs its hooded neck
to the size of a man's hand. It then dawns upon me that the gray-bearded
Hindoo is a conjurer; and being curious to see something of Indian
prestidigitation, I allow him to proceed.

Many of the tricks are quite commonplace and transparent even to a
novice. For example, he mixes red, yellow, and white powders together in
a tumbler of water and swallows the mixture, making, of course, a wry
face, as though taking a dose of bitter medicine. He then calls a boy
from among the by-standers and blows first red powder, then yellow, then
white into the youngster's face. I judge he had small bags of dry powder
stowed away in his cheek. He performs his tricks on the bare ground,
without any such invaluable adjunct as the table of his European rival,
and some of them, viewed in the light of this disadvantage, are indeed
puzzling. For instance, he fills an ordinary tin pot nearly full of
water, puts in a handful of yellow sand and a handful of red powder, and
thoroughly stirs them up; he then thrusts his naked han