pause to survey it
from the end of the avenue. An element of the ridiculous here appears in
the person and the appeals of an old Hindoo fruit-vender. This hopeful
agent of Pomona squats beside a little tray, and, as we stand and feast
our eyes on the sublimest object in the world of architecture, he
persistently calls our attention to a dozen or two half-decayed mangoes
and custard-apples that comprise his stock in trade.

We pass down the cypress aisle, and invade the plinth. Hundreds of
natives, both male and female, are wandering about it. The dazzling
whiteness of the promenade is in striking contrast to the color of their
own bodies. As the groups of women walk about, their toe-rings and
ankle-ornaments jingle against the marble, and their particolored raiment
and barbarous gewgaws look curiously out of place here. The place seems
more appropriate to vestal virgins, robed in white, than to dusky Hindoo
females, arrayed in all the colors of the rainbow. Many of these people
are pilgrims who have come hundreds of miles to see the Taj, and to pay
tribute to the memory of Shah Jehan, and his faithful wife the Princess
Arjumund, whose mausoleum is the Taj. Two young men we see, leading an
aged female, probably their mother, down the steps to the vault, where,
side by side, the remains of this royal pair repose. The old lady is
going down there to deposit a rose or two upon Arjumund's tomb, a tender
tribute paid to-day, by thousands, to her memory.

We climb the spiral stairs of one of the miuars, and sit out on the
little pavilion at the top, watching the big ugly crocodiles float lazily
on the surface of the Jumna at our feet. Before departing, we enter the
Taj and examine the wonderful mosaics on the cenotaphs and the encircling
screen-work. This inlaid flower-work is quite in keeping with the general
magnificence of the mausoleum, many of the flowers containing not less
than twenty-five different stones, assorted shades of agate, carnelian,
jasper, blood-stone, lapis lazuli, and turquoise. Ere leaving we put to
test the celebrated echo; that beautiful echoing, that--"floats and
soars overhead in a long, delicious undulation, fading away so slowly
that you hear it after it is silent, as you see, or seem to see, a lark
you have been watching, after it is swallowed up in the blue vault of
heaven."

We leave this garden of enchantment by way of one of the mosques. An
Indian boy is licking up honey from the floor of the