he idols of this city are legion.

But there is nothing here which impresses one more than its squalid
filth, and the abject degradation of the people which crowd its
streets. The temples are extremely dirty. There is not one of imposing
size or of decent attractiveness. There stands the monkey-temple,
where scores of mangy, tricky brutes are daily sumptuously fed by
devout pilgrims. On one side of the precinct a clever butcher-priest
severs with one stroke the heads of goats which are brought for
sacrifice to the thirsty deity. As in Madura, so in Benares, the great
god of the Hindu is Siva. But the character of the worship which is
rendered to him and to others of his cult is far from ennobling when
not actually revolting. And the phallic emblem of this god is
everywhere found in his temples and is suggestive of definite evils
connected with his worship.

The saddest and most grewsome of all objects which impress one in this
centre of Hinduism is its burning Ghaut. To the side of the river many
bodies are brought daily, each wrapped in a white cloth, and are
deposited just where they are half covered by the water. Within ten
feet of this place we see parties of pilgrims bathing in and drinking
of the sacred water of the river, utterly regardless of the proximity
of corpses above stream! From time to time corpses are picked out of
the water and placed upon piles of wood near by. Each pile is ignited
and the body reduced to ashes. These ashes are carefully collected,
later on, and sprinkled, with appropriate ceremonies, on the face of
the river. Day after day, and year after year, this ceaseless
procession of the dead takes place, while up stream and down stream
the bank of the river is covered with men and women who fatally
believe that by bathing in this dirty stream they are washing away
their sins and preparing themselves for final absorption and eternal
rest in Brahm!

Benares reminded the writer of Rome. He never realized the degradation
possible to Christianity until he visited "The Eternal City," with its
huge shams and ghastly superstitions. He never saw Hinduism with its
myriad inane rites and debasing idolatry half so grotesque, idiotic,
and repulsive, as in this city of Benares, where one ought to see the
religion of these two hundred odd million people at its best, and not
at its worst.

It is a positive relief to go out of the city, a distance of four
miles, to Sarnath, where the great Buddha--"The En