en and children. Upon these the bodies of the dead are
laid, and fastened down with chains or iron bands. Presently birds
of prey, so numerous within the tropics and always waiting to devour,
pounce upon the corpse and quickly tear the flesh from the bones,
while the skeleton remains intact. This is afterward deposited in
a pit dug within the same enclosure, and which remains open till
completely filled up with bones; after which another is dug, and
when the enclosure can conveniently contain no more pits a new one is
selected and prepared. None but priests and bearers of the dead may
enter, or even look into, these walled cemeteries. The priests, by
virtue of their holy office, are preserved from defilement, but the
bearers are men set apart for this express purpose, and they are
considered so unclean that they may not enter under the roof of any
other Parsee or salute him on the street. If in passing a bearer do
but touch one's clothes accidentally, he is subject to a heavy fine,
while he who has been thus contaminated must bathe his entire
person and burn every article of raiment he wore at the time of his
defilement.

I was anxious to visit one of their temples, but this, Sir Jamsetjee
assured me, was impossible, as none but the initiated are allowed
even to approach the entrance, still less to get a glimpse of what is
passing within. He, however, volunteered the information that, so far
as the sanctuary itself was concerned, there was little to be seen,
only naked walls, bare floors, and an altar upon which burns the
sacred fire brought with the Parsees from Persia, and which, he said,
had never been extinguished since it was kindled by Zoroaster from the
sun four thousand years ago. Of the form of service I could not induce
the baronet to speak, but I learned afterward from my ship-friend that
the altar is enclosed by gratings, within which none but the priest
may enter. He goes in every day to tend "the eternal fire," when he
must remain for the space of an hour, repeating certain invocations,
with a bundle of rods in his hand to repel any unclean spirits that
should venture to approach the sacred fire. Meanwhile, the assembled
multitudes prostrate themselves without and offer up their silent
adoration. "Yet, after all," musingly said the Parsee, "the universe
is the throne of the invisible God, of whom fire is but the emblem,
and we worship Him most acceptably with our eyes fixed on the east
when the sun rides