{200} Children are generally considered as impure until the ninth year, and are therefore not subject to the laws of their religion.

{204} The god Vishnu is represented as a tortoise.

{209} Although only the beginning of spring, the temperature rose during the day as high as 95-99 degrees Fah.

{212a} Mundsch is the royal tutor, writer, or interpreter.

{212b} It is well known that saltpetre produces a considerable reduction of temperature.

{213} Indor lies 2,000 feet above the level of the sea.

{225} Monsoons are the periodical winds which blow during one-half the year from east to west, during the other half from west to east.

{226} The Black Town is that part of the town in which the poorer classes of inhabitants reside.  That neither beauty nor cleanliness are to be sought there, is a matter of course.

{227} There are in all only 6,000 Parsees in the island of Bombay.

{228} And yet Bombay is the principal seat of the Fire-worshippers.

{268} This is an error:  M. Botta made the first attempt to excavate the Ninevite remains at Khorsabad.  Mr. Layard had, moreover, commenced his excavations before he received the countenance of the British Museum authorities.  See “Nineveh—­the Buried City of the East,” one of the volumes of the “National Illustrated Library,” for the rectification of this and other errors in Madame Pfeiffer’s account.

{270} The manuscripts of the journey through Hindostan as far as Mosul miscarried for more than a year and a half.  I gave them up as lost.  This was the cause of the delay in the publication of my “Journey round the world.”

{279} I had picked up enough of the language between here and Mosul to understand this much.

{287} Mela is the name of the Indian religious festivals at which thousands of people assemble.  The missionaries frequently travel hundreds of miles to them in order to preach to the people.

{305} Tradition says that the country about Erivan is that part of the earth which was first of all peopled.  Noah and his family dwelt here, both before and after the deluge; the Garden of Eden is also said to have been situated here.  Erivan was formerly called Terva, and was the chief city of Armenia.  Not far from Erivan lies the chief sacred relic of the Armenian Christians—­the cloister Ecs-miazim.  The church is simple in construction; the pillars, seventy-three feet high, consist of blocks of stone joined together.  In the Treasury were, formerly, two of the nails with which Christ was crucified, the lance with which he was stabbed in the side, and, lastly, a seamless garment of Christ.  It is asserted that in the centre of the church is the spot where Noah, after his delivery, erected an altar and offered sacrifice.  Besides these, the church is in the possession of innumerable important relics.

{308} This is carried to such an extent that if a traveller has his horses already put to, and is in the carriage, and an officer arrives, the horses are taken off and given to the latter.