found to contain ’a choice assortment’—­as the Calcutta advertisers have it—­of gold, silver, or brass bangles and anklets, which have not been so expeditiously digested as their fair owners, victims of the monster’s voracity.  A little fat Brahminee child, ‘farci an ris,’ must be a tempting and tender bonne bouche to these river gourmands.  Horrific legends such as the above, together with a great deal of valuable advice on the subject, were quite thrown away upon me; for ninety degrees of Fahrenheit, and the enticing blueness of the water generally betrayed me into a plunge every evening during my Gangetic voyage.”

Nocturnal Bathing.

“On the occasion of a grand nocturnal bathing ceremony, held at the great tank called the Indra Daman, I went with a party of three or four others to witness the spectacle.  The walls surrounding the pool and a cluster of picturesque pavilions in its centre were brilliantly lighted up with hundreds of cheraugs, or small oil-lamps, casting a flickering lustre upon the heads and shoulders of about five hundred men, women, and children, who were ducking and praying, a corps perdu, in the water.  As I glanced over the figures nearest to me, I discovered floating among the indifferent bathers two dead bodies, which had either been drowned in the confusion, or had purposely come to die on the edge of the sacred tank; the cool and apathetic survivors taking not the slightest notice of their soulless neighbours.”

King John at the Cape.

“The largest house in Simon’s Town, and, indeed, the greater part of the town itself, belongs to an Englishman of the name of Osbond, who, however, is more generally known by the dignified title of ’King John.’  He was carpenter on board the sixty-gun ship Sceptre, which was wrecked off this coast some yearn ago.  Like Juan, he escaped the sea, and like Juan he found a Haidee.  Being well-favoured and sharp-witted, he won the heart and the hand of a wealthy Dutch widow, whose dollars he afterwards, in some bold but successful speculations, turned to good account.  He is said to have laid out ten thousand pounds on these—­to every one but himself—­inhospita littora. King John is much respected.”

Population of Cape Town.

“The variety of nations, and the numerous shades of complexion among the people in the streets of Cape Town, are very striking to a stranger.  First may be remarked the substantial Dutchman, with his pretty, smiling, round-faced, and particularly well-dressed daughter:  then the knot of ‘Qui hi’s,’ sent to the Cape, per doctor’s certificate, to husband their threadbare constitutions, and lavish their rupees:  next the obsequious, smirking, money-making China-man, with his poking shoulders, and whip-like pig-tail:  then the stout, squat Hottentots—­who resemble the Dutch in but one characteristic!—­and half castes of every intermediate tint between black and white.  These are well relieved and contrasted by the tall, warlike figures and splendid costume of his Majesty’s 72nd Highlanders, who, with the 98th regiment, form the garrison of Cape Town.”