pter in the _Arabian Nights_; from the middle of the
most gorgeous fairy-tale the mind of man could invent, I write to you
to-night.

Often I have heard of the Taj Mahal, read of its beauty, dreamed of
its magic, but never in my dreams did I imagine anything so exquisite,
so perfect.

Boggley thought I should not leave India without seeing this "miracle
of miracles--the final wonder of the world," so we left Calcutta on
Monday night by the Punjab mail and came to Agra, and we have done
it all in proper order. Yesterday, in the morning, we motored to
the deserted city, the capital of Akbar, the greatest of the Mogul
emperors, about twenty miles off. It has battlemented walls and great
gates like a fairy-tale city. The bazaar part of it is mostly in
ruins, but the royal part is perfectly preserved and could be lived in
comfortably now. There is Akbar's Council Chamber, the houses of his
wives, the courtyard where they played living chess, the stables,
waterworks, the palaces of his chief ministers, the mosque and
cloisters, the Gate of Victory. The carving in marble and red
sandstone is wonderful. Akbar must have been a broad-minded man, for
we found paintings of the Annunciation side by side with pictures of
the Hindu god Ganesh. It is intensely interesting to see the place
just as it was hundreds of years ago. In the great Mosque Quadrangle
there is a marble mausoleum, delicately carved, a priceless piece of
work in mother-of-pearl, erected to Akbar's high priest; and our guide
was his lineal descendant, glad to get five rupees for his trouble!

We lunched in the Government bungalow, a comfortable place, not
glaringly out of keeping with the surroundings, and then motored to
Akbar's tomb--another piece of colossal magnificence. I was awed by
it. Out of the glaring sunshine we went down a long dark passage to a
great vault, where the air was cold with the coldness of death. It
was completely dark except for one ray of light falling on the plain
marble tomb. An old Mohammedan crooned eerily, impressively, a lament
which echoed round and round the vault. The Mohammedans and the Scots
have a similar passion for deaths and funerals!

Lastly, in its fitting order, we drove to the Taj Mahal.

You know the story? I have just been reading about it in Steevens's
book. You know how Shah Jehan, grandson of Akbar, first Mogul Emperor
of Hindustan, loved and married the beautiful Persian Arjmand
Banu,--called Mumtaz-i-Mahal,--a