world, situated six miles from the sacred city. It is the remnants
of two large and tall towers built of brick and cut stone, about three
thousand years ago. These towers were closely connected with the history
of Buddha, one of them, according to tradition, being his dwelling and
the other his place of worship. This was formerly the site of a great
city, called Sarnath.

[Illustration: TOWER OF SARNATH.]

CHAPTER XXI.

Nimtoolaghat--Cremation in India--Parsee Funeral Rites.

India is the only country in the world where the civilization of the
East and that of the West are found side by side with equal rights and
equal chances of a free and full development. For, although the English
have conquered, and at present rule the country, they have respected the
peculiar customs and manners of the Hindoos, and guaranteed them liberty
to practice the same and to develop their social and religious
institutions in so far as they do not conflict with the generally
acknowledged principles of humanity.

Accordingly in Calcutta and other cities in India we frequently find a
stately Christian church side by side with a Hindoo temple with its
officiating priests. On one side of the street we may see a fine
European residence filled with guests around the dinner-table, eating,
chatting, and toasting just as at home, and on the other a Hindoo villa,
where turbaned Brahmins, in a squatting posture, eat their rice or smoke
their hokah, while extolling the merits of their juggernaut. At popular
meetings and fetes European lords, bishops, officials, and ladies are
often seen engaged in a friendly conversation with Hindoo princes, or
learned pundits, Mohammedan warriors, Persian, Armenian or Jewish
merchants. On the streets and promenades the European carriage and the
Hindoo palanquin are seen side by side; in Calcutta there are scores of
high schools and academies on the European plan, and close to these
again others where young students in oriental costumes and turbaned
heads, squat before a half-naked Brahmin, seeking wisdom and knowledge
from the works of the Vedas or Shastras.

It is therefore not surprising that in the very harbor where American
and European flags are waving from hundreds of mast-heads lies
Nimtoolaghat, a Hindoo place of cremation, from which the whole day long
dense clouds of smoke arise, scattering the vapors of burning human
bodies. It is a large brick building which is divided into two
apartments by