so fine, that it fills the throat and nostrils, and, together with the strong smell of the mummies, threatens suffocation. In some places there is not more than the vacancy of a foot left, which you must contrive to pass through in a creeping posture, on pointed and keen stones, that cut like fragments of glass. After getting through these passages, some of them 200 or 300 yards long, you generally find a more commodious spot, perhaps high enough to allow a sitting posture. But what a place of rest! surrounded by bodies, by heaps of mummies on every side, which, previous to my being accustomed to the sight, impressed me with horror. The blackness of the walls, the faint light given by the candles or torches for want of air, the different objects that surrounded me, looking at, and seeming to converse with each other, and the Arab guides, naked, and covered with dust, themselves resembling living mummies, absolutely formed a scene that cannot be described. In such a situation I found myself several times, and, when exhausted, fainting, and nearly overcome, I sought a restingplace, and found one; my weight bore on the body of an Egyptian, and it crushed like a band-box. I naturally had recourse to my hands to sustain my weight, but they found no better support; so that I sunk altogether among the broken mummies, with a crash of bones, rags, and wooden cases, which raised such a dust as kept me motionless for a quarter of an hour, waiting till it subsided again.

"Thus I proceeded from one cave to another, all full of mummies, piled up in various ways, some standing, some lying, and some on their heads. The purpose of my researches was to rob the Egyptians of their papyri, of which I found a few hidden in their breasts, under their arms, in the space above the knees, or on the legs, and

covered by the numerous folds of cloth that envelope the mummy."

M. Belzoni made also excursions into Nubia, and to several other districts bordering on Egypt, but without discovering anything so remarkable without that country, as he had found within.

The mighty mountain region of the Himmaleh, which towers behind our Indian settlements, had been the object, for some time, of peculiar curiosity. A volume was published at this time by Mr Frazer, which, if it does not greatly extend our knowledge, gives us at least a more lively idea of their aspect and scenery. In the course of the war against the Ghoorkas, he was sent to invite some of the mountain tribes, who had suffered from their depredations, to rise and act upon their rear. In coming to the district of Sirmore, one of the lower stages of the Himmaleh, he found it singularly divided into very high ridges, usually not less than 5000 feet, with deep glens intervening, so that the traveller had a most laborious succession of ascent and descent. In ascending to the still loftier district of Joobul, he found the mountains covered with the most magnificent forests; pines of all sorts, and of all ages, from the greenest state of youth to the most hoary state of decay. Hollies and oaks had grown to the most gigantic size, with sycamore and yew of the most varied forms. At one spot, a vista opened into the wild and awful forest, through which the whole of the hills, in their various ridges, to and beyond the Sutlej, appeared boldly swelling, till they faded in the distance. The cultivation was very great, and extraordinary labour had been exerted in fitting for it the almost perpendicular sides of the mountains. Districts, which seemed destined by nature to depend upon others

for food, were thus enabled even to export grain. The external accommodations of the natives are every way superior to those of the Scotch Highlanders; but of their character nothing can be said in praise. Not only, like other barbarians, are they prone to violence and plunder, involved in deadly feuds, and acknow ledging no law but the sword; they are also cringing, servile, and abject, and wholly insincere in their professions of service. Like Asiatic troops in general, they "fight for pay; and whose bread they eat, his cause they will defend against country, friends, and relations."

All the scenery hitherto seen appeared tame, when compared to that which presented itself when they approached the mighty mountains, whence issue the sources of the Jumna, and of the Ganges. Bunderpouch, containing the source of the Jumna, is described as follows:

"The scenery, on the whole, has very much changed its character; instead of the villages and extensive faces of cultivation, and sharp and steep, yet practicable hills, we now saw nothing but the brown rocks staring through the dark pine and oak woods, which hang shaggy around their brows, and clothe their feet, as well as the deeper and less stony glens, which are numerous and romantic. The tops of these hills are spotted with green or brown, as the bright verdure of the rainy season springs from the scanty soil, or is denied to the barren rock, and clouds and darkness hang over all. Having reached the top of the ascent, we looked down upon a very deep and dark glen, called Palia Gadh, which is the outlet to the waters of one of the most terrific and gloomy valleys I have ever seen. The lofty peak Buchooncha stretches forth a rugged ridge called Tolpoora, to the south

ward, which becomes continuous with Toonul, the lower part of which we crossed. This ridge forms a side and part of the back of the valley or hollow of Cot,ha, the chief ravine of which, however, commences at the top of the bosom of Buchooncha; this is joined by smaller, but equally rugged clefts from the back, which all unite their waters below, and roll a great and rapid torrent to the Jumna.

"But it would not be easy to convey by any description a just idea of the peculiarly rugged and gloomy wildness of this glen; it looks like the ruins of nature, and appears, as it is said to be, completely impracticable and impenetrable. Little is to be seen except dark rock; wood only fringes the lower parts and the waters' edge; perhaps the spots and streaks of snow, contrasting with the general blackness of the scene, heighten the ap pearance of desolation. No living thing is seen; no motion but that of the waters; no sound but their roar."

The general comparative view of the scenery on the two rivers concen. trates a great deal of information.

"From the description given of the nature and appearance of the banks of the Jumna, it may be conceived that nothing wilder or more imprac ticable could well present itself to the traveller's view, than the scenes there witnessed; and I confess that this was my own idea. Nevertheless, it is certain that the character of the mountains that form the banks of the Bhagiruttee, in the quarter we have passed to-day, is not only different from that of any yet seen, but marked by features unspeakably more lofty, rugged, and inaccessible. There is even less of beauty, and more of horror; more to inspire dread, less to captivate. The variety of character to be met with in these mountains, particularly after reaching their more remote and difficult regions, is remark

able; and, to a person who has only travelled in the lower parts, and seen the better cultivated and more inhabited tracts of the country, scarcely credible. Perhaps a more complete and better marked example of this cannot be produced in any purely mountainous country, certainly not in that under consideration, than is exhibited in the features we see, marking the beds of the Sutlej, the Pabur, the Jumna, and the Bhagiruttee (the head of the Ganges.)

"The mountains which form the valley of the Sutlej, particularly on the north-west side, are brown, bar. ren, steep, and rocky; but they have these characters without the grandeur produced by lofty precipices or fringing wood. The nullahs that furrow them are dark, uninteresting chasms, and their breasts in general are unenlivened by cultivation; and, though their heights are thickly crowned with forts, there are no neat villages surrounded with trees, on which the eye may turn and rest from the dark desert around. Such are the Cooloo hills, which met our view from below Comharsein, even to beyond Seran. And on the Bischur side, though there may be somewhat more cultivation above, and wood yields its verdure here and there, to embellish the valleys, still the lower parts of the hills, for a descent of full three miles, to the narrow, rocky, and arid bed of the river, exhibit little except black rock peeping irregularly through brown burnt grass.

"The smiling vale of the Pabur, offers a delightful contrast to the black chasm through which the Sutlej rolls. We cannot speak of this river very near its source; but, from a long way beyond the village of Pooroo, which is seven miles above Raeengudh, it flows meandering through a valley of moderate breadth, in which pasture and crops are chequered with its dif

ferent streams; and on the banks and roots of the hills, rich cultivation, villages, and wood, form a lovely picture, which extends up the stream as far as the eye can distinguish, and till brown hills, topped with snow and rocks, close the prospect.

"If any success has attended the perhaps too detailed descriptions of the banks and bed of the Jumna, the reader will already have formed an idea of them: though rocky, precipitous, and wild, they are woody, green, and varied with sloping faces, which are rich with cultivation and verdure. Here and there the river runs through a level, though narrow bottom, and many well-cultivated and beautiful valleys lead into it; even at its source, though a wilder collection of requisites for a romantic and imposing landscape, as rock, wood, precipice, and snow, could not well be drawn together, they did not form so truly desert and stern a scene as is exhibited in the bed of the Bhagiruttee.

"I have said that these mountains are more lofty and bare; in fact, we had now penetrated farther into their higher and more inclement regions; and the Bhagiruttee, a far larger river than the Jumna, has worn a deeper bed, even in the stubborn materials of their bowels.

"It is not easy to describe the change of scene effected by this change of situation; not only is luxuriant foliage more rare, all rich and lively greens giving way to the dark brown of the fir, which spots the face of the rock; but even that rock is evidently more continually acted on by the severity of the storms. Instead of being covered with rich and varied hues, the effect of lichens and the smaller herbage, that usually clothe and variegate even a precipice, the rocks here are white, grey, red, or brown, the colour of their fracture, as if a constant violence was crum

bling them to pieces. Their sharp and splintered pinnacles spire up above the general mass; their middle region and feet are scantily sprinkled with the sombre, unvarying fir-tree; while the higher parts, retiring from the view, present little more than brown rock, except where a lofty mass of snow overtops them, and calls to our recollection how nearly and completely we are surrounded by it. No green smiling valleys yield their waters to the river ; the white and foul torrents which swell its stream, pour their troubled tribute through chasms cleft in the solid rock, or are seen tumbling down its face, from the snow that gives them birth.

"The whole scene casts a damp on the mind; an indefinite idea of desert solitude and helplessness steals over it : we are, as it were, shut out from the world, and feel our nothingness."

Nothing, however, could equal the grandeur of the scene at Gungotree, a place sacred in the eyes of the Hindoos, and where the traveller is immediately in presence of that wonderful peak, whence the Ganges issues.

"The scene in which this holy place is situated, is worthy of the mysterious sanctity attributed to it, and the reverence with which it is regarded. The bare and peaked cliffs which shoot to the skies, yield not in ruggedness or elevation to any we have seen; their ruins lie in wild chaotic masses at their feet, and scantier wood imperfectly relieves their na

kedness; even the dark pine more rarely roots itself in the deep chasms which time has worn. Thus on all sides is the prospect closed, except in front to the eastward, where, from behind a mass of bare spires, four huge, lofty, snowy peaks arise; these are the peaks of Roodroo-Himmalah. There could be no finer finishing, no grander close, to such a scene.

، We approach it through a labyrinth of enormous shapeless masses of granite, which, during ages, have fallen from the cliffs above, that frown over the very temple, and, in all probability, will some day themselves descend in ruins and crush it. Around the enclosure, and among the masses, for some distance up the mountain, a few fine old pine-trees throw a dark shade, and form a magnificent foreground; while the river runs impetuously in its shingly bed, and the stifled but fearful sound of the stones which it rolls along with it, crushing together, mixes with the roar of its waters.

"We are now in the centre of the stupendous Himmalali, the loftiest, and perhaps most rugged, range of mountains in the world. We were at the acknowledged source of that noble river, equally an object of veneration and a source of fertility, plenty, and opulence to Hindostan; and we had now reached the holiest shrine of Hindoo worship which these holy hills contain. These are surely striking considerations, combining with the solemn grandeur of the place, to move the feelings strongly."