The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1895-02-21

CnlSei CuU 1US uTSt curve, VI palAeCE \
pencil traced its first figure, or ma
sons plumb-linc measured its first |
wall, or architects compass swept its |
first circle.
The Tai has sixteen great arched
windows, four at each corner. Also at
each Of the four corners of the TAI
stands ninaret one hundred and
thirty seven feet high. Also at each
side of this building is splendid
MOSQUE of red sandstone. Two hun
dred and fifty years has the Tai stood,
and yet not wall is cracked, nor
mosaic loosened, nor an arch sagged,
nor a panel dulled. The storms of
two hundred and fifty winters have
not marred, nor the heats of two hum
dred and fifty summers disintegrated
marble. There is no story of
age written by MOSES on its
white surface. Montaz, the queen,
was beautiful, and Shah Jehan, the
king, here proposed to let all the CEN
turies of time know it. She was mar
| ried at twenty years of age and died at
| twenty-nine. Her life ended as an
other life began; as the rose bloomed
| the rose bush perished. To adorn this
| dormitory of the dead, at the command
of the king Bagdad sent to this build
| ing it's carnelian, and Ceylon Its lapis
| lazuli, and Punjab it's jasper, ard Per-
sia it's amethyst, and Thibet its tur-
quoise, and Lanka its sapphire, and
Yemen it's agate, and Punah its
diamonds; and blood-stones, and sar-
| III, nd
agates are as common as though they
were pebbles. You find one spray of
vine beset with eighty, and another
with one hundred stones. Twenty
thousand men were twenty years in
building it, and, although the labor
was slave labor, and not paid for, the
building cost what would be about
sixty million dollars of our American
money. Some of the Jewels have been
picked out of the walls by icono-
clasts or ccnquerors, and substi-
tutes of less value have taken
their places, but the vines, the
traceries, the arabesques, the span
drels, the entablatures are so won
drous that you feel like dating the
rest of your life from the day you first
saw them. In letters of black marble
the whole of the Koran is spelled out
in and on this august pile. The king
sleeps in the tomb beside the queen.
although he intended to build pal
ace as black as this was white on the
opposite side of the river for himself
to sleep in. Indeed, the foundation
of such metropolis of black marble
is still there, and from the white to
the black temple of the dead bridge
was to cross; but the son dcthroned
him and imprisoned him, and it is won
derful that the king had any place at
all in which to be buried. Instead OF
windows to let in the light upon the
two tombs, there is a trellis work oil
marble, marble cut SO delicately thin
that the sun shines through it as easily
as through glass. Look the world over
and find so much translucency; cano
pies, traceries, lace work, cnbroideries
, of stone.
, But / thought while looking at that
, palace for the dead, all this construct
i ed to cover handful Of dust, but ever
, that handful has probably gone from
the mausoleum. How much better i
! would have been to expend sixty mil
, lion dollars, which the TAI Mahal cost
, for the living. What asylums it nigh
: build for the sick, what houses for tht
. homeless! What improvement our cen
. tury has made upon other centuries il
8 lifting in honor of the departed me
A mortal churches. memorial hospitals
9 memorial reading rooms, memoria
! observatories. BY all possible mean
! let us keep the memory of departe,
p loved ones fresh in mind, and let ther
4 be an appropriate headstone or monu
= 1nent in the cemetery, but there is
n dividing line between reasonable com
q memoration and wicked extravaganza
A The Tai Mahal has it's uses as archi
, tectural achievement, eclipsing al
II other architecture, but as memoria
! of departed wife and mothe
I it expresses no more than the plain
a est slab in many country grave
r yard. The best monument we ca
; any of us have built for us when w
q are gone is in the memory of thos
n whose sorrows we have allcviated,
! the wounds we have healed, in tn
n kindnesses we have done, in the ignt
,s rance we have enlightened, in the n
!, creant we have reclaimed, in the sou
we have saved! Such monument
:. built out of material more lasting tina
N marble or bronze, and will stand ami
d the eternal splendors long after til
y TAI Mahal of India shall have gor
h down in the ruins of world of whic
|. it was the costliest adornment. But
A. promised to show you not only tom
a of India, but unique heather tempt
ID and it is temple underground.
ii And now we come near the famo,
u temple hewn from one rock OF porph
V. ry at least eight hundred years ag
al On either side of the chief temple is
Of chapel, these cut out of the same ston
i'd SO vast was the undertaking, and
e, the Hindoo was SO great the hum;
n, irnpossibility that they say the go
~ scooped out the structure from Il
as rock, and carved the pillars, and hew
he it's shape into gigantic idols, and de-
it Gated it to all the grandeur
at We climb many stone steps
or fore we get to the gateway. The G