The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-06-24

recently had to leave their homes because
of deaths among their native servants.
With so many dying in a single city land
10. 1000 a week in the entire country, India
would seem an unsafe place to visit, and
yet one would not know Except for the
newspapers that an epidemic was raging,
so little does it affect business or social
life.
There is now in use a system of inocula-
tion which promises to lessen materially
the mortality from this disease. A serum
is prepared in which the venom of serpents
is the chief ingredient, and this h%ypoder-
micaliy administered has been found almost
a sure preventative. While the physicians
are employing this remedy, the rat catchers
are also busy and about a thousand rodents
are captured every day, it having been
demonstrated that the rat not only spreads
the disease but carries a flea that imparts
it by its bite.
Bombay is the Manchester of India
and the smokesta cks of its many cotton
factories give to the city a very business
like appearance. These mills are largely
owned by Indians and operated by Indian
capital.
On an island near Bombay is one OF the
most frequented of the rock hewn temples,
called the %Elephanta caves. This temple
is ohiselled out Of the solid rock, great pill
lars being left to support the roof. 1t is
about 1870 feet square by seventeen in height
and contains a number OF figures Of heroic
size.
These figures are carved from the walls
and represent various gods and demons.
The Portuguese Christians several CEN
turtles ago showed their contempt for these
gods Of stone by firing their cannon into
the temple. While some of the pillars were
battered down and some Of the carvings
mutilated, enough remains to show the
impressiveness of this ancient place of
worship.
THE PARSEEs.
No one can visit Bombay without be-
coming interested in a religious sect the
members Of which are known as Parsees.
They are few in number, probably not ex-
ceeding a hundred thousan nd in the world,
more than half OF whom live in or near
Bombay. Theirs is the religion Of Zoroaster
and they contest with the Hebrews the
honor Of being the first believers in one
God.
Their sacred books, the Zend-Avesta, are
very ancient, and the origin Of their religion
is placed anywhere from 200 B. c. to 5000
B. C. They not only believe in one God,
but they believe in immortality and claim
to have impressed their ideas upon the
Israelites when the latter were in bond
age in Babylon. The Pa rsees see in the
world, as well as in the human being, a
continuing conflict between right and
wrong, and they regulate their conduct
by a high ethical system.
When the Moslems swept over Persia and
made 1t one Of the stars in Islam's crown
a band OF Parsees preferred migration
to conversion, and, like our Pilgrim fathers,
sought a home In a new country. In Bon-
bay they haye preserved their identity for
some nine centuries and have made them
selves a potent influence in every depart
ment OF the city's activity.
They have their marriage ceremony, their
fire temples and their funeral rites. They
lave sometimes been called fire worshippers
and sun worshippers, but they simply regard
fire as the purest thing known, n there
fore accept 1t as a symbol OF the invisible
god. .
Fire is kept burning in their temples, and
when a new temple Is TO be dedicated fire