AUGUST 1st.--To Wangut nine miles rough and hilly walking. I lost the path once, and had a long scramble before I regained it. Though not a pleasant march the scenery is very fine and picturesque. Wangut lies up a short and contracted valley, an offshoot of the Scind which is a much larger one, and the mountains around it are very grand especially at the head of the valley, I put up large coveys of grey partridge on the road. I have come here for the purpose of visiting some mines two miles further on, and I intend to halt to-morrow and walk to see them. There is a great row going on while I write this, the natives appear unwilling to furnish supplies (milk, eggs, &c.,) and my boatman who has accompanied me is applying his stick freely by way of persuasion. There is of course a Babel of tongues and I sit within a few yards, quietly ignoring the proceeding, though if necessary, I shall get up and add some lusty whacks as my share of the argument. A mountain torrent--a tributary of the Scind runs down the valley with the usual noise and hurly burly. A travelling native carpenter is here, and all the village are bringing their ploughs to be mended, he is very clever with his hoe-shaped hatchet fashioning the hard walnut wood so correctly with it, that the chisel is hardly necessary for the few finishing touches. I have seen him make some wooden ladles very rapidly, and he has provided me with a new set of tent pegs and mallet and a wooden roller, by means of which I hope to avoid the digital process in the manufacture of my chepatties.
AUGUST 2nd, Sunday.--Sitting having my feet washed by a servant (delightful sensation) after my return from the ruin of Rajdainbul and Nagbul. I meditate on the mutability of all things human. I have taken a walk before breakfast this Sabbath morning to witness the overthrow of former magnificence and the destruction of man's crafty handiwork. These two temples erected many long years ago in honour of a Hindoo Deity named Naranay, now stand desolate piles in the dense jungle. Fallen stones cover the ground and great trees grow from the interstices of those that still hold together and retain a semblance of their original shape. Confusion reigns supreme and the place that was once the scene of mistaken worship, is now only the haunt of the wild beast and deadly reptile. The thoughts which such a sight suggest, have been the theme of many a moralist, but the great lesson it teaches cannot lose any of its importance by repetition. Yet a consideration of the littleness of man and the utter vanity of his proudest works is, I fear, distasteful to most of us; we cannot bear to be forced to admit our own insignificance. We go to church and cry "what is man that Thou art mindful of him," but the words are but empty sounds. Our preachers may tell us that life is but a shadow, but they speak to unwilling and heedless ears, and we go on ignoring the fact, crying peace, and stifling our conscience by a form of religion without godliness. We are arrogant, high-minded, puffed up in our own conceit, and though there are many that would wish to be considered holy, how few there are that are humble men of heart, and time continues to repeat the old, old story, filling our grave-yards, destroying our works; creation alone remaining stable, waiting for the end. These ruins are small in size, and their architecture rude, though the individual blocks are certainly large and well though not elaborately carved. But they produce a strange impression of awe by the dreary solitude and wildness of their position which is perhaps peculiar to themselves, although they lack both the fairy elegance of Netley Abbey, and the massive grandeur of a Pevensey Castle. The men who accompanied me advanced very cautiously through the thick underwood, beating with their sticks in order to drive away the Iguana Lizards, which they call the "bis cobra" and hold in deadly fear, believing its bite to be most surely fatal. This belief is universal among the natives of India, but there is no proof of its truth, and I need hardly say that the dental arrangement of Bactrachian reptiles is incompatible with the possession of poisonous qualities. But though science will not admit it, it is strange that the idea is so widely spread, especially as the natives do not fear any other species of lizard, while they believe that every snake is armed with the fatal fang.