beautiful regions and cities, inhabited by beings of the fairy race, and occasionally made accessible to mortals, who, after staying for a time amid splendid sights and entertainments, were allowed to return to upper air. In Ireland and Wales there are many lakes of which such stories are told, and various forms of allied beliefs are found in classical and mediaeval traditions. In India nothing corresponding to the poetical fairy mythology of Europe is known, and all popular superstitions are forms of devil-worship and belief in beings always evil and malevolent, personified diseases, and spiteful goblins. Once, however, I was surprised by meeting with an account much resembling the legends of under-water countries in Europe. It appeared in an Indian newspaper, from which this is taken verbatim:
"To the Editor of The Bengalee.
"A private letter from Shahpore informs me that more than three years ago a boy named Gholam Hussein, of the family of Syud, an inhabitant of Chandna, was supposed to have been drowned on the 22nd June, 1860, in the River Thelum, one of the tributaries of the Indus. Now he has come safely to his home. His relations were, of course, very glad to see him. He told them in reply that no sooner had he sank in the river than he reached the bottom, where he found a prodigious empire and met with its "Khiser" (chief or prophet), who took him on his knees and gave him shelter. There he with great pomp and joy passed more than three years; and now two followers of the king caused him to return to the shore of the river whence he came. Now people of every colour and creed, from every creek and corner of the world, are flocking to his house to see him.
"Yours obediently,
"Calcutta, Nov. 12, 1863."
This bears a remarkable resemblance to the well-known tale of Elidurus, related by Giraldus Cambrensis, and is, I think, worth preserving as a modern instance of the belief on which that legend is founded. For even if we suppose the boy to have been a conscious romancer, his tale seems to have been implicitly believed by the people of his neighbourhood.
