upon camels or elephants, and presented a spectacle which Bernier delighted to contemplate. In general the blinds or casements of these splendid little mansions of gold, scarlet, and azure, were closed, to preserve the charms of those within from "Phœbus' amorous kisses," or the profane gaze of the vulgar; but once, as the gorgeous cavalcade moved along, our traveller caught a glimpse of the interior of Ranchenara's mikdembar, and beheld the princess reclined within, while a little female slave fanned away the dust and flies from her face with a bunch of peacock's feathers. A train of fifty or sixty elephants similarly, though less splendidly, appointed, moving along with grave, solemn pace, surrounded by so vast a retinue as that which now accompanied the court, appeared in the eyes of our traveller to possess something truly royal in its aspect, and with the beauteous goddesses which the fancy placed within, seem, in spite of his affected philosophical indifference, to have delighted him in a very extraordinary manner. True philosophy, however, would have admired the show, while it condemned the extravagance, and despised the pride and effeminacy which produced it.
In this manner the court proceeded through Lahore and the plains of the Pundjâb towards Cashmere; but as their motions were slow, they were overtaken in those burning hollows which condensed and reflected back the rays of the sun like a vast burning-glass, by the heats of summer, which are there little less intense than on the shores of the Persian Gulf. No sooner had the sun appeared above the horizon than the heat became insupportable. Not a cloud stained the firmament; not a breath of air stood upon the earth. Every herb was scorched to cinders; and throughout the wide horizon nothing appeared but an interminable plain of dust below, and above a brazen or coppery sky, glowing like the mouth of a furnace. The horses, languid and worn
