SINGULAR TWINS. 
97 
would have been very difficult to distinguish them 
apart. They were evidently twins., and the children 
of the beautiful Hindoo whom we had just passed. 
Being roused by the noise of our approach, they ran 
to their mother, as if for protection. They were both 
straight, and admirably formed ; their little limbs 
exhibiting a gracefulness and precision of outline, 
which showed that they had not been cramped into 
obliquity according to those refinements exclusively 
practised by the great in more civilized Europe. 
I was arrested by the premature sagacity deve- 
loped in the countenances of these children. They 
were shy but not timid, and shrank from my ap- 
proach rather with the seeming of considering it an 
unauthorised intrusion, than from any apprehension 
of harm. I expressed my admiration of them to the 
mother, who said nothing, but received my lauda- 
tions with a slight graceful inclination of body ; yet 
the relaxed expression of her eye satisfied me my 
praises were not unwelcome : and as if to show that 
she appreciated my commendation, she turned the 
boys round, when to my astonishment I perceived that 
from the nape of the neck to their heels the whole 
body behind was covered with a short thick hair, as 
black and glossy as the feathers on a raven’s throat. 
In front their skins were as smooth as the cheek 
of a beautiful woman, and without the least speck 
of deformity. Their legs were feathered behind like 
those of a high-bred spaniel, and nothing could exceed 
the strange contrast presented by the front and back 
of their little bodies. They had come into the world, 
as I at length ascertained from the parent, with the 
K 
