294 
SCENES IN INDIA. 
try blight upon the opening primrose. I could find 
no room for mirth, though my companion assumed a 
gaiety foreign to his condition. He told me that his 
motto was “ a short life and a merry one that he 
had given and received fifteen shots within the last six 
months without a scratch on either side ; that it was, 
therefore, evident he was not to be the victim of gun- 
powder. 
“ I bear a charmed life !” said he, flourishing his 
clenched fist over his head ; and when this ebullition 
had subsided, with puffed cheeks that were one uni- 
form tinge of deep crimson, his eye the while rolling 
dull and languid beneath the lid, he gulped a deep 
draught of arrack, slightly diluted with water. 
Habits of intemperance were so confirmed in this 
unhappy youth, that he was never sober beyond 
three or four hours in the morning. The characters 
of death were already written legibly in his pursed 
and flaccid forehead. The worm was evidently at 
the root, but he seemed not to heed it, or, if he 
did, it gave him no concern. It was useless talking 
to such a man ; I therefore quitted him with a pain- 
ful emotion of sorrow at the blight which had so 
sadly fallen upon him. Within a month from the 
time I saw him he was in his grave. 
The most remarkable place in Bombay is Malabar 
Point, a conspicuous promontory, in which there is 
a large rift in the cliff. This is considered a sa- 
cred spot by pilgrims and other Hindoo visionaries 
who resort thither for the purposes of spiritual ex- 
purgation. By passing through this aperture they 
imagine that they obtain remission of their sins, and 
