FUTTEHPORE SIKRI. 
167 
Voyage in a very short time. For if we only consider 
the nimble Progress of Light through the Air — with 
what Swiftness it darts its bright active Atoms from 
East to West, and flies through the immense Expanse 
from the lofty Regions of the Sky, we cannot ivith any 
great Reason deny this same, or greater Power to the 
active Spirits of Darkness, who are strip t of all the 
Clogs of Matter, and void of all material Substance 
I could have presented the reader with anecdotes of 
the same description, which far surpass the foregoing 
in the wonders of magical power ; hut since they are 
attested by natives, not by European governors, pre- 
sidents, and chaplains, of His Britannic Majesty, I 
thought it possible that, in this matter-of-fact age, 
they might have been contemptuously treated as idle 
inventions, or, at least, have been regarded with unme- 
rited suspicion. For the same reason, I have not 
ventured to detail the rites and ceremonies, the canta- 
tions and incantations, which have been described to 
me, as the means by which this supernatural know- 
ledge is acquired. That vile impostors have, at various 
times, brought evil report upon the art by pretend- 
ing to its mysteries, cannot be contradicted ; hut 
surely it has been so with all other arts and mysteries 
from the days of Noah downwards; and with deference 
it is submitted, that this very circumstance is, in 
reality, a compliment to the genuine science, rather 
than a disgrace to it ; for the impostor certainly will 
not assume the colours of that in which there is no 
