PIECE OF SUPPOSED ANTIQUITY. 
31 
sprinkled on the wall, and on the horses, and he trode her under 
their feet; and when he sent to bury her, no more was found of 
her than the scull, and the feet, and the palms of her hands. 
Nearer home, the classic reader has only to remember the 
various precipitations from the Tarpeian rock, to see what chas¬ 
tisements the sages of antiquity, in almost every country, devised 
for the reformation of mankind. Blessed indeed are these latter 
times of the world, when such fierce punishments are neither 
necessary to appal vice, nor would their barbarous outrage on 
human sympathy be tolerated. The change has been wrought 
by the ameliorating effects of Christianity; and, therefore, only 
in countries where the religion of mercy has not yet been re¬ 
ceived, do we find the dregs of heathenish cruelties remain. 
Amongst the company who, with myself, were paying their 
morning compliments to the worthy Abyssinian, was the Moollah 
Bashi, or chief priest of the town ; and in the course of our 
mixed conversation, he mentioned that his mosque contained a 
curious piece of ancient marble, evidently of the remotest ages 
of the fire-worshippers ; the figure of the sun, and other pagan 
characters of those misbelievers, being marked all over its sur¬ 
face. This description naturally excited my curiosity, and I 
asked him to favour me with a sight of it; but, with a civil em¬ 
barrassment at doing what might be felt an incivility to a 
stranger, he refused; alleging in excuse, the impossibility of 
allowing a Christian to look at any religious remains in his 
country, and particularly since these were now in the sacred pre¬ 
cincts of a building dedicated to the true faith. The good- 
natured comptroller burst out at this, and said, “ That as the 
marble had doubtless belonged to the old misbelievers of the 
country; and as all misbelievers must be alike, in a religious 
