from whence he counted about three thousand tents, dispersed over the plain, of which two-thirds belonged to the two hadj caravans, and to the suite and soldiers of Mohammed Ali; but the greatest number of the assembled multitudes were,' says our traveller, 'like myself, without tents.' Those of the wife of Mohammed Ali, the mother of Tousoun and Ibrahim Pasha, were magnificent, the transport of her baggage alone, from Djidda to Mecca, having required five hundred camels.

"Her tent was in fact an encampment, consisting of a dozen tents of different sizes, inhabited by her women; the whole inclosed by a wall of linen cloth, eight hundred paces in circuit, the single entrance of which was guarded by eunuchs in splendid dresses. Around this inclosure were pitched the tents of the men who formed her numerous suite. The beautiful embroidery on the exterior of this linen palace, with the various colors displayed in every part of it, constituted an object which reminded me of some descriptions in the Arabian Tales of a Thousand and One Nights.'

"Mr. Burckhardt says, he estimated the number of persons assembled on the plain at seventy thousand; but whether any, or how many of them, were supplied by angels,' he does not say it is, however, deserv ing of remark, that he is the third traveller who mentions the same number. This enormous mass, after washing and purifying the body according to law, or going through the motions where water was not to be had, now pressed forwards towards the mountains of Arafat, and covered its sides from top to bottom. At the appointed hour, the cadi of Mecca took his stand on a stone platform on the top of the mountain, and began his sermon, to which the multitude appeared to listen in solemn and respectful silence. At every pause, however, the assembled multitudes waved the skirts of their ihrams over their heads, and rent the air with shouts of 'Lebeyk, allahuma lebeyk !''Here we are, at thy commands, O God! During the wavings of the ihrams,' says Burckhardt, the side of the mountain, thickly crowded as it was by the people in their white garments, had the appearance of a cataract of water; while the green umbrellas, with which several thousand hadjis, sitting on their camels below, were provided, bore some resemblance to a verdant plain.' The assemblage of such a multitude, to every outward appearance humbling themselves in prayer and adoration before God, must be an imposing and impressive spectacle to him who first observes it, whether Mahometan, Christian, Jew, or Pagan. 'It was a sight, indeed,' says Pitts, ' able to pierce one's heart, to behold so many in their garments of humility and mortification, with their naked heads and cheeks watered with tears, and to hear their grievous sighs and sobs, begging earnestly for the remission of their sins." Burckhardt mentions the first arrival of a black Darfoor pilgrim at the temple, at the time when it was illuminated; and from eight to ten thousand persons in the act of adoration, who was so overawed, that, after remaining prostrate for some time, 'he burst into a flood of tears; and in the height of his emotion, instead of reciting the usual prayers of the visitor, only exclaimed-" O God! now take my soul, for this is paradise!"'

"As the sun descended behind the western mountains, the cadi shut

his book instantly the crowds rushed down the mountains, the tents were struck, and the whole mass of pilgrims moved forward across the plain on their return. Thousands of torches were now lighted; volleys of artillery and of musketry were fired; sky-rockets innumerable were let off; the pasha's band of music were played till they arrived at a place called Mezdelfé, when every one lay down on the bare ground, where he could find a spot. Here another sermon was preached, commencing with the first dawn, and continuing till the first rays of the sun appear, when the multitude again move forward, with a slow pace to Wady Muna, about three miles off. This is the scene for the ceremony of throwing stones at the devil;' every pilgrim must throw seven little stones at three several spots in the valley of Muna, or twenty-one in the whole; and at each throw repeat the words, 'In the name of God; God is great; we do this to secure ourselves from the devil and his troops.' Joseph Pitts says, 'as I was going to throw the stones, a facetious hadji met me; saith he, You may save your labor at present, if you please, for I have hit out the devil's eyes already." The pilgrims are here shown a rock with a deep split in the middle, which was made by the angel turning aside the knife of Abraham, when he was about to sacrifice his son Isaac. Pitts, on being told this, observes, 'it must have been a good stroke indeed.' The pilgrims are taught also to believe, that the custom of 'stoning the devil' is to commemorate the endeavor of his satanic majesty to dissuade Isaac from following his father, and whispering in his ear that he was going to slay him.

"This stoning' in the valley of Muna occupies a day or two, after which comes the grand sacrifice of animals, some brought by the several hadjis, others purchased from the Bedouins for the occasion; the throats of which must always be cut with their faces towards the kaaba. At the pilgrimage in question, the number of sheep thus slaughtered 'in the name of the most merciful God,' is represented as small, amounting only to between six and eight thousand. The historian Kotobeddyn, quoted by Burckhardt, relates, that when the caliph Mokteda performed the pilgrimage, in the year of the Hejira 350, he sacrificed on this occasion forty thousand camels and cows, and fifty thousand sheep. Barthema" talks of thirty thousand oxen being slain, and their carcasses given to the poor, who appeared to him 'more anxious to have their bellies filled than their sins remitted.' One is at a loss to imagine where, in such a miserable country, all these thousands and tens of thousands of camels, cows, and sheep, can possibly be subsisted; the numbers may be exaggerated, but there is no question of their being very great. The feast being ended, all the pilgrims had their heads shaved, threw off the ihram, and resumed their ordinary clothing; a larger fair was now held, the valley blazed all night with illuminations, bonfires, the discharge of artillery, and fireworks; and the hadjis then returned to Mecca. Many of the poorer pilgrims, however, remained to feast on the offals of the slaughtered sheep. At Mecca the ceremonies of the kaaba and the drura were again to be repeated, and then the hadj was truly perfumed. Burckhardt makes no mention of any females becoming hadjis by a visit to Arafat, though Ali Bey talks of two thousand. There is no absolute

prohibition; but from what follows, no great encouragement for the fair sex to go through the ceremonies.

"The Mahometan law prescribes, that no unmarried woman shall perform the pilgrimage; and that even every married woman must be accompanied by her husband, or at least by a very near relation; (the Shaffay sect does not even allow the latter.) Female hadjis sometimes arrive from Turkey for the hadj; rich old widows who wish to see Mecca before they die; or women who set out with their husbands, and lose them on the road by disease. In such cases the female finds at Djidda delyls (or, as this class is called, Muhallil) ready to facilitate their progress through the sacred territory in the character of husbands. The marriage contract is written out before the kadhy; and the lady, accompanied by her delyl, performs the pilgrimage to Mecca, Arafat, and all the sacred places. This, however, is understood to be merely a nominal marriage; and the delyl must divorce the woman on his return to Djidda: if he were to refuse a divorce, the law cannot compel him to it, and the marriage would be considered binding: but he could no longer exercise the lucrative profession of delyl; and my informant could only recollect two examples of the delyl continuing to be the woman's husband. I believe there is not any exaggeration of the number, in stating that there are eight hundred full grown delyls, besides boys who are learning the profession. Whenever a shopkeeper loses his customers, or a poor man of letters wishes to procure as much money as will purchase an Abyssinian slave, he turns delyl. The profession is one of little repute; but many a prosperous mekkawy has, at some period of his life, been a member of it.'

"Burckhardt remained at Mecca a whole month after the conclusion of the hadj, at which time it appeared like a deserted town.

"Of its brilliant shops one fourth only remained; and in the streets, where a few weeks before it was necessary to force one's way through the crowd, not a single hadji was seen, except solitary beggars, who raised their plaintive voices towards the windows of the houses which they supposed to be still inhabited. Rubbish and filth covered all the streets, and nobody appeared to be disposed to remove it. The skirts of the town were crowded with the dead 'carcasses of camels, the smell from which rendered the air, even in the midst of the town, offensive, and certainly contributed to the many diseases now prevalent.'

"Disease and mortality, which succeed to the fatigues endured on the journey, or are caused by the light covering of the ihram, the unhealthy lodgings at Mecca, the bad fare, and sometimes absolute want, fill the mosque with dead bodies carried thither to receive the imam's prayer, or with sick persons, many of whom, when their dissolution approaches, are brought to the colonades, that they may either be cured by the sight of the kaaba, or at least to have the satisfaction of expiring within the sacred inclosure. Poor hadjis, worn out with disease and hunger, are seen dragging their emaciated bodies along the columns; and when no longer able to stretch forth their hand to ask the passenger for charity, they place a bowl to receive alms near the mat on which they lay themselves. When they feel their last moments approaching, they cover

themselves with their tattered garments; and often a whole day passes before it is discovered that they are dead. For a month subsequent to the conclusion of the hadj, I found, almost every morning, corpses of pilgrims lying in the mosque; myself and a Greek hadji, whom accident had brought to the spot, once closed the eyes of a poor Moggrebyn pilgrim, who had crawled into the neighborhood of the kaaba to breathe his last, as the Moslems say, 'in the arms of the prophet and of the guardian angels.' He intimated by signs his wish that we should sprinkle zemzem water over him; and while we were doing so, he expired: half an hour afterward he was buried.

"The situation of Mecca is singularly unhappy, and ill adapted for the accommodation of the numerous votaries of Islam that flock thither to perform the rites of the pilgrimage. The town is built in a narrow valley, hemmed in by barren mountains; the water of the wells is bitter or brackish; no pastures for cattle are near it ; no land fit for agriculture'; and the only resource from which its inhabitants derive their subsistence is a little traffic, and the visits of the hadjis. Mr. Burckhardt estimates the population of the town and suburbs at twenty-five or thirty thousand stationary inhabitants, to which he adds three or four thousand Abyssinian and black slaves.

"On the whole, notwithstanding all that Burckhardt records as to certain symptoms of enthusiasm in the course of his hadj, it is sufficiently plain, that even in the original seat of Mahometanism, the religious feelings of the people have cooled down considerably. The educated Moslems every where are mostly of the sect of Mahomet Ali of Egypt; nor can we have any doubt, that all things are thus working together for the re-establishment of the true religion in the regions where man was first civilized, and where the oracles of God were uttered. In the mean time, the decline of the arch-heresy of the East will be regretted by no one who judges of the tree by the fruit. A long residence,' says Burckhardt, among Turks, Syrians, and Egyptians' (and no man knew them better) 'justifies me in declaring that they are wholly deficient in virtue, honor, and justice; that they have little true piety, and still less charity or forbearance; and that honesty is only to be found in their paupers or idiots.'"

The Mahometans consider matrimony as a mere civil contract. They practice polygamy. They may have four regularly married wives; they may, besides, purchase concubines, (generally Circassian and other slaves;) they have, also, hired wives, whose obligation to live with a man lasts only for a certain time. Generally, the Mahometans have but ene wife; the wealthier sort have two; the very rich still more. With ne Turks, the marriage is concluded upon between the parents, often while the children are at a very tender age; and when the engagement is completed, at mature years, the bride is conducted in a procession to the husband's house. Entertainments follow, and, in the evening, the bride is led by a eunuch (or, with the poorer classes, by a maidservant) into the bridechamber.

The Mahometans bury their dead. The interment takes place as soon as possible, in obedience to the command of the prophet: "Make haste

to bury the dead, that, if he have done well, he may go forthwith into blessedness; if evil, unto hell-fire." No signs of excessive grief, no tears, nor lamentations are allowed, as it is the duty of a good Mussulman to acquiesce without a murmur in the will of God. On arrival at the burial place, the body is committed to the earth, with the face turned towards Mecca.

In Turkey deceased persons are buried naked. A procession is formed, and the deceased is carried to his grave, with solemn ceremony. The Turkish burying-grounds are shaded with cypress trees, and neatly kept it is common to see females in them placing flowers around the graves. A turban, rudely carved on a stone, is placed over the grave of a male, and a vase over that of a female. On the tombs of unmarried females, instead of a vase, is a rose.

IV. CHRISTIANITY.

It is doubtless the tendency of the Bible, especially of the New Testament, the acknowledged foundation of Christianity, to unite all who enjoy the study of it in one faith, and one practice. But owing in part to a real or supposed ambiguity of certain passages, and the consequent various interpretations of commentators-but more, perhaps, to the pride, ambition, and selfishness of the human heart, the professed Christian world is now, and has long been divided, into a multiplicity of sects. Between some of these, the differences both as to doctrine and practice are few and comparatively unimportant. Between others, they are many and apparently radical.

It is not the object of these pages to enter into any discussion as to modes of faith or practice; or to attempt any thing by way of praise or censure upon different denominations of Christians. Our aim is briefly to exhibit some of the peculiarities of different sects, especially of those which may be supposed to be less understood by the common reader; and to this partial survey of an extended field our prescribed limits imperiously oblige us to submit.

ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH.

1. ELECTION OF A NEW POPE.-The election of a new pope is always attended with much ceremony. The duty devolves upon the cardinals, who are seventy in number, when the sacred college, as it is called, is complete. They reside in different countries; but, on the demise of the incumbent of the papal chair, they are assembled at Rome, for the purpose of a new election. A place called the Conclave is fitted up in the Vatican palace, where the important service is to be performed. A number of cells or chambers, equal to the number of cardinals, are formed, with a small distance between every two, and a broad gallery before them. A number is put on every cell, and small papers, with corresponding numbers, are put into a box: every cardinal, or some one for him, draws out one of these papers, which determines in what cell he is to lodge. The cells are lined with cloth; and there is a part of each one separated for the conclavists, or attendants, of whom two are allowed