elapsed, before she manifested solicitude for her soul; her pride gave way: she commenced attending the meetings, unaware of the lever which was moving her unwilling feet, and ere a week had passed over, she was rejoicing in the Savior. She came forth as a lamp trimmed and burning. She was decided--she was active for Christ. The writer heard her voice ascend in anxious entreaty for her unconverted companions, and she often followed and urged them to come to the Savior. Her bright course was short. In little more than a year, she ascended to the world of spirits, there to join, in songs of praise, all those who ascribe their redemption, through the mercy of Christ, to the prevailing power of united prayer. Sisters, brothers, can you not do likewise?

For the Mother's Magazine.

LETTERS ON INDIA-BY A LADY.

[It is a well attested fact, that no person can be very deeply interested in behalf of individuals, or of any people, without an intimate knowledge of their situation, character, and necessities. In view of this fact, we are gratified with the prospect of receiving, for the Magazine, a series of letters respecting India, addressed by the writer to her niece, the first of which we now present to our readers. By this means we hope to arrest the attention, and excite the interest of mothers, in regard to the condition of females in that portion of the heathen world. In connexion with these letters, our readers, who can obtain the book, may, with great advantage, consult the "Memoirs of the life, writings, and character of the converted brahman Babajee," by the Rev. Hollis Reed, missionary at Bombay. While perusing this work, we hope that both fathers and mothers will assist their children in examining the different places referred to, which are so well defined upon maps and charts. For no matter how graphic may be the general description of a place, if the eye does not rest upon individual objects, impressions on the youthful

mind must be evanescent.

It is believed that one faithful experiment of this sort would lead to the most happy results.]

LETTER I.

MY DEAR NIECE,

You have so frequently made inquiries of me respecting that interesting country where, in the providence of God, I have spent a portion of my life, that I am induced to address you a short series of letters, and this you may regard as the first. In writing you, I do not design, nor will you expect me, to confine myself to objects and scenes which have never been described before. I shall suppose that very many things have been said about India, which you have read; and therefore I shall describe what I have seen and heard in that country, which I think will interest you, without reference to what has been said or written before.

India proper is the whole of that extensive territory included between the river Ganges and the Indus, and reaching from Cape Comorin to the Himmaleh mountains. It includes about thirty degrees of latitude, and of course presents a great variety of climate. The southern part is very warm, while the northern mountains, some of which are the highest in the world, are covered with perpetual snow. In the northern angle of India, and among the above-mentioned mountains, is the lovely valley of Cashmere, surrounded by beautiful hills, intersected by cooling streams, and adorned by such a rich profusion of flowers and fruits, and luxuriant vegetation, as to give it some claim to be called the garden of the world. We can scarcely wonder that this charming spot has been selected by some of our expositors as the location of the garden of Eden. Here are wrought. those beautiful fabrics, the Cashmere shawls; and here, too, is woman renowned for her beauty.

India is an old country. When America was unknown to the civilized world--when this country was one boundless wilderness, its dark unbroken forests penetrated only by the red man, and the lawless tenants of the wood-when England was in her infancy, and western Europe but just emerging from

a long night of barbarism,-India was an extensive, powerful, rich, and magnificent kingdom. Gorgeous palaces, splendid mosques, marble tombs and mausoleums, gardens, fountains, and aqueducts, displaying the works of nature and art, then adorned the imperial cities of India. The Great Mogul, who at this time swayed the sceptre over this vast country, sat on the far-famed peacock throne, which was formed of solid gold, embossed with various figures, and studded with precious stones. Seven years was spent in its preparation, and the expense of the jewels only, amounted to £1,250,000 sterling. It was called the peacock throne, from its having the figures of two peacocks standing behind it, with their tails spread, which were studded with jewels of various colours to represent life. The grandeur of the imperial court was such as the pride and ambition of the house of Timour, with the vast wealth of India at his disposal, would lead us to expect. Gold was as silver, and silver as brass; and precious stones, as diamonds, rubies, pearls, and emeralds, were as profuse in the royal mansions, and among the nobles of the empire, as if they had been the common pebbles of the rivulet. Such was India when the white man began to traverse the dark wilds of America, and to build his thatched hut beside the Indian's wigwam.

But let us look down the vista of years, and see what India was at a far more distant period.

When invaded by Alexander the Great, more than three centuries before Christ, India was an old country. Her institutions were consolidated, her manners, habits, and customs fixed, her religious superstitions and rites settled on a basis that has scarcely suffered any material change since. Little, however, was known of India, from this time till its conquest by the Mohammedans in the year of the Christian era one thousand. The Hindoos were then found to be, in respect to character, habits, customs, and religion, almost precisely what they had been described to be by the private secretary of Alexander, thirteen hundred years before.

A

Improvements in the art of navigation, and the consequent discoveries of the fifteenth century, opened this fairy land to the eyes of western Europe. Previous to the discovery of the pas

sage around the Cape of Good Hope by De Gama, in 1492, an overland trade had been carried on with India, to no inconsiderable extent, by different western nations. The Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, and Venetians, largely participated in it. Now the great barrier was removed the east and the west was brought near. The ocean became the highway of nations, and India became the prey of the west. From this period, the European nations have been replenished from the east. And could we compute the immense riches which have been conveyed in one almost uninterrupted stream from that country for the last three centuries, we could not avoid accommodating to the case of the Hindoos, the prophet's description of eastern nations. "Their land was full of silver and gold, there seemed no end of their treasures; their land was full of horses, and there seemed no end of the chariots. Their land was also full of idols; they worshipped the work of their own hands, that which their own fingers had made."

England has shared largely in the spoil. She has at length supplanted all her competitors, and now sways her uncontrolled sceptre over the wide dominions of Hindoostan. The idolatrous Hindoos, the haughty and bigoted Moossulman, are alike compelled to yield a ready obedience to a power which they af fect to despise. Costly and magnificent temples, tombs, mosques, excavations, palaces, fortifications, some in ruins and others in good state of preservation, all show what India has been. And a foreign government, European camps and costumes, with an impoverished people, show what she now is. Yours, &c.

For the Mother's Magazine.

MRS. W.

OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE.

ITHACA, 31st Dec. 1836.

AMONG the great variety of interesting subjects brought before the minds of Christian mothers at the present day, I find none of so much importance as that suggested by the often-repeated inquiry, "Why are not the prayers of parents answered, for the early conversion of their children ?" That Christian parents have had their attention more or less turned to this sub

ject, and that every parent feels in regard to it, cannot be denied. That multitudes belonging to maternal associations, and we hope others, are in the constant habit of asking for this blessing, is also certain. Indeed, so true is this fact, that we have heard it asserted, that long-continued, persevering prayer seems to engage the honor of God on our side; that his glory even, would be sullied, and he would suffer his enemies, and the enemies of his people to exult, should he turn away from the voice of their supplication. Yet the prayer remains unanswered. The subjects of prayer are heedless of all but the interests of time. Some of them have once been, and perhaps are still, impenitent members of the church of God, averting their faces from his holy ordinances, and saying, by an open practice before the sun, that there is no reality in religion, and afflicting their friends and brethren by their careless lives. Some others of these subjects of so much prayer have never been known to have been moved very powerfully by any considerations of conscience; the word, or Spirit of God, and all affectionate parental entreaties are unheeded. Some are alternately affected by hopes and fears, terrors and alarms, but give to their anxious parents no proof of decided piety, or the firmness of good moral principle. The day of social prayer arrives, and these pious nothers again assemble, and in agonized feeling of the danger and wretchedness of a state of impenitency, carry the case before a throne of grace and a hearer of prayer. And this is the history of months, it may be of years. Shall it be said that God is not a faithful, covenant-keeping, sin-forgiving God? Shall the heaven-daring assertion be hazarded that he is trying his people's faithfulness in this way? That when the word of him who cannot lie has been repeatedly uttered, that "whatsoever" they ask they shall receive, still, the sincere, humble, heart-broken, penitent mother, is rejected. No. The distressing cause must be sought elsewhere. And, my dear Mrs. W., permit me to suggest a thought on this subject. After years of critical observation, I am convinced, whatever other causes may be subsidiary, that the evil lics just where it lay in the case of an stherwise interesting Christian of Bible days. Who will not mmediately recur in his recollection to one, the sins of whose