Page:Life in India or Madras, the Neilgherries, and Calcutta.djvu/463

Rh word of God, Satan is raising up in drunkenness a barrier to the spread of the gospel in India. It is as true that no drunkard as that no idolater shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; and now, to her shame it must be said, the influence of Christian England is introducing many a Hindu to this road to everlasting death.

But pass this sad spot, and the long street which stretches before you is straight and broad, and pleasantly skirted on both sides with cocoanut-palms. The houses are low, and roofed with hard mud laid upon boards lying evenly across the walls, with gutters of crockery-ware to carry off the rain. Women stand in the doorways, with blue and yellow robes thrown gracefully over their shoulders and folded around their waists. With rings on their clattering toes, and jewels in their ears and noses, they chat with one another or scream out the gossip of the day to their friends across the street. The men stand idly round, or sit behind their piles of goods exposed for sale on boards raised a few inches from the ground, while throngs of pedestrians walk through the middle of the street (for there are no sidewalks) to their places of business or labour.