Page:Life in India or Madras, the Neilgherries, and Calcutta.djvu/64

52 an unknown tongue, with squeaking voices and eager gestures, they seemed to us more like monkeys than men. Yet we remembered that they had souls as precious as our own, and prayed for strength to labour in faith for India's swarming millions.

As we passed with a light breeze up the coast, new scenes constantly broke upon our gaze, and objects were more clearly discerned as we drew nearer to the land. By afternoon we were abreast of the Seven Pagodas of Malaveram—ancient temples standing upon the shore, and one of them on a rock washed by the sea. A little later, Mount St. Thomé, which is but eight miles south of Madras, came in sight, with its shining-white Roman Catholic Church, the reputed burial-place of the apostle Thomas. At sunset the Madras light shone bright before us. Soon the masts of ships lying in the roadstead could be dimly seen in the darkness, and at half-past eight o'clock our anchor was dropped, and our voyage of one hundred and thirty-one days was at an end.