Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 7.djvu/234

 ing built at the junction of two sacred rivers, the Ganges and the Jumna, whose waters attract pilgrims from the whole peninsula. It is said also that, according to the legends of the Ramayana, the Ganges takes its source in heaven, whence, thanks to Brahma, it descends upon the earth.

In making his purchases, Passepartout had soon seen the city, at one time defended by a magnificent fort, which has become a State prison. There are no more commerce and no more manufactures in this city, formerly a manufacturing and commercial point. Passepartout, who vainly sought a variety shop, such as there was in Regent street, a few steps off from Farmer & Co., found only at a second-hand dealer's, an old whimsical Jew, the objects which he needed—a dress of Scotch stuff, a large mantle, and a magnificent otter-skin pelisse, for which he did not hesitate to pay seventy-five pounds. Then, quite triumphant, he returned to the station.

Aouda commenced to revive. The influence to which the priests of Pillaji had subjected her, disappeared by degrees, and her beautiful eyes resumed all their Indian softness.

When the poet-king, Ucaf Uddaul celebrates the charms of the Queen of Ahemhnagara, he thus expresses himself, "Her shining tresses, regularly divided into two parts, encircle the harmonious outlines of her delicate and white cheeks, brilliant with their glow and freshness. Her ebony eyebrows have the form and strength of the bow of Kama, god of love; and under her long silken lashes, in the black pupil of her large limpid eyes, there float, as in the sacred lakes of the Himalaya, the purest reflections of the celestial light. Fine, regular, and white, her teeth shine out between her smiling lips, like dew-drops in the half-closed bosom of the pomegranate blossom. Her ears, types of the symmetric curves, her rosy hands, her little feet, curved and tender as lotus buds, shine with the splendor of the finest pearls of Ceylon, the most beautiful diamonds of Golconda. Her delicate and supple waist, which a hand can clasp, heightens the elegant outline of her rounded figure, and the wealth of her bosom, where youth in its prime displays its most perfect treasures, and under the silken folds of her tunic she seems to have been modeled in pure silver by the divine hand of Vicvarcarma, the immortal sculptor."