intervals, adding to the colour scintillating in the rippling water, and, stooping to drink from the sacred stream, or perform the ordinary ceremony of throwing in flowers to be carried away by the current, they resemble a garden of gay blossoms. Up the steep steps of the temple their forms wobble like tired balloons, a gust of music stirs the air as they enter, a ring of sweet sounding bells, and their heads may be seen above a parapet as they pass along an ambulatory. From here it is usual to throw a handful of small coin into the holy waters underneath, which is speedily scrambled for by lusty loungers on the temple steps. Each visitor to the shrine goes through exactly the same religious routine, and passes out through another doorway into the street.
But below, the gay crowd comes and goes. Youths splash about in the shallow stream or sport on the stone steps. The sun kisses the gilt pinnacles, or lights up the vermilion painted shrines. Bathers wind around them gorgeously dyed fabrics, or stand about in picturesque groups. Girls in many-tinted robes laughingly cast yellow marigolds into
