"He will proceed, I have no doubt, very cautiously; examine and re-examine every step he takes; but when the Rubicon is passed, there will be no fruitless attempts to unite religion and the world, but an unreserved devotion of soul to God."
In the evening Miss Roscoe was at the chapel, and after service called at Fairmount to see her friends.
"It is true," she said; "my dear father is at length brought to know that he is a sinner, and to feel the importance of redemption through the blood of Christ. I went with him in the morning to hear the Rev. Mr. Cole, with whose sermon he was not so well pleased as on some former occasions; and he would have accompanied me this evening, had it not been for mamma, who most earnestly requested him not to go."
The evening came when we were to pay our promised visit to the Roscoes, and just as we were about to set out, the Rev. Mr. Guion arrived. When he found where we were going, he proposed returning home; but Mrs. Stevens said, "No, no; you must accompany us. You may be the means of doing some good; and I think your Master has sent you for that purpose."
Mr. Roscoe gave us a cordial welcome; but when the name of Guion was announced, Mrs. Roscoe drew back with a very polite movement, and became unusually reserved. Conversation flagged, till Mr. Roscoe mentioned that he had been reading Buchanan's Christian Researches in Asia, and called our attention to some passages, which had much interested him:—
"I have returned home," says the writer, "from witnessing a scene which I shall never forget. At twelve o'clock of this day, being the great day of the feast, the Moloch of Hindoostan was brought out of his temple, amidst the acclamations of hundreds of thousands of his worshippers. When the idol was placed on his throne, a shout was raised by the multitude, such as I had never before heard. It continued equable for a few minutes, and then gradually died away. After a short interval of silence, a murmur was heard at a distance; all eyes were turned towards the place, and behold, a grove advancing! A body of men, having green branches in their hands, approached with great celerity. The people opened a way for them; and when they had come up to the throne, they fell down before him that sat thereon, and worshipped. And the multitude again sent forth a voice like the sound of a great thunder. But the voices I now heard were not those of melody; for there is no harmony in the praise of Moloch's worshippers.
"The throne of the idol was placed on a car, about sixty feet in height, resting on wheels which indented the ground deeply, as they turned slowly under the ponderous machine. Attached to it were six cables, by which the people drew it along. Upon the car were the priests and satellites of the idol, surrounding his throne. I went on in the procession, close by the tower of Moloch, which, as it was drawn with difficulty, grated on its many wheels harsh thunder. After a few minutes it stopped; and now the worship of the god began. A high priest mounted the car in front of the idol, and pronounced his obscene stanzas in the ears of the people, who responded at intervals in the same strain. 'These songs,' said he, 'are the delight of the god.' After the car had moved some way, a pilgrim announced that he was ready to offer himself in sacrifice to the idol. He laid himself down in the road before the car, as it was moving along, lying on his face, with his arms stretched forward. The multitude passed round him, leaving the space clear, and he was crushed to death by the wheels of the car.
"A horrid tragedy was acted on the 12th of September, 1807, at a place about three miles from Calcutta. A Brahmin died at the advanced age of ninety-two. He had twelve wives, and three of them were burned alive with his dead body. Of these three, one was a venerable lady, having white locks, who had been long known in the neighbourhood. Not being able to walk, she was carried in a palanquin to the place of burning, and was then placed by the priests on the funeral pile. The two other ladies were younger; one of them of a very pleasing and interesting countenance. The old lady was placed on one side of the dead husband, and the two other wives laid themselves down on the other side; and then an old Brahmin, the eldest son of the deceased, applied the torch to the pile, with unaverted face. The pile suddenly blazed, for it was covered with combustibles; and this human sacrifice was completed amidst the din of drums and cymbals, and the shouts of the Brahmins."