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I had come half-way round the World to see this sight and had traveled days in such terrific heat that a sunstroke was as much to be feared as a stroke of lightning. I saw the Taj by the full moon and was so busy looking that I stepped into a pool of water up to my knees, and I had hardly clambered out when I stepped off aplatform and sprained my ankle. But it was worth it. And yet to me the most beautiful building in the World is not the Taj. It is the Pearl Mosque, which is also at Agra. I don’t know what the buildings in Heaven look like, but I don’t believe they could be more beautiful than the Pearl Mosque.
On the east side of the country is the sacred river of India; it is called the Ganges. It has several mouthsand at one of these mouths is Calcutta. Calcutta is in India but most of the mouths of the Ganges are in Pakistan.
Farther up the sacred river is the sacred city of the Hindus. It is called Benares. No one but a Mohammedan may go to the sacred city of Mecca, but any one may go to Benares. Benares is built on the banks of the river, and covering the banks are long stone steps leading down into the river. Hindus come from all over India to bathe in the Ganges at Benares, not to wash away dirt but to wash away sins. They go in about waist-deep and, filling a bowl with the sacred water, pour it over their heads. Especially do they come to the Ganges when they think they are about to die. Good Hindus are not afraid to die. In fact, if they are miserably poorand unhappy they are glad to die, for if their sins are washed away they expect, by dying, they will immediately be changed into the body of a happier creature.
