These all are left behind, and now the solemn silence betokens some revered and oft-honored shrine. They are at the bottom of the valley in which lies the cave-temple of Elephantum. Hills all around—receding, impending, bowing their leafy summits clothed in rich tropic verdure, gorgeous in the season of bloom—silence unbroken, save the dove as she laments her absent mate with wo as meek and patient as the injured _Philomela_. Silence, solemn silence—no sound but their echoing footsteps repeated on the hill sides. The air dull and motionless, pregnant with the aroma of the thousand-hued flowers which wind round the murmuring tree tops—no signs of human desecration to mar the temple of Nature. A heat of noon, like the scorching glow of a furnace. The hills rise with loftier summits and more precipitous sides as they advance—nearly excluding the sunlight. Mossy was now the way to their tread—soft were their silent footsteps—and from the rocky walls and moist underwood the deepening gorge exuded the silvery dew, which trickled noiseless and refreshing down. The humid exhalations softened the fierce heat of noon-day and quieted the burning thirst of the travelers. A holier influence seemed, soft as zephyrs, to breathe within these sacred glades and to refresh whomsoever it fell on. Thus with reverent step they journey noiseless on, when from some great distance the sweet sound of vocal harmony stole softly on their ears—rising, quivering, pausing, dying away among the whispering leaves—now rising loud and triumphant like the joyous clamor of victory; now lingering sadly sweet, with scarce audible vibration, like the sigh of the parting spirit. And ever as they advanced, bowing in silence to its solemn influence, it seemed to grow fainter and louder, but still to be ever removing, like the verge of the retreating horizon. They pass the bend of the valley and the whole scene of worship bursts upon their astonished eyes in all its sombre grandeur. The long troop of priests are winding in ever changing measure among the pillars of a vast subterranean hall, under-reaching the opposite hill side. Like pigmies they march beneath the colossal arches of the temple.