The Parsees also hold all birds sacred, as a sort of spiritual agent of universal purification, through whose agency all gross, unclean substances pass into healthy conditions. For these reasons the towers of silence which receive the dead spoil are open to the sky, and by means of the bird of prey it re-enters almost immediately into the domain of life and health and purity. From the universal testimony of pagan or Christian travellers we find that the Fire-worshippers of India are thought to be more honorable in their dealings with one another, and even with strangers, than the generality of Asiatics, and even than those peoples professing Christianity. They rarely resort to written contracts, as their word is the best bond. Benevolence is said to flow in their veins, so conspicuous have they become for their love of charity. The Rev. Mr. Avington, during his stay at Surat so early as 1698, bore testimony to the fact that the Parsees there were ever more ready to provide for the comfort and support of the poor and suffering than even the Christians; and this reputation they bear to this day in India. The Bombay government voted thanks so far back as 1790 to Sorabjee Muncherjee, who during the scarcity that prevailed at that time daily fed at his own expense two thousand people, comprising Jews, Christians, Mohammedans, and Hindoos. Mrs. Graham, in her journal of a residence in India, declares that she was enraptured with the simplicity, purity, and never-ceasing kindliness of the Parsee community; and every one in India is familiar with the name of that very prince of benevolence and kindliness, the venerable Parsee baronet Sir Jamsetjee Jeeboy, knighted by the queen of England for his unbounded charities, which are not only unsurpassed, but without a parallel, in ancient or modern times. He has done more in his lifetime for Western India, in feeding the poor, releasing unhappy prisoners for debt, building causeways, founding schools and colleges for the education of all castes and conditions of men and women, erecting hospitals for the relief of the suffering poor, benevolent institutions for the deformed, spacious resting-places, or dhurrum-salas, for weary travellers in all parts of India, stupendous aqueducts, wells, and tanks, than any other single individual, or even the East India Company, for the benefit of mankind. Connected with the Grant Medical College of Bombay is the noble hospital, the gift of this Parsee baronet; and only a few years ago his family erected a hospital for incurables near it. An ophthalmic hospital has been opened and endowed by another liberal Parsee, Cowasjee Jehangheer. The late Sir Jamsetjee commenced life in Bombay at the early age of twelve as a street peddler, selling old bottles, and was called "Bottle-wallah" to the day of his death.