It has always been inseparably connected with religion and religious observances, from the organ and choir of Western religions to the drum and cymbals of the East. If the imagination of the poet can give to “airy nothing a local habitation and a name,” music has a yet greater power; and they are indeed twin sisters, poetry and music raising the civilized mind far above the ordinary range of things earthly. There will doubtless always be some mortals, even in the highest stage of civilization, who are nowise susceptible to the beauties of music; of them our poet for all time has spoken in uncomplimentary terms, perhaps harshly; but, if such a being is not to blame, he is at least incomprehensible. Among the many disadvantages under which Eastern nations labour, is the absence of melody in the voices of the feathered tribe. Our nightingale, thrush, and lark are all birds of sober plumage; but in the East there are no vocal artists; no lark poising itself in mid-air warbling forth in the early morn, and gladdening the heart of man with its song; no thrush singing to its lady-love from the topmost branch of a may-tree; no nightingale to lend its charm to a summer twilight—nothing but gaudy plumage and burnished colours that dart hither and thither “brief as the lightning in the collied night.” The birds utter for the most part harsh, discordant sounds; and it appears to me that the reason for this want of vocal sweetness is to be found either in the climate or in the number of carrion-eaters. A nightingale, for instance, singing from the leafy branch of a tamarind tree, with a pack of jackals yelling beneath, would be a contrast repugnant to nature, a dislocation of the fitness of things. Our English vanity enables us to tolerate peacocks in the gardens of the wealthy. For the sake of seeing them strut about terraces and spread their tails in the sunlight, people will endure their torturing cry at daybreak, and even turn a deaf ear to the complaints of the gardener, who soon loses all patience with this most mischievous of birds. I do not remember them in Burmah, but in India they are very numerous, affecting in particular the denser jungles frequented by tigers.