At an early stage of our residence at Benares voyaging on the Ganges was a favourite mode of enjoying the cold season. There were budgerows, vessels with two tolerably sized rooms, available for hire at a moderate charge. It was indispensable to have with the budgerow a small boat for the accommodation of servants and for the cooking of food. On a few occasions I took a trip on a vessel of this description with my family, moving up and down the river, and halting towards evening near a town or village, which I could visit for the purpose of speaking to the people about the Saviour. The country is so populous that there was no difficulty in mooring our little craft in the evening near some place where hearers could be collected. It was seldom on any tour in the North-West we were allowed to forget that we were in the region of the sacred river, which receives from the people divine honours, and which in their belief confers inestimable benefit on all who bathe in its waters. When on the bank of the river, its alleged virtues formed a frequent subject of remark and discussion. There, as elsewhere, we had to tell them that Ganges water, however good for refreshing and cleansing the body, cannot wash away one spot from the soul. We had to tell them frequently, that as the washerman who puts clothes into a box and carefully washes it with the expectation of their coming out clean and white will be acting a very foolish part, so they were acting an equally futile part if they supposed that the water of the Ganges, so useful for the body, had any effect on the spirit. In answer to the remark that Ganges water could not do what other water could not, as it had nothing peculiar in its composition, I have been gravely told that two things exactly the same to the senses may be essentially different; and the proof given was that the river Kurumnasa, which means the destroyer of merit, takes away all merit from those who bathe in it, while bathing in the Ganges secures an untold degree of merit, extending not only to one's own past and future, but to an untold number of ancestors and descendants! When on the Ganges or its banks one continually sees proof of the implicit trust placed in it. We remember being awakened very early one morning long before dawn by a person bathing close to our boat, in a quivering voice which showed he was chilled by the water, long and earnestly imploring the favour of _Gunga Ma_--Mother Ganges.