"When we heard about the peacock throne you can be sure we wanted to see it, and asked the guide to show us where it was. He said it was carried away by the great Persian conqueror, Nadir Shah, when he captured Delhi in 1738, and ordered its inhabitants to be massacred. More than 100,000 were killed by his command, and history says that he sat in the Dewan-i-Khas with the captured monarch, while the troops were obeying his command and slaughtering everybody on whom they could lay their hands. Men, women, and children were butchered, and the property carried away from Delhi amounted to a great many millions. The throne was in the centre of the room, and the place where it stood is occupied by a block of marble. We tried to picture the scene when Shah Jehan was in the height of his power, and before the Persians had come to plunder him. According to all accounts, Delhi must have been superior to any other city of the East in barbaric splendor, and her wealth was something fabulous. When the English captured the place, in 1857, the soldiers were allowed to plunder the palace, and they carried away millions of dollars' worth of diamonds, and gold, and other precious things. "On the block of marble where the peacock throne stood we saw an inscription in Arabic, and asked what it was. The guide said it was famous all over the world, and was as follows: 'If there be an elysium on earth, it is this, it is this, it is this.' The Arabic words are '_Agar furduse baru-i-zamin ast, hamin ast, hamin ast, hamin ast._' [Illustration: JAMMA MUSJID, OR GREAT MOSQUE.] "We left the palace and proceeded to the Jamma Musjid, or Great Mosque, one of the finest in all India. It stands on a small hill; and as the minarets are 130 feet high, a view from the top of one of them includes the whole of Delhi and a large extent of country around it. To enter it we climbed a long flight of broad steps, and then crossed a court-yard 450 feet square, with a marble tank in the centre. The court-yard has steps on three of its sides, but the principal entrance is on the east, and this was the one our guide led us to. The mosque is on the west side of the court, and is a handsome building, 200 feet by 120; it has three marble cupolas, and is paved throughout with slabs of white marble with a black border, so that its appearance is very rich. There is a good deal of marble carving in and about the mosque, and we were not surprised to learn that it took ten years to complete the building. The proportions of the interior are not as fine as those of the Pearl Mosque, at Agra, and it is evident that the architect tried to make a large building, rather than a strictly handsome one.