THE sketches which are here collected and reprinted
were some of the records of many journeys at the
time the writer's avocations led him to travel almost yearly
across the continent of India. They were labours of love,
written during the intervals of graver occupations, and the
author trusts that the work may reflect some of his own keen
enjoyment in these cities, and some of their serene charm and
Oriental enchantment. He has endeavoured, both by con-
versation and reading, to enter into the spirit of the times
in which each temple or mosque or palace was produced,
and into the manners and customs of those who erected it.
By selections from the ancient records and old books of
travels, and the great Anglo-Indian classics, he has en-
deavoured to give life to old scenes, and to reproduce senti-
ments unfamiliar to the present generation. After giving
an account of the story of each city, he has referred to the
prominent objects of interest in it, and he has borrowed freely
from the inquirers of other days whatsoever he considered
important, as illustrating their architecture or antiquity.
He has endeavoured to acknowledge in all cases the sources
of his information, but as some of the papers were written
twenty years ago it has not always been easy to trace them.
He has also borrowed from the Introductions to the volumes
of State Papers edited by him, on the old principle that a
man may once say a thing as he would have it said — he
cannot say it twice.