INDIAN PICTURES DRAWN WITH PEN AND PENCIL

India together with Ceylon, stretches two thousand miles from the Himalayas southwards into the ocean; and its extreme width, measured across its northern boundary, is nineteen hundred miles. It is as large as Europeless Russia. Physically it divides itself into three parts(i) the Himalayas, “the abode of snow,” as the name means, where are the treasures of the rain, and the bracing mountain air, forming a double mountain wall against the north; (2) the River Plains, with the Brahmaputra in the east, the Indus in the west, and the mighty Ganges,” Mother Ganga” adored by the people, across the centre ; (3) the threesided table land of the Deccan, separated from the river plains by the Vindhya mountains, with the Eastern and Western Ghats running along either coast and meeting at Cape Comorin. Thus, this vast country is naturally isolated, with the sea on either side, the Himalayan range scimitar like across the north, its spurs in the east making a natural wall, and the Sulaiman range along the Indus in the west, forming a boundary equally secure. The religions of India may be classified as followsI. Brahmanism, the religion of the Aryans, which found its earliest exposition in the hymns of the Vedas, and its development in the institutes of Manu. Originally it was monotheistic. The RigVeda, usually placed 1400 years B.C., consists of a series of hymns addressed to bright friendly gods, devas, literally, ?the shining ones,” the great powers of nature, the fatherheaven, motherearth, the encompassing sky. Brahma, the creator, has no separate existence in these hymns. The book is profusely illustrated to make it more informative.