The Boys' School.

THE BOYS' SCHOOL .

LONDON , SATURDAY , SfABGS : 14 , 1863 .

The Anniversary Festival of this Institution was celebrated at the Freemasons' Tavern , on Wednesdaylast , and though in consequence of the festivities connected with the Boyal marriage , the attendance ivas not so numerous as last year ; and , thereby , added to the comfort of those pz'esent . The financial

results were of the most satisfactory description , no less than £ 4500 being announced as the subscription of the evening , of which £ 1500 came from "West Yorkshire alone . TheR . W . D . Grand Master , Avho is also Prov . Grand

Master , presided , and must have felt highly gratified at the support he received from his own province and the . brethren generally . Bro . Binckes , the Secretary , has exerted himself incessantly throughout the year to ensure the success

of the meeting , and meets with his reward by the largest subscription ever announced for any Masonic Charity . The whole of the arrangements were excellent , and the most perfect order reigned throughout the evening , every word that fell from the various speakers being distinctly heard throughout the Hall .

Classical Theology.—Lxii.

CLASSICAL THEOLOGY . —LXII .

XI . —JTJKO AST ) JAIST / ABT . Scarcely less famous than Elephanta , for the magnificence and magnitude of its excavations dedicated to the same description of deities of Hindoo worship , is Salsette , a still nearer island , which , with Colabba

, or Old Woman's isle , now attached by a causeway on the west , lies north of the Harbour of Bombay , so anglicised from Bom Bahia , its Portuguese name . The fort contains an English church , but numerous Portuguese and Armenian churches are both within

and without its walls . The Jews have three synagogues there ; mosques and pagodas also are numerous , for to the 2000 English civilians aud the British forces of 2500 , with about 900 Jews residing on the island , there are upwards of 30 , 000 Mahometans , 100 , 000

Hindoos , and 13 , 000 Parsees , who , as Gibers , we have already mentioned , accord the unalterable descent of their religion to Zoroaster , whose birth , they believe , took place at Oromia , 5505 years before Christ . The most considerable in size and grandeur of the roek

temples in Bombay is the one inscribed to Momba Devi , somewhat within the distance of two miles from the fort . But in art , extent , and splendour , those of ¦ Adjunta and Elora are said to surpass them all . Many

superlative appellations have been propounded to induce an idea of these stupendous subterranean mansions . The pagodas , or rather as properly called Vicaras , which we have briefly described , are held to be of such ancient antiquitybythe natives , as to be withoutthepale

of history or tradition ; and , there being no account of the time in which they were constructed , they regard them as the work of superhuman beings of a preexistent race of mortality and excellence , whose influences and con-socialities were attainable in the

sacerdotal observances they had ordained for their instruction , and left with them to that end to b « followed out . Many of the figures of the Hindoo gods and goddesses , that decorate the exterior of some of th « Yicaras , or Vicharas , are , consistently with their

arrangement , above twenty feet in height as they sit carved out of the roek , or in high relief . Whether they were meant to personify a race of giants , or were the appropriate essentials to an architecture of which they were designed to form both the motive

and representative support and style , we cannot determine , but suppose that it was intended that they should serve for both purposes . But Pagodas , properly so called , of the most antique and of the grandest order , —still to be met with in many parts of Hindostan ornately rising

from , the plains as well as from the mountains , are immense pyramidical structures , in fact actual pyramids . In all respect , unlike the Eareees , the Hindoos have been strictly taught , as , at first , in the gloom of their caverns , to hold sacred the solemn darkness in which they were accustomed to perform their religious rites and ' ceremonies . The Chiliambrum Pagoda on the Coromandel coast , highly venerated on

account of its great antiquity , is entered by a decorated , noble , gateway under a complete jiyramid of huge stones tapering to the height of a hundred and twenty feet . Each stone is above forty feet long , and five feet square , covered with plates of copper embellished with a manifold variety of skilfully

executed figures . This stately edifice extends not less than 1332 feet in length , and * 936 feet in breadth . And yet , in grandeur , and far more for sanctity , we find , in Orme ' s History of India , the Pagoda of Seringham greatly surpasses it . The footway of the outward wallwhich is nearly four miles

, in circumference , is grandly ornamented with regular columns , mostly single stones thirty-three feet long and five in diameter ; those forming , the roof being still larger . The structure itself consists of " seven square enclosures , one within the other , the walls of which are twenty-five feet high and four

thick . _ These enclosures are three hundred and fifty feet distant from one another , and each has four large pates , with a high tower , which are placed in the middle of each side of the enclosure , and opposite the four cardinal points . " Within the innermost enclosures are the chambers of imagery or the chapels . It is on account of the prevalent belief that it eontains the actual image of the god Wistchnu , which