Note 36 — Chapter I · The Exodus of the Parsis

Dr. Fryer, who visited Bombay in the year 1671,36 says: “On the other side of the great bay, towards the sea, there is a sort of promontory called Malabar Hill, a rocky mountain covered with woods, on the top of which is a recently erected Parsi tomb.”37 Now, as the first care of the Parsis, wherever they settle, is to construct a “Tower of Silence,” it is to be presumed that the community could not have been of any importance before this period; it has prospered since. It is in Bombay at the present time that can be best studied the changes that have been going on for two centuries, and which make the modern Parsis the most loyal subjects of the British Crown, and the most active agents of civilisation and progress.