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CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 
 924 059 084 21 
 
The Simple Adventures 
 
 of a 
 Memsahib 
 
LITERATURE OF THE RAJ 
 
 General Editor 
 
 Saros Cowasjee 
 
 A lesser-known legacy of the British Raj in India is a literature 
 written in English. Kipling, Forster and Orwell are household words, 
 but they by no means exhaust what is good in Anglo-Indian litera- 
 ture. Anglo-India produced a large body of work, perhaps the 
 largest of any community in relation to its size. Granted that the bulk 
 is mediocre (a truism for literature anywhere in the world), there still 
 remains much that is good. The purpose of this Series is to rein- 
 troduce the best of the works written during the Raj which have 
 been out of print or otherwise difficult for the average reader to pro- 
 cure. 
 
 No study of Indian literature in English is complete without a 
 study of the works of Anglo- Indian writers. We can no more leave 
 them out of our study than we can, say, leave Clive or Hastings out 
 of a study of Indian history. The novels of Forster, Orwell, Edmund 
 Candler, Edward Thompson, Flora Annie Steel and a host of others 
 are a part of our literature — as much indeed as the fiction of Mulk 
 Raj Anand or R.K. Narayan or Raja Rao. 
 
 This novel is the first Canadian volume in the series, sponsored 
 abroad by Arnold Heinemann publishers of New Delhi. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES 
 OF A MEMSAHIB 
 
 BY 
 
 SARA JEANNETTE DUNCAN 
 
 Edited and with an Introduction 
 
 by 
 
 Thomas E. Tausky 
 
 @ 
 
 The Tecumseh Press 
 Ottawa, Canada 
 
Copyright © by Tecumseh Press Limited, 1986. 
 First Canadian edition of this 1893 publication. 
 
 All rights reserved. No part of this book may 
 
 be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any means, 
 
 except by reviewers for the public press, without written 
 
 permission from the Publishers. 
 
 Tecumseh Press Limited 
 
 8 Mohawk Crescent 
 
 Ottawa, Ontario K2H 7G6 
 
 The Publishers gratefully acknowledge the support of the 
 
 Ontario Arts Council 
 
 and the 
 
 Canada Council 
 
 for its publishing programme. 
 
 Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data 
 
 Duncan, Sara Jeannette, 1861-1922 
 The simple adventures of a memsahib 
 
 ISBN 0-919662-12-9 (bound).- 
 ISBN 0-919662-13-7 (pbk.) 
 
 I. Tausky, Thomas E., 1943- II. Title. 
 
 PS8455.085S5 1985 C813'.4 C86-090017-7 
 PR9199.2.D96S5 1985 
 
 Printed and bound in Canada. 
 
Contents 
 
 Introduction, Thomas E. Tausky vii 
 
 Chapters I — XXVIII 1-311 
 
 Notes 312 
 
Introduction 
 
 For all that she played no part in the administration of British 
 India, the memsahib as wife, mother and mistress has figured prom- 
 inently in the complex mythology of that society. In fiction and non- 
 fiction alike, the memsahib has been portrayed as heroine, martyr 
 and villainess. Sara Jeannette Duncan, on the contrary, concerned 
 herself with the mundane life of the ordinary memsahib. It is her 
 distinctive achievement that she combines entertaining craftsmanship 
 with an absence of melodrama. Her Helen Browne, Duncan con- 
 vinces us, is what most memsahibs really were like. 
 
 1. 
 The debate about the defining qualities of a memsahib has con- 
 tinued into the present day. In her 1976 study The Memsahibs, Pat 
 Barr concentrated on a few exceptional individuals, but found much 
 virtue in the type: "For the most part, the women loyally and stoi- 
 cally accepted their share of the white people's burden and lightened 
 the weight of it with their quiet humour, their grace, and often their 
 youth." An oral historian of the Raj, Charles Allan, concedes that 
 memsahibs have not always been admired, but then claims they were 
 victims of circumstance: "It has often been said that all the worst 
 faults of the Raj . . . stemmed from the memsahib. The fact of the 
 matter is that the memsahib never really stood much of a chance — 
 and the wonder is that so many came through so well." One of the 
 men Allan interviewed, John Morris, does not draw so sunny a con- 
 clusion: "Most of them started out as perfectly reasonable, decent 
 English girls, and many of them in the course of time developed into 
 what I can only describe as the most awful old harridans." In his 
 lively history, India Britannica, Geoffrey Moorhouse acknowledges 
 the role of conditioning, but condemns the final result: "They were 
 at first victims and then perpetuators of a vicious circle which re- 
 served them for their husband's pleasure alone, [and] left them ig- 
 norant and smug within a small superior coterie.'' 
 
John Morris's contention that "they [memsahibs] were very 
 largely responsible for the break-up of relations between the British 
 and the Indians'' is an echo of the viewpoint presented in the most 
 familiar of all denunciations of the memsahib, E.M. Forster's A 
 Passage to India (1924). The action of the novel begins, it will be re- 
 membered, with a discussion among Muslim friends regarding the 
 length of time an English person will remain civil in his attitude to- 
 wards Indians: two years for a man, one character concludes, and six 
 months for a memsahib. The novel's events reinforce this gloomy 
 view: at the "Bridge Party'' theoretically designed to bring the races 
 together, the Collector's wife sets an inspiring example of bigoted 
 aloofness, and the narrator comments, "The Englishmen had in- 
 tended to play up better, but had been prevented from doing so by 
 their womenfolk." Forster allows room for both the theory that fate 
 conspired against the memsahibs, and the idea that they simply en- 
 joyed being venemous: Fielding, the novel's English hero, charitably 
 observes that "there's something that doesn't suit them out here," but 
 the Collector, in his private musings, is more inclined to cast blame: 
 "After all, it's our women who make everything more difTicult out 
 here." 
 
 Forster was Sara Jeannette Duncan's house-guest for a weekend 
 in Simla, the Himalayan summer capital of British India (he found 
 her to be "difficult, and I fancy unhappy"). He could not have influ- 
 enced her work, since all of her Indian novels preceded both his visit 
 and A Passage to India. As we know from internal evidence in her fic- 
 tion, Duncan certainly was aware of an account of the memsahib 
 which in its time was as famous as Forster's characterization: the sto- 
 ries collected in Kipling's Plain Tales from the Hills (1888). 
 
 Kipling found that same Simla, Duncan's home for several years, 
 to be over-populated with fascinating but frivolous women, eager to 
 sink their claws into innocent, easily seduced young men. The pro- 
 portion of stories in his volume dealing with this Anglo-Indian man- 
 ifestation of the femme fatale is quite low, but the few tales on this 
 theme were accepted as truth in Britain and no doubt provoked 
 many lively debates in the clubs and drawing rooms of India. For all 
 their charms, neither Mrs. Hauksbee (who appears in four of 
 Kipling's stories) nor Mrs. Reiver (who figures in two) are very ap- 
 pealing characters. In each story, one or other or both of these 
 women fight and scheme for a man — not for his love, but for the 
 
vanity or public prestige of being worshipped by liim, or for the 
 whimsical enjoyment to be gained by molding his destiny. As "The 
 Rescue of Pluffles" makes clear, superficially the two women are con- 
 trasted: "Mrs. Hauksbee was honest — honest as her own front teeth 
 — and, but for her love of mischief, would have been a woman's 
 woman. There was no honesty about Mrs. Reiver." Yet beneath this 
 opposition is the fearful display of female power that unites the two 
 characters. A mere man like Pluffles, "callow all over — like a canary 
 that had not finished fledging itself has no choice but to be the bat- 
 defield on which the "Seven Weeks War" between the two Amazons 
 is fought. 
 
 Memsahibs who also happened to be novelists did not always take 
 kindly to Kipling's indictment of their sex. In her novel The Potter's 
 Thumb (1894), published the year after The Simple Adventures of a 
 Memsahib, Flora Annie Steel reproaches Kipling for giving an in- 
 complete and therefore distorted picture. Her words are an early 
 statement of the memsahib as victim theory: 
 
 Going to the Hills! Whose fault is it that the phrase conjures up to the 
 English ear a vision [sic] of grass-widows, flirtations, scandals, frivolities? 
 Surely it is the fault of those who, telling the tale of a hill-station, leave 
 out the tragedy of separation, which makes British rule in India such a 
 marvel of self-sacrifice, both to the woman and to the man. 
 
 Yet Steel's images of the memsahib, and those of her fellow nov- 
 elist Maud Diver, are just as theatrical as Kipling's creations. Indeed, 
 in the novel from which the foregoing passage was taken. Steel bor- 
 rowed the Mrs. Hauksbee pattern to serve as a contrast with a touch- 
 ing example of the memsahib as chaste goddess. 
 
 Steel also evidently shared Kipling's suspicion of feminine wiles. 
 Gwen Boynton's cupidity sets off a chain of events leading to her in- 
 nocent admirer's suicide; as one of the numerous native plotters re- 
 marks, "he killed himself for love of the mem sahib." Gwen's evil, 
 however, goes beyond the specific acts of frailty she commits. She 
 has, we are told on the penultimate page, an "absolutely untrust- 
 worthy nature," and her ability to charm is in principle held against 
 her as much as her greed. She belongs to the category of "men's 
 women," Rose Tweedie reflects, and that is enough, for the character 
 and the author, to condemn her. 
 
 Rose herself is first introduced as "a well-made, well-balanced 
 girl." It perhaps takes Steel's special perspective to perceive this bal- 
 ance: she asserted in her autobiography that she was not in love 
 
when she married; "I never have been." Her heroine, therefore, is a 
 
 virtuous maiden who sternly rebuffs any effort at flirtation. When 
 
 the man whom she eventually marries dares to suggest that they 
 
 might "bill and coo,' both the violence of her reaction and the 
 
 pointed comparison with Gwen are significant: 
 
 If she could have boxed his ears it would have relieved her feelings. As it 
 was she raced up-stairs in a fury without vouchsafing one word of resent- 
 ment, and paced up and down her tiny room with flaming cheeks. . . .Of 
 course Gwen Boynton would have laughed easily — would not have 
 minded perhaps; but then Gwen was charming; everything apparently 
 that a woman ought to be. 
 
 If Gwen is the devious woman. Rose remains the sexless girl. 
 Even after she marries and becomes pregnant, her husband is driven 
 to timorous complaint: "he would enter a feeble protest against her 
 lack of sentiment." 
 
 Writing a few years later, Maud Diver defended the memsahib in 
 a work of non-fiction and idealized her in novels. Her collection of 
 articles, The Englishwoman in India (1909), contains an odd melange 
 of opinions. KipUng "presents one side of the picture only" — but 
 "Kipling has sketched her ["the Anglo-Indian woman"] with inimita- 
 ble skill and truth." Diver's apparent purpose is to make her English 
 readers feel more charitable towards their Anglo-Indian kinswomen: 
 "India's heroines and martyrs far outnumber her social sinners," she 
 claims; "the random assertion that the tone of social morality is lower 
 in India than in England, is unjust and untrue." Yet she goes on to 
 concede that "'the Simla woman' is [her emphasis] frivolous and free 
 and easy in both mind and manners." 
 
 Diver is consistent in illustrating the view that "India tests a wom- 
 an's character to the uttermost." As her contribution to the victim 
 theory, she finds an astonishing range of dangers and temptations 
 lurking to undermine the hapless memsahib. The climate is blamed 
 for "restlessness and irritability" (the same symptoms Helen Browne 
 of Duncan's Memsahib exhibits; cf. p. 308). In the plains, the heroic 
 memsahib suffers from intolerable heat; in the hills, the frivolous 
 memsahib may be undone by "amateur theatricals and the military 
 man on leave." The fresh young miss has too many dances to attend; 
 the wife is compelled to choose between her husband in India and 
 her children sent back "home." The latter situation was a genuine 
 tragedy for many, but one cannot always share Diver's abundant 
 compassion for young women who are "borne along this strange, 
 
swift stream of life, unthinking," because a cruel fate dictates that 
 "save for arranging a wealth of cut flowers, laid to her hand by the 
 faithful mali, an Anglo-Indian girl's domestic duties are practically 
 nil." 
 
 In her massive novel Desmond's Daughter (1916), Diver, like Steel, 
 devises a structural contrast between two women, though in this case 
 the opposition is between two types of virtue rather than between 
 virtue and vice. Whereas Gwen Boynton lured men to destruction, 
 Thea Desmond, a general's daughter, takes the reluctant clay of a 
 junior officer and shapes him into a true soldier: "for me, myself, 
 the word soldier is the greatest word in the language," she informs 
 him. "All the vitality and joy in life radiated from her like an aura," 
 whereas Phyllis Eden, married to a gambler and consequently sub- 
 ject to a heart condition and pathetic swoons, is a sad example of the 
 effects produced by "marriage and its peculiar difficulties under In- 
 dian conditions.'' 
 
 Whether sinners or saviours, all of the fictional memsahibs imag- 
 ined by Duncan's contemporaries have in common their transcend- 
 ence of the boundaries set by mediocre standards of behaviour. 
 More than forty years after Duncan's arrival, Hilda Hamar, the spir- 
 ited heroine of Edward Thompson's A Farewell to India (1936) still 
 derives her interest as a character from her conscious unconvention- 
 ality, her determination "not to sink into the station lady." 
 
 It was therefore in defiance of fictional convention that Sara 
 Jeannette Duncan, rarely a conformist herself, made a highly con- 
 ventional woman the central figure of The Simple Adventures of a 
 Memsahib. Duncan no doubt had her contemporaries' emphasis on 
 the exotic in mind when she gave the narrator a defence of the pro- 
 tagonist's lack of individuality: "I have not known the present Mrs. 
 Browne to be dull, even at the close of a protracted round of Indian 
 social gaieties; but you must not expect her to be original"(26). 
 
 2. 
 
 By the time Helen Browne's modest adventures appeared in 
 print, Sara Jeannette Duncan herself was a memsahib of less than 
 three years' standing. She married Everard Cotes in Calcutta on De- 
 cember 6, 1890; her wedding, unlike Helen Browne's, was not at the 
 Cathedral. 
 
 As the wife of a civil servant (Cotes at the time was Deputy Su- 
 perintendent of the Indian Museum), Duncan was well placed to ob- 
 
serve the system whereby "Government affixes a tag to each man's 
 work"(130). In the one known interview Duncan gave, she acknowl- 
 edged that many of the details of the Brownes' imaginary existence 
 were based on the circumstances of the Cotes's domestic life: 
 
 "It was certainly our own house," Mrs. Cotes replied, "and the neigh- 
 bours, yes — you remember I talked no scandal about them! — and the 
 garden was like ours as nearly as I could describe it. . . ." 
 "Indeed! And the social and domestic experiences?" 
 "They were just what happen to everybody, modified to suit Mr. and 
 Mrs. Browne." (.The Idler, August 1895) 
 
 As a vehicle to depict what happens to everybody, there could be 
 no better choice than Helen Browne. Duncan uses Helen, however, 
 not just as a focal point for social observation, but also as the instru- 
 ment by which to probe the psychological consequences attendant 
 upon being Anglo-Indian. 
 
 Duncan brought to this ambitious theme the better part of a dec- 
 ade's training as a journalist, and a Canadian perspective which gave 
 her sympathy with the Imperial purpose and yet amused detach- 
 ment towards the British character. Her writing career was given its 
 first impetus when she reported on the New Orleans' Fair of 
 1884-85 for the Toronto Globe and other newspapers. After work for 
 the Washington Post, The Globe again, the Montreal Star, and a promi- 
 nent Canadian literary journal, The Week, she topped her previous 
 journalistic wanderings with a round-the-world trip which brought 
 her to Calcutta, as a tourist, towards the end of February, 1889. 
 
 Duncan's North American journalism anticipated many of the 
 features oi Memsahib — an interest in social types and social generali- 
 zations, an attraction towards economical comic sketches, a tendency 
 to combine symbolism and moral reflection. Her analyses of the so- 
 cial systems of New Orleans, Washington, Toronto and Ottawa (arti- 
 cles reproduced in the Tecumseh Press edition, Sara Jeannette Duncan: 
 Selected Journalism) show that Duncan had both the inclination and 
 the opportunity to develop her powers as a student of cities and civic 
 habits long before she reached Calcutta. She unlocks the key to the 
 "visiting code" in Washington as well as in Calcutta (cf. pp. 104-06 of 
 the novel). The gradations of the Governor-General's favour are ex- 
 amined in Ottawa, just as the Private Entree and other evidences of 
 the official pecking order are explored in the account of the Vicere- 
 gal Drawing Room (pp. 119-30). In a November, 1886 column re- 
 produced in the Tecumseh edition, a "plain Mrs. Brown" expounds 
 
tne toibles ot one afternoon's callers; in Chapter X of the novel, 
 Helen Browne is called upon to carry out exactly the same fictional 
 device. The Anglo-Indian situation results in a somewhat altered at- 
 mosphere, but the underlying character types are quite similar. 
 
 Duncan made the crucial transition from being a writer of news- 
 paper essays to being a writer of books when she re-cast a lengthy se- 
 quence of articles and thereby produced A Social Departure (1890), a 
 lively narrative of her 1888-89 expedition. Though it has a fictional 
 element, A Social Departure has as many affinities with the journalism 
 that precedes it as with the fiction that follows. Impressions of India 
 occupy one-third of the text, but the India Duncan shows the reader 
 in her travel book is very different from the India of Memsahib. 
 
 Essentially, the Indian section of A Social Departure blends, not al- 
 ways smoothly, two ingredients: the world of the tourist which Helen 
 Browne, as a permanent resident, never experiences, and the back- 
 ground of the native culture which Helen never troubles to investi- 
 gate. The narrator of the first book spends part of her time chatter- 
 ing gaily about boarding-houses and sight-seeing attractions, but she 
 also displays a reflective, inquiring mind when she talks to an Angli- 
 cized Hindu barrister, or observes Parsee funeral towers. 
 
 Duncan had come to India from Japan, where she and her trav- 
 elling companion had shunned the Tokyo district set aside for for- 
 eigners, choosing instead to fend entirely for themselves. Such an op- 
 tion was simply not possible in India, as Duncan ruefully senses from 
 the start: 
 
 We had arrived at the dignity of memsahibs. We felt this dignity the mo- 
 ment we walked across the gangway and stepped upon India — an odd 
 slight conscious uplifting of the head and decision of the foot — the first 
 touch of Anglo-Indianism. 
 
 Already Duncan had come to feel that to be a memsahib was to 
 
 undergo an inevitable coarsening of character. The critical attitude 
 
 Duncan here displays towards Anglo-Indian imperiousness is not 
 
 consistently sustained as the section on India proceeds, but neither is 
 
 it dropped completely. The few passages that comment directly upon 
 
 the women of Anglo-India carry opposite implications. Overawed by 
 
 the glamour of a viceregal evening party, the narrator pays tribute 
 
 to the graces of the memsahib: 
 
 Very charmingly indeed do the Anglo-Indian ladies costume themselves, 
 and neither in their clothes nor in their curtseys does one find the stiff- 
 ness — now the saints give me couragel, — that is occasionally laid to the 
 charge of British femininity. 
 
Yet a sea voyage from Calcutta to Madras prompts a less respect- 
 ful response. The narrator, acting as a "feminine democrat," does 
 not allow a general's wife to claim precedence in the bathroom 
 queue. She also notes that a Mrs. Hauksbee type, known on board 
 ship as "the Scandal," instantly ceases to be a pariah when it turns 
 out that she is a friend of the Honourable Mrs. Fitzomnipo of 
 Grosvenor Square. 
 
 The years changed Duncan from a tourist into a Canadian exile 
 living among British exiles, but they did not change the divided view 
 she took of Anglo-Indian society. Her ambivalence is captured in an- 
 other paragraph of the interview already quoted; 
 
 "Society is delightful in its own way. It is a very individual way, always 
 pictorial, sometimes brilliant, absolutely free from little local prejudices. 
 That, of course, you would guess — men can't do Imperial work with 
 municipal minds. There are things that are missing. We are almost too 
 uniform in our originality, if I may put it absurdly; which is doubtless the 
 fault of the competitive examination. And society has no fringe, no bor- 
 derland, no mystery, almost no privacy. Also, the arts are absent. And 
 when you think how far we are from Piccadilly!" 
 
 The praise of the first two sentences modulates into some funda- 
 mental criticisms by the end, and if "we" suggests identification with 
 Anglo-India, "the arts are absent" (a phrase Duncan was to repeat in 
 two novels, one about Calcutta, the other about Canada) implies a 
 lamentable situation for the artist. 
 
 In the quoted passage, Duncan's subject seems to be the middle- 
 class males who prepared for Imperial work by taking the controver- 
 sial Indian Civil Service examinations. Her pointed response to a 
 question on the merits of living in Calcutta shows, however, that she 
 has not forgotten that she is a memsahib, not a bureaucrat: 
 
 "On the whole, is it a good place to live in, Calcutta?" 
 "It is a good place to write in. There is sb much time. Life is one long 
 holiday — I speak as a Mem Sahib, of course, not as a collector [official 
 in charge of a district]. One's housekeeping is done in a quarter of an 
 hour in the morning. . ." 
 
 3. 
 Despite its title. The Simple Adventures of a Memsahib is a tale of 
 two memsahibs, not one. Like Kipling, Steel and Diver, Duncan cre- 
 ates fictional unity out of a contrast between female temperaments. 
 The opposition between the innocent young memsahib and the so- 
 phisticated middle-aged memsahib who observes her enables 
 Duncan to analyze Anglo-Indian life with both delicacy and penetra- 
 tion. 
 
As Helen Browne's sharp-eyed ayah [maid] observes, the mistress 
 is but a "chota memsahib," a memsahib of low degree. Helen is no 
 more distinguished in intellectual ability or moral character than she 
 is in social prestige. Yet if "she is not clever" (307), neither is she con- 
 spicuously, dull-witted; if she is not blessed with extraordinary sensi- 
 tivity, neither is she obnoxious. She was, is, and will be "a nice little 
 woman'' (307), and she has the good fortune to be married to a man 
 who is her exact match in every respect. 
 
 Her character of stunning normality allows Helen to serve' as 
 Duncan's litmus-paper for Anglo-Indian society. Before she even 
 lands in India, she is exposed to a range of representative figures on 
 board that nautical extension of the Raj, the P&O liner. As a conven- 
 tional English girl, she is bemused by her socialite chaperon, shocked 
 by the flirtation married memsahibs regard as their due, and disin- 
 clined to share the religiosity of her missionary room-mate. 
 
 Once in Calcutta, Helen soon passes from the "special raptures, 
 which she has since outgrown" (36; Duncan is perhaps thinking of 
 the enthusiasm she herself recorded in A Social Departure) to the two 
 quintessential memsahib experiences: bossing servants and enter- 
 taining one's peers. Her modest adventures in establishing two 
 Calcutta households form the core of the book, while two excursions, 
 one in quest of rising ground and purer air, the other a more sub- 
 lime experience in the Himalayas, permit the Brownes to escape the 
 city, but not to abandon Anglo-Indian ways. 
 
 The course of Helen's seemingly uneventful passage from inge- 
 nue to memsahib is marked by a variety of symbolic incidents. On a 
 honeymoon designed to avoid the rest of humanity, Helen is in- 
 trigued to discover fellow tourists and fascinated by the delights of 
 the box- wallah: her eagerness to mix with her peers and negotiate 
 with her underlings provides a clear indication that she is tempera- 
 mentally well-equipped for the life of a memsahib. Yet the wedding 
 cake a few pages earlier which "has not carried well" (37) and needs 
 to be replaced by a local creation is very tangible evidence of the sad 
 truth, reiterated throughout the novel, that to be a citizen of Anglo- 
 India is to estrange oneself from England. The brilliantly evoked ep- 
 isode of the smoky kerosene stove is a poignant reminder of the ob- 
 stacles inherent in seeking to create a substitute England in an 
 ill-suited land. 
 
The extended section devoted to the establishment of the 
 Brownes' first household is rich in implication. The conditions of do- 
 mestic life in the Calcutta of the early 1890s are thoroughly docu- 
 mented, but the fundamental subject is not so much the appropriate 
 wages to be bestowed upon a bawarachi or kitmungur as it is the na- 
 ture of the master-servant social contract. George's lengthy lecture to 
 his wife about the exotic vices and virtues of Indian servants is itself 
 an unconscious revelation of the mixed character of Anglo-Indians, 
 as displayed when they exercised command over lesser breeds. He is 
 not unkind (he has "licked" a servant only once), has some measure 
 of tolerance for unfamiliar customs, values desirable character traits, 
 such as integrity, when he can recognize them, and attempts to be 
 fair. On the other hand, he is incurious about both native language 
 and tradition (apart from a few phrases and cliches) and his autocra- 
 tic or coarse manner is often the outward manifestation of a con- 
 scious assumption of superiority. 
 
 As an apprentice memsahib, Helen Jearns some significant les- 
 sons fixjm her husband's indoctrination, her peers' advice, and her 
 servants' participation in the system. She drops her noble resolve to 
 learn Hindi, and schools herself instead in the guile required to in- 
 spect servants' accounts satisfactorily. At the end of the novel, she 
 has qualified to be a mature memsahib by growing insensitive to the 
 charms of India and by acquiring "for the Aryan inhabitant a cer- 
 tain strong irritation" (310). The most telling passage about the sta- 
 tus of memsahibs in the hierarchy of the Raj emerges out of Helen's 
 first confrontation with the cook: 
 
 Helen found herself confronted with her little domestic corner of the 
 great problem of India — the natives' "way." But she had not language 
 with which to circumvent it or remonstrate with it. She could only decide 
 that Kali Bagh was an eminently proper subject for discipline, and re- 
 solve to tell George, which was not much of an expedient. It is exactly 
 what we all do in India, however, under the circumstances. We tell our 
 superior officers, vmtil at last the Queen Emperor is told. . . .(86) 
 
 A passage like this lends support to those commentators who 
 found the memsahib's position a pitiable one. Unwilling or unable to 
 understand her inferiors, she is compelled to look upon her husband 
 as a higher being. If Kali Bagh is intractable, George is almost as pa- 
 tronizing to her as to his servants. When a choice has to be made be- 
 tween his favourite servant and hers, he makes a gesture towards 
 consultation, but it is his view of the case that prevails. 
 
The novel moves from this establishment of domestic discipline 
 to a central section (pp. 104-55) which takes as its principal subject 
 Helen's dealings with her peers and betters. Then, after a chapter 
 on natives as neighbours, the Anglo-Indian world is further defined 
 through the perspective of an unwelcome outsider, the globe-trotter 
 Batcham. The three social gatherings preceding Mr. Batcham's ap- 
 pearance — Helen Browne at Home, the Viceregal Drawing Room 
 and Mr. Sayter's dinner party — each serve to underline the princi- 
 ple of the Imperial Tag (131), the punctilious classifying of human- 
 ity to which theoBritish in India were addicted. Helen's visitors at 
 least reveal that memsahibs are not all alike: the reader, like Helen 
 herself, is led to wonder whether Mrs. Toote's distinction between 
 the frivolous and the unfrivolous is universally applicable. Mrs. 
 Toote herself, a woman who has intellectual pretensions but flirts in 
 a highly Kiplingesque manner, is not easy to fit into her own system. 
 Yet the counsel Helen receives from her callers — whether it is to 
 play golf, sign a Government House register or "take up something" 
 (117) philanthropic, is intended to draw her into the circle of Anglo- 
 Indian conventions, as each visitor interprets them. 
 
 It is the Kipling model of the memsahib that Mr. Batcham sus- 
 pects of lurking everywhere in Calcutta, much to George Browne's 
 amusement and then annoyance. Mr. Batcham's single-minded view 
 of the memsahib is one indication of the ignorance and insensitivity 
 Duncan rather heavy-handedly ascribes to the globe-trotter; in com- 
 bining criticism of British habits in India with a stern repudiation of 
 the outsider's reproaches, Duncan places herself in the company of 
 many Anglo-Indian writers, including Kipling himself, whose "Bal- 
 lad of Paget, M.P." is mentioned on p. 147 of Memsahib. 
 
 The narrator mocks Mr. Batcham's exaggerated view of "the 
 glaring facts" of memsahib immorality; nevertheless, the incident 
 which follows immediately upon the parliamentarian's unlamented 
 departure seems, curiously enough, to give credence to his suspi- 
 cions. Anglo-Saxon reserve seems about to melt into blissful intimacy 
 when the Brownes move in with the Lovitts, but Helen's well- 
 intentioned efforts to promote a match between Jack Lovitt's sister 
 and Jimmy Forbes, Mrs. Lovitt's cavaliere-servente, are not well re- 
 ceived. Duncan does not, it is true, attribute sexual misconduct to 
 Mrs. Lovitt, but her jealous hold over Jimmy, for all its Platonism, is 
 worthy of Kipling's Mrs. Reiver. If Anglo-Indian women are not all 
 dangerous flirts, Duncan seems to be saying, neither is that sub- 
 
species totally extinct. Defenceless males need to flee the "occasional 
 all-conquering lady" who has "a speciality in the souls of men" (308). 
 
 Even virtuous Helen Browne, in a less sinister way, has founded 
 "an empire among her husband's bachelor friends, to whom she will 
 continue to give gracious little orders for ten years yet" (308). This is 
 one of the defining attributes she has acquired since, in the words of 
 the same paragraph, she "has become a memsahib, graduated, quali- 
 fied, sophisticated." If, through her intrinsic sweetness of character, 
 Helen may "avoid the graver perils of memsahibship" (307), she has 
 nevertheless, according to the narrator, deteriorated in no less than 
 nine respects, ranging from increasing nervousness to diminished in- 
 terest in the outside world, simply because she is a fully-fledged 
 memsahib. The concluding pages of the novel, like all that has gone 
 before, render a judgment upon, not just Helen Browne, but upon 
 "memsahibship" in general. Duncan seems to be in sympathy with 
 those observers who lament the sadness of the memsahibs' fate, but 
 she does not allow sentimentality to replace a shrewd awareness of 
 the deficiencies and limitations of the social system the memsahibs 
 themselves so largely created. 
 
 Pity and ironic dismissal are brilliantly fused in Mrs. Macintyre's 
 marine metaphor describing the irresistable pull of Anglo-Indian so- 
 cial pressure upon her unremarkable protegee: "It was a very little 
 splash that submerged Mrs. Browne in Anglo-India, and there is no 
 longer a ripple to tell about it" (310). Mrs. Macintyre herself is 
 shown emerging from the experience of the Raj at the novel's con- 
 clusion, while Helen sinks into it. The Macintyres' retirement to 
 England means that "our story [finds] its end in the beginning of 
 theirs" (307). It has been Mrs. Macintyre's purpose in the preceding 
 narrative to read "the first pages of the Anglo-Indian book again 
 with those young eyes of hers" (307) — yet not simply to reveal an- 
 other person's point of view, but also to provide the reader with the 
 benefit of her own commentary, which has "re-written and inter- 
 leaved" what, left to Helen's own powers of interpretation, would 
 have been a simple tale indeed. 
 
 Mrs. Macintyre disingenuously asserts that "it is not essential to 
 the progress of this narrative that you should be allowed to gather 
 from my conversation the sort of person I am" (118). She is not 
 named until p. 105, but the few autobiographical details she lets slip, 
 combined with the dry irony of her narration, do disclose a person- 
 ality very artfully designed to place Helen in perspective. Mrs. 
 
Macintyre has remained an outsider in spirit despite decades of resi- 
 dence in a society she says is "inclined to be intellectually limp" (50). 
 English flowers, she witheringly remarks, "preserve the remnant of 
 grace which is left in the Anglo-Indian soul" (166). Her acerbic de- 
 scription of the self-importance that descends upon the wives of 
 higher officials ends with a note of chilly condescension: "it is diffi- 
 cult to understand how, in spite of all this, she can be as charming as 
 she occasionally [emphasis mine] is" (134). Envy plays its part in this 
 evaluation, since Mrs. Macintyre has not been granted the honour of 
 being received at the Private Entree of Viceregal Drawing Rooms 
 (124), though, somewhat curiously, she is invited to viceregal dinner 
 parties (125). 
 
 Yet Mrs. Macintyre's criticisms of Anglo-India do not prevent 
 her from having moods of allegiance to the prevailing social order. I 
 have already referred to her contempt for Mr. Batcham, the visiting 
 parliamentarian; less abrasive and more persuasive to the present- 
 day reader are the three extended passages (129; 254-59; 310-11) in 
 which Mrs. Macintyre laments the obliteration that faces individuals 
 briefly whirled along the "current of British life in India," observes 
 the "general depression" that surrounds the ritual band concerts, 
 and gives as a final judgment the grim conclusion that "Anglo- 
 Indian tissues, material and spiritual, are apt to turn in twenty-two 
 years to a substance somewhat resembling cork." Though self-pitying 
 assessments of the community life were common in Anglo-Indian 
 fiction (one critic, Susanna Howe, says "novels about India are 
 among the unhappiest in the language"), Duncan gives these plaints 
 an unusual dignity and poignancy. 
 
 Duncan resembled Helen Browne in being a comparatively re- 
 cent arrival in India at the time she wrote Memsahib; however, the 
 author's verdict on Helen — "a nice little woman" — could not con- 
 ceivably be applied to Duncan herself. Mrs. Macintyre's often caustic 
 shrewdness is much closer to Duncan's own note, and the Idler inter- 
 view reveals that the narrator's divided view of Anglo-India was very 
 much the author's viewpoint. Duncan's novels often reflect what 
 seems to be her amused detachment from the societies she describes; 
 on the other hand, in this instance her own situation as a memsahib 
 results in passages that shiver with what appear to be personal fore- 
 bodings about the memsahib's tragic destiny. 
 
4. • 
 
 In the eight subsequent books Duncan wrote about India, she 
 created many more memsahibs. In several instances, she retained the 
 principle of contrasting heroines, but the basis of the opposition is 
 never quite the same as in Memsahib. The next significant novel. His 
 Honour, and a Lady (1896), features an independent, clever young 
 woman, witty enough to be a junior Mrs. Macintyre, juxtaposed with 
 a less spirited but more passionate creature tempted by adultery. In 
 The Path of a Star (1898), a self-consciously Bohemian actress enters 
 into an intimate friendship with a more conventional, if sensitive, so- 
 ciety girl. Duncan's final Indian novel, The Burnt Offering (1909), 
 displays a happily married memsahib (a Helen Browne type a few 
 years further on) as a foil to a feminist radical who disgraces herself 
 by attempting to marry an Indian revolutionary. In this work, 
 Duncan finally atones for the caricatures of "natives" in her previous 
 fiction by creating an Indian woman whose emotions are depicted 
 with respect. 
 
 The persevering reader will therefore find much variety in 
 Duncan's portrait gallery of memsahibs, and a continuing avoidance 
 of the stereotypes so favoured by Kipling and the other novel- 
 writing contemporaries. First editions of Duncan's Indian fiction are 
 scarce and becoming increasingly expensive, but British copyright 
 libraries have all of Duncan's work and major Canadian university 
 libraries may have either original editions or reproductions in the 
 University of Toronto Press Toronto Reprint Library series (of the 
 Indian works, The Burnt Offering and The Pool in the Desert are avail- 
 able in this format). The latter title, a collection of short stories, has 
 also been re-issued recently in the Penguin Short Fiction series. The 
 stories are uneven in quality, but the two better ones are very good 
 indeed. "A Mother in India" deals with the abandonment of chil- 
 dren, a central aspect of the Memsahib's plight, while "An Impossi- 
 ble Ideal" is a skeptical examination of Simla. "A Mother in India" 
 has also been reprinted in Rosemary Sullivan's Stories by Canadian 
 Women and in Saros Cowasjee's Stories From the Raj. Duncan's most 
 well-known and most Canadian novel. The Imperialist, is in the New 
 Canadian Library, and may soon appear in a fully annotated edi- 
 tion. 
 
 It is an inexplicable fact that Duncan's work has been neglected 
 in recent surveys of Anglo-Indian fiction and culture. Neither Allen 
 Greenberger's The British Image of India nor Benita Parry's Delusions 
 
and Discoveries, two studies specifically on the Anglo-Indian novel, 
 even mention Duncan. In her social history, Simla, Pat Barr calls 
 Memsahib "delightful," but claims it is about Simla; Charles Allen, in 
 his Raj: A Scrapbook of British India, refers to Duncan, apparently 
 without a deep pang of regret, as a "forgotten" novelist. Only Mi- 
 chael Edwardes, the prolific historian of British India, gives Duncan 
 considerable space: his Bound to Exile: the Victorians in India contains 
 a chapter on memsahibs which is mostly a paraphrase of Duncan's 
 Memsahib. 
 
 Until the past two decades, Canadian critics were equally indif- 
 ferent, but that error has now been corrected. Duncan is the subject 
 of two books (a lively biography by Marian Fowler and a critical 
 study by the present writer), and scholarly articles about her work 
 appear at an ever increasing rate. So, if there was a danger at one 
 time that her work might disappear from sight as completely as 
 Helen Browne was submerged in Anglo-India, that cruel fate has 
 now been averted. 
 
 The present edition of The Simple Adventures of a Memsahib repro- 
 duces a copy of the first American edition. This copy, owned by the 
 editor, has been compared with a copy of the first British edition 
 (London: Chatto & Windus, 1893) obtained on loan from Augusta 
 College, Georgia. The two editions contain the same number of 
 pages, but the American publication has been re-set in slightly 
 smaller type and the order of illustrations has been re-arranged. 
 The British edition must be regarded as the primary one, since 
 Duncan's correspondence reveals that she always submitted her man- 
 uscripts to English publishers in the first instance. However, differ- 
 ences between the two texts are very minor: there are a few substitu- 
 tions of individual words, none of them affecting the interpretation 
 of a single passage, and some explanatory notes are present in the 
 British, but not the American, edition (most of these are supplied in 
 the notes at the back of this text). The American edition has a cover 
 in plain green, uniform with Duncan's many other Appleton publi- 
 cations, whereas the British edition is turquoise, with more flashy 
 pseudo-Oriental lettering in the style of Duncan's other Chatto & 
 Windus titles. 
 
THH SIMPLE ADVENTURES 
 OE A MEMSAHIB 
 
 BY 
 
 SARA JHANNETTF DUNCAN 
 
 AlifHoR OF 
 A SOCIAL DITARTURC, AM AMIitlcA-J (",1KL IN LONDON ETC, 
 
 WITH ILLLSTRATIONS BY F. H. TOWNSEND 
 
 N C \V >■ O R K 
 
 U. A P P I, F T O N AND COMPANY 
 
 iSqi 
 
COPTRIQHT, 1893, 
 
 By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY. 
 
 ElXCTROTTPED AND PRINTED 
 AT THE APPLETON PrESS, U. S. A. 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PAOC 
 
 They c»rae in little straggling strings and bands Frontispiece 
 
 Cups of tea 3 
 
 Young Browne's tennis 5 
 
 Her new field of labour 15 
 
 Aunt Plovtree 19 
 
 Initial letter 24 
 
 Initial letter 49 
 
 Uncertain whether she ought to bow 57 
 
 "It's just the place for centipedes" 63 
 
 Initial letter 68 
 
 "A very worthy and hardworking sort" 79 
 
 "What is this!" said Mrs. Browne 87 
 
 Chua 94 
 
 An accident disclosed them 96 
 
 Mr. Sayter 136 
 
 Mr. Sayter gave Mrs. Browne his arm 138 
 
 Mi-s. Lovitt 151 
 
 Initial letter 156 
 
 The ladies went most securely 159 
 
 Initial letter Igg 
 
 Mr. Jonas Batcham, M. P 175 
 
 Three others much like himself 187 
 
 A sudden indisposition 191 
 
 Initial letter 193 
 
 Their hats 210 
 
 Initial letter 214 
 
iv LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PAOS 
 
 "Halma" 222 
 
 Miss Josephine Lovitt 225 
 
 Initial 234 
 
 Mr. Week slept on a bench 243 
 
 He stood upon one leg 252 
 
 Initial 260 
 
 Initial .... 278 
 
 He asked nothing of the Brownes 282 
 
 The snows 291 
 
 "Liver complications — we all come to if 297 
 
 She has fallen into a way of crossing her knees in a low chair . 309 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF 
 A MEMS AH IB. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 TTELEN FRANCES BROWXE was formerly a Miss 
 -* — ^ Peachey. Xot one of the Deronsliire Peacheys — they 
 are quite a different family. This Miss Peachey's father was a 
 clergyman, who folded his flock and his family in the town of 
 Canbury in Yrilts, very nice people and well thought of, with 
 nice, well-thought-of connections, but nothing particularly aristo- 
 cratic amongst them, like the Devonshire Peacheys, and no beer. 
 The former Miss Peachey is now a memsahib of Lower Ben- 
 gal. As you probably know, one is not born a memsahib ; the 
 dignity is arrived at later, through circumstances, processes, and 
 sometimes through foresight on the part of one's mamma. It is 
 not so easy to obtain as it used to be. Formerly it was a mere 
 question of facilities for transportation, and the whole matter 
 ■was arranged, obviously and without criticism, by the operation 
 of the law of supply. The necessary six months' tossing fortune 
 in a .=aiiing ship made young ladies who were willing to under- 
 take it scarce and valuable, we hear. We are even given to un- 
 derstand that the unclaimed remnant, the few standing over to 
 be more deliberately acquired, after the ball given on board for 
 the facilitation of these matters the night succeeding the ship's 
 
2 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAN IB. 
 
 arrival in port, were held to have fallen short of what they rea- 
 sonably might have expected. But that was fifty years ago. 
 To-day Lower Bengal, in the cold weather, is gay with potential 
 memsahibs of all degrees of attraction, in raiment fresh from 
 Oxford Street, in high spirits, in excellent form for tennis, danc- 
 ing, riding, and full of a charmed appreciation of the " pictur- 
 esqueness " of India. 
 
 They come from the East and from the West, and from school 
 in Germany. They come to make the acquaintance of their 
 Anglo-Indian fathers and mothers, to teach the Bible and plain 
 sewing in the Zenanas, to stay with a married sister, to keep 
 house for a brother who is in the Department of Police. In the 
 hot weather a proportion migrate northward, to Darjeeling, or 
 Simla, in the Hills, but there are enough in our midst all the 
 year round to produce a certain coy hesitancy and dalliance on the 
 part of pretending bachelors, augmented by the consideration of 
 all that might be done in England in three months' " Privilege " 
 leave. Young Browne was an example of this. There was no 
 doubt that young Browne was tremendously attracted by Miss 
 Pellington — Pellington, Scott & Co., rice and coolies chiefly, a 
 very old firm — down from the Hills for her second cold weather, 
 and only beginning to be faintly spoilt, when it so happened 
 that his furlough fell due. He had fully intended to " do Swit- 
 zerland this time," but Canbury, with tennis every Wednesday 
 afternoon at the Rectory, and Helen Peachey playing there in 
 blue and white striped flannel, pink cheeks and a sailor hat, 
 was so much more interesting than he had expected it to be, 
 that Switzerland was gradually relegated five years into the 
 future. After tennis there was always tea in the drawing-room, 
 and Helen, in the pretty flush of her exertions, poured it out. 
 Just at first, young Browne did not quite know which he ap- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OE A MEMSAIfrB. ■, 
 
 preciated most, Helen who poured it out, or the neat little maid 
 in cap and apron who brought it in — it was so long since he had 
 seen tea brought in by anything feminine in cap and apron ; but 
 
 
 GOT MIDDLE-AGED LADIES OF WILTSHIRE CUPS OF TEA. 
 
 after a bit the little maid sank to her proper status of considera- 
 tion, and Helen was left supreme. And Helen Peachey's tennis, 
 for grace and muscularity, was certainly a thing to see, young 
 
4 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 Browne thought. She played in tournaments while he stood by 
 in immaculate whites with an idle racquet, and got middle-aged 
 ladies of Wiltshire cups of tea ; but she was not puffed up about 
 this, and often condescended to be his partner on the Rectory 
 lawn against the two younger Misses Peachey. It made the 
 best sett that way, for young Browne's tennis fluctuated from 
 indifferent bad to indifferent worse, and the younger Misses 
 Peachey were vigorous creatures, and gave Helen all she could 
 do to win with her handicap. 
 
 Mr. Browne — we must really get into the way of giving him 
 his title — was not naturally prone to depression, rather the re- 
 verse ; but when the two Misses Peachey came off victorious he 
 used to be quite uncomfortably gloomy for a time. Once I 
 know, when he had remarked apologetically to Helen that he, 
 hoped she would have a better partner next time, and she ab- 
 sent-mindedly returned, " I hope so indeed ! " his spirits went 
 down with a run and did not rise again until somebody who 
 overheard, chaffed Helen about her blunder and produced gentle 
 consternation and a melting appeal for pardon. That was at a 
 very advanced stage of these young people's relations, long after 
 everybody but themselves knew exactly what would happen, and 
 what did happen in the course of another week. It was a 
 triviality, it would have had no place in our consideration of 
 the affairs of a young man and woman who fell in love accord- 
 ing to approved analytical methods, with subtle silent scruples 
 and mysterious misunderstandings, in the modern way. I intro- 
 duce it on its merits as a triviality, to indicate that George Wil- 
 liam Browne and Helen Frances Peachey arrived at a point 
 where thoy considered themselves indispensable to each other 
 in the most natural, simple, and unimpeded manner. I will go 
 so far as to say tliat if Helen had not been there — if she had 
 
THE Sr.'ifPLE AnVF.NTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 
 YOUNG Browne's tennis fluctuated from indifferent bad to 
 
 INDIFFERENT WORSE. 
 
 spent the summer with an aunt in Hampshire, as was at one 
 time contemplated — one of the other Misses I'eachey might have 
 
6 Till-: SIMPLK ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 inspired this chronicle. But that is risking a good deal, I know, 
 at the hands of the critics, and especially perhaps at Helen's. 
 After all, what I want to state is merely the felicitous engage- 
 ment, in Jnly of a recent year, of Mr. Browne and Miss Peachey. 
 'J"'wo tender months later, Mr. Browne sailed for India again, 
 with a joyful conviction that he had done well to come home, 
 that somewhat modified his natural grief. Helen remained be- 
 hind for various reasons, chiefly connected with the financial 
 future of the Browne family, and the small part of Calcutta 
 interested in young Browne found occupation for a few days in 
 wondering what Miss Pellington would have said if he had pro- 
 posed to her. There was no doubt as to the point that he did 
 not. Calcutta is always accurately informed upon such matters. 
 The dreary waste of a year and four thousand miles that lay 
 between Miss Peachey and the state of memsahibship was re- 
 lieved and made interesting in the usual way by the whole 
 Peachey family. You know what I mean, perhaps, without 
 details. Miss Kitty Peachey " etched " Kate Greenway figures 
 on the corners of table napkins, Miss Julia Peachey wrought the 
 monogram P. M. in the centre of pillQW-shams with many frills, 
 their Aunt Plovtree, widow of a prominent physician of Can- 
 bury, at once " gave up her time " to the adornment of Helen's 
 future drawing-room in Kensington stitch, and Mrs. Peachey 
 spent many hours of hers in the composition of letters to people 
 like John Noble, holding general councils over the packets of 
 patterns that came by return of post. Mrs. Peachey was much 
 occxipied also in receiving the condolences of friends upon so 
 complete a separation from her daughter, but I am bound to say 
 that she accepted them with a fair show of cheerfulness. Mrs. 
 Peachey declared that she would wait until the time came before 
 she worried. As to both the wild animals and the climate she 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 7 
 
 understood that they were very much exaggerated, and, indeed, 
 on account of Helen's weak throat, she was quite in hopes the 
 heat might benefit her. And really nowadays, India wasn't so 
 very far away after all, was it ? It was difficult, however, even 
 with arguments like these, to reconcile the Canbury ladies to the 
 hardship of Helen's fate, especially those with daughters of their 
 own who had escaped it. Helen listened to the condolences with 
 bright eyes and a spot of pink on each cheek. They brought her 
 tender pangs sometimes, but, speaking generally, I am afraid she 
 liked them. 
 
 In six months it was positively time to begin to see about the 
 trousseau, because, as Mrs. Plovtree very justly remarked, it was 
 not like getting the child ready to be married in England, where 
 one woBld know from a pinior a button exactly what she wanted; 
 in the case of Indian trousseaux everything had to be thought 
 out and considered and time allowed to get proper advice in. 
 For instance, there was that very thing they were talking about 
 yesterday — that idea of getting Jaeger all through for Helen. 
 It seemed advisable, but who knew definitely whether it was ! 
 And if there loas an unsatisfactory thing in Mrs. Plovtree's 
 opinion it was putting ofE anything whatever, not to speak of an 
 important matter like this, till the last moment. 
 
 The event redounded to the wisdom of Mrs. Plovtree, as 
 events usually did. It took the Peachey family quite six months 
 to collect reliable information and construct a trousseau for 
 Helen out of it; six months indeed, as Mrs. Peachey said, seemed 
 too little to give to it. They collected a great deal of informa- 
 tion. Mrs. Peachey wrote to everybody she knew who had ever 
 been in India or had relations there, and so did several friends of 
 the Peacheys, and the results could not have been more gratify- 
 ing either in bulk or in variety. As their Aunt Plovtree said, 
 
8 TJfE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 they really could not have asked for more, indeed they would 
 have had less difficulty in making up their minds without quite 
 so much. " Do be advised," one lady wrote, with impressive un- 
 derlinings, "and let her take as little as she c^n possibly do with. 
 It is impossible to keep good dresses in India, the climate is 
 simple ruination to them. I shall never forget the first year of 
 my married life on that account. It was a heart-breaking ex- 
 perience, and I do hope that Helen may avoid it. Besides, the 
 durzies, the native dressmakers, will copy anything, and do it 
 wonderfully well, at about a fifth of the price one pays at home." 
 Which read very convincingly. By the same post a second 
 cousin of Mrs. Plovtree's wrote, " If you ask me, I should say 
 make a special point of having everything in reasonable abun- 
 dance. The European shops ask frightful prices, the natives 
 are always unsatisfactory, and your niece will find it very incon- 
 venient to send to England for things. My plan was to buy as 
 little as possible in India, and lay in supplies when we came 
 home on leave ! " 
 
 " In the face of that," said Mrs. Plovtree, " what are we to 
 do?" 
 
 Ladies wrote that Helen would require as warm a ward- 
 robe as in England; the cold might not be so great but she 
 would " feel it more." She must take her furs, by all means. 
 They wrote also that when they were in India, they wore noth- 
 ing more substantial than nun's veiling, and a light jacket the 
 year round. They gave her intense directions about her shoes 
 and slippers — it was impossible to get nice ones in India — they 
 were made very well and cheaply in the " China bazar " — they 
 lasted for ever if one took care of them — they were instantly 
 destroyed by mould and cockroaches when "the rains" came 
 on. She would require a size larger than usual, on account of 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. g 
 
 the heat ; she must remember to take a size smaller because she 
 would use her feet so little that they would decrease somewhat, 
 everybody's did. She must bear one thing in mind, they were 
 quite two years behind the fashion in India, so that it would be 
 advisable to date her garments back a little, not to be remark- 
 able. In another opinion there was this advantage, that in tak- 
 ing a fashionable trousseau to India, one could rely upon its 
 being the correct thing for at least two years. The directions in 
 flannel, and cotton, and linen, were too complicated for precise 
 detail, but they left equal freedom of choice. And choice was 
 diflBcult, because these ladies were all ex-memsahibs, retired 
 after fifteen, twenty, or twenty-five years' honourable service, all 
 equally qualified to warn and to instruct, and equally anxious to 
 do it. They had lived in somewhat different localities in India, 
 ranging from seven to seven thousand feet above the level of the 
 sea, in the Northwest provinces, in the Punjaub, in Southern 
 India, in Beluchistan, and none of them had spent more than an 
 occasional " cold weather " in Calcutta, but this triviality escaped 
 the attention of the Peachey family, in dealing with the matter. 
 India, to their imagination, was incapable of subdivision, a vast 
 sandy area filled with heathen and fringed with cocoanut trees, 
 which drew a great many young Englishmen away from their 
 homes and their families for some occult purpose connected with 
 drawing pay in rupees. So the Peacheys put these discrepancies 
 down to the fact that people had such different ideas, and pro- 
 ceeded to arrange Helen's trousseau upon a modification of all 
 of them. When this was quite done Mrs. Plovtree remarked 
 with some surprise that with the addition of a few muslin frocks, 
 the child had been fitted out almost exactly &k if she were going 
 to live in England. There was the wedding dress, which she 
 might or might not wear upon the occasion, it would be indis- 
 
lO THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 pensable a/^erwards ; there was the travelling dress chosen pri- 
 marily not to " take the dust " and secondarily not to show it ; 
 two or three gowns of incipient dignity for dinner parties ; two 
 or three more of airier sorts for balls — but at this point I must 
 refer you to the ladies' papers. Turn over a few of their pages 
 and you will see Helen's trousseau illustrated with skill and 
 imagination, but with trains, I am bound to add, more prehen- 
 sile than Helen ever wore, the habit of the Peachey family 
 being to follow the fashions at a safe and unaggressive distance. 
 Among the photographs of the brides which accompany you 
 may even find one fairly like Helen. These young ladies have 
 always struck me as bearing a charmingly subdued resemblance 
 to one another, probably induced by the similarly trying condi- 
 tions under which their portraits are published. And certainly 
 in the lists of presents appended you will find many, if not all 
 of those that the Rev. Peachey packed with his own clerical 
 hands in large wooden boxes, for consignment to the P. and 0., 
 indeed I fancy a discriminating inspection of the advertisements 
 would reveal most of them. As the Rev. Peachey himself would 
 say, I need not go into that. 
 
 Helen was the first bride that Canbury had contributed to 
 India, in the social memory. Two or three young men had 
 gone forth to be brokers' assistants or civil servants or bank 
 clerks, and an odd red-coat turned up periodically in the lower 
 stratum of society on furlough, bringing many-armed red and 
 yellow idols to its female relatives; but Canbury had no femi- 
 nine connections with India, the only sort which are really 
 binding. Helen's engagement had an extrinsic interest there- 
 fore, as well as the usual kind, and Canbury made the most of 
 it. There was the deplorable fact, to begin with, that she could 
 not be married at home. Canbury gave a dubious assent to its 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. \\ 
 
 necessity ; everybody had a dim understanding of the exigencies 
 of " leave," and knew the theory that such departures from tlie 
 orthodox and usual form of matrimonial proceeding were com- 
 mon and unavoidable. Yet in its heart and out of the Peachey 
 and Plovtree earshot, Canbury firmly dissented, not without 
 criticism. Would anybody tell it wliy they had not gone out 
 together last year 'i On the face of it, there could be no ques- 
 tion of saving. The young man was not in debt, and received a 
 salary of five hundred pounds a year — had not Mr. Peachey 's 
 curate married Jennie Plovtree a month after they were engaged 
 on two hundred, and no expectations whatever ! Or why, since 
 they had made ap their minds to wait, could they not have put 
 it off another year I Surely in two years Mr. Browne might 
 scrape enough together to come home again ! Canbury thouglit 
 it possessed a slight opinion of a young man who could not come 
 after his wife. Privately Canbury upheld the extremest tradi- 
 tions of chivalry, and various among Miss Peachoy's young lady 
 friends, quite unconscious of fibbing, confided to each other that 
 "they wouldn't be in Helen's place for anything." In the 
 rectory drawing-room, however, these stringencies took a smiling 
 face and a sympathetic form, sometimes disappearing altogether 
 in the exaltation of the subject's general aspects. Helen was 
 told it was very " brave " of her, and Mrs. Peachey was admired 
 for her courage in letting her daughter go. At which she and 
 Helen smiled into each other's eyes understandingly. Then 
 Canbury began to searcli the aforesaid advertisements in the 
 ladies' papers for mementoes suitable in character and price, 
 and to send them to the rectory with as hearty wislies for tiie 
 happiness of the future Brownes as if they had behaved properly 
 in every respect. 
 
12 THE srMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 TO Mrs. Peachey, one very consoling circumstance connected 
 with Helen's going to India was the good she would prob- 
 ably be able to do to " those surrounding her." Helen had al- 
 ways been " active " at home ; she had been the inspiration of 
 work-parties, the life and soul of penny-readings. She often 
 took the entire superintendence of the night school. The Can- 
 bury branch of the Y. W. C. T. U. did not know how it' should 
 get on without her. Besides playing the organ of St. Stephen's, 
 in which, however, another Miss Peachey was by this time ready 
 to succeed her. Much as Mrs. Peachey and the parish would 
 miss Helen, it was a sustaining thought that she was going 
 amongst those whose need of her was so much greater than 
 Canbury's. Mrs. Peachey had private chastened visions, chiefiy 
 on Sunday afternoons, of Helen in her new field of labor. Mrs. 
 Peachey was not destitute of imagination, and she usually pic- 
 tured Helen seated under a bread-fruit tree in her Indian 
 garden, dressed in white muslin, teaching a circle of little 
 " blacks " to read the Scriptures. Helen was so successful with 
 children; and so far as being tempted to its ultimate salvation 
 with goodies was concerned, a black child was probably just like 
 a white one. Of course, Helen would have to adapt her induce- 
 ments to circumstances — it was not likely that a little Bengali 
 could be baited with a Bath bun. Doubtless she would have to 
 offer theui rice or — what else was it they liked so much ? — oh 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 IJ 
 
 yes ! sugar-cane. Over the form of these delicacies Mrs. Peachey 
 usually went to sleep, to dream of larger schemes of heathen 
 emancipation which Helen should inaugurate. Mr. Peachey, 
 who knew how hard the human heart could be, even in Can- 
 bury, among an enlightened people efijoying all the blessings of 
 the nineteenth century, was not so sanguine. He said he be- 
 lieved these Hindus were very subtle-minded, and Helen was not 
 much at an argument. He understood they gave able theolo- 
 gians very hard nuts to crack. Their ideas were entirely differ- 
 ent from ours, and Helen would be obliged to master their ideas 
 before effecting any very radical change in them. He was afraid 
 there would be diflSculties. 
 
 Mrs. Plovtree settled the whole question. Helen was not 
 going out as a missionary, except in so far as that every woman 
 who married undertook the charge of one heathen, and she 
 could not expect to jump into work of that sort all at once. Be- 
 sides, -the people were so difficult to get at, all shut up in 
 zenanas and places. And she did not know the language ; first 
 of all, she would have to conquer the language ; not that it would 
 take Helen long, for see what she did in French and German at 
 school in less than a year! For her part, she would advise 
 Helen to try to do very little at first — to begin, say, with her 
 own servants; she would have a number of them, and they 
 would be greatly under her personal influence and control. Mrs. 
 Plovtree imparted an obscure idea of Helen's responsibility for 
 the higher welfare of her domestics, and a more evident one 
 that it would be rather a good thing to practice on them, that 
 they would afford convenient and valuable material for experi- 
 ments. In all of which Mrs. Peachey thoughtfully acquiesced, 
 though in fancy she still allowed herself to picture Helen lead- 
 ing in gentle triumph a train of Rajahs to the bosom of the 
 
14 THE SIMPLE ADVENTUKES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 Cliurch — a train of nice Kajahs, clean and savoury. That, as I 
 have said, was always on Sunday afternoons. On the secular 
 days of the week they discussed other matters, non-spiritual, and 
 personal, to which they were able to bring more definiteness of 
 perspective, and they found a great deal to say. 
 
 A f i-iend of young Browne's had gone home opportunely on 
 six months' leave, and his recently acquired little wife would be 
 " delighted," she said, to wreak her new-found dignity upon 
 Helen in tlic capacity of chaperone for the voyage out. But for 
 this happy circumstance, Helen's transportation would hav6 pre- 
 sented a serious difficulty, for the Peacheys were out of the way 
 of knowing the ever-flowing and returning tide of Anglo-Indians 
 that find old friends at Cheltenham and take lodgings in Ken- 
 sington, and fill their brief holiday with London theatres and 
 shopping. As it was, there was great congratulation among 
 the Peacheys, and they hastened to invite Mr. and Mrs. Mac- 
 donald to spend a short time at the rectory before the day on 
 which the ship sailed. Mrs. Macdonald was extremely sorry that 
 they couldn't come ; nothing would have given them more pleas- 
 ure, but they had so many engagements with old friends of her 
 husband's, and the time was getting so short and they had such 
 a quantity of things to do in London before they sailed, that — 
 the Peacheys must resign themselves to disappointment. Mrs. 
 Macdonald hoped that they would all meet on board the A7«e- 
 rfur, but held out very faint hopes of making acquaintance 
 sooner than that. It was a bright agreeable letter as the one or 
 two that came before had been, but it left them all in a difficulty 
 to conjure up Mrs. Macdonald, and unitedly they lamented the 
 necessity. What Mr. Macdonald was like, as Mrs. Plovtree ob- 
 served, bcins: of no consequence whatever. But it was absolute, 
 and not until the THiedive was within an hour of weighing an- 
 
l6 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 chor at the Royal Albert Docks, did the assembled Peacheys, for- 
 lorn ou the main deck in the midst of Helen's boxes, get a 
 glimpse of Mrs. Macdonald. Then it was brief. One of the 
 stewards pointed out the Peachey group to a very young lady in a 
 very tight-fitting tailor-made dress, swinging an ulster over her 
 arm, who approached them briskly with an outstretched hand and 
 a businesslike little smile. " I think you must be Mr. and Mrs. 
 Peachey," she said ; " I am Mrs. Macdonald. And where is the 
 young lady?" Mr. Peachey unbent the back of his neck in the 
 clerical manner, and Mrs. Peachey indicated Helen as well as she 
 could in the suffusion of the moment, taking farewell counsels of 
 her sisters with pink eyelids. " But you mustn't mind her go- 
 ing, Mrs. Peachey ! " Mrs. Macdonald went on vivaciously, shak- 
 ing hands with the group, " she will be sure to like it. Every- 
 body likes it. / am devoted to India ! She'll soon get accus- 
 tomed to everything, and then she won't want to come home — 
 that's the way it was with me. I dare say you won't believe it, 
 but I'm dying to get back ! You've seen your cabin?" she de- 
 manded of Helen, " is it forwai'd or aft ? Are you port or star- 
 board?" 
 
 The Peacheys opened their eyes respectfully at this nau- 
 tical proficiency, and Helen said she was afraid she didn't 
 know, it was down some stairs and one turned to the left, 
 toward the end of a long passage, and then to the right into a 
 little corner. 
 
 "Oh, then you're starboard and a little forward of the 
 engines ! " Mrs. Macdonald declared. " Very lucky you are ! 
 You'll have your port open far oftener than we will — we're 
 weather-side and almost directly over the screw. So much for 
 not taking one's passage till three weeks before sailing — and 
 very fortunate we were to get one at all, the agent said. We 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. \-j 
 
 have the place to ourselves though, one can generally manage 
 that by paying for it you know — one comfort ! How many in 
 your cabin ? " 
 
 " Three of us ! " Helen responded apprehensively, " and it is 
 such a little one ! And the one whose name is Stitch has piled 
 all her rugs and portmanteaux on my bed, and there's nowhere 
 to put mine ! " 
 
 " Oh, the cabins in this ship are not small," returned Mrs. 
 Macdonald with seriousness. " She's got a heavy cargo and 
 they're pretty low in the water, if you like, but they're not small. 
 Wait till you get used to it a little. As to Madam Stitch, just 
 pop her bags and things on the floor — don't hesitate a moment. 
 One must assert one's rights on shipboard — it's positively the 
 only way ! But there are some people to see me off — I must 
 fly ! " She gave them a brisk nod and was on the wing to her 
 friends when Mrs. Peachey put a hand on her arm. "You 
 spoke of the ship's being low in the water, Mrs. Macdonald. 
 You don't think— you don't think there is any danger on that 
 account ? " 
 
 Little Mrs. Macdonald stopped to enjoy her laugh. "Oh 
 dear, no ! " she said with vast amusement, " rather the other 
 way I should think — and we'll be a great deal steadier for it ! " 
 Then she went, and the Peacheys saw her in the confused 
 distance babbling as gaily in the midst of her new-comers as 
 if a thought of the responsibilities of chaperonage had never 
 entered her head. 
 
 " Helen, I believe you are older than she is ! " exclaimed 
 the youngest Miss Peachey. 
 
 " I don't like her," remarked the second succinctly. " She 
 giggles and she gabbles. Helen, I wish some of us were going 
 with you." 
 
1 8 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " She doesn't seem to mind travelling," said the Miss 
 Peacl)cy with the prospective claim to the title. 
 
 " Dear mv., Helen ! " began Mrs. Peachey almost dolorously, 
 " she — she seems very bright," changing her comment. After 
 all they must make the best of it. The llev. Peachey clasped 
 his stick behind his back, and tapped the deck with it, saying 
 nothing, with rather a pursing of his wide shaven lips, Helen 
 looked after Mrs. Macdonald helplessly, and her family ex- 
 changed glances in which that lady might have read deprecia- 
 tion. 
 
 "Your roll-up, Helen?" exclaimed Mrs. Peachey. 
 
 " Here, mamma." 
 
 " You have seven small pieces, remember ! Have you got 
 your keys ? Are you sure you are dressed warmly enough ? It 
 will be some time before you get to India, you know ! " Mrs. 
 Peachey had suffered an accession of anxiety in the last ten 
 minutes. 
 
 They stood looking at each other in the common misery of 
 coming separation, casting about for last words and finding 
 none of any significance, for people do not anticipate an event 
 for a whole year without exhausting themselves on the topic 
 of it. Helen would keep a little diary; she would post it at 
 Gibraltar, Na]iles, Port Said, and Colombo; and they were to 
 write overland to Naples, and by the next mail to Calcutta, 
 which would reach before she did. These time-worn arrange- 
 ments were made over again. Helen thought of a last affec- 
 tionate message to her Aunt Plovtree and was in the act of 
 wording it, when a steward with a yellow envelope inquired of 
 them for "any lady by the name of Peachey." The contents 
 of the yellow envelope had telegraphic brevity. " Good-bye and 
 God bless you ! J. Plovtree." Helen read, and immediately 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 19 
 
 took out her handkerchief again. " Just like Jane ! " said Mrs. 
 Peachey, sadly, with her eyes full, and Mr. Peachey, to cover 
 his emotion read aloud the hours at which the message had 
 been received and delivered. 
 " Forty-two minutes " he an- 
 nounced " fairly quick ! " 
 Helen proposed a walk on the 
 quarter-deck. " The luggage, 
 my dear child I " Mrs. Peach- 
 ey cried. " "We mustn't leave 
 the luggage, with all these 
 people about ! James, dear, 
 it would not be safe to leave 
 the luggage, would it ! You 
 and the girls may go, Helen. 
 Your father and I will stay 
 here." 
 
 "Oh, no!" Helen re- 
 turned reproachfully, and 
 clung to them all. 
 
 The crowd on the deck 
 increased and grew noisier, 
 people streamed up and down 
 the wide gangway. Cabin 
 luggage came rattling down 
 in cabs, perilously late, the 
 arm of the great steam-crane 
 swung load after load high in 
 
 air and lowered it into the hold, asserting its own right of 
 way. "That's one of your tin-lined boxes, Helen," exclaimed 
 Mrs. Peachey, intent on the lightening of the last load, " and 
 
 AUNT PLOVTREE. 
 
20 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 oh, I'm sure it is not safe, dear ! James won't you call to 
 them that it is not safe ! " But the long deal case with " Miss 
 Peach EY, Calcutta," in big black letters on it was already 
 describing an arc over the heads of the unwary, and as it 
 found its haven Mrs. Peachey made a statement of excited re- 
 lief, " I never saw such carelessness ! " said she. 
 
 A number of ladies, dressed a good deal alike, arrived upon 
 the deck in company and took up a position near the forward 
 part of tlie ship, where the second class passengers were gathered 
 together, producing little black books. From these they began 
 to sing with smiling faces and great vigour, various hymns, with 
 sentiments appropriate to long voyages, danger, and exile from 
 home. It was a parting attention from their friends to a num- 
 ber of young missionaries for Burmah, probably designed to 
 keep up their spirits. The hymns were not exclusively of any 
 church or creed — Moody and Sankey contributed as many of 
 them as the Ancient and Modern, but they were all lustily emo- 
 tional and befitting the occasion to the most unfortunate de- 
 gree. The departing missionaries stood about in subdued 
 groups and tried to wave their handkerchiefs. One or two 
 young lady missionaries found refuge in their cabins where they 
 might sob comfortably. The notes rang high and bathed the 
 whole ship in elegy, plaintively fell and reveled in the general 
 wreck of spirits and affectation of hilarity. It began to rain 
 a little, but the ladies were all provided with umbrellas, and 
 under them sang on. 
 
 " While the nearer waters roll, 
 While the tempest still is high." 
 
 " Whfit idiots they are ! " remarked the youngest plain- 
 spoken Miss Peachey when it became impossible to ignore the 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 2 1 
 
 effect upon Helen's feelings any longer. " As if they couldn't 
 find anything else to sing than (hat ! " 
 
 " Oh, my dear" rebuked Mrs. Peachey, drying her eyes, " we 
 may be sure that their motive is everything that is good." 
 Whereat the youngest Miss Peachey, unsubdued, muttered " Mo- 
 tive!" 
 
 " H'all this for the cabin, miss ? " asked a steward, grasping 
 a hat-box and a portmanteau. " I don't quite know 'ow that 
 there long box is a-going in, miss. Is it accordin' to the Com- 
 pany's regillations, miss ? " Mr. Peachey interposed, with dig- 
 nity, and said that it was — the precise measurements. It came 
 from the Army and Navy Stores, he was quite sure the size was 
 correct. The man still looked dubious, but when Helen said, 
 regardless of measurements, that she must have it, that it con- 
 tained nearly everything she wanted for the voyage, he shoul- 
 dered it without further dissent. He was accustomed to this 
 ultimatum of seafaring ladies, and bowed to it. 
 
 Mrs. Peachey began to think that they ought to go down to 
 the cabin and stay beside the luggage, there were so many odd- 
 looking people about ; but she succumbed to the suggestion of 
 being carried off; and they all went up on the quarter-deck. 
 Mrs. Macdonald was there — they might see something more of 
 Mrs. Macdonald. They clung to the hope. 
 
 They did see something more of Mrs. Macdonald — a little. 
 She interrupted herself and her friends long enough to approach 
 the Peacheys and ask if all Helen's luggage was on board, " wed- 
 ding presents and all?" jocularly. Mrs. Peachey replied fer- 
 vently that she hoped so, and Mrs. Macdonald said. Oh, that was 
 all right then, and Was she a good sailor? Oh, well, she would 
 soon get over it. And oh, by the by— departing to her beckon- 
 ing friends again — it was all right about their seats at table — 
 
22 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 Miss Peachey was to sit by them — she had seen the head stew- 
 ard and he said there would be no difficulty. Having thus re- 
 assured them, " I'll see you again," said Mrs. Macdonald, and 
 noddingly departed. 
 
 The first whistle shrilled and bellowed, and a parting stir re- 
 sponded to it all over the ship. Mrs. Peachey looked agitated, 
 and laid a hand on Helen's arm. " There is no cause for haste, 
 mamma," said the Rev. Peachey, looking at his watch. " We 
 have still twenty minutes, and there is a quantity of freight yet 
 to be got on board." The missionary ladies began a new hymn, 
 
 " Oh, think of the friends over there 1 " 
 
 " Only twenty minutes, my love ! Then I think we ought 
 really to be getting off ! My darling child " 
 
 The whistle blew again stertorously, and the gangway began 
 to throng with friends of the outward-bound. The dear, tender, 
 human-hearted Peacheys clustered about the girl they were giv- 
 ing up — the girl who was going from their arms and their fire- 
 side an infinite distance, to a land of palm-trees and yams, to 
 marry — and what a lottery marriage was ! — a young Browne. 
 They held her fast, each in turn. " I almost w-wish I w-weren't 
 go — " sobbed Helen in her mother's embraces. " Helen ! " said 
 the youngest Miss Peachey sternly, with a very red nose, " you 
 do nothing of the sort! You're only too pleased and proud to 
 go, and so should I be in your place ! " Which rebuke revived 
 Helen's loyalty to her Browne if it did not subdue the pangs 
 with which she hugged her sister. 
 
 At last the gangway was withdrawn and all the Peacheys 
 were on the other side of it. It rained faster, the missionary 
 ladies still sang on, people called last words to their friends in 
 the damp crowd below. A box of sweets was thrown to a young 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 n 
 
 lady on the main deck — it dropped into the black water between 
 the ship and the wharf and was fished out with great excite- 
 ment. The Peacheys gathered in a knot under their several 
 umbrellafi, and Helen stood desolately by herself watching them, 
 now and then exchanging a watery smile. They cast ofi the 
 ropes, the Lascars skipped about like monkeys, the crowd stood 
 back, slowly the great ship slipped away from the wharf into the 
 river, and as she moved down stream the crowd ran with her a 
 little way, drowning the missionary ladies with hurrahs. In the 
 Peacheys' last glimpse of their Helen she was standing beside 
 little Mrs. Macdonald and a stout gentleman with a pale face, 
 rather flabby and deeply marked about the mouth and under the 
 eyes — a gentleman whom nature had intended to be fair but 
 whom climatic conditions had darkened in defiance of the inten- 
 tion. Mrs. Macdonald tapped the gentleman in a sprightly way 
 with her parasol, for the Peacheys' benefit, and he took off his 
 hat. The Peachey family supposed, quite correctly, that that 
 must be Mr. Macdonald. 
 
24 
 
 lUF. SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 HELEN thought the prospect 
 of England slipping away 
 
 from her in the rain as the ship 
 throbbed down the river, too deso- 
 late for endurance, so she de- 
 scended to her cabin with the un- 
 avowed intention of casting her- 
 self upon her berth to weep. Miss 
 Stitch was there, however, and Mrs. 
 Forsyth - Jones, who occupied the 
 berth above Miss Stitch's, and the 
 ^^^^^If ftm ^ steward, which seemed to 
 
 \l ^ ^BHr ~ /Ml^ ^^BB^^ Helen a good many, and she 
 ^^^ i^^Bil 'V* retreated. 
 
 " Oh, come in ! " both the 
 ladies cried ; but Helen 
 thought it was obviously im- 
 possible. She wandered into 
 the long dining - saloon and 
 sat down in one of the re- 
 volving chairs ; she watched 
 a fat ayah patting a baby to 
 sleep oil the floor, looked into the ladies' cabin and went hastily 
 out again, for ulrcady the dejected had begun to gather there, 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 25 
 
 prone on the sofas and commiserated by the stewardesses. 
 Finally she made her way upon deck again, meeting Mrs. Mac- 
 donald in the companion-way. " Are you all right ? " asked 
 Mrs. Macdonald cheerfully ; but, before Helen had time to say 
 that she was or was not, the lady had disappeared. 
 
 The deck was full of irresolute people like herself, who sat 
 about on the damp benches or walked up and down under the 
 awning, still with the look of being fresh from town, still in 
 gloves and stiff hats, and land-faring garments. They put 
 their hands in their pockets and shivered, and looked askance 
 at each other, or made vain attempts to extract their own from 
 the steamer chairs that were heaped up astern, waiting the 
 offices of a quartermaster. An occasional hurrying steward 
 was stopped a dozen times by passengers thirsting for informa- 
 tion. Barefooted Lascars climbed about their monkey-like busi- 
 ness among the ropes, or polished the brasses on the smoking- 
 cabin, or holystoned a deck which seemed to Helen immacu- 
 lately clean before. She found a dry corner and sat down in it 
 to consider how much more familiar with the ship many of the 
 people seemed to be than she was, and to envy all the accus- 
 tomed ones. It seemed to Helen that she had better not analyse 
 her other emotions. She wasn't comfortable, but no doubt she 
 soon would be; she wasn't cheerful; but how could anybody 
 expect that? She was restless and damp and unhappy, and it 
 finally became necessary for her to draw young Browne's photo- 
 graph out of her hand-bag and peruse it in shelter of the Daily 
 Graphic for a very long time. After which her spirits rose 
 appreciably. " He is a dear ! " she smiled to herself, " and he's 
 got a lovely forehead — and in just five weeks I shall see him 
 again — just five weeks ! " 
 
 Quite an ordinary reflection you see, without a shade of 
 
26 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 subtlety, a reflection probably common to engaged young ladies 
 the world over ; but I have already warned you under no circum- 
 stances to expect anything extraordinary from Helen. It will 
 be my fault if you find her dull, I shall be in that case no faith- 
 ful historian, but a traducer. I have not known the present 
 Mrs. Browne to be dull, even at the close of a protracted round 
 of Indian social gaieties ; but you must not expect her to be 
 original. 
 
 The voyage to Calcutta began in this way, and I happen to 
 know that its chief feature of consolation — young Browne's 
 forehead — remained in Helen's pocket, and was constantly be- 
 spoken. Esj)ecially perhaps in the Bay of Biscay, which ful- 
 filled all its traditions for her benefit. I fear that there were 
 moments, tempestuous moments, in the Bay of Biscay, height- 
 ened by the impassioned comments of Miss Stitch and Mrs. 
 Forsyth-Jones, when Helen did not dare to dwell upon the 
 comparative advantages of desiccated spinsterhood in Canbury, 
 and matrimony in foreign parts attainable only by sea. She 
 felt that it would be indiscreet, that she could not trust her 
 conclusions to do credit to her fealty. If it were not for Miss 
 Stitch and Mrs. Forsyth- Jones, Helen reflected, the horrors of 
 the situation would have been less keen ; but I have no doubt 
 that each of these ladies entertained the same sentiments towards 
 her two fellow-voyagers. They united, however, in extolling 
 the steward. The stewardess was a necessarily perfunctory per- 
 son, with the quaverings of forty ladies in her ears at once. 
 The stewardess was always sure she " didn't know, ma'am," and 
 seemed to think it was a duty one owed the ship to go up on 
 deck, no matter how one felt. She was also occasionally guilty 
 of bringing one cold vegetables, if one occurred about thirty- 
 ninth ajjon her list of non-diners in public. But the steward 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 27 
 
 was a man, and always respectfully cheerful. He could tell 
 exactly why it was the ship rolled in that peculiar manner — 
 owing to the disposition of iron in the hold. He knew just 
 how long tliey would be in " the Bay," and what sort of weather 
 "she" would be likely to experience during the night; also 
 could predict within a quarter of an hour, the time at which 
 they would land at Gibraltar. He was generally incorrect in 
 every particular, but that made no difference to the value of 
 his sanguine prophecies, while it mitigated the distressful effects 
 of his gloomy ones. And it was always he who brought the 
 first advice that the ports might be opened, who calmed all 
 fear of a possible rat or cockroach " coming up from the hold," 
 and who heralded the ladies' appearance on deck with armfuls 
 of rugs, in the days of early convalescence. They chanted to 
 one another continually how " nice " he was, and how hard he 
 was obliged to work, poor fellow, each mentally determining a 
 higher figure for her farewell tip than she had thought of the 
 day before. This is the custom of ladies the world over who 
 sail upon the seas. 
 
 It must be mentioned that Mrs. Macdonald visited Helen's 
 cabin several times in the Bay of Biscay. For her part Mrs. 
 Macdonald was never ill, she simply made up her mind not to 
 be, and in her opinion if Helen would only commit herself to a 
 similar effort she would be all right immediately. The expres- 
 sion of this opinion rather lessened the value of Mrs. Macdon- 
 ald's sympathy; and the announcement that there was really 
 lovely weather going on above and the ship was beginning to be 
 so jolly, failed to make Helen any more comfortable. " Well, 
 you are funny ! " Mrs. Macdonald would say cheerfully in de- 
 parting, and she said it every day. 
 
 Mr. Macdonald remarked that Gibraltar looked much as usual 
 
28 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 the morning they steamed under its hostile shadow, and Mrs. 
 Macdonald said that if she wasn't in absolute need of some darn- 
 ing cotton and letter-paper she wouldn't think of going ashore — 
 the place was such an old story. The consideration of darning 
 cotton prevailed, however, and the Macdonalds went ashore, 
 Helen with them. Helen's acquaintance with the Macdonalds 
 had progressed meanwhile. She had learned what not to expect 
 of them, which excluded all but the gayest and airiest and most 
 indifferent companionship, and this facilitated matters between 
 them considerably. It was a little difficult at first. It seemed 
 to this young lady from Wiltshire, brought up among serious 
 traditions of matrimony, that her case, if not herself, ought to 
 be taken a little more importantly, that some impression of the 
 fateful crisis in her life, toward which they were helping to 
 hurry her, ought to be evident occasionally in the Macdonald 
 conduct or conversation. It was only gradually that she came 
 to see how lightly such projects as hers and young Browne's 
 were regarded by these people who were still in the initial stages 
 of their own ; how little space she or her affairs occupied in their 
 good-natured thoughts ; how invariably she must expect any ref- 
 erence to it to be jocular. During the process Helen had now 
 and then a novel sense of making one of the various parcels 
 which Mrs. Macdonald had undertaken to bring out to friends in 
 Calcutta — a feeling, that she ought properly to be in an air-tight 
 box in the hold, corded and labelled and expected to give no 
 further trouble. She realized, at moments, that she was being 
 " shipped " to young Browne. 
 
 They did exactly what everybody does in Gibraltar. There 
 was no time to get permission from the authorities and go 
 through the galleries, there never is. Barring which, the people 
 of the ships find themselves without resource except to drive in 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 29 
 
 the rattle-trap conveyances of the place through its narrow twist- 
 ing, high-walled over-topping white streets and out past the 
 Spanish market, where everybody buys figs and pomegranates to 
 throw overboard afterwards, and so emerging from the town trot 
 through the sand and the short grass round the mighty gray 
 foot of tlie Rock, to look up and marvel at the terror of those 
 irregular holes upon its face, and the majesty that it had long 
 before it became conscious with cannon. Helen and the Mac- 
 donalds did all this and said just what P. and 0. voyagers have 
 said for the last quarter of a century about it. Coming back Mrs. 
 Macdonald bought her darning cotton and her letter-paper at a 
 little shop, whose black-browed proprietor sold photographs and 
 wicked knives, and long pipes as well. Afterwards they all 
 strolled through the Alameda gardetis, that cling for life among 
 their verbenas and rose bushes to the sides of the Rock, and 
 finally fell into that fatal corner shop which entraps the unwary 
 with curios. All roads seem to lead to it in Gibraltar, and one 
 knows it by the crowd of speculative passengers that encumber 
 the doorway considering and contrasting desirable purchases. 
 The Spaniards inside are haughty and indifferent, they will abate 
 a shilling or two of their exorbitance perhaps, not more. That 
 is what the Macdonalds said to everybody in an undertone — 
 "You needn't try, they won't come down — it doesn't seem to be 
 worth their while. We used to think they would, but now we 
 don't ask them ! " and in the face of this advice of experience 
 the passengers hesitated still more over their ill-shaped Moorish 
 vases, black and red and blue and gilt, their brass and coloured 
 glass hanging lamps from Cairo, their Persian china superfi- 
 cially gilt but beautifully blue. The things that fascinated Helen 
 were curious plaques in relief, all marshy greens, in which the 
 most realistic lizards and toads were creeping about in imitated 
 
30 Tim sr.vPLE advent ckes of a mem sahib. 
 
 moss. Miss Pcacliey would liavc liked at least four of these, they 
 struck her as so original and clever, until Mrs. Macdouald at her 
 elbow said, in an impressive whisper '■'• Doii'i ! You see them in 
 board iny-houses in Calcutta ! " when slie put them reluctantly 
 down, and bought a big bedecked Spanish Iiat to make a 
 work-biisket of, and a large fan, upon wliicli sundry ladies of de- 
 praved appearance and very Irish features were dancing a fati- 
 diingo instead. I have seen tliat fan in the present Mrs. 
 IJrowuc's Calcutta drawing-room frequently since. She has it 
 fastened on the wall immediately under a photogravure of The 
 A ngehifi, and she will not take it down. 
 
 Between Gibraltar and Naples, Helen observed the peculiari- 
 ties of the species P. and 0. passenger, the person who spends 
 so large a jiortion of a lifetime shorter than the average, in won- 
 dering how much more of this delightful or this abominable 
 weather " we'll have," in the Indian Ocean or the Red Sea. She 
 observed that Miss Stitch arose betimes every morning, and at- 
 tended the service hold by the little pale ritualistic clergyman in 
 the sidoo!i before the tables were laid for breakfast, which struck 
 lier as eminently proper. Miss Stitch being a missionary. She 
 also noticed that Mrs. Forsyth-Jones, returning to her husband 
 in Burninh, with three photographs of him in uniform variously 
 arranged in the cabin, had as many small flirtations well in 
 hand, one in the morning, of the promenade sort, with a middle- 
 aged Under Secretary, one in the afternoon, conducted in long 
 chairs, enhanced by sunset, with a Royal Engineer, whoso wife 
 was similarly occupied at the other end of the ship, and one in 
 the evening in a secluded corner of the hurricane deck, chari- 
 tably witnessed by the moon and stars, with a callow indigo 
 planter about the age of her eldest son. Helen thought that the 
 missionary or somebody, some older person, ought to speak to this 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 31 
 
 lady in terms of guarded reproof, and tell her that her conduct 
 was more conspicuous than perhaps she knew ; and our young 
 lady from Wiltshire was surprised to observe not only that no- 
 body did, but that Mrs. Forsyth-Jones seemed to be a person of 
 some popularity on board. The Macdonalds, for instance, hung 
 about her chair with solicitude, in the temporary absence of any 
 of the attaches. Mrs. Maodonald herself had plenty of " men- 
 friends " as she called them. They buzzed about her, whenever 
 she sat or stood long enough to permit their approach, all day — 
 they were always bringing her rugs, or old numbers of Punch, 
 or an orange. But Mrs. Maodonald did not particularize, she 
 was content with a general empire, though she prized that, as 
 anybody could see. Among the throng Mr. Maodonald re- 
 mained supreme ; she expected most attention from him too, and 
 she called him " Mac." 
 
 Miss Stitch confided to Miss Peachey her opinion that " the 
 people on board this ship " were more than usually cliquey ; but 
 this was not a conclusion that Helen would huve arrived at unas- 
 sisted. She saw about her day after day, lining the long tables 
 and afterwards scattered about easefully on deck, a great many 
 people, some of whom she thought agreeable-looking, and others 
 distinctly the reverse. Miss Stitch seemed to think one ought 
 to know everybody. Helen was sure that a few — a very few — of 
 the agreeable-looking people would do quite well. She did not 
 see at all how Miss Stitch could bring herself to talk to the per- 
 son who sat next her at table, and wore a large diamond ring on 
 his third finger, and drank champagne every day at tiffin, and 
 said he was travelling for his " 'ealth," and pointed most of his re- 
 marks with a tooth-pick. Helen thought that even missionary 
 zeal would not carry her so far as that. On the other hand, she 
 found it difficult to understand why everybody, including Miss 
 
32 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 Stitch, seemed agreed not to make acquaintance with a soft-eyed, 
 sad-faced lady of rather dark complexion, who talked in a gentle 
 voice with a slightly foreign accent, Helen thought, and was 
 accompanied by three daughters, who much resembled her. 
 They looked very quiet and lady-like to Helen, and she thought 
 the manners of certain boisterous young ladies who polkaed with 
 the ship's officers on a heaving deck after dinner, and whom 
 everybody accepted, suffered by comparison with them. When 
 she was told that their name was De Cruz, Helen privately criti- 
 cised her fellow countrywomen's attitude. " It must be," she 
 said to herself, " because they are foreign." And so it was — be- 
 cause they were foreign. " About four annas in the rupee," said 
 Miss Stitch about them one day, and told Helen that she would 
 find out what that meant before she had been long in India. 
 But Miss Stitch, M. D., was interested in the welfare, temporal 
 and eternal, only of ladies who were " pure native." 
 
 Then one peaceful rainy morning, after a rolling night, Na- 
 ples lay before them, gathered all about her harbour with Vesu- 
 vius gently smoking in the distance. The slippery hurricane 
 deck was full of people looking for Vesuvius, grouped round 
 the single male passenger, who, awakened by the first officer at 
 four in the morning, had seen it spouting fire. Enviable male 
 passenger! Invidious first officer! Out from shore came dis- 
 reputable Neapolitan companies in small boats, with stringed 
 instruments, who lay under the ship's sides and sang, "Pini- 
 culi — Finicula!" in a lavish and abandoned manner, turning 
 up their impudent faces for contributions from the truly musical 
 souls on board, Helen listened, enraptured, to a number of 
 these renditions, after which she concluded that she preferred 
 " Finiculi — Finicula " as she had heard it sung by Mr. Browne, 
 in Canbury, Wilts. After breakfast, the Macdonalds attached 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 33 
 
 themselves to an exploring party for Pompeii, under the guid- 
 ance of a black-browed Neapolitan, representing Messrs. Cook. 
 Mrs. Macdonald went about in a pretty, new waterproof, with 
 Bnlwer's Last Days in her hand, telling people she really must 
 go this time, she had been lazy so often before, and it was so 
 awfully cheap with these people — carriages, rail, tiffin and see 
 everything for only thirty francs each ! Helen and Miss Stitch 
 stayed behind, the night had been too rough to let them ven- 
 ture on the absorption of so much ancient history, even at this 
 advantageous rate. But later, when the sun came out, the 
 young ladies recovered their spirits sufficiently to cruise adven- 
 turously to shore by themselves, to engage a ragged-pocketed 
 " guide " of perhaps thirteen, and a rattling little victoria, 
 pulled by a clinking little pony, with bells upon his collar, and 
 drive about Naples for three delicious hours. I can't say they 
 added much to their stock of information. They had no idea 
 where to go and what to see ; but one can always absorb colour 
 and life without a guide-book, happily ; and I know, from what 
 she told me afterward, that Helen Peachey did that. They 
 found abundant happiness in the curio shops and much un- 
 palatable fruit in the open market ; they filled their rattletrap 
 of a carriage with great bunches of tiny pink roses at a few 
 coppers a-piece, and buried their faces in them. They were 
 told, driving through a grand toppljng main street, all draped 
 and garlanded with little glass bells for candles, red, green, and 
 blue, that the King was coming next day. The boy guide told 
 them this. He showed them also the Eoyal Palace, with all 
 the statues of former kings standing about outside, and the 
 "Grand Cafe de I'Europe," much embellished by a painter 
 whose art had evidently once found favour with the munici- 
 pality. In the opinion of the guide, the "Grand Caf6 de 
 
34 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 'Europe" was what reasonable people came to Naples to see; 
 he pointed it out many times and with an increasing show of 
 personal admiration, lie was a very useful, clever boy the 
 young lailies thought, especially when he took them to the post 
 ofliee and obtained for Miss Stitch a receipt for the registered 
 letter slie wauled to send away, in as business-like a manner as 
 if he were in the habit of transmitting large sums abroad daily. 
 "Don' you lossit, for goodniz sake!" he exclaimed, as he 
 gave her the slip. But I doubt whether he was quite worth 
 the sum lie claimed at the water's edge when they departed — 
 the pay of a full-grown, well-fed guide for a whole day, plus a 
 pourboire, which they ungrudgingly gave between them. 
 
 But I cannot give any more of my valuable space to Mrs. 
 Browne's reminiscences of that voyage, which must, according 
 to the volumes of them, have lasted a space of about seven 
 months. I believe they were all very gay at Port Said, walking 
 through the single wide China bazaar street of the place, flam- 
 ing with colour and resonant of musicians in the gambling 
 houses, drinking black coffee on the boulevard, and realizing 
 no wliit of Port Said's iniquity. The Suez Canal had no inci- 
 dent but several loathly odors, and then came the long smooth 
 voyage to Colombo and a fantastic glimpse of first cocoanut 
 trees fringing the shores of Ceylon. A great deal here about 
 sapphires and rubies and cat's eyes and little elephants made 
 of ivory and small brown diving-boys, and first tropical impres- 
 sions, but I must not linger in the chronicling. Then the 
 sail up to Madras, and the brief tarrying there, and the days 
 that came after, short days when everybody packed and rejoiced. 
 At last, one night at ten o'clock, a light that was not a star, 
 shining far through the soft still darkness beyond the bow of 
 the ship, the light at the mouth of a wide brown river that 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 35 
 
 slipped to the sea through the India, Helen would see in the 
 morning, and past the city whither her simple heart had gone 
 before her. 
 
 Mrs. Macdonald kept out of the way. It was the one con- 
 siderate thing she did during the voyage. Young Browne, 
 rather white and nervous-looking, came upon Mr. Macdonald 
 first in the turbulent shore-going crowd. Mr. Macdonald was 
 genial and reassuring. " You'll find her over there, old man," 
 said he without circumlocution, "rather back. Better bring 
 her up to Hungerford Street to breakfast yourself." And Helen 
 straightway was found by young Browne in the precise direction 
 Mr. Macdonald had indicated, and " rather back." She always 
 remembers very distinctly that on that occasion she wore a blue 
 Chambray frock and a sailor hat with a white ribbon round it. 
 It is not a matter of consequence, still it might as well be 
 mentioned. 
 
36 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ~r HAVE no doubt that the present Mrs. Browne would like 
 J- me to linger over her first impressions of Calcutta. She 
 has a habit now of stating that they were keen. That the 
 pillared houses and the palm-shaded gardens, and the multi- 
 plicity of turbaned domestics gave her special raptures, which 
 she has since outgrown, but still likes to claim. She said noth- 
 ing about it at the time, however, and I am disposed to believe 
 that the impressions came later, after young Browne had become 
 a familiar object, and all the boxes were unpacked. As they 
 were not married immediately, but a week after the Khedive 
 arrived, to give Mrs. Macdonald time to unpack lier boxes, the 
 former of these processes was an agreeably gradual one occu- 
 pying six morning and evening drives in Mr. Browne's dog- 
 cart, and sundry half-hours between. Mrs. Macdonald wanted 
 to make the house pretty for the wedding. " Really, child," 
 said she, " you can't be married in a bam like this ! " and to 
 that end she drew forth many Liberty muslins, much "art" 
 needlework, and all the decoration flotsam and jetsam of the 
 season's summer sales in Oxford Street. I understand that both 
 the Brownes protested against the plan to have a wedding; they 
 only wanted to be married, they said, of course in the Church, 
 regularly, but without unnecessary circumstance. " People can 
 see it next day in Tlie Englishman" suggested young Browne, 
 urged privately to this course by Helen. But it was a point 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 37 
 
 upon which Mrs. Macdonald was inflexible. " Certainly not a 
 lig wedding," said she, "since you don't want it, but a few 
 people we must have just to see it properly done. What 
 would Calcutta think of you " — reproachfully, to young 
 Browne, "getting the knot tied that way, in a corner! Be- 
 sides, it will be a lovely way of letting everybody know we 
 are back. Vll manage it — I know exactly who you ought to 
 have ! " 
 
 Thereupon Helen brought out from among her effects a cer- 
 tain square wooden box, and besought that it might be opened. 
 " It's — it's the cake," she explained with blushes ; mother thought 
 I ought to bring it — " 
 
 " Oh, of course ! " exclaimed Mrs. Macdonald briskly ; " every- 
 body does. There were five altogether on board the Khedive. 
 Let us hope it has carried well ! " 
 
 They opened the box, and Helen took out layers of silver 
 paper with nervous fingers. " It seems a good deal crushed," 
 she said. Then she came upon a beautiful white sugar bird of 
 Paradise lacking his tail, and other fragments dotted with little 
 silver pellets, and the petals of a whole flower-garden in pink 
 icing. " It has not carried well ! " she exclaimed grievously — 
 and it hadn't. It was the proudest erection of the Canbury con- 
 fectioner's experience, a glory and a wonder when it arrived at 
 the Rectory, but it certainly had not carried well: it was a 
 travelled wreck. 
 
 " Looks very sorry for itself ! " remarked young Browne, who 
 happened to be present. 
 
 " It must have happened in that hateful Bay of Biscay ! " 
 said Helen, with an inclination to tears. 
 
 " Oh, never mind ! " Mrs. Macdonald put in airily, as if it 
 were a trifle. "It's easy enough to get another. I'll send a 
 
38 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 chit to Peliti's this very afternoon. You can use up this one 
 for five o'clock tea afterwards." 
 
 "But do you think it won't do at all, Mrs. Macdonald?" 
 Helen begged. " You see the lower tier isn't much damaged, 
 and it came all the way from home, you know." 
 
 " I think it ought to do," remarked young Browne. 
 
 " My dear ! " cried her hostess, " think of how it would look! 
 In the midst of everything ! It would quite spoil your wedding ! 
 Oh, no — we'll have another from Peliti's." 
 
 " What could one do ? " confided Mrs. Browne to me after- 
 wards. " It was her affair — not ours in the least. We were get- 
 ting married, don't you see, for her amusement!" But that 
 was in one of Mrs. Browne's ungrateful moments. And was 
 private to me. Generally speaking, Mrs. Browne said she 
 thought the Macdonalds arranged everything charmingly. The 
 Canbury cake went, however, to the later suburban residence of 
 the Brownes, and was there consumed by them in the reckless 
 moments of the next six months. 
 
 I was one of the people Mrs. Macdonald knew the Brownes 
 ought to have, and I went to the wedding, in a new heliotrope 
 silk. I remember that also came out by the Khedive. It was 
 in the Cathedral, at four o'clock in the afternoon, full choral 
 service, quantities of flowers, and two heads of departments in 
 the company, one ex-Commissioner, and a Member of Council. 
 None of them were people the Brownes were likely to see much 
 of afterward, in my opinion, and I wondered at Mrs. Macdonald's 
 asking them ; but the gown she graced the occasion in would 
 have justified an invitation to the Viceroy — pale green poplin 
 with silver embroidery. 
 
 The bride came very bravely up the aisle upon the arm of her 
 host, all in the white China silk, a little crushed in places, which 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 30 
 
 the Canbury dressmaker had been reluctantly persuaded to make 
 unostentatiously. The bridegroom stood consciously ready with 
 his supporter; we all listened to the nervous vows, sympa- 
 thetically thinking back; the little Eurasian choir-boys sang 
 lustily over the pair. Two inquisitive black crows perched in 
 the open window and surveyed the ceremony, flying oflf with 
 hoarse caws at the point of the blessing ; from the world out- 
 side came the hot bright glare of the afternoon sun upon the 
 Mwdan, and the creaking of the ox-gharries,* and the chatting 
 of the mynaa in the casucrinaf trees, and the scent of some 
 waxy heavy-smelling thing of the country — how like it was to 
 every other Indian wedding where a maid comes trippingly 
 from over seas to live in a long chair under a punkah, and 
 be a law unto kitmutgars ! 
 
 The new Mrs. Browne received our congratulations with shy 
 distance after it was all over. She looked round at the big stucco 
 church with its white pillars and cane chairs, and at our unfa- 
 miliar faces, with a little pitiful smile. I had, at the moment, a 
 feminine desire to slap Mrs. Macdonald for having asked us. 
 And all the people of the Eectory, who ought to have been at 
 the wedding, were going about their ordinary business, with only 
 now and then a speculative thought of this. Everybody who 
 really cared was four thousand miles away, and unaware. We 
 could not expect either of them to think much of our perfunc- 
 tory congratulations, although Mr. Browne expressed himself 
 very politely to the contrary in the valuable sentiments he uttered 
 afterwards iu connection with champagne cup and the Peliti 
 wedding cake, on Mrs. Macdonald's veranda. 
 
 They had a five days' honeymoon, so far as the outer world 
 
 * Native ox-carts. t Australian fir. 
 
40 Tirii SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 was concerned, and they spent it at Patapore. Darjiling, as 
 young Browne was careful to explain to Helen, was the proper 
 place, really the thing to do, but it took twenty-six hours to 
 got to Darjiling, and twenty-six hours to get back, and no- 
 body wanted to plan oS a five days' honeymoon like that. 
 P.atapore, on the contrary, was quite accessible, only six hours 
 by mail. 
 
 " Is it a hill-station ? " asked Helen, when they discussed it. 
 
 " Not precisely a hill-station, darling, but it's on rising 
 ground — a thousand feet higher than this." 
 
 " Is it an interesting place ? " she inquired. 
 
 " I think it ought to be, under the circumstances." 
 
 " George! I mean are there any temples there, or any- 
 thing?" 
 
 "I don't remember any temples. There is a capital dak- 
 bungalo." 
 
 "And what is a dak-bungalow, dear? How short you cut 
 your hair, you dear old thing ! " 
 
 " That was provisional against your arrival, darling — so you 
 couldn't pull it. A dak-bungalow is a sort of government hotel, 
 put up in unfrequented places where there aren't any others, for 
 the accommodation of travellers." 
 
 " Unfrequented places ! George ! Any snakes or tigers ? " 
 
 " Snakes — a few, I dare say. Tigers — let me see ; you might 
 hear of one about fifty miles from there." 
 
 " Dreadful ! " shuddered Helen, rubbing her cheek upon 
 George's convict crop. " But what is the attraction, dear ? " 
 
 " The air," responded he, promptly substituting his mous- 
 tache. " Wonderful air ! Think of it, Helen — a thousand feet 
 up ! " 
 
 But Helen had not been long enough in India to think of 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 41 
 
 it. " Air is a tiling one can get anywhere," she suggested ; 
 " isn't there anything else?" 
 
 " Seclusion, darling — the most perfect seclusion ! Lots to 
 eat — there's always the railway restaurant if the dak-bungalow 
 gives out, capital air, nice country to walk over, and not a soul 
 to speak to but our two selves! " 
 
 " Oh ! " said Helen. " It sounds very nice, dear " And 
 
 so they agreed. 
 
 It was an excellent dak-bungalow without doubt, quite a 
 wonder in dak-bungalows. It was new, for one thing — they are 
 not generally new — and clean, they are not generally clean. 
 There had been no deserted palace or disused tomb for the gov- 
 ernment to utilize at Patapore, so they had been obliged to build 
 this dak-bungalow, and they built it very well. It had apvkka* 
 roof instead of a thatched one, which was less comfortable for 
 the karaits but pleasanter to sleep under ; and its walls were 
 straight and high, well raised from the ground, and newly white- 
 washed. Inside it was divided into three pairs of rooms, one in 
 the middle and one at each end. You stepped into one of your 
 rooms on the north side of the house and out of the other on the 
 south side, upon your share of the south veranda. The ar- 
 rangement was very simple, each pair of rooms was separate and 
 independent, and had nothing to say to any other. 
 
 The furniture was simple too, its simplicity left nothing to 
 be desired. There were charpoysf to sleep on, travellers brought 
 their own bedding. In one room there were two chairs and a 
 table, in the other a table and two chairs. Tliere was nothing 
 on the floor and nothing on the walls. Tliere was ample accom- 
 modation for the air of Patapore, and no other attraction to inter- 
 
 * Made of brick and mortar. f Native beds. 
 
 4 
 
42 THE SIMPLE ADVEh'-URES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 fere with it. I don't know whether we have any riglit to accom- 
 pany the Hrownes to Patapore, and to stay witli them there ; it 
 is cortiiiu that we would not be welcome, if they knew it. It is 
 eriually certain that nobody else did — they were, as young Browne 
 had predicted, supremely alone. At seven in the morning the 
 old khansamah in charge of the place gave them chota hazri * 
 in the room with the table in it, bringing tea in a chipped brown 
 te.'ipot, and big thick cups to drink it out of, one edged with blue 
 and the other with green, and buttered toast upon a plate which 
 did not match anything;. He was a little brown khansamah, 
 with very bright eyes and a thin white beard and a trot — he re- 
 minded one curiously of a goat. His lips were thin and much 
 compressed ; he took the Brownes solemnly, and charged them 
 only three rupees a day each for their food, which young Browne 
 found astonishingly moderate, though Helen, when she worked 
 it out in shillings and pence, and considered the value received, 
 could not b;ing herself to agree with this. 
 
 After chota hazri they went for walks, long walks, stepping 
 off the dak-bungalow veranda, as Helen said, into India, as it 
 was before ever the Sahibs came to rule over it. For they could 
 turn their backs upon the long straight bank of the railway and 
 wander for miles in any direction over a country that seemed as 
 empty as if it had just been made. As far as they could see it 
 rolled in irregular plains and low broken ridges and round hil- 
 locks all covered with short, dry grass, to the horizon, and there, 
 very far away, the gray outlines of an odd mountain or two stood 
 against the sky. A few sari trees were scattered here and there 
 in clumps, all their lower branches stolen for firewood, and 
 wherever a mud hut squatted behind a hillock there grew a tall 
 
 * Little breakfast. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 43 
 
 castor oil bean tree or two, and some plantains. There were 
 tracks of cattle, there was an occasional tank that had evidently 
 been dug out by men, and there were footpaths making up and 
 over the hillocks and across the stony beds of the empty nul- 
 lahs ; * but it was only in the morning or in the evening that 
 they met any of the brown people that lived thereabouts. Then 
 they came in little straggling strings and bands, looking at these 
 strangers from under inverted baskets, appearing from nowhere 
 and disappearing in vague and crooked directions. Helen's 
 husband told her that they were coolies working in coal mines on 
 the side of the railway. There were crows, too, and vultures — the 
 crows were familiar and impertinent, the vultures sailed high and 
 took no notice of them — and that was all. They went forth and 
 they came back again. Helen made a few primitive sketches in 
 her husband's note-book. I do not think she did the country 
 justice, but her sketches seemed to me to indicate the character of 
 her impressions of it. They went forth and they came back again, 
 always to a meal — breakfast, or tiffin, or dinner, as the case 
 might be. Helen liked dinner best, because then the lamps 
 were lighted, and she had an excuse for changing her dress. 
 They partook of these meals with three-tined steel forks, and 
 knives worn down to dagger points, according to the un- 
 fathomable custom of the mussalchi.^ The courses consisted of 
 variations upon an original leg of mutton which occurred at one 
 of their earlier repasts, served upon large cracked plates with 
 metal reservoirs of hot-water under them, and embellished by 
 tinned peas of a suspicious pallor. And always there was 
 moorghyX — moorghy boiled and fried and roasted, moorghy cut- 
 lets, moorghy curry, moorghy stew. " Nice old person," said 
 
 • Stream bprls. f Dishwnphcr. | Fowl. 
 
44 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 llcloii, the first time it appc.ired, "he has given us fowl ! Dear 
 old patriarch." " He may or may not bo a dear old patriarch," 
 George responded, fixing grim eyes upon the bird, " but he is 
 tolci'ably sure to have the characteristics of one. You aren't ac- 
 qiiaintwl with the indigenous moorghy yet, Helen. You regard 
 him ill the light of a luxury, as if he were a Christian fowl. He 
 isn't a luxury out here upon my word. He stalks up and down 
 all over India improving his muscular tissues, he doesn't disdain 
 to pick from a drain, he costs threepence to buy. She is an in- 
 ferior creature still. It may be a prejudice of mine, but if 
 there's any other form of sustenance to be had I don't eat 
 moorghy." 
 
 " He tastes," said Mrs. Browne after experiment, " like an 
 ' indestructible ' picture-book." It was au unwarrantable simile 
 upoTi Mrs. Browne's jiart, since she could not possibly remember 
 the flavour of the literature she used to suck as an infant; but 
 her verdict was never reversed, and so one Indian staple passed 
 out of the domestic experiences of the Brownes. 
 
 Those two young people had unlimited conversation, and one 
 of them a great many more cigars than were good for him. So 
 far as I have been able to discover, by way of diversion they had 
 nothing else. It had not occurred to either of them that the 
 equipment of a honeymoon required any novels ; and the dak- 
 bungalow was not provided with current fiction. They covered 
 an extensive range of subjects, therefore, as they thought, ex- 
 haustively. As a matter of fact, their conversation was so super- 
 ficial in its nature, and led to such trivial conclusions, that I do 
 not propose to repeat it. They were very unanimous always. 
 Young Browne declared that if his views had habitually received 
 the unquiilifiod assent which Helen gave them he would have 
 been a monihcr of tlie Viceroy's Council j-ears before. They 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OE A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 45 
 
 could not say enough in praise of the air of ratai)ore, and when 
 the wind rose it blew them into an ecstasy. Frequently they 
 discussed the supreme advantages of a dak-bungalow for a honey- 
 moon, and then it was something like this on the afternoon of 
 tlie third day. 
 
 " The perfect freedom of it, you know — the being able to 
 smoke with one's legs on the table " 
 
 " Yes, dear. I love to see you doing it. It's so — it's so 
 home-like ! " (I think I sec the Rev. Peachey with his legs 
 upon the table!) Then, with sudden animation, "Do you 
 know, George, I think I heard boxes coming into the next 
 room ! " 
 
 "Not at all, Helen. You didn't, I'm sure you didn't. And 
 then the absolute silence of this place " 
 
 " Lovely, George I And that's how I heard the boxes so dis- 
 tinctly." Getting up and going softly to the wall — "George, 
 there are peojjle in there ! " 
 
 "Blow the people! However, they haven't got anything to 
 do with us." 
 
 " But perhaps — perhaps you know them, George ! " 
 
 " Most piously I hope I don't. But never mind, darling. 
 We can easily keep out of the way, in any case. We won't let 
 them spoil it for us." 
 
 " N-no, dear, we won't. Certainly not. But you'll find out 
 who they are, won't yon, Geordie ! AsTc the khansamah, just for 
 the sake of knowing ! " 
 
 " Oh, we'll find out who they are fast enough. But don't be 
 distressed, darling. It will be the simplest thing in the world 
 to avoid them." 
 
 "Of course it will," Mrs. Browne responded. "But I 
 think, George dear, I really must put on my tailor-made this 
 
46 I'll I'- SIMPLE ADVEXTUKES OF A MEM SAN IP. 
 
 •ifternoon in case we should come in contact with tlioni in any 
 way." 
 
 " We won't," roiilied George, cheerfully lighting another 
 cigar. 
 
 To wliich Mrs. Browne replied without seeming relevance, 
 "I consider it perfectly shameful for dak-bungalows to have 
 no looking-glasses." 
 
 An hour later Helen flew in from the veranda. " Oh, 
 George, I've seen them : two men and a lady and a black and 
 wliite dog — spotted ! Quite nice, respectable-looking people, all 
 of them ! They walked past our veranda." 
 
 " Confound their impudence ! Did they look in ? " 
 
 " The dog did." 
 
 " None of the rest ? Well, dear, which way did they go ? " 
 
 Helen indicated a south-easterly direction, and the Brownes 
 that evening walked almost directly north, with perhaps a point 
 or two to the west, and did not return until it was quite dark. 
 
 The fourth day after breakfast, a stranger entered the veran- 
 da without invitation. He was clad chiefly in a turban and 
 loin cloth, and on his head he bore a large tin box. He had an 
 attendant, much like him, but wearing a dirtier loin-cloth, and 
 bearing a bigger box. 
 
 " Oh ! who is it?" Helen cried. 
 
 " It's one of those wretched box-wallahs, dear — a kind of 
 pedlar. I'll send him ofF. Hi(jao* yonV 
 
 " Oh, no, George ! Let us see what he has to sell," Helen in- 
 terposed with interest; and immediately the man was on the 
 floor untying his cords. 
 
 " My darling, you can't want anything from him ! " 
 
 * IJc off ! 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 47 
 
 " Heaps of things — I shall know as soon as I see what he's 
 got, dear ! To begin with, there's a lead pencil ! So far as I 
 know I haven't a lead pencil in the world. I'll take that lead 
 pencil ! Soap ? No, I think not, thank you. Do tell me what 
 he says, George. Elastic — the very thing I wanted. And tape ? 
 Please ask him if he's got any tape. Tooth-brushes — what do 
 you thiuk, George ? " 
 
 " Not tooth-brushes ! " her lord protested, as one who en- 
 dures. " They may be second-hand, dear." 
 
 " Oh ! No ! Here, take them back, please ! Eiljbon — have 
 you any narrow pale blue ? That's about right, if you've noth- 
 ing better. Hooks and eyes are always useful. So are mixed 
 pins and sewing cotton. I can't say I think much of these 
 towels, George, they're very thin — still we shall want towels." 
 
 Mrs. Browne was quite pink with excitement, and her eyes 
 glistened. She became all at once animated and eager, a joy of 
 her sex was upon her, and unexpectedly. The box-wallah was 
 sm Event, and an Event is a thing much to be desired, even in 
 one's honeymoon. This lady had previously and has since made 
 purchases much more interesting and considerably more expen- 
 sive than those that fell in her way at Patapore ; but I doubt 
 whether any of them afforded her a tenth of the satisfaction. 
 She turned over every one of the box- wallah's commonplaces, 
 trusting to find a need for it. She laid embroidered edging 
 down unwillingly, and put aside handkerchiefs and hosiery with 
 a sigh, pangs of conscience arising from a trousseau just un- 
 packed. But it was astonishing how valuably supplementary 
 that box-wallah's stores appeared to be. Helen declared, for in- 
 stance, that she never would have thought of Persian morning 
 slippers, which she has never yet been able to wear, if she had 
 not seen them there, and this I can believe. 
 
48 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A ME MSA NT B. 
 
 The tninsiiction occupied the best part of two hours, during 
 wliii'li young Browne behaved very well, smoking quietly, and 
 only interfering once, on the score of some neckties for himself. 
 And when Helen remonstrated that everything seemed to be for 
 her, he begged her to believe that he really didn't mind — ho 
 didn't feel acquisitive that morning ; she mustn't consider him. 
 To which Helen gave regretful compliance, for the box-wallah 
 had a lai-ge stock of gentlemen's small wares. In the end Mr. 
 Browne paid the box-wallah, in a matterly manner, something 
 over a third of his total demand, which he accepted, to Helen's 
 astonishment, with only a perfunctory demur, and straight 
 away put liis box on his head and departed. About which time 
 young Browne's bearer came with respectful inquiry as to 
 which train he would pack their joint effects for on the morrow. 
 This is an invariable terminal point for honeymoons in India. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVEXTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 49 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 T is time, perhaps, to state a 
 few facts about Mr. George 
 William Browne in addi- 
 tion to those which are in 
 the reader's possession al- 
 ready. I have mentioned, 
 I think, that he played 
 tennis badly and was fond 
 of privacy; it runs in my 
 mind also that I have in 
 some way conveyed to you 
 that he is a rather short 
 and thickly built young 
 gentleman, with brown eyes 
 and a dark moustache, and 
 a sallow complexion and a broad smile. Helen declares him 
 handsome, and I never considered him unpleasant-looking, but 
 it is undoubtedly the case that he is very like other young men 
 in Calcutta, also clerks in tea and indigo houses on five hundred 
 rupees a month, with the expectation of partnership whenever 
 retirement or fever shall remove a head of the firm. His tastes 
 were common to Calcutta young men also. He liked golf and 
 polo, and regretted that his pony was not up to the paper-chases; 
 in literature he preferred Clark Russell and the Pioneer, with 
 
 r^ir K~'^>-'-'^- 
 
50 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 Lord Lytton for serious moments. He complied with the cus- 
 toms of the Cathedral to the extent of a silk hat and a pair of 
 gloves in the cold weather, and usually attended one service 
 every Sunday, invariably contributing eight annas to the offer- 
 tory. His political creed was simple. He believed in India for 
 the Anglo-Indians, and despised the teaching and hated the in- 
 fluence, with sturdy reasons, of Exeter Hall. Any views that he 
 had of real importance mainly concerned the propagation of tea 
 in distant markets; but his spare ideas had a crispness that gave 
 them value in a society inclined to be intellectually limp, and 
 his nature was sufficiently cheerful and sympathetic to make 
 him popular, in connection with the fact that he was undeniably 
 a good fellow. 
 
 When all this has been said, I fear that Mr. Browne will not 
 appear in these pages with the equipment proper for a young 
 man of whom anything is expected in the nature of modern 
 fiction. Perhaps this, however, is not so important as it looks, 
 which will be more evident when we reflect that in marrying 
 Miss Helen Francis Peachey Mr. Browne performed considerably 
 the greater part of v;hat will be required of him in this history. 
 
 That Young Browne's tulub * was only five hundred rupees 
 a month is, however, a fact of serious importance both to the 
 Brownes and to the readers of these chapters. It must be borne 
 in mind, even as the Brownes bore it in mind, to the proper 
 understanding of the unpretending matters herein referred to. 
 There are parts of the world in which this amount translated 
 into the local currency, would make a plutocrat of its recipient. 
 Even in Calcutta, in the olden golden time when the rupee was 
 worth two invariable shillings and the stockbroker waxed not so 
 
 *Pay. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 51 
 
 fat as now, there was a sweet reasonableness about an income of 
 five hundred that does not exist to-day. There is no doubt, for 
 one thing, that at tliat time it did not cost so much to live in a 
 house. At the present time, and in view of the degeneracy of 
 the coin, that luxury is not so easy to compass as it used to be. 
 
 The Brownes would live in a house, however. Young 
 Browne, when the matter was up for discussion, stated wiih 
 some vehemence his objection to the Calcutta system of private 
 liostelries. Helen said conclusively that if they had no other 
 reason for housekeeping, there were those lovely dessert knives 
 and forks from Aunt Plovtree, and all the other silver things 
 from people, to say nothing of the complete supply of house 
 and table linen, ready marked with an artistically intertwined 
 "HB." In the face of this, to use other people's cutlery and 
 table napkins would be foolish extravagance — didn't George 
 think so? George thought so, very decidedly, tliat was quite a 
 strong point. It must be a whole house, too, and not a flat : 
 there was no autonomy in a flat and no proprietorship of the 
 compound ; moreover, you were always meeting the other peo- 
 ple on the stairs. By all means a house to themselves — " if pos- 
 sible," added young Browne. 
 
 "About what rent does one pay for a house?" Helen in- 
 quired. 
 
 " You get a fairly good one for three hundred a month, on 
 lease. A visiting Rajah down for the cold weather to try for a 
 ' C. I. E.' * sometimes pays a thousand." 
 
 " But we," responded Mrs. Browne blankly, " are not Rajahs, 
 dear ! " 
 
 " "Vo, thank the Lord," said Mr. Browne, with what struck 
 
 • Companion of the Indian Empire. 
 
52 'HE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAH/B. 
 
 his wife as unnecessary piety; "and we'll make ourselves jolly 
 comfortable notwithstanding. Ncllnms— you'll see!" George 
 ]$rowne was always over-optimistic. If those two young people 
 had come to me — but it goes without saying that they went to 
 
 nobody. 
 
 Helen desired a garden, a tennis-court, and, if possible, a 
 cocoanut pidm-tree in the garden. She would prefer a yellow 
 house to a pink one, in view of the fact that the houses were all 
 yellow or pink, and she would like a few pillars in front of it — 
 pillars seemed so common an architectural incident in Calcutta 
 that she thought they must be cheap. Mr. Browne particularly 
 wanted air in the house, " a good south veranda," and a domi- 
 cile well raised above its native Bengal. Mr. Browne was strong 
 upon locality and drains, and the non-proximity of jungle and 
 bushes. Helen bowed to his superior knowledge, but secretly 
 longed that a garden with a cocoanut palm in it might be found 
 in a neighbourhood not insanitary. And so they fared forth 
 daily in a ticca-gharry to inspect desirable addresses. 
 
 They inspected many. There was no unnecessary formality 
 about permission to look, no " Enquire of Messrs. So and So," 
 no big key to procure from anywhere. The ticca-gharry* 
 stopped, and they aliglited. If the high wooden gates were 
 closed, Mr. Browne beat upon them lustily with his stick, shout- 
 ing, " Qui hai ! " f in tones of severe authority. Then, usually 
 from a small and dingy domicile near the gate, issued a figure 
 hastily, a lean, brown figure, in a dirty dlioty, that salaamed per- 
 functorily, and stood before them waiting. 
 
 " Iska ghur kali hai ? " | Mr. Browne would inquire and the 
 figure would answer, " Ila ! " 
 
 • Hired carriafco. t VVhoevcr is ! J Is this house empty f 
 
rilE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 53 
 
 Wheroiit, without further parley, the Brownes would enter 
 the place aiul begin to express their minds about it. Generally 
 it invited criticism. If the previous sahib had been but three 
 weeks dt'2iarted tlie place had an overgrown look, the boshes 
 were unkempt, the grass ragged ; there were cracks in the mor- 
 tar and stains on the walls ; within it smelt of desolation. Helen 
 investigated daintily ; it looked, she said, so very "snaky." The 
 general features of one house were very like the general features 
 of another ; that is to say, their disadvantages were fairly equal. 
 They all had jungly compounds, they were sill more or less tum- 
 ble-down, all in fashionable Eurasian neighbourhoods, and all at 
 least fifty rupees a month more than the Brownes could afford to 
 pay. Helen found some aesthetic charm, and young Browne 
 some objectionable odour in every one of them. She, one might 
 say, used nothing but her eyes, he nothing but his nose. With 
 regard to the attractions of one address in particular they came 
 almost to a difference of opinion. It was a bungalow, and it sat 
 down flatly in a luxuriant tangle of beaumontia, and bougain- 
 villiers, and trailing columbine. It had a veranda all round- 
 about, and the veranda was a bower of creeping things. Not 
 only cocoanut palms, but date palms, and areca palms, and toddy 
 palms grew in the corners of the compound with hibiscus bushes 
 all in crimson flower along the wall, a banyan tree in the middle, 
 and two luxuriant peepuls, one on each side, almost meeting 
 over the roof of the house. The walls and pillars of the bunga- 
 low were in delicate tones of grey and green ; close behind it 
 were all the picturesque features of a native bustee, and immedi- 
 ately in front a lovely reflection of the sky lay in a mossy tank in 
 places where the water was deep enough. The rent was moder- 
 ate : it had been empty a long time. 
 
 " George ! " Helen exclaimed, " it has been waiting for us." 
 
54 THE SIMPLE AnVEA-rUKES OE A MEMSAIilB. 
 
 (Jeorge (lemiirred. "It's far and away the worst place we've 
 seen," he remarked. 
 
 "I tliink it's perfectly sweet," liis wife maintained. 
 
 "If we took it," lie returned implacably, "within three 
 months two funerals would occur in this neighbourhood : one 
 would be yours and one would be mine. I don't speak of the 
 mortality among the servants. I'll just ask the durwan* how 
 many sahibs have died here lately. And he asked the durwan in 
 his own tongue. 
 
 " 'le says three in the last family, and it was the ' carab bimar,' 
 which is the bad sickness or the cholera, my dear. What a fool of 
 a durwan to leave in charge of an empty house ! If you still 
 think you'd like to have it, Helen, we can inquire " 
 
 " Oh, no ! " Helen cried. " Let us go away at once ! " 
 
 " I was going to say — at the undertaker's for additional ac- 
 commodation. But perhaps we had better not take it. Let's try 
 for something clean," 
 
 T consider that the Brownes were very lucky in the end. 
 They found a house in a suburban locality where a number of 
 Europeans had already survived for several years, at a rent they 
 thouglit they could afford by careful managing. It turned its face 
 aside from the street and looked towards the south ; sitting on its 
 roof, they could see far across those many-laned jungle suburbs 
 where the office baboo f lives, and whither the sahibs go only on 
 horseback. The palm fronds waved thick there, fringing the red 
 sky duskily Avhen the sun went down. The compound was 
 neglected, but had sanitary possibilities; there was enough grass 
 for a tennis-court and enough space for a garden. A low line of 
 godowns ran round two sides of it, where the servants might live 
 
 * Doorkppppr. f Native clerk. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 55 
 
 and the pony. Palms and plantains grew in the corners. It 
 was very tropical, and it was inclosed by a wall coloured to 
 match the house, in the cracks of which sprouted every green 
 thing. The house itself was pink, which Helen declared her 
 one disappointment: she preferred the yellow ones so much. 
 Inside it was chiefly light green, stencilled in yellow by way of 
 dadoes, which must have been trying, though Helen never ad- 
 mitted it. There were other peculiarities. The rafters curved 
 downwards and the floor sloped toward the middle and in vari- 
 ous other directions. In several places trailing decorations in 
 mud had been arranged by white ants. None of the doors had 
 locks or bolts ; they all opened inwards and were fastened from 
 the inside with movable bars. The outermost room had twelve 
 French windows ; the innermost room had no windows and was 
 quite dark when its doors were shut. Irregular holes appeared 
 at intervals over the wall for the accommodation of punkah-ropes, 
 each tenant having fancied a different seat outside for his pun- 
 kah-wallah. Two or three small apartments upstairs in the rear 
 of the house had corners divided off by partitions about six 
 inches high. These were bath-rooms, arranged on the simple 
 principle of upsetting the bath-tub on the floor and letting the 
 water run out of a hole in the wall inside the partition. Most 
 of the windows had glass in them, but not all, and some were 
 protected by iron bars, the domestic conditions inside having 
 been originally Aryan and jealous. 
 
 I do not wish it to be supposed from these details, that the 
 Brownes were subjected to exceptional hardships, or took up 
 housekeeping under particularly obscure circumstances. On the 
 contrary, so few people with their income in Calcutta could 
 afford to live in houses at all, that young Browne had his name 
 put up on the gatepost with considerable pride and oircum- 
 
56 THE SIMPLE ADV'ENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 stiiiicc. "George W. Browne," in wliite letters on a black 
 groiiiul, in the middle of an oblong w6oden tablet, according to 
 the custom of the place. The fact being that the characteristics 
 of the Brownes' house are common, in greater or less degree, to 
 every house in Calcutta. I venture to say that even the tub of a 
 Member of Council, on five thousand rupees a month, is dis- 
 charged through a hole in the wall. 
 
 Perhaps tlieir landlord was more or less unique. The land- 
 lord common to Calcutta is a prosperous Jew, a brocaded Bajah, 
 at least an unctuous baboo fattened upon dhol-bat and chutney. 
 The Brownes' landlord wore a pair of dirty white trousers and a 
 lean and hungry look, his upper parts being clad in yards of 
 soiled cotton, in which he also muffled up his head. He fol- 
 lowed them about the place in silent humility — they took him 
 for a coolie, and young Browne treated his statements with 
 brevity, turning a broad British back upon him. I don't think 
 this enhanced the rent ; I fancy it would have been equally ex- 
 tortionate in any case. But it was only when Mr. Browne asked 
 where the landlord was to be found that he proudly disclosed his 
 identity, with apologetic reference, however, to the state of his 
 attire. He said that his house had been vacant for many 
 months, and that he had just spent a thousand rupees in repair- 
 ing it. His prospective tenant accepted the first of these state- 
 ments, and received the second with open laughter. They 
 closed the bargain, however, and as the landlord occupied an 
 af I joining bustee, and was frequently to be met in the neighbour- 
 hood, Mrs. Browne was for some time uncertain as to whether she 
 ought to bow to him or not. 
 
58 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THERE are a number of ways of furnishing a house in Cal- 
 cutta. I, who have known the ins and outs of the place 
 for twenty odd years, have learned the unsatisfactoriness of all of 
 them, and am prepared to explain. You can be elaborately done 
 up by a fine helati upholsterer, who will provide you with spin- 
 dle-legged chairs in velvet brocade, and aesthetic window cur- 
 tains with faded pink roses on them, everything only about six 
 months behind the London shops, with prices however consider- 
 ably in advance. This way is popular with Viceroys. Or you 
 may go to the ordinary shops and get Westboume Grove sorts of 
 things only slightly depreciated as to value and slightly en- 
 hanced as to cost, paying cash — a way usually adopted by people 
 of no imagination. Or you may attend the auction sale that 
 speeds the departure of some home-going memsahib, and buy 
 her effects for a song : but that must be at the beginning of the 
 hot weather, when the migration of memsahibs occurs. Or you 
 can go to Bow Bazar, where all things are of honourable an- 
 tiquity, and there purchase pathetic three-legged memorials of 
 old Calcutta, springless oval-backed sofas that once upheld the 
 ponderous dignity of the East India Company, tarnished mirrors 
 which may have reflected the wanton charms of Madame Le 
 Grand. Baboos sell them, taking knowledge only of their out- 
 ward persons and their present utility ; and they stand huddled 
 in little hot low-roofed shops, intimate with the common teak- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 59 
 
 wood things of yesterday, condescending to gaudy Japanese vases 
 and fly-blown coloured prints and cracked lamps and mis- 
 matched crockery. Bow Bazar is not always bad and it is al- 
 ways cheap, granting some previous experience of baboo morals, 
 and the proprietors charge you nothing for the poetry of your 
 bargain. They set it off, perhaps, against necessary repairs. 
 This is not a popular way, as the baboos will testify, but it is a 
 pleasing one, and it is the way the . Brownes took in the main, 
 supplementing these plenishings with a few from the China 
 Bazar, where a multitude of the almond-eyed sell you wicker 
 chairs and tables. 
 
 It is a divinely simple thing to furnish a house in India. It 
 must be cleaned and it must be matted. This is done in a cer- 
 tain number of hours while you sleep, or ride, or walk, or take 
 your pleasure, by a God of Immediate Eesults, whom you collo- 
 quially dub the " bearer," working through an invisible agency 
 of coolies. Then you may go and live in it with two chairs and 
 a table if you like, and people will only think you have a some- 
 what immoderate hatred of hangings and furniture and other ob- 
 stacles to the free circulation of air. This you might easily pos- 
 sess to an extreme, and nobody will consider you any the worse 
 for it. I should have added an " almirah " to the list of your 
 necessaries, however. You would be criticised if you had not 
 one or more almirahs. An almirah is a wardrobe, utiless it con- 
 tains shelves instead of hooks, and then it is a tall cupboard with 
 doors. Almirahs, therefore, receive all your personal property, 
 from a dressing-gown to a box of sardines, and it is not possible 
 to live decently or respectably in India without them. But the 
 rest is at your good pleasure, and nobody will expect you to have 
 anything but plated forks and bazar china. Outward circum- 
 stance lies not in these things, but in the locality of your resi- 
 
6o THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAtJlfi. 
 
 dence and the size of your compound. If you wish to add to 
 your dignity, buy another pony ; if you wish to enhance it, let 
 the pony bo a horse and the horse a Waler. But think not to 
 aggrandize yourself in the eyes of your fellow Anglo-Indians by 
 treasures of Chippendale or of Sevres, by rare tapestries or mod- 
 ern masters, or even a piano. Dust and the mosquitos and the 
 monsoon war against all these things; but chiefly our incon- 
 stancy to the country. We are in conscious exile here for 
 twenty or twenty-five years, and there is a general theory that 
 it is too hot and too expensive to make the exile any more 
 than comfortable. Beside which, do we not pass a quarter 
 of our existence in the cabins of the P. and 0. ? But I 
 must not digress from the Brownes' experiences to my own 
 opinions. 
 
 The Brownes' ticca-gharry turned into Bow Bazar out of 
 Ohowringhee, out of Calcutta's pride among her thoroughfares, 
 broad and clean, and facing the wide green Maidan, lined with 
 European shops, and populous with the gharries * of the sahibs, 
 into the narrow crookedness of the native city, where the pro- 
 prietors are all Baboo This, or Sheik That, who sit upon the 
 thresholds of their establishments smoking the peaceful hubble- 
 bubble, and waiting until it please Allah or Lakshmi to send 
 them a customer. Very manifold are the wants that Bow 
 Bazar provides for, wants of the sahib, of the " kala sahib," f 
 of its own swarming population. You can buy a suit of clothes 
 there — oh, very cheap — or a seer of rice ; all sorts of publications 
 in English, Bengali, and Urdu ; a beautiful oil painting for a 
 rupee, a handful of sticky native sweetmeats for a pice. You 
 can have your beard shaved, your horoscope cast, your photo- 
 
 * Carriages. f " Black sahibs," i. c. Eurasians, 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 6 1 
 
 graph taken, all at a rate which will deeply astonish you. 
 There is a great deal of noise in the Bow Bazar, coming 
 chiefly from strenuous brown throats, a great deal of dust, a 
 great number and variety of odours. But there the sahib-lok, 
 in the midst of luxury, can enjoy economy — and you can't 
 have everything. 
 
 The sellers of sahib's furniture have the largest shops in Bow 
 Bazar, and the heaviest stock ; they are important among the 
 merchants; they often speak a little English. The baboo to 
 whom the Brownes first addressed themselves had this accom- 
 plishment, and he wore the dual European garment of white 
 duck, and a coat. He was a short baboo, very black, with a 
 round face so expressive of a sense of humour that young 
 Browne remarked to Helen privately that he was sure the fellow 
 had some European blood in him, in spite of the colour — no 
 pukka Bengali ever grinned like that ! 
 
 " What iss it, sir, that it iss your wish to buy?" he inquired. 
 He spoke so rapidly that his words seemed the output of one 
 breath ; yet they were perfectly distinct. It is the manner of 
 the native who speaks English, and the East Indians have bor- 
 rowed it from him. 
 
 " Oh ! we want to buy a lot of things. Baboo ! " said Mr. 
 Browne, familiarly, " at half your regular prices, and a largo dis- 
 count for cash ! What have you got ? Got any chairs ? " 
 
 " Oh yess indeed ; certainlee ! Will you please to come this 
 way?" 
 
 " This way " led through a labyrinth of furniture, new and 
 old, of glass and crockery and chipped ornaments, a dusty haven 
 of dismayed household gods. "What have you got in there, 
 Baboo ? " asked young Browne, as they passed an almirah reveal- 
 ing rows of tins and labels. 
 
62 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " Stores, sir, — verree best qualitty stores. You can see fo' 
 you'self, sir — Crosse an' Blackwell • " 
 
 " Oh yes, Baboo ! And how long did you say they'd been 
 there ? " 
 
 " Onlee one month, sir," tlie baboo replied, attempting an ex- 
 pression of surprise and injury. " I can tell you the name of 
 the ship they arrived in, sir." 
 
 " Of course you can, Baboo. But never mind. We don't 
 want any to-day. Let's see the chairs. Now, Helen," he con- 
 tinued, as the baboo went on in advance, " you see what we are 
 subject to in this ungodly place. Those pease and gooseberries 
 and asparaguses have probably been in Calcutta a good deal 
 longer than I have. They look like old sojourners ; I wouldn't 
 give them a day under six years. They are doubtless very cheap, 
 but tliink, Helen, of what might happen to my inside if you gave 
 me green pease out of Bow Bazar ! " Mrs. Browne looked 
 aghast. " But I never will, George ! " said she, solemnly. And 
 young Brown made her vow it there and then. " There are two 
 or thi-ee decent European shops here," he said, with unction, 
 " where they make a point of not poisoning more people than 
 they can help. You pay rather largely for that comfortable 
 assurance, I believe, but it's worth having. I'd have more faith 
 in the stability of the family, Helen, if you would promise always 
 to go to them for tinned things." 
 
 Helen promised effusively, and it is to her credit that she al- 
 ways informed young Browne, before consumption, whenever a 
 domestic exigency made her break her word. 
 
 They climbed up a dark and winding stair that led out upon 
 a flat roof, crossed the roof and entered a small room, borrowed 
 from the premises of some other baboo. " Hold your skirts well 
 up, Helen ; it's jnst the place for centipedes," her husband re- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OE A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 63 
 
 IT S JUST THE PLACE FOR CENTIPEDES. 
 
 marked callously; and Mrs. Browne exhibited a disregard for 
 her ankles that would have been remarkable under any other 
 circumstances. 
 
64 THE SIMl'LE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 " Here, you see, sir, all the chairs," stated the little baboo, 
 waving liis hand. " I must tell you, sir, that some are off teak 
 and some off shisham wood. Thee shisham are the superior." 
 
 " You mean, baboo," said young Browne, seriously, " that the 
 shisham are the less inferior. That's a better way of putting it, 
 baboo." 
 
 " Perhaps so, sir. Yessir, doubtless you are right, sir. The 
 less inferior — the more grammatical ! " 
 
 " Precisely. And now about the prices, baboo. What is 
 your exact overcharge for fellows like this ? He's shisham, isn't 
 he? And he's about as sound as any of 'em." 
 
 " Best shisham, sir — perfeckkly sound — not secon' hand — our 
 own make. Feel the weight of thiss, sir ! " 
 
 " All right, baboo — I know. What's the price ? " 
 
 " If thee ladee will just sit down in it for a rainit shee will 
 see how comfortable itiss ! " 
 
 " Trifle no longer, baboo — what's the dom ? " 
 
 " The price off that chair, sir, is eight rupees." 
 
 Mr. Browne sank into it with a pretence at gasping. " You 
 can't mean that, baboo. Nothing like that. Eight rupees ! 
 You're dreaming, baboo. You forget that you only paid two for 
 it. You're dreaming, baboo — or you're joking ! " 
 
 Hurry Doss Mitterjee smiled in deep appreciation of the 
 gentleman's humour. He even chuckled, with a note of depre- 
 cation. 
 
 " Ah, uo, sir ! You will pardon me for saying that is a mis- 
 take, sir ! In bissiness I doo not joke, never ! For those chairs 
 I pay seve7i rupees four annas, sir ! It iss a small profit but it iss 
 con ten table. I doo not ask more, sir ! " 
 
 " This is very sad, baboo ! " said Mr. Browne seriously. 
 " This is very sad, indeed ! I understood that you were a person 
 
THE SIMTLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 65 
 
 of probity, who never asked more than a hundred per cent. But 
 I know the value of shisham chairs, and this is four hundred — 
 Oh, very sad, indeed ! Now see here, I'll give you three rupees 
 apiece for these chairs, and take six." 
 
 " Sala'am ! " said the baboo, touching his forehead with iron- 
 ical gratitude and pushing back the chair. " Nossir ! " 
 
 " You may take them at coss price, sir — at seven four you 
 may take them, and I make no profit : but perhaps I get your 
 custom. Take them — seven four ! " 
 
 Mr. Browne turned away with a slight sigh. " Come along, 
 dear," he said to his wife, " this man sells only to Rajahs and 
 Members of Council." 
 
 The baboo ignored the pleasantry this time — the moment had 
 come for action. " What Ao you give, sir?" he said, following 
 them — " for the sake off bissiness, luhat do you give ? " 
 
 " Four rupees ! " 
 
 " Five eight ! " 
 
 " Four eight, baboo — there ! " 
 
 " Ah, sir, I cannot. Believe me they coss five eight to buy ! " 
 
 " Look here, baboo — I'll give you five rupees apiece for six of 
 those shisham wood chairs, every one as good as this, and I'll 
 pay you when you send them — that's thirty rupees — and not an- 
 other pice ! Helen, be careful of these steps." 
 
 "To what address, sir? Will to-morrow morning be suffi- 
 cient early, sir ? " 
 
 " George ! " exclaimed Helen, as they reached the outer 
 world of Bow Bazar, " what a horrid little cheat of a man ! 
 Did you hear him say at first that they cost seven four to 
 make?" 
 
 " Oh, my dear," young Browne responded, superiorly. 
 " That's a trifle ! You don't know the baboo." 
 
66 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIUn. 
 
 " Well ! " said his wife, admiringly, " I don't know liow you 
 kept your patience, George ! " 
 
 Whereat Mr. Browne looked still more siij)crior, and informed 
 Mrs. Browne that the only way to deal with these fellows was 
 to chaff 'em ; make up your mind in the beginning that you're 
 going to be done in the eye, and act accordingly. They always 
 score, he added, with true Anglo-Indian resignation. 
 
 They bought a table next, from a very fat old gentleman — 
 simply clad — in a beard and a dhoty.* The beard and the dhoty 
 were much the same colour, and both fell so abundantly about 
 his person that it would be difficult to say which was most useful 
 to him as an article of apparel. And his moral obliquity was 
 concealed under more rolls and pads of oily-brown adipose tissue 
 than could often be seen in Bow Bazar. lie must have been a 
 rascal, as young Browne said, or being a Hindu he wouldn't have 
 had a beard. 
 
 It was a small mahogany dining table, second hand, and its 
 owner wanted twenty rupees for it. 
 
 " I tliinh" said young Browne, " that the memsahib might 
 give you fourteen ! " 
 
 The usual humbly sarcastic sala'am — it was a very excellent 
 table — the baboo could not think of parting with it for that. 
 
 " All right ! " said Mr. Browne, " the memsahib says she 
 won't give more than fourteen, and that's very dear. But I'll 
 make you one offer — just one, mind, baboo ! I'll give you fifteen. 
 Now take it or leave it — one word ! " 
 
 The baboo sala'amed so that his beard swept the ground, and 
 fervently refused. 
 
 " Very well, baboo ! Now I don't want it at any price, see 
 if you can bargain with the memsahib." 
 
 * Cloth for legs. 
 
THE SIMFI.E ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 6/ 
 
 " Eighteen rupees, memsahab ! " insinuated the old fellow, 
 " very cheap." 
 
 " No, indeed ! " Helen exclaimed with indignation, rising to 
 the occasion, " I won't give you any more than fourteen." 
 
 " Chotvdrah rvpia, TOe??isa/u'6— /o-teen rupee ! But the sahib 
 he offer fifteen ! " 
 
 " Oh, I don't want it at all now," said the sahib, who stood 
 in the door with his back turned and whistled. " Now you must 
 bargain with the memsahib." 
 
 The baboo looked at his customers anxiously for a moment. 
 " For sixteen rupees you take it," he said. 
 
 " Don't want it," responded Mr. Browne. 
 
 "Alright— for fifteen?" 
 
 " Will you give him fifteen, Helen ? " 
 
 " Certainly not, dear ! Fourteen." 
 
 " Fifteen the sahib say he give ! " cried the baboo, his beard 
 wagging with righteous reproach. " Take it for fifteen ! " But 
 Mr. and Mrs. Browne had made their way out. The baboo fol- 
 lowed reminding and entreating for a hundred yards. They 
 were deaf. Then he wheeled round upon them in front. " Very 
 well, you give me fourteen?" The Brownes went back and left 
 their address, which was weak in them, I consider; but I have 
 no doubt that to this day that bearded baboo considers himself 
 an injured person, and the victim of a most disastrous bando- 
 
 busi.* 
 
 * Bargain. 
 
6S 
 
 77//; SIMPLE AD\'EXTUI<I:S OF A M /■:.]! SA /// /i. 
 
 CUAPTER VII. 
 
 ET'S have them up !" said Mr. 
 Browne. 
 
 Mr. Browne was smoking 
 a cigar after breakfast in his 
 own house. There had been 
 a time when Mr. Browne 
 smoked his morning cigar on 
 his way to office, but that was 
 formerly. The department of 
 tlie tea interest entrusted to 
 Mr. Browne by his firm did 
 not receive his active per- 
 sonal superintendence to the 
 usual extent during the early 
 months of the cold weather 
 of '91. I am aware of this 
 because my husband is a senior partner. Not that the firm 
 minded jiarticularly — they liked young Browne, and I know 
 that we were rather pleased at the time that he had discovered 
 something in the world besides tea. 
 
 The Browncs had been settled some two or three days, and 
 the wheels of their domestic arraTigements had been running 
 with that perfection of unobtrusive smoothness that can be fully 
 e-xpcricuced only in India, so far as I know. The meals had ap- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADX'ENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 69 
 
 peared and disappeared as by magic, the rooms had been swept 
 and dusted and garnished while there was no eye to see, their 
 wishes liad been anticipated, their orders had been carried out in 
 the night, as it seemed. 
 
 " Let's have 'em up ! " suggested Mr. Browne, with reference 
 to the mysterious agents of all this circumstance. Helen wanted 
 to see her servants. 
 
 " Bear-er .' " shouted the sahib, young Browne. 
 
 " Hazur! " * came the answer, in deep tones, from regions be- 
 low, with a sound of bare feet hastily ascending the stair. 
 
 " Hazur holya f " f enquired the bearer in a subdued voice, 
 partially presenting himself at the door. 
 
 " Ha ! " said young Brown, " Dekko, X bearer ! You may sul 
 nokar lao. Sumja f Memsaheb dekna muncta ! " * 
 
 " Bahut atcha ! " \\ responded the bearer, and retired. 
 
 Helen sat up vei-y straight, a little nervous air of apprehen- 
 sion mingled with her dignity. It had been no flippant business 
 in her experience, to interview even a prospective under-house- 
 maid, and presently she would be confronted by a whole retinue. 
 " Why are they so long ? " she asked. 
 
 " They're putting on their clean clothes, and perhaps a little 
 oil in your honour, my dear. They wish to make as radiant an 
 appearance as possible." And in a few minutes later the 
 Brownes' domestic staff followed its leader into the room, where 
 it stood abashed, hands hanging down, looking at the floor. The 
 bearer made a respectful showman's gesture and awaited the 
 pleasure of the sahib. 
 
 * Your honour. J Look 1 
 
 f Your lionour called. | Very good. 
 
 * Bring all the servants. Do you understand ? The menisahib wants to 
 see thoin. 
 
•JO THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 The sahib regarded them quizzically, and softly smoked on, 
 with crossed legs. 
 
 " Dear me ! " said Helen ; " what a lot ! " 
 
 " They are people of infinite leisure, my dear. The accom- 
 plishment of any one thing requires a great many of them. 
 Above all it is necessary that they have peace and long hours to 
 sleep, and an uninterrupted period in which to cook their rice 
 and wash and anoint themselves. You will soon find out their 
 little ways. Now let me explain. They don't understand a 
 word of English. 
 
 " The bearer you know. The bearer brought all the rest and 
 is responsible for them. I have no doubt that he is in honoured 
 receipt of at least half their first month's wages for securing 
 their situations for them. He is their superior officer, and is 
 a person of weight and influence among them, and he's a very 
 intelligent man. I've had him four years. In that time he has 
 looked after me very well, I consider, very well indeed. He 
 knows all about my clothes and keeps them tidy — ^buys a good 
 many of 'em — socks and ties and things, — takes care of my 
 room, rubs me down every evening before dinner, — keeps my 
 money." 
 
 " Keeps your money, George ! " 
 
 " Oh, yes I one can't be bothered with money in this country." 
 
 " Well ! " said his wife. " I think it's quite time you were 
 manied, George. Go on ! " 
 
 George said something irrelevantly foolish and went on. 
 
 " He's perfectly honest, my dear — entirely so. It would be 
 altogether beneath his dignity to misappropriate. And I've al- 
 ways found him moderate in his overcharges. I- took him partly 
 because he had good chits and good manners, and partly because 
 of his ingenuousness. I wanted a man for nine mipees — this 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 71 
 
 chap stood out for ten. By way of argument he remarked that 
 he would probably be purchasing a great many things for the 
 sahib in the bazar — that the sahib might as well give ten in the 
 first place ! I thought there was a logical acumen about that 
 that one didn't come across every day, and engaged him on the 
 spot." 
 
 " But, George — it's — it's almost immoral ! " 
 
 " Very, my dear ! But you'll find it saves a lot of trouble." 
 
 Helen compressed her pretty lips in a way that spoke of a stern 
 determination to adhere to the principles in vogue in Canbury. 
 
 " And I wouldn't advise you to interfere with him too much, 
 Helen, or he'll pray to be allowed to go to his mulluk* and we 
 shall lose a good servant. Of course, I'm obliged to jump down 
 his throat once a month or so — they all need that — but I con- 
 sider him a gentleman, and I never hurt his feelings. You ob- 
 serve the size of his turban, and the dignity of his bearing gener- 
 ally ? Well, so much for the bearer — he gets ten rupees," 
 
 " I've put it down, George." 
 
 " Now the kitmutgar — he's another old servant of mine — the 
 gentleman who has just salaamed to you. You see by his dress 
 that he's a Mussulman. No self-respecting Hindu, as you've 
 read in books of travel which occasionally contain a truth — will 
 wait on you at table. Observe his nether garments how they 
 differ from the bearer's. The B. you see wears a dhoty." 
 
 " A kind of twisted sheet," remarked Helen. 
 
 " Precisely. And this man a regular divided skirt. The 
 thing he wears on his head is not a dinner plate covered with 
 white cotton, as one naturally imagines, but another form of 
 Mussulman millinery— I'm sure I don't know what. But you're 
 
 * Own country. 
 
72 THE SlAfPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIflR. 
 
 never to let him appear in your presence without it. It would be 
 rank disrespect. 
 
 " He is also an old servant," Mr. Browne went on, " because 
 servants do get old in the course of time if one doesn't get rid of 
 them, and I've given up trying to get rid of this one. He's a 
 regular old granny, as you can see from his face ; he's infuriat- 
 ingly incompetent — always poking things at a man that a man 
 doesn't want when a man's got a liver. But he doesn't understand 
 being told to go. I dismissed him every day for a week last hot 
 weather : he didn't allow it to interfere with him in the least — 
 turned up behind my chair next morning as regularly as ever — 
 chose to regard it as a pleasantry of the sahib's. When I went 
 to England, to get engaged to you, my dear, I told him I desired 
 never to look upon his face again. It was the first one I saw 
 when the ship reached the P. and 0. jetty. And there was a 
 smile on it ! AVhat could I do ! And that very night he shot 
 me in the shirt-front with a soda-water bottle. I hand him over 
 to you, my dear — you'll find he'll stay." 
 
 " I like him," said Mrs. Browne, " and I think his conduct 
 has bpen very devoted, George. And he doesn't cheat?" 
 
 " He has no particular opportunity. Now for the cook. 
 This is the cook, I take it. You see he wears nothing on his 
 head but his hair, and that's cut short. Also he wears his par- 
 ticular strip of muslin draped about his shoulders, toga-wise. 
 Also he is of a different cast of countenance, broader, higher 
 cheek-bones, more benevolent. Eemotely he's got a strain of 
 Chinese blood in him — he's probably Moog from Chittagong." 
 
 " Tiim lawarcld hai, eh? " * 
 
 " Gce-ha ! " \ 
 
 * YdU aro the cook t f Worthy one, yes. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHtB. 73 
 
 " Turn Moog hai ? " * 
 
 " Gee-ha!" 
 
 " lie is, you see. Most of the cooks are, and all of them pre- 
 tend to be. 
 
 " Turn sub cheese junta, eh, bawarchi ! " f 
 
 " Gee-ha, hazur ! Hum atcha issoup sumja — atcha sfdish 
 sunija, atcha eepudi?i sumja — subcheese khana kawasti teke sum- 
 ja ! Chittie hai hazur.'" X 
 
 " He says he's a treasure, my dear, but that's a modest state- 
 ment they all make. And he wishes to show you his chits ; will 
 you condescend to look at them ? " 
 
 " What are his chits?" Helen inquired. 
 
 " His certificates from other people whose digestions he has 
 ruined from time to time. Let's see — ' Kali Bagh, cook ' — that's 
 his name apparently, but you needn't remember it, he'll always 
 answer to ' Bawarchi ! ' — ' has been in my service eighteen 
 months, and has generally given satisfaction. He is as clean as 
 any I have ever had, fairly honest, and not inclined to be wasteful. 
 He is dismissed for no fault, but because I am leaving India.' 
 H'm ! I don't think much of chits ! This one probably ought to 
 jead, ' He doesn't get drunk often, but he's lazy, unpunctual, 
 and beats his wife. He has cooked for me eighteen months, 
 because I have been too weak-minded to dismiss him. He now 
 goes by force of circumstances ! ' But it's not a bad chit." 
 
 " I don't consider it a very good one," said Helen. " As clean 
 as any I have ever had ! " 
 
 " That's his profoundest recommendation, my dear ! He 
 probably does not make toast with his toes. 
 
 * You are a Moogf f You know everything? 
 
 X I know good soup, good sidedishes, good puddings. Everything for 
 dinner I know well. Here are recommendations, your honour. 
 6 
 
74 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OE A MEMSAiriB. 
 
 " People are utterly devoid of scruple about chits," Mr. 
 Browne went on, running over the dirty envelopes and long- 
 folded half-sheets of letter-paper. " I've known men, who 
 wouldn't tell a lie under any other circumstances to — to save 
 their souls, calmly sit down and write fervent recommendations 
 of the most whopping blackguards, in the joyful moment of their 
 deliverance, over their own names, perfectly regardless of the im- 
 morality of the thing. It's a curious example of the way the 
 natives' desire to be obliging at any cost comes ofE on us. Now 
 here's a memsahib who ought to be ashamed of herself — ' Kali 
 Bagh is a capital cook. His entrees are delicious, and he always 
 sends up a joint done to perfection. Ilis puddings are perhaps 
 his best point, but his vegetables are quite French. I can 
 thoroughly recommend him to anyone wanting a really first-rate 
 chef. — Mary L. Johnson.' Now we don't want a chef, this man 
 isn't a chef, and Mary Ij. Johnson never had a chef. I knew 
 the lady — she was the wife of Bob Johnson of the Jumna Bank 
 — and they hadn't a pice more to live on than we have ! Chef 
 — upon my word. And yet," said young Browne thoughtfully, 
 " I've had some very decent plain dinners at Bob Johnson's." 
 
 " But what's the use of chits, George, if people don't believe 
 in them ? " 
 
 " Oh, they do believe in 'em implicitly, till they find out the 
 horrible mendacity of 'em. Then they rage about it and send 
 the fellow ofF, with another excellent chit! And one would 
 never engage a servant without chits, you know. You see how 
 they value them — this man's date back to '79. Here's a break, 
 two years ago. — AVhat sahib's cook were you two years ago, Ba- 
 ■warclii?" asked Mr. Browne. 
 
 "Exactly! I thought so, he paid a visit to his mulluk two 
 years ago — that's his own country. In other words, he got a bad 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 'c 
 
 chit from that sahib and was compelled to destroy it. They 
 have always visited their mulluks under those circumstances, 
 for the length of time corresponding to the break. But I guess 
 he'll do — we mustn't expect too much. Twelve rupees." 
 
 The cook took his chits hack and salaamed. Helen looked 
 as if she thought a great deal more might be desired in a cook, 
 but could not bring herself to the point of discussing it in his 
 immediate presence. 
 
 " He seems so very intelligent," she said to herself with a 
 qualm. 
 
 " Now then, for the mussalchi ! Turn mussalchi hai, eh ? " 
 
 " Gee-ha, hazur ! " 
 
 The mussalchi wore a short cotton coat, a dhoty, and an ex- 
 pression of dejection. On his head was a mere suggestion of a 
 turban — an abject rag. Written upon his face was a hopeless 
 longing to become a bawarehi, which fate forbade. Once a mus- 
 salchi, the son of a mussalchi, always a mussalchi, the bearer of 
 hot water and a dish-cloth, the receiver of orders from kitmut- 
 gars. 
 
 " Consider your mussalchi, Helen ! He is engaged to wash 
 the dishes, to keep the silver clean, and the pots and pans. His 
 real mission is to break as many as possible, and to levy large 
 illegal charges upon you monthly for knife-polish and m.ops. 
 In addition he'll carry the basket home from the market every 
 morning on his head — the cook, you know, is much too swagger 
 for that! Think he'll do ? " 
 
 " I don't know," said Helen in unhappy indecision. " What 
 do you think, George ? " 
 
 " Oh we'll try him, and I suppose he'll have to get seven 
 rupees. This is the mallie the gardener — this gentleman with 
 his hair done up neatly behind." 
 
76 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " Nice clean-looking man," remarked Helen, " but oughtn't 
 he to wear more clothes." 
 
 " Looks like a decent chap. No, I should say not ; I never 
 saw a mallie with more on. You see he's a very superior person, 
 a Brahmin in fact. He wears the sacred string, as well as his 
 beads and his dhoty ; do you see it, over his right shoulder and 
 under his left arm. He claims to have been 'twice born.' 
 They're generally of a very respectable /a^ * the mallies." 
 
 " He will take care of the garden," remarked Helen. 
 
 " As we happen to have a garden, yes. But his business is to 
 produce flowers. You want flowers, you engage a mallie. You 
 get flowers. This process of logic is perfectly simple to the na- 
 tive mind. It is nothing but justice and sweet reason. A 
 mallie is a person who causes flowers to appear." 
 
 " But where does he get them ? " 
 
 " Oh, my dear, that is one of the secrets of his profession. 
 But I understand that there's a very wise and liberal understand- 
 ing amongst mallies — and quite a number of mallies have gar- 
 dens attached to them. There's a very old story about a mallie's 
 chit which you haven't heard yet. His departing master gave 
 him an excellent character and summed up by saying : ' This 
 mallie has been with me fifteen years. I have had no garden, 
 I have never lacked flowers, and he has never had a convic- 
 tion.' " 
 
 " George — do you mean to say they steal ! " 
 
 " Oh, no, my dear ! It's a matter of arrangement. This 
 man could never take flowers out of another sahib's garden with- 
 out consulting the other sahib's mallie — that would be very 
 wrong. But we'll see if he can't grow us some for ourselves." 
 
 ♦ Caste. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVEJVTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 77 
 
 " But the other sahib." 
 
 " The other sahib is similarly obliged from somebody else's 
 garden, and doesn't know anything about it. Eight rupees for 
 the mallie." 
 
 Helen put it down with inquietude of spirit. 
 
 " Now for the syce, who looks after the pony. I've had the 
 syce two or three years, too. He's a very good servant now, but 
 he used to give me a lot of trouble by pure laziness. Once he 
 let a pony of mine get a sore back, and never told me, and I 
 licked him. I licked him well, and I consider that licking made 
 a man of him. He realized gradually — he's a stupid chap — that 
 it was undesirable to be licked, especially in the compound with 
 the other servants looking on, and instead of throwing up his 
 place and bringing me before the magistrate for assault, he con- 
 cluded that he wouldn't let it happen again. It never has, and 
 he has respected himself and me more ever since." 
 
 " Do you often ' lick ' them, George ? " 
 
 " Except this once I never have. Neither does anybody else, 
 except a few ill-conditioned young cubs, who haven't been out 
 long enough to understand the native and think they can kick 
 him about to advantage. But decent servants never stay with 
 such men. Indeed they can't get 'em. You've got to have a 
 good character to get good servants, and there isn't a sahib in 
 Calcutta that hasn't a reputation in the bazar. The bearer 
 knows perfectly well I wouldn't touch a hair of his head, and if 
 the bearer went out with cholera to-morrow I could get half a 
 dozen as good in his place. On the other hand, probably all the 
 kitmutgar-lok despise me for keeping such a poor servant as the 
 Kit, and I'd have a difficulty in getting a better one." 
 
 " Curious ! " said Helen. 
 
 " Yes. The syce, my dear, will desire you to pay for quite 
 
78 
 
 TUB SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 twice as much grain and grass as the pony consumes, and for a 
 time you will do it. Bye-aud-bye you will acquire the wisdom 
 of a serpent and cut him accordingly. In the meantime he's 
 bound to have as much sugar-cane on hand as you want to feed 
 the pony witli, at a fixed charge of four annas a month. Don't 
 forget that the syce's tnlub is eight rupees. 
 
 " This very smug and smiling person is the dhoby, the wash- 
 erwoman, lie is an. unmitigated rascal. There is no pallia- 
 tion for anything he does. He carries off your dirty linen every 
 week in a very big pack on a very little donkey, and brings it 
 home on the same, beating the donkey all the way there and all 
 the way back. He mismatches your garments with other peo- 
 ple's, he washes them with country soap that smells to heaven if 
 you don't watch him. His custom in cleaning them is to beat 
 them violently between two large and jagged stones. He com- 
 bines all the vices of his profession upon the civilized globe ; 
 but I'm afraid you'll have to find out for yourself, dear. Put 
 down the dhoby at ten. 
 
 " This excessively modest person is the bheesty, who brings 
 us water every day in a goat-skin. He isn't used to polite so- 
 ciety, but he's a very worthy and hard-working sort. He's only 
 a ticca-bheesty. I fancy several people about here use him. 
 You see his sole business in life is carrying water about in goat- 
 skins. So we only give him three rupees. 
 
 " The sweeper is out on the veranda. Very properly he 
 doesn't venture into our presence. He is of very low caste — 
 does the sweeping and all the menial work, you know. You are 
 never to see or speak to him, or you'll be lowered in the respect 
 of the compound. The sweeper is a very poor sort of person — 
 he is the only servant in the place that will eat the remains of 
 our food. He gets six rupees." 
 
rilE SIMri.E ADl-EXrCKI-.S OF A MF.MSAIIIR. 
 
 79 
 
 " Is that all?" asked Helen. "I'm sure I don't know them 
 apart." 
 
 " That's all, except your ayah, who isn't here, and a durwan 
 to keep the door, whom we'll get when we're richer, and a durzie 
 
 A VERY WORTHY AND II A RDWORKINd SORT. 
 
 to mend our clothes, whom we'll get when they begin to wear out. 
 May they be dismissed now ? " 
 
 "Oh, yes, please r' said Helen, and '' Bahut atcha? Trmi 
 jane sitcta" * remarked her husband, whereat they salaamed and 
 departed in single file. 
 
 Mjii may go. 
 
8o THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " But George," said Helen, " they come, with my ayah at 
 eleven, to eighty-five rupees a month ! Almost seven pounds ! 
 I thought servants were cheap in India ! " 
 
 " No, dear, they're not ; at least, not in Calcutta. And these 
 are the very least we can have to be at all comfortable." 
 
 The two Brownes looked at each other with a slight shade of 
 domestic anxiety. This was dispelled by the foolish old con- 
 sideration of how little anything really mattered, now that they 
 were one Browne, and presently they were disporting themselves 
 behind the pony on the Maidan, leaving the cares of their house- 
 hold to those who were most concerned in them. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIP. gj 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 A WEEK later Helen took over the accounts. In the mean- 
 time she had learned to count rupees and annas, pi and 
 pice, also a few words of that tongue in which orders are given 
 in Calcutta. She arose on the seventh morning of her tenure of 
 office rigidly determined that the office should no longer be a 
 sinecure. She would drop curiosity and pleasure, and assume 
 discipline, righteousness and understanding. She would make a 
 stand. She would deal justly, but she would make a stand. It 
 would be after George had gone to office. When he came home, 
 tired with tea affairs, he would not be compelled to rack his brain 
 further with the day's marketing. He would see that the lady 
 he had made Mrs. Browne was capable of more than driving 
 about in a tum-tum and writing enthusiastic letters home about 
 the beauties of Calcutta. 
 
 George went to office. The kitmutgar softly removed the 
 blue and white breakfast things. Outside the door, in the " bot- 
 tle khana," the mussalchi, squatting, washed them in an earthen 
 bowl with a mop-stick. It occurred to Helen that she might as 
 well begin by going to look at the mussalchi, and she did. She 
 looked at him with a somewhat severe expression, thereby caus- 
 ing him dismay and terror. She walked all round the mussalchi, 
 but found nothing about him to criticise. "But, probably," 
 thought she, as she went back to the dining-room, " my looking 
 at him had its moral effect." Then she sent for the cook. 
 
82 THE SIMPLE ADVEA'TCRES OF A MEMSAIJfB. 
 
 The cook arrived with an expression of deep solemnity, tem- 
 pered by all the amiable qualities you can think of. He held in 
 his hand an extremely dirty piece of paper, covered with strange 
 characters in Nagri — how little anybody would have thought, 
 when they were designed in the dawn of the world, that they 
 would ever be used to indicate the items of an Englishman's din- 
 ner ! The co»k put a pair of spectacles on to read them, which 
 completed the anomaly, and made him look more benevolent than 
 ever. 
 
 " Well, bawarchi," said Helen, ready with pencil and note 
 book, " account hai ? " 
 
 " Gee-ha, hai ! " responded he. Then after a respectful pause, 
 " S'in-beef," he said, " char anna." 
 
 " Shin beef," repeated Helen, with satisfaction, " four annas. 
 Yes?" 
 
 " Fiss — che * anna. Bress mutton — egrupee, che anna. 
 Eggis — satrah — ahtf anna." 
 
 " Seventeen eggs, bawarchi ? When did we eat seventeen 
 eggs ? How did we eat seventeen eggs yesterday ? " 
 
 Mrs. Browne spoke impulsively, in English, but Kali Bagh 
 seemed to understand, and with an unruffled front proceeded 
 to account circumstantially for every egg. His mistress was 
 helpless. But, «' to-morrow," thought she earnestly, " I will see 
 whether he puts four in the soup ! " 
 
 The cook went on to state that since yesterday the Browne 
 family had consumed three seers of potatoes— six pounds — at two 
 annas a seer, which would be six annas. " And I don't believe 
 that, either," mentally ejaculated Mrs. Browne, but Kali Bagh 
 continued without flinching. He chronicled salt, pepper, sauce, 
 
 * Six. t Eight. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAfffR. 
 
 83 
 
 sugar, he mentioned rice, dhal, " garden-isspice," " guava isstew," 
 " k'rats,"* " kiss-miss,"f " maida,"! and enough " mukkan"* to 
 have supplied a charity-school. Helen was amazed to find the 
 number of culinary articles which undeniably might have been 
 used in the course of twenty-four hours — she did not consider 
 the long calm evening that went to meditation over the list. 
 When it was finished she found that the day's expenses in food 
 had been exactly eight rupees six annas, or about eleven shillings. 
 Helen had had a thrifty education, and she knew this was absurd. 
 She turned to the flagrant eggs and to the unblushing potatoes, 
 and she made a calculation. 
 
 " Bawarchi ! " said she, " Potatoes — four annas. Eggs — five 
 annas, dag a." |{ 
 
 " Bahut atcha ! " said the cook, without remonstrance. He 
 still had twenty-five per cent of profit. 
 
 Helen observed, and was encouraged. She summoned up her 
 sternest look, and drew her pencil through the total. " Eight 
 rupees," she remarked with simplicity, " daga na. Fiv» rupees 
 daga," and she closed the book. 
 
 Kali Bagli looked at her with an expression of understanding, 
 mingled with disappointment. He did not expect all he ask6d, 
 but he expected more than he got. As it was, his profit 
 amounted only to two rupees, not much for a poor man with a 
 family. But in after days, when his memsabib grew in general 
 sagacity and particular knowledge of the bazar. Kali Bagh had 
 reason to look back regretfully to those two rupees as to the brief 
 passing of a golden age. 
 
 " I will now go down," said Mrs. Browne with enthusiasm, 
 "and look at his pots." 
 
 • Carrots. X Flour. | I will give. 
 
 f Raisins. * Butter. 
 
$4 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 The compound, as she crossed it, was full of the eternal sun- 
 light of India, the gay shrill gossip of the mynas, the hoarse 
 ejaculations of the crows. A flashy little green parrot flew out of 
 a hibiscus bush by the wall in full crimson flower ; he belonged 
 to the jungle. But a pair of grey pigeons cooed to each other 
 over the building of their nest in the cornice of a pillar of the 
 Brownes' upper veranda. They had come to stay, and they 
 spoke of the advantages of co-operative housekeeping with an- 
 other young couple like themselves, knowing it to be on a safe 
 and permanent basis. The garden was all freshly scratched and 
 tidy ; there was a pleasant smell of earth ; the mallie, under a pi- 
 pal tree, gathered up its broad dry fallen leaves to cook his rice 
 with. It was a graphic bit of economy, so pleasantly close to 
 nature that its poetry was plain. " We are the only people who 
 are extravagant in India," thought Helen, as she regarded the 
 mallie, and in this reflection I venture to say that she was quite 
 correct. 
 
 The door of the bawarchi khana * was open — it was never 
 shut. I am not sure, indeed, that there was a door. There were 
 certainly no windows. It is possible that the bawarchi khana was 
 seven feet square, and its mistress was just able to stand up straight 
 in it with a few inches to spare. It contained a shelf, a table, 
 and a stove. When Kali Bagh sat down he used his heels. The 
 shelf and the table were full of the oil and condiments dear to the 
 heart of every bawarchi. The stove was an erection like a tene- 
 ment house, built with what was left over from the walls, and artis- 
 tically coloured pink to be like them. It contained various hol- 
 lows on the top, in one or two of which charcoal was glowing — 
 beyond this I cannot explain its construction to be plain to un- 
 
 * Cook-house. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A. MEMSAHIB. 
 
 85 
 
 derstandings accustomed to the kitchen ranges of Christianity 
 and civilisation. But nothing ever went wrong with Kali Bagh's 
 stove, the boiler never leaked, the hot water pipes never burst, 
 the oven never required relining, the dampers never had to be re- 
 regulated. He was its presiding genius, he worked it with a 
 palm leaf fan, and nothing would induce him to look at a modern 
 improvement. Kali Bagh was a conservative institution himself, 
 his recipes were an heritage, he was the living representative of 
 an immemorial dustur. * Why should Kali Bagh afflict himself 
 with the ways of the memsahib ! 
 
 The bawarchi khana had another door, opening into a rather 
 smaller apartment, otherwise lightless and airless, which con- 
 tained Kali Bagh's wardrobe and bed. The wardrobe was ele- 
 mentary and hung upon a single peg, the bed consisted of four 
 short legs and a piece of matting. Kali Bagh had reposed him- 
 self on it, and was already snoring, when Mrs. Browne came in. 
 He had divested himself of his chuddar and his spectacles, and 
 looked less of a philosopher and more of an Aryan. Mrs. Browne 
 made a rude clatter among the pans, which brought him to a 
 sense of her disturbing presence. Presently she observed him 
 standing behind her, looking anxious. His mistress sniffed about 
 intrepidly. She lifted saucepan lids and discovered within re- 
 mains of concoctions three days old ; she found the day's milk in 
 an erstwh ile kerosene tin ; she lifted a kettle and intruded upon 
 the privacy of a large family of cockroaches, any one of them as 
 big as a five-shilling piece. Kali Bagh would never have dis- 
 turbed them. She found messes and mixtures and herbs and 
 spices and sauces which she did not understand and could not 
 approve. The day's marketing lay in a flat basket under the 
 
 * Custom. 
 
86 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 table. Helen drew it forth and discovered a live pigeon indiscrim- 
 inately near the mutton with its wings twisted around one an- 
 other at the joint, while from beneath a debris of potatoes, beans 
 and cauliflower, came a feeble and plaintive " Quack ! " 
 
 "What is this?" said Mrs. Browne with paler and sterner 
 criticism, looking into a pot that was bubbling on the fire. 
 
 " Chaul hai, memsahib ! Hamara khana ! " * 
 
 " Your, dinner, bawarchi ! All that rice ? " And, indeed, 
 therein was lio justification for Kali Bagh. It was not only 
 his dinner, but the dinner of the sweeper and of the syce and of 
 the mussalchi, to be supplied to them a trifle below current 
 market rates, and Mrs. Browne had paid for it all that morning. 
 Helen found herself confronted with her little domestic corner of 
 the great problem of India — the natives' " way." But she had 
 no language with which to circumvent it or remonstrate with it. 
 She could only decide that Kali Bagh was an eminently proper 
 subject for discipline, and resolve to tell George, which was not 
 much of an expedient. It is exactly what we all do in India, 
 however, under the circumstances. We tell our superior offi- 
 cers, until at last the Queen Empress herself is told; and the 
 Queen-Empress is quite as incapable of further procedure as Mrs. 
 Browne ; indeed, much more so, for she is compelled to listen to 
 the voice of her parliamentary wrangling-machine upon the mat- 
 ter, which obeys the turning of a handle, and is a very fine piece 
 of mechanism indeed, but not absolutely reliable when it delivers 
 ready-made opinions upon Aryan problems. At least I am quite 
 sure that is my husband's idea, and I have often heard young 
 Browne say the same thing. 
 
 There was a scattering to right and left when Helen reap- 
 
 " It is rice, memsahib ; my dinner. 
 
^'':^^ 
 
 'WHAT IS THISt" SAID MRS. BROWNK, WITH PALER AND STERNER CRITICISM. 
 
88 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 peared in the compound. Her domestics were not dressed to re- 
 ceive her, and they ran this way and that, noiselessly like cock- 
 roaches to their respective holes. There seemed to be a great 
 many of them, more by at least half-a-dozen than were properly 
 accredited to the house ; and Helen was afterwards informed that 
 they were the hhai * of the other servants, representing a fraction 
 of the great unemployed of Asia, who came daily for fraternal 
 gossip in the sun and any patronage that might be going. They 
 were a nuisance, these bhai, and were soon sternly put down by 
 the arm of the law and the edict of the sahib, who enacted that 
 no strange native should be allowed to enter the compound with- 
 out a chit. " It's the only way to convince them," said he, " that 
 the Maidan is the best place for public meetings." 
 
 The quarters of the syce and the pony were the only ones that 
 invited further inspection. The same roof sheltered both of these 
 creatures of service, a thatched one ; but between them a primi- 
 tive partition went half way up. On one side of this the pony 
 was tethered and enjoyed the luxuries of his dependence, on the 
 other the syce lived in freedom, but did not fare so well. The 
 pony's expenses were quite five times as heavy. His food cost 
 more, his clothes cost more, his medical attendance cost more, to 
 say nothing of his requiring a valet. He was much the more 
 valuable animal of the two, though the other is popularly be- 
 lieved in England to have a soul. His wants were even more 
 elaborately supplied than the syce's— he had a trough to feed 
 from, and a pail to drink out of, a fresh bed every night, a box 
 for his grain, and a curry-comb for his skin ; while the syce's do- 
 mestic arrangements consisted of an earthenware pot, a wooden 
 stick, and a rickety charpoy. When he was cold he borrowed 
 
 * Caste-brothers. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 89 
 
 the pony's blanket, and I never heard of any toUet articles in 
 connection with him. The accommodation was not equally 
 divided between him and the pony, either. The pony had at least 
 twice as much, and it was in better repair. 
 
 The pony looked much askance at Helen. He was accus- 
 tomed only to the race of his dark-skinned servitor. The sahib 
 with his white face and strange talk he associated with the whip 
 and being made to pull an objectionable construction upon 
 wheels from which he could not get away; but a memsahib 
 might be something of inconceivable terror — her petticoats 
 looked like it. Therefore the pony withdrew himself into a re- 
 mote comer of his stable, where he stood looking ineffably silly, 
 and declined to be seduced by Split pieces of sugar-cane or wheed- 
 ling words. 
 
 " Gorah atcha hai ? " * asked Helen, and was assured that he 
 was very " atcha," that his grain he ate, his grass he ate, his 
 water he ate, and "cubbi kooch na iolta " " he never said any- 
 thing whatever," which was the final proof of his flourishing 
 condition. 
 
 It was getting a little discouraging, but Helen thought that 
 before retreating she might at least inspect the bearer's cow, a 
 cow being a gentle domestic animal, of uniform habits, all the 
 world over. One's own cow is a thorn in the flesh and a source 
 of ruin, in India. She declines to give milk, except to the out- 
 side world at so much a 8eer,f she devours abnormal quantities of 
 food, she is neglected and becomes depraved, being nobody's par- 
 ticular business. But it is impossible to draw lacteal supplies 
 from an unknown source in India. It is paying a large price for 
 cholera bacilli, which is absurd, since one can get them almost 
 
 * Is the horse well f f Two pounds. 
 
 7 
 
go THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 anywhere for nothing. To say nothing of the depravity of the 
 milk-wallah,* who strains his commodity through his dhoty, and 
 replenishes his cans from the first stagnant tank he comes to. 
 The wise and advisable thing is to permit the bearer, as a 
 gracious favour, to keep a cow on the premises and to supply the 
 family at current rates. It is a source of income to him, and of 
 confidence to yon, while the cow does her whole duty in that 
 clean and comfortable state whereto she is called. The bearer, 
 too, is honoured and dignified by the possession of the sacred 
 animal. He performs every office for her himself, though he 
 would scorn to bring a pail of water to a horse, and he is happy 
 to live in the odour of her sanctity. Helen discovered the cow 
 of their establishment tied with her calf outside the best " go- 
 down " in the compound — the largest and cleanest — which she 
 occupied at night. The bearer himself had not nearly such good 
 quarters, and this was of his own dispensation. Sha wore a 
 string of blue beads around her horns, and munched contentedly 
 at a large illegal breakfast of straw which had been bought and 
 paid for to supply the pony's bed. 
 
 " Poor cooey ! " said Helen, advancing to attempt a familiar- 
 ity, but the cow put down her head and made such a violent 
 lunge at her that she beat a hasty and undignified retreat. This 
 was partly on account of the calf, which stood a little way off, 
 but well within the maternal vision, and it was quite an unrea- 
 sonable demonstration, as the calf was stuffed, and put there to 
 act upon the cow's imagination only. This is a necessary ex- 
 pedient to ensure milk in India from a cow that has no calf of 
 her own ; it is a painful imposition, but uniformly successful. 
 The fact is one of reputation, as being the only one invariably 
 
 * Man. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. gi 
 
 rejected by travellers as a lively lie, whereas they are known to 
 swallow greedily much larger fictions than stuffed calves. 
 
 From an upper window, shortly after, Helen saw the cow's 
 morning toilet being performed by the bearer. And it was an 
 instructive sight to see this solemn functionary holding at arm's 
 length the utmost end of her tail, and with art and precision im- 
 proving its appearance. 
 
 In the cool of the evening after dinner, the two Brownes sat 
 together in the shadow of the pillars of their upper veranda, 
 and Helen told the story of her adventure in the compound. 
 Overhead the pigeons cooed of their day's doings, the pony 
 neighed from his stable in the expectation of his content. A 
 light wind stirred the palms where they stood against the stars, 
 the smoke of the mallie's pipal leaves curled up faintly from his 
 roof where he dwelt beside the gate. Below, in the black shadow 
 of the godowns, easeful figures sat or moved, the subdued tones 
 of their parley hardly came to the upper veranda. They had 
 rice and rest and the comfortable hubble-bubble. And the sahib 
 and the memsahib devised how they might circumvent these 
 humble people in all their unlawful doings, till the air grew 
 chill with the dew, and the young moon showed over their 
 neighbour's tamarind tree. 
 
92 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 MRS. BROWNE'S ayah was a little Mussulman woman of 
 about thirty-five, with bright eyes and an expression of 
 great woridly wisdom upon her small, square, high-boned face. 
 She dressed somewhat variously, but her official garments were a 
 short jacket and a striped cotton petticoat, a string of beads 
 round her neck, silver bangles on her arms and ankles, hoops in 
 her ears, and a small gold button in her right nostril. This last 
 bit of coquetry affected Helen uncomfortably for some tim6. 
 Her name was Chua, signifying " a rat," and her heathen spon- 
 sors showed rather a fine discrimination in giving it to her. She 
 was very like one. It would be easy to fancy her nibbling in the 
 dark, or making unwarrantable investigations when honest peo- 
 ple were asleep. When Chua was engaged and questioned upon 
 the subject of remuneration, she salaamed very humbly, and said, 
 " What the memsahib pleases," which was ten rupees. At this 
 Chua's countenance fell, for most of the ayahs of her acquaint- 
 ance received twelve. Accepting the fact, however, that her mis- 
 tress was not a " burra memsahib " * from whom much might 
 be expected, but a " chota memsahib " f from whom little could 
 be extracted, she went away content, and spread her mat in the 
 women's place in the mosque and bowed many times to the west 
 as the sun went down, and paid at least four annas to the moulvi\ 
 who had helped her to this good fortune. 
 
 * Great memsahib, f Little memsahib. % Priest. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 03 
 
 Chua abode in her own house, as is the custom of ayaha with 
 family ties. She was married — ^her husband was a kitmutgar. 
 Tliey lived in a bustee in the very middle of Calcutta, where 
 dwelt several other kitmutgars and their wives, a dhoby and a 
 number of goats, and Chua walked out every morning to her 
 work. Then home at twelve to cook her food and sleep, then 
 back at four for further duty until after dinner. She never 
 breakfasted before starting in the morning, but she carried with 
 her always a small square tin box from which she refreshed her- 
 self surreptitiously at intervals. Inside the box was only a rolled - 
 up betel leaf, and inside the leaf a dab of white paste ; but it was 
 to Chua what the hubble-bubble was to Abdul, her husband, a 
 great and comfortable source of meditation upon the goodness of 
 Allah, and the easiest form of extortion to be practised upon her 
 lawful taskmistress. 
 
 Helen found great difficulty at first in assimilating this hand- 
 maid into her daily life. She had been told that an ayah was 
 indispensable, and she could accept Chua as a necessary append- 
 age to the lofty state of her Oriental existence, but to find occu- 
 pation for her became rather a burden to the mind of Mrs. Browne. 
 Things to do were precious, she could not spare them to be done 
 by anybody else, even at ten rupees a month with the alternative 
 of improper idleness. Moreover, the situation was in some re- 
 spects embarrassing. One could have one's ribbons straightened 
 and one's hair brushed with equanimity, but when it came to the 
 bathing of one's feet and the putting on of one's stockings Helen 
 was disposed to dispense with the services of her ayah as verging 
 on the indelicate. Chua was still more grieved when her mis- 
 tress utterly declined to allow herself to be " punched and prod- 
 ded," as she expressed it, in the process of gentle massaging in 
 which the ayah species are proficient. Mrs. Browne was young 
 
CHUA. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHTB. qc 
 
 then, and a new comer, and not of a disposition to brook any 
 interference with her muscular tissues. But the other day she 
 particularly recommended an ayah to me on account of this 
 accomplishment. This to illustrate, of course, not the degenera- 
 tion of Mrs. Browne's sense of propriety, but of her muscular 
 tissues. 
 
 The comprehension and precise knowledge which Chua at 
 once obtained of her mistress's wardrobe and effects was wonder- 
 ful in its way. She knew the exact contents of every box and 
 drawer and wardrobe, the number of pen-nibs in the writing-case, 
 the number of spools in the workbasket. Helen used to feel, in 
 the shock of some disclosure of observation extraordinary, as if 
 the omniscient little woman had made an index of her mistress's 
 emotions and ideas as well, and could lay her small skinny brown 
 finger upon any one of them, which intuition was very far from 
 being wrong. Chua early induced an admiring confidence in 
 her rectitude by begging Mrs. Browne to make a list of all her 
 possessions so that from time to time she could demonstrate 
 their safety. The aj'ah felt herself responsible. She knew that 
 upon the provocation of a missing embroidered petticoat there 
 might be unpleasant results connected with the police-wallah and 
 the thana* not only for her but for the whole establishment, and 
 she wished to be in a secure position to give evidence, if neces- 
 sary, against somebody else. It could certainly not be Chua, 
 therefore, Helen announced, when she communicated to her lord 
 at the breakfast table the fact that her very best scissors had been 
 missing for three days. " Isn't it tedious ? " said she. 
 
 " Scissors," said young Browne. " Yes, good new shiny sharp 
 ones, weren't they, with Kodgers' name plainly stamped on them 
 — and rather small ? " 
 
 * Police oflRce, 
 
96 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " All that," lamented Helen, " and embroidery size — such 
 loves ! " 
 
 " You are gradually coming within the operation of custom, 
 my dear. Steel is the weakness of the Aryan. ^ He — in this 
 
 case she — will respect your 
 clothes, take care of your 
 money, and guard your jew- 
 ellery — they all have a gen- 
 eral sense of property in its 
 correct relation, but it does 
 not apply to a small pair 
 of scissors or a neat pocket 
 knife. Such things seem 
 to yield to some superior 
 attraction outside the moral 
 sense connected with these 
 people, and they invariably 
 disappear. It's inveterate, 
 but it's a nuisance. One 
 has to make such a row." 
 
 " George," said Helen 
 gravely, " why do you say 
 in this case site ? " 
 
 " I think you'll find it 
 
 was your virtuous maid, my 
 
 dear. It wasn't the bearer 
 
 — he has permitted me to 
 
 keep the same knife and 
 
 nail scissors now for two years and a half, and the rest of the 
 
 servants, all but the ayah, are the bearer's creatures, and will 
 
 reflect exactly his morality in quality and degree. She isn't — 
 
 AN ACCIDENT DISCLOSED THEM AT THE 
 BOTTOM OF AN IMPOSSIBLE VASE. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 97 
 
 she's an irresponsible functionary, except to you ; you'll haye to 
 keep an eye on her. However, if we make ourselves patiently 
 and unremittingly disagreeable for a week or two they'll turn up." 
 
 " I haven't the Hindustani to be disagreeable in," Helen re- 
 marked. 
 
 " Oh, you needn't be violent ; just inquire at least three times 
 a day, ' Humara kinchi, kidder gia ? ' * and look forbidding the 
 rest of the time. Never dream for a moment they're stolen or 
 admit they're lost. It's a kind of worry she won't be able to stand 
 — she'll never know what you're going to do. And she'll con- 
 clude it's cheaper in the end to restore them." 
 
 I don't know whether the Brownes made themselves as disa- 
 greeable as they might about the kinchi, but it was a long time be- 
 fore they were restored. Then an accident disclosed them at the 
 bottom of an impossible vase. Chua, standing by, went through 
 an extravaganza of gratification. Her eyes shone, she laughed 
 and clasped her hands with dramatic effect. " Eggi bat " f — 
 would the memsahib inform the sahib and also the bearer that 
 they had been found ? — the latter evidently having resorted lately 
 to some nefarious means of extracting from her what she had 
 done with them. Chua had doubtless had an uncomfortable 
 quarter of an hour before her mistress discovered them, and felt 
 unjustly served in it. For the theft was only a prospective one, 
 to be accomplished in the course of time, if it looked advisable. 
 It did not look advisable and Chua reconsidered it, thereby leav- 
 ing her Mohammedan conscience void of offence. 
 
 As soon as she was able to understand and be understood, 
 Helen thought it her duty to make some kindly enquiries about 
 Chua's domestic affairs. Had she, for instance, any children ? 
 
 * My scissors, where have they gone? f One word. 
 
g8 THE SIaMPLE -ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 "Na, memsahib ! ''' she responded, with a look of assumed 
 contempt that conld not have sat more emphatically upon the 
 face of any fin de siecle lady who does not believe in babies. 
 "J3aba hai na ! Baba na nmncta," * she went on with a large 
 curl of the lip, *• Baba all time cry kiirta \ — Waow ! Waow ! 
 atcha na, J memsahib ! " 
 
 " Oh na, ayah ! Baba atcha hai," laughed Helen, defending 
 the sacredest theory of her sex. 
 
 Chua took an attitude of self-effacement, but her reply had 
 a patronising dignity, " Memsahib kawasti baba atcha hai" said 
 she. " Memsahib kawasti kooch kain hai na ! Ayah ka kam 
 hai ! Tub baba atcha na — kooch na nmncta ! " * 
 
 Chua occupied quite the modern ground, which was exhila- 
 rating in an Oriental, and doubtless testified to the march of 
 truth — that babies were only practicable and advisable when 
 their possible mothers could find nothing better to do. Helen 
 was impressed, and more deeply so when she presently discovered 
 that Chua and Abdul, her husband, lived in different houses in 
 the bustee I have mentioned — different huts, that is, mud-baked 
 and red-tiled and leaking, and offering equal facilities for the 
 intrusion of the ubiquitous goat. Chua spoke of Abdul with an 
 angry flash of contempt. In accommodating himself to circum- 
 stances reccTitly, Abdul had offended her very deeply. It was 
 on an occasion when Chua had accompanied a memsahib to 
 England with the usual infant charge. She was very sick, she 
 earned a hundred and fifty rupees, she was away three months — 
 "■'kali tin mahina,\ memsahib!" and when she returned she 
 
 * I do not want babies. f Makes crying. X Not good. 
 
 « For tlie memsahib babies are good. The memsahib has no work to 
 do. The ayah has work. Then babies arc not good, she does not want 
 any ! ) Only three months. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. qq 
 
 found Abdul mated to another. She was artful, was Chua — her 
 mistress's face expressed such a degree of disapprobation that 
 she fancied herself implicated, and instantly laughed to throw a 
 triviality over Abdul's misconduct. It was a girl he married, a 
 mere child " laha kamafik, * memsahib " — fourteen years old. 
 But her scorn came through the mask of her amusement when 
 she went on to state that the house of Abdul was no longer with- 
 out its olive branch, but that Abdul's sahib had gone away and 
 there was very little rice for anybody in that family. The recre- 
 ant had come to her in his extremity, asking alms, she said with 
 her curled lip. " Enpia do-o ! " f she whined, holding out her 
 hand and imitating his suppliance with intensest irony. Then 
 drawing herself up proudly she rehearsed her answer brief, con- 
 temptuous, and to the point. 
 
 " Daga na ! — Jao / " J 
 
 She had invested the proceeds of her journey over the " black 
 water " in a ticca- gharry which lent itself all day long to the 
 Calcutta public under her administration and to her profit. 
 The day after Helen had been thus edified, the ayah did not ap- 
 pear until the afternoon. She had been to law about some point 
 in relation to the ticca-gharry. I can't remember what Mrs. 
 Browne said it was — but she wanted an advance of wages for her 
 legal expenses. She intended to spare nothing to be triumphant 
 — her adversary had trusted his case to a common vakeel, * she 
 would have a gorah-vakeel, || though they came higher. Her 
 witnesses would be properly paid too — a rupee apiece, and eight 
 annas extra for any necessary falsification at present unexpected. 
 The next afternoon she came late, with a tale of undeserved dis- 
 aster which she lucubrated with indignant tears, after the man- 
 
 * Like a baby. X I ^'H not give 1 Go ! 1 Literally, horse-lawyer. 
 
 ■)• Ten rupees. * Lawyer. 
 
lOo THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 ner of her sex. It was not that the magistrate sahib was not 
 fair, he was just as the snn at noon, or that Rahim the gharry- 
 wallah had more witnesses than she — indeed, being a poor man, 
 he had only four — but they were four of the five, unhappily, 
 whose serrices she had engaged. The gharry-wallah had offered 
 them two rupees — a higher bid — and so they spoke jute bat* 
 But he would never be able to pay ! Oh, it was very carab ! f 
 and Ghua sat in the dust and wrapped her face in her sariX and 
 wept again. Later, she informed her mistress that it was pos- 
 sible she might again be absent to-morrow — it was possible that 
 she might come into contact that evening in the street with 
 these defaulting witnesses — violent contact. It was possible 
 that if they laughed at her she would strike them, and then — 
 with an intensely observing eye always upon Helen — then her 
 memsahib, in the event of her being carried off to the thana 
 for assault, would of course enquire " Hamara ayah, kidder 
 hat?"* and immediately take proceedings to get her out. 
 Chua's countenance fell, though with instant submission, when 
 Helen informed her sternly that she would on no account insti- 
 tute such proceedings, and she was deprived even of illegal 
 means of satisfaction, taken with impunity. 
 
 It was Chua's aptitude for assault that led to her final expul- 
 sion from the service of the Brownes and from the pages of 
 these annals. Her manner toward the bearer had been pro- 
 pitiatory from the beginning. She called him " Sirdar," || she 
 paid him florid Oriental compliments ; by the effacement of her 
 own status and personality she tried to establish a friendly un- 
 derstanding with him. She undertook small services on his 
 behalf. She attempted to owe him allegiance as the other serv- 
 
 * False talk. J Head cloth. | Head bearer, 
 
 t Bad. * M7 ayah, where is she t 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. loi 
 
 ants did. It is imposeible to say that she did not press upon 
 him a percentage of her tulah, to ensure his omnipotent good 
 will. But Kasi was for some dark reason unreciprocal — young 
 Browne believed he thought she was storming his affections — 
 and at best consented only to preserve an armed neutrality. 
 Whereat Chua became resentful and angry, carried her head 
 high, and exchanged remarks with Kasi which were not in the 
 nature of amenities. The crisis came one afternoon when the 
 Brownes were out. 
 
 " I have something to tell you after dinner," said Mrs. 
 Browne significantly later, across the joint. 
 
 "And I have something to tell you" young Browne re- 
 sponded with equal meaning. 
 
 Mrs. Browne had the first word, in order, her husband said, 
 that she shouldn't have the last. She explained that she had 
 found the ayah in tears, quite extinguished upon the floor, the 
 cause being insult. Chua had forgotten at noon the little bright 
 shawl which she wrapped about her head in the streets — had left 
 it upon the memsahib's veranda. Seeing it, the bearer had done 
 a deadly thing. He had not touched it himself, but he had sent 
 for the sweeper — the sweeper ! — and bade him fenk-do * it to his 
 own unclean place of living. And there, after much search, had 
 Chua found it. Therefore was she deeply abased, and therefore 
 did she tender her resignation. The bearer had behaved Rajah 
 kamafik ! f and had, moreover, spoken to her in bat that was 
 carah, very carab. 
 
 " Yes," said the sahib, judicially, " and the bearer came to 
 me also weeping with joined hands to supplicate. His tale of 
 woe is a little different. He declares he never saw the shawl 
 
 • Throw. t Like n lord 1 
 
I02 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 and never gave the order — I've no doubt he did both — but that 
 the sweeper acted upon his own responsibility. And what do 
 you think the ayah did in revenge ? She slippered him ! — all 
 round the compound ! The bearer, poor chap, fled in disorder, 
 but couldn't escape. He has undoubtedly been slippered. And 
 in the presence of the whole compound ! It's worse — infinitely 
 worse — than having his puggri * knocked off in ribaldry. And 
 now he says that though he has served me faithfully all these 
 years, and I am his father and his aiother, his honour has been 
 damaged in this place, and he prays to be allowed to depart." 
 
 " Slippered him, George ! but he's such a big man and she 
 such a little woman! All round the compound! Oh," said 
 George's wife, giving way to unseemly hilarity, " I should like to 
 have seen that ! " 
 
 " Little termagant ! Oh, it was the insult he ran from, my 
 dear — not the blow. That she — an ayah and the wife of a kit- 
 mntgar, should have touched him with the sole of her shoe! 
 Don't laugh, dear — they'll hear you, and I'd rather they didn't." 
 
 The Brownes held further debate, and took all the circum- 
 stances into consideration. Young Browne had evidently ar- 
 rived immediately at a judicial view of the case, though he pro- 
 fessed himself willing to let the bearer go if Helen wanted to 
 retain Chua. " Though in that case there'll be anarchy, my 
 dear, I warn you," said he. The result was a solemn gathering 
 of the servants next morning upon the veranda, addressed by 
 young Browne, while the memsahib sat up straight in another 
 chair and looked serious. He took no evidence, there would 
 have been too much, but he spoke thus: 
 
 " There was yesterday a great disturbance in the compound, 
 
 • Turban. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 103 
 
 which is a shameful thing. Those who thus made great noises, 
 and used bad language and were without self-respect, were the 
 bearer and the ayah. The bearer has served me many years in 
 many places and with many other servants, and I have never be- 
 fore known him to act without shame or to quarrel. The ayah 
 has been known a few weeks only. Both the bearer and the 
 ayah wish to go away. The ayah may go. Bus ! " * 
 
 After this simple and direct delivery no word was said. The 
 servants dispersed to the compound, the bearer, reinstated in his 
 self-esteem and justified before the world, applied himself to for- 
 get his wrongs and was more diligent than ever in his master's 
 service. Chua stated to her mistress that if she had any more 
 trouble she would die and the wind would blow through her 
 bones, and many other things in grief-stricken Hindustani 
 which Helen did not understand. But her mistress permitted 
 her this balm to her wounded feelings, that when she departed 
 she left the dishonoured shawl scornfully behind her, having 
 privately received sufficient backsheesh to buy three like it. 
 
 * Enough. 
 
I04 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 CALCUTTA, in social matters, is a law unto herself, inscru- 
 table, unevadable. She asks no opinion and permits no 
 suggestion. She proclaims that it shall be thus, thus it is, and 
 however odd and inconvenient the custom may be, it lies within 
 the province of no woman — the men need not be thought of — to 
 change it, or even to discover by what historic whim it came to 
 be. Calcutta decrees, for example, that from twelve to two, 
 what time the sun strikes straightest and strongest on the car- 
 riage-top, what time all brown Bengal with sweet reasonableness 
 takes its siesta, in the very heat and burden of the day — from 
 twelve to two is the proper hour forsooth for the memsahib to 
 visit and be visited. Thus this usually tepid form frequently' 
 reaches a boiling point of social consideration, becomes a mark 
 of recognition which is simply perfervid. It is also an unami- 
 able time of day. The cheering effects of breakfast have worn 
 off, and tififin looms distantly, the reward of virtue. It would 
 be impossible to say for how much malice it is directly respon- 
 sible. But this is of the gods ; we stew obediently, we do not 
 dream of demurring. Another honoured principle is that all 
 strangers, except brides, shall make the first call. Herein is the 
 indolence of Calcutta generous and unreckoning. All new 
 comers, of whatever business, jat, or antecedents, have the fee 
 simple of her drawing-rooms, the right to expect their calls to 
 be returned, and even to feel slighted if no further recognition 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 105 
 
 is made of them. Anybody may tacitly request Calcutta to in- 
 vite him to dinner, and lay upon Calcutta the disagreeable onus 
 of refusing to do it. Strangers present themselves on their 
 merits ; the tone of society naturally therefore becomes a little 
 assertive. There are other methods of indirect compulsion. A 
 man may cull — this invariably at mid -day on Sunday — and 
 thereby invite you to Jeave cards upon his wife, and the lady is 
 aggrieved if you decline the invitation. Calcutta suffers all this. 
 It is the dustvr. 
 
 Mrs. George William Browne of course was a bride, and had 
 made her appearance at church. It was not an imposing ap- 
 pearance, and probably did not attract as much attention as the 
 Brownes imagined ; they occupied one of the back seats of a 
 sacred edifice of Calcutta which is known to be consecrated to 
 official circles, and the Brownes were only mercantile. But the 
 appearance had been made, whether or not anybody was aware 
 of it; and Mrs. Browne was assuredly entitled to sit from twelve 
 to two in the days that followed at the receipt of congratula- 
 tions. 
 
 " All Calcutta won't come," remarked young Browne, in a 
 tone of easy prophecy. " But Mrs. Fisher will probably look you 
 up, and Mrs. Jack Lovitt, and the Wodenhamers — I've known 
 the Wodenhamers a long time. And Mrs. P. Macintyre "—the 
 person who undertakes this history — " Mrs. P. is the only lady 
 in the firm just now. She's sure to call." 
 
 " Where are the rest, George ? " 
 
 " One of 'm dead. Mrs. J. L. Macintyre's dead — two of 'em, 
 Mrs. Babcock and Mrs. Walsh, home in England with their 
 babies." 
 
 " But, George — all the people who came to the wedding ? " 
 
 "Out of compliment to the MacJonalds. Yes, they'll prob- 
 
Io6 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 ably call — in their own good time. They're very busy making 
 other visits just now, my dear. We mustn't allow ourselves to 
 forget that we're popularly known to be living on five hundred 
 a month. Society bows to five hundred a month — with possibili- 
 ties of advance — but it doesn't hurry about calling. You see 
 there are so many people with superior claims — fifteen hundred, 
 three thousand a month. It's an original place in that respect 
 — Calcutta. The valuation of society is done by Government, 
 Most people arrive here invoiced at so much, the amount usually 
 rises as they stay, but they're always kept carefully tit;keted and 
 published, and Calcutta accepts or rejects them, religiously and 
 gratefully, at their market rates. It's rather an uninteresting 
 social basis — especially from our point of view — but it has the 
 advantage of simplicity. You have a solemn official right to ex- 
 pect exactly what you can pay for." 
 
 With which treble cynicism young Browne received a bit of 
 mignonette in his button-hole, kissed his wife, and departed. 
 They were not really much concerned, these Brownes, about the 
 conduct and theories of their fellow-beings at this time. Society 
 was homogeneous, a human mass whose business it was to in- 
 habit other parts of Calcutta, and do it as unobtrusively as possi- 
 ble. Even as a subject for conversation, society was perfunctory, 
 and rather dull. It was a thing apart, it did not menace them 
 yet, or involve them, or tempt them. They had not arrived at a 
 point when anything it chose to concern itself with was impor- 
 tant to them. It is charming, this indifference, while it lasts, but 
 it is not intended to endure. 
 
 " It is certainly pretty," Helen remarked in a tone of convic- 
 tion, looking round her little drav,ring-room. " It's charming ! " 
 And it was. The walls were tinted a delicate grey, and the win- 
 dows were all hung with Indian saris, pale yellow and white. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 107 
 
 The fresh matted floor was bespread in places with blue and 
 white dhurries, and a big beflowered Japanese vase in a corner 
 held a spiky palm. There were books and pictures — perhaps 
 neither of the sort to bear the last analysis, but that at a glance 
 didn't matter — and bits of old china, and all Aunt Plovtree's 
 crewel work, and two or three vases running over with roses. 
 There were some comfortable wicker chairs from the China ba- 
 zaar, gay with cushions after Liberty, and there were all the little 
 daintinesses that accompany the earlier stages of matrimony. 
 Through the windows came in bars and patches the sunlight of 
 high noon, and the rustling of the palms, and the cooing of the 
 doves in the veranda. 
 
 " It hasn't much character" said Mrs. Browne, with her head 
 at a critical angle, " but it's charming." 
 
 The fact is that it expressed cleanliness and the Brownes' in- 
 come. I fear that Mrs. Browne belonged to that very numerous 
 class of ladies in whose opinion character is a thing to arrange, 
 just a matter to be attended to like the ordering of dinner. If 
 you had asked her what particular character she wanted her 
 room to express I think she would have been nonplussed. Or 
 she might have said. Oh, she wanted it to be " artistic," with a 
 little smile of defiance which would have been an evasion, not to 
 say an equivocation of the matter. Helen Browne was not " ar- 
 tistic," and why she should have wanted her drawing-room to 
 express what she did not understand is one of those enigmas 
 common to the sex, as it flowers from day to day into new mod- 
 ern perplexities. 
 
 Perhaps it was much more charming of her to be what she 
 was. It led her, at all events, into no burlesques. Nothing 
 could be less extravagant, for instance, than that she should 
 presently occupy herself, with amused concern and mock de- 
 
I08 THE SIMPLE ADVEXTUKES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 spuir, in turning over ii collection of young Browne's garments 
 with a view to improving thcni. Tlie bearer brought them to 
 her in a basket, laid them deprecatiugly at her feet, and retired, 
 doubtless thinking that though the memsahib might be tronble- 
 somo in various ways, she had her advantages. She would per- 
 haps destroy the sahib's partiality for old clothes. He himself 
 had struggled with these ancient socks and shirts a long and 
 fruitless time, had cobbled them until his soul revolted, espe- 
 cially when the sahib, observing the result of his labour, had 
 laughed deep liiuglis. The sahib was in no wise stingy — he 
 would give new harness to the pony and n^^ kupra* to the 
 syce, and the bazaar was full of beautiful garments for the ap- 
 parelling of sahibs, yet persistently and without sense of dis- 
 honour he enrobed himself daily thus ! It was a painful, incom- 
 prehensible eccentricity. Now, perhaps, there would be a new 
 order of things, arid a chance for a little reasonable dusturi.\ 
 And Kasi spent the rest of the morning discussing contracts in 
 the bazaar. 
 
 To his wife, however, young Browne was obliged to be ex- 
 planatory, and even apologetic, upon this point. He had to tell 
 her it was a way they had in India of sticking to their old things 
 — it was only the most hideous swells that ever got anything 
 new. You couldn't keep up with the fashion in India anyhow 
 — the thing was to be superior to it altogether. Oh, she 
 wouldn't have him discard that hat; he'd had that hat four 
 years, and he was attached to it. If he might be allowed to 
 kecj) it another year or two the shape would very likely "come 
 in " again. Surely he wasn't inexorably condemned to a new 
 coat. It would take years to make another as comfortable as 
 
 * Clothes. + Profit. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADl'EiVrUKES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 no9 
 
 that, and it was only a bit ragged in tlie cuffs. But Helen was 
 inflexible over the shortcomings of her husband's wardrobe, as it 
 is the first duty of the ladies of Anglo-India to be, and young 
 Browne shortly paid one penalty of matrimony in being reclad 
 at vast expense, and suffered much contumely in consequence 
 from his bachelor contemporaries. This morning Helen smiled 
 over her basket with content and entertainment. 
 
 " What aren't shreds are patches," said she to the pigeons. 
 " Dear me ! Fancy having married a person who hasn't been 
 properly mended since he left England." The pigeons replied 
 with suitable sympathy. There was a roll of wheels under the 
 porch, and the bearer brought up cards, " Mr. and Mrs. John 
 Lawrence Lovitt." 
 
 " Bearer,"- said Helen, mistress of the situation, "all these 
 things lejao ! * Memsahib sala'am do." f 
 
 " Balmt atcha,'" J said the bearer, whisking them away as he 
 went. Not for worlds would Kasi have allowed his master's di- 
 lapidations to become public. And Mrs. Jack Lovitt tripped up. 
 
 " How d'ye do, Mrs. Browne ? " she said. " I hope I haven't 
 come too soon. Some one told me you'd been seen — somewhere 
 — church, I suppose. People always do go to church at first, in 
 Calcutta. After a while you won't — at least not so regularly. It 
 gets to be rather a bore, don't you know, either morning or even- 
 ing. In the morning it takes it out of you so that you haven't 
 energy to receive your callers, and in the evening — well, if you 
 go in for Sunday tennis you're too much done for church. But 
 perhaps you won't go in for Sunday tennis." 
 
 Mrs. Lovitt sank into a chair and crossed her knees so that 
 one small high-heeled boot stuck out at a sharp and knowing 
 
 * Take away. f Give greeting. J Very good. 
 
no THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OE A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 angle. Nlie was a very little person, and she wore a very smart 
 gown, tliougli it w.as only a spotted cotton, and a very small bon- 
 net, llcr long-handled parasol had an enormous bow on it, and 
 her small hands were buttoned up in an excessive amount of kid. 
 She had a tiny waist, svnd her dress fitted her with an absurd 
 j)erfection. There was a slight extravagance about Mrs. Jack 
 [jovitt everywhere. No one could describe her without saying 
 " very " and " exceedingly " a great many times. Her thin little 
 face hadn't a shade of colour — it was absolutely pale, and there 
 were odd little drawn lines about it that did not interfere with its 
 particular kind of attractiveness. She wore a pince nez astride 
 her small, sharp features, and when she sat down it dropped into 
 her lap quite as if it belonged to a man of fashion. 
 
 Helen said, with a conscious effort not to be priggish, that she 
 didn't think she would go in for Sunday tennis. 
 
 " Oh," said Mrs. Lovifct, smiling tolerantly, " don't believe in 
 it, I suppose? Neither did I when I came out. You'll soon get 
 over that. You'll begin virtuously by doing it for your hus- 
 band's sake, and by and by you'll find that kind of prejudice 
 doesn't thrive in India. I played with your husband the last 
 Sunday before you came out. The other side completely smashed 
 us up ; I don't think your husband was in his usual form." 
 
 " Oh, I dare say he was," said Helen, smiling ; " he doesn't 
 play a very strong game." 
 
 " Oh, I wasn't either. I played abominably. But, of course, 
 i blamed it all upon him ; I declared his nerves were affected — 
 on account of you, you know. He admitted there might be 
 something in it," and Mrs. Lovitt laughed casually. " He says 
 you're a tremendous swell at it," she continued inquiringly. 
 
 Helen protested, and Mrs. Lovitt went on to say that it didn't 
 matter much how one played anyway, for tennis was certainly 
 
TlfE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. j,i 
 
 going out— everybody went in for golf now—links all over the 
 place. Did Helen go in for golf, and had she done any cricket 
 before she left England ? Mrs. Lovitt had a cousin, Stella Short, 
 who was in the Wilbarrow Eleven. Perhaps Helen had seen her 
 photograph— it had been in all the ladies' papers. 
 
 " What do you think of the climate, Mrs. Browne?" 
 
 Helen said she thought it perfectly delightful; she found the 
 glare a little trying. 
 
 " Oh, glare ! Wait till the hot weather comes. It's all very 
 well now and will be till March, but the hot weather's simply 
 beastly ; and in the rains— well, in the rains you feel exactly like 
 a dead rat." 
 
 " That must be an extraordinary feeling," Helen responded, 
 with some astonishment at the directness of the lady's similes. 
 
 " It is — rather ! I suppose you're going to see the Viceroy's 
 Cup won this afternoon ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Helen, " are you ? " 
 
 " Very much so ! I'm one of those happy people who have 
 got a tip. Jimmy Forbes gave me mine. You don't know 
 Jimmy. He and I are great chums — we're always out together." 
 Mrs. Lovitt spoke with virtuous candour. "He's an awfully 
 pucca * sort of fellow, is Jimmy — you'll like him when you know 
 him. He's a great friend of my husband's, too," Mrs. Lovitt 
 added. " Jack thinks a lot of him. And he's very knowing about 
 horses. How do you get on with the servants ? They'll stick 
 you no end at first — of course you know that. When I began I 
 used to pay three rupees for a leg of mutton. It used to cost us 
 two hundred a month more than our income to live ! " 
 
 " Dear me ! " said Helen. " Wasn't that very inconvenient ? " 
 
 * Genuine. 
 
112 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " Inconvenient as the — as possible, sometimes, till Jack got 
 jiis promotion. Now we manage all right." 
 
 " Have you any children, Mrs. Lovitt ? " Helen ventured, as 
 the bearer brought up another card. 
 
 " Children ! Bless me, no, I should think not ! " replied 
 Mrs. John Lawrence Lovitt. "But I've got the littlest black- 
 and-tan in Calcutta. Jimmy Forbes gave liim to me. You must 
 come and see him. Hello, Kitty Toote, so you're on the ram- 
 page ! Good-bye, Mrs. Browne ; don't let her prejudice you 
 against Calcutta. She's always running it down, and it's the 
 sweetest place in the world ! " 
 
 Mrs. Toote made polite greetings to Mrs. Browne. " You 
 know it isn't really," she said, disposing her tall figure gracefully 
 among the cotton cushions of Helen's little sofa. " But of course 
 it depends upon your tastes." Mrs. Toote had fine eyes, and an 
 inclination to embonpoitii. Her expression advertised a superior 
 discontent, but there was a more genuine suggestion of gratified 
 well-being underneath which contradicted the advertisement. 
 "It's really awfully frivolous here," Mrs. Toote remarked. 
 " Don't you think so— after England ? " 
 
 " How can I possibly tell — so soon ? " said Helen. 
 
 " No, I suppose not. Personally, I wouldn't mind the frivol- 
 itjf. The frivolity's all right — if there were only anything else, 
 but there isn't." 
 
 " Anything else ? " Helen inquired. 
 
 "Yes, anything really elevating, you know — anything that 
 one could devote one's self to. I haven't a word to say against 
 frivolity ; I like it myself as well as anybody," said Mrs. Toote 
 with engaging naivete, " but there ought to be something behind 
 it to back it up, you know." Mrs. Toote spoke as if she were 
 objecting to dining exclusively upon ortolans. But the objection 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIflB. 113 
 
 was a matter of pure dietetic theory. In practice, Mrs. Toote 
 throve upon ortolans. 
 
 " Nobody reads," said Mrs. Toote. 
 
 "Nobody?" asked Helen. 
 
 " Nobody that / know — except novels, of course." 
 
 "And you prefer other kinds of books," Helen said, im- 
 pressed. " More solid reading ? " 
 
 " Oh, I enjoy a good novel," Mrs. Toote conceded ; " but I 
 don't think people ought to confine themselves to fiction. 
 There's biography and philosophy, and — and social economy. 
 All very interesting — to me." 
 
 " Which are your favorite authors ? " asked Helen, with defer- 
 ence. 
 
 Mrs. Toote thought a minute. " John Stuart Mill," said she, 
 " is a very fine writer. My husband has all his books. So is 
 Herbert Spencer ; we have all his, too. So is Sir Henry Cun- 
 ninghame. Have you read The Chronicles of Dusf.ypore ? " 
 
 " I'm afraid not," said Helen. '• Is it very good ?" 
 
 " Oh, awfully. You must read it. Then, of course, there's 
 Kipling. I'm devoted to Kipling." 
 
 " Do you think he's nice ? " asked Mrs. Browne, doubtfully. 
 
 " I think he's everything. And I must say for the people 
 here they do read their Kipling. But they don't talk ahout him. 
 I don't believe they know the difference between Kipling and 
 anybody else." 
 
 " Perhaps," Helen ventured, " they're tired of him." 
 
 " That's just where it is. How could anybody get tired of 
 Kipling! You'll find plenty of gaiety in Calcutta, Mrs. 
 Browne ; but you won't find much — culture ! " And Mrs. Toote 
 lifted her eyebrows and twisted her lips into a look of critical 
 resignation. 
 
114 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 " Aren't there any societies ? " 
 
 " Oil, if you mean the Asiatic, that's for scientists and people 
 of that sort, you know, and they read awful papers there about 
 monoliths and ancient dynasties and things. You can't con- 
 sider that the Asiatic represents any popular tendency. / don't 
 know anybody that's fond of Sanskrit. Of course," Mrs. Toote 
 continued, " I'm speaking generally, and I mean particularly the 
 women out here. There are some clever men in the depart- 
 ments, naturally. One or two of them are my greatest friends, 
 and it is refreshing to talk to them." 
 
 " But are the ladies all frivolous?" Helen asked. 
 
 " Oh, dear, no ! " 
 
 "And the uufrivolous ones — what do they do?" 
 
 " They mess about charities, and keep their husbands in their 
 pockets, and write eternal letters to their children in England. 
 I've less patience with them than with the other kind," Mrs. 
 Toote avowed. 
 
 " Well," said Helen, smiling, " Fm not very literary, so I 
 daresay it won't matter much to me." 
 
 " Then you'll either go in for society or philanthropy — that's 
 the way everybody ends up. You are going to the Drawing- 
 Room next Thursday ? " 
 
 " I think so." 
 
 " Well, immediately after you must write your names down 
 in the Government House books. Then they ask you to every- 
 tliitig, you see. Don't put it off," advised Mrs. Toote, on the 
 point of departure. " Don't put it off a day." 
 
 In a quarter of an hour the Wodenhamers came — Colonel 
 and Mrs. Wodenhamer, a large lady and a generously planned 
 gentleman. The smallest and slightest of Helen's wicker chairs 
 creaked ominously, as Colonel Wodenhamer sat down in it with 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 •15 
 
 an air of asserting that he wasn't the weight you might tliink him. 
 As to Mrs. Wodenhamer, her draperies completely submerged 
 Helen's cotton cushions upon the sofa. Colonel Wodenhamer had 
 mutton-chop whiskers and a double chin and a look of rotund re- 
 spectability that couldn't be surpassed iu Hyde Park on Sunday. 
 He was not a fighting colonel, and in the adding up of commis- 
 sariat accounts there is time and opportunity to develop these 
 amplitudes. Mrs. Wodenhamer matched him more perfectly 
 than is customary in the odd luck of matrimony, and had a com- 
 plexion besides, which the Colonel couldn't boast. The com- 
 plexion spread over features generously planned, and a smile 
 that contained many of the qualities of a warm sunset, spread 
 over both. Helen wondered in vain to which of Mrs. Toote's 
 two social orders they belonged, for as soon as Colonel Woden- 
 hamer had explained how it was he had come to call on a week- 
 day — Colonel Wodenhamer made this a point of serious impor- 
 tance — Mrs. Wodenhamer led the conversation into domestic de- 
 tails. It wandered for a time among pots and pans — enamelled 
 ones were so much the best — it embraced aU the servants, took 
 a turn in the direction of the bazaar, and finally settled upon 
 iharruns. 
 
 " You'll find them so troublesome ! " said Mrs. Wodenhamer. 
 
 " I don't know what they are," said Mrs. Browne, reflecting 
 upon the insect pests of India. 
 
 " Don't you, really ! It's a wonder you haven't found out ! 
 They're towels or dust-cloths — anything of that sort. Almost 
 every servant must have his jharrnns. You have no idea how 
 they mount up." 
 
 " I suppose they must," returned Helen, and turned to Colo- 
 nel Wodenhamer with intent to venture something about the 
 weather. 
 
Il6 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " I don't see how you've got on without them so long ! " Mrs. 
 Wodeuhamer remarked, glancing round with involuntary criti- 
 cism. " I assure you I give out weekly in my house no less than 
 five dozen — five dozen ! " 
 
 " That's a great many," Helen agreed. " A very fair passage, 
 I believe, Colonel Wodenhamer — thirty-one days." 
 
 " It's just a question whether they're better made in the 
 hou'^e," Mrs. Wodenhamer went on placidly ; " I don't know 
 that I wouldn't advise you to go to the Women's Friendly — they 
 ^Vork very neatly there." 
 
 " For the jharruns. Oh, yes ! " said Helen. " The captain's 
 name ? I'm afraid I forgot. Colonel Wodenhamer. He was a 
 little man." 
 
 " They wear out so frightfully fast," his lady remarked. 
 
 " P. and 0. captains ? But consider the life, my dear 1 " 
 
 '■'■Jharruns, John ! Mrs. Browne really shouldn't begin with 
 less than six dozen." 
 
 " I must see about them at once," Helen said. " I'm sure 
 they are very important." 
 
 " The whole comfort of your life depends upon tliera," her 
 visitor replied, rather ambiguously, and at that moment Mrs. 
 Macdonald came up, and the conversation became so general that 
 nobody noticed Mrs. Wodenhamer's being lost in thought. As 
 she and her husband rose to go, " Your house is smaller than 
 mine," said Mrs. AVodenhamer, "I forgot that. I think" — con- 
 scientiously — " ycu might do with four dozen." 
 
 Neither could Helen bring Mrs. Macdonald under Mrs. 
 Toote's classification, for Mrs. Macdonald certainly did not give 
 one the idea of a serious person, and yet she talked a great deal 
 about committees. Mrs. Macdonald expressly advised Helen to 
 " go in for " philanthropy, and in the next breath declared that 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 117 
 
 of course she and young Browne must get themselves put up at 
 the Saturday Chib, where a proportion of Calcutta banded itself 
 together for purposes of dancing and amateur theatricals, tennis 
 and light literature. It was puzzling, this combination of good 
 works and fashionable recreation, until Mrs. Macdonald ex- 
 plained, the explanation being inferential. 
 
 " You see," said Mrs. Macdonald, " you must take up some- 
 thing, you know, and then you will get to be known, and it will 
 make all the difference. Of course if you came out as the wife 
 of a major-general or a commissioner or a bishop it wouldn't 
 matter — you could be independent. But as it is," continued 
 Mrs. Macdonald with delicate vagueness, indicating the Brownes' 
 five hundred a month, " it would be better for you to take an in- 
 terest in something, you know. There's the Home for Sailors' 
 Orphans — Mrs. Leek and Mrs. Vondermore — they're not very 
 important, though. And there's Lady Blebbin's Hindu Widow 
 Institute — that's overcrowded now. I believe the very best thing 
 for you " — with an increase of business-like emphasis — " would 
 be the East Indian Self-Help Society ! Mrs. Walter Lull runs 
 that, and she's just the woman to appreciate anybody fresh and 
 energetic like you ! I've got influence there too — I'll get you 
 nominated." 
 
 " But," said Helen, in some dismay, " it's not at all likely 
 that I should be able to be of any use." 
 
 " Use ? Of course yon will. You'll be driven to death, but 
 if Mrs. Walter Luff takes you up, you won't mind that ! Be- 
 sides," said Mrs. Macdonald with an effect of awakened con- 
 science, " the East Indian SelMIelps do a lot of good. You're 
 interested in the East Indians, aren't you— the Eurasians ? " 
 
 " I don't know them when I see them," said Helen. " I 
 always confuse them with the Jews and the Greeks." 
 
Il8 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 " Oh, well, you soon will. As a rule they're awfully poor, -oa 
 know, and give us a lot of trouble in Calcutta. Dear me ! " 
 Mrs. Macdonald ej.iculated, looking round, " how pretty you arc ! 
 Hut if I were you I'd have a Mirzapore rug for the middle of the 
 floor ; it makes the room so much richer, you know — shows up 
 everything. And you ought to get two or three good engrav- 
 ings — there are some lovely new French things at Thacker's — 
 only fifty rupees each. Go and see them. But I must be ofF," 
 said this sprightly lady, and Helen was presently again alone, with 
 a delicate disappearing odour of jessamine and her reflections. 
 
 I dropped in that morning too, after all the rest ; but it is 
 not essential to the progress of this narrative that you should be 
 allowed to gather from my conversation the sort of person that 
 I am. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. ng 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 IT was clearly impossible to attend Her Excellency's Drawing- 
 Room in a tum-tum. The Brownes discussed it with fulness 
 and precision at some length. Most people resident in Calcutta 
 would have arrived at this conclusion *m ore rapidly; but as 
 young Browne said, he had never taken a wife to a Drawing- 
 Room before, and a fellow always went to the levees in his 
 tum-tum. 
 
 " It's that awful silk tail of yours that's the difficulty, dear," 
 said he. " It might get wound up in the wheels, or Lord knows 
 what. Couldn't you take it in a parcel and put it on when you 
 get there?" 
 
 I can safely leave Helen's response to the imagination of all 
 femininity. 
 
 "Then," said young Browne, "it must be a ticca," and 
 Helen sighed compliance, for she bated ticcas. 
 
 So does all Calcutta, except the baboos. The ticca is an 
 uncompromising shuttered wooden box with a door in each side 
 and a seat across each end. Its springs are primitive, its angles 
 severe. When no man has hired the ticca, the driver slumbers 
 along the roof and the syce by the wayside. When the ticca is 
 in action, the driver sits on the top, loosely connected with a 
 bundle of hay which forms the casual, infrequent dejeiiner of 
 the horses. The syce stands behind, and if the back shutters 
 are open he is frequently malodorous. There may be some 
 
120 TIIF. SIMVr.E ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAM IB. 
 
 worldly distinction between the syce and the driver, but it is im- 
 perceptible to the foreign eye. I have never been able to decide 
 wiiicii is the more completely disreputable of the two. Their 
 rags flutter in competition. There is more variety among the 
 horses. They are large and gaunt and speckled. They are small 
 and lean and of one colour. They are fly-bitten, unkempt, knock- 
 kneed, vicious, and nasty. They have bad and vulgar habits. 
 Some of them have seen Australia and better times, but it is not 
 evident in their manners. Some of them have been country-bred 
 for so many generations that the original animal has almost dis- 
 appeared, leaving a stricken and nondescript little representative 
 that might more fitly be harnessed to a wheelbarrow, if wheel- 
 barrows lent themselves to harness. The ticca-gharry horse is 
 always ridiculous when he is not pitiful; his gait under pressure 
 is a gallop, and his equipment is made out in places with pieces 
 of rope and other expediencies. The baboo loves the ticca- 
 gharry because the baboo knows not mercy and gets a long ride, 
 yea and seven of his kind with him, for threepence. Calcutta 
 people hate it for reasons which are perhaps obvious. And for 
 another. The ticca-gharry directly aids and abets Government 
 in its admirable system for the valuation of society, represented, 
 as has been seen, by the Accountant-General. A person who 
 habitually drives in a ticca-gharry is not likely on the face of it 
 to be in receipt of more than a very limited income, and is thus 
 twice gazetted as not being a particularly desirable person to 
 know. It is evident therefore that when the Brcwnes decided to 
 go to the Viceregal Drawing-Room in a ticca they bowed to 
 circumstances. 
 
 " Only doiiH get one, George," said Helen, plaintively, " with 
 a pink rosette on its ear." 
 
 There were a few, a very few, other ticca-gharries in the 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHJB. \2\ 
 
 crowd of veliicles that blocked tlie street leading to Government 
 House, and presently they all found themselves unaccountably 
 in the rear of the line that was made to preserve ordet and 
 prevent aggression. The stately landaus, the snug broughams 
 and the smart victorias rolled naturally into their places in front. 
 The British policeman whether in Hyde Park or Imperial 
 India, knows his duty. So that Mr. and Mrs. Browne were not 
 the first who alighted under the wide porch and made their way 
 with more trepidation than they allowed to appear, into the crim- 
 son-carpeted precincts of the Burra Lord Sahib. 
 
 "Where shall I meet you after — after it's over, George?" 
 asked Helen coming out of the cloak-room, very pretty in her 
 soft white silk and the fresh Wiltshire colour that showed in her 
 cheeks and proclaimed her newly " out." 
 
 " Oh I'll find you — I'll be waiting with the other men out- 
 side the door. Good-bye, dear. Don't be nervous ! " 
 
 "lam nervous," said Mrs. Browne. "But I don't propose 
 to show it. Good-bye ! " and Mrs. Browne followed in the wake 
 of other shimmering trains that were being marshalled from 
 corridor to corridor on their way to the Throne Room, where 
 Their Excellencies, doubtless very bored, were returning bows to 
 the curtseys of all feminine Calcutta. How very fine those 
 trains were, some of them. How elaborate and marvellous — 
 how effective ! And indeed they had come forth straight from 
 Bond-street, many of them, for this very occasion, and therefore, 
 why not? What use, pray, in being wives and daughters of 
 thousands a month in the land of exile, if measures could not 
 be sacredly kept in England and "decent things" got out at 
 least once a year ! And how the trains of thousands a month 
 rejoiced in their contrast with others representing a smaller 
 tuluh. I do not speak of Helen's, for hers was a flowing credit 
 
122 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 to tlie Ciinbury dressmaker and quite up to date, but of gowns 
 of an elder fashion and another day that sliowed themselves with 
 delightful naivete among the glittering creations of the season. 
 They had seen, some of them, a great many December dissipa- 
 tions; they had been carefully packed away through a great 
 many hot weathers and monsoons ; they smeit of camphor ; 
 there was a quaintness in their very creases. One or two of 
 them even told of trousseaux, Helen thought, that must have 
 come to India in the old sailing days, round Cape Horn. Doubt- 
 loss this new little memsahib felt amused in her trim feathers, but 
 I have worn creases and smellcd of camphor myself in my day, 
 and I could have told her that with five sons at college and a 
 daughter at school in England, one becomes necessarily indiffer- 
 ent to the fashions, even if the daughter does spend the holidays 
 with an aunt in the country, free of expense. But of course one 
 can't forecast OTie's own camphor and creases, and Helen Browne 
 may never have any. 
 
 The dames who waited or who didn't wait their turn at the 
 various barriers that regulated the road to Viceroyalty were 
 chiefly imported English ladies of the usual pale Anglo-Indian 
 type and pretty, either intrinsically or with the prettiness that 
 comes of being well spoilt. Most of them had curtseyed formally 
 to Their Excellencies every December for several years, yet they 
 were quite as happily a-tremble as the brides or the debtitantes — 
 the brides of next season. 
 
 " I suppose," Helen overheard one little woman remark with 
 animation, "Their Excellencies won't bite!" But she con- 
 tinued to behave as if she thought they would. There were also 
 a few ladies who had not been imported. These were noticeable 
 for a slight and not unbecoming Oriental duskiness under the 
 powder, an unusual softness and blackness of eye, and an oddity 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 123 
 
 of inflection that struck Helen as so pretty and "foreign." 
 These ladies usually wore the feathers in their hair — the three 
 feathers that compliment Royalty — of the same hue as their 
 gowns, pink or blue or perhaps yellow, which was doubtless a 
 survival of some lavish and tropical taste for colour that may 
 have been peculiarly their own. The Ranees and the Maha- 
 ranees made no attempt to subdue the gorgeousness of their 
 natural instincts, but showed undisguisedly in purple and gold 
 and eccentric gems, disposed according to the fashion that best 
 liked them ; and it was Helen's lot to proceed into the Viceregal 
 presence immediately behind a Mohammedan lady of enormous 
 proportions, who represented matrimonially a great Nawab, and 
 did it wholly in crimson satin. 
 
 Their Excellencies stood upon a dais, near enough to the 
 Throne chair to suggest their connection with it. There were 
 two stately lines of the Body-Guard, imperturbable under the 
 majesty of their turbans ; there were five or six A.-D.-C.'s, and 
 secretaries in uniform with an expression of solemn self-con- 
 tainment under their immature moustaches. And there were, 
 gathered together at Their Excellencies' right, tlie ladies of the 
 Private Entree. These ladies were the wives of gentlemen 
 whose interests were the special care of Government. It was 
 advisable therefore that their trains should not be stepped on, 
 nor their tempers disarranged ; and they had been received ^n 
 hour earlier, with more circumstance, possibly to slower music, 
 different portals being thrown open for the approach of their 
 landaus— they all approached in landaus. If you stay in India 
 long enough. Government will see that you get the Private En- 
 tree before you go, as a rule. That is if you are a person of any 
 perseverance, and have objected with sufficient stolidity to get- 
 ting out of anybody else's way. This is not invariably the case, 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 125 
 
 peared, and Helen had the opportunity of taking a lesson in 
 social astronomy, and learning if she chose, now that there is one 
 glory of the sun and another glory of the moon, and how dark 
 and unamiable those regions may be where the sun and the moon 
 shine not. Also how an A.-D.-C. may twinkle as a little star in 
 the firmament, and how a Lieutenant-Governor may be the cen- 
 tre of a brilliant constellation. Helen noticed a subtle difference 
 between Their Excellencies and the rest, and put it down in her 
 admiring innocence to aristocratic lineage or some such vague 
 reason. As a matter of fact they were '.,he only people in the 
 room who did not directly or indirectly suggest a life-long inter- 
 est in pay and promotion, which is quite enough to make a most 
 vital difference, a most violent contrast, though it must take 
 some years to discern this. The pay of a Viceroy is magnificent- 
 ly absolute, and you can't promote him. I believe that is ar- 
 ranged by Her Majesty, in order that he may have time to 
 think about other things. This may look a trifle caustic, but 
 tlie Perth Macintyres have out-stayed five Viceroys in Calcutta, 
 and I have found that number at least to be quite human. 
 Although it is a serious fact that the more one comes in con- 
 tact with them the less one is struck with any idea of their 
 common fallibility, and the more one is inclined to refer to 
 His Excellency as a very superior mind, and to Her Excellency 
 as "a perfectly charming woman," without cavil. The last two 
 Viceroys for instance have seemed to me to be much more 
 valuable acquaintances than their predecessors. Can it be that 
 circumstances — chiefly viceregal dinners — have thrown us more 
 together ? 
 
 Little Mrs. Macdonald, sitting alone upon a sofa in a corner, 
 welcomed the Brownes with effusion. 
 
 " Do let me go half shares in your husband for a while," she 
 
126 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIUR. 
 
 said to Helen, making room for them. " Mine has gone off with 
 Mrs. Toote, and I know wliat that means. Half an hour's deser- 
 tion at least." 
 
 " What did he go for? " asked young Browne. 
 
 " Because Mrs. Toote is charming." 
 
 "Do you think so?" 
 
 " Don't you ? I thought all the men grovelled before Mrs. 
 Toote ! " 
 
 " I don't grovel," said young Browne. " I think she's a bit 
 of a humbug." 
 
 " But she has good eyes," Mrs. Macdonald protested. 
 
 " Lovely eyes," Helen chimed. 
 
 " Though / wish she wouldn't spoil them with charcoal the 
 way she does," remarked Mrs. Macdonald with amiable unction. 
 " She doesn't need to, you know." 
 
 "How do you do, Captain Delytis?" and Mrs. Macdonald 
 bent very much forward on the sofa in recognizing a young man 
 in blue lapels, who suddenly reined himself in as it were, re- 
 sponded profoundly to her salutation, and then hurried on. 
 " That's Captain Delytis," she informed Helen. " One of the 
 A.-D.-C.'s. Such a dear ! He called on me twice last cold 
 weather, and I was darwaza huiid each time. Wasn't it a 
 shame ! " 
 
 " I wouldn't be too remorseful," remarked young Browne, 
 not without malice. He had found Mrs. Macdonald darwaza 
 bund frequently, and had all a black coat's aversion to the supe- 
 rior charms of blue lapels. " A.-D.-C.'s have a way, you know, of 
 finding out first." 
 
 " Don't be nasty, George Browne," responded Mrs. Macdonald, 
 " besides in this case it doesn't apply, for Captain Delytis told 
 me himself how sorry he was. I daresay they have to resort to 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 127 
 
 that sort of thing occasionally though, poor things. They have 
 so much to do." 
 
 " Do ! " remarked young Browne, with the peculiar contempt 
 mercantile pursuits so often inspire for the army and the civil 
 service in Calcutta. " They order dinner, I believe." 
 
 " They have charge of the invitations to everything, so you'd 
 better just make him properly civil to them," said Mrs. Mac- 
 donald, turning to Helen, who responded, with perfectly femi- 
 nine appreciation of the advice, that she would indeed. 
 
 " I wonder," continued Mrs. Macdonald thoughtfully, " why 
 Mrs. Alec Forbes didn't see me just now. Did you notice her? 
 — that tall woman in the pompadourish gown that passed just 
 now. They say she's getting too swagger to see lots of people 
 now that the Simlaites have taken her up so tremendously, but 
 she's generally as sweet as possible to me. They tell a funny 
 story about Mrs. Forbes and Mrs. Perth Macintyre — you've seen 
 Mrs. Perth Macintyre : perhaps you can imagine how patronis- 
 ing and interfering the old lady is ! Well, it was when Mrs. 
 Forbes first came out, and Calcutta wasn't at all disposed to take 
 to her — a little of the tar-brush, you know, and that doesn't go 
 down here. But everybody liked Alec Forbes, and she had a lot 
 of money, and people came round. Mrs. Perth Macintyre de- 
 cided to come round too, and one night at dinner, when people 
 were discussing this very function, she undertook to encourage 
 Mrs. Forbes about it. 'I daresay you'll be a bit timid, my 
 dear,' said she, 'but you'll just have to go through it like 
 the rest of us.' ' Oh,' said Mrs. Forbes casually, ' I daresay its 
 nothing to St. James's!' Mrs. Perth Macintyre was sat on 
 for once — she had never been presented at home. Wasn't it 
 good?" 
 
 " I can't see what earthly difference it made," said young 
 
128 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 Browne, but his wife could, and turned anotlier page in Part II., 
 Feminine: of the Book of Anglo-India. 
 
 " Why, George," she said presently, " who's that ? " her hus- 
 band having emitted a gruff " IIow do ! " as a gentleman passed 
 them. 
 
 "That? Oh, nobody much ! Sir William Peete." 
 
 " What did Sir William get his K for?" asked Mrs. Macdon- 
 ald. " I've forgotten." 
 
 " For trimming up Calcutta the time some Royalty or other 
 came out. He made a very good municipal milliner, got out a 
 most unusual amount of bunting. They had to recognise it. 
 The man who drained the place got nothing, so far as I remem- 
 ber." 
 
 " George, you don't like him," Mrs. Browne remarked as- 
 tutely. 
 
 " Oh, yes, I do, for two months in the year, when he likes 
 me. Tliey occur in the rains. Then he's passionately fond of 
 everybody who will speak to him. For the rest of the time he's 
 exclusively occupied with Sir William Peete and a few other peo- 
 ple of similar standing." 
 
 " What do you mean?" asked Mrs. Macdonald. 
 
 "About August and September," young Browne continued 
 suavely, " Sir William comes out in boils — comes out copiously. 
 He gets 'em on his neck and on his face and in the middle of 
 his forehead. He becomes an awfnl spectacle. He fawns on 
 his fellow-beings then. As soon as they leave him he returns 
 to the sublime consideration of the social eminence of Sir Wil- 
 liam Peete. Boils are the only known method of reminding 
 him that he belongs to the human race, so Providence takes it." 
 
 Mr. Macdonald came up at this moment and carried off his 
 wife, leaving these young Brownes alone on the sofa in the cor- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 129 
 
 ner of the room, looking on. They seemed to themselves as they 
 sat there to have drifted into some tranquil place from which 
 they could watch the steady current passing, the current that 
 changes every year and yet is always the same, of English life in 
 India. The old, old ambitions, the stereotyped political aims, 
 the worn competitions, the social appraisements — how they have 
 repeated themselves through what illustrations of the great Brit- 
 ish average, even in my time ! How little more than illustra- 
 tions the men and women have been, as one looks back, pictures 
 in a magic lantern, shadows on a wall ! Good illustrations, 
 though sharp reflections of the narrow conditions they lived in, 
 solemn warnings to those that are so eager to come after, if only 
 the glamour of India left people with eyes to see. How gay they 
 were and how luxurious, and how important in their little day ! 
 How gorgeous were the attendants of their circumstance, on the 
 box with a crest upon their turbans — there is a firm in Calcutta 
 that supplies beautiful crests. And now — let me think ! — some 
 of them in Circular Road Cemetery — cholera, fever, heat — apo- 
 plexy ; some of them under the Christian daisies of England — 
 probably abscess of the liver ; the rest grey-faced Cheltenham 
 pensioners, dull and obscure, with uncertain tempers and an ac- 
 quired detestation of the climate of Great Britain. And soon, 
 very soon, long before the Brownes appear in print, the Perth 
 Macintyres also will have gone over to the great majority who 
 have forgotten their Hindustani and regret their khansamahs. 
 Our brief day too will have died in a red sunset behind cluster- 
 ing palms, and all its little doings and graspings and pushings, 
 all its pretty scandals and surmises and sensations, will echo 
 further and further back into the night. 
 
 Of course the Brownes did not moralize thus unpardonably. 
 Why should they? They sat in their corner and looked at the 
 
•30 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 brilliant scene before them, and young Browne talked with more 
 or less good-natured cynicism about everybody he saw, and 
 Helen quite failed to understand why George should take such 
 ridiculous views of things. And by and by they went down the 
 broiwi stairs, past the brown men that stood aside in their gar- 
 ments of crimson and gold, and the Browne's ticca-gharry rolled 
 home with as light-hearted a sahib and memsahib as left Gov- 
 ernment House that night. As they had forgotten all about 
 refreshments it was perhaps fortunate that they were able to 
 find two mutton cutlets cold from the hands of Kali Bagh and 
 some biscuits and marmalade, when they arrived, which afforded 
 them keen satisfaction. They could still, poor dears, with the 
 solace of a cold cutlet enjoy seeing the world go by. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 131 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 T HAVE hinted, perhaps broadly, how the Government of 
 J- India assists society in determining the Values of People. 
 But this is not wholly done by columns of figures prepared with 
 great accuracy in the Accounts Department, it is much facili- 
 tated by the discriminating indication of official position. I feel 
 that official position should have capitals too — in India it always 
 has. Government determines it profoundly, awfully, and with a 
 microscope. It affixes a tag to each man's work and person de- 
 scribing him and all that he does. There is probably an office 
 for the manufacture of these, and its head is doubtless known 
 as the Distributor-General of Imperial Tags to the Government 
 of India. With all his own time and energy at his disposal for 
 the purpose he might arrange a designation for himself even 
 more striking than thai. He would date his letters from the 
 Imperial Tag Office, and they would be composed by the Sub- 
 Assistant-Deputy-Distributor, who would dictate them to one of 
 the various gentle and oleaginous baboos who are content to 
 sharpen pencils and permit their white nether draperies to fall 
 round tall office stools for moderate remuneration without tags. 
 In the hot weather the Distributor-General would go to Simla 
 and the Assistant-Distributor would act for him, indulging pre- 
 maturely in the airs which are attached to the office of his supe- 
 rior — borrowing his tag as it were, for the time. And so the 
 days of the Distributor-General of Imperial Tags to the Govern- 
 
132 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 ment of India, aud those of the lady who is made comforta- 
 ble under the same title wonld be days of great glory and 
 importance, except perhaps those which he spends in Eng- 
 land on furlough, when he would be obliged to leave his halo 
 behind him, with his bearer, to be kept in order. After an 
 absence of a year or two the halo is apt to be found a little 
 large, but in such cases it is never cut down, the head is 
 allowed to expand. 
 
 I don't know of the actual existence of such an office in Cal- 
 cutta, for as I have stated, Mr. Perth Macintyre has never had 
 occasion to apply for a tag — they are comparatively uncommon 
 in what the Simla element is pleased to call the mercantile com- 
 munity here — but if it does not exist I am at a loss to under- 
 stand how they get on without it. Somewhere and somehow the 
 solemn work of such a Department goes on under the direction 
 of Heaven, and whether gentlemen in Government service wear 
 their tags upon their watch-chains or keep them in their pock- 
 ets, they are all tagged. 
 
 It makes a notable difference. It gives Calcutta for admira- 
 tion and emulation a great and glorious company, concerning 
 whom the stranger, beholding their red-coated chuprassies and 
 the state which attends them, might well inquire, " Who, who 
 are these?" Then one who knew — and everybody knows — 
 might make answer, " These are the Covenanted Ones. These 
 are the Judges of the High Court and all those who dispense 
 the law of the Raj, the Scions of the Secretariat and other De- 
 partments, such people as commissioners and Collectors who are 
 in authority throughout the land, the Army ! Bow down ! " 
 The stranger would then remember the old saying in the mouths 
 of women concerning these, " Three hundred a year dead or 
 alive," with reference to pensions, which at one time was dis- 
 
THE SLMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 133 
 
 tinclly the most important quotation in the matrimonial market 
 for India. 
 
 Thereafter follow the great multitude of the Uncovenanted 
 Ones, the men whose business is with education, and science 
 and engineering, and the forests and the police, whose personal 
 usefulness dies with them, probably because they get less pay 
 and less furlough while they live. The human heart is deceit- 
 ful above all things, and desperately wicked, and it has lately 
 entered into the Uncovenanted kind of human heart to cavil at 
 this arrangement. It has had the audacity to Guggest that it is 
 just as homesick, that it suffers just as much from the climate, 
 and that its work is just as indispensable as can possibly be the 
 Covenanted case. I believe the matter is with the Secretary of 
 State, where so many other matters have tender and indefinite 
 safe keeping. Meanwhile there are certain positions of lustre 
 among the Uncovenanted also, but they are few to count and 
 difficult to attain. It is safe to say that a large proportion of 
 the Uncovenanted Ones keep their tags in their pockets. 
 
 I have heard it stated that au expert can tell a Covenanted 
 from an Uncovenanted individual by his back, given a social 
 occasion which would natur.ally evoke self-consciousness. In 
 the case of their wives, one need not be an expert. Covenanted 
 shoulders are not obviously whiter or more classically moulded 
 than the other kind, but they have a subtle way of establishing 
 their relations with Government that is not to be mistaken even 
 by an amateur. The effect cannot be described, and may be ob- 
 tained only by contrast. You look at Uncovenanted shoulders, 
 and you will observe that they fall away. You consider a pair 
 of mercantile ones, and however massive and richly girt, you will 
 notice that they suggest a slight depreciation of themselves. It 
 is only the Covenanted neck that can assert itself with that im- 
 
134 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 pressivc unconsciousness that comes from tlie knowledge of con- 
 stant homage — bones, one might say, or no bones. Tliis is in 
 accordance with the will and intention of the Government of 
 India, and therefore is as it should be. It is the Kaj that has 
 accorded this lady her consideration, therefore in no quarter is it 
 withheld. The feet of such a one are stayed upon a rock ; it 
 has never been hers to pick her anxious way among the quick- 
 Biinds of ordinary social advance. Her invitations are secure. 
 She is acquainted with the number and magnitude of them, she 
 might almost demand them under a sjjecific regulation. I have 
 never heard anybody discuss her brains. She occupies a posi- 
 tion which an intellect no doubt adorns, but not indispensably. 
 Iler little frivolities are the care of the Government that holds 
 her in the hollow of its hand. Society declines to be Phari- 
 saical about them, and asks her to dinner just the same. The 
 shifting aristocracy of England affords nothing like her secu- 
 rity, her remarkable poise. It is difficult to understand how, 
 in spite of all this, she can be as charming as she occasionally 
 is. 
 
 It was in my mind to say much sooner that the Browncs were 
 going out to dinner. They had gone out to dinner on several 
 occasions already among the people who had known young 
 Browne before he was married, but the occasions had been in- 
 formal, the invitations worded " quite quietly," and there had 
 been no champagne. This was to be a " burra-khana," with no 
 lack of circumstance. The invitation ran thus: — "My dear 
 Mrs. Browne — Will you and your husband give Mr. Peckle, Mr. 
 Cran and myself the pleasure of your company at dinner on 
 Tuesday the 27th, at eight o'clock? — Yours sincerely, J. L. 
 Sayter." 
 
 " Old Sayter ! " remarked Mr. Browne. " It's a chummery, 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 135 
 
 Nell. They called, the lot of them, that Sunday wo went up the 
 river." 
 
 "A chummery— that's a lot of bachelors living together," 
 said Helen. 
 
 "Not necessarily bachelors— Sayter's a bachelor, Cran and 
 Peckle are both married men, wives in England. It's two years 
 since Mrs. Cran went home, and Mrs. Peckle's never been out, 
 so far as I know. In fact, we've only got Peckle's bare word for 
 the existence of a Mrs. Peckle ; maybe it's a fiction in self-de- 
 fence." 
 
 " George ! " 
 
 " And I don't know that he doesn't invent the little Peckles. 
 To hear him groan over their expenses you'd think there was a 
 new one every year, and you know that's manifestly — " 
 
 " George ! " 
 
 " I was going to say improbable. But I dare say there are a 
 lot of 'em. Peckle goes home once in three or four years and 
 refreshes his memory as to number and size. After that he al- 
 ways has a fit of economy and puts down a horse or two." 
 
 " Poor things ! " said Helen, pensively, " an old bachelor and 
 two grass widowers ! How Wretched their lives must be ! Why, 
 if I had to go home for my health, dear, I can't imagine what 
 would become of you ! " 
 
 " Y — yes ! No, indeed, darling ! But you sha'n't go ! " An 
 interruption foolish but inevitable. " As to those old fellows — 
 well, you'll see. It's rather a swagger chummery, very decent 
 men," young Browne went on, " and therefore, my dear," with 
 mock resignation, " they'll give us all sorts of unholy indigesti- 
 bles to eat, and your husband will have liver of the most fright- 
 ful description for a week." 
 
 "Liver," however, very seldom ensues in the early days of 
 
136 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 matrimony, and Helen, unacquainted with this domestic bane, 
 laughed it to scorn. It was her unconscious belief that the idylls 
 of the Brownes could not suffer from such a commonplace. 
 
 Mr. Sayter wore a civil tag of considerable size; the other 
 two men were brokers. Mr. Sayter's tag was not offensively 
 
 MR. SAYTER. 
 
 conspicuous, was not in fact to be seen at all unless one took the 
 trouble to observe it by inference. I mean that a critical esti- 
 mate of Mr. Sayter's manner would discover the tag ; it might 
 be detected behind his attitude and his aphorisms and the free 
 way in which he lifted his voice upon all things. Perhaps it was 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 137 
 
 only observable in the course of time and the progress of one's 
 acquaintance with tagography. At first sight Mr. Sayter was a 
 little grey gentleman with a look of shrinking modesty and a 
 pair of very bright eyes. Indeed Mr. Sayter bore himself almost 
 with humility, his shoulders had a very unaggressive slope, and 
 he had a way of casting down his eyes as he talked to you which 
 did not suggest a lofty spirit. Custom, however, proved Mr. 
 Sayter's modesty to be rather like that of the fretful porcupine, 
 his humility to take amused superior standpoints of opinion, and 
 his eyes to be cast down in search of clever jests that were just 
 the least bit wicked. All of which, in Anglo-India, subtly de- 
 notes the tag. The untagged or the undertagged are much more 
 careful how they behave. 
 
 Mr. Sayter came down to meet them in the hall and give 
 Mrs. Browne his arm up stairs, as is the custom in this place. 
 Helen observed that the wall was very white and high and un- 
 decorated, that the floor was tiled with blocks of marble, and 
 that the stairs were of broad polished mahogany. In her host 
 she saw only the unobtrusive Mr. Sayter with a reassuring smile 
 of characteristic sweetness anxiously getting out of the way of 
 her train. Young Browne, temporarily abandoned, followed 
 them up discreetly, and at the top Mrs. Browne was introduced 
 to a Calcutta dinner-party waiting for a Calcutta dinner. 
 
 Among the various low-necked ladies Helen was pleased to 
 recognise Mrs. Wodenhamer. The presence of Mrs. Woden- 
 hamer at a dinner given even participially, by Mr. Sayter, indi- 
 cates as well as anything the inalienable privileges connected 
 with the wife of a Commissariat Colonel ; but that is by the way. 
 It is perhaps enough to say that the other ladies were various, 
 one or two young and rather flippant, one or two middle-aged 
 
 and rather fat, verging toward Mrs. Wodenhamer; all very 
 10 
 
MR. PATTER nAVE MRS. BROWNE HIS ARM. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 •39 
 
 agreeably dressed, except Mrs. Wodenhamer, who wore crimson 
 and black ; all extremely self-possessed, all disposed to be easily 
 conversational. I might itemize their husbands standing about 
 in degrees of eminence and worldly plethora fairly proportioned 
 to their waistbands, and sharing the proud consciousness of 
 having contributed a wife to the occasion. I ought to men- 
 tion also Mr. Cran and Mr. Peckle, though I need not dwell 
 on Mr. Cran's bearded baldness, or Mr. Peckle's rosy expan- 
 siveness, as it is quite unlikely that you will have occasion 
 to recognise them out of their own house. They followed 
 Mr. Sayter down stairs with Mrs. Wodenhamer and the lady 
 who most resembled her, when the sound of the gong came 
 up. Helen, as the bride of the occasion, went down on Mr. 
 Sayter's arm. 
 
 " Well, Mrs. Browne," said Mr. Sayter presently, giving her 
 an amiable glance from his soup, " what do you think of us ? 
 Now I know what you're going to say," he continued, holding 
 up a bit of crust in a warning manner, " You're going to say 
 that you haven't been here long enough to form an opinion, or 
 words to that effect. I'm perfectly right, ain't I ? " 
 
 Helen admitted that her answer might have been "some- 
 thing like that." 
 
 " But you don't mean it, you know. Really and truly, if 
 you think a minute, you'll find you don't mean it. You've got 
 a lovely opinion of us, all ready for use, in this last month. 
 And very proper too. The very first thing everybody does here 
 is to form an opinion of Anglo- Indians. It can't be postponed, 
 it's involuntary. Besides, it's a duty. We appeal to the moral 
 side. We call out, as it were, for condemnation. Isn't that so, 
 Wodenhamer ? " 
 
 "Isn't what so?" said that gentleman. "Certainly. Nal 
 
I40 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 peg do,"* to the kitmutgar who wanted to give him cham- 
 pagne. 
 
 " You should have been listening. I decline to begin again. 
 I was trying to convince Mrs. Browne that India is the only 
 country in the world where people can be properly applied 
 to for their impressions before they leave the ship — the way 
 they do in America with travellers of distinction. But there's 
 no use asking Wodenhamer. He's never been to America, and 
 when he does travel he goes incog, to avoid these things." 
 
 Colonel Wodenhamer's mutton-chop whiskers expanded in 
 recognition of the joke, " People know it when you travel," he 
 said. 
 
 " That's sarcastic of you, Wodenhamer, and naughty and 
 unkind. I think he refers, Mrs. Browne, to the fact that I was 
 gazetted for duty in Assam last month, and just a fortnight and 
 three days after I came back the Briton announced that I was 
 going. Do you know the Briton? Capital paper in many 
 respects, but erratic occasionally in matters of considerable im- 
 portance. Delicious paper for description of ball dresses. I 
 revel in the Brifon^s ball dresses." 
 
 "Who d'you think does that sort of thing for them?" Mr. 
 Peckle inquired. " Some lady, I suppose." 
 
 " No indeed, Mr. Peckle," volunteered one in grey bengaline 
 and gold embroidery, on the other side of the table. " It's 
 Captain Dodge, if you please ! I know, because at the Belvedere 
 dance on Friday he came and implored me to tell him what 
 colour Lady Blebbins was wearing. It was hyacinth and daffodil 
 faille — the simplest thing, but he was awfully at a loss, poor 
 fellow ! And afterwards I saw him put it down on the back of 
 his dance-card." 
 
 * Whisky and soda. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 141 
 
 " I daresay they pay for such things," Mr. Peckle remarked. 
 
 " I fancy Dodge gets a polo pony out of it," observed Mr. 
 Cran. 
 
 " I didn't give that man Dodge credit for so much imagina- 
 tion," said Mr. Sayter. " I wonder if I could induce him to put 
 me in ! I'd like to be treated poetically in the newspapers, for 
 once. But I'm afraid he won't," Mr. Sayter continued sadly, 
 " because I can't wear mull muslin— isn't that what you call it ? " 
 to Helen. " I can't wear it because I should suffer from the 
 cold, and yet the baboos do ! That's queer, yon know. The 
 baboo is vain enough already, and I'm not vain at all ; yet 
 Heaven permits the baboo to disport himself in the sweetest 
 gossamer and threatens me with fever and rheumatism if I 
 should even think of such a thing ! " 
 
 " But surely, Mr. Sayter," Helen interposed, " nobody suffers 
 from the cold here ! " 
 
 " Oh, my dear lady ! You don't know ! The cold is the one 
 thing we can't get acclimatized to in India ! To-night it would 
 be Arctic if we weren't dining. Kitmutgar, bund caro dar- 
 waza ! * We'll have a fire up stairs afterwards." 
 
 ^^ A. fire ! " said Helen in astonishment. 
 
 " Yes. And then we'll be comfortable. He can leave all the 
 doors and windows open, you know, so that you can take a 
 severe cold if you want to. Although this is a country governed 
 by a merciless despotism we don't compel people to keep well if 
 they'd rather not." 
 
 " I can't imagine anybody suffering from the cold in Cal- 
 cutta ! " Helen declared. " Why, to-day the thermometer stood 
 at eighty-three ! " 
 
 " Oh," said Mr. Sayter, " how I envy you. — What ! no Roman 
 
 * Shut the door. 
 
142 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 puncli ! You are still warm, you still believe in the ther- 
 mometer, you still find the baboo picturesque — I know you do ! 
 Thank Heaven, I continue to like Koman punch — I retain that 
 innocent taste. But I've been cold," said Mr. Sayter, rubbing 
 his hand, with a shiver, " for years. For years I've had no faith 
 in the thermometer, for years I've been compelled to separate 
 the oil from the less virtuous principles in the baboo. It's very 
 sad, Mrs. Browne, but you'll come to it." 
 
 " I say, Sayter," remarked young Browne, who was singularly 
 without respect of persons, considering that he lived in Calcutta, 
 " I c^u't have you frightening my wife about what she'll come to 
 in Calcutta. I don't want her to develop nervous moral appre- 
 hensions — based on what you've come to ! " 
 
 Mr. Sayter's chin sank into his necktie in official deprecation 
 of this liberty on the part of a junior, and a mercantile one, but 
 he allowed himself to find it humorous, and chuckled, if the 
 word does not express too vulgar a demonstration. He leaned 
 back and fingered his empty glass. 
 
 '' Mrs. Browne," he said deliberately and engagingly, " will 
 come to nothing that is not entirely charming." And he smiled 
 at Helen in a way which said, " There, I can't do better than 
 that." As a matter of fact he could, and Helen, as she blushed, 
 was blissfully unaware that this was the kind of compliment 
 Mr. Sayter offered, though riot invidiously, to the wives of 
 mercantile juniors. 
 
 " Moral apprehensions," repeated Mr. Sayter slowly. — " No ! 
 I've had you for ten years," — he apostrophized the kitmutgar — 
 " you've grown grey in my service and fat on my income, and 
 you don't know yet that I never take anything with a hole in it 
 like that — and pink vegetables inside the hole ! Mrs. Browne, 
 I'm glad you refrained. That's the single thing Calcutta 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OP A MEMSAHIB. 143 
 
 dinuers teach — the one great lesson of abstinence ! I was very 
 clever and learned it early — and you see how many of them I 
 must have survived. But talking of moral apprehensions, I 
 know you're disappointed in one thing." 
 
 " No," said Helen, promptly ; " I like everything." 
 
 "Then you haven't anticipated us properly — you haven't 
 heard about us. You ought to be very much disappointed in 
 our flagrant respectability." 
 
 " But I like respectability," Helen replied, with honesty. 
 
 " Oh ! There, I'm obliged to consider that you come short 
 again, Mrs. Browne. You're not in sympathy with the age. I 
 don't. I'm very respectable myself, but that's not my fault. 
 I've never had the good luck to be married, for one thing ; and 
 that, in India, is essential to a career of any interest. But I was 
 once quite an exceptional, quite an original, character on that 
 account, and I'm not any more. Those were the good old times. 
 And to see a beautiful, well-based, well-deserved reputation for 
 impropriety gradually disappear from a social system it did so 
 much to make entertaining is enough to sadden a man at my 
 time of life." 
 
 " Really," said Helen ; and then, with a little bold shivering 
 plunge, " Were the people out here formerly so veiy — incorrect ? " 
 
 " Oh, deliciously incorrect ! Scandals were really artistic in 
 those days. I often wish I had preserved more of them ; my 
 memory's getting old too. I find myself forgetting important 
 incidents even in those concerning my most intimate friends. 
 And how people spent their money then ! Big houses — turned 
 into boarding-houses now — heaps of servants, horses — entertained 
 like princes ! Nowadays people live in flats, and cut the cook, 
 and save to the uttermost cowrie, so they can retire a year earlier 
 to drink beer with impunity and eat mutton chops with a better 
 
144 ^^^ SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 appetite in England. Ignoble age! People — these respectable 
 people — go home second-class now, too, and pretend to be com- 
 fortable. Disgracefur, I call it." 
 
 " There isn't the money there used to be, Sayter," protested 
 Mr. Peckle. " In those days a man got a deoent tuluh, and car- 
 ried it away in a bag. And the vile rupee was worth two shil- 
 lings." 
 
 Mr. Peckle helped himself to pistachios, and passed the port. 
 
 " I believe that explains it ! " and Mr. Sayter pressed his lips 
 knowingly together. " It never occurred to me before. Econo- 
 my and scandals don't go together. Make a man economical, 
 and he becomes righteous in every other respect. So Govern- 
 ment's to blame, as usual. I think, in view of this, we ought to 
 memorialise Government to drop the income-tax. You would 
 sign, wouldn't you, Mrs. Wodenhamer ? " 
 
 " Yes, indeed," Mrs. Wodenhamer returned, placidly. " Gov- 
 ernment ought to get the income-tax out of those rich natives. 
 I think it's a shame to make us pay." 
 
 " Quite right, Mrs. Wodenhamer ! These, Mrs. Browne, are 
 called promotion nuts ! They're useful to effect the permanent 
 removal of your superiors from office. Very nice and very deadly. 
 You must be sure to have them when you ask any of Browne's 
 firm to dinner. No, I've a prejudice against them ever since 
 they were once offered to me in a pudding. I've a sad associa- 
 tion with them, too." And Mr. Sayter looked grave. 
 
 " Indeed ! " said Helen, not quite sure whether she ought to 
 make her tone sympathetic. 
 
 " Yes, they always come on just as the ladies are leaving," 
 twinkled Mr. Sayter ; and Helen became aware that Mrs. Woden- 
 hamer was looking at her with ponderous significance. There 
 was the usual gracious rustle, and presently the ladies were com- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 145 
 
 fortably and critically ensconced in the drawing-room, sipping 
 their coffee, at various distances from the indubitable fire. The 
 conversation was not very general. Mrs. Wodenhamer discussed 
 something in a suppressed voice on the sofa, with the lady who 
 approximated her. Helen wondered if it vfere jharruns. There 
 was apparently some sympathy between the grey bengaline and 
 gold embroidery and a cream cr6pe de Chine and pearls, with 
 very yellow hair. A little incisive lady in black who happened 
 to be nearest to Helen, asked if she didn't think for three men 
 the room was awfully pretty. Helen said she did, indeed ; and 
 the little lady in black continued, with an entirely unnecessary 
 sigh, that men certainly did know how to make themselves com- 
 fortable, there was no doubt about that. Did Mrs. Browne ever 
 see anything more exquisite than that water-colour on the easel ? 
 Mr. Peckle had just bought it at the Calcutta Art Exhibition ; 
 Mr. Peckle was a great patron of art and that sort of thing, but 
 then he had to be ; he was a director, or something. 
 
 " My husband says," remarked Helen, with lamentable indis- 
 cretion, " that there isn't any art in Calcutta." 
 
 " Does he ? Oh, I think that's a mistake. There's Mrs. Cub- 
 blewell, and Colonel Lamb, and Mrs. Tommy Jackson. Mrs. 
 Tommy paints roses beautifully, and I do a little on satin my- 
 self ! " Then, as if it were a natural outgrowth on the subject, 
 " What is your husband here, Mrs. Browne ? " 
 
 " He's in Macintyre and Macintyre's." 
 
 "Oh, yes.'" 
 
 Whereafter there fell a silence, during which the little lady 
 in black seemed to be debating young Browne's probable con- 
 nection with the firm of Macintyre and Macintyre — it sometimes 
 made such a difference — but before she had properly made up 
 her mind the gentlemen appeared, and there ensued that uncer- 
 
146 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEnr SAHIB. 
 
 tain form of conversation which betrays the prevalent desire that 
 somebody should " make a move." 
 
 Somebody made one finally, before Mr. Sayter actually 
 yawned. The Brownes drove home rather silently in their ticca- 
 gharry. 
 
 "Well?" said young Browne interrogatively, chucking his 
 wife tenderly under the chin in a moonlit space of Chowringhee. 
 
 " I was thinking, George," said she, " that I didn't see any 
 photographs of their wives about the room." 
 
 " No," said young Browne. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 147 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 TNDIA is a country of ameliorations. The punkah is an amel- 
 J- ioration. So is the second-rate theatrical company from 
 Australia, notwithstanding its twang. So, for those who like it, 
 is the custard-apple. It is our complaint that our ameliorations 
 are too numerous and too obvious. It is painful to us that they 
 should obscure everything else in the vision of the travelling 
 public, and suggest themselves as the main facts of an idyllic 
 existence which runs sweetly among them to the tinkle of the 
 peg and the salaams of a loyal and affectionate subject race — 
 which they do. When the travelling public goes back and repre- 
 sents this to be the case in the columns of the Home Press we do 
 not like it. The effect is that we are embittered, and the single 
 one of us who is clever enongh writes the ballad of " Paget 
 M. P." This is natural and proper. We are none of us con- 
 stituted to see our trifling advantages magnified, and our tragic 
 miseries minimised, especially in the papers, without a sense of 
 the Jinpardonable obtuseness of the human race. I do not in- 
 tend to be drawn into personal anathema in this chapter though. 
 It will always be so. The travelling public will continue to 
 arrive and tarry during the months of November, December, 
 January, and February, and to rejoice in the realisation of all 
 they have ever read in the Sunday School books. The travelling 
 public will continue to prefer its own impressions. In British 
 journalism and Great British Parliamentary opinion there will 
 
148 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 always be a stodgy impracticability which the returned Anglo- 
 Indian can never be strong enough to influence. We are a little 
 leaven, but we cannot leaveu the whole lump. 
 
 We die too soon. Besides, it is easier and more comfortable 
 to philosophise when one is going home next hot weather for 
 good. I am content, as I write, to think of my ameliorations 
 even with gratitude, and will only say what so many have said 
 before me, that a protracted residence under ameliorations is 
 necessary to the full understanding of how grievous a thing an 
 ameliorated existence may be. 
 
 The Brownes were not contented with what Nature does for 
 us in this way in the cold weather — green peas and cauliflowers, 
 red sunsets, oranges and guavas at twopence a dozen. Ever 
 since the evening they dined with Mr. Sayter they had been of 
 opinion that the only people whose existence was properly amel- 
 iorated in Calcutta were the people with the joy of a fireplace in 
 their houses. As a family young Browne declared they were 
 entitled to a fireside — it was monstrous that they should lack 
 such an elemental feature of the domestic habit. True they 
 had a " siggaree," a funnel-shaped pot of charcoal, like every- 
 body else — the kitmutgar made toast with it and the bearer 
 dried damp sheets over it — ^but one couldn't be comforted at the 
 risk of asphyxiation, and besides, it smelled. There was nothing 
 else, and the Brownes felt that they could not accustom them- 
 selves to gather in a semicircle round a tall Japanese vase, or a 
 blank sj)ace in a white wall fifteen feet high, for anything like 
 cheerful discourse. They considered that the enduring bliss 
 which they seemed to have taken with the house lacked this one 
 thing only. It was impossible to persuade the Spirit of the 
 Hearth to make himself comfortable in a flower-pot. 
 
 It was also impossible to build a chimney — their local tenure 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB, i^g 
 
 being of that brief and uncertain kind which is popular in Cal- 
 cutta. A long lease is not desirable when a neighbourhood may 
 develop typhoid any day, when beams may take to dropping any 
 night, when one may want six months' leave just at a season 
 which is unpropitious for sub-letting. All these conditions ob- 
 tain in Calcutta, and any of them might be the Brownes' ! Be- 
 sides, a chimney would cost rupees incalculable, 
 
 There were alternatives, however. The Brownes went to the 
 ironmonger's to look at them. They were disposed to take an 
 alternative if it could be had at a moderate price. Most of those 
 they saw were connected with a length of stove pipe which went 
 through the wall, some of them were decoratively tiled, some 
 involved a marble mantel, and they all required an outlay which, 
 for a matter of pure sentiment, seemed large to the Brownes. 
 
 " For forty-nine weeks in the year," remarked young Browne 
 gloomily, " it would have to be stored." 
 
 " Wouldn't it rust ? " inquired Helen. 
 
 " Inches ! " 
 
 " I don't think we can depend on being able to make a new 
 hole in the wall every time we move," Mrs. Browne suggested. 
 "The landlord mightn't like it." 
 
 " We could always arrange to fill it up with purple glass when 
 we leave. If we did that the baboos would encourage our per- 
 forations. So much do they love coloured glass that they paper 
 it on one side, and thus dissimulate." 
 
 Helen thought this ingenious, but it did not alter the fact 
 that the tiled temptations were expensive. Then the ironmon- 
 ger's young man, rising to the situation, suggested a kerosene 
 stove. You purchased a kerosene stove, he said, and there it 
 was, your inalienable property, or words to that effect. It didn't 
 require no fittings, nor yet being built into the wall. It would 
 
I50 Tm-- SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 go with you anywheres, it didn't want a stove pipe nor yet a 
 liole. It didn't go in for being to say decorative, not exactly, 
 but then see how cheerful it was. You never knew till you tried 
 how cheerful kerosene could be : The young man gave them to 
 understand, moreover, that its mechanism could be compre- 
 hended by a child or a punkah wallah. And they had no idea 
 to what extent it would reduce the consumption of coal. The 
 Brownes listened attentively, and when the young man paused 
 and rested one elbow against a patent punkah machine in his 
 exhaustion, young Browne made a scientific observation of the 
 stove, lie turned one wick up and the other down. " Seems to 
 work all right," he said to Helen. 
 
 " Terfectly, sir," said the ironmonger's young man. 
 
 Young Browne looked at him curiously. " You haven't been 
 long out?" he remarked. 
 
 " No, sir. Only three weeks, sir. I came from this depart- 
 ment in AVilliam Witely's, sir." 
 
 " I remember," said Mr. Browne, " they do like to sell things 
 there. Three months in Calcutta and you won't care a blow." 
 
 " That so, sir ? " the young man returned, smilingly. " I 
 'ope not, sir, for the sake of business." 
 
 " It is. Vf hat do you think of this thing, Helen ? Shall we 
 have it sent up?" 
 
 " It would be nice for toffee," said Helen. " And I'm sure I 
 can make toffee cheaper than the cook does. I dare say it would 
 save us a lot in toffee, George." 
 
 " I'm sure it would. And it's only thirty-five rupees — about 
 two pounds seven, at the current rate of exchange. It isn't just 
 my ideal of a fireside, but it seems the best we can do." And 
 the next morning the kerosene stove arrived on the heads of foiu" 
 coolies, at the Brownes' suburban residence. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADl-EXTUKES OE A MEM SAHIB. 151 
 
 The iiiglit was propitiously and comfortably cold. As they 
 drove home from tennis at Mrs. Jack Lovitt's, muffled up in the 
 
 MRS. LOVITT. 
 
 strijied flannel jackets with which C'alcutta protects itself from 
 the inclemency of the weather after tennis, Helen declared, with 
 the kerosene stove in anticipation, that it was really almost 
 
152 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 piercing. " It's a pity, though, George," she said regretfully, 
 " that we were (luite in such a hurry about buying the stove, for 
 I was telling Mrs. Lovitt about it, and she said she was so sorry 
 she didn't know we wanted one — we could have had theirs, and 
 it's in perfect order, for ten rupees." 
 
 " Oh, next cold weather," returned her lord, " we'll have the 
 pleasure of selling ours for ten rupees instead, it comes to much 
 the same thing, you see." 
 
 It is almost impossible to persuade a sahib of Calcutta to take 
 his domestic accounts seriously. If his natural proclivities are 
 in that direction, he is usually not to be respected. 
 
 The Brownes had a hump for dinner, and a hump costs a 
 rupee and several annas. Nevertheless they hurried through it, 
 the more speedily to avail themselves of their unaccustomed lux- 
 ury in kerosene, to " cluster round the cheerful blaze," as George 
 Browne put it, which stood solemnly between two long windows 
 in the drawing-room awaiting a match. Entering, they found 
 the bearer, the kitmutgar and the mallie kneeling about it, with 
 varied expressions of concern, the machine still grim and black, 
 in the midst of a pervasive odour of kerosene. The Brownes 
 felt palled. It was not what they had expected. 
 
 " Bilcul na liona sucta^'' * said the bearer, rising and survey- 
 ing the thing as if it were an obdurate Hindu deity. 
 
 " What does he say ? " inquired Mrs. Browne. Mrs. Browne 
 was always inquiring what the bearer said. Mr. Browne was 
 rapidly besoming a peripatetic hand-book of Hindustani. He 
 implored his wife to have a 'nmnsM,\ and Helen thought it 
 would be delightful but sternly declined on the score of economy. 
 So young Browne had no surcease. 
 
 * Simply it may not be ! f Instnictor. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 153 
 
 '■'■Albut hona sucta!"* said he, going upon his own knees 
 before the refractory divinity. Helen stood by with superior in- 
 terest and knitted brows, after the manner of women. 
 
 " Dya-silai hum ko-do! " \ enunciated the sahib. 
 
 Deep relief became visible upon the faces of the bearer, the 
 kitmutgar, and the mallie. The sahib was omnipotent. 
 
 Mr. Browne presently discovered that the wicks had dropped 
 into the oil reservoirs. He proceeded to take the newly imported 
 fireside upon his lap, so to speak, and unscrew it,, his wife re- 
 marking meanwhile that she supposed it was quite safe. He 
 rescued the wicks, but Helen has since mournfully given me to 
 understand that certain of the garments he had on were never 
 tenable afterwards. 
 
 Then they applied a match to engender the sacred fire upon 
 their hearth, and it was engendered in two long narrow flames 
 that flared up in yawning tin chasms on either side and sent be- 
 fore them a wreathing blackness of smoke which escaped rapidly 
 through the holes on the top for the saucepan and the gridiron. 
 
 " It is cheerful," said Helen insistently. " But it seems to 
 need a stoVe pipe after all," she added, in doubt. 
 
 " Not at all," said her husband, " only to be turned down." 
 So he turned it down to a wavering blue and yellow line, and 
 closed the doors. 
 
 " Finish hai ? " inquired the bearer, and the sahib said yes, it 
 was finished, so the bearer, the kitmutgar and the mallie re- 
 paired to the simpler solaces of sentimental organisations less 
 subtly devised than ours. 
 
 These two exiled Brownes drew up chairs and tried to feel at 
 least anticipative appreciation. There were two round trans- 
 
 • Without doubt it may be! f (Jive me the matches. 
 
 11 
 
154 '^"^ SIMPLE ADVEKTURBS OF A .VEMSAH/B. 
 
 parent holes in the doors through which they could see a reflec- 
 tion of their glowing hearth. They leaned towards it and spread 
 out their hands. Young Browne remarked, with a chill smile, 
 that it was certainly warmer than it had been. They pulled 
 their chairs closer together, in order, I have no doubt, to impede 
 the heat that might escape into other quarters of the room. 
 Helen slipped her hand into lier husband's, and together they 
 looked thoughtfully into the depths of the burning wick. I 
 think the way in which they must have regarded this thing, 
 which was to mean for them the essence of home life in an un- 
 homelike country, and ths warm glow of home love caught and 
 held where it is reputed apt to stray abroad, was not altogether 
 laughable though. In fact 
 
 "Nellie!" exclaimed young Browne,_jiiid had occasion to 
 bring his chair closer still There was a moist contact of cheeks 
 and a succession of comforting silences. The kerosene stove 
 continued to burn excellently, but was disregarded. 
 
 "It looks like some kind of — of engine, doesn't it, George?" 
 Mrs. Browne recovered herself sufficiently to say. 
 
 " Yes. Beastly thing ! " concurred young Browne in further 
 disparagement. Then they began to observe the eflFect of the 
 heat on the varnish. It took the form of a hot penetrative un- 
 pleasant smell that radiated from the kerosene stove into every 
 quarter of the room. 
 
 "I expect it will wear off," said young Browne gloomily, 
 " but we'd better put the thing out in the compound every night 
 until it does." 
 
 It has never worn off, however. Helen, with responsible 
 memory of the thirty-five rupees, used it conscientiously all last 
 cold weather. She did serious and light-minded cooking with it 
 while she suffered the delusion that she was Kali Bagh's superior 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 •55 
 
 — inevitable but short — and she made almost enough toffee upon 
 it to justify its expense, if it had been necessary to subsist upon 
 toffee. Whenever anything could be done with it the Brownes 
 did it. They had it lighted to welcome their return from burra- 
 khanas and Government House dances, and on one occasion 
 Helen sat for half an hour before it in her most cherished gown, 
 under a shower of softly falling black flakes of carbonized kero- 
 sene without being aware of it — the result of an injudicious 
 lighting and forgetting on the part of the bearer. Many an 
 evening they sat in its presence making efforts at hilarity and 
 trying to forget the odours of varnish and kerosene — in the end 
 they always confessed it inadequate. It had a self-contained 
 moroseness, it never snapped or sparkled or died down. When 
 they went to bed they turned it out. Through its two round 
 eyes it mocked their homesick effort after the cheer of other 
 lands. The bearer admired it and took pride in setting it alight. 
 But the Brownes regarded it with feelings that grew constantly 
 more "mixed." It made no ashes and gave no trouble, and 
 when they didn't want it it was not there — all of which seemed 
 additional offences. 
 
 The old kite that surveyed them always through the window 
 from his perch in the sago palm beside the veranda said nothing, 
 but if they had been intelligent they might have heard the jack- 
 als that nightly pillaged the city's rubbish heaps, howling derision 
 at the foolishness of a sahib who tried to plant his hearth-stone 
 in India. 
 
156 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 'RS. BROWNE was not permitted to 
 ktiow any of her immediate neigh- 
 bours, which she thouglit unfor- 
 tunate. It was a pity in a way, and yet not a 
 great pity, for if I know anything about Helen 
 Browne she would not have been able to assimi- 
 late her neighbours comfortably. Un- 
 less they live with the great and good 
 in Chowringhee, it is often difficult for 
 Calcutta people to do this. It is said 
 that the missionaries manage it, but 
 about tliis no one is certain, for between Calcutta people and 
 the missionaries tjiere is a great gulf fixed. Calcutta interprets 
 the missionary position with strict logic. It was not Calcutta 
 — Calcutta proper — that the missionaries came out, second class, 
 to establish intimate spiritual relations with, but the heathen. 
 Calcutta is careful, therefore, not to interfere in any way with 
 this very laudable arrangement ; the good work must not be 
 retarded by any worldly distraction. Calcutta contributes to it, 
 in her own peculiar way, by allowing the missionaries the full- 
 est possible opportunity for becoming acquainted with the hea- 
 then. If one does not readily suspect the self-denial in this, it is 
 because one is predisposed against society— it is perhaps because 
 oiic has been snubbed. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 157 
 
 I cannot say with accuracy, therefore, whether a missionary 
 in Mrs. Browne's place would have known Uadabullub Mitter- 
 jee, Bahadur, who lived next door to the west; doubtless she 
 would have made attempts, at least, to introduce herself to the 
 ladies who divided the matrimonial dignities of his establish- 
 ment ; but it did not occur to Helen that there was any opening 
 for such advances upon her part. Even the slits of windows 
 which commanded the Browne compound were generally shut 
 and always iron-barred ; no dangerous communication from an 
 unveiled memsahib who ate with her husband could get in there. 
 It was a little narrow, silent, yellow house, too tall for its width, 
 much overgrown with heavy-hanging trees, and it stood a long 
 way back from the road, looking out on a strip of compound, 
 through a glass door, purple in places and green in places, and 
 altogether brilliant to behold. The strip of compound was a 
 marvel of rectangular crookedness. It was a good deal taken 
 up with a tank, a long narrow tank covered with a generous 
 green slime, dug rather sidewise. The rest of the place was 
 divided into small sharp-angled-beds with rows of stones. They 
 were very much at odds with each other, and nothing grew in 
 them but a few ragged rose-bnshes, and flagrant things that came 
 of their own accord. Almost every evening R. Mitterjee, Baha- 
 dur, went out to drive. The Brownes used to meet him in the 
 broad Red Road that cleaves the Maidan, where the landaus, and 
 victorias, and tum- turns of Calcutta amuse themselves by passing 
 and repassing, and bowing to each other, in the pleasant part of 
 the day, before the quick darkness comes and sends them all 
 home to dinner. Nobody bowed to Radabullub, and lie bowed 
 to nobody, though assuredly no sahib drove in so resplendent a 
 gharry as his. It was built on the most imposing lines, with 
 ornamentation of brass, and a beautiful bunch of flowers painted 
 
158 'I"-- SIMPLE ADVEXTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 on cither door-pauel. And it was pulled by two of the most im- 
 petuous prancing steeds in silver mounted harness, that the soul 
 of a Bahadur could desire. The silver mountings were very 
 rusty, and the prancing steeds lamentably weak in their fore legs, 
 but the soul of a Bahadur is not perturbed by little things like 
 that. Kadabullub leaned back behind them superciliously, fold- 
 ing his arms over his tight silk coat of pink brocade, or twisting 
 his moustache. With his embroidered yellow turban ai a certain 
 angle, this Bahadur was a killing fellow — very much a man of 
 the world indeed, but not enough to know a good horse when he 
 saw it, or to be able to drive it if he did, or to understand what 
 earthly difference it made to a sahib how his servants were 
 dressed. His own sat behind in a cluster — he had more of them 
 than any sahib — in turbans of the colours they most fancied, and 
 alike only in the respect that they were all dirty and down at 
 heels, if the expression, in a shoeless case, is properly applied. 
 But when it was necessary to prepare the way none shouted 
 louder or ran faster than the servants of Radabullub Mitterjee, 
 who probably thought that there ought to be a sensible difference 
 between the apparel of a syce and pink brocade, and approved it. 
 Radabullub did not always drive in the Red Road alone. Some- 
 times the cushion beside him was occupied by a very small and 
 high-shouldered edition of himself, encased in blue satin with 
 gold edgings. This Baha(Jur in embryo folded his arms like his 
 father and looked at the Red Road with equal superciliousness ; 
 indeed, I fancy he took much the same views of life generally. 
 Tliey are early inherited in Bengal. 
 
 But the ladies, the Mesdames Mitterjee, when they issued 
 forth from the little silent yellow house, which they did but sel- 
 dom, went most securely in charge and under cover, and Mrs. 
 Browne miglit look in vain for any glimpse of their fascinations 
 
l6o THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 behind the purple curtains of their palanquins, as they passed 
 her gate. 
 
 I don't know the name of the people on the other side, and 
 neither does Mrs. Browne. They seemed to live a good deal in 
 the veranda in an untidy way. Helen could always command a 
 man asleep there in pyjamas from her drawing-room window, up 
 to eleven o'clock in the morning. They paid no more attention 
 to their compound than Radabullub did, but they had a leggy 
 bay colt tied up there upon which the family lavished the tender- 
 est affection. When the Brownes drove home in the early dark- 
 ness from tennis, they could usually see a casual meal going on 
 through an open window at which the discourse was very cheer- 
 ful and general, the men in shirt-sleeves, the ladies posed negli- 
 gently with their arms upon the table. There was a baby, a 
 cracked piano, and a violin in the house, but the baby had a good 
 constitution and went to bed at eight o'clock, and it did not 
 seem to the Brownes, as they listened to the songs their neigh- 
 bours sang after dinner, that the piano was very much out of 
 tune. They were old old songs that everybody knew, sung with 
 great spirit and energy, chiefly in chorus, and Mrs. Browne's 
 slipper kept time to them with great enjoyment. A boisterous 
 old song in Calcutta was a pleasant anomaly and struck through 
 the mango trees like a voice from home. The hearts of the 
 Brownes warmed towards their neighbours as they smote the 
 languid air with " Do ye ken John Peel with his coat so gay ? " 
 and as it came again and again, Mr. and Mrs. Browne smiled at 
 each other and joined softly in the chorus, being comforted 
 thereby. It was rather an additional attraction that these har- 
 monies grew a little beery later in the evening. Young Browne 
 could drink beer in Calcutta only under pain of his own later dis- 
 pleasure — a bitter thing for an Englishman. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. l6l 
 
 They were jockeys, these neighbours of the Brownes' — from 
 Australia very likely, with the last batch of Waler horses. They 
 belonged to the class Calcutta knows collectively, as a sub-social 
 element, that nevertheless has its indeterminate value, being 
 white, or nearly so, as a rule. The aristocracy of the class is 
 probably represented by the commissariat sergeants and the local 
 police, and I have no doubt it observes its rules of precedence, 
 though it is unlikely that Mrs. Browne's neighbours had much 
 regard for them. On certain days of the year Calcutta makes 
 brief acquaintance with " Light Blue and Canary," or " Green 
 Pink Sleeves," but his wife and baby go on, one might say, with- 
 out official sanction of any sort ; they are permitted. So it 
 doesn't matter to anybody what Light Blue and Canary's Chris- 
 tian name is — his cap and sleeves are enough. Occasionally the 
 reporters are obliged to find it out when Light Blue and Canary 
 breaks his wretched neck and half ruins a beautiful horse, and 
 the public have to be informed of it. Then his friends dress 
 Light Blue and Canary in mufti and bury him early next morn- 
 ing in Circular Road Cemetery, and there is the most annoying 
 confusion when both he and his horse have to be scratched for 
 the afternoon's races. As to the wife and baby under these cir- 
 cumstances, they still go on, it is supposed. 
 
 I regret to say that the Brownes were bounded on the north 
 by a bustee. It is not necessary to explain that a bustee is an 
 unsavoury place, the word has a taste and a smell of its own. 
 One is always aware of the vicinity of a bustee, chiefly because of 
 the bovine nature of the fuel it consumes. It is impossible to 
 put it less vulp'arly than that. All over Calcutta, in the cold 
 weather, there hangs at set of sun a blue cloud of smoke with an 
 acrid smell. It offends the nostrils of the very Viceroy, yet it is 
 not in the power of any municipal Commissioner to put out the 
 
1 62 'I'liJ^- SJMPI.F. ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 lircs that send it up. It curls througli a thousand roofs, the 
 tiled roofs of the country, representing much humble comfort 
 and many humble dinners, and every morning on the Maidan 
 you may see ugly old women stooping to collect the material for it. 
 Uustees, moreover, are never drained. They and their inhabit- 
 ants fester comfortably through the long blue and green Indian 
 days unconscious that their proximity does not enhance rents. 
 
 Mrs. Browne found her bustee neighbours more approachable. 
 Her dressing-room window overlooked the place and gave her a 
 point of speculation which she enjoyed quite shamelessly. A 
 young papoia tree flourished in a corner of the roof she looked 
 down upon, and various forms of vegetables fringed it. It was 
 the daily promenade of the family cock, and occasionally a black 
 goat took the air there. The cock flew up, but the goat always 
 made use of the family staircase. The family lived mostly in 
 the yard — three old women and five babies. The old women 
 wore various kinds of rags, the babies were uniformly dressed in 
 a string. The biggest baby carried the littlest about, astride her 
 hip, and they all played together in one corner, where they made 
 marvels in mud, just as children who wear clothes do. The old 
 women scolded them severally and collectively, especially when 
 they came and teased for breakfast with pathetic hands upon 
 their little round stomachs. The oldest of the old women cooked 
 the breakfast, and she would not have it hurried. She cooked it 
 in a single pot that stood on a mud fireplace in the middle of 
 the yard, squatting before it, feeding the flames with one hand 
 and stirring the mess with the other. Helen could see what she 
 put in it — rice, and more rice, and yellow dhol, and last of all 
 pieees of fish. As she cooked the woman looked up at Helen 
 now ami tlicu and smiled, amused that she should be interested 
 in so ])oor an occupation — a memsahib ! And the babies, when 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 163 
 
 they discovered her, stood open-mouthed and gazed, forgetting 
 the pot. In the house they divided it upon plantain leaves, a 
 popular dinner service in Bengal ; and when the babies issued 
 forth again, in file, their appearance was quite aldermanic. The 
 old women perhaps reposed, the sun grew hot on the window- 
 ledge, and Helen thought of other things to do. In the evening, 
 though, when the hibiscus bushes threw long shadows across the 
 garden path, and Helen waited for her lord by the gate as a bride 
 will, the babies came round through devious lanes to assert them- 
 selves as the same babies of the morning and eligible for pice. 
 Helen felt an elementary joy in bestowing it, and the babies re- 
 ceived it solemnly, as entirely their due, with little salaams for 
 form's sake. There was tremendous interest on both sides, but 
 beyond the statement that the babies lived in the little house, 
 and the memsahib in the big one, conversation was difficult, and 
 Helen thought with concern of the vocabulary that would be 
 necessary in order to teach them about man's chief end. They 
 came every day to watch the going forth of the Brownes in the 
 tum-tum, and made a silent, open eyed, admiring little group 
 beside the gate, at which the pony usually shied. Then young 
 Browne would crack his whip in the air very fiercely indeed, and 
 address them in language that sounded severe, though it had no 
 perceptible effect. Even the babies in Bengal accept the sahib 
 as a blustering, impolite person of whom nobody need be afraid. 
 And then opposite, across the weedy road and the stagnant 
 ditch, a riotous Eajah resided, in a wonderful castellated place 
 with four or five abandoned acres around it. The Rajah was 
 very splendid and important. He had a slouching guard at his 
 gate with a gun, who probably bullied the dhoby ; and when he 
 went abroad in the evenings, four badly uniformed horsemen, 
 and no less, pranced uncertainly behind his carriage. The Ra- 
 
j64 the simple adventures of a mem sahib. 
 
 jah gave entertainments to European gentlemen of circumstance, 
 whereat I do not think any single variety of food or drink pro- 
 curable in Calcutta was omitted ; but ladies did not participate, 
 except, of course, those who contributed to the entertainment — 
 the ladies of the nautch, or those of a stray theatrical company 
 whose performances the Rajah fancied. In return the Rajah 
 was invited to evening parties at Government House, where 
 he appeared in a turban and diamonds, supremely oiled and 
 scented, stood about in corners with his hands behind his back, 
 and never for an instant dreamed in his disdainful Hindu soul 
 of eating at the Viceroy's supper-table. At the end of the cold 
 weather he went back to his own state, where he sat on the floor 
 and hatched treason against the British with both majesty and 
 comfort. In the evening his domain was dotted with the cook- 
 ing-fires of his people, who made a sort of tented field of it. The 
 wind blew the smoke across the Brownes' compound, causing 
 young Browne to use language uncomplimentary to Rajahs, and 
 that was all they ever had to do with this one. 
 
 I mention the local isolation of these young people because it 
 is typical of Calcutta, where nobody by any chance ever leans 
 over anybody else's garden gate. Doubtless this has its advan- 
 tages — they are probably official — but Helen, not being official, 
 found it cramping. 
 
 There was always the garden, though ; she had that much lib- 
 erty. The garden had begun with the Brownes, it was a con- 
 temporary success. There had been desolation, but you have 
 heard how they engaged a mallie. Desolation fled before the 
 mallie by daily degrees, though he was seldom seen in pursuit of 
 it. When gardeners work in Christendom, this one sought re- 
 pose and the balmy hubble-bubble, or Ijathed and oiled and ate 
 in his little mud house under the pipal tree. It was very early 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. ,65 
 
 in the morning, at crow-caw one might say in poetic reference to 
 the dawn in India, that the mallie scratched and scraped along 
 the garden beds with his wonderful little trowel, and spoke to 
 the flowers so that they sprang up to answer him. When the 
 shadow of the house fell on the hibiscus bushes he came out 
 again, and slaked the hot beds with water from the tank in 
 many buckets. Here and there he stooped over them like a 
 glistening brown toad-stool, but Helen never knew what he did 
 or his reason for doing it — that was hid with the mallie-lok. 
 
 As to the garden, there was not a tropical seed in it, they 
 were all English flowers, which made the mallie's excellent un- 
 derstanding with them more remarkable, for they spoke a differ- 
 ent language. It was not much of a garden, there was abso- 
 lutely no order or arrangement — it would have worried me — but 
 the Brownes planted a vast amount of interest and affection and 
 expectation in it ; and it all grew. There were such nasturtiums 
 as Helen longed to show her mother, there were phloxes white 
 and purple, pansies too, and pinks, and not a quiet corner but 
 was fragrant with mignonette. A row of sunflowers tilted tall 
 against the side of the house, and they actually had corn-bottles, 
 and balsams and daisies. Violets too — violets in exile, violets in 
 pots, with the peculiar property that violets sometimes have in 
 India, of bringing tears to the eyes if one bends over them. 
 
 The Brownes began by counting them — the first pansy-bud 
 was an event, and I have heard references between them to " the 
 day the sunflower came out." They chronicled daily at break- 
 fast : " Two nasturtiums and a pink," " two pinks, three nastur- 
 tiums, and the monthly rose," with great gratulation, while I am 
 convinced neither of them looked twice at the fine bunch I sent 
 round occasionally from my garden while their garden was grow- 
 ing. It grew so fast, their garden, that presently, if you met 
 
1 66 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 them in society, they could talk of nothing else. It was new to 
 them, this friendly solace of the flowers of home. One would 
 have thonglit it specially invented for their honeymoon, whereas 
 the rest of us demanded it every cold weather, as regularly as the 
 punkah on the fifteenth of March. Mrs. Browne used to go 
 about saying what a wonderful amount of comfort one could get 
 out of a verbena, if it were only the right colour, without the 
 slightest suspicion of the triteness of the remark ; and young 
 Browne would show you his home-grown button-hole, as if no 
 other man in the place possessed one. It was eminently good 
 for them, as it is for all of us. To some of us, you know, Eng- 
 land at last becomes a place where one dies daily of bronchitis, 
 and is obliged to do without a kitmutgar; but this never hap- 
 pens if every cold weather one plants one's self round about with 
 English flowers. They preserve the remnant of grace which is 
 left in the Anglo- Indian soul, and keep it homesick, which is its 
 one chance of salvation. Young Browne seldom said anything 
 cynical in the garden, and as for Helen, it was simply Canbury 
 to her. She could always go down and talk of home to her 
 friends in the flower-beds, who were so steadfastly gay, and tell 
 them, as she often did, how brave and true it was of them to 
 come so far from England, forgetting, perhaps, that from a cli- 
 matic point of view nasturtiums like heathendom. And in the 
 evening the smoke of the hubble-bubble was lost in the fragrance 
 of the garden. 
 
 Mrs. Browne says that if I am writing about their compound, 
 I ought not to omit to mention the fowl-yard, which was situ- 
 ated at one end of it, near the stable. It was another experiment 
 in economy — the cook used such a quantity of eggs that the 
 Brownes saw no reason why they should not be produced on the 
 promises. So they enclosed a fowl-yard and stocked it, and the 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 167 
 
 cock vied with the crows in informing them of the earliest hint 
 of daylight. But the Brownes do not now advise the keeping of 
 fowls on the ground of economy ; they say, indeed, that only the 
 very rich can afford to keep them. It seems that the syce kindly 
 supplied their food out of the pony's gram, charging the deficit to 
 the memsahib, who also paid liberally for barley, a visionary pro- 
 vision at which her birds had never a pick. They were, notwith- 
 standing, sound healthy hens, and the marvel was that they did 
 not lay — except an egg or two a week for pure ostentation. Kali 
 Bagh was doing a good business with the rest, supplying them to 
 Mrs. Browne at full market rates, and to Mrs. Green Pink Sleeves 
 at about half, to secure her custom. The hens in the meantime 
 clucked cheerfully, and Helen was in a parlous state when in the 
 end they had to be cut off untimely and stewed. " But with ruin 
 staring us in the face," she said, " what else could we do ! " 
 
 This will serve as an explanation to posterity, if any should 
 inquire why it was that toward the end of the nineteenth century 
 in Bengal only Members of Council were in the habit of keeping 
 hens. 
 
l68 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 cold weather is not a season of unquali- 
 fied delight in Calcutta, in spite <A the 
 glorious coming of the Raj into his 
 winter palace, and the consequent 
 nautch. The cold weather has its 
 trifling drawbacks. The mosquitoes 
 and the globe-trotters are so bad 
 then, that some people have been 
 known to prefer the comparative 
 seclusion they enjoy when the thermometer stands at 103° in 
 the shade, when the mosquitoes have gone to the Hills, pursuing 
 the fat of the land, and the globe-trotters to northern latitudes 
 seeking publishers. 
 
 It may be set down as an axiom that the genus globe-trotter 
 is unloved in Calcutta. It may also be set down as an axiom 
 that it is his own fault, for reasons that may appear. But there 
 are globe-trotters and globe-trotters, and of some the offence is 
 venial — nothing more, perhaps, than that they make the hotels 
 uncomfortable, and put up the price of native curiosities. And 
 some are amusing in their way, and some bring English con- 
 versation with them ; and I have known one to be grateful for 
 such poor favours as he received, but he was not a globe-trotter 
 that took himself seriously. It is also possible, I believe, if one 
 lives in india long enough, to come across a globe-trotter who is 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 169 
 
 modest and teachable, but we have been out here only twenty- 
 two years, and I am going home without having seen one. 
 
 The Parliamentary globe-trotter represents the species which 
 has impressed itself most upon Anglo-India, lie has given a 
 character and a finish, as it were, to the whole genus. He has 
 made himself so prevalent and of such repute that, meeting any 
 stalwart stranger of cheerful aggressive countenance at llis Ex- 
 cellency's board, we are apt to inquire amongst ourselves, " of 
 what district?" hoping for reasons private to Anglo-India, that 
 it may not be a Radical one. The initials " M. P." have become 
 cabalistic signs. They fill us with the memory of past re- 
 proaches, and the certainty of coming ones. They stand for 
 much improper language, not entirely used in India. They 
 inspire a terrible form of fear, the apprehension of the unknown, 
 for the potentials of the globe-trotting M. P. are only revealed 
 in caucus, the simple Anglo-Indian cannot forecast them. 
 Regularly with December he arrives, yearly more vigorous, more 
 inquisitive, more corpulent, more disposed to make a note of it. 
 We have also noticed an annual increase in his political impor- 
 tance, his loquacity, and his capacity to be taken in, which he 
 would consider better described as ability to form an independ- 
 ent opinion. At this moment we are looking forward to the 
 last straw in the shape of Lord Randolph Churchill. 
 
 Mr. Jonas Batcham, M. P., was not so great a man as Lord 
 Randolph Churchill when he arrived in Calcutta last cold 
 weather ; what he may have become since, by the diligent use of 
 his Indian experiences and information collected "on the spot," 
 I have no means of knowing. George Browne's father was one 
 of Mr. Batcham's constituents, and this made Mr. Batcham will- 
 ing to stay with the Brownes while he was inspecting Calcutta, 
 
 and collecting advice to offer to the Viceroy. lie kindly put up 
 12 
 
170 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 with them for several weeks, and wheu he went away he gave 
 four annas to the sweeper. 
 
 Mr. Batcham occasionally described himself as one of the 
 largest manufacturers in the north of England, and though the 
 description leaves something to be desired, it does suggest Mr. 
 Batcham. lie was large, imposing iu front, massive in the rear. 
 He was gray-whiskered, of a rubicund countenance, of a double 
 chin. He wore a soft felt hat a little on one side, and his hands 
 in his pockets, a habit which always strikes me as characteristic 
 of a real manufacturer. He was very well informed — they all 
 are. He had a suave yet off-hand manner, a business-like smile, 
 a sonorous bass voice, and a deep, raging and unquenchable 
 thirst for facts. 
 
 Mr. Batcham was very much aware of his value to the 
 Brownes as a new arrival from England — a delicate apprecia- 
 tion of himself, which is never wanting to a globe-trotter. Mr. 
 Batcham blandly mixed himself up with the days when people 
 came round the Cape in a sailing-ship, or across the sands of 
 Suez on a camel, and invested himself with all the sentimental 
 interest that might attach to a fellow-countryman discovered in 
 the interior of Bechuanaland. A generous philanthropic in- 
 stinct rose up and surged within him as he thought, in the midst 
 of his joyful impressions of the tropics, how much pleasure his 
 mere presence was probably imparting. He almost felt at mo- 
 ments as if he had undertaken this long, arduous, and expensive 
 journey in the interest of the Brownes as well as those of his 
 constituents. 
 
 The great concourse of his kind in the hotels, the telegrams 
 in the morning's Englishman, the presence of overland cheese, 
 the electric light, and the modern bacteriologist, should have re- 
 buked this pretension somewhat, but it is doubtful if anything 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 17 j 
 
 could do that. " I saw both your parents before I sailed," said 
 Mr. Batcham, in liberal compensation, as it were, for his first 
 dinner, "and left them quite well." And when young Browne 
 replied that since then he was sorry to say his mother had had 
 a bad attack of bronchitis, however, by the last mail they had 
 heard she was getting over it, the damper was only momentary, 
 and Mr. Batcham proceeded to inform them that Parnell was 
 dead. 
 
 Oh, he was sufficiently communicative, that Batcham, suffi- 
 ciently willing to impart his impressions, as expansive, by the 
 time they got to the joint, as ever you liked. He had a cer- 
 tain humorous perception of what was expected of him. As a 
 " globe-trotter," he was familiar with the expression, and applied 
 it to himself jovially without shame. The perception was in- 
 complete, and therefore did not make Mr. Batcham uncomfort- 
 able. However, he understood perfectly that globe-trotters as a 
 class were frequently and prodigiously taken in. Acting upon 
 this, Mr. Batcham made his incredulity the strong point of his 
 intelligence, and received certain kinds of information with an 
 almost obvious wink. That very first night at dinner, he pro- 
 claimed himself to the Brownes a person who conld not be im- 
 posed upon — useless to try. " Coming down from Benares," 
 said Mr. Batcham, " I travelled with a couple of men who said 
 they were indigo planters, and so they may have been for all I 
 know. Anyhow they spotted me to be a globe-trotter — said they 
 knew it by the kind of hat I wore — and then they proceeded to 
 fill me up about the country. One fellow said he didn't own a 
 yard of indigo land himself ; always got the peasants to grow it 
 for him ; and the other went into some complicarted explanation 
 of how bine indigo was got by squeezing green leaves. All sorts 
 of yarns they told me. How the natives wouldn't eat factory 
 
172 
 
 THE SlMI'Lli ADVENTUKES OE A xM EM SAHIB. 
 
 sugar, because they believed it defiled in the preparation, but 
 preferred drain water to any other. How a Hill woman would 
 make nothing of carrying me on her back a thousand feet steady 
 climbing. How in the part of the country we were going 
 through, it was so hot in June that men had servants to drench 
 them with water in the middle of the night regularly. I saw 
 they were enjoying it, so I let them go on — in fact I rather drew 
 them out, especially about indigo. Took it all in and cried for 
 more, as the babies do for patent medicine. Then when we got 
 out at the station here I said, ' Thank you gentlemen, for all the 
 " information " you have given me. It has been very entertain- 
 ing. Of course you will understand, however, that I don't be- 
 lieve a word of it. Good morning ! ' I fancy those two indigo 
 planters will hesitate before they tackle their next globe-trotter. 
 I never saw men look more astonished in my life." 
 
 " I should think so ! " exclaimed young Browne ; " what they 
 told you was wholly and literally true." 
 
 Mr. Jonas Batcham looked at his host with a humorous 
 twinkle. " Don't you try it on," said he. 
 
 Although Mr. Batcham found it advisable to shed so much 
 of the light of his countenance upon the Brownes, as I have said, 
 it was native India that he came to see and report upon. And 
 to this end he had read one or two of the most recent publica- 
 tions on the subject, works produced, that is to say, by our very 
 most recent visitors, smoking from the London press before their 
 authors' names were dry in the Bombay hotel register. These 
 volumes had given Mr. Batcham comprehensive ideas of native 
 India, and he knew that between Cape Comorin and Peshawur 
 were lying two hundred and fifty million people urgently in need 
 of his benevolent interference. They were of different races, 
 religions, customs, and languages — Mr. Batcham had expected to 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 >73 
 
 find that and had equipped himself for it by learning the names 
 of almost all of them. He was acquainted with several of their 
 gods, he knew that Ganesh had an elephant's head, that Kali 
 loved the blood of goats, and that Krishna was the source of all 
 things. He was aware also that it was not proper to speak of 
 Mohammedan rajahs or Hindoo sheiks, a.nd he had informed 
 himself upon the subject of Eastern polygamy. Mr. Batcham 
 was a person of intelligence who did not travel without prepar- 
 ing his mind, and though according to his own modest statement 
 there was still a great deal that he didn't know about India, it 
 was open to an appreciative person to doubt this. In one direc- 
 tion Mr. Batcham had prepared his mind with particular care, 
 so that the very slightest impression could not fail to be deep 
 and permanent — in the direction of the wrongs, the sufferings, 
 the grievances under British rule, of his two hundred and fifty 
 million fellow subjects in India. Upon this point Mr. Batcham 
 was tender and susceptible to a degree that contrasted singular- 
 ly with his attitude towards the rest of the world, which had 
 never found reason to consider him a philanthropist. This 
 solicitude about his Indian brethren was the more touching per- 
 haps on that account, and the more remarkable because it found 
 only cause for grief and remorse in the condition of native In- 
 dia. Any trifling benefits that have accrued to the people 
 through British administration — one thinks of public works, 
 sanitation, education, courts of justice, and so forth — Mr. Batch- 
 am either depreciated or ignored. We had done so little, so 
 " terribly little," as Mr. Batcham put it, compared with what we 
 might have done, and of that little so much had been done bad- 
 ly ! Daily Mr. Batcham discovered more things that had been 
 neglected, and more things that had been done badly. He looked 
 for them carefully, and whenever he found one he wept audibly 
 
174 Tfi>'' SIMPLE ADVENTUKES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 and made a note of it. Time would fail me, as the preacher 
 says, to recount all the iuiquities that came under Mr. Batcham's 
 observation during the weeks he spent in India, and I jim un- 
 wortliy to describe the energy and self-forgetfuluess with which 
 he threw himself into the task of " investigating " them, always 
 with the most copious notes. There was the fact that both opium 
 and country spirit were sold to the innocent Hindu, not only 
 with Government cognisance but actually under Government 
 regulations, the outrage to every Briton's conscience being that 
 revenues were derived therefrom. The Government fattened, in 
 Mr. Batcham's graphic figure, upon the physical misery and 
 moral degradation of its helpless wards. Mr. Batcham searched 
 his mind in vain to find a parallel to this, strange as it may seem 
 in connection with his accurate acquaintance with the amount of 
 excise paid by his brother philanthropists in British beer. The 
 position of the Government of India was monstrously unique. If 
 Mr. Batcham were the Government of India, he would scorn to 
 fill the treasury with the returns of vice. Mr. Batcham would 
 tax nothing but virtue and the pay of Government servants. 
 And though Mr. Batcham was not the Government of India, was 
 he not entitled from his seat in the British House of Commons 
 and the depth of his righteous indignation, to call the Govern- 
 ment of India to account? For what else then did Jonas Batch- 
 am, M. P., one of the largest manufacturers in the north of 
 England, with little time to spare, undertake this arduous and 
 expensive journey to the East? Oh, there were many things 
 that grieved him, Mr. Batcham, many things to which he felt 
 compelled to take exception, of which he felt compelled to make 
 a note. He was grieved at the attitude of the Government 
 towards the native press in the matter of seditious and disloyal 
 editorials, scattered by thousands under shelter of the vernacular 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 175 
 
 3^"*^^% 
 
 MB. JONAS BATCHAM, M. P. 
 
 amongst an ignorant and fanatic population. Mr. Batcham did 
 not wish to see this practice discouraged. The liberty of the 
 press Mr. Batcham considered the foundation stone of the liberty 
 
176 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 of the subject — let the people raise tlieir voice. Grieved also 
 was Mr. Batcliam at the cold shoulder turned by Government 
 to the Indian Congress — that noble embodiment of the struggles 
 and asi)irations of a subject people. Mr. Batcham thought that 
 all native movements, movements tliat marked progress and 
 emancipation, should be warndy encouraged. The suspicion of 
 intrigue was an absurd one, and tliis was not merely a matter of 
 opinion with AEr. Batcham. lie had it from a native gentleman 
 prominently connected with tlie Congress. Mr. Batcham had 
 brouglit a letter of introduction to the native gentleman — Mr. 
 Debendra Lai Banerjee — and Mr. Debendra Lai Banerjee had 
 given him such an "inside" view of the methods and aims of 
 the Congress as gratified Mr. Batcham exceedingly. Mr. Batch- 
 am found j\[r. Debendra Lai Banerjee the soul of hospitality, 
 very appreciative of Mr. Batcham's illustrious position, anxious 
 to gratify Mr. Batcham's intelligent curiosity by every means in 
 his power, and brimming over with loyalty and enthusiasm for 
 tlie institutions which Mr. Batcham represented. And when 
 Mr. Debendra Lai BaJierjce declared, in admirably fluent Eng- 
 lisli, that the Congress was inspired by the single thought of 
 aiding and upholding, so far as lay in its humble power, the ad- 
 ministration of the British Government — to which every member 
 felt himself personally and incalculably indebted — Mr. Batcham 
 rejoined audibly, begged Mr. Debendra Lai Banerjee to believe 
 that he was proud to be his fellow-subject, friend, brother, and 
 made a copious note of it. 
 
 Naturally, under these circumstances, Mr. Batcham would 
 find a very severe grief in the relations existing between Euro- 
 pean and native society here, and naturally he could not find 
 words to express his indignation at the insolent and indifferent 
 front of his fellow countrymen towards the people of India. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 177 
 
 " All," said Mr. Batcharn, " on account of a brown skin ! " lie 
 could not understand it — no, he could not understand it ! But 
 if Mr. Batcham could not understand it, he could do what lay 
 in his power as a person of generous sympathies and high moral 
 tone to alleviate it, and he threw himself into the task. Mr. 
 Debcndra Lai Banerjee gave him no invitation which he did not 
 accept, offered him no opportunity which he did not profit by. 
 lie drove with Mr. Debendra Lai Banerjee, he accompanied him 
 to the races, to the native theatre, to the English theatre, to 
 the Kalighat, to the Botanical Gardens, to various interesting reli- 
 gious and family festivals among Mr. Debendra Lai Banerjee's 
 immediate social circle; also, on occasions upon which the 
 Brownes made immoderate thanksgiving, he dined with this 
 Indian gentleman and his emancipated wife, who was allowed to 
 appear in public, where she smiled a great deal and said nothing 
 whatever. Mrs. Debendra Lai Banerjee had not been very long 
 emancipated, however, and it was in complimenting his Indian 
 friend upon having so charming a lady to be his companion and 
 helpmeet, as Mr. Batcham put it, that he observed the first and 
 only slight chill — it is impossible for Indian gentlemen to freeze 
 — in Mr. Debendra Lai Banerjee's responses. If Mr. Batcham 
 could have known how Mrs. Debendra Lai Banerjee was pinched 
 for that compliment ! 
 
 I suppose that the entertainment and education of Mr. Jonas 
 Batcham, M. P., could hardly have cost Mr. Debendra Lai Ban- 
 erjee less than four or five hundred rupees when he added it up, 
 but if he had the least desire to see disaffection and sedition 
 properly encouraged among his countrymen, or took the smallest 
 satisfaction in the aggravated annoyance and embarrassment of 
 the Government of India by Iler Majesty's most loyal Opposi- 
 tion, he must have felt that he had done much to further these 
 
178 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIUB. 
 
 things, and considered the money well invested. Mr. Jonas 
 Batcham, the incredulous, certainly left his hands so biimful of 
 native hypothecations that it would have been impossible to 
 lodge another lie in him anywhere. Urbane, impressively self- 
 satisfied, and well oiled for work, Mr. Jonas Batcham, M. P., 
 being towed homeward down the river Hooghly, was a sight 
 which must have brought tears of pious thanksgiving to the eyes 
 of his amiable native friend upon the wharf. Nor was Mr. De- 
 bendra Lai Banerjee without his private reward. Mr. Batcham, 
 in departing, clasped him figuratively to his capacious bosom, 
 and told him movingly that if ever he came to England the 
 Batchams would hasten collectively to do likewise. Mr. Bat- 
 cham's wife and family and friends would await that event with 
 an impatience which Mr. Banerjee must make as brief as pos- 
 sible. Nothing would give Mr. Batcham greater pleasure than 
 to receive Mr. Banerjee in his home and show bim over his 
 " works," or perhaps — jocularly — to take him to a sitting of the 
 House to hear his humble servant badger the Secretary of State. 
 And Mr. Banerjee responded suitably that simply to hear the 
 eloquent addresses of his honourable friend would be amply 
 sufficient to induce him to undertake the journey, and that to 
 witness the domestic happiness of this honourable friend would 
 be only too much joy — he was unworthy. And they parted in 
 mutual dolours. I anticipate, however, Mr. Batcham is not 
 gone yet. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 •79 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 T HAVE not yet mentioned the one matter of all the grievous 
 -L matters that came under his observation in India, about 
 which Mr. Batcham was particularly grieved. So bitterly, so 
 loudly, and so persistently did he grieve about this, that one 
 might almost have thought he came out for the purpose, absurd 
 as it may seem. I cannot do better than describe it in Mr. 
 Batcham 's own terms as " the grinding of the faces of the poor, 
 through our culpable neglect in failing to provide India with the 
 humane limitations of a Factories Act." For years past English 
 labour had been thus happily conditioned, and who could meas- 
 ure the benefit to the toiling millions on whose behalf the law 
 had been made ! It was incalculable. As a matter of fact the 
 only result of its operation, which could be computed with accu- 
 racy, was to be found in the out-turn of the mills. There Mr. 
 Batcham knew to a yard how valuable the Factories Act was to 
 the operatives ; but this was not a view of the question upon 
 which he dwelt much in India. While he was with us indeed 
 all practical considerations were swallowed up, for Mr. Batcham, 
 in the contemplation of the profundity of our iniquity in allow- 
 ing the factories of this country pretty much to manage their 
 own affairs. He did not even permit himself to consider that 
 the enormous product of Indian looms, together with the cheap- 
 ness of the cost of production, was having a prejudicial effect 
 upon the market. He certainly never mentioned it. His busi- 
 
l8o THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 ness was with the poor, the down-trodden, the victims of the 
 rapacity of the capitalist, as much among her Majesty's subjects 
 on India's coral strand as in the crowded tenements of Man- 
 chester or Birmingham. His duty towards these unfortunates 
 was plain, and heaven forbid that he should think of anything 
 but his duty ! 
 
 And so Mr. Batcham lamented high and low over the woes 
 of the unprotected factory " hand " in India. He began his 
 lament as soon as ever he was informed — though he knew it 
 before — that protection did not exist ; on the face of it, oppres- 
 sion must then be rampant. He himself was in the trade, he 
 knew the temptations of the capitalist, and he would not go so 
 far as to say that, if a wise and just law did not prevent him, the 
 exigencies of the market would never lead him to be — inconsid- 
 erate — toward his employes. Reflect then upon the result of al- 
 most unlimited power in the hands of the Indian manufacturer ! 
 
 This being Mr. Batcham's pronounced opinion, evcTi before 
 he gave his personal attention to the subject of Indian manufac- 
 tures, his investigations naturally had the effect of heightening 
 it — one might say they were undertaken with that object. They 
 did not heighten it, however, as satisfactorily or as definitely as 
 Mr. Batcham could have wished. After inspecting a cotton 
 factory in Bombay, a woollen factory in Cawnpore, a jute factory 
 in Calcutta, he found that the notes left too much to the imagi- 
 nation ; and it would be useless to appeal to the imagination of 
 the House ; the House was utterly devoid of it. True, he had 
 seen hundreds of operatives working in miserable nakedness 
 under the unpitying eye of a Eurasian overseer; but then it was 
 certainly very warm, and the overseer had not been sufficiently 
 considerate to kick any of them in Mr. Batcham's presence. 
 They certainly began early and worked late, but then they tie 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. \%\ 
 
 and slumbered in the middle of the day, chewing betel for casual 
 delectation the rest of the time. Something might possibly be 
 done with tiiat if he were careful to avoid dwelling upon the 
 fciiesta, and he would be sorry to lay stress upon any trifling 
 amelioration in the condition of these poor wretches. Mr. 
 Batcham pondered long upon the betel-nut, but saw no salvation 
 there. If it could be proved that these miserable beings were 
 compelled to resort to an injurious stimulant to keep their flag- 
 ging energies up to the incredible amount of labour required of 
 them — and Mr. Batcham had no doubt whatever that this was 
 the case — it might be useful to cite the betel-nut, but there 
 seemed to be a difficulty about proving it. The only tangible 
 deplorable fact that Mr. Batcham had to go upon, was that the 
 pay of a full-grown operative, not a woman or a child, but a man, 
 was represented by the shockingly incredible sum of eight annas — 
 eightpence ! — a day ! AVhen he heard this Mr. Batcham thought 
 of the colossal wages paid to factory hands in England and 
 shuddered. He was so completely occupied in shuddering over 
 this instance of the rapacity of the Indian manufacturer, that the 
 statement of what it cost the same operative to live according 
 to the immemorial custom of his people — about five shillings a 
 month — entirely escaped his observation. In the stress of his 
 emotion Mr. Batcham failed to notice one or two other facts that 
 would have tended to alleviate it, the fact that a factory operative 
 is paid twice as much as a domestic servant and three times as 
 much as a cooly, though the cost of life weighs no more heavily 
 upon him than upon them. The fact that he often works only 
 two or three months of the year at gunny-bags, and spends the 
 rest of his time in the more leisurely and congenial scratching of 
 his fields, and above all^ the fact that in India the enterprises of 
 the foreigner accommodate themselves— not of philantrophy but 
 
!82 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 of necessity — to the customs of tlie country. It is not the service 
 of the sahib, with his few thousand personiil establishments, his 
 few hundred phmtations and shops, his few dozen factory chim- 
 neys rising along the Ilooghly, tainting the sea breeze of Bombivy, 
 that can revolutionise their way of life for two hundred and fifty 
 million people with whom custom is religion and religion is more 
 than rice. But Mr. Batcham had no heart to be comforted by 
 such trivialities. lie made emotional notes, dwelt upon the 
 " eight anna daily pittance," and felt a still more poignant pri- 
 vate grief that there was no cause for louder sorrow. 
 
 At first Mr. Dahendra Lai Benerjee was inclined to assure 
 his honourable friend that there was not the slightest need for 
 any beneficent interference with the condition of his humble com- 
 patriots, to praise but to deprecate Mr. Batcham's enthusiasm in 
 the matter, and to point out that the only true and lasting eleva- 
 tion of her Majesty's most loyal subjects in India must be brought 
 about through that much maligned and little understood body, 
 the Indian Congress. But it was a very, very short time indeed 
 before Mr. Debendra LaJ Banerjee found himself in full union 
 with the noble aims of this British benefactor. He had only to 
 learn — and he learned very quickly — that his sympathy would be 
 appreciated, to bestow it with all the gushing fulness of which 
 the Bengali soul is capable, and Mr. Debendra Lai Banerjee's 
 sympathy was invaluable to Mr. Batcham. It disclosed points of 
 weakness in the Indian factory system that would otherwise have 
 escaped his observation to this day, and suggested interpretations 
 whioli no simple-minded Briton would have thought of alone. 
 And it divined Mr. Batcham's dissatisfaction that he could not 
 be more dissatisfied with remarkable accuracy. 
 
 In taking measures — Bengali measures — to secure the sym- 
 pathy of the travelling British M. P. with the grand progres- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 183 
 
 sive movement of Bengali patriotism, it is highly advisable to dis- 
 cover as soon as possible whether he has any little " movement " 
 of his own in contemplation which might receive a slight im- 
 petus with adv.intage. It is then generally possible to combine 
 the two, to arrange reciprocal favours, to induce the globe-trot- 
 ting potentate to take " broader views." Mr. Debendra Lai 
 Banerjee put the whole of his time, and a vocabulary which no 
 English dictionary could improve, at Mr. Batcham's disposal, to 
 convince him that this factory grievance was one of the first 
 which the Indian Congress would press upon the ear of the Raj, 
 once it had an official right to make suggestions to that honour- 
 able organ. Although Mr. Banerjee quite agreed with Mr. 
 Batcham that it would be inadvisable to wait until that hap- 
 pened, he would like Mr. Batcham to understand how close the 
 interests of the British manufacturer lay to the bosom of the 
 Indian Congress — though of course Mr. Banerjee designated 
 them as the wrongs of the native operatives. In the meantime, 
 however, his honourable friend was naturally restless, naturally 
 desired to lend his own helping hand to the cause he had at 
 heart. Mr. Banerjee was overcome by the sublimity of Mr. 
 Batcham's devotion, and suggested a little evidence acquired per- 
 sonally. If it were possible for Mr. Batcham to converse with 
 any of these unfortunate people ! . 
 
 " It's the terrible disadvantage of not knowing the language ! " 
 responded Mr. Batcham, in a tone which suggested that the lan- 
 guage ought to be supplied to Members of Parliament. "I 
 have conversed with 'em through another man, but it was very 
 unsatisfactory. Couldn't get anything definite. The fact is, 
 Mr. Banerjee, the other man was an Anglo-Indian, and I've no 
 doubt the poor wretches suffered from a sort of unconscious in- 
 timidation ! " 
 
1 84 7W^£ SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHTB. 
 
 Mr. Banerjec shook his head. The head had a black silk hat 
 on it, and shook as impressively as it might have done in Lom- 
 bard street or Westminster. " I fear," said Mr. Banerjec, " that 
 it is unhappily but too probable." Then he raised his eyebrows in 
 a sadly submissive way, took out his pocket handkerchief and used 
 it in a manner which suggested — very respectfully — a general 
 deprecation of Anglo-Indians. Mr. Banerjee must have used it, 
 I think, for this purpose. I doubt whether he is even yet suffi- 
 ciently deteriorated by our civilisation to take out his handker- 
 chief seriously 
 
 " Above all things," added Mr. Banerjee, thrusting his fat 
 hand into the breast of his tightly-buttoned frock coat, and wrap- 
 ping himself up in the situation, " above all things it is indispen- 
 sable that your evidence shall be unbiassed in every particular. 
 There is no doubt, I deplore to tell you, that here in India the 
 poor and the needy amongst us will sometimes be wrongly in- 
 fluenced by the fear of being deprived of the stafif of life. I 
 have even known cases where, under unjust and reprehensible 
 intimidation, perjury " — Mr. Banerjee's tone suggested, " I 
 hardly expected you to believe it ! " — " has been committed ! " 
 
 " Dear me, I dare say," said Mr. Batcham, " that happens 
 everywhere." 
 
 But Mr. Banerjee had more than sentimental reflections 
 upon the moral turpitude of his fellow Aryans to contribute to 
 the difficulty of his honourable friend. He had given his hon- 
 ourable friend's difficulty the very fullest attention. He had 
 chased it through the most private labyrinth of his mind, where 
 he had come into sudden and violent contact with Ambica Nath 
 Mitter. And in the joyful shock of collision with Ambica Nath 
 Mitter, Debendra Lai Banerjee had said to himself, " Why didn't 
 I think of him before ?" 
 
THE SIAfPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAiriB. 
 
 185 
 
 " There is a very intelligent young man in my office," said 
 Mr. Banerjee, " who was formerly employed as clerk in a jute 
 mill here. I think he would most willingly obtain for you any 
 grievances you may require." Mr. Banerjee spoke absent-mind- 
 edly, reflecting upon the qualifications of Ambica for the task. 
 
 " The statement of them," corrected Mr. Batcham. 
 
 " The statement of them — precisely, yes. Young Mitter has 
 had all facilities for observing the oppression in the factories, 
 and I have no doubt it made a deep impression upon his excel- 
 lent heart. He speaks English also fairly well. I will send him 
 to you." 
 
 " I should like very much to see Mr. Mitter," Mr. Batcham 
 remarked. " Mitter, you said ? " 
 
 " It will not be necessary to remember his name. Call him 
 ' Baboo ' ; he will answer to plain ' Baboo.' I am sure he will 
 remember well about the oppressions." 
 
 " I should be even better pleased," said Mr. Batcham, " if he 
 brought two or three of the oppressed with him." 
 
 " I think he could also do that," replied Mr. Banerjee with- 
 out hesitation. 
 
 Then Mr. Banerjee went away and explained Mr. Batcham's 
 difficulty to Ambica Nath Mitter. Considering how discreetly 
 Mr. Banerjee explained it, the sympathetic perception shown by 
 Ambica Nath Mitter was extraordinary. It might possibly be 
 explained by the fact that they both spoke Hindustani. At all 
 events, Mr. Banerjee dismissed the young man of the excellent 
 heart with the comfortable feeling that Mr. Batcham's difficulty 
 would be solved quite inexpensively. 
 
 Two days after, Ambica presented himself at the residence of 
 
 the Brownes, accredited to Mr. Batcham by Mr. Debendra Lai 
 
 Banerjee. Mr. Browne had gone to office, Mrs. Browne had 
 13 
 
l86 THE SfMPUi ADVEXTVRES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 gone to shop. Mr. Batcham, ruddy and expansive in the thin- 
 nest of flannels, occupied a large portion of the small veranda 
 alone. The time was most fortuitous, and Mr. Batcham re- 
 ceived Mr. Banerjec's labour with an agreeable sense of free- 
 dom for the most searching investigations. Having well break- 
 fasted, digested the morning paper, and fully smoked moreover, 
 Mr. Batcham was in the mood for the most heartrending revela- 
 tions. 
 
 Ambica was a prepossessing young man, Mr. Batcham 
 thought. His lustrous long black hair was brushed smoothly 
 back from a forehead that insisted on its guilelessness. His soft 
 brown eyes were timid but trustful, and his ambient tissues 
 spread themselves over features of the most engagingly aquiline 
 character. He was just at the anti-protuberant stage of baboo- 
 dom, tliere was no offence in his fatness. He wore spotless mus- 
 lin drfiperies dependent from either shoulder, and his pen behind 
 his car. In his rear were three others much like himself, but 
 less savoury, less lubricated, less comfortable in appearance. 
 They impressed one as less virtuous too, but this was purely the 
 result of adversity. 
 
 Mr. Batcham began by asking " Mr. Mitter " to sit down, 
 which Ml-. Mitter did with alacrity. Never in his life had Mr. 
 Mitter been asked to sit down by a sahib before. Then Mr. 
 Batcham took out his note-book and pencil, and said impressive- 
 ly to Mr. Mitter that above all things these men must under- 
 stand tliat they were to tell the truth, the whole truth, and 
 nothing but the truth with regard to the matters upon which he 
 was about to question them. Then he questioned them. 
 
 Perhaps it is unnecessary to go into Mr. Batcham's questions. 
 They were put with the fluency and precision of a man of busi- 
 ness. Ambica Nath Mitter understood them perfectly, and ex- 
 
1 88 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 plained them admirably. They elicited exactly what Mr. 
 Batcham wanted to know. His fat, red hand trembled with 
 avidity as he set down fact after fact of the most " painful " de- 
 scription — or possibly it was agitated by an indignation which 
 Mr. Batcham doubtless could not wholly suppress. And, indeed, 
 the recital of the wrongs which these three miserable men had 
 suffered under the cruel hand of the tyrannical sirdar,* and the 
 indifferent eye of the callous sahib, would have moved an even 
 less susceptible heart than that of a British manufacturer in the 
 same line of business. One had been beaten with stripes — he 
 showed Mr. Batcham the weal on his shoulder, and Mr. Batcham 
 touched it, for the sake of the dramatic effect of saying so after- 
 wards. Another had been compelled to work four hours a day 
 overtime for a week without a pice of extra pay; the third had 
 humbly begged for a day's leave to attend the burning of his 
 grandmother, and when he returned had been abruptly and 
 unjustly dismissed — the sahib had said he wished to see his face 
 no more. It was useless to complain ; the factory sahibs would 
 cut their wages, and the other sahibs did not care. They were 
 all poor men ; they could not buy the law. At this point Mr. 
 Batcham grew quite feverish. He unbuttoned his shirt-collar, 
 and interspersed his notes with interjection-points. "This is 
 better," he said to himself — " I mean worse, than I expected." 
 The interview took a long time — quite three-quarters of an hour 
 — but Mr. Batcham was distinctly of the opinion that it had not 
 been misspent. And when Mr. Batcham closed his note-book, 
 and said to Mr. Mitter that this was a very sad state of things, 
 but that would do for the present, his three down-trodden In- 
 dian fellow-subjects knelt weeping and kissed thfl^uppers of Mr. 
 
 • Nfttive manager. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEAfSAHtB. 189 
 
 Batcham's broad British boots, invoking the secular blessings of 
 heaven upon this " protector of the poor." Mr. Batcham had to 
 shuffle his feet under his chair so suddenly that he nearly dis- 
 located one of his knees. "Don't!" said he, "pray don't, not 
 on any account ! " And he raised them with his own hands, 
 very nearly mingled his tears with theirs, and immediately after- 
 wards made a most dramatic note of it. 
 
 Mr. Batcham had not breakfasted the next morning in fact, 
 he was looking at his watch and wondering why the Brownes 
 were always so confoundedly late with their meals when his 
 bearer came up and inquired whether the sahib would see again 
 the three "admi" * he had seen the day before, they waited 
 below in the compound. Breakfast was still ten minutes off, 
 and Mr. Batcham said he would go down. He went down, re- 
 ceived the men with affability, and learned through his English- 
 speaking bearer that they had been the victims of great injustice 
 at the hands of Ambica Nath Mitter. This one, it seemed, had 
 persuaded them to come to the sahib and leave work for the day 
 on the promise not only of paying them their day's wages, but 
 of making the matter right with the sirdar at the factory. In- 
 stead of which, he had paid them only half a day's wages, and 
 when they returned that morning they found themselves dis- 
 missed. Therefore, knowing the heart of the sahib that it was 
 full of mercy, they had come to cast themselves at his feet. 
 They were all poor men, a very little would satisfy them — two 
 rupees each perhaps. 
 
 "That's six rupees!" said Mr. Batcham seriously, "two 
 rupees each would keep you for nearly a month in idleness. 
 You can get employment much sooner than that." Mr. Batcham 
 
 • Persons. 
 
igo 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 knitted his pliilanthropic brow. " I'll see you after breakfast," 
 he said, as the kitmutgar came to announce it. 
 
 The question of his duty in the matter of the six rupees so 
 agitated Mr. Batcham that he consulted young Browne about it 
 at the breakfast-table, and that is the reason why it is I, and not 
 Mr. Batcham, who recount his experience with Ambica Nath 
 Mitter to the public. Young Browne heard his guest politely 
 and sympathetically through before he ventured to express an 
 opinion. Even then he deferred it. " I'll have a look at your 
 factory- wallahs," said young Browne. Presently he sent the 
 bearer for them, who came up with two. The other, he said, 
 had been taken with a sudden indisposition and had gone 
 away. 
 
 Young Browne put up his eye-glass — he sometimes wore an 
 eye-glass, it was the purest affectation — and looked at the victims 
 of British oppression in India as they stood with their hands 
 behind them in acute discomfort, twining and untwining their 
 dusty toes. As he looked, a smile appeared under the eye-glass, 
 which gradually broadened and broadened until it knocked the 
 eye-glass out, and young Browne laughed until the tears came 
 into his eyes. " It's too good ! " said young Browne brokenly. 
 " It's too good ! " and laughed again until Mr. Batcham's an- 
 noyance became serious and obvious and it was necessary to 
 explain. 
 
 " I don't know what these men may have learned incidentally 
 about jute," said he wiping his eyes, " but that's not their occu- 
 pation, Mr. Batcham, I — I happen to know their faces. They're 
 both umidwallahs in Watson and Selwyn's, indigo people, next 
 door to our place." 
 
 " Dear me, are you sure ? " asked Mr. Batcham with a judi- 
 cial contraction of his e)'ebrows. "'What is an umid wallah ?" 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. igi 
 
 " Umid means hope — a man of hope. They come and ask to 
 work in the office as a favour, and don't get any pay, expecting 
 
 THE OTHER HAD BEEN TAKEN WITH A SUDDEN INDISPOSITION AND HAD 
 GONE AWAY. 
 
 to be taken on in case of a vacancy. These scoundrels have 
 been in Watson and Selwyn's for the last year. 1 venture to 
 state they've never been inside a jute mill in their lives." 
 
192 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIflB. 
 
 " Tumera kam, k'on hai?" * asked young Browne mockingly 
 of one baboo. 
 
 The baboo cast down his eyes nervously and said, " Wasson 
 Sewwin company kapas, sahib," \ and the other to the same 
 question made the same answer. They were crushed and sorrow- 
 ing baboos suffering under a cruel blow of fate. Why siiould it 
 have been granted to only one of them to conclude to be indis- 
 posed at the right moment? 
 
 I am afraid the savage Anglo-Indian instinct arose in young 
 Browne and caused him to tease those baboos a little that morn- 
 ing. It was very wrong of him doubtless, and then it led to the 
 destruction of a number of Mr. Batcham's most interesting 
 notes, which is another regretable fact. But the only person 
 who really suffered was Ambica Nath Mitter. Mr. Batcham, of 
 course, thought it his duty to inform Mr. Debendra Lai Banerjee 
 of the whole unfortunate affair, and Mr. Debendra Lai Banerjee, 
 in a white heat of indignation, which lasted several days, dis- 
 missed Ambica. 
 
 " How could I repose further trust in a man like that ! " said 
 Mr. Banerjee to Mr. Batcham. Besides, privately, Mr. Banerjee 
 thought Ambica grasping. Mr. Banerjee had entirely intended 
 that out of the five rupees Ambica received from him, the " fac- 
 tory wallahs" should be paid in full. 
 
 * Your work, what is it f f With Watson Selwyn Company. 
 
iiul simple adventures of a memsahib. 
 
 '93 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 OCIAJjLY, as I have said, Mr. Batcham repre- 
 sented one of onr cold weather phenomena. 
 They remain phenomena, tlie globe-trotters, 
 notwithstanding the regularity of their re- 
 appearance, flashing like November comets 
 across the tranquil Anglo-Indian mind, 
 wliich refuses to accustom itself to one class 
 of its heaveiilv visitors any more than to the 
 other. It is inaccurate, however, to use any figure of speech 
 which represents Mr. Batcham as a meteoric body. He had his 
 prescribed orbit — it is all laid down in Murray — and he circled 
 through it, revolving regularly upon the axis of an excellent 
 digestion with great gravity of demeanor. When he appeared 
 upon Calcutta's horizon, Calcutta could only jiut up a helpless 
 eyeglass and writhe wearily until the large red luminary dipped 
 again in the west. Then for a week it set at nought and 
 mocked him. Then it unanimously forgot him, and was only 
 remindeil of his unnecessary existence afterward by the acerbity 
 of the Englishman'' s comments upon his intelligence, which 
 was entirely deserved. 
 
 It was interesting to watch Mr. Batcham in the process of 
 forming an opinion of Anglo-Indian society ; that is, of making 
 his observations match the rags and tags of ideas about us which 
 he had gathered together from various popular sources before 
 
194 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 coming out. They were curious, Mr. Batcham's impressions, 
 and tbey led him into even greater discreetness of conduct than 
 would naturally be shown by one of the largest manufacturers of 
 the North of England, of sound evangelical views and inordinate 
 abdominal development, travelling in search of Truth. In the 
 doubtful mazes of the flippant Anglo-Indian capital Mr. Batcham 
 felt that it behoved him to wrap the capacious mantle of his 
 virtue well about him and to be very heedful of his walk and 
 conversation. He kept a sharp eye open for invitations to light 
 and foolish behaviour on the part of possible Mrs. Hawksbees 
 and Mrs. Mallowes whom he met at Government House, and he 
 saw a great many. AVlien Lady Blebbins asked him if Mrs. 
 Batcham were with him, Mr. Batcham said to himself, " There 
 is certainly sometliing behind that ! " and when Mrs. Walter 
 Lull, who is as proper as proper can be, proposed to drive him 
 about the Maidan in her barouche, Mr. Batcham said coyly but 
 firmly that Mrs. Luff must excuse him for asking, but was her 
 husband to be of the party ? Some such uncompromising front 
 Mr. Batcham showed to temptation in forms even more insidi- 
 ous than these. I need not say that he never in any case failed 
 to make a careful note of it ; and I have no doubt that long be- 
 fore this reaches you the glaring facts will have been confided 
 with inculpating initials to the sympathetic British public 
 through the columns of the Times over the bashful signature of 
 Jonns Batcham. 
 
 Mr. Batcham saw no reason for concealing his preconceived 
 ideas of Anglo-Indian society from any of the Anglo-Indians he 
 mot — our morals embarrassed him as little as he supposed that 
 tliey embarrassed us. He discussed them with us in candid sor- 
 row, lie enquired of us about them, he told us exactly to what 
 extent he considered the deterioration of the ethical sense 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 195 
 
 amongst us was to be ascribed to the climate. He spoke calmly 
 and dispassionately about these things, as an indifferent foreigner 
 might speak about the exchange value of the rupee or the quality 
 of Peliti's ices. He seemed to think that as a subject of conver- 
 sation we should rather like it, that his investigations would 
 have a morbid interest for us. It was reported that he ap- 
 proached an A. D. C. in uniform with the tentative remark 
 that he believed Simla was a very immoral place, and that the 
 A. D. C. in uniform made with great difficulty three wrinkles 
 in his forehead — it is almost impossible for an A. D. C. in 
 uniform to wrinkle himself — and said with calm surprise, 
 " We are Simla," subsequently reporting the matter to the 
 Viceroy and suggesting the bastinado. The story adds that 
 the Viceroy said that nothing could be done, because an 
 M. P. was certain to go home and tell. But this is the merept 
 rumour. 
 
 Mr. Batcham found the Brownes disappointing in this re- 
 spect as he found them disappointing in other respects. They 
 were not extravagant, they were not in debt, and Mrs. Browne 
 neither swore nor smoked cigarettes nor rode in steeplechases. 
 Mr. Batcham investigated them until he found them quite hope- 
 lessly proper, when he put them down as the shining and praise- 
 worthy exception that proves the rule, and restricted his en- 
 quiries to the private life of their neighbours. Thus, driving 
 upon the Eed Road in the evening and encountering a smart 
 young pair in a cabriolet, Mr. Batcham would demand, " Who is 
 that lady ? " 
 
 "That's Mrs. Finsley- Jones," Mrs. Browne would reply. 
 
 "And with whom," Mr. Batcham would continue severely, 
 " is Mrs. Finsley-Jones driving? " 
 
 " With Mr. Plnsley-Jones." 
 
196 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " Oh— ah ! and who is that lady in the straw hat on the grey 
 cob ? " 
 
 " Mrs. MacDonald, I think." 
 
 " And the gentleman ? " 
 
 "Her husband." 
 
 " Really ! you are quite sure it is her husband, Mrs. Browne. 
 I understood that in India ladies seldom rode with their hus- 
 bands." 
 
 " On the contrary, Mr. Batcham," Helen returned innocently, 
 " horses are apt to be so skittish in India that it isn't really safe 
 to go out without a man, and of course one would rather have 
 one's husband than anybody else." 
 
 " Not at all, I assure you, Mrs. Browne. I understand that 
 quite the opposite opinion prevails among the ladies of Calcutta, 
 and I can depend upon the source of my information. Now 
 these two people in the dog cart — they are actually flirting with 
 each other in broad daylight ! It is impossible," said Mr. 
 Batcham, with an accent of grave deprecation, " that they can 
 be married." 
 
 " Mr. and Mrs. Tubbs," said Helen shortly, " they were mar- 
 ried about the same time as we were. Why shouldn't they flirt 
 with each other if they want to ? " 
 
 " Certainly not," said young Browne, who was driving. " It 
 leads to incorrect ideas of their relations, you see. Fact is, I 
 caught Tubbs kissing his wife in a dark corner of the Maidan by 
 the Cathedral myself the other evening, and it was such a very 
 dark corner that if I hadn't happened to be lighting a cheroot at 
 the time, 1 wouldn't have believed that Tubbs was Tubbs any 
 more than Mr. Batcham does. Tubbs can't afford a popular 
 misapprehension that he isn't Mrs. Tubbs's husband. I'll tell 
 Tubbs." 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. \gy 
 
 " I think," said Helen rebukingly, " that you might have 
 taken some other place to light your cigar in, George." 
 
 " Didn't light it. Dropped the match, I was so startled. 
 Last match I had, too. I've got that against Tubbs. Oh, I 
 must speak to Tubbs ! " 
 
 "If you speak to Tubbs," Mr. Batcham put in prudently, 
 " don't mention my name. I am glad to find myself wrong in 
 this case. But Mr. Banerjee assures me — " 
 
 The pony leaped forward under the cut of young Browne's 
 whip, and Mr. Batcham very nearly tumbled out of the back 
 seat. Young Browne didn't apologise. " Do you mean to 
 say," said he in a red fury, " that you have been talking to a 
 beastly baboo about the white women of Calcutta? It — it 
 isn't usual." 
 
 It was as much for their own amusement as for their guest's 
 edification that the Brownes asked Mr. Sayter to dinner to meet 
 Mr. Batcham. Mr. Sayter came unsuspectingly, and I have 
 reason to believe that he has not yet forgiven the Brownes. 
 Nobody in Calcutta could hate a large red globe-trotter more 
 ferociously than Mr. Sayter did. And the Brownes failed to 
 palliate their offence by asking anybody else. They were a 
 square party, and Mr. Batcham sat opposite Mr. Sayter, who 
 went about afterwards talking about his recent narrow escape 
 from suffocation. 
 
 Mr. Batcham welcomed Mr. Sayter as if he had been in his 
 own house or his own " works." He shook Mr. Sayter warmly 
 by his slender and frigid hand and said he was delighted to meet 
 him — it was always a pleasure to meet representative men, and 
 his young friends had told him that Mr. Sayter was a very 
 representative man indeed, standing almost at the head of his 
 department. 
 
igS THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " Oh, goodness gracious ! " exclaimed Mr. Sayter, sinking into 
 a chair. " Fancy being talked about like that now." 
 
 " I have a thousand things to ask you," continued Mr. Batch- 
 am with increasing cordiality, " a thousand questions are surg- 
 ing ill my brain at this very moment. This India of yours is a 
 wonderful place, sir ! " 
 
 " Well," said Mr. Sayter, " I suppose I can't help that. But 
 it isn't as wonderful as it used to be — that's one comfort." 
 
 " I'm afraid," Mr. Batcham remarked with seriousness, "that 
 your eyes are blinded. I've met numbers of people out here — 
 people of more than average perception — whose eyes seem to me 
 to be blinded to the beauties of Ind." 
 
 " Probably affected by the dust of Ind," put in young Browne. 
 " Will you take my wife in, Mr. Sayter ? " 
 
 " No," said Mr. Sayter, " it's the perverseness of the Anglo- 
 Indian, lie thinks if he talks about the beauties of Ind the 
 Secretary of State will cut his pay." 
 
 " And yet," said Mr. Batcham, tucking his napkin into his 
 capacious waistcoat, " the average public official in this country 
 seems to me to be pretty fairly remunerated." 
 
 " As a matter of fact," said Mr. Sayter confidentially, looking 
 up from liis soup, " they're grossly overpaid. They live in lux- 
 ury. I am one of them. I live in luxury. I have a servant to 
 put on my boots. In England what action should I be obliged 
 to take in regard to my boots ? I should be obliged to put them 
 on myself ! And for the misfortune of living in a country where 
 I get my boots put on, I'm paid twice as much as I would be in 
 England, and three times as much as I'm worth. Monstrous, 
 isn't it?" 
 
 Mr. Batcham smiled a benign smile of approbation. " I as- 
 sure you, sir, that is not the way the situation has been repre- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 199 
 
 sented to me thus far. I hope that before I leave India I may 
 meet other gentlemen who like yourself have the moral rectitude 
 to rise above mere considerations of gain — I may say of plunder 
 — and state the case frankly as it is. With regard to yourself I 
 have no doubt you exaggerate, but I will tell you candidly that I 
 have myself for some time held the same opinion precisely with 
 regard to — with regard to — " 
 
 " The Indian services generally. Exactly," responded Mr. 
 Sayter, " and when you get home you mean to bring it under 
 the consideration of Lord Kimberley. Quite so. I wouldn't be 
 too sanguine about popularizing your view among the Europeans 
 out here — the Anglo-Indian is a sordid person — but all the 
 baboos will be very pleased. You will of course endeavour to 
 extend the employment of baboos in the higher branches of the 
 Covenanted service — the judicial and administrative. They 
 come much cheaper, and their feelings are very deeply hurt at 
 being overlooked in favour of the alien Englishman. You could 
 get an excellent baboo for any purpose on earth for thirty rupees 
 a month. And yet," continued Mr. Sayter absently, " they pay 
 me two thousand." 
 
 Mr. Batcham looked reflective, and young Browne said, 
 " Cheap and nasty." 
 
 " Oh, dear no ! " remarked Mr. Sayter, " A nice fat wholesome 
 baboo who could write a beautiful hand — probably a graduate of 
 the Calcutta University. Talking of universities reminds me to 
 add, Mr. Batcham, that the university baboo is not quite so 
 cheap as he used to be. He is still very plentiful and very inex- 
 pensive, but his price is going up since the new regulations." 
 
 " Kegulations ! " said Mr. Batcham. " You people will regu- 
 late these unfortunate natives off the face of the earth." 
 
 " We should love to," replied Mr. Sayter, " but we can't. You 
 
200 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIllB. 
 
 have no idea of their rate of multiplication. These particular 
 regulations were a frightful blow to the baboo." 
 
 " May I ask their nature?" Mr. Batcham inquired. 
 
 " Oh yes. They were connected with the examinations for 
 degrees. It was thought remarkable for some time how univer- 
 sally the baboos passed them, and how singularly similar the 
 answers were. Tlie charitable put it down to the extraordinary 
 aptitude of the Bengali for the retention of printed matter and 
 the known tendency of his mind to run in grooves. The un- 
 charitable put the other baboos in charge of printing the exami- 
 nation papers under a mean system of espionage. I regret to 
 say that it was only too successful ; they caught a whole batch of 
 baboos taking the means of earning an honest living a little pre- 
 maturely." 
 
 " Then what happened ? " asked young Browne. " I haven't 
 heard this story." 
 
 " I don't remember whether they suppressed that lot of ba- 
 boos or not. But they put an end to the extra edition of exami- 
 nation papers system. They had the lithographing stone 
 brought into an office where there was only one man, a Euro- 
 pean, and they shut the shutters and they locked the door — oh, 
 they took stringent measures ! — and they had the papers turned 
 oif by a coolie, in solemn secrecy, the day before the examina- 
 tion." 
 
 " That must have been entirely satisfactory," Mr. Batcham 
 remarked. 
 
 " It was not. The baboos passed in great numbers that year 
 and sent in their papers with a smile. Then I believe they 
 stopped up the key-hole and blindfolded the coolie. It made no 
 difference whatever." 
 
 " How did they find out ? " Helen asked. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 20I 
 
 "In the end they took to watching this simple, ignorant 
 coolie. And they observed tliat when he had finished his work 
 he invariably sat down and rested on the lithographing stone. 
 So that he went away charged, one might say, with the wisdom 
 of the examiners, and published himself in the bazar for I dare- 
 say four annas a copy.'' 
 
 " That boy, if he lived in the United States, would rise to be 
 president," remarked Mr. Batcham oracularly. 
 
 " He was of great assistance to the B. A.'s of that year. 
 Though I believe they found him rather bony for a satisfactory 
 proof, and they complained that the sense of the questions was 
 a little disconnected." 
 
 " Mrs. Browne, have you seen anything of the Tootes lately ? " 
 
 " Nobody has, Mr. Sayter. Mr. Toote has fever." 
 
 " Temperature one hundred and five this morning," said Mrs. 
 Browne. " The third attack this year." 
 
 " And the Archie Campbells are going home on sick leave," 
 added Helen. " Poor Mr. Campbell is down with abscess of the 
 liver. There's a great deal of sickness about." 
 
 " Not more than usual ; it's a deadly time of year," Mr. Sayter 
 lemarked. " You heard about Bobby Hamilton ? " 
 
 "Hamilton seedy?" inquired young Browne. "I saw him 
 riding a fine beast the day before yesterday— he looked fairly fit. 
 Hamilton's a very knowing chap about horses, he's promised to 
 look after a pony for my wife." 
 
 " You'll have to get somebody else, I'm afraid." 
 
 " Hamilton's not " 
 
 " Yes. Went to the funeral this morning. Fine chap. Aw- 
 ful pity. Cholera." 
 
 " And Mrs. Hamilton is at home ! " exclaimed Helen. 
 
 "With another baby. Yes. Four now, Hamilton told me 
 14 
 
202 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 last hot weather. He'd been seedy, and I was urging him to 
 take furlough." 
 
 " Why didn't he? It might have saved him," asked Helen. 
 
 "I believe the fourth baby was the reason. He couldn't 
 afford it. Had to stay and grill, poor chap." 
 
 " How very distressing," said Mr. Batcham. " I suppose the 
 widow will be able to live on her pension ? " 
 
 " She will receive no pension, sir. Mr. Hamilton belonged 
 to the Education Department, which is uncovenanted. In the 
 uncovenanted service it is necessary to live in order to enjoy 
 one's pension, and that is the reason why its departments add so 
 little to the taxes." 
 
 "Ah, well," said Mr. Batcham rather vaguely, "you can't 
 have your cake and eat it too. I should consider marriage under 
 those conditions an improvidence, and I don't understand people 
 being ill in this climate. I think it must be largely due to the 
 imagination. So far as my testimony is worth anything, I find 
 myself much benefited by it. Thanks, Browne, I'll have Bass. 
 Vm not afraid of it." 
 
 Young Browne smiled and wistfully drank half the unsatis- 
 factory contents of the long glass by his plate. 
 
 " To say nothing," said he, in mournful reference to the cli- 
 mate, " of the magnificent thirst it engenders." 
 
 Mr. Sayter joined his hands together at the finger tips and 
 looked at Mr. Jonas Batcham, M. P., from under his eyebrows 
 in a way which was certainly impertinent, oblivious of the kit- 
 mutgar at his elbow who patiently offered him iced asparagus. 
 
 " I'm perfectly certain," said he, with a crispness in every 
 syllable, " that Mr. Batcham has been benefited by staying six 
 weeks in India. If he stayed six years he would doubtless be 
 more benefited still. I daresay, as he says, we would all be bene- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 203 
 
 lited if it were not for ovir imaginations. It's a climate that 
 leaves only one thing to be desired, and if some people say that's 
 a coflSn, that is clearly their imagination. Uncovenanted people 
 have a way of dying pretty freely, but that's out of sheer per- 
 verseness to get more furlough. Most of them go for ever be- 
 cause they can't arrange it any other way. And as for cholera, 
 I give you my word not one man in ten dies of cholera out here ; 
 they go off with typhoid or dysentery, or in some comfortable 
 way like that, and probably have a punkah the whole time 
 they're ill." 
 
 The half-past nine gun boomed from the fort, and Mr. Batch- 
 am started nervously. " I don't know why it is," said he, 
 " that one doesn't accustom one's self to hearing guns in India. 
 I suppose it is some association with the Mutiny." 
 
 " Oh, we'll have another mutiny," Mr. Sayter remarked ; 
 " it's quite on the cards. But you must not be alarmed, Mr. 
 Batcham. It won't be," he added irrepressibly, " till after you 
 go home." 
 
 The conversation turned upon light literature, and Mr. Batch- 
 am contributed to it the fact that he understood that man 
 Besant was making a lot of money. Helen had been reading 
 the memoirs of Mdlle. BashkirtsefE, and had to say that one half 
 she didn't understand, and the other half she didn't like. " And 
 when," said Mr. Sayter, " does your book come out, Mr. 
 Batcham ? " 
 
 " I haven't said that I was writing one," Mr. Batcham re- 
 plied, smiling coyly. 
 
 " It isn't necessary," declared young Browne, " we should ex- 
 pect a book from you, Mr. Batcham, as a matter of course." 
 
 " Oh, well, I expect I shall have to own to some little account 
 of my experience," confessed Mr. Batcham. " My friends have 
 
204 T^ff^ SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 urged me to do something of the kind. If the illustrations can 
 be got ready, I daresay it will be out in time to catch the spring 
 market." 
 
 " Don't forget the illustration of the cobra milking the cow," 
 said George Browne, infected by Mr. Sayter ; " it will add a great 
 deal to the interest of the volume without detracting seriously 
 from its reliability." 
 
 " No," said Mr. Batcham, " I haven't got a photograph of 
 that, I'm sorry to say. The illustrations will be entirely repro- 
 duced from photographs. I've got a beauty of the Taj, taken by 
 magnesium light." 
 
 " Have you decided on a title, Mr. Batcham ? " Helen inquired, 
 playing with the orange-blossom in her finger-bowl. 
 
 Mr. Batcham looked carefully round him, and observed that 
 the kitmutgars had left the room. " Don't mention it," he said, 
 "because somebody else may get hold of it, but I think I'll 
 christen the book either ' My Trot Through India,' or ' India, Its 
 Past, Present, and Future.' " 
 
 " Capital ! " exclaimed Mr. Sayter, skipping nimbly to hold 
 back the purdah for the exit of Mrs. Browne. " You can't really 
 dispense with either title, and if I were you I should use them 
 both ! " 
 
 A little later, before Mr. Sayter disappeared into his brough- 
 am, exploding a vast yawn among the wreaths of his Trichi- 
 nopoly, Mr. Batcham shook him warmly by the hand, and re-ex- 
 pressed his gratification at the opportunity of meeting so repre- 
 sentative a gentleman, to whose opinions such great importance 
 would naturally attach itself. " Joking apart," said Mr. Batch- 
 am, " the candid statement of your views upon many points 
 this evening will be very useful to me." 
 
 " I'm so glad ! " said Mr. Sayter. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 205 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 HELEN BROWNE never could be brought to understand 
 that she was not rich with five hundred rupees a month. 
 Every now and then she reduced the amount — reduced it indeed, 
 with the rupee at one and twopence ! — to pounds, shillings, and 
 pence, in order to assure herself over again that it was only a 
 little less than the entire stipend of the Canbury rectory, " and 
 we all lived upon that," she would argue, as if she had there some- 
 what unanswerable. It was to her a source of continual and 
 lamentable mystery that they never seemed to find it convenient 
 to open a bank account — it was so unwise not to have a bank 
 account — and yet there was always what George Browne called a 
 " negative difficulty," always something to be paid first. On the 
 last days of every month when it came to balancing the accounts 
 and finding nothing over, Mrs. Browne regularly cut the bawarchi 
 six pice on general principles, for which he as regularly came 
 prepared. Kali Bagh cooked nothing better than his accounts. 
 Besides this she had her evening gloves cleaned, and saved the 
 price of a ticca dhurzie, which is at least eight annas, every Sat- 
 urday by doing the family darning, and this, in a memsahib, is 
 saintly. Certainly the Brownes were not extravagant. Helen 
 used to maintain that the remarkable part of it was vegetables 
 being so cheap, hut there was probably more force in her reflec- 
 tion that it didn't really matter much about getting a cauliflower 
 for a penny when one's ticca gharries came to three pounds. It 
 
2o6 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 was much more curious to observe how exactly every month the 
 Hrowiies' expenses met their income with perhaps just a trifle 
 now and then to spare, which they might put away if they liked, 
 unreceipted, to be a nest-egg for a comfortable debt in the near 
 future — the fact being that Kasi and Kali Bagh and the rest 
 knew the sahib's tulab as well as they knew their own, and were 
 all good at arithmetic to the splitting of a pi. It is perhaps a 
 tribute to the perfection of their skill that they never disturbed 
 Helen's idea that she was very well off. When the rupees disap- 
 peared more quickly than usual, she thought of the price of vege- 
 tables and was convinced that retrenchments were possible and 
 should soon be effected. Next month Kasi would permit himself 
 to forget various trifling bills, and there would be great prosperity 
 with the Bi-ownes for a fortnight. But invariably there came a 
 time of reckoning when Kasi demonstrated that the income was 
 very nearly equal to the outgo. On the whole Kasi was contented 
 with the sahib's present pay, having great faith in his prospects 
 of promotion. Barring accidents, Kasi's speculations upon the 
 financial future of the Brownes were very perfectly adjusted. 
 
 It was the elusive bank account that induced them to listen 
 to the Jack Lovitts, who lived in Park-street in a bigger house 
 than they could afford. " "We can perfectly well let you have the 
 top flat," said Mrs. Jack Lovitt at the end of the cold weather, 
 " and it will be that much off our rent besides being a lot cheaper 
 for yon. You see we could divide the mallie and the sweeper," 
 said Mrs. Lovitt, enunciating this horror quite callously, "and 
 that would be an advantage. Then we might have one leg of 
 mutton between us, you know, and that sort of thing — save a lot 
 of bazar." 
 
 " But should you like to have somebody living over your 
 head? " asked Helen, pondering over the idea. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OJ^ A MEM SAHIB. 20; 
 
 " Of course not," replied Mrs. Lovitt candidly, " who would ? 
 But if we mean to go on leave next year we've got to do some- 
 thing. Jack's eight hundred simply vanishes in our hands. 
 Last month, Helen Browne, our bill from Peliti alone was a 
 hundred and ten — beast ! If Jack wouldn't insist on giving ice 
 to his polo ponies I think we might get on. But you can't reason 
 with him about it. He'll come home with a broken neck from 
 that polo one of these days. And we haven't earned anything 
 approaching a decent pension yet, and my complexion's absolutely 
 gone," added this vivacious lady, who liked saying these insincere 
 things to her " young friend Mrs. Browne," who began at this 
 time to be amused by them. 
 
 " I've done my little uttermost," Mrs. Lovitt continued. 
 "This nougat is filthy, isn't it? I'll never leave my dear Peliti 
 again ! " The ladies were tiffining together in a luxury of soli- 
 tude. " I've sold three frocks." 
 
 " No ! " said Helen. " Which ? " 
 
 " That vieux rose brocade that I got out from home for the 
 Drawing-Room — the more fool I ! — and that gray shimmery cr^pe 
 that you like ; and another, a mouse-coloured sort of thing, with 
 gold bands, that I don't think you know — I've never had it on. 
 Frifri sent it home with a bill for a hundred and fifty if you 
 please — and I gave her the foundation. However, I've been paid 
 for it, and Frifri hasn't, and she can jolly well wait ! " 
 
 " What did you get for it? " asked Helen. 
 
 " Eighty-five— wasn't I lucky ? That new little Mrs. Niblit— 
 jute or indigo or something — heaps of money. Lady Blebbins 
 bought the other two for Julia. She's up in Allahabad, you 
 know, where the fact of my having swaggered around in them all 
 season won't make any difference. What a pretty little flannel 
 blouse that is of yours, my dear — I wish 1 could afford one like it ! " 
 
2o8 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 "It cost three eight altogether," said Mrs. Browne, "the 
 dhnrzie made it last week. He took two days, but I think he 
 dawdled." 
 
 " Three eight's a good deal, I think, for a blouse," returned 
 Mrs. Lovitt, the experienced. " Dear me, what a horrible thing 
 it is to be poor! And nothing but boxes in that upper flat! 
 Three rooms and two bath-rooms, going, going, gone — I wish it 
 were! What do you say, Mrs. Browne? Ninety-five rupees 
 only ! " 
 
 " It's cheap," said Helen ; "I'll ask George." 
 
 She did ask George, at the shortest possible intervals for 
 three days, and when the subject had been allowed to drop for a 
 quarter of an hour George asked her. It became the supreme 
 " question, and the consideration they devoted to it might have 
 revised the Permanent Settlement or decided our right to occupy 
 the Pamirs. 
 
 There were more pros and cons than I have patience to go 
 into, and I daresay they would have been discussing it still, if 
 Mrs. Browne had not thought fit to decline her breakfast on the 
 morning of the third day. Whereat young Browne suspected 
 fever — he hoped not typhoid — but the place certainly smelt 
 feverish, now that he came to smell it — and there was no doubt 
 that it Would be an economy to take Mrs. Lovitt's flat, and forth- 
 with they took it. 
 
 Moving house in India is a light aflSiction and but for a 
 moment. The sahib summoned Kasi, and announced to him 
 that the change would be made to-morrow, " and in thy hand 
 all things will be." Kasi received particulars of the address in 
 Park -street, salaamed, saying " Very good," and went away more 
 sorrowful than he seemed, for he was comfortable and mighty 
 where he was, and change was not often a good thing. Besides, 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 209 
 
 he knew Lovitt sahib that he had a violent temper and repre- 
 hensible modes of speech — it might not be good to come often 
 under the eye of Lovitt sahib. And he would be obliged to tell 
 the mallie his friend that it would be to depart, which would 
 split his heart in two. However, it was the sahib's will and 
 there was nothing to say, but a great deal to do. Moreover, 
 there might be backsheesh, which alleviated all things. 
 
 Next morning the Brownes found themselves allowed one 
 table and two chairs for breakfast purposes, and six coolies sat 
 without, dusty and expectorant, waiting for those. Kasi, at the 
 gate, directed a departing train, each balancing some portion of 
 their worldly goods upon his head, Kasi, watchful and stern, the 
 protector of his master's property. The dining-room was dis- 
 mantled, the drawing-room had become a floor space enclosed by 
 high white walls with nail marks in them. There was a little 
 heap of torn paper in one corner, and cobwebs seemed to have 
 been spun in the night in half the windows. 
 
 " It's pure magic ! " Helen exclaimed. " It's to-day week, 
 and I've been asleep," and then " We've been awfully happy 
 here, George," — an illogical statement to accompany wet 
 eyelashes. 
 
 Even while they sat on their single chairs at their single 
 table, which George put his elbows on, to secure it he said, the 
 bedroom furniture decamped with many footsteps, and after the 
 meal was over there was nothing left to testify of them but their 
 hats laid conspicuously on a sheet of paper in the middle of the 
 drawing-room floor. " I suppose," said young Browne, " they 
 think we've got brains enough to carry those over ourselves." 
 
 Mrs. Browne put hers on and drove her husband to ofiice. 
 Then she shopped for an hour or two, and finished up by 
 coming to tiffin with me. Then she repaired to Park-street, 
 
2IO THE SIMPLE AD\-ENTVRES Of A MEiMSAHlB. 
 
 where she found lierself cstublished in the main, with Kasi still 
 sujierintendiiig', his loclfs escaping from his turban, in a state of 
 
 THEIR HATS LAID (ON'SI'K TOUSLY ON A SHEKT OK PAPER. 
 
 extreme perspiration. Then she made a dainty afternoon toilet 
 with great comfort, and by the time young Browne came home 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 2II 
 
 to tea it was quite ready for him in every respect, even to the 
 wife behind the teapot, in circumstances which, except for the 
 pictures and the bric-a-brac, might be described as normal. 
 And of course, being an insensate sahib, he congratulated his 
 wife — it was prodigious, and all her doing ! KaSi was also com- 
 mended, however, and the praise of his master fell pleasantly on 
 the ear of Kasi, who immediately added another rupee to the 
 amount he meant to charge for coolie-hire. Thus is life allevi- 
 ated in India ; thus do all its material cares devolve into a hun- 
 dred brown hands and leave us free for our exalted occupations 
 or our noble pleasure. We are unencumbered by the considera- 
 tion of so much as a button. Under these beatitudes the average 
 Anglo-Indian career ought to be one of pure spirit and intellect, 
 but it is not so — not singularly so. 
 
 " What we must be thoroughly on our guard against," said 
 young Browne in the top flat at his second cup, " is seeing too 
 much of the Lovitts. They're not a bad sort if you keep them 
 at a proper distance ; I don't believe for an instant there's any 
 harm in little Mrs. Jack ; but it won't do to be too intimate. 
 They'll be as troublesome as sparrows if we are." 
 
 "There's one thing we'll have to look out for," said Mr. 
 Jack Lovitt in the bottom flat at his third muflin, " and that is 
 being too chummy with the Brownes ; they're all right so long 
 as they stay upstairs, but we won't encourage them to come 
 down too often. We'll have Mrs. B. gushing all over the place 
 if we do. They'll have to understand they've only rented the 
 top flat." 
 
 " They'll always know what we have for dinner," remarked 
 the spouse in the top flat. 
 
 " They'll see every soul that comes to the house," said the 
 spouse in the bottom flat. 
 
212 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 " It isn't the slightest concern of theirs," replied the lord 
 upstairs. 
 
 "It's absolutely none of their business," returned the lord 
 downstairs. 
 
 And they were both "blowed" if they would tolerate the 
 slightest interest in their respective affairs. The Brownes con- 
 cluded that " perhaps once a month " would be often enough to 
 ask the Lovitts to come up and dine, and the Lovitts thought 
 the Brownes might come in to tea " once in three weeks or so." 
 Before this they had been in the habit of entertaining each 
 other rather of tener, but then they were not under the same 
 roof, with a supreme reason for establishing distance. Mrs. 
 Browne believed that on the whole she wouldn't engage Mrs. 
 Lovitt's dhurzie — it might lead to complications; and Mrs. 
 Lovitt fancied she had better not offer Helen that skirt-pattern 
 — it would necessitate endless discussions and runnings up and 
 down. Mrs. Lovitt deliberately arranged to go up to see Helen 
 for the first time with her hat and gloves on, to make it obvious 
 that the call should be formally returned. Helen sent down a 
 note, beautifully written and addressed, to ask Mrs. Lovitt to 
 come to tea on Wednesday afternoon, at a quarter past five. 
 The ladies left no little thing undone, in fact, that would help to 
 quell a tendency to effusion ; they arranged to live as remotely 
 from each other as the limits of No. 61, Park-street, permitted. 
 The Brownes had always the roof and habitually sent chairs up 
 there. " They can't say we haven't rented it," said Helen. 
 
 Their precautions not to be offensive to each other were still 
 more elaborate. Mr. Browne ascertained at what time Mr. 
 Lovitt went to office, and made a habit of starting a quarter of 
 an hour earlier. Mrs. Lovitt, observing that the Brownes were 
 fond of walking in the compound in the evening, walked there 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 213 
 
 always in the morning. Neither of them would give any orders 
 to the mallie, whom they jointly paid, for fear of committing an 
 unwarrantable interference, and that functionary grew fat and 
 lazy, while the weeds multiplied in the gravel walks. Helen 
 even went so far as to use the back staircase to avoid a possible 
 encounter at the front door, but young Browne disapproved of 
 this. He believed in abating no jot or tittle of their lawful 
 claims. " Use the staircase freely, my dear," said he, " but do 
 not engage in conversation at the foot of it." 
 
 They assumed a bland ignorance of each other's affairs, more 
 discreet than veracious. When Mrs. Lovitt mentioned that they 
 had had a lot of people to dinner the night before, Helen said, 
 '■'■Had you?" as if she had not heard at least half a dozen car- 
 riages drive up at dinner time ; as if she had not decided, she 
 and George, indifferent upon the roof, that the trap which drove 
 off so much later than the others must have been Jimmy Forbes's. 
 And they would be as much surprised, these two ladies, at meet- 
 ing anywhere else at dinner as if they had not seen each other's 
 name inscribed in the peon book that brought the invitations, 
 and remarked each of the other, at the time, "It seems to me we 
 see enough of those people at home." 
 
 They were a little ridiculous, but on the whole they were 
 very wise indeed, and the relations that ensued were as polite 
 and as amiable as possible. It was like living on the edge of a 
 volcano, taking the precaution of throwing a pail or two of 
 water down every day or two. And nothing happened. 
 
'14 
 
 fHh SIMPLE AVrjiXTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 OTHING happened. Thus for three 
 months, three hot weather months. 
 The punkah wallahs came and min- 
 istered to the sahiblok with creak- 
 ings and snorings that cannot be 
 uttered, much less spelled. The 
 mango-crop was gathered and sold, 
 the to-pii]! mucliies swam up the river 
 Hooghly, and were caught and cooked in their appointed sea- 
 son. The Viceroy and his shining ones went to Simla, and 
 a wave of flirtation swept over the Himalayas. The shops 
 put up grass-tatties for the wind to blow through, and the 
 custoiners who went in were much cooler than the coolies who 
 stood outside throwing water over them. The brain-fever bird 
 spoke — he docs not sing — all day long in the banyan-tree — 
 "■ Potil- ! Poiik ! " all day long in the thickest part of the 
 banyan-tree, where nobody can see or shoot him. He comes 
 and stays with the hot weather, a feathered thing accursed. 
 The morning paper devoted itself exclusively to publishing the 
 " (Jazette" notices of leave and the lists of intending passengers 
 liy 1*. and ()., and week after week the tide bore great ships out- 
 ward, every cabin occupied by persons connected with more or 
 loss difioi'dered livers, going home for three or six or twelve 
 uumths' ri'pairs. You could count on your fingers the people 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 215 
 
 you knew in the Red Road. Kasi asked for an umbrella ; re- 
 spectfully as a right, it was the dushir for the sahib to provide 
 an umbrella. The ayah begged for an umbrella, humbly as a 
 favour ; she had far to come and the sun was " ag kamqfik." * 
 The kitmutgar asked for an umbrella, not because he had the 
 slightest idea that he would get it, but because it was generally 
 more blessed to ask than not to ask. The cholera arrived punc- 
 tually, and increased the native death-rate, with its customary 
 industry. The Lovitts lost a bearer from this cause, and a 
 valuable polo pony from heat apoplexy. The latter bereave- 
 ment was in the paper. The oil exuded more profusely still 
 upon the adipose tissue that encloses the poul of a baboo, and 
 Calcutta flamed with the red flowers of the gold mohur tree, 
 panting nightly, when they were all put out, under the cool south 
 wind from the sea. 
 
 Neither the Lovitts nor the Brownes left Calcutta ; they were 
 among the people you counted on your fingers. There is very 
 little to talk about in the hot weather, and the fact that nothing 
 had happened was discussed a good deal, in the dead privacy of 
 the roof or the lower veranda. Both the top flat and the bottom 
 flat thought it had managed admirably, and congratulated itself 
 accordingly. That nothing should have happened caused them 
 to rise considerably in each other's esteem — there were so few 
 people living under one roof in Calcutta who were able to say it. 
 They told society how agreeable they found it to live with each 
 other, and society repeated it, so that the Brownes heard of the 
 Lovitts' satisfaction, and the Lovitts heard of the Brownes'. 
 Indeed, there came a time when the Brownes and the Lovitts 
 thought almost as much of each other as they did before they 
 lived together. 
 
 * Like fire. 
 
2l6 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 It had been an extinct volcano after all, and they stopped 
 throwing water down. Mrs. Lovitt, by degrees, became easily 
 confidential again, and told Helen among other things that edified 
 her, exactly what they were saying at the club about Mrs. Lush- 
 ington and the General's A. D. C, Mrs. Lovitt's version coming 
 straight from Jimmy Forbes, and being absolutely correct. 
 Helen being without a confidential male admirer upon these 
 matters — husbands kept them notoriously to themselves — had 
 not the wherewithal to exchange ; but she borrowed the Lovitts' 
 khansamah to make some cocoanut creams, which was going a 
 great deal further. When the Brownes' pony was laid up with 
 the sun, threatening vertigo. Jack Lovitt took young Browne to 
 office very sociably in his cart ; and when the Lovitts ran up to 
 Darjiling on ten days' casual leave, the Brownes looked after 
 " the littlest black and tan in Calcutta," and took it out for a 
 drive every day. They dined and lunched and shopped more 
 and more often together, and Mrs. Lovitt knew exactly how many 
 topsy muchies Mrs. Browne got for eight annas. 
 
 It was just at this very favourable point that the difficulty 
 about Mr. Lovitt's unmarried sister arose. Mr. Lovitt's unmar- 
 ried sister had been shipped six months before to an up-country 
 relation, and having made no use whatever of her time in Cawn- 
 pore, was now to be transferred to Calcutta as a final experiment. 
 Mrs. Lovitt wanted a room for her unmarried sister-in-law, 
 wanted Helen's dining-room. It was a serious difficulty, and the 
 Lovitts and the Brownes in thc'plenitude of their confidence and 
 good-will agreed to surmount it by "chumming," — living together 
 and dividing the bulk of the household expenses — a form of ex- 
 istence largely supported in Calcutta. 
 
 In the beginning, chumming lends itself vastly to expansion, 
 and the Brownes and the Levitts expanded to the utmost verge. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAItlB. 217 
 
 They forgot the happy result of past disci-etions ; they became a 
 united family, no longer a top and a bottom flat. They pooled 
 their domestic resources — the soup-plates were Mrs. Lovitt's, the 
 dessert-knives were Mrs. Browne's. They consulted each other's 
 tastes pressingly. They had brisket always on Saturday night 
 because " Jack " liked cold brisket for breakfast on Sunday morn- 
 ing, and mutton twice a week because young Browne had a weak- 
 ness for caper sauce. Mrs. Lovitt sent away her cook — a crown- 
 ing act of grace — and Kali Bagh reigned in his stead. It was all 
 peace and fraternity, and the sahibs sat together in long praiso 
 of each other's cigars every evening, while the memsahibs upstairs 
 discussed their mutual friends and sank deeper into each other's 
 affections. Indeed, in little Mrs. Lovitt's Helen had absolutely 
 no rival except Jimmy Forbes, the black and tan, and Mr. Lovitt. 
 They saw a good deal of Mr. Forbes naturally, and the inter- 
 esting and unique position in the house occupied by that gentle- 
 man was revealed to Helen with all the force of an Anglo-Indian 
 experience. He was nearly always there, and when he hadn't 
 been there he was in the habit of giving an account of himself as 
 having been elsewhere. It was expected of him, and much be- 
 side. Helen decided that he couldn't be described as a "tame 
 cat " in the family, because the position of a tame cat is an ir- 
 responsible one, and Mr. Forbes had many responsibilities. If 
 Mrs. Lovitt's racquet went '■'■fuV * it was Jimmy who had it re- 
 strung for her. When a new theatrical company came sailing 
 up from Ceylon, Jimmy went on its opening night to report, 
 and if it were good enough to waste an evening on, he took the 
 Lovitts — generally both of them— later. If the roof leaked, or 
 the servants misbehaved, Mrs. Lovitt complained to Jimmy quite 
 
 * To ruin. 
 15 
 
2l8 THE SIMPLE ADFE.VTUKES OE .4 MEM SAHIB. 
 
 as often as to Jack, and Jimmy saw to it. When Mrs. Lovitt 
 wanted some Burmese carvings, Jimmy arranged it at the jail, 
 where the caiitive Burmese carve, and when that lady decided 
 that she would like to sell her victoria and buy a cabriolet, 
 Jimmy advertised it in The Englishman and made the bargain. 
 In fact Mr. Forbes relieved Mr. Lovitt of more than half the 
 duties pertaining to his official position, of which kindness the 
 latter gentleman was not insensible. Nor could anybody say 
 that little Mrs. Lovitt was. She nursed Jimmy Forbes when he 
 was ill, scolded him when he was imprudent, and advised him on 
 the subject of his clothes. I don't know that she ever put his 
 necktie straight, but she never would allow him to wear anything 
 but blue ones, and made a point of his throwing away all his 
 high collars — the turned down ones suited him so much better. 
 She did not overload him with benefits, but at Christmas and on 
 his birthday she always gave him some little thing with a per- 
 sonal association, a pair of slippers, some initialled handker- 
 chiefs, a new photograph of herself, generally taken with the 
 littlest black and tan in Calcutta. 
 
 Thus they made no secret of their affection ; it had the can- 
 dour of high noon. They called each other Jimmy and Jenny 
 with all publicity. When Jimmy went home on three months' 
 leave, Jennie told all her friends that she was simply desolated. 
 She declared to Jimmy and to the world that she was a mother 
 to tliis young man, and no mother could have walked and danced 
 and driven more self-sacrificingly with her son. Mrs. Lovitt 
 was at least three years younger than her "Jimmy-boy," but 
 that, in cases of adoption, is known to be immaterial. In 
 periods of absence they wrote to M,ch other regularly twice a 
 week, and Jimmy never forgot to send kind regards to Jack. 
 Their manner to each other was conspicuous for the absence of 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 219 
 
 anything foolish or awkward or constrained — it was above em- 
 barrassment, it spoke of a secure footing and an untroubled mind, 
 Mrs. Lovitt lectured Mr. Forbes, and Mr. Forbes rebuked Mrs. 
 Lovitt with a simplicity and good humour that produced a kind 
 of astonishment in the spectator, who looked about her in vain 
 for a formula of criticism. " No," Mr. Forbes would say, " you'd 
 better not call on Mrs. Lushington. It's all right for me to go, 
 of course, but I'd rather you didn't know her." And Mrs. 
 Lovitt would poutingly acquiesce. When Tertium Quiddism 
 takes this form, what is there to say ? 
 
 Mrs. Levitt's oificial lord, at all events, found very little to 
 say. He liked Forbes himself extremely — capital fellow — aw- 
 fully clever chap^and admitted him into full communion as a 
 member of the family in good and Tegiilar standing, with a pla- 
 cidity which many husbands doubtless envied him. The gentle- 
 men were not brothers or even brothers-in-law, the relation was 
 one too delicately adjusted to come under any commonly recog- 
 nised description ; but there was a kind of fraternity in it which 
 Mrs. Lovitt seemed to establish, with tacit limitations which 
 established themselves. The limitations were concerned with 
 impropriety — in the general sense. It is certain that there were 
 no occasions a deux when Mr. Forbes felt out of it with Mr. and 
 Mrs. Lovitt — they had no privacy to speak of which Jimmy was 
 not welcome to share. In family matters Mr. Lovitt treated 
 Mr. Forbes much as a valued Under-Secretary. The two men 
 were calling upon me one Sunday, and I inquired of Mr. Lovitt 
 whether his wife were going to Mrs. Walter Lull's concert for 
 the East Indian Self -Help Association. "'Pon my word," he 
 said, "I don't know. Forbes will tell you." Mrs. Lovitt had 
 frequent occasion to mention these amicable conditions to her 
 friends. "My husband thinks the world of Jimmy Forbes," she 
 
220 T'I'i SIMPLE ADVEXTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 often said, "and Jimmy is perfectly devoted to him." In mo- 
 ments of intimacy after tiffin with Mrs. Browne, she was fond of 
 comparing the two. " Jimmy is a good deal the cleverer," she 
 would say judicially, "but Jack is much the better tempered, 
 poor dear, and his looks leave nothing to be desired, in my 
 opinion. But then I always did spoil Jack." 
 
 When Miss Josephine Lovitt arrived, tall and vigorous, with 
 a complexion fresh from the school-room, full of bubbling 
 laughter, and already made fully aware of herself by six months' 
 diligent spurning of nice little subalterns, who thought her a 
 Juno of tremendously good form, these ladies had further con- 
 fidences. Mrs. Lovitt initiated them by asking Helen if she 
 didn't think it would be just the thing for Jimmy, and in the 
 discussion which followed it appeared that Mrs. Lovitt had 
 often tried to marry Jimmy oil — she was sure he would be much 
 happier married — but hitherto unavailingly. No one knew the 
 trouble she had taken, the efforts she had made. Mrs. Lovitt 
 couldn't understand it, for it was only a matter of picking and 
 choosing, and Jimmy wasn't shy. " I've argued it out with him 
 a score of times," she said, " but I can't get the least satisfac- 
 tion. Men are queer animals." 
 
 Helen agreed that Mr. Forbes ought to be married. It was 
 so much her opinion that she had to be careful not to argue 
 too emphatically. It seemed to Mrs. Browne that there were 
 particular as well as general grounds for approving such an 
 idea, and Miss Josephine Lovitt struck her also as its brilliant 
 apotheosis. " Josie's a nice girl," declared Mrs. Lovitt, " and a 
 great deal cleverer than she pretends to be. And Jack would 
 like it above all things. But it's too nice to hope for," and Mrs. 
 Lovitt sighed with the resignation that is born of hope deferred. 
 
 Helen reported the matter duly to George, who laughed in 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEAf SAHIB. 221 
 
 a ribald manner about Mrs. Lovitt's intentions, and would hear 
 nothing of the advisability of the match, as men never will. So 
 she was not encouraged to suggest anything of co-operation on 
 her own part. Indeed, she was hardly conscious of such an 
 idea, but the married woman's instinct was already awake in 
 her, and she was quite prepared to do anything she could to 
 further Mrs. Lovitt's benevolent design. It should be fur- 
 thered, Helen thought, in the interests of the normal and the 
 orthodox. 
 
 Opportunities did not immediately occur, because Mrs. Lovitt 
 took them all herself. She gave tennis parties at the Saturday 
 club, and made up sets so that Mr. Forbes and Miss Lovitt 
 played together. When Mr. Forbes sang " The Bogie Man " to 
 them all after dinner she made Josephine play his accompani- 
 ment to save her " rheumatic " finger-joints. Josephine might 
 teach Jimmy " Halma " — she was much too stupid to learn — 
 she would talk to Mr. Browne. All this quite shamelessly, 
 rather with an air of conscious rectitude, of child-like naivetS. 
 It was the old thing, Jimmy Forbes thought, over his peaceful 
 private cigar ; it amused her to do it, it always had amused her 
 to do it. Before he had generally resented it a good deal ; this 
 time he resented it too, by Jove, but not so much. After all, 
 why should he resent it — deuced bad policy; it only encour- 
 aged the little woman to go on with this sort of game. And for 
 the first time in Mr. Forbes's dawning experience of womankind 
 it occurred to him that it might be advisable under some cir- 
 cumstances not to sulk. He wouldn't sulk — he would teach the 
 little woman a lesson. It wouldn't be a bad thing to do. Be- 
 sides, Miss Lovitt was rather amusing, and no fool either ; she 
 wouldn't misunderstand things. And Mr. Forbes finished his 
 cigar with the conviction that such an experiment would be 
 
JOiKPHIXE MlflllT TEACH .IIMMY "HAI.MA." 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 223 
 
 absolutely safe so far as the girl was concerned — of course, he 
 was bound to think of the girl — and more or less agreeable. 
 
 A little later Helen confided to George that she really 
 wouldn't be one bit surprised if something came of it; Jack 
 Lovitt remarked to his wife that Forbes seemed rather taken 
 with Josie, and he was quite prepared to give them his blessing ; 
 and Mrs. Lovitt replied that it would be lovely, wouldn't it, but 
 she was afraid it was only temporary, adding rather vaguely that 
 Jimmy Forbes wasn't a bit like other men. On the whole it 
 wouldn't be unsuitable, but it was a pity Josie was so tall — she 
 overtopped him by about a foot — a tall woman and a little 
 man did look so idiotic together. That evening Mrs. Lovitt 
 accompanied " The Bogie Man " without any reference to her 
 rheumatic finger-joints. 
 
 It was at this juncture — when any lady of discretion living 
 in the same house would have been looking on in silent joy, 
 without lifting a finger — that Helen found herself yielding 
 to the temptation of furthering matters, so successfully, you 
 understand, was Mr. Forbes making his experiment. Here a 
 little and there a little Mrs. Browne permitted herself to do 
 what she could, and opportunities occurred to an extent which 
 inspired and delighted her. She discovered herself to be a per- 
 son of wonderful tact, and the discovery no doubt stimulated 
 her, though it must be said that circumstances put themselves 
 very readily at her disposal. Mrs. Lovitt, for one thing, had 
 gradually retired from the generalship of the situation, becom- 
 ing less and less sanguine of its issue as Helen became more and 
 more hopeful. She even had a little confidential conversation 
 with Josephine, in which she told that young lady that though 
 Jimmy was a dear good fellow and she had always been able to 
 depend upbn him to be kind to any friends of hers, she was 
 
224 ^"^^ SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A At EM SAHIB. 
 
 afraid he was not a person to be taken altogether seriously. 
 Josie would understand. And Josie did understand quite well. 
 
 As to Mr. Forbes himself, his experiment had succeeded. 
 There was no doubt whatever that the little woman had been 
 taught a lesson ; anyone could see that she had learnt it remark- 
 ably well. Yet he continued to instruct her, he did not with- 
 draw the experiment. He found it interesting, and not exclu- 
 sively in its effect upon Mrs. Lovitt. Miss Josephine found it 
 interesting too. She thought she would like to hand Mr. Forbes 
 back to her little sister-in-law, to hand him back a little dam- 
 aged, perhaps. This was doubtless very naughty of Miss Jo- 
 sephine, but not unnatural under the circumstances. It was 
 only, after all, that she did not make a good cat's paw. 
 
 And thus it went on, to be brief — for this is not a chronicle 
 of the affair of Jimmy Forbes and Mrs. Lovitt's sister-in-law, the 
 which any gossip of Calcutta will give you at great length and 
 detail — until the Brownes asked Miss Josephine Lo^tt and Mr. 
 Forbes to go with them to see Mr. "Wjlde de Vinton, assisted by 
 a scratch company, perform Hamlet in the opera house, on a 
 Saturday evening. Hitherto Mr. Forbes's Saturday evenings had 
 not been his own, they had been Mrs. Lovitt's. She had estab- 
 lished a peculiar claim to be amused on Saturday evenings — they 
 were usually consecrated to long talks of a semi-sentimental or- 
 der, which Jack Lovitt could not possibly have understood even 
 if he had been there. Therefore when Mr. Forbes showed Mrs. 
 Lovitt Helen's note and stated his intention of accepting, it was 
 in the nature of a finality. 
 
 I am not interested in deciding whether it was from purely 
 conscientious motives that Miss Josephine Lovitt, having dis- 
 covered Mr. Forbes to have sustained considerable damage, re- 
 frained from handing him back to Mrs. Lovitt. All I wish to 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVEXTUKES OE A MEMSAITIB. 
 
 225 
 
 establish is tliat the Brownes did not leave No. CI, Park-street 
 until quite three weeks after the engagement was announced. 
 
 MISS .iiiski'Iiinf; i.uvitt refrained from handing mim back TH mrs. i.ovitt. 
 
 Mrs. liOvitt was obliged to wait until they found a house. And 
 of course their going had nothing whatever to do with dear 
 Josie's engagement — Mrs. Lovitt made that match, and was very 
 
226 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 proud of it. The incident that brought about their misunder- 
 standing with the Brownes was the merest trifle, Mrs. Lovitt 
 would tell you if you knew her well enough, the merest trifle. 
 They, the Lovitts, had asked the Honourable Mr. Justice Lamb 
 of the High Court to dinner on, say, Friday of next week. His 
 lordship was suffering very much from the weather when the in- 
 vitation came, and declined it, fabricating another engagement 
 as even their lordships will. Mrs. Browne and Mrs. Lovitt had 
 then reached that point in the development of the chumming 
 system — hastened a little by circumstances — when one thinks it 
 isn't absolutely necessary for those people to concern themselves 
 in all one's affairs, and the circumstance was not mentioned. As 
 it lia])pened, therefore, the Brownes two days later invited Mr. 
 Justice Lamb to dinner on the same Friday, the old gentleman 
 being a second cousin of young Browne's, and in the habit of 
 dining with them once in six months or so. The thermometer 
 having gone down a few degrees, his lordship, who was a person 
 of absent mind, accepted with much pleasure, putting the note 
 in his pocket-book so that he wouldn't forget the youngster's ad- 
 dress. 
 
 " We have a man coming to dinner to-night," Helen re- 
 marked casually at breakfast, and Mrs. Lovitt was of course not 
 sufficiently interested to inquire who it was, if Mrs. Browne 
 didn't choose to say. The man came, ate his dinner with a 
 good conscience and a better appetite, and being as amiable as 
 he was forgetful, mentioned particularly to Mrs. Lovitt how sor- 
 ry he was not to have been able to accept her kind invitation of 
 last week. 
 
 It was a little thing, but Mrs. Lovitt foresaw that it might 
 lead to complications. And so the Brownes departed from No. 
 61, Park-street, not without thanksgiving. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 227 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 TTIOR the furtherance of a good understanding between the 
 -*- sahibs and the Aryans who obey them and minister unto 
 them, the Raj * has ordained language examinations. This was 
 necessary, because in war, contract-making, or the management 
 of accounts, neither a Ghurka nor a Bengali will comprehend 
 you if you simply swear at him. He must be approached through 
 a rudimentary medium of imperative moods and future tenses. 
 Therefore the institution of the Higher and the Lower Standard, 
 and much anguish on the part of Her Majesty's subalterns. The 
 Raj attaches rather more credit to the former of these examina- 
 tions, but afterwards the difference is nominal — you forget them 
 with equal facility. 
 
 It might be respectively pointed out, however, that the Gov- 
 ernment of India has done nothing in this direction to stimulate 
 intercourse with the native population among memsahibs. In 
 fact the Government of India does not recognise memsahibs in 
 any way that is not strictly and entirely polite. And so the 
 memsahib " picks up " Hindustani — picks it up in her own sim- 
 ple artless fashion which dispenses with all ordinary aids to the 
 acquirement of a foreign tongue. She gathers together her own 
 vocabulary, gathers it from the east and the west, and the north 
 and the south, from Bengal and Bombay, from Madras and the 
 Punjab, a preposition from Persia, a conjunction from Cashmere, 
 
 • Government. 
 
228 THE SIArriK adventures of a MEArSAIIIB. 
 
 a noun from the Nilgherries. She makes lier own rules, and all 
 the natives she knows are governed by them — nothing from a 
 grammatical point of view could be more satisfactory than that. 
 Her constructions in the language are such as she pleases to 
 place upon it ; thus it is impossible that she should make mis- 
 takes. 
 
 The memsahib's Hindustani is nevertheless not perfectly 
 pure, entirely apart from questions of pronunciation, which she 
 regulates somewhat imperiously. This is because she prefers to 
 improve it by the admixture of a little English ; and the effect 
 upon the native mind is quite the same. It really doesn't mat- 
 ter whether you say, " That's bote atchn hai khansamah-gee" * or 
 " This is very carnb, f you stupid ool-ka-heta" \ or use the simple 
 Hindustani statements to express your feelings. The English 
 may adorn them, but it is the Hindustani after all that gives 
 vitality to your remarks. " Chokee lao," means " bring a chair," 
 but if you put it, " bring me a chokee lao," the meaning of the 
 command is not seriously interfered with, beside convincing 
 you more firmly that you have said what you wanted to say. I 
 suppose Mrs. Browne talked more Hindustani to Kali Bagh than 
 to anybody else, and one dinner's dialogue, so to speak, might be 
 like this : 
 
 " Kvl ka * mutton, how much is there. Kali Bagh ? " 
 
 " Ifn, bus hai, hazvr.'''' |{ 
 
 " Then you may irony-stew do, ^ and undercut beefsteak 
 vmnrta, (j and mind you find an atcha tvaJlah. J Onions fry ka 
 sat, snmjd ? " | 
 
 * Very good, worthy Khansamah. I Yes, there is enough, your honour. 
 t Bad. ^ Give an Irish stew. 
 
 i Ron of an owl. * <) I want. J Good one. 
 
 * Of yesterday. J Thcrt'with, do you understand t 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 229 
 
 " //a, hazur ! Bote atcha wallah miliga* Ecpuddin ka- 
 wasti?''' \ 
 
 " Oh, you can plum-pudding, do — a chota wallah, and cabadar 
 bote plenty kismiss." I 
 
 " Brmmdi-sauce ka sat ? " * 
 
 " Na. Put into whiskey-shrab. Brunndi burra dom hai. || 
 And dekko, curry hazri na muncta, tiffin muncta." 
 
 This last statement is to the effect that curry does not want 
 breakfast, wants tiffin, but the heathen mind never translates the 
 memsahib literally. It picks the words it knows out of her dis- 
 course and links them together upon a system of probabilities 
 which long application and severe experiences have made remark- 
 ably correct. Then it salaams and acts. The usually admirable 
 result is misleading to the memsahib, who naturally ascribes it to 
 the grace and force and clearness of her directions. Whereas 
 it is really the discernment of Kali Bagh that is to be com- 
 mended. 
 
 Considering the existence of the Higher and Lower Standard 
 there is less difference between the Hindustani of Anglo-Indian 
 ladies and Anglo-Indian gentlemen than one would expect. The 
 sahib has several choice epithets that do not attach themselves to 
 the vocabulary of the memsahib, who seldom allows her wrath to 
 run to anything more abusive than " Son-of-an-Owl," or " Poor- 
 kind-of-man," and the voice of the sahib is in itself a terrible 
 thing so that all his commands are more emphatic, more quickly 
 to be obeyed. But he is pleased to use much the same forms of 
 speech as are common to the memsahib, and if he isn't under- 
 stood he will know the reason why. The same delicate autocracy 
 
 * I will find. • With brandy sauce! 
 
 f And for pudding 1 || Brandy is a large price. 
 
 X Take care to put plenty of raisins. 
 
230 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 pervades the sahib's Hindustani as characterises most of his re- 
 lations with liis Indian fellow-subjects. He has subdued their 
 language, as it were, to such uses as he thinks fit to put it, and 
 if they do not choose to acquire it in this form, so much the 
 more inconvenient for them. He can always get another kit- 
 mutgar. The slight incongruities of his system do not present 
 themselves to the sahib. He has a vague theory that one ought 
 not to say turn * to a Kajah, but he doesn't want to talk to Eajahs 
 — he didn't come out for that. So that my accuracy need not 
 be doubted I will quote the case of Mr. Perth Macintyre, and I 
 am quite sure that if Mr. Perth Macintyre were to be presented 
 to the Nizam of Hyderabad to-morrow — an honour he would not 
 at all covet — he would find nothing better to say to him in Hin- 
 dustani than '■'■Atclia liaiV \ — the formula he would use to a 
 favourite syce. 
 
 Mrs. Browne had a great aptitude for languages. She had 
 brought her German prizes with her, and used to look at them 
 with much satisfaction when the problem of conquering Hindu- 
 stani was new to her, and she thought it would be a matter of 
 some difficulty. She had ambitious ideas at first, connected with 
 a grammar and a dictionary, and one January afternoon she 
 learned a whole page of rules for the termination of the feminine. 
 Mrs. Macdonald found her at it, and assured her earnestly that 
 she was " going the wrong way about it." " With all you have 
 to do," declared Mrs. Macdonald, " you'll never get to the end of 
 that book, and when you do you'll have forgotten the beginning. 
 AVhatever is the difference to you whether ghoree is the feminine 
 for horse, or what the plural is ! They're all gorahs ! Now I 
 picked up Hindustani in the ordinary way. I listened, and 
 
 * Yoii (familiar). f Are you welH (familiar). 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 23 1 
 
 whenever I didn't know a thing I asked my ayah what its name 
 was — and in two months I spoke the language fluently. So will 
 you, but never with a grammar ; a grammar won't help you to 
 order dinner. Neither will a dictionary — you won't find ' hoss- 
 nallis' in a dictionary. That's Hindustani for 'horse-radish.' 
 It's awfully funny, how like English the language is in some 
 words?" 
 
 "Is it?" said Helen, "I hadn't noticed that. It must be 
 quite easy to learn, then." 
 
 " Oh, quite ! For instance, where we say ' stable,' and 'coat,' 
 and ' beer,' they say ' ishtable,' and ' coatee,' and ' beer-shrab.' 
 And the Hindustani for ' kettle ' is ' kettley,' and for ' bottle,' 
 ' botle.' Oh, it's not a difficult language ! " 
 
 One does not cling to a manual of Hindustani in the face of 
 the protestations of one's friends, and Mrs. Browne found herself 
 induced to abandon hers before the terminations for the feminine 
 were quite fixed in her mind. One might just as well acquire 
 the language in a less laborious way. So she paid diligent atten- 
 tion, for one thing, to ordinary Anglo-Indian conversation, which 
 is in itself a very fair manual of Hindustani. There is hardly 
 any slang in Anglo-India, the tongue of the gentle Hindu sup- 
 plies a substitute for that picturesque form of expression. It 
 permeates all classes of society, that is, both Covenanted and Un- 
 covenanted classes ; and there are none so dignified in speech as 
 to eschew it. Mrs. Wodenhamer uses it, and the missionaries' 
 wives. It is ever on the tongue of Kitty Toote ; I have no doubt 
 it creeps into the parlance of Het Excellency. Therefore it can- 
 not be vulgar. Only this morning, Mrs. Jack Levitt in the 
 course of ten minutes' conversatfon in my drawing-room simply 
 scintillated with it. She wanted to know if it was pucca that we 
 were going home for good next hot weather, and remarked that 
 
232 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 it was a pity we had the house on a long bundabust,* it was 
 always such a dick and worry to get rid of a lease. One of her 
 kitmutgars had been giving her trouble — she was afraid he was a 
 bad jat of man — he was turning out a regular budmash. f He 
 attended to his hookums J very well, but he Avas always getting 
 into golmals * with the other servants. Had I heard the gup 
 about Walter Toote's being in trouble with his Department? 
 Awful row on, Mrs. Lovitt believed. And had I been at Govern- 
 ment House the night before? It was getting altogether too 
 gurrum || for nautches now. As for her, she had been up every 
 blessed night for a week with Mrs. Gammidge's butcha ^ — aw- 
 fully bad with dysentery, poor little wretch — and was too done to 
 go. It was quite time the season was over, and yet they had 
 three burra khanas ^ on for next week. 
 
 It will be evident that a very limited amount of intercourse of 
 this sort will assist tremendously toward a self -satisfying acquaint- 
 ance with Hindustani. There is a distinct flavour of the lan- 
 guage about it. But this lingers only in India. We leave it 
 when we sail away from the Apollo Bunder, J where it attaches 
 itself to the first new-comers. It belongs to the land of the kit- 
 mutgar ; it forsakes us utterly in Kensington. 
 
 Mrs. Browne found it very facilitating, and if she did not 
 finally learn to speak like a native she speedily learned to speak 
 like a memsahib, which was more desirable. In the course of 
 time young Browne forgave her the agonies her initiation cost 
 him. They began early in the morning when Helen remarked 
 that it was a very " atcha " day, they continued at breakfast when 
 
 * Agreement. \ Hot. 
 
 \ Blackguard. •* Oflfspring. 
 
 X Orders. ^ Big dinners. 
 
 * Rows. J The Bombay jetty. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 233 
 
 she asked him if he would have an " unda " * or some " muchli " f 
 or some " tunda beef," \ and it went on at intervals from five 
 o'clock till bed-time. It was her impression, poor dear thing, 
 that she was humorous in this — it was not for six whole months 
 that she learned how Anglo-India sanctions Hindustani for grim 
 convenience only, declining to be amused by it in any way what- 
 ever, and has placed its own stamp upon such time-established 
 expressions aa are admissible. More than these are recognised to 
 come of vanity and the desire of display, and Anglo-India will 
 have none of them. In the meantime Mrs. Browne trespassed 
 daily, smiling and unaware. At first her George received these 
 pleasantries with a pained smile. Then he looked solemn, then 
 severe. When Mrs. Browne's lapses had been particularly flagrant 
 a chill fell upon their intercourse which she was puzzled to un- 
 derstand. Whereupon she tried to dissipate it by the jocular use 
 of more Hindustani, which made young Browne wriggle in liis 
 chair. They arrived at a point where it was obviously impossible 
 to go on. It did not occur to young Browne to propose a separa- 
 tion, though he had shocking liver that day, but he arose sud- 
 denly and said he'd be hanged if he'd stand being talked Hindu- 
 stani to any longer. Thereat Mrs. Browne, being a person of 
 tender feelings, wept. Whereat Mr. Browne, being a man of 
 sentiment in spite of liver complications, was instantly reduced 
 to nothingness and suppliance, when explanations of course en- 
 sued, and Helen was made acquainted with most of the informa- 
 tion in this chapter. In the upshot, whether Mrs. Browne never 
 spoke a word of Hindustani again, as she proposed, or spoke it 
 all day long for a year and nothing could be sweeter, as he pro- 
 posed, I have never been made aware. 
 
 * Egg. t Fish. X Cold beef. 
 
 10 
 
234 
 
 THE S/MTLE ADVENTURES OE A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 IT would be im- 
 proper to pre- 
 tend to chronicle 
 even the simple ad- 
 ventures of a mem- 
 sahib without a re- 
 spectful reference to 
 their clerical side. 
 The reference will be 
 slight ; but it must 
 be made, if only in 
 answer to Aunt Plov- 
 tree's communication 
 upon the subject, in which she took the trouble to remark par- 
 ticularly how curious it was that Helen's letters said so little 
 about purish matters or a clergyman. One might almost fancy, 
 said Aunt Plovtree, that such things did not exist in India; and 
 it is higlily inadvisable that these chapters should produce a simi- 
 lar impression. Helen replied to her aunt that on the contrary 
 there were several churches scattered about Calcutta, with cler- 
 gymen attached to all of them, also an Archdeacon and a Bishop. 
 Some were higher than others — the clergymen she meant — and 
 she believed that a number of them were very nice. She didn't 
 know any of the clergymen themselves yet; but she had met one 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 235 
 
 or two of the wives of the junior chaplains, and one she thought 
 an awfully sweet woman. The Archdeacon she didn't know by 
 sight, the Bishop she had seen once at a distance. They — the 
 Brownes — were not quite sure which parish they belonged to 
 yet ; but when they found out she would be sure to mention any- 
 thing connected with it that she thought would interest her 
 dearest Aunt Plovtree. Doubtless Mrs. Plovtree thought that 
 this left something to be desired, and if my chapter should pro- 
 voke the same opinion I can only deplore without presuming to 
 question it. 
 
 The Government of India provides two medical departments 
 for the benefit of its servants : one for the body and one for the 
 soul. The Government of India has the reputation of being a 
 hard taskmaster, but its liberality is not questioned here, unless 
 one cavils at being obliged to pay one's own undertaker. It has 
 arranged, educated, graduated, and certificated assistance in all 
 cases of bodily and spiritual extremity free of charge, assuming, 
 however, no ultimate responsibility, except towards the higher 
 grades of the Covenanted Ones. To them, I believe, it guarantees 
 heaven ; but it is difficult to obtain accurate information upon 
 this point, especially as that state is apt to be confounded out 
 here with the rank and privileges of a Knight Commander of the 
 Order of the Star of India. 
 
 It is, of course, a debatable question — I speak here of the 
 senior chaplains ; the junior chaplains suffer an almost prohib- 
 itive baby-tax, which, to a junior chaplain, is a serious financial 
 consideration, and his pay is not luxurious — but I have always 
 understood that the spiritual service of the Kaj is not such an 
 excessively bad thing. I know that comparatively few of its 
 members are of this opinion, and I have no doubt that the pecul- 
 iarly agreeable absence of theological controversy in India is due 
 
236 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 to the fact that the energy of reverend gentlemen is largely occu- 
 pied in popularising a diiferent one. Still it remains the lay 
 idea that the chaplains of the Government of India are in their 
 father-in-law's house. The term of service is brief, and during 
 its course the reverend servant may claim to write his sermons 
 and proclaim the example of the wicked man for three years 
 comfortably in a hill station, where his clerical liver need never 
 compel his clerical temper to spend itself unbecomingly upon 
 kitmutgars. His pay is moderate, but as high probably as could 
 be considered prudent in view of the undcsirability of encourag- 
 ing worldliness in a spiritual department, and it is not written in 
 his contract that the beady simpkin shall enhance his little dinner 
 parties. 
 
 " Pegs, claret, and beer for a junior chaplain," remarked one 
 of Calcutta's spiritual advisers to me once ; " but sherry is ex- 
 pected as well of a senior chaplain, and even cura9oa!" He 
 spoke ruefully, for he was a senior chaplain, and given to hospi- 
 tality. The reverend brotherhood are eligible for three months' 
 privilege leave every year upon full pay, and three years' furlough 
 during service on half pay. In addition to which they do not 
 scruple to hold " retreats," also doubtless upon full official allow- 
 ances, though their cardinal features may be fish and eggs. They 
 enter into their reward early, and it is a substantial one — three 
 hundred a year, and such pickings as offer themselves in England 
 to reverend gentlemen with a competency. Neither is the exer- 
 cise of faith required of them in regard to it ; it is in the bond. 
 In this respect it is obvious that the Indian vineyard offers a dis- 
 tinct advantage over others, where the labourers are expected to 
 be contented with abstract compensations to be enjoyed after 
 their decease. Popularly they are known as " padres," which is 
 a Portuguese survival more respectable than any other, and a 
 
TIfE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 237 
 
 demi-official tag which admits its owner to society. It ought to 
 be mentioned that the Indian padre does not move in the atmos- 
 phere of feminine adoration which would be created for him in 
 England ; there are too many other men for that. Doubtless the 
 more attractive of the junior chaplains, sent out, as it were, in 
 cotton wool, miss the little attentions of the ladies of the par- 
 ish at home, but then they have their polo ponies and their 
 pegs. 
 
 There were various reasons why Mrs. George Browne had been 
 compelled to write to her inquiring aunt that as yet she had not 
 the pleasure of any clergyman's acquaintance. The padres are 
 official, for one thing, and one does not approach an official in 
 India — especially if one is a commercial — without some appropri- 
 ate excuse. When the Brownes wanted to be married a reverend 
 gentleman married them, and did it very well — as they always do 
 in the cathedral — for I was looking on. If either of them had 
 since required to be buried he would doubtless have done that 
 with the same ability, despatch, and desire to oblige. He might 
 also in the future be applied to with propriety in connection with 
 a christening. If the Brownes' water-pipes leaked the Brownes 
 would with equal and similar propriety request the Municipal 
 Engineer to mend them and they would be mended, but the 
 Municipal Engineer would probably not consider himself natu- 
 rally drawn within the circle of the Brownes' amicable social 
 relations in consequence. Mrs. Brown would not call upon Mrs. 
 Municipal Engineer to assure her that they were well mended. 
 The spiritual official also discharges his duty as specified, and 
 one would have an equal hesitation, generally, in interpreting it 
 too broadly. And, indeed, with only the forms and papers relat- 
 ing to the nuptial, baptismal, and burial business of the capital 
 upon his hands the Calcutta cleric may claim to be overburdened. 
 
238 'I'lll-- SJAfPLK ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 His cemetery work alone would keep a hill padre from all sloth 
 and fatness. 
 
 Bicn cntendu, the missionary padres are different. The mis- 
 sionary padres are not official. I have no doubt the Government 
 would interfere to prevent their being eaten if the Bengali baboo 
 were carnivorous ; but he is not, he has no fleshy tastes ; he 
 prefers an inglorious diet of rice, fried sweetmeats and mango 
 chutney, to even a stalled chaplain, beside whom a missionary 
 padre is lean and tough. Moreover, the Bengali baboo was never 
 designed for the shedding of blood. So that the Government 
 has really no responsibilities toward the missionary padres. It 
 will educate and sanitate the baboo, but it leaves his salvation to 
 private enterprise, undertaking nothing on behalf of the entre- 
 prenfur>>. 
 
 The missionary padre receives his slender stipend from the 
 S. P. G. or from some obscure source in America. It is arranged 
 upon a scale to promote self-denial, and it is very successful. He 
 usually lives where the drains are thickest and the smells most 
 unmanageable, and when we of the broad river and the great 
 Maidan happen to hear of his address, we invariably ejaculate, 
 " AVhat a frightfully long way off ! " The ticca gharry is not an 
 expensive conveyance, but the missionary padre finds himself 
 better commended of his conscience if he walks and pays the 
 cost of his transportation in energy and vitality, which must be 
 lieavy in the hot weather and the rains. For the rest, he lives 
 largely upon second-class beef and his ideals, though they don't 
 kce]) very well either in this climate. Those who come out 
 celibates remain celibates if not by force of conviction by force 
 of circumstances. The expensively home-bred young ladies of 
 Anglo-India are not for missionaries! Whereas those who are 
 married are usually married to missionary ladies of similar size 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 239 
 
 and complexion labouring in the same cause. Covenanted chap- 
 lains, on the contrary, with the prospects I have mentioned, may 
 be yoked together with the debutante of any season. So there 
 is this further difference, that while the official padre's wife looks 
 like any other memsahib, the missionary padre's wife looks like 
 the missionary padre. I believe that chaplains sometimes ask 
 missionary padres to dinner " quietly," and always make a point 
 of giving them plenty to eat. And I remember meeting a mar- 
 ried pair of them at the Brownes', a Mr. and Mrs. Week. 
 Young Browne had known Mr. Week at school before his voca- 
 tion appeared to him. He was an undersized young man, high- 
 shouldered, very hollow-chested, and wore his long hair brushed 
 back from his high forehead, almost, one might say, behind his 
 ears. She wis a little white woman in a high dress, and wore 
 her locks, which were beginning to thin, in a tiny knot at the 
 very back of her crown. It was in the hot weather, and they 
 spoke appreciatively of the punkah. They had no punkah, it 
 seemed, either day or night ; but the little wife had been very 
 clever, and had made muslin bags for their heads and hands to 
 keep off the mosquitoes while they were asleep. We couldn't 
 ascertain that either of them had ever been really well since 
 they came out, and they said they simply made up their minds 
 to have sickness in the house during the whole of the rains. It 
 was either neuralgia or fever that season through, and neither 
 of them knew which was worst. I asked Mrs. Week inadvert- 
 ently if she had any children. She said " No," and there was 
 a silence which Helen explained afterwards by telling me that 
 Mrs. Week had lost her only baby from diphtheria, which they 
 attributed to a certain miasma that " came up through the floor." 
 Young Browne tried to make the conversation, but it invari- 
 ably turned to some aspect of the " work," and left him blun- 
 
240 THl^ SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 dering and embarrassed, with no resource except to beg Mrs. 
 Week to have another slice of the joint. They knew little of the 
 Red lload or the Eden Gardens, where the band plays in the 
 evening ; they talked of strange places — Khengua Puttoo's 
 Lane— Coolootollah. Mrs. Week told us that her great difficulty 
 in the zenanas lay in getting the ladies to talk. They liked her 
 to come, they were always pleased and polite, but they seemed 
 interested in so few things. When Mre. Week had asked them 
 if they were well, and how much of a family they had, and how 
 old the children were, there seemed to be no getting any further, 
 and she could not chew betel with them. Mrs. Week said she 
 had tried, but it was no use. She loved her zenana ladies, they 
 were dear things, and she knew they were attached to her, but 
 they were provoking, too, sometimes. One day last week she 
 had talked very seriously to them for nearly an hour, and they 
 had seemed most attentive. Just as she was going away one of 
 them — an old lady — approached her, with cast-down eyes and 
 great reluctance, wishing to speak. Mrs. Week encouraged her 
 to begin — was she at last to see some fruit of her visits ? And 
 the old lady had said " Eggi bat" would the memsahib please 
 to tell them why she put those shiny black hooks in her hair ? 
 
 Everybody laughed ; but Mrs. Week added gravely that she 
 had shown them the use of hairpins, and taken them a packet 
 next day, to their great delight. " One never can tell," said 
 Mrs. AVeek, " what these trifles may lead to." 
 
 And Mr. Week had been down in the Sunderbunds, far down 
 in the Sunderbunds where the miasmas are thickest, and where 
 he had slept every night for a week on a bench in the same 
 small room with two baboos and the ague. Mr. Week had found 
 the people very much interested in the joys of the future state ; 
 their attention only flagged, he said, when he referred to the 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 241 
 
 earthly preparation for them. Mr. Week was more emaciated 
 than clever. He spoke with an enthusiastic cockney twang of 
 his open-air meetings and discussions in Dhurrumtollah, of the 
 anxiety with which the baboos wished to discuss the most recon- 
 dite theological points with him. " Yes," said Mr. Perth Mac- 
 intyre, " the baboo is a great buck-wallah." * There is reason to 
 fear that the lay community of Calcutta is rather inclined to 
 consider the baboo's soul an unproved entity. 
 
 Returning to the senior and junior chaplains, it is delightful 
 to see the natural man under the Indian surplice. At home the 
 padre is an order, in India he is an individual. He is not sup- 
 pressed by parish opinion, he is rather encouraged to expand in 
 the smile of the Raj, which is above all and over all. He is 
 official, joyous, free, and he develops happily along the lines 
 which Nature designed for him before ever he turned aside into 
 the crooked paths of theology. It is seeing by these lights that 
 we say so often of an Indian padre, " What an excellent politi- 
 cian, broker, soldier, insurance agent he would have made ? " 
 
 Being now, as one might say, a sheep of some age and ex- 
 perience and standing in the community, I have agreeable 
 recollections of many shepherds. Most of them have long 
 since retired upon pension, while the flock is still wistfully 
 baaing over the bars toward the west. Doubtless the reunion 
 will not be long deferred. It will take place at Bournemouth, 
 and we will talk of the debased value of the rupee. For one, I 
 should like to see Padre Corbett again — he would be able to 
 express himself so forcibly on the subject of the rupee. Padre 
 Corbett, it is my certain belief, entered the Church because there 
 was no practicable alternative. He looked facts in the face in a 
 
 • Talker. 
 
242 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 busiiiess-likc manner, sliook his big square head over them, 
 smoked a farewell pipe to the sturdy beitses of his youth, and 
 went in for orders under the advice of a second cousin in the In- 
 dia Oflice. Then he came out to minister to the soul of Tommy 
 Atkins in Murshidabad, where it is very hot, and whether it 
 was the heat of Murshidabad, or the atmosphere of military 
 discipline there. Padre Corbett got into the way of ordering 
 T'ominy Atkins to come to be saved and not to answer back or 
 otherwise give trouble about it, that I remember him by. 
 Padre Corbett never lost the disciplinary air and ideas of 
 Murshidabad. As he marched up the aisle of peaceful St. 
 Ignatius in Calcutta behind his choir boys, there was a distinct 
 military swagger in the rear folds of his surplice, and he put us 
 through our devotional drill with the rapidity and precision of a 
 field-marshal. " Fours about ! Trot ! you miserable sinners ! " he 
 gave us to understand at the beginning of the Psalms, and the 
 main battalion of St. Ignatius in the pews, following the 
 directing flank under the organ came on from laudite to laudite 
 at a magnificent pace. The sermon was a tissue of directions and 
 a statement of consequences ; we were deployed out of church. 
 We bowed to it, it was quite befitting. We were not Tommy 
 Atkinses, but we were all officially subordinated to Padre Corbett 
 in a spiritual sense; in the case of an archangel from Simla 
 it would be quite the same, and he was perfectly entitled to 
 " have tlic honor to inform " us that we would do well to mend 
 our ways. This sense of constituted authority and the fitness of 
 things would naturally lead Padre Corbett to the chaste official 
 glories of the archdeaconry. Indeed, I'm not sure that it 
 didn't. 
 
 The I?ev. T. C. Peterson, too, once of St. Pancras. I wonder 
 in what rural corner of South Devonshire Padre Peterson to- 
 
244 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 day entertains Dorcas meetings with innocently amusing ac- 
 counts of domestic life in India ! He was always by way of being 
 amusing, was Padre Peterson ; he had a fine luminous smile, 
 which he invariably took with him when he went out to dine. 
 He was kindly and unostentatious, he lived simply and quietly, 
 giving a little of his money to the poor and putting a great deal 
 of it into the Bank of Bengal pending a desirable rate of 
 exchange. Padre Peterson was every inch a padre ; there was 
 nothing but ecclesiastical meekness in his surplice of a Sunday ; 
 and even his secular expression, notwithstanding the smile, spoke 
 of high ideals and an embarrassed compromise with week-day 
 occupations. He had a humble, hopeful way of clasping his 
 hands and sloping his shoulders and arranging his beard over 
 his long black cassock, especially when he sat at meat, which 
 reminded one irresistibly, though I admit the simile is worn, of an 
 oriel apostle in stained glass. He was seriously happy, and he 
 made old, old Anglo-Indian jokes with his luminous smile in a 
 manner which was peculiarly maddening to the enlarged liver 
 of Calcutta. He would have hesitated to employ coercion even 
 as a last resort with his flock of St. Pancras. He was no 
 shepherd with a cracking whip, he would go before rather, and 
 play upon the lute and dance and so beguile the sheep to follow. 
 His amiability was great ; he was known to " get on " with 
 everybody. Nobody knew precisely why Padre Peterson always 
 got everything he wanted, but it was obscurely connected with 
 the abounding charity for sinners in general, and official sinners 
 in high places in particular, which was so characteristic of him. 
 He could placate an angry Under-Secretary, and when an 
 Under-Secretary is angry India quakes and all the Lieutenant- 
 Governors go to bed. The finances in St. Pancras were never in 
 better hands. St. Pancras had a new organ, a new font, and 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 245 
 
 new beams and rafters all through in Padre Peterson's day. 
 If new graves and gravestones had been as urgently required 
 then as they are now, Padre Peterson would have found the 
 money and had the thing done at the lowest contract rates. A 
 remarkable man in many ways, and now that I think of it, he's 
 dead, quite a long time ago. 
 
 Others I seem to remember best in some secular connection. 
 Padre Jenkins, whose pony won the Gymkhana Cup at the 
 Barrackpore races of I can't remember just what year ; Padre 
 MacWhirter, who used to say very truly that he made golf what 
 it was in Alipore ; Padre Lewis- Lewis, who had for five years 
 the most charming manners and the best choir in Calcutta. But 
 there is no reason why I should count them over to you. Long 
 since they have disappeared, most of them, with their little flat 
 black felt hats on their heads and their tennis racquets in 
 their hand, into the fogs of that northerly isle whither in 
 the end we all go and whence none of us return. This chap- 
 ter is really more of an apology to Mrs. Plovtree than anything 
 else. 
 
 Mrs. Plovtree will be grieved, however, and justly so, that I 
 have not said more about the Indian bishop. The explanation 
 is that I have never known a bishop very well, as I have never 
 known a Viceroy very well. Even at my own dinner-table I 
 have never permitted myself to observe a bishop beyond the 
 point of admiration. Some day in Bournemouth, however, I 
 will write a thoughtful essay on the points of similarity, so far as 
 I have noticed them, between Indian bishops and other kinds, 
 and sent it to the Guardian., where Mrs. Plovtree will be sure to 
 see it ; but it is not considered wise in India to write critical esti- 
 mates of bishops or of any other heads of departments until after 
 one retires. I might just say that the bishop, like the Viceroy, 
 
246 TIfl: SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 is a foreign plenipotentiary. He does not rise from the withered 
 ranks of the Indian service, but, like the Viceroy, comes out 
 fresh from the culling hand of the Secretary of State. He di- 
 vides with the Viceroy certain Divine rights, divinest of which is 
 the right not to care a parrot's eyelash for anybody. In con- 
 sequence the bishop holds his venerable head high and dines 
 where lie pleases. Certain of the Raj-enthralled of Calcutta find 
 the independence of a bishop offensive. In me it provokes a 
 lively enthusiasm. I consider the episcopal attitude even more 
 valuable than the episcopal blessing, even more interesting than 
 the episcopal discourse. And I agree with Mrs. Browne, who 
 thinks it must be lovely to be a bishop. 
 
 But neither for our spiritual pastors and masters are times 
 what they were. There was a day, now faded, with all the rol- 
 licking romance of John Company Bahadur, when two honest 
 butts of golden crown madeira a year helped to alleviate the sor- 
 rows of exile for King George's chaplains in India — the present 
 Secretary of State would probably see them teetotallers first ! 
 The mails come out in a fortnight, the competition-wallah over- 
 runs the land, the Rajah studies French. India is not what it 
 was, and another of the differences is that the padres buy their 
 own madeira. 
 
 I saw a priest of Kali, wrapped in his yellow chudder, sit 
 hugging his knees under a mahogany tree to-night beside the 
 broad road where the carriages passed rolling into the " cow's 
 dust " of the twilight. A brother cleric of the Raj went by in 
 his victoria with his wife and children, and the yellow robed 
 one watched them out of sight. There was neither hatred nor 
 malice nor any evil thing in his gaze, only perhaps a subtle ap- 
 preciation of the advantages of the other cloth. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 247 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 HAVING suited themselves with the furnished house of a 
 junior civilian, who had suddenly decamped before heat 
 apoplexy and gastric complications, the Brownes settled down, 
 if the expression is not too comfortable, to wait for the rains. I 
 should dislike any misunderstanding on the point of comfort. It 
 is not too much to say that the word is not understood in Cal- 
 cutta. We talk of aram here instead, which means a drugged 
 ease with heavy dreams. 
 
 The Brownes stored their furniture in the godowns of the 
 other man, and had aram nevertheless in contemplating his, 
 which was ugly. Aram is cheap — the price of a cup of cofifee 
 and a long veranda chair — and seductive ; but I was annoyed 
 with Helen Browne for accepting the other people's furniture so 
 pacifically. It seemed to me that she was becoming acclimatised 
 too soon. There is a point in that process where a bom British 
 gentlewoman will live without antimacassars and sleep on a char- 
 poy ; but I do not wish to be considered a morbid modern ana- 
 lyst, so this need not be enlarged upon. The other people's fur- 
 niture, moreover, would have been entertaining if it could have 
 talked", to so many people it had been let and sub-let and re-let 
 and leased, always with the house, since it left Bow Bazar, where 
 it was originally bought outright by an extravagant person sec- 
 ondhand. It had never belonged to anybody since : it had al- 
 ways been a mere convenience — a means of enabling people to 
 
248 77//S SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 give dinner parties. No one had ever regarded it, or mended it, 
 or kept it any cleaner than decency required. It was tarnished, 
 cracked, frayed, soiled ; it included tables with white marble tops, 
 and bad chromo-lithographs and dusty bunches of dried grasses 
 which nobody had ever taken the trouble to eliminate. In the 
 cold weather certain people had paid five hundred rupees a month 
 for the privilege of living with it ; in the hot weather certain 
 other people had lived with it for nothing, to keep the white ants 
 out. Withal it was typical Calcutta furniture — a typical part of 
 the absurd pretence that white people make of being at home in 
 this place. 
 
 The rains are due, as all Calcutta knows, on June the fif- 
 teenth. That is the limit of our time of pure grilling. We 
 know it is written upon our foreheads that we must turn and 
 writhe and bite the dust in the pain of the sun to that day ; but 
 on that day we expect that the clouds will come up out of the 
 east and out of the west and clothe the brazen sky, and interpose 
 between us and the dolour of India. It is what we call a pucca 
 bandobust, arranged through the Meteorological Department, 
 part of the bargain of exile with the Secretary of State. For so 
 many years of active service we get so much pension and so much 
 furlough, and we are to be rained upon every fifteenth of June 
 for three months. 
 
 Therefore when the sun arose upon the fifteenth of June of 
 this current year of the Brownes, and marched across the sky 
 without winking, the Brownes were naturally and properly ag- 
 grieved together with the Bengal Government and all Calcutta. 
 When one has defined the very point and limit of one's endur- 
 ance, it is inconsistent and undignified to go on enduring. The 
 ticca-gharry liorses were so much of this opinion that they re- 
 fused too, and dropped down dead all up and down Chowring- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 249 
 
 hee, as a preferable alternative — those that were driven. The 
 more prudent gharry wallah drew up in the reeking shade of 
 some great building — it was cooler in the streets than in the 
 stables — and slept profoundly, refusing all fares till sundown; 
 and the broker-sahib, who spends his life upon wheels, changed 
 horses four times a day. On the night of the fifteenth of June 
 young Browne got up stealthily and deftly turned a jug of water 
 over a hole in the floor through which a punkah rope hung inert. 
 There was a sudden scramble below, the punkah rope sawed con- 
 vulsively, and young Browne, with a ghastly smile, put out the 
 glimmering candle and went back to bed. It is a popular form 
 of discipline in Calcutta, but as applied by young Browne it bore 
 strikingly upon the weather. 
 
 The Maidan cracked and split, and even the broad leaves of 
 the teak-wood tree hung limp and grey under the powder of the 
 road. The crows had nothing to say all day, but hopped about 
 with their beaks ridiculously agape, while the sun blazed down 
 through the flat roofs of Calcutta, and made Mrs. Browne's chairs 
 and tables so hot that it was a surprise to touch them. At the 
 same time it drew up the evil soul of the odour of the bazars, 
 the " hurra krab * smell," as Kipling calls the chief characteristic 
 of Calcutta, and cast it abroad in all the city. The Brownes 
 squandered sums upon Condy's fluid wholly disproportionate 
 with their income vainly, for nothing yet known to pharmacy 
 can cope with that smell. It grew hotter and hotter, and some- 
 times the south wind failed, and then the smell became several 
 smells, special, local, individual, though the frangi-panni tree 
 leaned blooming on its spiky elbows over every garden wall, and 
 made them all sweet and langorous and interesting and truly 
 
 • Very bad. 
 17 
 
2SO 
 
 TIIK SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIUH. 
 
 Eiistorn. The smells were not of great consequence; one gets 
 accustomed to the smells as one gets accustomed to the curries. 
 Mrs. Browne declared, too, tiiat one could put up with the 
 weather, and the cholera, and sunstroke — one didn't particularly 
 mind even having one's house turned inside out occasionally by 
 a dust-storm. The really trying things — the things one hadn't 
 reckoned with beforehand — were that one's envelope flaps should 
 all stick down ; that the pages of one's books should curl up ; 
 that the towel should sting one's face ; that the punkah should 
 stop in the night. Even under these greater afflictions we are 
 uncomplaining up to the fifteenth of June. But the sixteenth 
 passed over these Brownes, and the seventeenth and the eight- 
 eenth, and many days moi'e, and still the dusty sun went down 
 in the smoky west, and against the great red glow of his setting 
 the naked beesties ran like black gnomes with their goat skins 
 on tlieir hips, slaking the roads that were red too. . . . And a 
 mile and a league all round about the city the ryot folded his 
 hands before his baking rice-fields, not knowing that men wrote 
 daily in the EmiUxhmnn about him, and wondered in what way 
 he had otfended Lakshmi that for so many days she should with- 
 hold the rain ! 
 
 A shutter banged downstairs at three o'clock in the morning, 
 there came a cool swishing and a subsiding among the fronds of 
 the date-palms, tlie gold mohur trees raised their heads and lis- 
 tened — it was coming. Far down in the Sunderbunds it was 
 raining, and with great sweeps and curves it rained further and 
 further inland. Calcutta turned more easily upon its pillow, 
 and slept sound and late, the punkah-wallah slept also with 
 impunity, and when the city awoke in the morning the rains 
 had come. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 351 
 
 Mrs. Browne professed to find a great difference and novelty 
 in the rains of India. She declared that they came from lower 
 down, that they were whiter and greyer, that they didn't refresh 
 the earth, but beat it and sat upon it, that there was quite an 
 extraordinary quality of moisture about them. I believe every 
 new-comer makes similar observations. To the rest of us, it has 
 been obvious for so many years that during July, August, and 
 September a considerable amount of water descends upon Ben- 
 gal, that we have ceased to make original remarks about it. 
 But Bengal certainly gets very wet, and Mrs. Browne's observa- 
 tions as the time went on, and the floods abated not, were en- 
 tirely excusable. Every day it rained, more. in the morning 
 and less in the evening, or less in the morning and more in the 
 evening. The garden became a jungle, the English flowers that 
 had died a puzzled death in May, sent up hysterical long shoots ; 
 one could see the grass growing. An adjutant sailed in from 
 the mofussil * marshes, trailing his legs behind him, to look for 
 frogs on the Maidan. He stood on one leg to look for them, 
 upon the bronze head of Lord Lawrence, and his appearance, 
 with his chin^buried thoughtfully in his bosom, was much more 
 sapient than that of the administrator underneath. In the 
 evening he flew back again, and then the frogs were at liberty 
 to express their opinion of him. They spoke strongly, as was 
 natural ; one of them, in the tank of Ram Dass Hurrymunny, 
 barked like a pariah. The crickets did their concerted best to 
 outvoice the frogs, the cicadas reinforced the crickets, and all the 
 other shrill-voiced things that could sing in the dark, sang in 
 such a wheezy heaving eternal monotone, that Mr. and Mrs. 
 Browne, sitting damply behind their open windows, were quite 
 reduced to silence. 
 
 • Country. 
 
252 
 
 Tl/E SIMPLE ADVENrUKES OE A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 They were planting tlic little green rice shoots in the mofus- 
 sil, they wanted it all and more ; but Mrs. Browne in Calcutta 
 
 was obliged to look in the 
 newspapers for the assur- 
 ance that she ought to be 
 thankful for quite so much 
 rain. It seemed to Mrs. 
 Browne that all her rela- 
 tions with the world were 
 being submerged, and that 
 she personally was becom- 
 ing too wet. She found it 
 an unnatural and unpleas- 
 ant thing that furniture 
 should perspire ; and when 
 in addition to the roof leak- 
 ing, and the matting rot- 
 ting, and the cockroaches 
 multiplying, the yellow sun- 
 set and the blue sea of her 
 nicest water-colour mixed 
 themselves up in a terrible 
 and crumpled and impossi- 
 ble manner, Mrs. Browne 
 added tears to the general 
 moisture, and thought the 
 very fabric of her exist- 
 ence was dissolving. Be- 
 sides that, the Rev. Peachey 
 
 HE STOOD UPON ONE LEO ON THE HKONZE ^^'^^ Unglued OUt of hls 
 
 HEAD OF LORD LAWRENCE. bluc plush frame, and Aunt 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 253 
 
 Plovtree developed yellow spots. Moreover, a green mould 
 sprouted in the soles of their shoes, fresh every morning, 
 and Helen's evening dresses and gloves " went," as she ex- 
 pressed it in writing to Canbury, "all sorts of colours." To 
 pass over the fact that centipedes began to run in their play- 
 ful zigzag way across the floor, and young Browne killed a 
 snake in the veranda, which he was not indisposed to be- 
 lieve a cobra. Helen thought there was no room for doubt 
 about it, and, as a matter of fact, one hardly ever hears of a 
 snake being killed in Calcutta that is not a cobra. The harm- 
 less varieties have a remarkable facility in keeping out of the 
 way. 
 
 All over India it was raining, coming down hard on the raar- 
 ginless plains, on the great slopes of the Himalayas, on the great 
 cities where the bunnias hive gold in the bazars, on the little 
 thatched brown villages where the people live and die like harm- 
 less animals, with the memory that once or twice they have had 
 enough to eat. 
 
 But more than anywhere it seemed to rain in Calcutta, where 
 only about siic feet of solid ground intervenes between the peo- 
 ple and the bottomless miry pit. So that it is telling the literal 
 truth to say that Calcutta was soaked through and through, 
 dripping, reeking, pestilentially drunken with water. Infinite 
 deeps below, infinite sources above, between the two a few 
 macadamised roads, and an inadequate supply of gutters and 
 drain-pipes. And yet it is not recorded that at any time Cal- 
 cutta has succumbed to the rains, and sunk swamped into her- 
 self. 
 
 Nevertheless, at first it was a few degrees cooler, and, to 
 borrow a phrase from the press, there was a slight increase in 
 social activity. People began to give dinners. There are peo- 
 
254 
 
 THE SIMri.K ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 pie in Bengal whom all the manifestations of Providence and 
 of Nature together would not prevent giving dinners. They 
 find it agreeable to feel the warming, drying influence of the 
 various forms of carbon prepared by the khansamah in com- 
 pany. They talk of appointments, promotions, and the Lieu- 
 tenant-Governor, and they chatter as if the ague were already 
 upon them, about how much more sociable Calcutta is in the 
 rains than in the cold weather — you get to know people so 
 much better. 
 
 Then there were days when it djdn't rain ; it shone. Early 
 in the morning it shone with a vague and watery brilliance in 
 the sky, and a curious white gleam over the earth. Later the 
 shining was hot, and straight, and strong, and then Calcutta 
 steamed, and one saw a parboiled baboo at every corner. Later 
 still the sun went down over the river, and then one saw hun- 
 dreds of parboiled baboos everywhere ; and on the Maidan, driv- 
 ing about in carriages, a few score of the very whitest people on 
 earth. The Brownes were as white as anybody. Privately Helen 
 thought her complexion much more interesting than it used to 
 be, and coveted a barouche to lean back and look languidly 
 bored in like the few burra memsahibs that devotedly stayed in 
 Calcutta. It was impossible to be languid in a tum-tum, which 
 is an uncompromising vehicle, not constructed to encourage 
 poses. 
 
 Behind tlieir stubby little country-bred, Mr. and Mrs. Browne, 
 taking the air, saw a Calcutta that never revealed itself to any 
 globe-trotter, and which you will not find described in the 
 printed experiences in cloth, at 7s. 6d., of Jonas Batcham, for 
 instance. They saw the broad Maidan laid out in lakes and 
 rivers, with a theatrical sun, set in purple and gold, dissolving 
 in each of them, and all the spaces between a marvellous lush- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADl-ENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 255 
 
 green, where the horses sank to their fetlocks. Floating over it 
 they saw a gossamer white pall tliat consisted of water and bacilli 
 in a state of suspension, and hung abreast of the people. Cal- 
 cutta has a saving grace, known to her Anglo-Indians as the 
 Casuerina-avenue. You can lose your soul in the infinite filmy 
 shadows of the marching trees. Even the Indian sunlight, fil- 
 tering through their soft dead green, becomes a delicate thing. 
 The Brownes saw this ranged before them, misty and wonderful 
 in the evening, hiding the last of the glow in its plumy nearer 
 branches, and piling up soft clouds of dusk as it stretched further 
 away. They saw the fort and all the pillared fa9ade of Chow- 
 ringhee, with its monuments and palaces and praying places yel- 
 low against a more and more empurpled sky, and the grey spire 
 of the cathedral rising in its green corner of the Maidan behind 
 a cluster of trees and a brimming lake, just as it might do in 
 England. Calcutta sits close beside her river, and there are no 
 miles of teeming wharfage between her and it. The great ships 
 lie with their noses against the bank, and the level road runs 
 beside them. Thus, by a wise provision of the municipality, 
 people who live in Calcutta are able to drive down every 
 day and see for themselves that it is possible to get away. 
 For this reason the Brownes loved the close ships and all the 
 populous river, lying under the wraith of the rains — the faint 
 outlines of the crowding masts, with the sunset sky behind 
 them as far as they could see; the majestic grey ghost of the 
 old East Indiamen at anchor, with her " state cabin " full of 
 dates from Mocha ; slipping towards them solitarily out of the 
 unreality the dipping red-brown three-cornered sail of an Arab 
 dhow. Eloquently always the river breathed of exile and of 
 home-going, sometimes with her own proper voice, sometimes 
 with the tongue of a second mate from Portsmouth, or the 
 
256 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 twang of a uegro cook from Savannah, full of airs and super- 
 ciliousness. It depended on where you lived yourself when you 
 were at home. 
 
 On a corner of the Maidan a number of mad young English- 
 men played football ; in another place there was a lively sale of 
 goats for sacrifice. An erection of red and gold paper, like a 
 Chinese pagoda, still wobbled about the biggest tank in propitia- 
 tion of its god. Calcutta emptied itself on its wide green acres. 
 The Brownes met a smart turnout with a thoroughbred, driven 
 at a spanking pace by a pucca Chinaman, who leant forward 
 nonchalantly with his pigtail streaming out behind. They met a 
 fiery pair in a mail-phaeton, with two anxious syces behind, and 
 driving on the high seat a small, bold, brown lady, all in green 
 and pink gauze, tinselled, bareheaded, wearing her iniquity as 
 lightly as a feather. They met a big roomy barouche, with two 
 servants on the box, two more behind, and an ayah inside, all in 
 attendance upon a tiny white mite of a belati baby. A small 
 British terrier met them, regarded them, sniffed them, wagged 
 his tail and followed them. They were not personal friends of 
 his, but they were sahibs, and his countrymen ; they would un- 
 derstand his lost estate, a sahib's dog ; he could confide himself 
 to their good feeling and hospitality pending explanations. And 
 so the stubby little country-bred trotted down the river road till 
 he came to a place where the road widened — where, beside an 
 octagonal erection with a roof, a great many other stubby little 
 country-breds and slender Arabs and big Walers stood very 
 quietly between their shafts with drooping heads ; and here he 
 turned, almost of his own accord, and trotted in amongst them 
 until he found comfortable standing room, when he stopped. 
 This was Calcutta's place of pleasure. Behind the octagonal 
 erection, where presently tlip band would play, stretched those 
 
THE SlAfPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 257 
 
 Eden Gardens which the photographers reproduce so effectively, 
 and the globe-trotters buy so abundantly. Here we have the 
 elements of the most romantic municipal scenery — tall palms 
 and red poinsettias, a fine winding artificial lake with a beautiful 
 arched artificial bridge, realistic artificial rocks cropping out of 
 the griiss, and a genuine Burmese pagoda of white chunam, 
 specially constructed for the gardens, in the middle of it all. 
 The pagoda runs up into a spire, or a lightning conductor, or 
 something of that nature ; and on the top of this a frolicsome 
 British tar once placed an empty soda-water bottle upside down. 
 I think the native municipal commissioners regard this with 
 some pride as a flnial ornament ; certainly nobody has ever taken 
 it down. And that is as well, for the soda-water bottle gives, 
 one might say, the key to the design of the place, which might 
 otherwise puzzle the stranger. I should not omit to say that the 
 gardens are illuminated with electric light, as such gardens of 
 course should be. The people walk up and down under the 
 electric light, looking at each other ; the young men go in among 
 the carriages and talk to the ladies they know. Calcutta makes 
 a violent attempt to distract itself. On this particular evening 
 the Brownes also came to distract themselves — it becomes a habit 
 in time. 
 
 The electric light sputtered and fizzled over the crowd of 
 standing carriages. Helen thought it darkened the black circle 
 round young Browne's eyes ; and he asked his wife apprehend- 
 ingly if she were feeling chilled or anything — she looked so 
 white. The damp, warm air clung to their faces. A man in a 
 ticca gharry said to a man in the road that it was damned 
 muggy. Several people in the carriages near heard him say 
 this — it was so quiet. The crowd of carriage-tops gleamed 
 motionless, the horses stood dejectedly on three legs, and under 
 
258 I'll-' SIMPLE ADl'EXTUA'ES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 every liorse's nose a cotton-clad syce " bitoed " * on the ground 
 with liis chin on his knees. A peddling native thrust up a 
 round Hat bouquet of pink and white roses that smelt of " Jockey 
 Club." " ,lao ! " said young Browne. 
 
 Presently the band played a gay and lightsome air, very sad 
 to hear, from an opera long superseded at home, and with the 
 playing of the band tiie general depression seemed to thicken and 
 close down. There are people in Calcutta who, even for distrac- 
 tion's sake, cannot stand selections from the Mikado so near the 
 end of the century. One by one the carriages began to roll away. 
 Perhaps along the river road there would be a breath of air. 
 The band played a medley, all sorts of things, and then " The 
 Land o' the Leal." I saw the MacTaggarts drive off. "Syce!" 
 said Mr. Pcrtli Macintyre ; " buftie jnllao ! Our ko!"\ . . . The 
 last of the pink flush faded out of the sky behind the ships. 
 The air grew sodden and chill, a little raw breeze crept in from 
 the east. Young Browne took off his hat to " God Save the 
 Queen," and then " I think we ought to hurry him a little," said 
 Helen, referring to the stubby little country-bred. " It's going 
 to rain." 
 
 It was in tins month of August, I remember, that we lost a 
 partner of the firm, in a sad though not unusual way. He died, 
 as a matter of fact, from a little Calcutta mud which rubbed 
 itself into his elbow one afternoon when he was thrown out of 
 his brougham. Tetanus the doctors called it, and they said 
 he would have had a better chance if he had been thrown 
 out of his brougham at another time of year. He was 
 buried, poor man, in seven inches of water; and Mr. Perth 
 
 * Sat on his heels. 
 
 f " Light the (carriage) lamps. To the house 1 " 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 259 
 
 Macintyre had two months' fever after attending the dripping 
 funeral. 
 
 It would be an affectation to write about Mrs. Browne's ex- 
 periences and to omit a chapter on at least one phase of the 
 weather; but I could have told you in the beginning that it 
 would not be amusing. 
 
26o THF. SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHJB. 
 
 rilAPTER XXIII. 
 
 F you have not entirely forgotten 
 geography you will know 
 that against the 
 eternal gold and 
 blue of the In- 
 dian sky, across 
 and across the 
 middle of the 
 land, there runs 
 unevenly a high 
 white line. You 
 will remember it 
 better, perhaps, 
 as " the trend of 
 the Himalayas," and it may have a latter-day association in 
 your mind with imprudent subalterns and middle-aged ladies 
 who consume a great many chocolates and call each other 
 "mv dear gii'l." Out 'here we never forget it for a single in- 
 stant; it survives the boundaries of our native counties, and 
 replaces in our imaginations every height in Europe. We call 
 it "The Snows," and the name is as little presumptuous as 
 any other. It is very far off, and the more like heaven for 
 that reason ; moreover, that way Simla lies, which is heaven's 
 outer portal, full of knights and angels. They are distant and 
 
 M'.-^~ii^i'i 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 261 
 
 imperturbable, the Snows, we can only gaze and wonder and 
 descend again to earth ; we have only the globe-trotter's word 
 for it that they do not belong to another world. It is the brown 
 outer ranges that we climb, the heaving brown outer ranges 
 that stand between the Holy of Holies and the eye of the pro- 
 fane, the unbeliever, the alien. Because these brown outer 
 ranges are such very big mountains it is our pleasure to call 
 them " The Hills " — if you talked of spending three months in 
 the mountains it would not be clear that you didn't mean Switz- 
 erland. Here we perch our hill-stations, here once in every 
 year or two we grow fat and well-liking, here on the brink of a 
 literal precipice the callow subalterns and the hlase married 
 ladies flirt. 
 
 It was by the merest accident, which I helped to precipitate, 
 that the Brownes went to the Hills in September. A planter 
 in the Doon * had committed suicide — acute dyspepsia — whose 
 business was in our hands, and somebody had to go to see 
 about it. The junior partner wanted to go, but the junior 
 partner had just come out from England weighing fourteen 
 stone, and I got Mr. Perth Macintyre to persuade him that it 
 was absolutely necessary to spend two months of the rains in 
 Calcutta if he wished to recover his figure. Thus to the 
 Brownes also came the hope of the clean breath of the Hills. 
 I went myself down to Howrah station after dinner to add my 
 blessing to their luggage, but the train was gone. A fat baboo 
 of Bengal told me so, with a wreath of marigolds round his 
 neck. I thought, looking at him, how glad they must be to 
 have turned their faces toward a country where men eat millet 
 and chupatties,f and are lean. 
 
 * Valley. f Native cakes of flour and water. 
 
262 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEAf SAHIB. 
 
 Kasi was there too. Kasi travelled " intermediate," that is 
 to say sitting on the floor, quite comfortably, in a wooden box, 
 iron-barred down the sides to let in light and air. Before the 
 train started Kasi had unrolled all the rugs and pillows, had 
 made ready soap and towels and brushes, and had left the sahib 
 who had been very troublesome all day, and the memsahib who 
 had already unjustly accused him of having forgotten seven 
 things, with nothing to do but to go to bed and to rise again. 
 1'hen he returned to his own place, where his own kind buzzed 
 about him with flat baskets of sticky brown balls and fried 
 sweetmeats to sell. Kasi regarded them indifEerently and bought 
 nothing ; the kinship was only skin-deep, the lime-marks upon 
 their foreheads were different, he could not eat from their 
 hands. Secretly, when the shadow of none fell upon it he took 
 from a little brass box his betel solace, then ais the train whis- 
 tled he unwound the ten yards of his turban, wrapped his 
 red cliuddar* about him, and disposed himself on the floor 
 to dream of the profit there might be when the sahib took a 
 journey. 
 
 In the morning a dry coolness blew in at the windows. It 
 had been raining, it would rain again ; but here in Behar the 
 earth had been needy, and her face had grown lovely with the 
 slaking of her great thirst. The rain had washed the air and the 
 sun had dried it ; to these dwellers in Calcutta it seemed that 
 they were already on the heights. All night long they had been 
 going through tlie rice country, where the pale green shoots stood 
 knee-deep in the glistening water for miles around, now they 
 rolled througli a land where the crops waved tall with sprouting 
 ears — maize and millet and wheat. The little villages were almost 
 
 * Cloth worn over shoulders. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 263 
 
 lost in them. High over the grain the ryot's sons kept watch and 
 ward against the thieving parrots in little open thatched houses 
 stuck on the top of a long pole or in the fork of a dead tree. 
 They were perched up there to be safe from the leopard's spring ; 
 the leopards like a maize-fed ryot's son. They could give warn- 
 ing, too, if the zemindar's servant came that way, to ask an extra 
 tax for the wedding expenses of his master's second daughter. 
 The little villages seemed of kindly disposition ; here was a pre- 
 carious crop that wanted shade, and upon this field every man 
 had set his bed, one beside another, so that it was covered. They 
 were at ease, the little villages, the crops throve, there would be 
 enough for the zemindar if they pretended to be very poor ; no- 
 body would starve that year, and perhaps Malita or Alanga would 
 add a new silver bangle to her wedding portion. 
 
 The Brownes were too utterly poor for the railway restaurants. 
 They brought a tiffin-basket. Young Browne designed the tiffin- 
 basket, a Chinaman designed the price. It was as big as a small 
 trunk ; it would just go under the seat. There was room in it 
 for everything that has yet been thought of in connection with a 
 civilized repast. I believe Mrs. Browne is now using it as a china 
 and linen closet. It held ten rupees' worth of tinned stores 
 among other things, and a kerosene stove. Mrs. Browne filled 
 the rest of it up economically with bread and butter and cold 
 meat, and young Browne added as an after-thought half-a-dozen 
 pints of champagne. It was a modest Anglo-Indian tiffin-basket, 
 and they drew it forth with much joy in the morning, having the 
 carriage to themselves. It was seven o'clock and the train had 
 stopped. Servants were running about the platform with cups 
 of tea and slices of toast for the cliota hazri of people who hadn't 
 brought tiffin-baskets. " Just for curiosity, George," said Helen, 
 " ask how much they are charging ? " 
 
264 'J'"'-- SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 Young Browne, in the unconveutionality of his pyjamas,* 
 leaned out of the window. " Hi, yen ! " he called, " dom 
 kitna ? " t 
 
 " Aht anna, sahib ! " 
 
 " Good gracious ! " cried Mrs. Browne. " Eight annas for a 
 cup of tea and two bits of toast ! The tiffin-basket is a saving, 
 dear!" 
 
 " Oh, it is ! " responded Mr. Browne, " for the other meals. 
 But now that I think of it, I want my chota hazri now, 
 don't you? Ili-ups kitmutgar! lao chota hazri and jeldi 
 karo!" J 
 
 "One could so easily boil the water, dear," objected Mrs. 
 Browne. 
 
 " For the other meals. But we can't cook our chota hazri. 
 Everything's at the bottom. We shouldn't get it ready till mid- 
 night. The fact is," said young Browne decisively, " we ought 
 to have brought a kitmutgar — that would have been a saving if 
 you like ! " And as the steaming tea came through the window 
 and the price went out, " I don't think it's so very much," said 
 young Browne. 
 
 That is the way they began. The precise number and extent 
 of the economies effected by the tiffin-basket will never be re- 
 corded, but I believe they drank the champagne. 
 
 I doubt either your information or your gratification at being 
 told that they changed at Mogulsarai. Mogulsarai is on the 
 map, but you will not find it there because you will not look — 
 which I do not say censoriously ; it is quite enough that Anglo- 
 Indians should be obliged to remember the names of such places. 
 They are curiously profane, with their crowded little roofs and 
 
 • Night garments worn by men in India. f " Price, how much!" 
 
 X "Bring a little breakfast, and be quick about it I " 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 265 
 
 their mosque-towers ; and they are very hot. The Brownes' train 
 lay on a side-track baking, as they entered it, four coolies bearing 
 the tiffin-basket. The place grilled almost silently, black and 
 white and grey with converging railway lines encumbered with 
 trucks ; an engine moved about snorting painfully, and nearly 
 naked men ran in and out under the carriages smiting the wheels. 
 They rolled out of the place and on for an hour, then over the 
 bridge of the Ganges and past some old fortifications, and out of 
 the windows they saw Benares, Benares the impressively filthy, 
 trailing her skirts and her sins in her great sacred river, but 
 fair, very fair indeed, with the morning sunlight on the faces 
 of all her gods, and the morning sky behind the minarets of 
 Aurungzebe. 
 
 It was the middle of the night before they reached Luck- 
 now, where they awoke thirsty. A wide, lighted, orderly sta- 
 tion platform, railway guards walking about in white duck 
 and gold buttons, a single dissipated-looking little subaltern 
 promenading with his hands in his pockets. There was no 
 ice, and young Browne sleepily abused the first railway official 
 that passed the window. " A big station like this, and the ice 
 allowed to run out in such weather! The thing ought to be 
 reported." 
 
 ." It's in weather the like o' this, sir, that the ice diz run out," 
 suggested the guard. " Tickets, sir ! " 
 
 Lucknow, with her tragedy still upon her lips, her rugged 
 walls still gaping in the white moonlight up yonder, her graves 
 still tenderly remembered — and the Brownes' bitter complaint 
 of Lucknow was that they found no ice there! Ah, little 
 Brownes! I write this of you more in sorrow than in anger; 
 for I know a soldier's wife whose husband's name you might 
 have read graven on a Lucknow tablet in the moonlight that 
 18 
 
266 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIIIB. 
 
 night, and when I remember all that she has told me, I find it 
 grievous tliat you should even have been aware that there was 
 no ice in Luck now ! 
 
 lu tlie morning they were rolling through a lightsome 
 country, all gay fields and gravelly river-beds, with billows of 
 sunlit air coming in at the windows, an hour from Saharanpora. 
 A blue hill stood like a cloud on the edge of the horizon, the 
 Brownes descried it simultaneously and laughed aloud together. 
 It was so long since they had seen any elevation greater than 
 their own roof, or a palm-tree, or an umbrella. They got out at 
 Saharanporc, and Kasi got out at Saharanpore, and the bundles 
 and the boxes and the bags got out at Saharanpore. They were 
 all as dirty as they could possibly be, but the people who did not 
 get out at Saharanpore looked at them enviously, for they had the 
 prospect of being dirtier still. Arrived at the place of the ddk- 
 bungalow, and the solace of unlimited ablutions, Mrs. Browne 
 could not imagine in what respect she had ever found a ddk- 
 bungalow wanting. Could anything be more delightful than 
 that they should have it entirely to themselves ! Between her 
 first di'ik-bungalow and this one Mrs. Browne had made steps 
 towards the solitary Calcutta ideal. On this occasion she pulled 
 down all the chicks,* and told the solitary box wallah who had 
 outspread his wares in the veranda against her arrival to " Jao, 
 jeldi!" 
 
 Here they tarried till the following day, wlien the blowing of 
 a trumpet aroused them at what they considered an excessively 
 early hour of the morning. It was their trumpet; they had 
 bought the exclusive right to it for twelve hours. It belonged to 
 the ddk-gharry that was to take them from Saharanpore to Dehra, 
 
 • Venetian blinds. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 267 
 
 "a distance," as any gnide-book will tell you, of "forty- two 
 miles." If you could see a ddk-gharry you would probably 
 inquire with Mrs. Browne if there wasn't any other way of 
 going. There is no other way of going. There are large num- 
 bers of places in India to which there is no other way of going. 
 And if one had answered you thus, yon would have said that if 
 you had known that you wouldn't have come. Mrs. Browne 
 said that when she saw the travelling-carriage of this Orient 
 land of dreamy luxury, but she didn't particularly mean it, and 
 neither would you. 
 
 In appearance the Browne's ddk-gharry was a cross between 
 a sun-bonnet and a blue hearse. This may be a little difficult to 
 imagine ; but I don't appeal to your imagination, I state facts. 
 It was the shape of a hearse, and you were supposed to lie down 
 in it, which completed the suggestion. To counteract the 
 gloomy apprehension of this idea, it was painted blue inside 
 and out — distinctly a foncee blue. This superficial cheerfulness 
 was accentuated by shutters in the back and sliding doors at the 
 sides, and the whole thing was trimmed from the roof with 
 canvas wings. The top would take as much luggage as the hold 
 of a ship — a small ship. Inside there was nothing at all, and a 
 place to put your feet. Kasi condoned this austerity with rugs 
 and pillows, and took his seat beside the driver, with whom he 
 conversed as aCFably as his superior social position would admit. 
 The two Brownes were carefully extended inside like modern 
 mummies ; four native persons of ambiguous appearance and a 
 persuasive odour fastened themselves on behind. The driver 
 cracked his whip, and the two meek brown spotted down-trod- 
 den horses stood promptly upon their hind legs pawing the air. 
 They came down in time, and then they began to back into the 
 ddk-bungalow dining-room. Dissuaded from this they walked 
 
268 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEAfSAIIIS. 
 
 across the road with the intention of putting themselves in the 
 ditch ; itnd finally, after a terrific expenditure of language on 
 the part of the driver, they broke into a gallop, which brought 
 each of the recumbent Brownes inside to a right angle by the 
 action of some mechanical principle containing a very large ele- 
 ment of alarm. This was not at all a remarkable demonstration. 
 It is the invincible dustur of every animal in the ddk-gharry 
 business, and is perfectly understood, locally. The animals at- 
 tached to the Brownes galloped their three miles and arrived 
 reeking at the next dak-stable without another thought of any- 
 thing but their business. In the meantime the local under- 
 standing spread to the Brownes, who specified it afterwards with 
 liniment. 
 
 To this impetuous way of going it was a relief, Mrs. Browne 
 told me afterwards, to hang one's feet out of the door. The 
 picturesque conduct of the fresh dAk -ponies every three or four 
 milps displayed novel forms of vice, interesting to the uniniti- 
 ated. They bit and strove and kicked, and one of them at- 
 tempted to get inside. Helen said it was very wearing to one's 
 nerves. But when they had accomplished the little earthquake 
 of starting there were compensations. The road was green and 
 shaded, as it would be in England ; squirrels frisked from one 
 trunk to another, silvery doves with burnished breasts cooed in 
 the bamboo branches, and ever the gracious hills drew nearer and 
 a little nearer. 
 
 " These are only the Siwalliks," remarked young Browne, in 
 a pause of their jubilant conversation. " Wait till you see the 
 Himalayas on the other side ! The Siwalliks are only rubble. 
 They're rapidly crumbling away." 
 
 " If they were in England," replied Mrs. Browne, watching 
 the little topmost turrets grow greener, " we wouldn't admit that 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 269 
 
 they were rubble. And I don't believe they'll crumble away very 
 soon." 
 
 " In a few aeons," returned Mr. Browne superiorly. " It won't 
 matter to us. We're getting regularly up amongst them. This 
 is the beginning of the pass." 
 
 They had journeyed four hours and had come to a little white 
 bungalow perched high upon the flank of the nearest hill. Here 
 the khansamali had a red beard, and swore by it that the sahib 
 had not forwarned him ; how should there be beef and potatoes ! 
 Milk and moorghy might be, but eggs no— the eggs were a lit- 
 tle bad. 
 
 " For that saying, son of the Prophet," said young Browne, 
 " backsheesh will be to you. In Bengal there is no true talk 
 regarding eggs. And now hasten with the milk and the warmed 
 moorghy curry of the traveller of yesterday, and dekko, Kasi, 
 tiffin-basket, lao ! " 
 
 Broad is the road that leads over the Mohun Pass, and 
 beautiful are the summits that look down on it, but it cannot 
 be climbed with the unaided strength of horses. It was dull 
 driving but for the sunset behind the hills, when they put oxen 
 on in the bad places ; and still duller when the sulky, long- 
 haired black buffaloes lent a leg ; but there was a certain pictur- 
 esqueuess in being pulled by the three varieties of beasts at once, 
 especially when a gang of road-coolies turned in and pushed be- 
 hind. 
 
 They had always the trumpet, too, which enlivened the whole 
 of that part of Asia. And wild white balsams grew high on the 
 rocks, and naked little children, in blue necklaces, played about 
 the road. 
 
 There was the blackness of a tunnel, and then the vision of a 
 fair valley mightily walled in, with the softness of evening still 
 
270 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 in hor face, and the smoke of her hearth-fires curling up to a 
 purple sky. They rattled across a quarter of a mile of dry river- 
 bed full of stones, and were in Dehra, Dehra Doon, where all the 
 hedges drop pink rose-petals, and the bul-bul sings love songs in 
 I'ersiiin, and the sahib lives in a little white house in a garden 
 which is almost home. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 271 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 TN Dehra the Brownes were within sight of the promised land, 
 -^ not always but often. Sometimes it lay quite hidden in 
 some indefinable matted cloud-region of the sky, and then the 
 last of the September rains came pelting down the Doon. Some- 
 times it thrust only a shoulder out of its cloud garments, and 
 sometimes white fleeces swept over it from morning till night. 
 But there were other days when the clouds sailed high above it, 
 trailing their shadows after them, and then indeed the Brownes 
 could climb to it by a winding road that began at their very 
 feet. The road ascended to Mussoorie, which twinkled white on 
 a spur above them seven thousand feet up, and twelve miles off. 
 It would have been perfectly easy and practicable for them to 
 go to Mussoorie; so easy and practicable that they didn't go. 
 When young Browne had looked after the planter's tea-bushes, 
 and put a headstone to his grave, and settled his bills and 
 written home to his people the details of his affairs, there were 
 eight days over. Mussoorie, the particular paradise of " quiet " 
 people and retired old gentlemen who mean to die in the coun- 
 try, was an insignificant achievement for eight days. The 
 Brownes surveyed the great brown flanks of the hills and burned 
 for a wider conquest. They would go to Chakrata, high in the 
 heart of the Himalayas to the west, half way to Simla. They 
 would ride on horseback all the way up and down again to the 
 railway station at Saharanpore ; it would be more than a hun- 
 
272 
 
 THE S/MPI.E ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 dred miles — an expedition, as young Browne remarked, that 
 tliey could dine out on for weeks when they got back to Cal- 
 cutta, llis own statement of their equipment for the journey 
 is succinct. " \Ve shall want," said he, " two ponies, two syces, 
 and an ekka. The ekka will take the luggage, bedding, Kasi, 
 and the tiffin-basket. The ponies will take us, and the syces 
 ■will come along behind. Let us go and hire them." 
 
 They drove out the long shady main road of Dehra, creeping 
 always upward to Rajpore, upon this business, and on the way 
 Mr. Browne explained to Mrs. Browne the natural history, char- 
 acter and antecedents of the " bazar tat." " They run small," 
 said young Browne, " mostly ears and tails. They have a tend- 
 ency to displace objects to the rear of them, and a taste for 
 human flesh. They were born and brought up in the bazar, and 
 their morals are unspeakable. But you can't get morals at any 
 price in the bazar ; they are too expensive to be sold there. And 
 there's no real harm in the bazar tat, if you only keep away 
 from his heels and look a bit spry when you get on." 
 
 Mrs. Browne asked, with concealed anxiety, if there were no 
 donkeys. She was accustomed to a donkey, she said ; she could 
 ride one really rather well, and if George didn't mind she would 
 so mxicli prefer it. But George answered in a spirit of ribaldry. 
 The only donkeys in India, he said, belonged to the dhobies, 
 and were permanently engaged in taking home the wash. By 
 that time they had arrived. It was only a sharp elbow of a 
 narrow mountain road, Rajpore, with its tumble-down houses, 
 overhanging it on both sides, and it was quite empty. " There 
 aren't any horses here ! " Helen remarked with disparagement. 
 
 " Wait," returned her husband. Then, with really no par- 
 ticular emphasis, he said, " Gorah ! " * to Rajpore. 
 
 * Horse I 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 273 
 
 "//a, haztir!" 
 
 " Good pony, sahib ! " 
 
 " Here iz, memsahib — here iz ! " 
 
 Rajpore human on innumerable pairs of brown legs, turned 
 suddenly into the best and most spacious of its ground floors, 
 dragging thence Rajpore equine hostile on four, wearing an ag- 
 grieved expression above clinging strands of country grass. 
 They came, and still they came, from above trotting down, from 
 below trotting up. A human being of sorts was usually attached 
 to them, but Rajpore was obviously inhabited by ponies. No 
 other census would have been worth taking there. Mrs. Browne 
 was surrounded by ragged turbans and man-eaters. With Mr. 
 Browne's anxious hand upon her arm she felt herself precipitated 
 in every direction at once. " I can't keep out of the way of all 
 their heels, George," she exclaimed in the voice of the tried 
 woman, and then George backed her carefully against a wall, 
 drew a semicircle round her with a diameter of five feet, and 
 forbade man or beast to cross the line. Then they proceeded to 
 a choice. 
 
 " Here iz, hazur ! Good nice thin wallah, memsahib ha- 
 wasti ! " * 
 
 "Thanks," said Helen; "he's a diagram! I want a fat 
 one." 
 
 "Look, memsahib! This one bote plenty fat. Rose, rose, 
 tarty bun'nles ghas khata ! " f 
 
 " He's a baote-tamasha- wallah," remarked young Browne. 
 " Look at his eye, Helen. He also appears to have kicked all his 
 skin off his fetlocks. For you I should prefer the diagram." 
 
 Finally it was the diagram for Helen, who commanded that 
 
 * For the memsahib. 
 
 f Day by day he eats thirty bundles of grass 1 
 
274 
 
 rilE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEAf SAHIB. 
 
 an unreasonable quantity of food should be given to it under her 
 eyes, and remained until it was finished. " If she isn't fatter 
 after that," she said with satisfaction, "it's her own fault." 
 Young Browne selected the veritable charger of Rajpore. He 
 wore his mouth and nose carefully tied up in rope, and might be 
 relied upon at all points so long as that one remained secure. 
 "They're not much of a pair," said young Browne, "but in 
 ijour animal, dear, I don't mind sacrificing both speed and ap- 
 pearances." 
 
 " To safety. Yes, dear, you are perfectly right." And Mrs. 
 BroAvne, whose sense of humour was imperfectly developed, re- 
 garded her husband with affection. 
 
 Thereafter it became a question of an ekka, and Bajpore had 
 ekkas bewildering in their variety and in their disrepair. If you 
 have never scon an ekka it will be difScult for yon to understand 
 one. The business ekka does not stand about to be photo- 
 graphed, and therefore you must be told that, although it ap- 
 pears to rest mainly on the horse's back, it has two wheels gen- 
 erally, one on each side. There is a popular saying that no sahib 
 likes a one-wheeled ekka, and though it is a popular saying it is 
 true. Tlie vehicle will do prodigious distances with one wheel, 
 but it is anticipating Providence to engage it on that basis. An 
 ekka is rather like a very old two-storied birdcage tilted up and 
 fore-shortened, with a vaulted roof, and it runs in my mind that 
 the roof is frescoed. The upstiinding little posts at the four 
 corners arc certainly painted red and yellow ; they are carved 
 also, like the rungs of ccrtsiin chairs. I know that the ekka- 
 wallah sits in the upper story smiling upon the world. An ekka- 
 wallah always smiles ; his is a life of ease. I know too that there 
 are bulgings above and protuberances below, and half a yard of 
 dirty sacking, and seven pieces of ragged rope, and always room 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 275 
 
 for something else ; but at this point my impression becomes a 
 little confused, and I cannot state with assurance which end is 
 attached to the horse. That, however, is a matter of detail. 
 The real point is that the Brownes found an ekka apparently 
 two feet square, which contracted to carry their luggage, bed- 
 ding, tiffin-basket, and Kasi up to Chakrata and down to the 
 plains for the sum of three rupees per diepi, which was extor- 
 tionate. But the ptiHkans * were moring down, and the ser- 
 geants' wives would require many ekkas. They conld afford to 
 wait for the sergeants' wives. In expectation of these ladies 
 the ekka market was a solid unit and the Brownes succumbed 
 before it. 
 
 Next day they left Dehra, dropping the first of its October 
 rose-leaves. Thinking of the planter in his grave, Helen won- 
 dered how he could have been so indifferent as to close his eyes 
 wilfully and intentionally on such a place. It was the morning, 
 there was a sweet and pungent gaiety in the air, the long road 
 they had to travel stretched before them in the pleasaunce of 
 leaf-checkered sunshine. Little striped squirrels played on the 
 boles of the trees — they were English-looking trees — that met 
 over their heads. Young Browne thanked God audibly that 
 they were out of the region of palms and plantains. 
 
 Tiny green fly-catchers swung on the rushes of an occasional 
 pool, pink-breasted ring-doves sidled out of their way, thieving 
 parrots flew by sixes and sevens screaming up from the kharif 
 crops.f Very green were the kharif crops, with the rain still 
 about their roots, surging up under the lowest branches of the 
 trees as far as these travellers could see before them. But for the 
 teeming luxuriance of everything, the sense of breadth and 
 
 • Regiments. f Cold weather crops. 
 
276 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OE A At EM SAHIB. 
 
 brightness ami the caressing sun, it miglit- have be^n a road in 
 ])evonshirc. But for the wayfarers too. There were neither 
 smobks nor gigs ; the ryot went by, chiefly dressed in his own 
 brown skin, urging his lean oxen ; all the gentle cows had curi- 
 ous humps between their shoulders. And here by the wayside 
 they saw the tiny dome of a battered white praying place, and 
 there the square slab of a Mahomedan tomb. 
 
 The sun grew hot as they scrambled with the road down to 
 the bridge across a broad river bed full of round white stones 
 and boulders, with a narrow shallow brown stream hurrying along 
 the middle. Further away it trickled into the Jumna ; here it 
 played with pebbles and crabs, but now and then in the rains it 
 brought the boulders down from the mountains swirling, and 
 threw stones at the Department of Public Works, and shook the 
 bridges. Looking one way as they crossed the bridge, it was a 
 piled-up picture, the blue hills massed behind, the big white 
 stones huddled and stranded in the glistening grey sand, the 
 foolish little stream in the middle. Looking the other, the pic- 
 ture went to pieces, the hills sloped further away, the sky came 
 down, the big stones rounded themselves into little ones, and 
 spread indistinguishably far. Either way it was beautiful in the 
 crisp Indian sunlight ; it had a gay untroubled life, like porce- 
 lain. 
 
 After that there were miles of irresponsible curving, weedy 
 road, that led them sometimes past the sirkar's * sari forest, and 
 sometimes past a little village gathered together under a mango- 
 tree, but oftenest it straggled through wide, sunny, stony coun- 
 try, full of pale half-tints, where only wild grasses grew. Such 
 tall wild grasses, purple and yellow and white, bending and tuft- 
 
 • Government's. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 277 
 
 ing above their heads on either side of the way. " They would 
 make Aunt Plovtree happy for life," Helen said. They would 
 indeed, and many another estimable lady resident in Great Brit- 
 ain. It was a sorrowful waste that they should be growing there 
 far from the solemn interiors that yearned for their dusty 
 charms. Helen was so much of this opinion that she dismounted 
 and gathered a bunch, compelling her husband to do the same, 
 to send by parcel post to Aunt Plovtree. She flicked the flies oflE 
 the Diagram's ears with them for three miles, then she lost a 
 third of them in a canter, and young Browne arranged that the 
 rest should be carefully forgotten at Kalsi ddk-bungalow. He 
 was of opinion that in undertaking an ascent of nine thousand 
 feet on a bazar tat in India you couldn't be expected to gather 
 and preserve wild grasses for your aunt in England. 
 
2-8 ////-■ SIMPJ.E Ain-RNTURES OF A iMEMSANIB. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 
 
 ALL night long the Jumna 
 purred in their ears, roll- 
 ing over the stones at the bot- 
 tom of the shady hill, 
 whereon the Kaj had built 
 a travellers' rest. Look- 
 ing out through the 
 dewy branches in the 
 morning, they saw the 
 Doon lying under 
 its mists at their 
 feet, with the rag- 
 ged Siwalliks on 
 the other side — 
 ahciuly they had begun to climb. Already, too, there was the 
 mountain scent in the air — that smell of wet mossy rock and 
 ferns and running streams and vigour— and this, as they set 
 fortli ujion the Himalayas, with their faces turned upwards, took 
 possession of their senses and made them altogether joyous. 
 Tlie Kajporc charger sniffed the wind with his Roman nose as 
 copiously as circumstances would permit, and snapped viciously 
 at young Browne's trousers with his retreating under-lip. The 
 Rajpore charger must have been at least twelve hands high, and 
 fat out of all ]uoportion. His syce and proprietor, Boophal — 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 279 
 
 probably thirteen years old, wearing a ragged cloth jacket, a 
 dboty, and an expression of precocious iniquity, was very proud 
 of him. The syce attached to Helen's pony was visibly abased 
 by the contrast, and Helen herself declared loudly against the 
 injustice of being expected to keep up under the circumstances. 
 Mrs. Browne's mount had only one idea of going, and that was 
 to imitate the gait of her distinguished friend in front at a con- 
 siderable distance to the rear; and there is no doubt that it 
 must have been trying invariably to come up puffing, to the 
 reproaches of a waiting lord, complacent in his saddle. " If yon 
 could ride behind for awhile and beat it," suggested Helen ; " it 
 doesn't seem to mind me." But young Browne thought that 
 was quite impossible. There was one thing they might do, 
 though — at Saia they might get her a spur ! " George ! " cried 
 she, "do you think I would use a spur? — hotrid, cruel thing, 
 that you never can tell when it's going in!" with ungram- 
 matical emotion. " But we might change ponies for a bitj if 
 you like." 
 
 " We might," said young Browne, reflectively, " but I don't 
 think that I should feel justified in putting you on this one, my 
 dear ; his rage and fury with his nose are awful." 
 
 " But, George, I should like to ride beside you ! " 
 
 "Not more than I should like to have you, dear. But I 
 think, since I can't have that pleasure, what a satisfaction I take 
 in the knowledge that you are safe. Do you feel disposed to 
 trot?" 
 
 "/do," returned Mrs. Browne, with plaintive emphasis; 
 " but you'll have to start, please. What is the matter with this 
 animal ? " 
 
 The Diagram was neighing — long, shrill neighs of presage- 
 ment, with her ears cocked forward. "Something's coming," 
 
28o Tlll^ SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 said young Browne. '■'■ Ddk-xcallahata!" * remarked Boophal. 
 A faint jingling on the far side of the nearest curve ; the ddk- 
 wallah had rounded it, and was upon them, at a short, steady, 
 unrelenting trot. The ddk-wallah, all in khaki, had charge of 
 Her JIajesty's mails. There was no time for a salaam. He 
 wore bells at his waist for premonition, and a spear over his 
 shoulder for defence. These hills were full ot janwas f without 
 special respect for Her Majesty's mails. On he went, jingling 
 faint and fainter, bearing the news of the mountains down into 
 the valleys, a pleasant primitive figure of the pleasant primitive 
 East. Young Browne liked him particularly. " What a decent 
 way of earning one's living ! " said he. 
 
 The hills began to round out nobly before them now. The 
 road took great sweeps and curves, always penetrating and 
 climbing, and a low stone wall made its appearance running 
 along the outer edge. Over the wall they looked down upon a 
 hurrying river and tree-tops ; but the hill-sides towered straight 
 up beside them, lost in sari, and oak, and mosses, and shadows. 
 They had climbed a very little way. The stillness seemed to 
 grow with the sunshine. Only now and then a jungle-fowl 
 stirred, or a hoo-poe cried, or they heard the trickling of a tiny 
 stream that made its ferny way down the face of the rock to the 
 road. Underneath the warm air lay always the cool scent; 
 strange flowers bloomed in it, but did not change it; it was the 
 goodly smell of the mountains, and Helen, respiring it, declared 
 that it was the first time her nose had been the slightest pleasure 
 to her in India. They turned to look back — the hills had grown 
 up around them and shut them in ; they were upon the solitary, 
 engirdling road, with its low stone parapet below unknown 
 
 * The postman comes. f Animals. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 28 1 
 
 heights, above unknown depths, insisting always upwards round 
 the nearer masses to hills that were greater, further, bluer. It 
 was the little parapet, Helen decided, that made it look so 
 lonely. It must have taken quantities of people to build the 
 little parapet along such mighty curves, and now they had all 
 gone away down the road, and it seemed as if none of them 
 would ever come back. 
 
 After the dik- wallah the jogi * with his matted hair and 
 furtive eyes. He asked nothing of the Brownes, the jogi, he 
 extracted pice from his own people, for the good of their souls ; 
 the souls of the Brownes were past paying for ; besides, it was so 
 unlikely that a sahib would pay. And after the jogi came a 
 score of black, long-haired, long-horned buffaloes, and a man 
 seated upon an ass driving them. The buffaloes had evidently 
 never seen anything approaching a Browne before, for they all 
 with one accord stood quite still when they came within twenty 
 yards of these two, and stared with the stolidly resentful surprise 
 that never strikes one as an affectation in a buffalo. There were 
 so very many buffaloes and so very few Brownes and so little 
 room for any of them that the situation was awkward. "Keep 
 close behind me and stick to the inside," young Browne enjoined 
 his lady. "They have been known to charge at things they 
 don't understand, but they take a good while to make up their 
 minds." 
 
 "Do let's try to squeeze past before they make them up," 
 said Helen nervously; but as the Brownes circumspectly ad- 
 vanced each of the small syces ran out from behind his pony's 
 heels, and laying hold of the buffaloes by any horn, ear, or tail 
 that came nearest, jostled them intrepidly out of the way. And 
 
 * Religious beggar. 
 10 
 
282 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAIfFB. 
 
 there was a deeper humiliation to come. As they took their 
 riglit of way at a trot with what dignity they miglit, a buffalo 
 calf, a highly idiotic baby bull, overcome by the dazzling appear- 
 
 HE ASKED NOTHING OK THE BROWNES. 
 
 ance of the Rajpore charger, turned round and trotted after him 
 and would not be denied. In vain young Browne smote him 
 upon the nose, in vain he who sat upon the ass abused with a 
 loud voice the ancestors of all buffaloes, the little bull fixed upon 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 283 
 
 the charger a look which said, " Entreat me not to leave thee," 
 and lumbered steadfastly alongside. Already the little bull's 
 mamma, smelling desertion from the rear, had looked round 
 inquiringly — she was in process of turning — she was after them 
 horns down, tail straight out, and she was coming fast ! There 
 was very little time for reflection, but it occurred irresistibly to 
 both the Brownes that the little bull's mamma would not be 
 likely to put the blame upon the little bull. There was nothing 
 for it but flight, therefore, and they fled ; promiscuous and fast, 
 for even the ponies appeared to understand that it was an un- 
 pleasant thing to be pursued by an enraged female buffalo for 
 the restitution of maternal rights. First the flying Brownes, 
 neck and neck exhorting each other to calmness, then the bleat- 
 ing calf that chased the flying Brownes, then the snorting cow 
 that chased the bleating calf, and, finally, he upon the ass who 
 chased them all, with shouts and brayings to wake the mountain- 
 side. It was a scene for the imperishable plate of a Kodak : 
 there was hardly time to take it with the imagination. As 
 his ideal departed from him the calf fell back into the hands, 
 as it were, of his mother and his master; and young Browne, 
 glancing behind, declared with relief that they were both lick- 
 ing him. 
 
 They stopped to rest, to consume quantities of bread and but- 
 ter and hard-boiled eggs, to ask milk of an out-cropping village. 
 Milk was plentiful in the village, cool creamy buffaloes' milk, 
 and the price was small, but from what vessel should the sahib 
 drink it? All the round brass bowls that held it were sacred to 
 the feeding of themselves, sacred to personalities worth about 
 four pice each ; and the lips of a sahib might not defile them. 
 The outcast sahib bought a new little earthen pot for a pice, 
 breaking it solemnly on a stone when they had finished; and 
 
284 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 eTen mixed with the taste of fired mud the buffaloes' milk vru 
 ambrosial. 
 
 On they went and up, the trees shelved further down below 
 and grew scantier above ; upon the heights that rose before them 
 there seemed to be none at all. Down where the river was even- 
 ing had fallen, and all the hills behind stood in purple, but a 
 little white cluster still shone sunlit in a notch above them. 
 Boophal pointed it out. " Tin cos" * said Boophal. They has- 
 tened on at that, all six of them ; they rounded a last flank, rat- 
 tled over a bridge with a foaming torrent underneath, and found 
 themselves clinging, with several fowls, oxen, and people, to the 
 side of the gorge the torrent made. The dd.k-bungalow sat on a 
 ledge a hundred feet or so further up, and the Brownes felt this 
 to be excessive. They climbed it, however, and entered into 
 peace at the top. There was a khansamah and two long chairs, 
 there would be dinner. The Diagram, unsaddled and fed, folded 
 herself up like a chest of drawers for repose ; but the charger 
 roamed up and down seeking something to kick, and all night 
 long at intervals they heard him chewing in imagination the cud 
 of the bufEalo calf, neighing, yawning, biting his under-lip. 
 
 Next day they saw what the creeping road had conquered, 
 and what it had yet to conquer. It was no longer question of 
 climbing the great hills, they were amongst the summits, they 
 walked upon the heights, behind them slope after outlying slope 
 rose up and barred the way that they had come ; and yet the 
 parapeted road, with its endless loops and curves insisted up- 
 ward, and the little military slabs that stood by the mountain- 
 side told them that they had still eighteen, seventeen, sixteen 
 miles to follow it before they came to Ghakrata, whence they 
 
 * Three miles. 
 
THE STMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 285 
 
 should see the Snows. Helen found it difficult to believe that 
 the next turn would not disclose them, that they were not lying 
 fair and shining beyond that brown" mountain before her to the 
 left— it was such a prodigious mountain, it must be the last. 
 But always the belting road sloped upward and disappeared 
 again, always behind the prodigious brown mountain rose a more 
 prodigious brown mountain still. They had astounding, soul- 
 stretching views, these Brownes, but always around and behind 
 them ; before them rose ever the bulk of a single mountain, and 
 the line of the climbing girdling road. 
 
 When God gave men tongues, he never dreamed that they 
 would want to talk about the Himalayas ; there are consequently 
 no words in the world to do it with. It is given to some of us, 
 as it was given to these Brownes, thus to creep and to climb up 
 into the heart of them, to look down over their awful verges and 
 out upon the immensity of their slopes, to be solitary in the stu- 
 pendous surging, heaving mountain-sea that stands mute and 
 vast here upon the edge of the plains of India. Afterward these 
 people have more privacy than the rest of the world, for they 
 have once been quite alone in it, with perhaps a near boulder 
 and a dragon-fly. And their privacy is the more complete be- 
 cause there is no password to let another in — language will not 
 compass it. So they either babble foolishly, or are silent. 
 
 The Brownes, in the fulness of their hearts, babbled foolishly. 
 They wondered whether the white speck near the top of the 
 mountain across the ravine was a cow or a house, and in either 
 case how it held on. They wondered what the curious blood-red 
 crop could be, that lay in little square patches far below them on 
 the lower slopes where people had tiny farms. They wondered 
 how cold it was up there in the winter — it was jolly cold now 
 when you faced the wind. They found ox-eyed daisies and other 
 
286 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 Christian flowers growing in clefts of the rock, and they gathered 
 these rejoicing. They implored each other to " keep to the in- 
 side " in places where the low stone wall had been washed away, 
 and neither of them dared to look over. And they had an ad- 
 venture which to this day Mrs. Browne relates as blood-curdling. 
 
 It was in rounding an old sunny corner in silent disappoint- 
 ment at again failing to find Chakrata. Young Browne, riding 
 first, noticed a loose pebble rattle down the side of the rock. 
 Mrs. Browne insists that she did not notice the pebble, and I 
 don't know that it is important to her evidence that she should. 
 But she certainly noticed the leopard, so carefully that she never 
 will be quite sure it wasn't a tiger. She saw it rise from its four 
 legs from a ledge of rock above young Browne's head and look 
 at young Browne. Mrs. Browne is naturally unable to give any- 
 one an accurate idea of her emotion during the instant that fol- 
 lowed, but she was perfectly certain that it did not occur to 
 young Browne to transfix the animal with his eye, and he had 
 nothing else. Neither it did, but the situation did not find Mr. 
 Browne entirely without presence of mind notwithstanding. 
 Raising his whip in a threatening manner Mr. Browne said 
 " Shoo ! " and whatever may have been the value of that exple- 
 tive in Mr. Browne's mouth under ordinary circumstances, in 
 Mrs. Browne's opinion it saved his life on that occasion. For 
 without even an answering growl the leopard turned and trotted 
 into the thicket quickly, as if she had forgotten something. 
 
 " Did you see that, Helen ? " inquired her husband, turning 
 in his saddle. 
 
 " I sh-should think I did ? " exclaimed Mrs. Browne. W-vi- 
 w-wait for me, George ! " And as the Diagram came up along- 
 side, young Browne received several tearful embraces, chiefly 
 upon his arm, in the presence of the syces. " I told you you 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 287 
 
 ought to have a g-g-gun, darling, and you wouldnH be advised," 
 Mrs. Browne reproached him hysterically. " It's all very well to 
 laugh, but thin-thin-think of what might have been ! " 
 
 " It's awful to think of what might have been if I had had a 
 gun," said young Browne solemnly. " In the excitement of the 
 moment I should have been certain to let it go off, and then she 
 would have been down on us, sure. They hate guns awfully. 
 Oh, we may be thankful I hadn't a gun I " 
 
288 J'"!-' Sj.UrLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 PRESENTLY they met a wonderfully pretty lady with red 
 cheeks, such red cheeks as all the Miss Peacheys had in 
 Canbury, being swung along in a dandy on the shoulders of four 
 stout coolies. The red cheeks belonged to Chakrata; they were 
 within half-a-mile of it then ; they would see it before the sun 
 went down. The road zig-zagged a bit and climbed more 
 steeply, narrowing hideously here and there. The khuds became 
 terrific. Young Browne dismounted and walked at his wife's 
 bridle, pushing her pony close to the mountain-side. The preci- 
 pices seemed to shout to them. 
 
 There was a last outstanding brown flank ; the road hurtled 
 round it, over it, and then with the greeting of a mighty torrent 
 of wind that seemed to come from the other side of the world it 
 ran out upon a wide level place, where a band played and five 
 hundred soldiers, in Her Majesty's red, wheeled and Tnarched 
 and countermarched, it seemed to the Brownes, for pure light- 
 heartedness. That was the end ; there, grouped all about a crag 
 or two, was Chakrata. There across a vast heaving of mountains 
 to the horizon — mountains that sank at their feet and swelled 
 again and again and again purple and blue — stood the still won- 
 der of the Snows. 
 
 " They aren't real," said Helen simply, " they're painted on 
 the sky." 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 289 
 
 The Brownes followed a path that twisted through Chakrata, 
 and in course of time they came to a little out-cropping wooden 
 diamond-paned chalet, with wide brown eaves that overhung 
 eternity and looked toward the Snows. It was a tiny toy d4k- 
 bungalow, and English dahlias, red and purple and yellow and 
 white, grew in clumps and thickets tall and wild around it. 
 Here they entered in and demanded a great fire and a cake; 
 while a grey furred cloud, flying low with her sisters, blotted out 
 the Snows, and darkness, coming up from the valleys, caught 
 them upon the mountain-top. 
 
 Distinct and unusual joys awaited them in the morning. 
 The fire had gone out for one thing, and they shivered luxurious 
 shivers at the prospect of getting up without one. They enjoyed 
 every shiver and prolonged it. How little one thought of being 
 thankful for that sort of thing in England, Helen remarked, with 
 little sniffs at the frosty air ; and young Browne said " No, by 
 Jove," and how one hated the idea of one's tub. Oh, delight- 
 fully cold it was, snapping cold, squeaking cold ! Helen showed 
 her hands blue after washing them, and they tumbled through 
 their respective toilettes like a couple of school children. It was 
 so long since they had been cold before. 
 
 At breakfast the butter was chippy, and that in itself was a 
 ravishing thing. At what time of year, they asked each other, 
 would butter ever stand alone without ice in Bengal. And their 
 fingers were numb — actually numb ; could anything have been 
 more agreeable, except to sit in the sun on the little veranda, as 
 they afterwards did, and get them warm again ! There, without 
 moving, they could watch that magical drifted white picture in 
 the sky, so pure as to be beyond all painting, so lifted up as to 
 be beyond all imagination. A ragged wallnut-tree clung to the 
 edge of the cliff; the wind shook the last of its blackening 
 
2go THE SIMPLE ADVENTCRES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 leaves ; the vast, wheeling sky was blue and empty, except of the 
 Snows, and the dahlias had trooped to the verge to look, so that 
 the sun shone through their petals with the light of wine. It is 
 their remoteness, their unapproachableness, that make these 
 Himalayan Snows a sanctuary. From the foot of man any- 
 where they are prodigiously far off, so that they look to him al- 
 ways the country of a dream just hanging above the world he 
 knows, or if he be of prayerful mind, the Habitation of the Holi- 
 ness of the Lord. And since it is permitted to us that by moun- 
 tain and by valley we may journey to look upon the Snows, even 
 from very far off, our souls do not perish utterly in India, and 
 our exile is not entirely without its possession. 
 
 The Brownes had only two days in Chakrata, which they em- 
 ployed chiefly as I have mentioned — sitting in the sun devout 
 before the Himalayas, or ecstatically blowing upon their fingers. 
 They made one expedition to see a pair of friends whom the 
 merciful decree of Providence had recently brought up from the 
 Plains for good, and found them laying in coal and flour for the 
 winter, which made them quite silent for a moment with sup- 
 pressed feeling. "I hope," said young Browne flippantly, to 
 conceal his emotion, " that on the event of other stores giving 
 out you have plenty of candles. They are sustaining in an emer- 
 gency," 
 
 And as they made their thoughtful way on pony-back to the 
 brown wooden chalet, Helen observed upon her riding habit 
 some clustering spots of white, that multiplied and thickened, 
 and she gathered them up between her fingers with a delighted 
 cry. " George, dearest, look ! We're being snowed on — in 
 India!" 
 
 All of which was doubtless very trivial, but they were not re- 
 markable i)oopIc, these Brownes ; from the first I told you so. 
 
292 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHtB. 
 
 And thougli they found this journey of theirs brimful of the ex- 
 traordinary, the unparalleled, there was really only one remark- 
 able thing about it, which was the dignified and self-reliant con- 
 duct of the ekka. The ekka had always gone before, overflow- 
 ing with their goods and crowned with Kasi in cross-legged 
 pomp. They had traced its wavering progress by ends of 
 ravelled rope, and splinters of wood, and scraps of worn-out 
 leather which lay behind in the road to testify of it ; and grave 
 as had been their apprehensions, they had never overtaken it in 
 a state of collapse. Invariably when they arrived they found the 
 ekka disburthened, tipped up under a tree, the ekka pony brows- 
 ing with a good conscience, Kasi awaiting with an air which 
 asked for congratulation. How it held together was a miracle 
 which repeated itself hourly ; but it did hold together, and in- 
 spired such confidence in young Browne that he proposed, when 
 she tired of tlie Diagram, to deposit Mrs. Browne in the ekka 
 also. This, liowever, was declined. Mrs. Browne said that she 
 had neither the heart nor the nerves for it ; in which case, of 
 course, an emergency would find her quite anatomically unpre- 
 pared. 
 
 Leaving the Snows with grief, therefore, they left the ekka 
 with trusting faith. There had been a hitch in the process of 
 packing, examination, consultation. The sahib, inquiring, had 
 been told thiit one of the wheels was " a little sick." It was an 
 excellent ekka — an ekka with all the qualities ; the other wheel 
 was quite new, and you did not often find an ekka with an 
 entirely new wheel ! But the other was certainly a little old, 
 and after these many miles a little sick. Young Browne diag- 
 nosed the suffering wheel, and made a serious report ; there were 
 internal complications, and the tire had already been off seven 
 times. Besides, it wouldn't stand up; obviously it was not 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 293 
 
 shamming, the purana chucker * was taken bad, very bad in- 
 deed. Its cure could be accomplished, however, with wet chips 
 and a hammer — and time. If the sahib would permit, the ekka 
 would follow in half an hour. 
 
 So the Brownes departed gaily, and an hour and three- 
 quarters later the ekka tottered forth also, with Kasi and the 
 ekka-wallah walking lamentably alongside exchanging compli- 
 ments upon the subject of the wheel. They travelled three 
 miles and an hour thus, and then the wheel had a sudden re- 
 lapse, with signs of dissolution ; while young Browne's dressing- 
 case, which happened to be on top, shot precipitately first into 
 space and then into the topmost branches of a wild cherry- 
 tree growing three thousand feet down the khud. The ekka 
 pony planted his feet in the road-bed and looked round for 
 directions ; the ekka-wallah groaned and sat down. " And the 
 sahib, 0, my brother-in-law ! " exclaimed Kasi, dancing round 
 the ekka. 
 
 " The sahib is in the hand of God ! " returned the ekka-wal- 
 lah piously. " To-day I have been much troubled. I will smoke." 
 And while the Brownes, at Saia, remotely lower down, grew 
 chilly with vain watching in the shadows that lengthened through 
 the khuds, the weary ekka leaned peacefully against the moun- 
 tain wall, the ekka-wallah drew long comfort from his hubble- 
 bubble, and Kasi reposed also by the wayside, chewing the pun- 
 gent betel, and thinking, with a meditative eye on the wild 
 cherry-tree below, hard things of fate. 
 
 Nevertheless, without the direct interposition of Providence, 
 the ekka eventually arrived, and there was peace in one end of 
 the ddk-bnngalow, and the crackling of sari branches, and the 
 
 * Old wheel. 
 
294 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 simmering of tinned hotch-potch. In the other end was wrath, 
 and a pair of Royal Engineers — a big Royal Engineer and a 
 little Royal Engineer. To understand why wrath should abide 
 with these two Royal Engineers in their end of the bungalow, 
 it is necessary to understand that it was not an ordinary travel- 
 lers' bungalow, but a " Military Works' " bungalow, their very 
 own bungalow, for " Military Works " and " Royal Engineers " 
 mean the same thing ; and that ordinary travellers were only 
 allowed to take shelter there by special permission or under 
 stress of weather. By their proper rights, therefore, these Royal 
 Engineers should have had both ends of the bungalow, and 
 the middle, and the compound, and the village, and a few miles 
 of the road north and south — and a little privacy. If these 
 ideas seem a trifle large, it becomes necessary to try to under- 
 stand, at least approximately, what a Royal Engineer is, where 
 he comes from, to what dignities and emoluments he may aspire. 
 And tlien, when we have looked upon the buttons which reflect 
 his shining past, and considered the breadth of his shoulders 
 and the straightness of his legs, and the probable expense he 
 has been as a whole to his parents and his country, we will easily 
 bring ourselves to a^'-nit that he is entirely right in considering 
 himself quite the most swagger article in ordinary Government 
 service in India. We may even share his pardonable incre- 
 dulity as to whether before his advent India was at all. And 
 certainly we will sympathise with the haughtily impatient ex- 
 pletives with which he would naturally greet pretensions to 
 circumscribe his vested rights in the Himalayan mountains 
 on the part of two absurdly unimportant and superfluous 
 Brownes. 
 
 The Brownes in their end heard the two Royal Engineers 
 kicking the fire logs in theirs, and conversing with that brevity 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB: 
 
 295 
 
 and suppression which always marks a Royal Engineer under 
 circumstances where ordinary people would be abusively 
 fluent. Apparently they had command of themselves, they 
 were Royal Engineers, they weren't saying much, but it was 
 vigorous the way they kicked the fire. The Brownes were still 
 as mice, and absorbed their soup with hearts that grew ever 
 heavier with a grievous sense of wrong inflicted not only upon 
 their neighbour but upon a Royal Engineer ! 
 
 "As a matter of fact, you know," said young Browne, 
 " we've no business here. I think I ought to go and speak to 
 them." 
 
 " We've got permission," remarked Mrs. Browne feebly, 
 " and we were here first." 
 
 " I'm afraid," said young Browne, " that we have the best 
 end, and we've certainly got the lamp. Maybe they would like 
 the lamp. I think I ought first to go and see them. After all, 
 it's their bungalow." 
 
 Young Browne came back presently twisting the end of his 
 moustache. It was an unconscious imitation of the Royal Engi- 
 neers acquired during their short and embarrassed interview. 
 
 "Well?" said Helen. 
 
 " Oh, it's all right. They don't particularly mind. They 
 accepted my apology — confound them I And they would like 
 the lamp — their's smokes. They're marching, like us, down to 
 Saharanpore, inspecting the road or something, and fishing. No 
 end of a good time those chaps have." 
 
 " What are their names ? " 
 
 " Haven't the least idea — they're Royal Engineers." 
 
 " Well," returned Mrs. Browne disconsolately, " what are we 
 to do when you give them the buttie?" 
 
 " Go to bed," returned her lord laconically. 
 
296 THE siArri.E adventures of a memsahib. 
 
 Mrs. Browne prepared, therefore, for repose, aud while Mr. 
 Browne yielded up the lamp there reached her from the other 
 end of the bungalow the ineffable condescension of a Eoyal En- 
 gineer, who said " Thanks awfully." 
 
 • They were gone in the morning ; the Brownes heard from 
 the kliansamah that the burra-sahibs had departed at daylight, 
 and the very hurra of the burra-sahibs rode a white horse. The 
 Brownes were glad these particularly burra-sahibs had gone; 
 they found they preferred to be entertained by the Military 
 Works Department in the abstract. " They probably mean to 
 ride a long way to-day, starting so early," said Helen hopefully- 
 "We won't find them at Futtehpore." It was unreasonable in 
 the Brownes ; they had no grievance against these Royal En- 
 gineers, and yet they desired exceedingly that somewhere, any- 
 where, their ways should diverge ; and there is no doubt what- 
 ever that the Royal Engineers would have heartily recommended 
 a change of route to the Brownes. Unfortunately there was 
 only one, and it lay before them unravelling down among the 
 hills to Futtehpore. It was such glorious cantering, though, 
 that these inconsiderable civil little Brownes on their bazar tats, 
 all agog with their holiday, almost forgot the possible recurrence 
 of the Royal Engineer. He became a small cloud on the horizon 
 of their joyous day ; he would probably vanish before evening. 
 So that th(! sun shone and the doves cooed and the crested 
 hoopoe ran across the path, of what import was a Royal En- 
 gineer — or even two? So the Brownes rode valiantly down 
 among the hills, she upon her Diagram and he upon the charger 
 of Raj])orc, and when they really went with wings and glory, the 
 syce-boys running behind attached themselves to the tails of the 
 Diagram and the charger of Rajpore respectively, relieving their 
 own legs and adding greatly to the imposing character of the 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 299 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 rr^HE Brownes had left the sunset behind thorn red upon the 
 -*- heights when they reached Futtehpore, but there was still 
 light enough for them to descry a white horse from afar, brows- 
 ing in the compound, and they looked at each other in unaffected 
 melancholy, saying, " They're here." If they wanted further 
 evidence they had it in the person of the khansamah, who ran 
 forth wagging his beard, and exclaiming that there was no room 
 — how should there be any room for these Presences from with- 
 out, when two Engineer-sahibs had already come ! Among his 
 other duties one Engineer-sahib had to report the shortcomings 
 of this khansamah. Should it be written among them that the 
 Engineer-sahib was rendered uncomfortable in his own house ! 
 Ah, that the Presence could be persuaded that there was another 
 bungalow five miles further on, which the Presence knew per- 
 fectly well there was not. 
 
 " Khansamah," replied young Browne, " two sahibs do not 
 require four apartments and all the beds. Go and make it right ; 
 and, look you, bring a long chair for the memsahib that thy back 
 be not smitten," for by this time the heart of George Browne, of 
 Macintyre and Macintyre's, Calcutta, had waxed hot within him 
 by reason of Royal Engineers. 
 
 The khansamah returned presently and announced that the 
 Presences might have beds, but a long chair — here the khansamah 
 held his back well behind him that it should not be smitten — he 
 
300 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAUIB. 
 
 could not give, for the biirra Engiiiecr-sahib sat upon the one, 
 jiud the chota Engineer-saliib sat upon the other. Yes, they 
 could have something to eat, when the Engineer-sahibs had 
 dined ; but there would not be time to prepare it before — the 
 Engineer-sahibs had commanded dinner in one hour. He would 
 sec if a fire was possible — it might be that the Engineer-sahibs 
 required all the dry wood. It was presently obvious that they 
 did, and as young Browne and Kasi struggled unavailingly with 
 an armful of green sari and a year-old copy of the Overland 
 Mail, that gentleman might have been overheard to remark 
 roundly in the smoke and the gloom, "Danni the Engineer- 
 sahibs!" 
 
 Next morning the white horse was still in the stable when 
 young Browne stepped out upon the veranda, and the Royal 
 Engineer stood there smoking with his hands in his pockets, his 
 legs describing a Royal Engineering angle. He said " Morning ! " 
 with a certain affability to young Browne, who made a lukewarm 
 response. 
 
 " Think of getting on to-day?" inquired the R. E. 
 
 " Oh, yes," Air. Browne replied. " We must. We're due at 
 Saharanpore Friday." 
 
 "Aw! same with us. Bagshiabag to-day, Kalsia to-morrow, 
 Saharanpore Friday." 
 
 " E.\actly our programme," said young Browne with firmness. 
 
 "Aw! Ilown'for'tchnit!" 
 
 "Is it?" 
 
 " Well, yes, rather. Y'see it was all right at Saia, and it's all 
 right here, but at Kalsia there'll be Mrs. Prinny of the 97th, and 
 Mrs. Prinny's got baby, and baby's got nurse. That'll be rather 
 tight, waovnH it?" and the Royal Engineer removed a cigar ash 
 from his pyjamas. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 301 
 
 " Now if either of us should push on to Kalsia to-day," he 
 cojitinued insinuatingly. 
 
 There was a pause. 
 
 " It's awkward for ms, y'see " continued the R. E., " because 
 we're fishing." 
 
 "How far is it?" 
 
 " 'Bout twenty-six miles." 
 
 " H'm ! Rather long march for a lady." 
 
 " Oh, yes — it would be long" responded the Royal Engineer 
 with an irresponsible air, " but then think of that awful nurse 
 an' baby." 
 
 A quarter of an hour later the Brownes were off again. 
 Crossing a bridge they passed the two Royal Engineers sitting 
 upon one of the buttresses examining their fishing tackle. 
 " We're going to see if we can manage it," remarked young 
 Browne. " Good morning." 
 
 The larger and finer of the Royal Engineers looked up. 
 "Aw," said he, "mustn't over-do it, y'know." 
 
 " We won't," returned young Browne. 
 
 As a matter of fact they didn't. Arrived at Bagshiabag, Mrs. 
 Browne declared herself very nearly dead, the Diagram had been 
 more diagrammatic than usual. She would rest, and " see " if 
 she felt equal to going on. 
 
 " I'm blowed if you shall," said her lord, " not for all the 
 R. E.'s in Asia." So they peacefully put up in their choice of 
 ends tliis time, and made an impartial division of the furniture, 
 and after tea went for a walk. It was the very last station on 
 the edge of the hills ; the plains began at their very feet to roll 
 away into unbroken, illimitable misty distances. Bagshiabag — 
 the King's garden — the palm-fringed plains that were doubtless 
 fair in the King's sight. The Brownes looked at them sorrow- 
 
302 ''ii-- si.\rri.E adventures of a mems^ahib. 
 
 iiig ; it rcqiiiii'S an Oriental imagination to admire the King's 
 garden from an inside point of view. 
 
 " We mnst start early to-morrow," said yCung Browpo regret- 
 fully. " it will be hot." 
 
 Ucturniiig tliey found the two Royal Engineers refreshing 
 themselves under a mango-tree in the compound, surrounded by 
 everything that appertained to the establishment, and wearing 
 an expression of god-like injury. " We didn't get on, after all," 
 said young Browne, as he passed them with what countenance he 
 could. The Royal Engineers looked at him and smiled a recti- 
 linear smile. " No," they said. It was not much to say, but there 
 was a compulsion in it that awoke the Brownes before daylight 
 next morning and put them in their saddles at sunrise. By ten 
 o'clock the last blue ridge had faded out of the sky-line, by 
 eleven they were in Kalsia — not Kalsi of the Doon — in the midst 
 of a great flatness. The ekka with the tiffin basket was behind 
 upon the roiul. They would wait there till it came, and then 
 make up their minds fibout pushing on to Saharanpore. The 
 sidy with the nurse and baby was no fiction ; she was coming by 
 dak-gharry at three o'clock, the khansamah said. And could 
 the Presence give him any tidings of the Engineer-sahibs who 
 were on the way? He had been in readiness for the Engineer- 
 sahibs these three days. The Presence could give him no tidings 
 whatever of the Engineer-sahibs. He thought very likely they 
 were dead. Numbers of people had died in India in the last 
 three days, and tlie Presence assuredly did not wish any talk of 
 tlie Engineer-sahibs. "What is there to eat ?" asked the Pres- 
 ence. And if there was only milk and eggs and chupatties — the 
 Siihibs goicrally bringing their own food to this place — then let 
 it be served instantly, to be in readiness when the ekka should 
 appear. And it was served. But the khansamah had lived a 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 303 
 
 great many years upon the earth, and, moreover, he had privately 
 questioned the syce-boys, so that he knew of the coming of the 
 Engineer-sahibs. He knew, too, that it would not be good, 
 either for his temporal or his eternal happiness, that the En- 
 gineer-sahibs should find four people and a baby in their house 
 when they arrived. "Therefore the khansamah, being full of 
 guile as of years, sfent an open-faced one privily to the turning of 
 the lane into the road, who gave word to Kasi and to the ekka- 
 wallah that the sahibs — the Browne sahibs — had gone on to 
 Saharanpore, and they were by no means to tarry at Kalsia, but 
 to hasten on after. Believing this word, Kasi and the ekka- 
 wallah, while the Brownes famished upon the veranda, were 
 drawing ever nearer to Saharanpore. 
 
 It is difficult to make a meal of eggs and milk and chupat- 
 ties, but the Brownes found that it could be done, even when 
 because of anger it is the more indigestible. They found an 
 unexpected and delightful solace, however, afterward in Saha- 
 ranpore. The place was full of the southward bound, a regi- 
 ment was on the move, all Mussoorie had emptied itself in dAk- 
 gharries upon the station. Nevertheless, Kasi the invaluable 
 had intrigued for a room for them, a room that opened upon a 
 veranda, with a lamp in it, and a smoking dinner. Kasi was 
 the more invaluable for being conscience-stricken at having 
 swallowed false talk. And there is no Military Works bungalow 
 in Saharanpore, which is a utation built primarily and almost 
 wholly for the use of the general public. The joy of these 
 unregenerate Brownes, therefore, upon seeing a white horse 
 vainly walk up to this veranda and hearing a hungry voice, the 
 voice of the Royal Engineer, vainly inquire for rooms and 
 dinner, was keen and excessive. 
 
 " They've funked the baby after all ! " said young Browne, 
 
304 
 
 THE SIMPLE ADVEKTURES OE A MEM SAHIB. 
 
 "tliinking we wouldn't. Now they'll become acquainted with 
 the emotions of the ordinary travelling public in a congested 
 district. Hope they'll enjoy 'em as much as we did, Nellie. 
 I'm going to have a bottle of beer." 
 
 And if the Royal Engineer outside in the dark, where it was 
 getting chilly, could be susceptible to a note of triumph, he 
 heard it in the pop of the Pilsener with which on this occasion 
 Mr. George Browne fortified his opinion of Royal Engineers at 
 large. 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SAHIB. 305 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 ~V7"^^ might have read in this morning's Englishman, in the 
 -1- list of passengers booked per P. and 0. steamer Ganges, 
 sailing 3d April, " Mr. and Mrs. Perth Macintyre and Miss 
 Macalister, for Brindisi." Miss Macalister is a nieoe of the 
 Perth Macintyres. She has been out two years and a half, and, 
 so far as her opportunities are concerned, we have nothing to 
 reproach ourselves with. For the first time in fifteen years we 
 have attended the subscription dances to take her, and did not 
 shirk the fancy dress ball, Mr. Perth Macintyre going as Falstaff, 
 for her sake. At our time of life this is a great deal of exertion 
 for a niece, and I consider, if such things are possible, Mr. Perth 
 Macintyre's deceased sister ought to have felt gratification at 
 what we did. Nevertheless, I have not had occasion to mention 
 Miss Macalister before, and it is only in connection with her 
 return-ticket that I mention her now. It represents an outlay 
 which we did not expect to be obliged to make. 
 
 We are due in England about the Ist of May, when we will 
 endeavour to find the warniest south wall in Devonshire — I 
 shiver at the thought — and hang ourselves up on it. As the 
 summer advances and the conditions of temperature in Great 
 Britain become less severe, we will make an effort to visit the 
 parental Peacheys in Canbury, if neither of us have previously 
 succumbed to influenza ; in which case the box of chutneys and 
 guava jelly that the Brownes have charged us to deliver will be 
 
3o6 'III- SIMriJi ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 sont by luggage train. The survivor — we expect there will be at 
 least a temporary survivor — is to attend to this. 
 
 It will make a difference to the Brownes, our going, the dif- 
 ference of a junior partnersliip ; and although I hope I have a 
 correct idea of the charms of our society, I fully expect that 
 their grief at our departure will be tempered by this considera- 
 tion. Some one of our administrators is always being quoted in 
 tlie newspapers as having called India "a land of regrets." It is 
 to be feared, however, that the regrets are felt exclusively by 
 those who are going. The satisfactions of retirement are ob- 
 scure, and the prospect of devoting a shrunken end of existence 
 to the solicitous avoid.ance of bronchitis is not inviting. Where- 
 as it is always to somebody's profit that an Englishman leaves 
 India, and he is so accustomed to the irony of the idea of being 
 liis own chief mourner, that he would suspect the deeply-afflicted 
 at his going of more than the usual manusuvres to obtain his 
 shoes. The Brownes are very pleased, undisguisedly very 
 pleased, though Mrs. Browne has condoled with me sincerely, in 
 private, on the subject of Miss Macalister; and we quite under- 
 stand it. 
 
 There is nothing, on the other hand, to mitigate our regret 
 at parting with the Brownes, which is lively. I may not have 
 been able to make it plain in these few score pages, but I like 
 the Brownes. They are nice young people, and my advice has 
 been so often useful to them. As the wife of the junior partner 
 in Macintyre and Macintyre's, Mrs. Browne will be obliged to 
 depend upon her own for the future ; but I am leaving her a 
 good deal to go on with, and a certain proportion of our draw- 
 ing-room furniture as well, which she will find equally useful. 
 I inherited it myself from Mrs. J. Macintyre ; it has been a long 
 time in the firm. I'urther, we have put ofE sailing for a fort- 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 307 
 
 night so that I can be godmother in person to the Browne baby, 
 for whose prospective future I knitted fifteen pairs of socks this 
 last cold weather; and that I consider the final proof of our 
 regard. 
 
 If it is necessary to explain my interest in these young 
 Browncs, which you, I regret to think, may find inexplicable, it 
 lies, I dare say, as much in this departure of ours as in anything 
 else. Their first chapter has been our last. When you turn 
 down the page upon the Brownes you close the book upon the 
 Perth Macintyres, and it has been pleasant to me that our story 
 should find its end in the beginning of theirs. If this is not 
 excuse enough, there is a sentimental one besides. For I also 
 have seen a day when the spell of India was strong upon my 
 youth, when I saw romance under a turban and soft magic be- 
 hind a palm, and found the most fascinating occupation in life 
 to be the wasting of my husband's substance among the gabbling 
 thieves of the China bazar. It was all new to me once — I had 
 forgotten how new until I saw the old novelty in the eyes of 
 Helen Browne. Then I thought of reading the first pages of 
 the Anglo-Indian book again with those young eyes of hers; 
 and as I have read I have re-written, and interleaved, as you see. 
 It may be that they will give warning to some and encourage- 
 ment to others. I don't mind confessing that to me they have 
 brought chiefly a gay reminder of a time when pretty little sub- 
 alterns used to trip over their swords to dance with young Mrs. 
 Perth Macintyre also, which seems quite a ludicrous thing to 
 print — and that has been enough. 
 
 I think she will avoid the graver perils of memsahibship, 
 Mrs. Browne. I think she will always be a nice little woman. 
 George and the baby will take care of that. With the moderate 
 social facilities of the wife of a junior partner in Macintyre and 
 
3o8 THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 Macintyre's, she will not be likely even to make the acquaint- 
 ance of the occasional all-conquering lady who floats on the sur- 
 face of Anglo-Indian society disreputably fair, like the Victoria 
 Regia in the artificial lake of the Eden Gardens. As to the 
 emulation of such a one, I believe it is not in the power of cir- 
 cumstsinccs to suggest it to Mrs. Browne. Besides, she is not 
 clever, and the Victoria Regia must be clever, clever all round, 
 besides having a specialty in the souls of men. 
 
 Nevertheless, Mrs. Browne has become a memsahib, gradu- 
 ated, qualified, sophisticated. That was inevitable. I have 
 watched it come to pass with a sense that it could not be pre- 
 vented. She has lost her pretty colour, that always goes first, 
 and has gained a shadowy ring under each eye, that always 
 comes afterwards. She is thinner than she was, and has acquired 
 nerves and some petulance. Helen Peachey had the cerebral 
 placidity and good temper of one of Fra Angelico's piping 
 angels. To make up, she dresses her hair more elaborately, and 
 crowns it with a little bonnet which is somewhat extravagantly 
 " chic." She has fallen into a way of crossing her knees in a low 
 chair that would horrify her Aunt Plovtree, and a whole set of 
 little feminine Anglo-Indian poses have come to her naturally. 
 There is a shade of assertion about her chin that was not there 
 in England, and her eyes — ah, the pity of this! — have looked 
 too straight into life to lower themselves as readily as they did 
 before. She has conie into an empire among her husband's 
 bachelor friends, to whom she will continue to give gracious lit- 
 tle orders for ten years yet, if she does not go off too shocking- 
 ly; and her interests have expanded to include a great many 
 sub-masculine ones, which she discusses with them in brief and 
 casual sentences interspersed with smiles that are a little tired. 
 Without being actually slangy she takes the easiest word and 
 
THE SIMPLE ADVENTURES OF A AfEMSAIIIB. 
 
 309 
 
 the shortest cut — in India we know only the necessities of 
 speech, we do not really talk, even in the cold weather. 
 
 SUE HAS FALLEN INTO A WAY OF CROSSING HER KNEES IN A LOW CHAIR 
 THAT WOULD HORRIFY HER AUNT PIXJYTREE. 
 
 Domesticity has slipped away from Mrs. Browne, though she 
 held it very tightly for a while, into the dusky hands whose 
 business is with the house of the sahib. She and young Browne 
 
3'o 
 
 THE S/MI'U-: ADVENTURES OF A MEMSAHIB. 
 
 iiiul the baby continue to be managed by Kasi with a skill that 
 deceives them into thinking themselves comfortable, and Helen 
 continues to predict with confidence that next month there will 
 be a balance in her favour instead of Kasi's. On the contrary, 
 the accounts will show that the Brownes have had all they 
 wanted to eat and drink, that the dhoby has been paid, the mem- 
 sahib has had a rupee's worth of postage stamps, and there is 
 one anna and six pices to pay to Kasi. 
 
 It was a very little splash that submerged Mrs. Browne in 
 Anglo-India, and there is no longer a ripple to tell about it. I 
 don't know that life has contracted much for her. I doubt if it 
 was ever intended to hold more than young Browne and the 
 baby — but it has changed. Affairs that are not young Browne's 
 or the baby's touch lier little. Her world is the personal world 
 of Anglo-India, and outside of it, except in ailection of Canbury, 
 I believe she does not think at all. She is growing dull to 
 India, too, which is about as sad a thing as any. She sees no 
 more the supple savagery of the Pathan in the market-place, the 
 bowed reverence of the Mussitlman praying in the sunset, the 
 early morning mists lifting among the domes and palms of the 
 city- She has acquired for the Aryan inhabitant a certain 
 strong irritation, and she believes him to be nasty in all his 
 ways. This will sum up her impressions of India as completely 
 years hence as it does to-day. She is a memsahib like another. 
 
 Iler mother still occasionally refers to the reports of the So- 
 ciety for the Propagation of the Gospel that reach them in Can- 
 bury, and fr-eely supposes that the active interest her daughter 
 took in Iiidiiin Missions has increased and intensified in India. 
 In reply, Helen is obliged to take refuge in general terms, and 
 has always discreetly refrained from mentioning the prejudice 
 that exists in Calcutta against Christian cooks. 
 
THE S/MTLE ADVENTURES OF A MEM SA NIB. 3,1 
 
 I hope she may not stay twenty-two years. Anglo-Indian 
 tissues, material and spiritual, are apt to turn in twenty-two 
 years to a substance somewhat resembling cork. And I hope 
 she will not remember so many dead faces as I do when she goes 
 away — dead faces and palm fronds grey with the powder of the 
 wayside, and clamorous voices of the bazar crying, " Zfere iz! 
 memsahib ! Here iz .'"... 
 
 So let us go our several ways. This is a dusty world. We 
 drop down the river with the tide to-night. We shall not see 
 the red tulip blossoms of the silk cottons fall again. 
 
 THE END. 
 
Notes 
 
 Abbreviations 
 
 C&W First English edition of The Simple Adventures of a Memsahib (Lon- 
 don: Chatto & Windus, 1893) 
 
 O.E.D. Oxford English Dictionary 
 
 P. 1 Facilities for transportation: "The term ['Fishing Fleet'] originated 
 
 early in the nineteenth century when unmarried women were reg- 
 ularly shipped out in batches to meet the demand for wives" 
 (Charles Allen, Raj: A Scrapbook of British India 1877-1947, p. 23). 
 
 P. 2 Zenanas: "1. . . an East Indian harem. 3. attrib., esp. of missionary 
 
 work carried on by Christian women among native women in In- 
 dia" (O.E.D.). 
 
 Cold weather, hot weather: the climate impelled Anglo-Indians to 
 divide the year into "the cold weather" (Oaober-March), "the hot 
 weather" (March to mid-June), and "the rains" (June-October). 
 Cf pp. HI, 168, 214-15, 248-54. Calcutta has "probably the 
 filthiest climate on earth" (Geoffrey Moorhouse, Calcutta, p. II). 
 During the "hot weather," Simla replaced Calcutta as the capital of 
 British India. 
 
 P. 10 P. and O.: "The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Com- 
 
 pany was always reckoned to be the smartest of lines; it was the 
 oldest, it carried the mails, and it never took dogs on board" 
 (Allen, Raj, p. 22). 
 
 P. 12 Y.W.C.T.U.: Young Woman's Christian Temperance Union 
 
 P. 20 Moody and Sankey: Dwight Lyman Moody and Ira Sankey were 
 
 late nineteenth century American evangelists whose collections of 
 gospel hymns were very popular. Hymns Ancient and Modem 
 (1 86 1) was edited by the Rev. Sir Henry Williams Baker, a Church 
 of England vicar. 
 
 P. 21 The Army and Navy Stores: the chief outfitter for those travelling 
 
 to India or other tropical areas of the Empire. 
 
 P. 23 Lascars: "An East Indian sailor" (O.E.D.) 
 
 P. 30 Small flirtations: Duncan writes about such shipboard relation- 
 
 ships in her short story "A Mother in India" (published in The 
 Pool in the Desert [1903]). 
 
 P. 31 Tiffin: the Anglo-Indian terra for lunch. 
 
 P. 32 "About four annas in the rupee": An allusion to the mixture of 
 
 races in the Eurasians, who were scorned by the British. Cf. pp. 
 117-18. In Charles Allen's oral history. Plain TaUs from the Raj, 
 Iris Portal recalls: "I took the conventional attitude which every- 
 body took — even enlightened people like my parents — of making 
 jokes about 'blackie-whites' and 'twelve annas in the rupee.'" 
 
 P. 33 Bulwer's Last Days: Bulwer-Lytton's The Last Days of Pompeii 
 
 (1834) was an enormously popular historical romance. 
 
p. 36 Liberty muslin: the well-known London shop founded by Arthur 
 
 Liberty in 1875. "The ventures made by Liberty in the field of 
 printed fabrics have. . . secured the shop's reputation" (Philippe 
 Gamer, The World of Edwardiana, p. 38). 
 
 P. 41 Karaits: "a very poisonous snake" (C&W foot-note). 
 
 P. 42 Khansamah: "butler" (C&W note). 
 
 P. 46 Box- wallah: the term was also used by officials to refer derogato- 
 
 rily to members of the mercantile class, like George Browne him- 
 self. 
 
 P. 49 Clark Russell (1844-1911) "wrote some sixty tales of nautical ad- 
 
 venture" (Harvey's Oxford Companion to English Literature). 
 
 The Pioneer: Anglo-Indian newspaper published in Allahabad. 
 Kipling worked for it in the late 1880s. 
 
 P. 50 Lord Lytton: either Bulwer-Lytton (see note to p. 33) who became 
 
 Baron Lytton in 1866, or his son, 1st Earl of Lytton, who was both 
 a poet and also Viceroy of India (1876-80). 
 
 Exeter Hall: a public hall in London; "the capital of Evangelical 
 Puritanism" (Walter Houghton, The Victorian Frame of Mind, p. 
 219). 
 
 P. 51 HB: C&W has "PB," presumably Peachey-Browne instead of 
 
 Helen Browne. 
 
 P. 52 Dhoty: "native loincloth" (C&W note). "Hal": "Yes" (C&W note). 
 
 P. 53 Bustee: "collection of native houses" (C&W note). Cf. pp. 161-62. 
 
 Bustees still exist as "an awful fact of life throughout the metropol- 
 itan area of Calcutta" (Moorhouse, Calcutta, p. 85). 
 
 P. 54 Godown: "a warehouse or store for goods in India" (O.E.D.). 
 
 P. 55 Punkah-wallah: "a native Indian servant who works a punkah." 
 
 Punkah: "A large swinging fan made of cloth stretched on a rec- 
 tangular frame, suspended from the ceiling or rafters, and worked 
 by a cord" (O.E.D.). The punkah-wallah makes a memorable sym- 
 bolic appearance in the courtroom scene of A Passage to India. 
 
 P. 56 Dhol-bat: "boiled rice and pulses" (C&W note). 
 
 P. 60 Waler: "Australian horse" (C&W note), known for size and sturdi- 
 
 ness. 
 
 Maidan: "An open space in or near a town; an esplanade or 
 parade-ground" (O.E.D.). Cf. pp. 255-56. The celebrated Calcutta 
 Maidan occupies two square miles. "Quite remarkably, when you 
 consider what has become of this pullulating dty, the Maidan feels 
 like a very wide open space" (Moorhouse, Calcutta, p. 214). 
 
 Seer: "Two pounds" (C&W note). Pice: "farthing" (C&W note). 
 
 P. 61 Baboo: Native clerk. Cf pp. 199-201. "Babu jokes. . . were a con- 
 
 stant source of amusement for all Anglo-India" (Allen, Plain Tales 
 from the Raj, p. 198). 
 
 Pukka: proper, genuine. Cf. p. 111. 
 
p. 71 Ten rupees: The salaries paid by the Brownes correspond very 
 
 closely to the table of suggested wages in Flora Steel's The Complete 
 Indian Housekeeper and Cook (1898). The chart is reproduced in 
 Allen, Raj: A Scrapbook, p. 63. 
 
 P. 78 Grain and grass: C&W has "gram," which it foot-notes as "crushed 
 
 food for horses." 
 
 P. 81 Botde khana: "scullery" (C&W note). 
 
 P. 84 Bauarchi khana: Elizabeth David, in Spices, Salts and Aromatics in the 
 
 English Kitchen, quotes a Victorian Anglo-Indian colonel's lament 
 that "the chamber set apart for the preparation of our food is. . . 
 the foulest in our premises." Half a century later, David found 
 that "the kitchens were still unbelievably primitive" (pp. 160-61). 
 
 P. 113 The Chronicles of Dustypore, A Tale of Modem Anglo-Indian Society 
 (1875) is praised by Susanna Howe (Novels of Empire, p. 48), as an 
 "amusingly satirical novel. . . one of the few humorous novels on 
 the too sad Indian question." 
 
 P. 117 Saturday Club: "If he was in commerce the first club which the 
 young man joined was the Saturday Club, which was a social club 
 for dancing and squash and swimming and a generally active so- 
 cial life" (Allen, Plain Tales, p. 101). 
 
 P. 126 Darwaza bund: not at home to visitors. 
 
 P. 127 A litUe of the tar-brush: "i.e. of negro or Indian blood, showing it- 
 self in the complexion" (O.E.D.). 
 
 P. 131 It affixes a tag: "The subtleties of the British class system became 
 elaborately codified in the Warrant of Precedence, which was de- 
 signed as an infallible guide to the hierarchy in India, indispensa- 
 ble to the proper arrangement of ceremony, conference, or even 
 of a mere dinner party" (Geoffrey Moorhouse, India Britannica, p. 
 131). Cf. p. 161. 
 
 Pp. 132-3 Covenanted Ones. . . .Unconvenanted Ones: As the novel sug- 
 gests, this was a crucial distinction within the government. In the 
 elite departments, a widow continued to receive her husband's 
 pension after his death. 
 
 P. 139 "We call out, as it were, for condemnation": Accusations of Anglo- 
 Indian immorality and extravagance, going back to the early days 
 of British rule, had been revived with the publication of Kipling's 
 Plain Tales from the Hills. Cf. p. 143. 
 
 Pp. 141-2 Roman punch: A drink made mainly with champagne, and served 
 between courses at Victorian dinner parties. "Its only connection 
 with Rome," the Horizon Cookbook rejrorts, "was its connotation of 
 orgies." 
 
 P. 145 The lack of decent art in India is the background to Duncan's 
 story "An Impossible Ideal" in The Pool in the Desert. 
 
 P. 146 Chowringhee: "fashionable street in Calcutta" (C&W note). Cf. p. 
 156. As far back as 1803, it had been praised as "an entire village 
 of palaces. . . the finest view I ever beheld in my life" (Moorhouse, 
 Calcutta, p. 59). 
 
 P. 147 The ballad of "Paget M.P."; A poem by Kipling. He also wrote a 
 didactic story on the same theme, called "The Enlightenment of 
 Pagett [sic], M.P." 
 
p. 157 Bahadur: apparently a courtesy title, going back to the names of 
 Mughal Emperors. 
 
 Red Road: "laid down especially so that Viceroys and their Em- 
 perors could make a very imperial progress towards their Govern- 
 ment House at the top" (Moorhouse, Calcutta, p. 215). 
 
 P. 158 The Mesdames Mitterjee: the British were very hostile to the In- 
 dian seclusion of women, and regarded the custom as an insuper- 
 able barrier to racial fraternization. It is the subject of Kipling's fa- 
 mous story "Beyond the Pale," which begins: "A man should, 
 whatever happens, keep to his own caste, race and breed." 
 
 P. 165 English flowers: all Anglo-Indians insisted on this "friendly solace 
 of the flowers of home" (p. 166). Duncan told G.B. Burgin (Idler 
 VIII, p. 117) that "the [Brownes'] garden was like ours as nearly 
 as I could describe it. You would be surprised to know how well 
 English flowers grow in India." 
 
 P. 166 Where one dies daily of bronchitis: the disease that killed Duncan, 
 in 1922. 
 
 P. 168 I have known one to be grateful: probably an autobiographical re- 
 mark, since Duncan first came to India as a globe-trotting journal- 
 ist. 
 
 P. 169 Lord Randolph Churchill: Sir Winston's father, and himself a 
 prominent late Victorian politician, he visited India in 1884-85, 
 but never returned. A chronic illness, still not clearly understood 
 today, worsened dramatically in 1892, and put an end to exotic 
 travel. 
 
 P. 171 Pamell was dead: Charles Stewart Pamell, the Irish Nationalist 
 leader, died on October 6, 1891. Presumably, Mr. Batcham thinks 
 India lags behind current events. 
 
 P. 179 Factories Act: Several Factory Acts passed by the British Parlia- 
 ment in the course of the nineteenth century made working con- 
 ditions progressively more humane. Duncan's satire is undercut by 
 the fact that the British government did institute a Faaory Art for 
 India in 1891 (S. Copal, British Policy in India 1858-1905, p. 214). 
 
 P. 194 Mrs. Hauksbees: the flirtatious protagonist of several Kipling sto- 
 ries (see Introdurtion). 
 
 P. 195 Bastinado: "An Eastern method of punishment, by beating with a 
 sdck the soles of the culprit's feet" (O.E.D.). 
 
 P. 199 Lord Kimberley: John Woodhouse, 1st Earl of Kimberley (1826- 
 1902), a Liberal politician, was Secretary of State for India three 
 times; he last occupied the post between 1892 and 1894 (Dictionary 
 of National Biography). 
 
 P. 201 Cholera: the chronic Anglo-Indian complaint about the dangers 
 of sudden death goes back a long time (Cf. Lady West's 1823 di- 
 ary: "These frequent sudden deaths make one tremble. The last 
 year they have been quite awful." Quoted in Hilton Brown ed., 
 The Sahibs). Rather ghoulishly, Duncan told her interviewer, G.B. 
 Burgin, that "tragic chance" added to the "abundance of material 
 in Anglo-Indian life" for the writer. 
 
 P. 202 Unconvenanted: Cf. note on this issue, pp. 132-33. 
 
p. 203 That man Besant: Sir Walter Besant (1836-1901) was a prolific 
 and popular novelist whose fiction often dealt with social ques- 
 tions. 
 
 Mdlle BashkirtsefF: Russian painter and diarist (1860-84). Her 
 Journal was published in Paris in 1887, and was translated into 
 English in 1890. It has Just been reprinted by Virago Press. 
 
 P. 204 Purdah: in this sense, a curtain. 
 
 Trichinopoly: "'a cigar fitjm Trichinopoli, a city in the Madras 
 presidency" (O.E.D.). 
 
 P. 206 Park-street: Now "a combination of honky-tonk and urbane shop- 
 ping centre" (Moorhouse, Calcutta, p. 143), it was then a fashiona- 
 ble address, and therefore a step upward for the Brownes. 
 
 P. 208 Permanent Settlement: a tax system based on collecting revenue 
 from the Zemindars, or land-owning class, instituted in 1793. 
 
 Our right to occupy the Pamirs: this mountain range was re- 
 garded as a potential Russian invasion route, and was the subject 
 of negotiations (1892-95) between the British and Russian govern- 
 ments. 
 
 P. 219 Tertium Quiddism: "something (indefinite or left undefined) re- 
 lated in some way to two (definite or known) things, but distinct 
 from both" (O.E.D.). Aptly applied to the triangular relationship 
 just described. 
 
 P. 232 Dick: "annoyance" (C&W note). Gup: "gossip" (C&W note). Naut- 
 ches: "dances" (C&W note). 
 
 P. 236 Beady simpkin: "champagne; Anglo-Indian colloquialism'' (Eric 
 Partridge, Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English). 
 
 Pegs: "A drink; esp. of brandy and soda-water. Chiefly in Anglo- 
 Indian slang" (O.E.D.). Allen, Plain Tales, identifies the alcoholic 
 ingredient as Scotch. 
 
 P. 238 S.P.G.: Society for the Propogation of the Gospel. 
 
 P. 242 Tommy Atkins: "familiar form of Thomas Atkins, as a name for 
 the typical private soldier" (O.E.D.). Kipling's poem "Tommy" 
 ("God bless you. Tommy Atkins") dates from 1892; the first re- 
 corded usage is 1883. 
 
 P. 246 John Company: "jocular appelation of the East India Company, 
 taken over from the name Jan Kompanie, by which the Dutch East 
 India Company, and now the Dutch government, are known to 
 natives in the East" (O.E.D.). 
 
 P. 250 Ryot: "an Indian peasant, husbandman, or cultivating tenant" 
 (O.E.D.). 
 
 Lakshmi: "Goddess of prosperity and good fortune" (Nancy 
 Wilson Ross, Three Ways of Asian Wisdom, p. 62). 
 
 P. 251 Adjutant: "a gigantic species of stork native to India" (O.E.D.). 
 
 Lord Lawrence: John Lawrence, 1st Baron (1811-79), prominent 
 in the suppression of the Mutiny, and Viceroy 1863-69. The statue 
 is one of many in honour of British heroes once on the Maidan; 
 all have been removed (Moorhouse, Calcutta, p. 215). 
 
 P. 253 Bunnias: "native merchants" (C&W note). 
 
p. 258 The Mikado: first performed in 1885. The nightly band selections 
 were announced in Calcutta newspapers. 
 
 P. 263 Zemindar: land-owner. The link between the ryot and the Raj. 
 
 P. 265 Lucknow, with her tragedy: during the Mutiny, the Residency at 
 Lucknow was under siege from the end of June to November, 
 1857. 
 
 P. 270 Bul-bul sings love songs in Persian: a renowned Oriental songbird, 
 "frequendy mentioned in Persian poetry" (Columbia Encyclopedia). 
 
 P. 305 Her return ticket: "those who returned without husbands or fi- 
 ances were known as 'Returned Empties."' Allen, Raj: A Scrapbook, 
 p. 23.