CHAPTER XLIV
Simla, Tuesday, Oct. 15, 1839.
IT is rather soon to begin again, but habit is everything, and there is a little more to say while the Sikhs are here. Our ball for them last night went off very well. I had the verandahs all closed in with branches of trees, and carpets put down and lamps put up, and the house looked a great deal larger. The chiefs were in splendid gold dresses, and certainly very gentleman-like men. They sat bolt upright on their chairs with their feet dangling, and I dare say suffered agonies from cramp. C. said we saw them amazingly divided between the necessity of listening to G. and their native feelings of not seeming surprised, and their curiosity at men and women dancing together. I think that they learned at least two figures of the quadrilles by heart, for I saw Gholâb Singh, the commander of the Goorcherras, who has been with Europeans before, expounding the dancing to the others.
The two chief sirdars were not even at Lahore when we were there. I thought they might eventually be taught to flirt, and wanted Mr. A. to try and make up a match between the old fakeer and old Miss J., who is between sixty and seventy, and something like the fakeer. Mr. A. was quite willing, but unluckily Miss J. did not come.
Thursday, Oct. 17.
The gentlemen got up some racing yesterday, to which the Sikhs came, and we all went. Racing is one of the few amusements they can enter into, and they were very much amused. G. gave a silver hookah to be run for, and the aides-de-camp a silver cheroot box, &c. The Sikhs saw us drawing a lottery for the races and enquired what it meant, and in their quick way set one up. Lehna Singh sent word to twelve of his guards to start; wrote all their names in Persian on bits of paper, and said with a complacent smile, ‘Lotteree.’
Their races were very funny. They started as fast as the horse could go – no Sikh horse can gallop 100 yards – and then they trotted on, or walked, or stopped; but towards the winning-post the first man always came in waving his whip over his head, looking in a prodigious hurry, with the others at least a quarter of a mile behind. They rode with their heavy shields and helmets on, and one man in chain-armour, which helped to break his horse’s leg. However, G. gave him a new horse, and gave the four winners a pair of shawls each, so they thought English racing quite delightful.
Friday, Oct. 18.
The Sikhs had their farewell durbar to-day. They are in such a fright, poor people! at going back to their disturbed country, that they begged for even one of the Government House hirkarus as a protection. They say they were sent by Kurruck Singh, whose power has now passed into the hands of his son and his minister, and they don’t know what may be done to them when they go back.
Noor Mahal and Dhian Singh called before them the uncle of Cheyt Singh, whose murder I mentioned to you in my last Journal, and after trying to make him confess where some pearls and jewels were hidden, killed him with their own hands, and threw his body out before the palace gate. Another chief, they say, killed himself in prison, but others say they poisoned him. The Punjâb is fast returning to the barbarous state from which Runjeet redeemed it.
The native writer describes it all so like some of the old Jewish troubles. He says: ‘The Maharajah refused comfort, and asked if he were really king, or if the power had left him; and the Koonwur (Noor Mahal) and the Rajah answered, that he was the Lord of the World, and that they were his slaves. The Maharajah went out to take the air on his elephant, and the Koonwur sat behind him and drove the flies from him with a chowry, and the Rajah carried a chattah (an umbrella) over his head’ – and then they came back and imprisoned and beat more of his servants.
We had some more ladies to see the durbar, and the secretaries have become resigned to that innovation, and think it rather improves the appearance of things.
Wednesday, Oct. 23.
P. returned from Cashmere to-day, much sooner than we expected him. He walked into my room just as I was going to dress, and I should not have known him the least if I had met him out of doors. He said he had spoken to several people, who had not made him out at all. His hair is quite long, hanging about his shoulders, and his beard half-way down to his waist. It is a mark of respectability in the countries he has travelled through, but it looks ruffianish here: however, it was rather becoming. P. gives such an account of the shawls that are making for us in Cashmere, and he has brought drawings of them that make one’s shawl-mouth water.
Hurripore, Wednesday, Oct. 30.
There! I have seen the last of poor, dear Simla, except a distant glimpse from the Fir Tree Bungalow, where I shall sleep to-morrow.
This place is so very low, and hot accordingly. I had always settled to make my journey to Barr last four days. More than three hours of a jonpaun knocks me up, and the last three days I have unluckily been ailing. I should not have set off yesterday afternoon, only that my bed and sofa and every atom of clothes had gone on in the morning, and three hours of any pain can be borne. So in spite of a desperate headache, I started for Syree, with Dr. D., Giles, and Wright, meaning to get into bed the moment I arrived. But I had the sad spectacle of my bed set down about half-way, and the coolies smoking and cooking their dinner round it. However, Rosina had made me up a bed on a native charpoy that did to lie and excruciate my head upon, till the bed came up, and the doctor made me up a composing draught; but such a night as I had! I had not tasted anything for thirty-six hours, and about ten an insane desire for a sandwich seized me; so, though I had heard the cooks with all their chattels set off for this place two hours before, I called to the hirkaru who was sleeping at the door, and told him to tell Giles I wanted a sandwich. Hirkarus are good for carrying a note, or a parcel, but are never trusted with a message. After making me repeat sandwich six times, and evidently thinking it meant a friend from England, or some new medicine, I heard him repeating as he walked off round the bungalow, ‘Lady Sahib sant vich muncta’ (muncta meaning ‘wants,’ and the only word that we have all learnt, showing what wanting creatures we are). Giles made up a mixture of leg of chicken and dust, which was satisfying under the circumstances, but still my head raved; and having heard the jackals (which do not exist at Simla) tearing up a dog, I had a vague idea that the sandwich was made of the remains of Chance, which gave it an unpleasant flavour.
Then the Pariah dogs fought, and the A.s’ coolies arrived with all their things and insisted on bringing them into the bungalow.
Then the Paharrees, at least 500 of them, who were resting on the hill, began calling to their friends, 500 more, who were cooking in the valley. One man was calling for his friend Buddooah. ‘Oh! Buddooah! Buddoo!’ to which somebody responded, ‘Oh! Almooah!’ and it was not Almooah who had called; so then the caller began again at the top of his voice: ‘Oh! Buddooah!’ and the answer was, ‘Oh! Culloo!’ but it was not Culloo, by any manner of means; so then he called again, till he had woke every Buddooah in camp, and I don’t believe he ever found the right one at last.
However, I arrived at the conclusion that Buddooah must be Hindustani for ‘Jack,’ it seemed such a common name, and that is a great discovery; and I also settled that, if I had had a stick and no headache, I would have gone and taught that man to carry his own messages, and not stand there screaming all night.
The conclusion of the night was, that a rat ran over my bed and across my throat, and did not the least care for my trying to catch him. We came on early this morning, and my head is beginning to improve.
Fir Tree Bungalow, Friday, Nov. 1.
F. and G. and P. arrived to breakfast to-day, and this afternoon we all go down to our deplorable tents. There is a distant view of Simla from this place, and very pretty it looks. Giles is taking a sentimental farewell of it through a telescope, and lamenting over his lost garden: ‘But one comfort, ma’am, is that I have brought away my favourite gardener to look after your pheasants.’ I am trying to carry down to Calcutta some of the Himalayan pheasants, to be shipped off to your Charlie the moment we arrive.
They are such beautiful creatures, the whole bird of bronzed blue, like the breast of a peacock, except the tail and wings, which are of a reddish brown, and they have a bright green tuft on their heads. I have had some of them two months, and they have grown tame, but at first they are very apt to die of fright. Yesterday, when I took up the last new one to feed it, it fainted away and died soon after. However, I still have five, and they have a snug little house, carried by two men, and a little tent of netting, which is pitched in front of it when we halt, so that they may run in and out without being touched. Every precaution is taken, but still there will be many a slip between this pheasant cup and Charlie’s lip, I am afraid.
CHAPTER XLV
Pinjore, Sunday, Nov. 3, 1839.
YES! we are in for it now. All the old discomfort, and worse; for we left the nice autumnal air blowing at the Fir Tree, with the fern waving and the trees looking red, and brown, and green, and beautiful – and now we are in all our old camel-dust and noise, the thermometer at 90° in the tents, and the punkah going. We received the officers of the escort and their wives, after church, which was hot work, but I am rather glad we have so many ladies in camp: it makes it pleasanter for the gentlemen, and at the different stations it is very popular. Last year there were only F. and me. In ten days, when we shall have a fresh cavalry regiment, there will be at least twenty, and about twelve of them dancers, which is lucky, for we hear of an awful number of balls in prospect.
They were a ladylike set that we saw to-day; one of them a striking likeness of you – a thing that I deny to everybody else, but still I do see it; and perhaps it is better than nothing.
Munny Majra, Monday, Nov. 4.
We began riding part of the march to-day, and the horses go very well, considering they have had a rest for seven months. My horse is such an angel! I really like him with a sort of minor Chance sentiment.
Umballa, Thursday, Nov. 7.
E. N. and Mr. G. met us this morning, and rode in with us, and in the afternoon we went to see E. N.’s house, which he has furnished very nicely, quite in his mother’s style.
A Captain B. arrived from Cabul, with one or two others, and are to march with us to Kurnaul. They all deny the report of the army ever having suffered further distress than a want of wine and cigars, and they are all looking uncommonly fat.
Captain D., of G.’s body-guard, brought back three of the sheep with which he left us last year, and the 16th are bringing back in safety their pack of foxhounds. That does not look like having undergone great privation. Captain B. brought me two shawls from Sir W. C., very pretty ones – at least we should have thought them so, before we were spoiled by plenty.
Shah-i-bad.
Mrs. B. arrived last night to meet her husband. She did not know he was come, so she went straight to E. N.’s bungalow – the usual method with ladies travelling dâk – and he found her there when he went home from dinner.
He said he had given up the house to her and gone into a tent, and that the two little children had arrived with their dear little stomachs much discomposed by the journey, and had spoilt the sofa whose cover I had admired in the morning.
This was the place where I bought my little girls last year, and it is a curious coincidence, that their nominal father, who went to the Punjâb and took service with Shere Singh, has left him, and arrived at this place last night, found Rosina’s tent, woke her up in the middle of the night, and the little girls too, and cried and sobbed and kissed the children, and wanted very much to have them back again. They are so afraid he will carry them off, that they will not lose sight of Rosina for a moment. Shere Singh gave this man a rupee a day to teach his cook English cookery like ours. The man had only waited at our table, so his imitation of an English cuisine must have been faint and nasty.
Thanjou, Saturday, Nov. 9.
The dear overland post came in just as we came off the march, and were sitting in front of the tents, sipping gritty tea, dusty up to the eyes, and with a wretched ‘up-before-breakfast’ feeling, which evinces itself in different manners: X. and Z. sneeze at each other; W. O. smokes a double allowance; F. suffers from hunger; I yawn; G. groans and turns black; the doctor scolds C. because the road was dusty, and A. rushes off to business; but this bad bit was cut short by that packet.
I know so well all you say, dearest, about these weary feelings of life; not that you have any right to them, because you have so many young lives growing up round you – first volumes of novels that you ought to carry on to third volumes.
I have a right to feel vapid and tired and willing to lie down and rest; for during the last four years my life has been essentially an artificial life; and, moreover, from my bad health it is physically fatiguing, and I feel I am flagging much more than I ever expected to do. I should like to see you and to be at home again; but I have no wish to begin a fresh course of life – not from any quarrel with it, for I know nobody who is in fact more spoiled, as far as worldly prosperity goes. I never wish for a thing here that I cannot have, and G., who has always been a sort of idol to me, is, I really think, fonder of me than ever, and more dependent on me, as I am his only confidant. I feel I am of use to him, and that I am in my right place when I am by his side. Moreover, his government here has hitherto been singularly prosperous and his health very good, so that there is nothing outward to find fault with, and much to be thankful for. Still, I have had enough of it, and as people say in ships, there is a difficulty in ‘carrying on.’
‘My blood creeps now only in drops through its courses, and the heart that I had of old, stirs feebly and heavily within me.’ It is the change from youth to age, and made in unfamiliar scenes, so that it is the more felt. I never had any opinion of
The glories serenely adorning the close of our day,
The calm eve of our night;…
and never wanted the caution, —
Nor from the dregs of life hope to receive
What the first sprightly runnings would not give.
The dregs never held out any promise, but the first sprightly runnings gave a good deal more happiness than people generally allow. I am quite sure that you and I feel unusually detached from the future, from having enjoyed our young days so eagerly.
They were very happy lives; and very often, when I am too tired to do anything else, I can think over particular days, with nothing but high spirits to recommend them, that are still quite refreshing. Days when we were making rush-mats in the garden; then your first ‘coming out’ at Oxford, with Lady Grenville; the day Mr. C. gave me my parrot, in what we called a gold cage; then, later on, visits to Longleat, and a sort of humble adoration of Lady B. and Lady G.; and then, of all the fortnights in life I should like to do over again, that fortnight at Burgh; – meeting us on his little black pony, as you brought me back from Thames Ditton, and giving me some heath and some bluebells; and then the fun of peering out of your window, to see him on the lawn. I could draw his picture now quite easily. Then there were some good passages at Neasdon, when T. and E. were such dear, little, small things; so stupid of them to grow up – they should never have consented to pass four years old. However, it is of no use going over these things; only, when you say you are rather tired, I merely answer – so am I!
God bless you, dearest. In two days we shall be at Kurnaul, where we shall halt the rest of the week; such a dusty, hot place. I never meant when I started in life to march three times through Kurnaul. However, it is all on the way home.
CHAPTER XLVI
Camp, Kurnaul, Nov. 13, 1839.
WE arrived here yesterday morning, and it is horrible to think how by constantly campaigning about we have become ‘Kurnaul’s tired denizens.’ This is the third time we have been here; the camp is always pitched in precisely the same place; the camp followers go and cook at their old ashes; Chance roots up the bones he buried last year; we disturb the same ants’ nests; in fact, this is our ‘third Kurnaul season,’ as people would say of London or Bath.
We had the same display of troops on arriving, except that a bright yellow General N. has taken his liver complaint home, and a pale primrose General D., who has been renovating for some years at Bath, has come out to take his place. We were at home in the evening, and it was an immense party, but except that pretty Mrs. J. who was at Simla, and who looked like a star amongst the others, the women were all plain.
I don’t wonder that if a tolerable-looking girl comes up the country that she is persecuted with proposals. There were several gentlemen at Kurnaul avowedly on the look-out for a wife.
That Mrs. – we always called ‘the little corpse’ is still at Kurnaul. She came and sat herself down by me, upon which Mr. K., with great presence of mind, offered me his arm, and asked if I would not like to walk, and said to G. he was taking me away from that corpse. ‘You are quite right,’ G. said; ‘it would be very dangerous sitting on the same sofa; we don’t know what she died of.’
G. gives a great man dinner to-day, which is refreshing to his womenkind, who may dine quietly in their own tents.
Friday, Nov. 15.
There were some races early yesterday morning, to which they expected us to go; so I got up early and went with G., and luckily they were more amusing than most Indian races. Captain Z. revels in a halt at a great station, calls at everybody’s house, eats everybody’s breakfast, and asks himself to dinner everywhere; also rides everybody’s horses, and as, when he is well fed and thickly clothed, he weighs about four pounds, he is a valuable jockey, and he won two races to his great delight.
The last race was run by fifteen of the grasscutters’ ponies, ridden by their owners. These ponies are always skeletons, and their riders wear no great quantity of drapery, partly because they have no means of buying it, and then it is not their custom. They ride without saddles, and go as fast as they can, with their legs and arms flying in the air, looking like spiders riding on ants. One pony which was not particularly lame, was reckoned so very superior, that all the other riders insisted on his carrying two grasscutters, so the poor animal cantered in with two men on his back. I was so sleepy at the ball last night; I had sat two hours by K., knowing I should have to go in to supper with him, and at last, in a fit of desperation, asked Colonel L., one of our camp, to give me his arm. He is a regular misanthrope, and a professed woman-hater, and never even will call on us, though he has to come to the house every day to see G., and he looked astounded at my assurance; however, he bore it very well, and was rather pleasant in a bitter kind of way. We did not get home till past one. To-day we have a small dinner, chiefly of people who have come into camp from a distance.
Sunday, Nov. 17.
We left Kurnaul yesterday morning. Little Mrs. J. was so unhappy at our going, that we asked her to come and pass the day here, and brought her with us. She went from tent to tent and chattered all day, and visited her friend Mrs. – , who is with the camp. I gave her a pink silk gown, and it was altogether a very happy day for her, evidently. It ended in her going back to Kurnaul on my elephant with E. N. by her side, and Mr. J. sitting behind, and she had never been on an elephant before, and thought it delightful. She is very pretty, and a good little thing, apparently, but they are very poor, and she is very young and lively, and if she falls into bad hands, she would soon laugh herself into foolish scrapes. At present the husband and wife are very fond of each other, but a girl who marries at fifteen hardly knows what she likes.
Paniput, Tuesday, Nov. 19.
I am so tired of being always at Paniput; are not you tired of hearing of it? We are constantly dropping in there. There is one European living here, a Mr. – , the image of Jenkins, the dancing-master, for which simple reason we have always liked him. He has no other striking merit, but there is a halo of ‘Prince of Wales’s step’ and ‘the slow movement’ floating round him which is rather interesting.
We went to see his gaol, two miles off, and the first shower of rain of the season chose to come just as we were half-way there, on the elephants. A howdah is a sort of open cage without a top, and nobody had thought of a cloak, so it was a pleasant expedition. Paniput has had several famous battles fought at, or near it, and there is a grand tradition of one battle where 200,000 men fought on each side, and four were left alive. That is something like fighting; but happily it is not true.
Friday, Nov. 22.
We have had two or three most uneventful marches, and Sergeant H., who goes on the day before, always sends back the same report, ‘Road rough and very dusty,’ or to vary it, ‘Road very rough and dusty.’ However, we are always able to ride half of the way, which is a great help.
To-day we came over a wretched road and a bridge with one arch broken and no parapet, and as Sergeant H. reported, ‘Bridge in a worse state, if possible, than last year; quite unsafe for the carriage.’ After we come in to camp, we generally all sit in front of the tents and drink tea. The gentlemen come and ask for a cup and talk over the disasters of the road, and it is rather a gossiping time; particularly when enlivened by Mr. S., who is always like a sharp contradictory character in a farce, but before he has had his breakfast he is perfectly rabid. To-day he began as usual.
‘How slowly you must have come.’
‘The road was so bad,’ I said.
‘Yes, so everybody chooses to say. I thought it the best road we have had, much better than any of C.’s famous smooth roads.’
‘Did you come safely over that bridge?’
‘What was to hinder me? I cannot think why people find fault with that bridge, one of the best bridges I ever saw.’
‘Except that it has a broken arch and no parapet,’ I suggested.
‘Well! nobody wants to drive on a parapet. I think parapets are perfectly useless.’
Then C.’s palanquin went by, and as he was standing with us, Mr. S. took the opportunity of asking, ‘What wretches of children are those, I wonder?’ ‘Mine,’ said C., ‘or you would have had no pleasure in asking.’
It was such nonsense! Little ‘Missey C.’ is the smallest, prettiest little fairy I ever saw, and the pet of the whole camp; they are really beautiful children, and S. knew the palanquin perfectly. I told him at last he was just what our governess used to call ‘a child that had got out of bed the wrong way,’ and recommended his having his breakfast as soon as possible, and he owned, he thought it advisable himself.
Delhi, Monday, Nov. 25.
I am glad to be at dear Delhi again; it is the only place in the plains I have ever seen worth looking at, and it looks grander and more ‘great Babylonish’ than ever. We arrived on Saturday morning and rode in through an immense crowd, for besides all the regiments here, people have come from all parts just to ask for what they can get; appointments are filled up in November, because all the sick people who have been knocked up by the hot season get their furloughs for going home.
G. hates Delhi from the very circumstance of all these applicants. We had an immense party on Saturday evening, and nobody but ourselves knows who composed it.
There were young ladies from Meerut come for the chance of two balls, and all the ladies of our camp, and a great many from Kurnaul, and several young civilians who really had come in from their solitary stations to look for wives.
F. has caught such a cold she cannot go out. We never can settle whether we would rather have a slight illness, or go through all the festivities of a Station.
F. has not tried it before, but she now thinks she prefers the cold, only she has too much pain in her bones.
The people will not tempt us with many pretty things to buy, or else we have grown particular.
Tuesday, Nov. 26.
We had a great dinner yesterday, and G. and I went to the Station ball, which was very well managed. I do not know why one ball should be better than another; as far as the dinners are concerned, I think they are all equally tiresome, but balls do differ.
This was a very dancing business, and we did not get away till one. It went on till three, and I have been obliged to represent to our engaged aides-de-camp how very wrong it is of them to dance three times with the same girl – such a waste of time to all parties.
P. is quite altered since he has been engaged, and will talk and joke and dance in the most débonnair manner. I suggested to him the propriety of my writing to Miss S. about his dancing three times with the same young lady, but he says he danced once under Captain L. E.’s name, and that he got up early to write an account of himself to ‘Clarissa’ this morning, mentioning that he had no pleasure in society whatever!
I have just been to ask G. to give F. and me two rings on which we have fixed our small affections, to which he was quite agreeable; but he had a lavish idea about buying for us two diamond bracelets, that a man from Lucknow has brought. I think that would be rather indefensible. However, they are gone to be valued.