'May they keep them?' and then laughed with Mr. E. at his knowing exactly what the English would say. This evening the Bombay extra arrived with news to the 27th of October; all good news.

X. and

Wednesday, Jan. 16.

Besides the overland letters this has been a great day of idle business for G. and his staff. F. and I left the camp at the usual time, and a bitter nasty day it was; a regular thick Indian fog. We rode most part of the way with Captain 'Frump,' Esq., as we always call him, not but what he is rather a pleasant man, but he frumps things in general, and wears a rough coat and stern-looking gloves, and never can see the fun of anything, and his name begins with an F., so I think it very likely he was christened Frump.' He was remarkably frumpish with the fog, which almost blinded us till the sun rose.. The unhappy G. remained with his staff to breakfast at seven, and then set off in full dress to return Putteealah's visit. He gave them magnificent presents, amongst others a horse with a gold howdah, and caparisoned like an elephant, and it sticks out its leg for the rider to mount by just as an elephant does. The little howdah

would make Chance's establishment quite complete, but the idea of presenting it to him has not yet crossed C.'s mind apparently. From that Durbar they came on to the camp, and were met by the old Rajah of Nabun, a Sikh chief, and a fine-looking old creature, and he brought G. home. Then they dressed, and at two, had to full-dress again for a Durbar to this old creature, and he asked G. to bring us in the evening to see his garden, so the gentlemen had to put on their uniforms a third time. Towards dusk, young Nabun (Nabun junior) came to fetch us, and we all scuttled along on elephants to a very ugly dilapidated garden, lit up in an elaborate manner, where the old man met us, but could hardly walk from age. A. and Mr. C. kept charging G. on no account to sit down, as the Rajah was not of sufficient rank to receive a visit from the Governor-General, and G. kept declaring that he knew he should sit down at 1 st, o he might as well do it at once. How

r, they would not hear of it, but kept walking him about; and the old man went up into a garden house to rest, while the son did the honours. Then G. would go up to this house, and then up the steps, A. and C. objurgating him

all the while; then the cunning old Nabun asked him to look at the paintings in the room. A. and C. grew desperate, and said the pictures were very improper. G. declared they were very pretty; and so we all went in and found a whole row of chairs, and a select assortment of Nautch girls. G. sank down on one side of the Rajah and told me to sit on the other, and so ended the advice of A. and C., and Nabun now thinks himself as good as Putteealah. That is the great result of this great measure, and C.'s hurt feelings were soothed by a pair of diamond bracelets that the old man gave me, and which I delivered to him. A large display of fireworks took place, and we came home in the dark.

Thursday, Jan. 17.

A rainy miserable sort of day, but not bad enough to prevent the tents from moving. We had several of the camp to dinner. St. Cloup is longing for our arrival at Kurnaul, that he may vary his cookery a little. We cannot kill a cow in the face of all these Sikhs, and at Simla the natives do not like it; so it is a long time since we have had the luxury of a beef-steak or a veal cutlet.

CHAPTER V.

Soonair, Friday, Jan. 18, 1839.

WE halt here till Monday. There is a great gathering of petty chiefs, and our arrival was very pretty. Each man came on his elephant, with a few wild followers on horseback, some with a second elephant, and they all scramble up to G., every individual giving him a bow and arrows, or a matchlock. His hand was soon full, then his howdah was hung with them; the hirkaru behind was buried in bows; then they boiled over into our howdahs, and at every break in the road a fresh chief and more bows appeared.

At last we came to Mr. E. bringing the Nahun Rajah. Don't you in your ignorance go and confound him with the old Nabun Rajah. This is the Nahun chief whom we visited last year in the hills, and who is very gentleman-like and civilised. I have found out why I was so glad to see him again. He has light blue eyes, and after three years of those enormous black

beads the natives habitually see with, these were mild and refreshing. They all brought us to the camp in a drizzling rain, which came on to a pour in the course of the day, and a wretched business it always is. All the servants and camp followers look so miserable and catch such bad colds. I thought when we were at Nabun that an old man, a sort of prime minister of the Rajah's, would make a good drawing, and I told him so; and to-day he arrived, having made two marches to have the picture drawn. He gave me his matchlock, which I asked Captain D. to return with the usual speech, that it was much better in his hands than mine; but the old man said no; it was a particularly good matchlock; he had shot with it very often, and I should not easily find so good a one, so C. gave me a watch to present to him in exchange, which quite delighted him. While Captain L. E. was gone to fetch the watch, the old man took the opportunity to question my jemadar about our habits, and I understood enough of the language to make out that he was asking how many times we eat in the day. The natives generally only eat once, but I believe they think our way of eating at several different times rather grand;