ttle island in a vast sea of matting, and there are two large
wardrobes, what they call _almirahs_, a dressing-table, and two
chairs. It is empty and airy, and that is all that is required of a
bedroom.

The four houses, as I told you, stand in a compound. It isn't exactly
a garden, for there are lots of things in it that we would consider
quite superfluous in a self-respecting garden. There is a good tennis
lawn, plots of flowers, trimly-kept walks bordered with poinsettias,
and trees with white, heavily-scented flowers, and opposite my bedroom
is a little stone-paved enclosure where two cows and two calves lead
a calm and meditative existence! And further, there are funny little
huts scattered about where one catches glimpses of natives at their
devotions or slumbering peacefully. Imagine in the middle of a garden
at home coming on a cowhouse or a shanty! But this is India.

Boggley conducted me round, both of us talking hard all the time. He
had so many questions to ask and I had so much to tell: all the home
news and silly little home jokes--Peter's latest sayings--things that
are so amusing to tell and to hear but lose all their flavour written.
You remember Boggley's wild bursts of laughter? He laughs just the
same now, throws his head back and shouts in the most whole-hearted
way. We talked from 11 a.m. till tea-time without a break--talked
ourselves hoarse and thirsty. After tea we drove on the Maidan, up
and down the Red Road in an unending stream of carriages and motors,
shabby _tikka-gharries_ and smart little dogcarts (called here
tum-tums)--all Calcutta taking the air. One might almost have imagined
oneself in the Park, if it had not been that now and again a strange
equipage would pass filled with natives, men and boys gorgeous in
purple and scarlet and gold, or closed carriages like boxes on wheels,
in which sat dark-skinned women demurely veiled. From the Red Road we
drove to the Strand, a carriage-way by the river where the great
ships lie, and watched the sun set and the spars and masts become
silhouetted against the red sky. Then darkness fell almost at once.

My mind was a chaos when I went to bed after my first day in India,
and I slept so soundly that when I woke I had no idea where I was. All
re-collections of the voyage and arrival were wiped from my memory and
I was filled first with vague astonishment and then with horror to
find myself surrounded by filmy white stuff through which peered a