ood our host's bungalow.

We spent a week at Udaipur--a happy week, whose short days flew by far too
quickly. The weather was splendid; hot in the middle of the day--for the
season is late, and the monsoon has greatly failed in its cooling
duty--but delightful in morning and evening.

Rising one morning at early dawn, before the sun leaped above the eastern
hills, we took boat and rowed to one of the island palaces, where, after
fishing for mahseer, we breakfasted on a marble balcony overlooking the
ripples of the Pichola Lake, which lapped the feet of a group of great
marble elephants.

Not the least interesting expedition was to the south end of the lake one
afternoon to see the wild pigs fed. Traversing the whole length of the
Pichola, past the marble ghats where the crimson-clad women washed and
chattered, while above them rose the roofs and temple domes of the fairy
city culminating in the walls and pinnacles of the palace--past the fleet
of queer green barges wherein the Maharana disports himself when
aquatically inclined, we left the many islands marble-crowned on our right;
and finally landed at a little jutting ledge of rock, whence a jungle
track led us in a few minutes to a terrace overlooking a rocky and steep
slope which fell away from the building near which we stood. The scene was
surprising! Hundreds of swine of all sorts and sizes, from grim slab-sided,
gaunt-headed old boars, whose ancient tusks showed menacing, to the
liveliest and sprightliest of little pigs playing hide-and-seek among
their staid relatives, were collected from the neighbouring jungle to
scramble for the daily dole of grain spread for them by the Maharana.

A cloud of dust rose thick in the air, stirred up by the busy feet and
snouts of the multitude, and grunts and squeals were loud and frequent as
a frisky party of younglings in their play would heedlessly bump up
against some short-tempered old boar, who in his turn would angrily butt a
too venturesome rival in the wind and send him, expostulating noisily,
down the hill!

Beyond the crowd of swine on the edge of the clearing, a few peacocks,
attracted by the prospect of a meal, held themselves strictly aloof from
the vulgar herd.

The whole city of Udaipur is a paradise for the artist--not a corner, not
a creature which does not seem to cry aloud to be painted. The only
difficulty in such _embarras de richesses_ of subject and such scantiness
of time, is to decide what not t