We now began to look out with some anxiety for the arrival of the
steamer at Bombay, speculating upon the chances of finding friends
able to receive us. As we drew nearer and nearer, the recollection of
the good hotels which had opened their hospitable doors for us in
the most unpromising places, caused us to lament over the absence of
similar establishments at the scene of our destination. Bombay has
been aptly denominated the landing-place of India; numbers of persons
who have no acquaintance upon the island pass through it on their way
to Bengal, or to the provinces, and if arriving by the Red Sea, are
totally unprovided with the means of making themselves comfortable in
the tents that may be hired upon their landing.

A tent, to a stranger in India, appears to be the most forlorn
residence imaginable, and many cannot be reconciled to it, even
after long custom. To those, however, who do not succeed in obtaining
invitations to private houses, a tent is the only resource. It seems
scarcely possible that the number of persons, who are obliged to
live under canvas on the Esplanade, would not prefer apartments at a
respectable hotel, if one should be erected for the purpose; yet it
is said that such an establishment would not answer. Bombay can never
obtain the pre-eminence over Calcutta, which it is so anxious to
accomplish, until it will provide the accommodation for visitors which
the City of Palaces has afforded during several years past. However
agreeable the overland journey may be, it cannot be performed without
considerable fatigue.

The voyage down the Red Sea, in warm weather especially, occasions
a strong desire for rest; even those persons, therefore, who are so
fortunate as to be carried off to friends' houses, immediately upon
their arrival, would much prefer the comfort and seclusion of a
hotel, for the first day or two at least. The idea of going amongst
strangers, travel-soiled and travel-worn, is anything but agreeable,
more particularly with the consciousness that a week's baths will
scarcely suffice to remove the coal-dust collected in the steamers of
the Red Sea: for my own part, I contemplated with almost equal alarm
the prospect of presenting myself immediately upon the termination of
my voyage, or of being left, on the charge of eight rupees _per diem_,
to the tender mercies of the vessel.

We entered the harbour of Bombay in the evening of the 29th of
October, too late to contemplate the beaut