ed a little, and felt in our
hearts we would wish to see the bride and bridegroom's friends and
relations about them. The best man came soon, and the bridegroom's
colonel, and made an audience of four, not counting the minister; and
the somewhat lonely pair stood before him, with the punkah above them,
and the sun streamed through latticed windows and a modest bit of
stained glass, and they were joined for better and no worse I am sure.
Then the minister opened a little paste board box someone had sent from
home, and out came a little rice, and we four got a little each and
threw it very carefully, two or three grains at a time so as not to
miss. The bride had a dainty sprig of white heather in a brooch of a
lion's collar bone, and was dressed in white and had a very becoming
rose from home, and the sea, on her cheeks. As we prayed I made a sketch
of them for her sister at home. Then they and the witnesses signed their
names, and where their hands and wrists touched the vestry table there
was a tiny puddle, and yet this is what they call "cold weather" here!

We met the bride and bridegroom later at lunch, and we drank to each
other's health in pegs of lemon squash after the latest fashion East of
Suez.

"It was a wee, wee waddin'
In a far, far toon,"

and it's far awayness from friends and relatives and their own country
was rather pathetic, even though the pair looked so handsome and happy.

We drove back more leisurely and marvelled at the innumerable lovely
groups in streets and by-ways, the flicker of light through banyan trees
on white-robed figures, the little carts with big wooden wheels and
small oxen and sharp big shadows, and we stopped to watch a splendid
group of men washing clothes, a dozen or more naked brown statues
against a white low wall, water splashing over them and round them,
flecks of sun and shadows coming through the leaves--I suppose these
were natives from the north as they had good legs. I must try and put
that down this afternoon if I can, and bring in the hedge of convolvulus
with lilac blooms behind and the hoody crows dancing round; then past
lines of pretty horses and tents and officers and ladies at lunch. At
our lunch at the Taj we bade good-bye to five friends, R. and D. for
Bangalore, Mrs D. C. for the north, and our newly-married pair for
Baroda. So G. and I and Mr and Mrs H. remain out of our table on board
ship; the H.'s stay for a time at the Taj and tell us so much