h they say like a man. Oh! excellent
speech. They must be tired--poor people--hear they were very pleased
with our decorations. Well, you know they weren't bad, were they?" Of
course the "excellent speech" was Lord Curzon's farewell, and "They"
stands for their Royal Highnesses.

I noticed some Parsi ladies rather better looking than I had already
seen. One was really beautiful, allowing a decimal point off her nose.
This beauty moved briskly and firmly and had eyes to see and be seen.
Many of them have slightly hen-like expressions and wear glasses and
carry their shoulders too high. As they are the only native women who
appear in public they naturally draw your attention. The Hindoos and
Mohammedans shut their women up at home and glower on yours; but the
Parsi goes about with his wife and daughters with him in public, and
therefore enlists your sympathy. These Parsis were driven from Persia in
pre-Mohammedan times by religious persecution. I suppose their belief
was akin to our old religion which the masterful Columba rang out of
Iona. I don't think I have seen any men on apparently such friendly
relations with their women and children. You see them everywhere in
Bombay, often in family groups, their expressions beyond being clever,
perhaps shrewd, are essentially those of gentlemen and gentlewomen.[6]
The only other native women I have seen have their mouths so horribly
red with betel nut and red saliva that you dare not look at them twice,
so perhaps it is as well that their absence is so conspicuous.

[6] The strength of intellectual capacity added to the material wealth
which is possessed by this community have given it abnormal prominence,
the measure of which may be estimated by the fact that out of a total of
287,000,000 inhabitants of India, the Parsis do not number even
one-tenth of a million. _See_ Sir Thomas Holdich's "India."

I need hardly say that Mrs H. and G. were the most beautifully dressed
ladies in the crowd, and made the most perfect curtseys, and H. and I
the most elegant bows to the Viceroy and Vicereine. They stood on a
dais, and as we passed in file we were introduced, and the Viceroy
bobbed and Lady Minto looked and smiled a little, just as if she knew
your name and about you and saw more than men as trees walking, and we
bowed and went on, thinking it nice to see people in so great and
responsible a position attending to the little details so well, not
forgetting that many littles make a