r bathing once you had got accustomed to diving through the
surf. If I go surf-logging again I will take a change of trousers--Got
on shoes, the natives standing three deep to see the Sahib get sand off
his feet, extremely curious but quite polite. The rupee I gave my man
pleased him very much, and the others all wanted to take me out again,
or at least to have a rupee too. They were a nicer, bolder-looking lot
of men than those in the town by a very long chalk.

We then went to another temple that was also worth seeing. There is a
tank near it that would be beautiful, but for a monumentally ugly iron
railing that has recently been put round it. It is distinctly
British--who on earth did it? We were fortunate, for just before coming
to the tank and temple, a christening party of Hindoos in their best
clothes, with yellow flowers in black hair, and priests with long
chanters and tom-toms playing, came out of some houses as we were
passing. In a loosely formed procession they proceeded very slowly to
the temple, the principals in a closed brougham in the middle. It was
just like one of Tadema's pictures on the move--barring the brougham!
The players led the way in white, with the dark wood chanters mounted
with silver bells and mouthpieces, and made music with a little of the
twang of our pipe chanter, but without the continuity and lift or crisp
grace-notes. Young girls, with their faces tinted yellow with saffron,
followed in dull red dresses. Behind the procession were
classical-looking houses, and over these appeared palms and banyan
trees; but in the middle was the prosaic old Waler, and the hired
brougham, which was very distressing, for otherwise the subject was
evidently "artistic," and combined just the proportions of sentiment and
positive colour, which would have insured for its faithful depiction, a
warm reception at any of our Royal Academical Exhibitions--the man in
the street could see that!

[Illustration]

Then home by the wide Marina, and the promenading Eurasians, and
well-to-do traders in carriages. The official people _must_ all be at
the Club and Gymkhana, or at Church. For choice I like the beach in the
morning, the wide sweep of ocean, the full sun on the endless sandy
shores, and the solitude.

This is a jotting, reduced by reproduction, of a native fishing in the
surf--all that I have "creeled" to-day.

... By Jove--it's ten minutes to the New Year--time to think of our
friends and relation