for cabin use on board
ship, and a gun-case each. This we afterwards found ample to contain
all the necessaries required.

On the evening, then, of the 13th of April, we stood on the platform
of the Charing Cross Station, awaiting the departure of the mail train
for Dover, and--our luggage duly registered for Paris--we ensconced
ourselves in a smoking-carriage, and lit up the fragrant weed, not
sorry that we were really off at last.

Our journey to Paris was pleasant enough--a quick run to Dover, a
smooth moonlit passage to Calais, a sound sleep in a comfortable
_coupe lit_, and we awoke to find Paris around us, white and cheerful
in the bright spring sunshine. Putting up at Meurice's Hotel, three
days were enjoyably spent here, and on the 17th we left for
Marseilles, which was reached at 6.30 a.m. on the 18th, after a
tedious journey of twenty hours. We at once drove to the ship, on
alighting at the railway station, not forgetting to purchase on our
way through the town those essentials on a long sea voyage, a couple
of cane easy-chairs.

On arrival at the quay we found active preparations for departure
going on, as the ship was to sail at 10 o'clock a.m.; and, being
Sunday, she was thronged with holiday-makers, who had come to see her
off. Having got on board, we dived below and installed ourselves in a
comfortable and roomy cabin (which we were lucky enough to get to
ourselves the entire voyage), and returned on deck to watch the busy
scene. The hubbub and the noise were deafening, for the squeakings of
some sixty or seventy pigs, which were being hoisted on board a vessel
alongside bound for Barcelona, added to the din, and combined to make
what the French would call "_un vacarme infernal_."

By 9.30, however, decks were cleared of all but passengers, and at 10
precisely hawsers were cast off, and we steamed out of harbour.

Our vessel, the _Sindh_, was a very fine one of over 3,000 tons
burthen, and our fellow-passengers chiefly Dutch and Spanish bound for
the Eastern Archipelago and Manilla, a few French, and but seven
English including ourselves. Among the latter was an individual who is
usually to be met with on the ships of the P. & O. Company and those
of the Messageries Maritimes, though more frequently on the former. L.
and I christened him "The Inevitable," as a voyage to India or China
can rarely be made without coming across him. He is invariably an
Englishman, and my Indian readers will readily re