I was delighted at the prospect of seeing one quite close at hand.  I pictured a strong still man with a beard, soft fat hands, and a sob in his voice that, at election times, would touch the great, deep throbbing Heart of the People.  Instead, I beheld a small, thin man, with eyes as tired as any of the poor sun-dried bureaucrats, and a wide mouth with a humorous twitch at the corners; a man one couldn’t imagine wanting to touch anything so silly as the Heart of the People.  He talked, I noticed, very little during dinner, but the men were unusually long in joining us afterwards, and as Boggley clambered after me into the tikka-gharry that was to take us home:  “That’s a ripping fellow!” said Boggley.

Another illusion shattered!

I hasten to set your mind at rest on one point.  I have a chaperon, and a very nice, though entirely unnecessary, one.  Her name is Mrs. Victor Ormonde, and she knows my people at home; that is why she bothers with me.  She is a most attractive woman to look at, tall, dark and slender, with the dearest little turned-up nose, which makes her look rather impertinent, and she is a little inclined to be sniffy to some people; she considers Calcutta women suburban!  Her husband is quite different, friends with everyone, a cheerful soul and as Irish as he can be.  He is very fond of chaffing his exclusive wife.  “Now do be affable,” he implored her the other night, before they went to a large and somewhat mixed gathering.  “And was she affable?” I asked next morning.  “Oh! rollin’ about on the floor,” was the obviously untrue reply.

You ask how I like the Anglo-Indian women, and I don’t know quite what to say.  It is the old story.  When they are nice they are very, very nice, but when they are nasty they are horrid.  Some of them I simply hate.  They give me such nasty little stabs the while they smile and pretend to be pleasant!

I am quite capable of giving back as good as I get, but it isn’t worth while, because if one does yield to the temptation, afterwards one feels such a worm.  There is no doubt it is more difficult in India than at home to obey the command of one’s childhood:  “to behave pretty and be a lady.”  What is a lady exactly?  I used to be told that a lady was one who always said “please” when asking for more bread-and-butter, and who never bit the fingers of her gloves.  That was simple.  “And what’ll I be if I’m not a lady?” I asked.  “You’ll be common,” said the nurse severely, and then and there, because snatched bread-and-butter was sweet and gloves chewed in secret pleasant, I registered a vow that common I would be.  A dear little lady I met the other day, talking about her sister Mem-sahibs, said airily, “Of course we very soon lose complexions, manners, and morals.”  She could afford to say so, it being so obviously untrue in her case.  I think it is just this, that the women who are pure gold grow more charming, but the pinch-beck wears off very