“Much odder,” Boggley retorts, “that you should have become such a little backbiting cat!  You’ll soon be as bad as old Mother Brodie, and she’s the worst in Calcutta.”

This is the Christmas mail, and I have written sixteen letters, but I can’t send presents except to Mother and some girls, for I haven’t seen a single thing suitable for a man.  Poor Peter wailed for a monkey or a mongoose, but I told him to wait till I came home and I would do my best to bring one or both.

I can only send you greetings from a far country.

You know you will never be better than I wish you.

Calcutta, Dec. 10.

Dear Mr. Oliver Twist,—­I really don’t think I can write longer letters.  They seem to me very long indeed.  I am not ashamed of their length, but I am ashamed, especially when I read yours, of their dullness and of the poverty-stricken attempt at description.  How is it that you can make your little German town fascinating, when I can only make this vast, stupefying India sound dull?  It wouldn’t sound dull if I were telling you about it by word of mouth.  I could make you see it then; but what can a poor uninspired one do with a pen, some ink, and a sheet of paper?

I have been employing a shining hour by paying calls.  You must know that in India the new arrival does not sit and wait to be called on, she up and calls first.  It is quite simple.  You call your carriage—­or, if you haven’t aspired to a carriage, the humble, useful tikka-gharry—­and drive away to the first house on the list, where you ask the durwan at the gate for bokkus.  If the lady is not receiving, he brings out a wooden box with the inscription “Mrs. What’s-her-name Not at home,” you drop in your cards, and drive on to the next.  If the box is not out, then the durwan, taking the cards, goes in to ask if his mistress is receiving, and comes back with her salaams, and that means that one has to go in for a few minutes, but it doesn’t often happen.  The funny part of it is one may have hundreds of people on one’s visiting list and not know half of them by sight, because of the convenient system of the “Not-at-home” box.

The men’s calling-time is Sunday between twelve and two.  Such a ridiculous time!  One is certainly not at one’s best at that hour.  Isn’t it the Irish R.M. who talks of that blank time of day when breakfast has died within one and lunch is not yet?  I find it, on the whole, entertaining, though somewhat trying; for Boggley, you see, has to be out paying calls on his own account, and so I have to receive my visitors alone.  It is quite like a game.

A servant comes in and presents me with a card inscribed with a name unfamiliar, and I, saying something that sounds like “Salaam do,” wait breathless for what may appear.  A man comes in.  We converse.

I begin:  “Where will you sit?” (As there are only four chairs in the room, the choice is not extensive.)