accomplishment, this talent for home-making.  There is one thing I want to say to you.  You know what Robert Louis says about married men?—­that there is no wandering in pleasant bypaths for them, that the road lies long and straight and dusty to the grave.  It dulls me to think of it. Don’t feel that.  Don’t let it be true.  We mustn’t let our lives get dusty and straight and narrow.  We shall love whimsies and we shall laugh.  So long as laughter isn’t heartless and doesn’t hurt anyone it is good to laugh.  Life will see to it that there are tears—­at least I’m told so.  But suppose in years to come, after we have grown used to each other (though it does amaze me that people should talk about things losing their charm because one gets used to them.  Does a child tire of its mother because it is used to her?  Is Spring any the less wonderful because we are used to her coming?  God grant we have many years to get used to each other!)—­suppose one fine morning you find that life has lost its savour, you are tired of the accustomed round, you are tired of the house, you are tired of the look of the furniture, you want to get away for a time—­in a word, to be free.  Well, remember, you are not to feel that the road isn’t clear before you.  I promise you not to feel aggrieved.  I shan’t wonder how my infinite variety could have palled.  I know that all men—­men who are men—­at times hear the Red Gods call them (women hear them too, you know, only they have more self-control; they find their peace in fearful innocence and household laws), and I shall be waiting on the doorstep when you return from climbing Kangchenjunga, or exploring the Bramahputra Gorges, ready to say, “Come away in, for I’m sure you must be tired.”

Arthur, dear, am I a disappointing person, do you find?  Ought I to be able to write you different sorts of letters, tenderer, more loving letters?  But, you see, it wouldn’t be me if I could.  My heart may be, indeed, I think it is, full of the warmest instincts, but they have been unwinged from birth so they can’t fly to you.  One of the most talkative people living, in some ways I am strangely speechless.  Why!  I haven’t even told Boggley, though if he had eyes to see instead of being the blindest of dear old bats, my shining face would betray me.  I keep on smiling in a perfectly imbecile manner, so that people exclaim, “Well, you are indecently glad to get away,” and when they ask Why?  I point them to the scene in the Old Testament where Hadad said unto Pharaoh, “Let me depart, that I may go to mine own country.”  Then Pharaoh said unto him, “But what hast thou lacked with me, that, behold, thou seekest to go to thine own country?” And he answered, “Nothing:  howbeit let me go in any wise.”  So it is with me.  India has given me the best of good times.  I have lacked for nothing—­“howbeit let me go in any wise.”  You needn’t think I am changed.  I’m not.  I’m afraid I’m not.  One would think that a new