Emily Eden

“ I can already feel what the languor is that this climate produces. We have arrived upon the verge of the hot season, and at this hour, with the windows and blinds closed, and the punkahs going, the slightest exertion, even of moving across the room, is a real fatigue. Keeping very quiet, there is, as yet, no suffering from heat, but in a month it will be much greater. Till half past nine or ten in the morning, the air is cool that comes in, but next week, when we begin to ride, we must be out at five in the morning, so as to be in before the sun has any power. ”

“ All the representation part of our lives must be very fatiguing in such a climate; but for five days in the week, I think we shall make it much more of a home life than I had dared to hope when we left England.
Taking a drive is as yet a very surprising operation to us. There are numbers of carriages, with their turbaned postilions and coachmen. Now and then, a very handsome European one; and one looks inside to see perhaps four natives sitting: two yards of muslin would handsomely suffice for the clothing that is on them all. Every figure one passes looks strange and picturesque. ”

“ The delight of these quiet hours after having had almost the whole of Calcutta to see us this morning, nobody can tell. This is the time that we shall go to sleep,when we get up to ride at five in the morning. ”