Emily Eden

“ An aide-de-camp is woke by finding it dancing at the foot of his bed, another by hearing him chattering by the side of it. It has broken some of my china cups and has carried off bodily our little French servant's large green parrot; that makes me shudder for my lory. Unless the monkey can be caught or killed, George must abdicate and go home; life is not worth having on such terms. ”

“ I always write to you when I am here, because, though all the windows and blinds are shut, and the house, in fact, full of people, there is a false air of liberty and solitude about it, which is exhilarating. ”

“ I flatter myself that I have secured a valuable and trustworthy attendant for him and Gazelle. Ariff the other day brought him to make his salaam, and, after giving him a long exhortation in Hindustanee, translated it for my benefit in this manner: ‘I tell him, Ladyship, that he come every morning for two hours and make acquaintance with Gazelle, then he go to Barrackpore and make acquaintance with monkey, and that he must always try to make himself pleasant to both beasts, and has no other duty.’ Such a new view of ‘the whole duty of man’! ”

“ The ‘horse’ party is the strongest in every sense of the word, because, if the ‘pony’ party grows provoking, it can kick it over the sides of a rock. We call ponies here gouits. I do not know why, except that we never call anything by the name that belongs to it. Because the Commander-in-Chief recommended horses, of course Emily and I ambled up the hill on ponies. And he came out with all his staff to meet George, all of them sworded and cocked-hatted, riding on great horses. The horses all began to kick, because they were not used to swords. And precipices on each side of us! ”

“ The aides-de-camp are all settled on different hills, and come in breathless and disturbed to dinner, because they are only used to plains. My dearest, I must finish, I am making my sitting-room look lovely, only somebody is turning my sofa with its back to the view. ”

“ The only civility we can show our female guests is to beg them to have tiffin sent to their bungalows, because it must be so unpleasant to cross in the sun; and generally they most heartily accept it; so from breakfast to dinner we see nothing of them. Then we do contrive to get out half an hour earlier here than at Calcutta; and there never was anything like the green of the park and the beauty of the river just now. ”

“ Chance lives and flourishes, and passes much time in the water, and has quite a travelled mind. Gazelle is lying on his shawl, with three small baskets before him, filled respectively with rice, leaves, and grass, and is growing rather tall. ”

“ That angel Gazelle has certainly contrived to grow up into that species of deer generally denominated ‘hog;’ he is therefore not eminently graceful, but his manners and disposition are quite beyond praise. The lemur is very tame and frightens me with its black human hands. ”

“ You all write in the same odd, dreamy way about some white, cold substance which falls from the sky and cuts up your communication with each other—the tops of Twelfth cakes probably, and very tiresome and sticky it must be. ”

“ We almost think it indiscreet of any public character to do so public a thing as to die; and we have been in a state of the highest indignation because our old Begum, evidently a superior woman, seeing the throne empty and comfortable-looking, seated herself and a little adopted boy upon it, and there reigned for half an hour, when we, in our usual despotic manner, went and took her off, and, an enemy says, plundered the throne of its jewels. ”

“ It is a very bad precedent that of torturing the women of a family by way of punishing the men. It might just happen they would not mind, certainly less than if they were tortured themselves. One of the native princes made his prime minister pound his family’s heads in a mortar with a pestle. ”

“ Rolla is supremely happy here; goes in and out of the house as he pleases; has discovered a large pumpkin; has frequently contributions of pears and apples pouring in to him as offerings from foreign potentates; wears red velvet and gold constantly, because he hates cold ”

“ I could tell you by a great effort of memory, but if you don’t very much care I had rather not make it.’ And that is just how we all feel now and then; if there is a glimmering of an amusing idea about one’s brain, it is far too much trouble to bring it into speaking shape; and, in fact, it is quite clear to me that there is as great a level of intellect here as of country, and no person can be much cleverer than another ”

“ He has lived here for fifty years, and is a fine old man, with a long white beard, and rules us all. He was in a transport of vanity with his dress, which is perfectly beautiful, both turban and tunic. He talks English, and did the honours of himself in this way: ‘I come with my kitmutgars and chowkeydars to make salaam to Ladysheep. My dress very beautiful; I got gold lace here and there, and have a crown and stars on shoulders, which nobody else has. ”

“ I should not wonder if the natives were to mistrust a coin with nothing but a woman's head on it.’ We should naturally be living under William IV. if the last overland despatch had not reached us in less than two months, and that makes us very precocious in our English knowledge.
We are on the brink of going up the country. We expect to set off about this day five weeks, and B—— is doing what may be called pulling our chairs from under us in the most ruthless manner. ”

“ I will not write about the buildings twice, but I think it as well to mention that the people do not wear conical hats. Our tents swarm all day with merchants, who cover the carpets with jewels; but they want money for them, and much money. ”

“ In the most dawdling way these birds manage to suck down live cats, rats, and crows without any apparent effort; but to swallow a body is rather strange. In some countries the bird would have been tried for murder ”

“ I say everything in those journals there is to be said, and have strong suspicions that they must be intensely tiresome and the sketches supremely ridiculous. I am driven into sketching figures because the country is so ugly, and I dare say their arms go where their legs ought to be ”

“ However, they shot on, and the bank gave way, —— and his elephant rolling down among the tigers, who were happily too badly wounded to do any harm. But I don’t think I will go out again to see them shoot tigers; certainly not when water is scarce, for then they wonder about in bodies. ”

“ We don’t die of our influenzas, because we have not strength enough; we are only left a shade weaker and a shade yellower, and if a healthy European lands it makes us all sneeze. B—— has escaped it, owing to his great serenity and being constantly engaged in plucking ahingas. I have another bunch of feathers for you, and some day I’ll freight a ship with them.
Our first and best energies are devoted towards making a clinquant figure of his Excellency, in order that he may shine in the eyes of the native princes ”