Here, There and Everywhere

ony-A native dinner-The disguised Europeans-Our shocking table-manners-Incidents-Two impersonations; one successful, the other reverse-I come off badly-Indian jugglers-The rope-trick-The juggler, the

Java-Colombo an Eastern Clapham Junction-The French lady and t

ught a brief glimpse of a glittering white cone on the horizon. This was mighty Kinchinjanga, the s

tation, a sign-post inscribed "To Lhassa 359 miles." The sign-post has omitted to state that this entails an ascent of 16,500 feet. The Darjeeling-Himalayan Railway, an intrepid little mountain-climber, looks as though it had come out of a toy-shop, for the gauge is only two feet, and the diminutive engines and carriages could almost

laming crimson on a vast unseen bulk, towering up 28,000 feet into the air. Then quickly comes a second flaming finger-tip, and a third, until you are fronting a colossal pyramid of the most intensely vivid rose-colour imaginable. It is a glorious sight! Suddenly, in one minute, the crimson splendour is replaced by the most dazzling, intense white, and as much as the eye can grasp of the two-thousand-mile-long mountain-rampart springs into light, peak after peak, blazing with white radiance, whilst the world below is still slumbering in the half-shadows, and the valleys are filled with purple darkness. I do not believe

scaling Kinchinjanga, and I do no

ffices, telegraphs nor policemen; these tidy commonplace "Belle Vues," "Claremonts" and "Montpeliers" are on the very threshold of the mysterious Forbidden Land. An Army doctor told me that he had been up at the last frontier telegraph-office of India. It is well above the line of snows, and one would imagine it a terrible place of captivity for the Sergeant and four Privates (all white men) in charge of it, but the spirits of

hether half that number could get in. "Very well," said Lord Kitchener, "I shall have the whole of the Fort ditch turned into a garden to-morrow." Next day he had eight hundred coolies at work. They levelled the rough sand, marked out with pegs walks of pounded bricks, which they flattened, sowed the sand with mustard and cress and watered it abundantly to counterfeit lawns, and finally brought cartloads of growing flowers, shrubs and palms, which they "plunged" in the mustard-and-cress lawn

of insulated wire. The boys are sent climbing up the trees; they drop long pieces of twine to which the electric wires are tied; they haul them up, and proceed to wire the trees an

the useful factor comes in of knowing to a day when the earliest possible shower of rain is due. The tent, a huge flat-topped "Shamyana," was, when finished, roughly paved with bricks, over which were spread priceless Persian and Indian carpets from the "Tosho Khana" or Treasury. The sides and roof were stretched at one end with sulphu

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ace-men with their gilt standards, the entry of the Rajahs, all in full gala costume, with half the amount of our pre-war National Debt hanging round their necks in the shape of diamonds and of uncut rubies and emeralds, the Knights of the Star of India in their pale-blue mantles, the Viceroy seated on his silv

alee gentleman. With some slight shock to my modesty, I was persuaded to discard my trousers, being draped in their place with over thirty yards of white muslin, wound round and round, and in and out of my lower limbs. A dark blue silk tunic, and a flat turban completed my transformation into a Bengalee country squire, or his equivalent. My nephew, being very slight and tall, was at once turned into a Sikh, with skin-tight trousers, a very high turban, and the tightest of cloth-of-gold tunics, whilst the other young man, a good-looking dark young fellow, became a Rajput prince, and shimmered with silver brocades. I must own that European ladies do not show up to advantage in the native saree. Their colouring looks all wrong, and they have not the knack of balancing their unaccusto

floor, and I was gratified at noting that the European ladies managed no better than I did. Added to which, half-lying, half-reclining on the little silk beds, the unaccustomed European gets attacked by violent cramps; one is also conscious of the presence of bones in the most unexpected portions of one's anatomy, and these bones begin aching furiously in the novel position. Some native dishes are excellent; others must certainly be acquired tastes. For instance, after a long course of apprenticeship one might be in a position to appreciate snipe stewed in rose-water, and I am convinced that asafoetida as a dressing to chicken must be delicious to those trained to it from their infancy. A

ithout any brown make-up) that we wished him to dress-up in the same clothes next d

aily bouts in our coach-house. The Duc de Vallombrosa was a great friend of my family's, and used to watch this boxing with immense interest. The Duc was a huge man, very powerfully built, but had had no experience with the gloves. The present Sir David Erskine was the youngest member of the crew, and was very slender and light built, and it struck my father one day that it would be interesting to see this comparative stripling put on the gloves with the great burly Frenchman. Sir David realised that his only chance with his huge

e so, but pleaded ignorance, should he have broken any rule. Ignorance was no excuse, retorted the gendarme, even foreigners were supposed to know the law. The big bearded gendarme, whose tone became more hectoring and bullying every moment, went on to say that my father had broken Article 382 of the French Penal Code, a very serious offence indeed, punishable with from three to six months' imprisonment. My father smiled, and drawing out his pocket-book, said that he imagined that the offence could be compounded. The stern officer of the law grew absolutely furious; did my father suppose that a French gendarme could be bribed into forgetting his duty? He would now take my father to the lock-up to pass the night there until the proces verbal should be drawn up, and though he regretted it, his orders in similar cases were

Lieutenant is (or rather was) to entertain ceaselessly, and private mourning was not supposed to interfere with this all-important task. So, after a respite of four months, the endless round of dinners, dances, and balls recommenced, but my mother could not forget her loss, and h

second to the peerless Moncrieffe sisters as regards beauty. Certainly I thought this particular sister, the late Lady Winterton, surpassed the others in outward appearan

uniform or Court dress, and the ladies their very best clothes. When the Lord and Lady Lieutenant entered the State box, attended by the various members of their Household, the

making a low bow and holding his high hat at arm's length from him. The writer explained that on the Command Night my sister had bowed to him in the most marked way. So taken aback was he, that he had not acknowledged it. He, therefore, to make amends, had had himself photographed in an attitude of perpetual salutation. Other letters rained in on my sister from the eccentric individual, and he sent her almost weekly fresh presentment

unauthorised persons, so I waited until we had moved to Baron's Court. Here I made careful preparations, and arranged to dress and makeup at the house of the Head-Keeper, a great ally of mine. I was met here by a hack-car ordered from the neighbouring town, and drove up to the front door armed with a nosegay the size of a cart-wheel, composed of dahlias, hollyhocks and sunflowers. I gave the hatter's name at the door, and was ushered by the unsuspecting footman into a library, where I waited an interminable time-with my gigantic bouquet in my hand. At length the door opened, but instead of my sister, as I had anticipated, it admitted my father, and my father had a hunting-crop in his hand, and to the crop was attached a heavy thong. His first words left me in no doubt as to his attitude

it would be as well to abandon the idea of a visit t

trick, as I have seen it, was an almost childish performance. Having made his heap of sand, inserted the mango-stone, and watered it, the juggler covered it with a large basket, and put his hands under the b

us at first-hand, but always at second- or third-hand, exactly like the accounts one heard from credulous people in 1914 of the passage of the 75,000 Russian soldiers through England. No one had actually seen them, but every one

nse smoke arising from two braziers burning mysterious compounds. The juggler, naked except for his loin-cloth, appeared and commenced salaaming profoundly, continuing his exaggerated salaams for some little while. Eventually he produced a long coil of rope. To Colonel Barnard's inexpressible surprise, the rope began paying away, as sailors would say, out of the juggler's hand of its own accord, and went straight up into the air. Colonel Barnard kodaked it. It went up and up, till their eyes could no longer follow it. Colonel Barnard kodaked it again. Then a small boy, standing by the juggler, commenced climbing up this rope, suspended to no

of the ascending rope, of the boy climbing it, and of the man following him, were simply blanks, showing the details of the courtyard and nothing else. Nothing whatever had happened, but how, in the name of all that is wonderful had the impression been conveyed to two hard-headed, matter-of-fact Engli

round with his collecting bowl, leaving his performing cobras in their basket. One cobra, probably devoid of the artistic temperament, or finding stage-life uncongenial to him, hungered for freedom, and, leaving his basket, glided swiftly on to the crowded verandah. He certainly occupied the middle of the stage at that moment and had the "spot-light" full

ill, I think, dispute this claim, though Kandy, nestling round its pretty little lake, and surrounded by low

palm-leaf fan. The simultaneous rhythmic motion of the fans recalled the temple scene at the end of the first Act of Aida. We found the "Devil Dancers" grouped in the garden, some thirty in number. The men were all short and very dark-skinned; they wore a species of kilt made of narrow strips of some white metal, which clashed furiously when they moved. Their legs and chests were naked except for festoons of white shells worn necklace-wise. On their heads they had curious helmets of white metal, branching into antlers, and these headdresses were covered with loose, jangling, metallic strips. The men had their faces, limbs, and bodies painted in white arabesques, which, against the dark skins, effectually destroyed any likeness

make out, this was less of an attempt to propitiate local devils than an endeavour to frighten them away by sheer terror. It was unquestionably a horribly uncanny performance, what with the white streaked faces and limbs,

just made a tour of all the French possessions in India. M. Des Etangs was full of curiosity about the so-called "Sacred Tooth

est carp and tortoises I ever saw. Every pilgrim to the shrine throws rice to these carp, and the unfortunate fish h

The Portuguese captured it again in 1560, burnt it, and ground it to powder, but the resourceful Vikrama Bahu at once manufactured a new tooth out of a piece of ivory, and the Buddhists readily accepted this false too

y offered to have it uncovered for us in two days' time. He added that the priests were by no means averse to receiving such an official order, for they would telegraph t

afford a sufficiently long day for the exposition. He implored us all, in view of the immense veneration with which the Buddhists regarded the ceremony of the unco

elves in a lower room of the temple, the actual sanctuary of the tooth itself, into whi

crowded with priests and leading Buddhists, and we Europeans panted and gasped for air in that stifling, over-scented atmosphere. Presently the Hereditary Keeper of the Tooth, who was not a priest but the lineal descendant of the old Kings of Kandy, knelt down and recited a long prayer. At its conclusion eight men staggered across the room, bearing a vast bell-shaped shrine of copper about seven feet high. This was the outer case of the tooth. The Hereditary Keeper produced an archaic key, and the outer case was unlocked. The

e Hereditary Keeper took a lotus-flower, beautifully fashioned out of pure gold without alloy, and placed the tooth in it, on a little altar heaped with frangipani flowers. T

cal library in the world. The books are all in manuscript, each one encased in a lacquer box, though the bo

e to read a word of any of them. The illuminations, though, struck me as fully equal to the finest fourteenth-century European work in their extreme minuteness and wonderful delicacy of detail. The young priest, whom I should suspect of being what

es produce a satisfactory budget. During the Kandy cricket week young planters trooped into the place by hundreds. Planters are divided locally into three categories: the manag

ith it. This, if authenticated by scientific evidence, would be an interesting example of heredity, but I suspect it to be an exaggeration. The bar-room in the hotel at Kandy was certainly of vast dimensions, and was continuously packed to overflowing during the cricket week, and an unusual notice conspicuously displayed, asking "gentlemen to refrain from singing in the passages and bedrooms at night," seemed to hint that undue conviviality was not unknown in the hot

ich I do not imply the throwing of three spoonfuls of dried leaves into a teapot, but the transformation of the green leaf of a camellia into the familiar black spirals of our breakfast-tables-is quite an art in itself. The "tea-maker" has to judge when the freshly gathered leaves are sufficiently withered for him to begin the process, into the complications of which I will not attempt to enter. I was much gratified, both in Ceylon and Assam, at noting how much of the tea-making machinery is manufactured in Belfast, for

subject of so many ridiculous legends. The curator told me that the upas (Antiaris toxicaria) was unquestionably intensely poisonous, juice and bark alike. A scratch made on the finger by the bark might have very serious results, and the emanations from a newly lopped-off branch would be strong enough to bring out a rash; equally, any one foolish enough to drink the sap would most certainly die. The stories of the tree giving out deadly fumes had no foundation, for the curator had himself sat for three hours under the tree without experiencing any bad effects whatever. All the legends of the upas tree are based on an account of i

ipat palms, surely the most majestic of their family, though the

here steamship lines from Australia, China, Burmah, and the Dut

-bull carriage. None of the party had ever left France before. As we approached the landing-stage, which was, as usual, black with baggage-coolies waiting for a job, the French children began howling at the top of their voices. "The savages! the savages! We're frightened at the savages," they sobbed in French; "we want to go back to France." Their mother a

is often unnece

after three thousand miles of water. All houses in Bermuda are whitewashed, and their owners are obliged by law to whitewash their coral roofs as well. Bermuda, too, is covered with low cedar-scrub of very sombre hue, and there are no tall trees. The boy, a very sharp little fellow, was astonished at the red-brick of the houses on the Isle of Wight, a