CHAPTER IV
LETTERS TO MISS MARTIN
DECEMBER 1873—DECEMBER 1875
THE letters of any well-known character are of twofold interest: the one biographical, the other literary. In many cases, the literary interest is but secondary, for the main purpose of a letter is never to produce a literary creation, but it may be an equivalent to talking with a friend. They should be, in fact, more or less ‘Table Talk’. ‘Letters must not be on a subject’, says Mackintosh; ‘conversation is relaxation, not business, and must never appear to be occupation; nor must letters.’ There is, then, as much difference between the author’s ‘works’ and his ‘letters’ as between the truthful snapshot and the pose of the professional portrait; and the severely critical point of view is as out of place in the one as it is right and necessary in the other.
Letters, therefore, very rarely can (from the nature of the case) rank as classics (although where the writer is an author, literary style becomes more or less of a habit). The letters of Chesterfield, Cowper, Charles Lamb, Coleridge, Shelley, and Robert Louis Stevenson, for instance, may fairly rank among their authors’ ‘works’. In the case of Toru Dutt, too, we have reason to believe that, if her genius had been allowed to reach maturity, her letters might have ranked as English classics.
The beautiful colouring of a dish of Indian fruit, the strong, sweet-scented flowering shrubs of the garden, the personalities by whom she is surrounded, all are visualized by her graphic pen before the eyes of her English friend. The artist’s soul reveals itself even in the sick chamber, as the invalid watches the wonderful effect of the patterns woven on the floor by the sunshine falling through the window bars.
Apart from the keen artistic sense, which the letters of Toru reveal, their prevailing characteristics are naturalness and sincerity, and in these they remind one of the letters of Cowper. Like his, too, is the quiet vein of humour running through them, which is touched, sometimes, into a pathos caused by physical weakness—like his, too, is the deep religious feeling, a piety natural as breathing.
From a biographical point of view, the letters of any literary character are invaluable. The main purpose of any biography is to throw light on the personality of the individual concerned. Without actual letters, however, this light is apt to become artificial, the unnatural, steady glare of the limelight, rather than the natural play of sunlight and shade. ‘Biographers’, says Cardinal Newman, ‘varnish; they assign motives, they conjecture feelings, they interpret Lord Burleigh’s nod—but contemporary letters are facts.’ In letters written to intimate friends, if anywhere, we may expect to find a man at his best, because most at his ease. In reading them, we become unseen visitors in his home, and watch him at his relaxations. We gain some idea of him in his most intimate relationships, and also see his attitude towards the world at large. Sometimes, it may be, we are privileged to read his very soul. In short, we have before us the living, breathing man. So it is with Toru’s letters. Their chief value for us lies in the revelation of her character, and before attempting to sketch that character, we would first of all leave the reader to study them and then form his own judgement.
The first letter from India is dated December 19, 1873, and was ‘most eagerly looked for’. This was written from the loved Garden House, ‘the scene of many family reunions and the favourite playground of all the younger generation’. The letter gives a charming description of the young people she had last seen as little ones, four years ago, and who were now fast growing up.
Baugmaree Garden House, Calcutta. December 19, 1873.
MY DEAR MARY,—I got your welcome and very interesting letter some days ago. I could not answer it before; the reason is, we were very busy settling ourselves for the first several days. I hope you will excuse this delay in writing on my part.
All at home were so glad to see us back. Old Maja, our favourite cat, is as pretty and well mannered as ever! Everyone, especially the children, were so changed. We hardly recognized the little toddlings we had left four years ago, in the big boys and girls who stood to welcome us at the gateway. The children were at first rather shy and silent, but now they are fast friends with us; at any mention of our return to England, they immediately cry out that they will never let ‘Aunts Aru and Toru’ return to England!
Our voyage all through was very pleasant; only after we had passed Madras, we had two or three days of rather rough weather and some rain. We all landed at Ceylon and spent a very pleasant day there. Unfortunately, our steamer was detained at Galle, for four days—that was very tiresome; while we were in harbour there, our steamer bumped three or four times pretty strongly against the sunken rocks, which are rather dangerous around Ceylon. The captain took our steamer out of harbour every night, for he was afraid she might sustain some injury from these rocks. Many of the passengers, about two hundred, left us at Galle and went in another steamer, The Bangalore, bound for Australia. Among these, there were some very nice and agreeable people, and we were sorry that they left us so soon. There was one very interesting little girl—one of the Australian passengers—who was both deaf and dumb; but she had such high animal spirits, never quiet, always laughing and playing. We used to speak with her in signs; she, her elder sister, and her father were all very agreeable acquaintances. There were also Mr. Layard, the brother of the celebrated Nineveh explorer, who was going out as Governor of the Fiji Islands; his wife and son were with him, the latter as the Consul of the Fiji Islands. They too were very nice people. Mr. Layard and his son were very fond of shooting, and used to land at almost every place where the vessel stopped, with their guns and accompanied by Lieutenant Brewer of the Royal Navy; they used to bring on board lots of seagulls and other birds, which Mr. Layard used to stuff. He would sit stuffing them a whole day without being tired. Lieutenant Brewer was a very nice fellow too, not given to much reading, but knowing his own business thoroughly. He would insist on talking French with us, which he knew very imperfectly, and he went away with the idea that he had improved himself thereby highly in that language; he had a high opinion of our French; he was a thorough sailor and seemed ‘to have come out of a book’. He left us at Ceylon to join his vessel, The Pearl, in Australia.
We stuck two or three times in the Suez Canal, but only for a few minutes. We went at a very small rate through the canal, and at night we had to anchor at Ismailia. The canal is very narrow, and you see land all the way on both sides; the salt lakes are very pretty. The land on both sides is very arid and sandy; we hardly saw any trees or houses near, only at Ismailia there is verdure and houses, the French engineers having settled here.
Aru is progressing pretty well, her general health is much better, but she has still got a very bad cough. I hope by next summer she will have got rid of it. Her birds, those that are left of the thirteen she brought, are thriving well; but five of them died, three linnets in the canal because of the heat, and one goldfinch and canary here. She bought some very pretty birds at Ceylon; they were not love-birds, but they were very like them; three of them are dead already and only one is left.
Last Saturday one of my cousins caught a very large fish from the ‘jheel’, or the little lake, that is in our garden. That was the only fish we ate of our own garden since our return, and didn’t we relish it! Aru and I angle or play croquet in the afternoon. It soon becomes dark here after six o’clock; there is hardly any twilight.
I am now reading Histoire d’un Paysan, by Erckmann-Chatrian. It is very interesting, and relates the Revolution of 1792. I have been reading lately some of De Vigny’s works. Have you read any of them? Grandeur et servitude militaires is very good.
We are very comfortable here in our own garden-house. The Calcutta residence is so hedged in, as it were, by other buildings, that there is hardly room enough to walk about. The Garden is all that can be wished in that respect. Though it is December now, there are roses, hibiscus, marigold, asters, &c., blowing plentifully. While you are in deep winter, with snow on the ground, and the roads hard with frost, we are enjoying a cool summer! For here the coldest winter is like an English summer. Mamma has planted many English flower plants in our Garden. She brought a packing case, full of bulbs, roots, and seeds from England. The hyacinths are just beginning to grow. I hope Mamma will succeed in her attempt to introduce English plants in India. Our tanks look very pretty with white water-lilies and blood-red lotus!
Aru’s guinea-pigs are thriving. Mamma has bought one pair of geese, very large and white, which she means to give to Aru; I am going to have a pair too in a few days; as we have got three or four tanks, it is very convenient for keeping ducks and geese, &c.
We get plenty of fresh fruits now; guavas which are something like the English pears, plantains, oranges, of which you can never get the like in England, Batavian limes (you may have seen the latter in Covent Garden), and other kinds of Indian fruit. In summer we shall get mangoes, jumrools, &c. Aru and I long to taste a mango of our own garden. Our garden is famed for its mangoes.
We have got a piano, a rather old and cracked one, but Papa says he will get us a new one as soon as possible; the present one answers pretty well now, but I am afraid that in a year or two it will become quite useless. We have also got a harmonium; it has now gone to be tuned.
All our books have been removed from the town house to the Garden, and I read to my heart’s content. What with our own library and the Calcutta library, of which Papa is a shareholder, I have no lack of books.
The other day we killed a snake in our garden; it was a pretty large one, about four feet, but it was not very poisonous. We see plenty of wild monkeys; it is very pretty to see the young ones play with each other; their mothers are very fond of them, and embrace them as affectionately as any human mother! Some of the males are very big, almost as tall as papa, my papa I mean, not the young monkey’s papa; these large ones are rather dangerous; but they will all run away at the very sight of a gun. We never shoot them, for they stanch their wounds with their hands and act like a human being, and it seems as if you had shot a man. They are very destructive to young plants, and sometimes eat up all the young leaves off the rose plants.
I have been some time writing this letter. I began it on the 19th and I am finishing it on Christmas Day. A merry Christmas and a happy New Year to you, dear Mary, and yours. We hope (D. V.) to return to England and settle there for good; wouldn’t that be jolly? Please give my love to A. L. and remind her of her promise to give us her photograph. To-morrow the mail goes off early, so I must send off my letter to-day, if I wish to post it this week. Your letters you may be sure will be always welcome, and I answer them with the greatest pleasure.
My best love to you and your mamma, in which Aru joins, and with kindest regards from us all to your father,—Believe me, yours very affectionately,
TORU DUTT.
Baugmaree Garden House. March 10, 1874.
I was so glad to receive your two letters dated respectively the 30th December 1873 and 3rd February 1874. You must forgive me for not answering them sooner, for I have been ill with a bad fever and cough. I was laid up in bed and could not go a step beyond my bedroom for more than a month; for the last four or five days I am feeling much better and am allowed to stir about a little. The hot weather has set in, and I hope to be quite well in a few days. Aru is getting on very well, her cough is much better, and she is, I hope, gaining ground.
You will, I am sure, sympathize with me and Aru in the loss of Maja, our favourite cat, which died on the 23rd February, 1874. When I received your first letter, she was quite well, a few days after she got a kitten, and eleven days after she left her poor babe an orphan. Fortunately another cat of ours (Maja’s grown-up daughter) had also just then presented us with four kits! We placed the poor orphan under her care; she loves it as any of her own little ones. Maja was buried under the shadow of some South Sea pines in our Garden near our little lake. Papa and Mamma attended the funeral; I was unable to go, being laid up in bed then. Aru could not go, she was so sorry. You must be told that Maja had lived with us for more than eleven years, so no wonder everybody is sorry she is dead; her illness was acute asthma; for the last seven or eight days of her illness she refused all food and drink, she got so thin, poor thing! she used to search out the quietest corner and would sit there for hours, her mouth open, gasping for breath; death was a relief to her, she suffered very much.
I am obliged to drink milk (the doctors being very peremptory on that head), though I dislike it very much. A week ago our cow calved, and in a day or two I shall be able to drink fresh home milk every morning. Aru wants to try once to milk the cow herself; unfortunately that is not very feasible, for our cow is very obstinate, and kicks everybody who tries to milk her, except the man we keep especially for her. The calf is not very pretty. Aru and I hoped it would be a white one, but it is a light brownish colour.
We have caught a very large porcupine near our garden; I have not seen it yet (for I am not allowed to go out yet), but Aru and Papa say it is a splendid animal. Unhappily in the struggles which it had made to get out of the trap when caught a great many of its quills had fallen off, and it has got some rather deep scratches here and there. It takes every kind of fruit greedily; plantains and potatoes it is very fond of.
We caught yesterday a very large fish from our small lake; it is called the Rohit in Bengali and is the Indian salmon. We have caught another to-day, which Papa weighed and found to be fourteen pounds; we caught besides many small fishes of the stickleback and whitebait species.
I wish you could see the basket of beautiful flowers, roses especially, which Papa gathers for me from our Garden every morning: they are so lovely and fragrant. There is very little fragrance in English flowers compared with ours. Mamma’s English flower plants have grown and budded, hyacinths, nasturtiums, crocuses, &c.
We have got a big poultry yard; just now Mamma sent up a bevy of chickens newly hatched for me to see; aren’t they pretty little creatures? We get fresh eggs every morning for breakfast.
12th.
I could not write any more of my letter yesterday, firstly because grandfather and grandmother came to spend the day with us, secondly, I had a slight return of the fever. To-morrow the mail leaves for England, so I must try and finish my letter to-day. Yesterday also we caught another large fish from our jheel (that is the Bengali name for the small lake in our Garden). It is generally one of our servants who catches these fishes. He has been long in our service and is a good hand at angling. Aru has not yet tried to catch any fish of size; she says she will wait till she is a little stronger, as she is afraid that the fish when hooked, might, in its attempts to get off, drag her into the water! I abstain from angling for big fishes, for these same excellent reasons also! The fever has rendered me rather weak.
I was glad to learn that Mr. Bose 1 took such a good place in the Mathematical Tripos; I hope his success will induce many of my countrymen to enter the English Universities and try to win University Honours.
The doctor who attended me in my illness, Mr. Day, has a son at St. John’s; he is going up for the Classical Tripos, I hope he will succeed. It is indeed surprising that the Senior Wrangler should be of Caius this year; I am glad of it, though, for after Trinity and St. John’s, Caius is the one I like best.
The monkeys in our Garden are very mischievous; they destroy so many young plants; they are very fond of the tamarind fruit, and there are always many of them to be seen on the tamarind tree opposite our window; they are very bold, and sometimes even come into the dining and bed rooms!
I was so glad to receive Miss A. L.’s photograph; I will try and write a note to her this mail.
The other day we killed another large serpent. Now that the summer has come, I am afraid they will be getting out from their winter quarters to bask in the sun. The kittens have become very playful now; and it is very interesting to see them at their gambols. Maja’s kitten is the most active one among them all, and runs about the whole room.
I have not been downstairs for a long time, and so have been unable to touch the piano for weeks.
I have been lately reading Carlyle’s History of the French Revolution. It is very interesting, and I am sure you will like it when you come to read it.
I am so very, very glad you have done so well in the Examination.
I have not read the book you mention, Voyage sous la terre. Is it by Jules Verne? I am now reading Valentine, by George Sand. It is very interesting.
Many thanks for the Christmas cards. I need not assure you how prized they will be.
Have you read M. Huc’s Souvenirs d’un voyage? It is very interesting. I have not read it myself, but Papa has and likes it very much.
Aru’s guinea-pigs are doing well; lately they added three more young ones to their number; the little ones are very pretty and active; there are altogether six of them now. Aru wants to get rid of some of the big ones, for they quarrel with each other very much. The birds are flourishing. How are your doves and canary? You do not speak a word of them in your letters!
Many thanks for your kind wishes for my birthday.
We hope to go to England, I do not know if we shall be able to go; this time Papa says he will sell all we have here and go to England and settle there for good.
I hope to be able to write to you again soon. Papa and Mamma send their kindest regards to your father and mother, in which we join.
Best love from me and every one to yourself. The Lord be with us all wherever we are.
Baugmaree Garden House, May 9, 1874.
Your welcome and long-looked-for letter came to hand this evening. I was rather anxious about you at not getting any news from you for some time. I am glad to learn from your letter that you are all quite well, and that you are enjoying your holidays to your heart’s content. Your letter is very interesting and I read it aloud to Papa, Mamma, and Aru.
You will be glad to hear that I am quite well now; my cough is almost gone, so is Aru’s—but I am afraid that Aru does not make the progress she ought to; she is suffering now from a slight attack of fever and her stomach is out of order, which makes her weak and thin. I hope she will soon be better.
It is dreadfully hot now here; the heat is quite unbearable during the middle part of the day. No noontide walks here as in England! If you walk even a mile or two, you are sure to have cholera! We do so miss our country walks in England. In the evening it gets cooler and pleasanter, and then it is very refreshing to sit out on the verandah. The rainy season will be soon upon us and then we shall have to move to our town residence, for the Garden gets unhealthy at that time. It is very jolly, though, during the rains, when the tanks overflow in our garden, and the fish come out on the grass. It is such fun catching them with a piece of rag or even with your handkerchief; one is sure to get numberless shrimps and Indian sticklebacks and whitebaits. We had a hailstorm some weeks ago; the hailstones here are fifty times larger than the biggest I ever saw in England.
The leechies, mangoes, water-melons, dates, and other kinds of fruits are now in season. The two former are the best fruits in the world. They are so refreshing, cool and juicy. We have let out our fruit trees to husbandmen, and we buy from them daily what we want. It is difficult to keep the fruit trees ourselves, for then the fruits are sure to be stolen, so the best way is to let them out—and it saves trouble and expense. I wish I could send you a basket of our fruits of the season. It would gladden your eyes! Yellow or vermilion mangoes, red leechies, white jumrools and deep violet jams; this last resembles the plum. How I wish you were here or that we were all in England! But that is impossible.
I am now reading Histoire de la Révolution Française, by Mignet. It is very interesting, as you may well conceive, but I find the subject rather stale, for I have read three or four histories of the Revolution, including Carlyle’s. I have been lately reading another of Erckmann-Chatrian’s stories, Les Deux Frères. It is very interesting. I like Erckmann-Chatrian’s tales very much, for they are always healthy and amusing. I have also been reading some of Corneille’s and Molière’s plays. I like the latter’s comedies very much, but I have not read his Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme; I mean to read it whenever I get hold of his works. I like Shakespeare immensely—I have read all his plays except five. I read in some French book that Lord Collingwood, the great English Admiral, wrote to his daughters to read Shakespeare ‘tant qu’il leur plaira’. Papa often says that when he sees me with a copy of the Bard of Avon in my hand. I must stop here for to-night.
11th May.
Maja’s (our late beloved cat) kitten is doing well; her elder sister (‘Missus’ is her name) has now only one of the four kittens she had; we disposed of the three others to some of our friends. The remaining one Aru kindly gave to me on my last birthday. It is a great favourite of mine and has no rival in my affections, as I have no other pets! It is very playful, and I call it ‘Baguette’. I often address to it the lines of the French song:
‘Baguette, Si bien faite, Donne-moi ton cœur, Ou je vais mourir!’
It is ‘Rojette’ in the song, but that is all the same.
We have got a number of ducks now, seventeen, and all except three are home-reared—is it not satisfying? We have also got a turkey chicken: some turkey’s eggs were given to us by our grandfather, our hens sat upon those eggs, and hatched five young turkeys. One has been, unhappily, carried off by a kite, and three others have died. The one that is living has grown big and strong and is likely to live. Aru’s guinea-pigs have had young ones again, five this time; one of the little ones is very pretty, all white like snow with ruby eyes. Her birds are flourishing; they seem to have got accustomed to the Indian climate. We have got two squirrels, which we caught in our Garden some time ago. They are not of the reddish-brown colour of the English squirrels, but are striped on the back. They are very frisky and amusing. We keep them in a large cage.
I have not heard from the Miss Halls since our return. Mary (the eldest) was inclined to be very tall always. I suppose Reginald, their brother, is gone to school, as there was talk of his going during our last visit to Cambridge.2 Please give our best remembrances to old Mr. and Mrs. Baker,3 if you see them. Are the Joneses still lodging there?
We all want so much to return to England. We miss the free life we led there; here we can hardly go out of the limits of our own Garden, but Baugmaree happily is a pretty big place, and we walk round our own park as much as we like. If we can fulfil our wishes and return to England, I think we shall most probably settle in some quiet country place. The English villages are so pretty. But before we go, we have to get quite well, and then sell our property here, for it is very expensive keeping up two houses here, we being in England in another.
I practise pretty often on the piano now; the instrument we have got is rather an old and cracked one, but it answers our purposes for the present; no use buying a splendid piano, if we do not mean to stay here. We have also got a small harmonium; we used to play it in our Church before we went to England.
Please give Aru’s and my love to A. Is she going to leave school soon? It is a pity that you are not in the same class with her, for it would have been so much nicer. When are you going to leave Cambridge House? 4 I do so want to see your dear old face again! ‘Oh, to be in England now that April’s there!’ sing I with Robert Browning.
12th May. I was rather too hasty in saying that I was quite well—for the last two days I have had a very bad cough, with spitting of blood; Aru has still got some fever. At nights the fever generally comes on very strongly, but during the day she feels better. I hope she will soon get well. My cousin, Charoo Chunder Dutt, who went to be a barrister, to England, has come back. He came only a few weeks before the end of April. His wife and children are very glad to have him back again. He also wants to go back to England. My uncles and other cousins are quite at a loss to find out what there can be so attractive in England, as to make us all long to go back there! We assure them that if they went once to England, they would very soon be of our opinion. The other day, Uncle Girish (Papa’s youngest brother, his sonnets are very good in the D. F. A.), invited us to lunch at his house. He had a freezing-machine, and he made a delicious ice-cream in our presence. We enjoyed the day immensely. Uncle is so hearty and aunt is so kind. They are talking of accompanying us to Europe on our return to England, but we have no more faith in Uncle’s ever going to England: he has been so long talking about it, for the last four years! It would be nice though, if he could go. Our grandfather and grandmother never can hear of our return to Europe; the latter weeps at even the mention of it. I wish you knew her: she is, I am sad to say, still a Hindu, but she is so gentle and loves us so much. She had many children, but now only Mamma and Mamma’s brother are living.
The other day one of our geese was killed by a snake: it had been bitten on the beak and near the eyes; the beak had become quite blue. It had been bitten during the night. All the poultry are shut up in a room at night. There were some holes in the floor of the room, and the serpent, no doubt, came out from one of them; the goose very likely pecked at the reptile and so was bitten. This morning, one of our servants saw a very big snake in the room where we keep our fire-wood; it was very likely the same serpent which bit the goose. All the holes have been filled up, and I hope there will be no more deaths by snake-bites among our poultry. A large cobra was killed the other day at our town house. If the small piece of ground there is to be infested with cobras, I do not know what we shall do. This is the third cobra that has been killed there.
I shall write to you again as soon as I can. I often think of you, dear, and long to see you again. If we ever go to England, we shall be sure to find you out the first thing. Your letters give me great pleasure, and I look out for them every mail.
We think of going on the banks of the Ganges for a change—it would be very pleasant, especially at this time of the year.
How gay Cambridge would be during the whole of this month. I should like to be there now. I hope you will enjoy all the gaieties of the May term. Our kindest regards to your father and mother and love to you, especially mine. God bless you and be with us all.
12, Manicktollah Street, Calcutta. September 19, 1874.
I could not write before to you. The Lord has taken dear Aru from us. It is a sore trial for us, but His will be done. We know He doeth all things for our good. She left us on the 23rd July last, at eleven in the morning. She was very peaceful and happy to the last, though she suffered intensely from fever, dyspepsia, and great debility during her last illness. She lies beside my brother in our little cemetery beyond the bridge. We feel lonely without her, who was the life of our small family. She was so cheerful and happy always. Think of us sometimes, dear.
I have received your letters. One, I received during Aru’s illness, so I was unable to reply to it, the other I have got this morning by the early post. I thank you sincerely for it. Please write to me as often as you can, for your letters are a source of great pleasure and enjoyment to me. I have to thank you also for the photograph of Cambridge House, which you enclosed in your last letter but one. I penned a letter to you some time ago, but could not send it on account of Aru’s illness. I will try and write oftener and more interesting letters.
I am glad to hear you are well and enjoying yourself. Westmoreland is a place where Papa longs to live, for it was by the Windermere Lakes that Wordsworth lived, and you know he is Papa’s favourite poet. Southey used to live at Keswick, and Coleridge and Professor Wilson of Blackwood’s Magazine had their homes there too. The latter (Professor Wilson) had a small sailing boat of his own on the lake, and he used to be on the lake whenever he pleased in his own little boat; was not that jolly?
I hope you will have better weather by and by. I believe it rains a good deal up in Westmoreland. The items in your letter are very interesting. I remember Miss Pullen very well; she used to attend the French lectures. Mr. Jebb 5 too, you say, is to wed an American widow—he is such a shy man, he dared hardly deliver his lectures to us with his face towards the class; he used almost to have his back towards us while he was at his desk delivering lectures on English Literature. I do not remember to have seen the lady he is going to be united to.
To-day is Sunday, but we were unable to attend service in the Old Church as it is undergoing repairs. The services are held at St. John’s, but at such an unreasonable hour, 7 a.m., that we can hardly get ready to be in time; it is also a great distance from our place. Mr. Goldsmith, curate of the Old Church, is a Cantab, and we like him very much. Mr. Welland, the pastor, is an old friend of ours; he went to England with us in the same steamer four years ago; he returned here sometime before we did. He is a very pleasant man, an Irishman; his sister has just been married here. The poem in the Appendix of the Dutt Family Album is from his pen; it was written in answer to one of Papa’s poems. I should so like to go back to Cambridge and have a look at you all.
20th.
In May last a dreadful thing happened in our Garden. One of our gardeners, while going round the jheel (lake) found a man hanging on a tree, stark dead, just between our garden and a neighbouring field. Papa immediately sent notice to the police station and soon two policemen arrived and they were quickly followed by the police sergeant. Nobody could identify the body. Papa was asked by the police officer to come and see the body. Papa went, though he did not like it very much. He said the man must have been about fifty, and was of course a native. The police officer ordered the body to be taken to the station that same night—all this happened about four in the afternoon. The case was investigated and the body examined but no clue was found to the mystery, as to whether the man had been murdered or had committed suicide. Our Garden becomes very lonely at nights, for there are very few houses round it and our grounds are very extensive. We heard of a dacoity having been committed very near it when we were in England. The servants said that the robbery was committed by night, and in the morning they gathered up some weapons which the dacoits had thrown in our Garden after they had done their work. This makes it rather unpleasant, and Papa bought a good revolver a few months ago in case of need. I was so frightened after that affair about the dead man, found hanging from the tree, that I could not sleep the whole blessed night!
Aru’s was such a lively and merry disposition, that she seemed to fill all the large Garden House with life and animation.—Now, without her, the place seems so lifeless and deserted that Mamma can hardly bear going there. We are thinking of disposing of it, if we go to England; for if we do go, as we all wish to, again, we shall settle there. The free air of Europe, and the free life there, are things not to be had here. We cannot stir out from our own garden without being stared at, or having a sun-stroke. And the streets are so dirty and narrow, that one feels quite suffocated in them. Of course not all the streets, for there are a few broad and clean streets newly opened.
Aru’s pets are getting on very well: her guinea-pigs have increased wonderfully their number; they are now eighteen, although we have given some away—dear Aru would have liked to see them come and take their breakfast of bread and milk. It makes one sad looking at her pets though, she is so far away; God have mercy upon us. Her pet kitten, Peenoo, is now become pretty big, so is Baguette, the kitten she gave me on my last birthday. Baguette has now got three kittens of her own. I am in a great perplexity how to dispose of them. Baguette and Peenoo are very fond of each other; Peenoo is the sharper of the two, she catches butterflies and brings them to Baguette to play with; is not that friendly of Peenoo?
I am now brushing up my arithmetic with Papa. I am rather backward in it, so I am now going into it heartily. We are looking out for a German master: it is hard getting a good one here; I wish we were in Cambridge under the teaching of Herr Steinhelper.
Papa has disposed of our piano, as it was a very old and jingling instrument: he means getting a new one soon.
- To-morrow is mail-day, so I must try and post this letter to-day.
I am now reading from the volumes of the Revue des Deux Mondes. The magazine is conducted very ably, and its contents are always very interesting and instructive, we get the volumes from the Calcutta Public Library, of which Papa is a shareholder—we can get as many books as we like at a time and keep them as long as it pleases us—unfortunately there are not many French works, I mean readable French works, in the Library, but the volumes of the Revue des Deux Mondes make ample compensation for this defect. The library possesses all the volumes of the Revue from the beginning. I had also been lately reading a tale recently published from the pen of Victor Hugo—Quatre-vingt-treize is its title. It is a very interesting work and treats of the French Revolution of ’98. I liked the book exceedingly; some parts of it are highly poetical; it is a very big book, three large volumes: but I never got tired in getting through it. I was also reading a criticism of his poem ‘Les Châtiments’ from the Revue. I should like to see the poem itself very much; the extracts I read of it are sublime.
I am so glad of your success at school—I knew you would be first in French, for you are a great scholar in French. I congratulate you heartily….
We see very few people here, except our own relations and friends—indeed we seldom go out of our own house and garden. Oh, for the walks in Cambridge with you!
Baguette is here interrupting me, coaxing me for a caress and a loving pat—breakfast is also ready, so I must stop here for the present; I shall finish this letter after breakfast. I shall post it to your address in Cambridge.
There has not been much rain this year, and the famine is beginning to be felt in Lower Bengal; already famine-stricken people are coming down from the up-country. I hope that this time it will be not so great as it was some years ago, while we were at Calcutta. I remember then, there used to come to our garden, women, men, and children, thin as skeletons, all their bones sticking out: when food used to be given them, it was painful to see how they fell greedily to it. Mothers would snatch out of their children’s hands. They used sometimes to stay in the garden for a few days for the sake of the simple rice and dal they got every morning.
The weather is very hot now, especially at nights—Papa does not allow me to sleep with my window open on account of my cough; this makes me very uncomfortable in bed. I am quite well at present, though I have still got some cough. Mamma has had very few attacks of her pains since she has been in India; Papa thinks it is from the change of diet, that she has necessarily undergone, from meat to rice. She is now suffering from a persistent rheumatic pain in her left foot. I hope as soon as this damp weather is over she will be quite well. Papa has had two or three attacks of fever lately, but he is pretty well now.
I am sorry to hear of your father’s indisposition, I hope he is now quite well. I suppose you will leave Cambridge House soon. Did you not write sometime before that you will leave it by next May?
We have got a large turkey now; it was hatched by a hen from a turkey’s egg that my grandfather gave us—he gave us several, and seven young turkeys were hatched, but they all died when young (two were stolen), except this one. It has grown a fine-looking bird now. The ducklings I wrote to you about some time ago have grown into very beautiful ducks now, of varied and sleek plumage.
I must close here. Papa and Mamma send their kindest regards to you all, in which I join. With best love to you from me.
P.S. I enclose a small flower and some leaves from the Toru-Lota plant. They have not been pressed and dried very well, but I know you will like to have them.
12, Manicktollah Street, Calcutta. November 17, 1874.
This letter will reach you just about Christmas time, so I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, with many many happy returns of both.
We are keeping pretty good health here. Papa had an attack of fever a few days ago, but he has got over it at present. I have still got a slight cough, but there is no blood-spitting with it now. Mamma seldom gets her old attacks of pain here; we think that the climate and the diet of this country have done this benefit to her health.
It is beginning to be pleasantly cold here; the mornings are often rather chilly like those of an English summer. The cold season is very pleasant in India; it reminds us of English springs or early summer weather.
We all long to go to Europe again. We hope, if we go, to settle in England and not return to India any more. I expect my youngest uncle and aunt will accompany us to Europe this time; it will be very nice if they do so. My uncle is a thorough casanier, as the French have it, and it will be a miracle if he goes with us; (he says he will;) he has never been a whole day from home I believe! The pets are all doing well, there are now twenty-four guinea-pigs! We hope to dispose of some of them soon; the birds are thriving, especially the canaries, the bullfinch died some months ago; our cats had a litter of kittens; we gave them away as soon as they were old enough; they are all sought after, on account of old Maja, who was famed, all the country round, for her hunting powers! We caught a wild parrot some time ago; it must have been very hungry, for it came on the table to pick some dried peas that we had strewn there to entice it. We have got two turkeys now; unfortunately the male one has lost one eye, through fighting with a cock of the neighbourhood.
I have been reading a good deal lately, French especially. I finished a translation of Sir Bulwer Lytton’s Last of the Barons, a few days ago. I have not read the original, but the translation is excellently done, and the book has high merits. It treats of the time of Edward the fourth of England, and the Last of the Barons is the great Warwick, the ‘King-maker’ as he was called. I have also read lately Lamartine’s Lectures pour tous. It is a very interesting collection from all his works and is very readable. I like the Revue des Deux Mondes very much; as the Calcutta Public Library has got all the volumes of the Revue there is no limit to my reading. The articles in the Revue are so interesting, and give me so much information on various subjects. I have lately been reading in the Revue a description of the inhabitants of the Jura mountains, their occupations and their ways and manners of living. The perusal of the article gave me great pleasure. The articles are written by able writers and the Magazine is conducted excellently well.
Papa has hired a piano for me; it is a very good one. It is unfortunate that we cannot get here the small-sized cabinet pianos which we got in Europe; all the instruments dispatched here are very big and cumbrous and occupy a great deal of room.
A friend of mine wants to send his daughter to England and have her educated there. He wants to know the terms of Cambridge House, and if a child of nine, who hardly knows any English, will be admitted in your school. He is adverse to putting his girl in one of the schools of Calcutta, as the instruction here is far inferior to what one gets in England. Please kindly let me know all about Cambridge House.
20th. We went to the Garden yesterday. It has become very junglified; we are going to have it cleared in a few days, as soon as the rainy season is quite over. It is very pleasant now in the suburbs of Calcutta. Perhaps we shall spend the winter in the Garden, but we have not made up our minds about it yet.
Papa wants to buy a carriage and pair of horses; but I am set against it. I tell him if he allows himself to be entramelled in Calcutta by equipages and gardens, we shall never be able to go to Europe again. I go usually of an evening to my uncle’s garden. He and my aunt are never tired of listening to the accounts of Europe which we give them. We attend the ‘Old Church’, of which Mr. Welland is the pastor. The Church has been lately renewed and looks very grand and magnificent.
Several weeks ago, a large cobra was killed in my uncle’s garden by one of his servants. My grandfather, who was here about a fortnight ago, related how they had killed a big alligator in his tank, inside his garden. He lives at Connaghur, near Serampore, on the banks of the Ganges; the alligator must have come from the river, during the night, in search of prey. It was killed after a great deal of trouble.
Papa has got a bad cold; the winter here is the most dry and pleasant season of the year, still it is very damp and almost everybody has coughs or colds.
The Hooghly Bridge (a floating bridge across the Ganges) has created a great sensation here. Street ballads are sung and written in its honour and that of the builder. Hindu ladies go to see it, in closed carriages, by thousands. We have not seen it yet; my uncles and aunts and numerous cousins have been to see it, and wonder that we do not follow their example. What is a floating bridge to people who have seen the Suez Canal, and have been through the underground railway in England?
The famine is happily at an end, and Government is selling off the remaining supplies at a very low rate; the poor people are very glad at this; the Government is also disposing of all the horses and mules, which had been required for the transmission of supplies to the parts of India where famine had made its appearance. The cheapness of rice will make everything cheap.
Calcutta has been very noisy and gay during the past fortnight in consequence of the Poojahs. The streets were blocked up by crowds of devotees going to throw their idols in the river Ganges; our ears were deafened by the continual din of drums, fifes, flutes, violins, &c., all imaginable instruments of music, playing altogether in exquisite discordance! The holidays are now over, and Calcutta has re-entered into its lethargic state. Papa is going out to-day, in the city, for some little affairs.
Pinoo, one of our cats, is a great bird-catcher; she is out all day seeking for prey, and is sure to catch either a wagtail, or sparrow, or some larger bird. She brings her prey into our sitting-room, and then I take it from her; she is very docile, so she lets me do what I like. Often I find the bird alive, then I let it off, and reward Pinoo with a good bit of fish!
I must now close. Dear Mary, think of us sometimes. Forgive this dull scrawl.
12, Manicktollah Street,
I received your very welcome letter two weeks ago, as also the kind note from Miss A. L.: please thank her from me very much; Papa has also received the kind letter from your dear mother, which you enclosed in yours.
We are all well at present, only my cough troubles me; I hope I shall soon get rid of it, for it’s a long time that I have had it.
We purpose going to the Garden in the mornings for walking and exercise; would you believe it? I have hardly walked one mile at a stretch since we left England! Mother gets up at five in the morning and walks about my uncle’s miniature garden till sunrise. I am too lazy to get up as early as that; I find it more comfortable to lie under the blankets at five a.m. than take exercise in the ‘trim kept lawns’ of 13 Manicktollah Street (vide Dutt Family Album). I go on reading from les Revues des Deux Mondes: they afford to me a vast field of amusement and instruction, and the subjects in each number are so varied: political questions, social questions, geological, literary, theatrical, and all subjects of interest are discussed and set forth clearly before the reader. I was lately reading an article on Voltaire and Shakespeare, and another very interesting one about Sergeant Hoff who figured in the last war. Papa says he will publish our translations from the French poets as soon as there are two hundred pieces. At present, I send them to the Bengal Magazine, edited by Mr. Dey, a native minister; Papa means to publish them in a collected form, as soon as the required number is ready.
Our cat Pinoo caught a bulbul the other day. The bird was quite alive and had not even a scratch; I snatched it away and we have still got it with our other birds. Pinoo was rewarded with a good bit of fried fish. Isn’t he a ‘fameux chasseur’?
My uncle went some days ago to shoot; he brought home only two water-fowls. He is very fond of shooting, and was in high spirits when he came back, though he had only shot two birds.
A gentleman of Cambridge, whom we met there several times, is now officiating in place of Mr. Welland (who has gone to the North West), at the Old Church. Mr. Clifford has hardly been yet a month here. He called to see us the other day. It is so pleasant to us to meet people whom we used to know in Cambridge.
December 26. It is now more than a week since I began this letter; I had an attack of fever which kept me in bed all that time. I am well now of the fever, but the cough has not left me. The doctor advised Papa to travel a little and take me to the North-West Provinces, as it might do my chest some good. Ah! we do not mean to go such a little way from Calcutta as that; when we travel it will be for a trip to Nice and St. Leonards!
Christmas passed very quietly with us; I was ill, so we did not go to Church. My uncles and cousins decked their houses with garlands of marigolds; there were no hot Christmas puddings as in England, but there were Christmas cakes full of plums.
Papa is going on the 1st January, 1875, to a College Reunion, to be held at the country residence of a rich native gentleman whom he knows. He is going there because he is very likely to meet some of his old college companions. My uncle too is going with him.
December 31. To-morrow is mail-day, so I must try and finish this letter to-day.
We went yesterday to the Garden. I walked as much as I could. The sun had not then gone down, so we walked under the shadow of the mango trees; we climbed the small mound, which is called a hill by everybody, and walked up to the gate; the afternoon was very pleasant. Oranges are in full season now; they are beautiful, we cannot get the like of them anywhere in England; they are as large as any of the English or Maltese oranges and the skin peels off like that of the Mandarin ones, and they are sweet as honey. Then we have now in season the Batavian oranges; our Garden is full of them; they are quite yellow outside and red inside, they are as big as a large water melon, and look very pretty amongst the dark-green leaves. The jungle in the Garden has been thoroughly cleared off, and the place looks clean and neat.
Our cow, at least one of them, for we have got two, has got a calf. The milk which we get is therefore very fresh and good; we make our own butter and cream, for it is a very good cow and gives plenty of milk.
1st January, 1875. A happy new year to you, dear, and many many glad returns of the same!
We see from the papers that the winter is very severe in England this time; the last telegram said that there has been heavy snow-storms and severe frosts during the last fortnight in England. Oh, how I should now like to be there! though Papa tells me to thank my stars that I am out of all this severe weather with my cough!
I saw in the Indian Daily News last night the death of Sir Ronald Martin, an old physician in India. He was in St. Leonards when we were staying there, and Papa took dear Aru to him for consultation, and he advised us to leave England before the winter. The paper says he was seventy-five years old when he died and that he succumbed to the severity of the winter.
I was sorry to hear of the death of the father 6 of the Misses Fisher; are they going to leave Cambridge?
One of our parrots is beginning to learn to speak; Mamma has a kitten called Judy, and Polly calls it so prettily—‘Poor Judy, poor Judy,’ and then Polly says—‘Sweet—Polly!’ Mamma is now teaching it a long sentence—‘Toru dear, don’t cough, take a little milk.’ Polly just stutters out my name so funnily.
We went to my uncle’s yesterday; he is never tired of listening to us when we speak about England, and he questions us on the most minute details; he will talk about England by the day till my cousin vows that he, my uncle, knows more about England, though he has never been there, than we do.
The guinea-pigs are increasing as rapidly as we are getting rid of them!
Papa promises to post my letter on his way to the College Reunion. I wonder how many of his schoolfellows he will meet there.
I have not done any arithmetic lately. It is optional to me to do it or not, as I have finished it; Papa means to go on to geometry and algebra, but I am afraid I am too thick-headed for that.
Dear Mary, I must now close. Please give my kindest regards to A. L. and also to your father and mother. With best love to yourself.
12, Manicktollah Street, Calcutta. January 11, 1875.
I have as yet not got any letter from you, but as I expect one soon, I have sat down to pen a reply.
I have had another attack of fever last week, but I am much better now; I am happy to say that both Papa and Mamma are keeping well. Last Monday we took a long drive all round the Maidan; we went along the river for a long time; such a number of vessels were anchored there; two or three steamers were just having their steam up, ready to start for merry England; I had a great mind to tell the coachman to stop, and get up in one of these ‘homeward bound steamers’!
We met the carriage and six of Sir Salar Jung, a great up-country dignitary. We saw the magnificent statue in bronze of Sir James Outram on horseback; it is the work of Mr. Foley, the celebrated sculptor, and had been expressly made to be sent out to India. We passed the Eden Gardens, which are the admiration of all Calcutta, and the promenade of the fashionable; and then the Calcutta Newgate or jail; it is very large and surrounded by a high wall;—sentries were pacing up and down, all round the building, armed with bayonets. The streets in the native quarter of Calcutta are so dirty, narrow, and blocked up that it is a wonder to me how we get through them without some accident.
The European part of the town is far better; though far inferior to some of the fashionable parts of London. We had a drive of about twelve miles that day. Our turkey has hatched seven of the nine eggs she was sitting upon; the young turkeys are so nimble, and it is so funny looking at them, when they pick up their rice or grain with their tiny beaks. Two of the bulbuls died, so we let go the third one for fear it should die too.
I have not been reading anything for the last few days, but I am a regular contributor to the Bengal Magazine. They are so slow in Calcutta (by they, I mean the printers). Would you believe it? the December number of the Magazine has not come out yet!
A few days ago one of my cousins, who is a Hindu, came here with his wife and two daughters and his son; the latter is a very fine, handsome boy, ‘like a prince,’ as the Bengalis say, of about ten. His two sisters are younger than me, but they look much bigger and older—the eldest has a boy of four, she has just lost her two younger children; the younger sister has a girl of about two, so plump and pretty; I took her on my lap, and she sat there very quiet for some time, but catching sight of Papa’s beard, she burst into tears; and her mother had to take her and send her out for a walk in the garden to calm her.
I hope you will excuse, dear Mary, my dull letters; they are a poor return for your interesting ones.
I hope you have not suffered from the severe weather this winter. The papers are full of the cold that is felt all over England; all the country covered under a sheet of snow. Here the weather is delightful, only in the mornings there is sometimes an unhealthy fog—but by nine o’clock, the sun shines warm and dispels all dampness and fog.
February 7th. It is a long time since I began this letter; I have been very ill, and it is only yesterday that I went downstairs. I have been ill with a very bad cough, accompanied with a good deal of blood-spitting and fever. I am glad to say I am better now, though still rather weak. Dr. Cayley of the new Mayo Hospital was called in, besides the native doctor. I have had such a number of blisters put on my chest and back, that they are quite sore—luckily they heal up in a day or two. Papa wishes to call in Dr. Cayley again—but I tell him, that one doctor is enough, for—
Faut des docteurs; pas trop n’en faut; L’excès en tout est un défaut. J’ai mis en parallèle Les coursiers et le médecin: A son char plus on en attèle, Plus on abrège son chemin.
Dr. Cayley says that we shall be able to go to Europe in April or May—he advises us to go to Italy or to the sea-coast in the South of England.
Papa has purchased a very nice and comfortable barouche and a splendid pair of bay mares, belonging to the Government stud; the pair are an excellent match—I have named them ‘Jeunette’ and ‘Gentille’. They have to go every morning to Dunnett’s to be broken in; they are very quiet, and the coachman thinks they will be ready for us in three weeks.
By last mail we sent for some French books from London, through Messrs. Hachette & Co. We hope to receive them by April. My uncle has had a lot of books out from England, both French and German. It is a long time since we attended Church; I have been too ill to go anywhere; I hope next Sunday we shall be able to go to the Old Church.
One of my cousins has bought a mare very lately—the mare he had ran off from the carriage somehow or other, and in its mad course knocked down a woman who was passing, and hurt her so dreadfully that she was immediately taken to the Hospital and is not likely to live; the animal hurt another person, but not so seriously; it has itself got three or four very deep flesh wounds which had to be sewed up. We have sold off a lot of the guinea-pigs; there are only six pairs left now; we are going to keep two pairs; one, the old pair which dear Aru brought from England, and another quite white. I have not been able to read much lately. I have neither practised much.
The weather is getting very warm here now; last night it was very hot. I must rest a little now.
February 8th. I am not quite sure about the affair of the little girl I wrote about—whether she will be sent to England, and if so, when she is to go. When I shall hear definitely about it, I shall let you know. It will be indeed very sad for her, if she does go, for she has never been from home, even for a day. Many thanks for the trouble you have taken for me. I shall write to Miss Fletcher either by this mail or the next; it is very kind of her to write to me herself. I am very glad to hear that it is very likely that Mademoiselle7 will come to stay in Cambridge.
The Rev. Mr. Dey, editor of the Bengal Magazine, to which I contribute, has very lately published a novel in two volumes, in English. He got a prize for it offered by a rich Zemindar for the best novel on humble rural life in India. I have not seen the book yet; I hope it will be successful.
We have not been able to go to Church for some time on account of my illness; I hope we shall be able to attend the Old Church next Sunday.
They have just brought into the compound Jeunette and Gentille. I regaled the pair with some sugar-cane, of which they are extremely fond. I like to look at them so much—they are my prime favourites now. They are kept in the Garden just for the present, till our stable in town is quite ready.
How are your pets getting on, doves and canaries? How nice it is for you to be at home again in Cambridge. Parker’s Piece must be full of football players now of an afternoon. And the lectures vont leur train, I suppose; and is M. Boquel still in Cambridge? and Dr. Garrett as crusty as ever? I shall write to Mrs. Baker at the earliest opportunity.
February 9th. I began yesterday a very interesting book, Papiers posthumes de Rossel. You know Rossel was shot because he held some position among the Communes. He was formerly an officer in Bazaine’s army, but he deserted when Metz capitulated. The last part of his diary is so pathetic. I remember all the English papers were of opinion that he was condemned unjustly—I think so too; his mistake lay in that he, an officier de génie of the French army, became one of the leaders of the Commune; but if he had lived, he would have been one of the best soldiers of the day. He was a Protestant; he loved his country ‘not wisely but too well’. He has written a book, L’Art de la guerre; I saw some reviews of it in the English papers.
February 10th. Yesterday, I went out for the first time since my illness; my uncle and aunt were so very glad to see me out.
I have not yet gone for a drive: as soon as Jeunette and Gentille are throughly broken in, I shall be able to drive about comfortably in our own carriage. The cabs here are so bad and uncomfortable that it is a feat of power and dexterity to get in or out of them!
The December number of the Bengal Magazine has at last come out! The January number has not come out yet, but it will soon, for they sent me the proof sheets of my translations some time ago. Papa sometimes gives an article to the Magazine, but not always.
One of our cats has now got three kittens; we shall dispose of them as soon as they are big enough, by giving them to friends.
I hope you will excuse my dull letters, they are but a poor return for your interesting ones, but
Croyez qu’avec vous de moitié Mon cœur tout autrement raisonne, Et qu’il ne redoute personne Au grand concours de l’amitié.
I have handed the prospectus to the little girl’s father; as soon as I know his decision, I shall write to you.
I must now close my letter. Give my kindest regards to your father and mother.
P.S.—Reading over my letter, I find I have written twice over about our going to Church, but never mind, you will excuse all such bêtises.
T. D.
12, Manicktollah Street, Calcutta. March 14, 1875.
I was glad indeed to receive your letter, dated the 3rd February, this morning. I enjoyed reading it so much. I am very sorry to hear that you have got a bad cold. I hope you are quite well by this time. I, myself, am much better now; the warm weather has set in and we are obliged to have the punkah going all through the day.
I asked the little girl’s father about her; she is not going to England just now; I do not know if she will ever be able to go. Thank you very much for the information about Cambridge House. Please give my very best thanks to Miss Fletcher, when you see her, for her kind letter.
Yesterday, Dunnet, the horse-breaker, came here; and we had the first ride in our own carriage and pair. Jeunette and Gentille go splendidly and are very quiet. We had a pretty long drive.
My cousin’s new mare was tried in his brougham; she went very well too. Dunnet is coming again to-morrow, to accustom our coachman to the horses.
April 3rd. It is some time since I began this letter; for the last fortnight Papa has been suffering from strong fever; he has now got rid of the fever, but is still rather weak.
I go out for a drive almost every day. Papa is not able to accompany me every time, because of his weakness. We are going to spend the day in the Garden and have our luncheon there.
Last night we had a thunderstorm, accompanied with hail. It is very fresh and cool this morning in consequence.
My birthday was the 4th of March. Mamma gave me Dickens’s Barnaby Rudge, and Papa a beautiful volume of Mrs. Barrett Browning’s poems. I have already read both of them, and I like them very much.
We expect our books from England on Thursday next; I am looking forward for it.
April 5th. We went to the Garden on Saturday last, and spent the day there. My uncle and aunt joined us there in the afternoon, and we took a walk when the sun had set. Papa and I are going out shopping to-day. I am now reading Dickens’s Bleak House. I have only just begun it, but as far as I have read, it is very interesting. We are going to live in the Garden during the hot season; I think we shall be able to remove by the end of this week.
April 6th. We had a great deal of rain last night, which has made the morning very pleasant and cool.
The delicious mangoes will be soon in season; unripe ones are already to be got; they are very nice boiled with a little sugar. Pineapples are to be got, but they are very dear, almost as dear as in England. Then we have now the Rose-berry, with its beautiful odour of fresh roses, and the Lokut, with its bright orange colour; and the water-melon, and the sugar-cane, and the Bael, which is very good, strained and made into a drink with ice and sugar.
I continue to contribute translations from the French poets to the Bengal Magazine; some of the Indian papers review them favourably, which makes me very happy and proud!
I get up early now, at five in the morning, because I have Jeunette and Gentille fed before me, and they come at six, so I am dressed and ready by the time they come. In the Garden, they will have plenty of pasture and free air. Here, of course, they are kept almost the whole day in their stable.
April 8th. I got your letter dated the 10th March this morning; oh, the long interesting letter! I was so glad to receive it, but I feel quite ashamed of my own remissness in my correspondence.
I have not got Voltaire’s Charles XII. I returned all the books you kindly lent me. I am very sorry to hear about the Fishers; will they stay on in Cambridge? I see from your letter that your father sees Mr. Hall very often. Do you meet Mary and Lizzie sometimes? If so, give my best love to them. All the Cambridge news you give in your letter is very interesting. Mr. George Macfarren (who is one of the candidates for the Cambridge professorship) we knew in London; his wife, Natalia Macfarren, was our singing mistress during our long sojourn in that city. I hope Mr. Macfarren all success with my whole heart. Many thanks for the little pin-cushion; I shall treasure it up for your dear sake. I was so sorry to learn of your illness and am so glad you are quite well now. I am pretty well now, but the cough has not quite left me yet. There is very little chance of our going to England just now, but still we hope to go soon. My uncle seriously declares that he will very soon start for England; but we have heard this so often that we do not think he will be able. What a severe winter you have had! Papa says we are well out of it! Here the weather is intolerably hot. We went yesterday for a drive. Jeunette and Gentille are so quiet, strong, and fleet that Papa was quite pleased with them. I have such merry tiffs with my uncle and aunt about the merits of their horse (a grey and rather small-sized stud-bred) and Jeunette and Gentille’s. My aunt calls her horse Peerless Roland, but I call him Rosinante, in remembrance of Don Quixote’s famous steed!
I am afraid my letter will be very short and dull this time. Are you going to leave Cambridge House next May? If so, you have left school by the time this reaches you. We have not been to Church for a long time, on account of sickness amongst us. To-morrow is mail-day, so I must post this to-day if I wish it to go by this mail. I am quite ashamed of this scrawl. Please give my love to your dear Mother, and best love to yourself.
Baugmaree Garden House. April 23, 1875.
I begin this letter now, so as to be able to make it long if not interesting. Papa has been suffering very much for the last week from an abscess in his right leg. The doctor wanted to make a slight incision, but Mamma is very much afraid of operations of any kind. I am glad to say that the sore is now in a fair way of getting well. You will see by the address that we have settled down at old Baugmaree for the hot season; it is so much cooler and pleasanter here than in town. We came here on the 15th instant.
The books we sent for from England have at last come to hand; there are only two more to come. Those that we have already received are: Les Châtiments, by Victor Hugo, a book which I have been longing to see; the poems therein are very beautiful; if I have time and space, I shall copy and send one of the smallest pieces with a translation by your humble servant! Then there are Voyage aux Pyrénées by Taine, Seul!, by Saintine. The latter is the well-known history of Alexander Selkirk, from which Defoe made out his Robinson Crusoe. Then we have received also: Napoléon le Petit, by Victor Hugo; Les Fiancés du Spitzberg, by Marmier, ‘ouvrage couronné par l’Académie Française’; La roche aux mouettes, by Sandeau; Histoire d’une bouchée de pain, by Macé. This is a scientific book treating of the organs of the human body and also of the animals, but the whole is so simply told, and so well explained, that it is most interesting reading. Then there are two volumes of Charles Nodier’s charming Contes. I have only read two or three of the whole lot as yet; I was so glad to receive them that a whole fortnight was passed in looking at them and hugging them! Yesterday our coachman, who is a good angler, caught a small Roheet from one of our tanks; he is going to try again to-day. Two or three nights ago, one of our servants saw two wild boars in our Garden. We had seen one before we went to England. My uncle is anxious to have a shot at them, if they make their appearance again. I saw a weasel this morning, while I was taking my ‘constitutional’. There are many weasels in our Garden; I am going to try and catch one if possible. There has been quite a murrain among our pets: almost all the kittens have died, only two are left, and Mamma’s pet cat, Judy, is dead too, and three of our rabbits also have had the same fate. Isn’t it distressing?
The leechies will be in soon now, the mangoes will come in later about the beginning of May. I am pretty well at present, only the cough has not left me yet. Mamma is quite well.
I went this morning to see Jeunette and Gentille bathed. They are so gentle, and are very fond of me! I go out driving almost every day in the evening. Papa is unable to accompany me just now, and Mamma stays at home for him. My uncle and aunt came to see us yesterday.
25th, Monday. Last evening we received a letter of receipt from Messrs. Hachette & Co., accompanied by the last book of those we sent for. It is the Scènes historiques, by Mme de Witt, née Guizot; it is a beautifully and richly bound volume, with illustrations. Last night, we had what the English papers would call a thunderstorm, and which we would denominate a refreshing shower! Yesterday, our coachman caught two large fishes; he is a lucky angler, indeed he supplies our daily consumption of fish; it is so pleasant having fresh fish from our own tanks.
The mornings are so pleasant in the Garden. Very early, at about three in the morning, the Bheem-raj, a little bird, begins his song; half an hour afterwards, all the bushes and trees burst into melody, the Kokila, the Bow-kotha-kow—which means, ‘Speak, O bride’—the Papia, &c. And the gay little hummingbirds, with their brilliant colours, dive into the flowers for honey with busy twitters. Oh, it is so cool and pleasant in the morning till ten o’clock, when the warmth increases; from noon to about four in the afternoon, all is quite still, except some lone woodpecker tapping at some far-off tree. Then in the evening, all the birds are astir again, till it gets dark, when, like wise little creatures that they are, they go to bed!
Jeunette and Gentille are thriving. I sometimes lead them to grass in our compound; they follow me as meek as lambs. I must stop here, for breakfast is ready.
April 27th. Yesterday my grandfather came here with one of his grandsons; he wished to consult Dr. Cayley about the health of the boy, who is rather weakly. Yesterday, in the afternoon, we had a good deal of rain and wind, which continued almost the whole night.
Of all the English birds that Aru brought from England, only six are living, two pairs of canaries, one goldfinch, and one chaffinch. The guinea-pigs increase their number weekly, and I continue to ‘drive a roaring trade’ as Papa says, by selling them by lots of eighteen or twenty at a time! I hope you are all quite well. By the time this letter reaches you, you would have left Cambridge House for good, I suppose. Where are you going this summer during the vacation? What do you think of coming out here for a summer-trip? We should be charmed to see you and should be happy to bring about this joyous event in any way, if you will just give a hint that it will suit you!
The weather looks cloudy, and as the Garden gets unhealthy during the rainy season, we shall soon have to decamp. Write to me at our Calcutta house, for I am afraid of the letters being lost if you were to address them here. Papa is pretty well, but as I said before, it will be some time before he is able to move about. He and Mamma join in sending kind regards to your father and mother and with best love to yourself.
CHANSON
From Victor Hugo’s Les Châtiments (Original)
La femelle? elle est morte. Le mâle? un chat l’emporte Et dévore ses os. Au doux nid qui frissonne Qui reviendra? personne. Pauvres petits oiseaux!
Le pâtre absent par fraude! Le chien mort! le loup rôde Et tend ses noirs panneaux Au bercail qui frissonne. Qui veillera? personne. Pauvres petits agneaux!
L’homme au bagne! la mère A l’hospice! ô misère! Le logis tremble aux vents; L’humble berceau frissonne. Que reste-t-il? personne. Pauvres petits enfants!
CHANSON
(Translation)
The female? She is dead. The male? The cat has fed On his flesh and his bone. To the nest which will come? Oh, poor birdlings, be dumb; But they moan, the weak things, and they moan.
The shepherd? Gone or fled. The dog? Killed, and instead The wolf prowling alone. He peers in.—Ho, I come! He may pity, hope some, Oh poor lambs, the wolf’s heart is of stone.
The man? To prison led. The mother? sick-a-bed In a workhouse is thrown. It is cold—will she come? They cry—cry for a crumb, Poor children, look to God on his throne.
From Les Châtiments of Victor Hugo
(Original)
—Sentiers où l’herbe se balance, Vallons, coteaux, bois chevelus, Pourquoi ce deuil et ce silence? —Celui qui venait ne vient plus.
—Pourquoi personne à la fenêtre, Et pourquoi ton jardin sans fleurs? O maison! où donc est ton maître? —Je ne sais pas, il est ailleurs.
—Chien, veille au logis. —Pour quoi faire? La maison est vide à présent. —Enfant, qui pleures-tu? —Mon père. —Femme, qui pleures-tu? —L’absent.
—Où s’en est-il allé? —Dans l’ombre. —Flots qui gémissez sur l’écueil, D’où venez-vous? —Du bagne sombre. —Et qu’apportez-vous? —Un cercueil.
THE POLITICAL PRISONER
(Translation)
—Paths that from trees dark shadows borrow Green vale and wood and pebbled shore! Wherefore this silence and this sorrow? —A step that came here, comes no more.
—Closed window, sign of some disaster! Garden, where never flowers are seen! And grey old house—where is the master? —Long in his home he has not been.
—Mastiff keep watch.—O stranger rather On Desolation look thou here. —Child why weepest thou?—For my Father. —And thou O woman?—For my dear.
—Where is he gone?—He left no traces. —Whence come ye, Waves, that thunder loud? —We come from earth’s dark cruel places. —And what bear ye?—A hammock shroud.
T. D.
12, Manicktollah Street, Calcutta. June 6, 1875.
I got your long-expected and welcome letter yesterday. So you have been to London! Is this your first visit to it? I am glad you enjoyed yourself; did you go to the Royal Academy? Aru and I were charmed when we saw the Zoological Gardens, and went there several times. I have never had the luck to see the elephant processions you mention; they very often take place, but I never had the curiosity to go and see them.
I have read all the books we have had brought from England, except one, Scènes historiques, by Mme de Witt, which I am now reading. Our next batch of books will come to hand about the middle of July; among them is M. Littré’s Dictionary, in four volumes. Les Fiancés du Spitzberg, by X. Marmier, is a very interesting and nice book. It is well worth reading, and I should recommend you to read it, if it comes in your way.
We are all well now. Mamma lately had a very bad carbuncle on the neck. We were afraid that it would have been necessary to cut it, but happily it got well through applying warm poultices and touching it up with caustic lotion.
I am very sorry to hear what you tell me about Mrs. Baker. Does she understand all one says to her? I will write to her and enclose the letter in yours. Please kindly send it over to her.
I have still got the cough, but have nothing else to complain of. Papa is quite well, he had an acute attack of the gout lately, but is now very well. We have left the Garden House, as the rainy season has commenced. The mangoes are in their full season now, and we are enjoying them to our hearts’ content.
I am not able to go out driving now, as Gentille is laid up with a strained shoulder. Jeunette is quite well and is in such excellent condition! My cousin, who is very fond of horses, never tires looking at her, and whenever he calls, he never fails to ask me to order Jeunette and Gentille to be brought in the compound of our house. I wanted very much to have a book about horses, and Mamma gave me one yesterday; it is written by an officer of the British army, and is intended for non-professional horse-owners in India. It is very interesting and gives so much information; I have been reading it all yesterday.
9th. Papa has had two rooms built lately over our kitchen and store-room, because we were hard up for rooms. They are not quite finished yet, but they will be so in a few days.
Among the list of those who have passed the Civil Service Examination, there is not one Indian gentleman; this is very unfortunate. One of our relations went up for the Examination, and has failed; this is very sad for him. It is harder when a Bengali fails than when an Englishman has the same mishap; the Bengali leaves all his friends and relations and stakes all his fortune for a successful examination, the expenses of going and coming are so great. There were three or four natives who went up this year, but they have all failed, it seems.
My letter will be dull this time, as I have literally nothing to write about. I get up very early now, at four or half-past four at the latest, so as to be able to pat and caress Jeunette and Gentille when they come for their morning feed. Mamma says I am mad about horses, and gives me a scolding now and then for getting up so early. One day Jeunette got loose in the Garden, and oh! didn’t she race! jumping clean over hedges and quite wild with joy! She was caught at last, when the grooms led Gentille to her. They are so very fond of each other. Now that Gentille is laid up with a bad shoulder Jeunette was made to go in a pair with my cousin’s horse, and stayed out some time. Gentille neighed and was restless all the time she was absent! I am getting very tiresome, am I not? always horses, horses, horses! Ah! but if you could see my Jeunette and Gentille!
The papers say that the Duke of Buckingham is coming out from England to be the Governor of Madras. This is, I believe, the first Duke that has ever come out to India as Governor.
The papers say that he is very likely to succeed Lord Northbrook as Governor-General of India. The Prince of Wales intends to give us the honour of a visit in November: some papers are in the seventh heaven about this visit, others depreciate it, saying it will only be an occasion for the increase of taxes. The Princess of Wales will not accompany him out, it seems, as then she will have to leave her children in England. Dr. Fayrer and Sir Bartle Frere are likely to bear him company. The Flying Squadron will come with him out to India. It will be a grand affair.
The Indian maize is coming into season. Papa is not very fond of it, but I am, when it is young and cuit sous les cendres; oh, then it is delicious!
We want to sell off the Garden before we leave India, as then we shall be able to settle for good in England. Already we have had some very good offers for it, but not such as we would wish to have.
The front of our town house was full of huts and small shops. One of my cousins has now bought it, and cleared it thoroughly, which is a great improvement. I believe the ground will be turned into a nice garden.
Has Miss A. L. left Cambridge House? Give her my best regards when you see her. By the time this reaches you, you will have left the old dear school. Where do you mean to go this autumn? Are the Fishers still in Cambridge? I suppose the usual boat-races in Cambridge between the Colleges took place in May. Who came out first? I am afraid you were in school then and did not see the boat-procession.
Polly is just beginning to say: ‘Toru, dear, give me some bread.’ She is even now squeaking the sentence out in great triumph! I want to know the date and year of your birth, because I want to put it in my Birthday Scripture text book; I have a good many names in it already, chiefly of our own relations.
The rains have fully set in, and the sky looks as dismal as the London summer skies. The rainy season will continue about two months more; it is the most dull and unhealthy season of the year.
I enclose a letter for Mrs. Baker and a penny stamp, please kindly forward the note to her. Give my kindest regards and those of Papa and Mamma to your father and mother.
12, Manicktollah Street, Calcutta. July 22, 1875.
I have not got a letter from you for such a long time that I am getting a little anxious about you all. To-morrow we shall receive letters from Europe; I hope there will be also one from you among them.
We are all well here at present. I hope to be able to go out again soon, as Gentille has got well of her strain in the shoulder under my own treatment. The weather is not very fine now-a-days, as the rainy season is in its height now; the sun nevertheless shows his bright face now and then for a day or two. The weather has become in no wise cooler on account of the rains; indeed, it is hotter now than ever. The thermometer, now, 6.30 a.m. in this room, under a punkah, stands at eighty-two!
The wife of my cousin, Charoo, who went to England to be enrolled as a barrister, had a baby, but it died the seventh day after its birth, of tetanus. The poor young mother (she is only twenty-two) is sorely tried; this is the first child she has lost; she has four children now, three boys and one girl. My great-grandmother died also on the 7th instant. We could not go to see her, as I had an increase of my cough, which again necessitated applying a blister on my chest.
My grandfather and grandmother came here on Thursday last, to consult the doctor about my grandmother’s eyes; she is suffering very much from them and can hardly see; the doctor says she will get well in a month.
We got a letter from Messrs. Hachette & Co.; we learn from it that our books will come to hand by the 1st of August. They write that they have still a balance of one pound and odd shillings in our favour, so we are going to send for some more books. Our old music-mistress, who used to teach us piano and singing before we went to England, came to see us the day before yesterday from Serampore, where she now resides. She brought her daughter Marie with her. I was so glad to see Mrs. Sinaes again! She is such a good motherly woman. She was quite shocked at my not having a piano!
We shall not be able to go to the Garden till November, when the rainy season will be over. The garden is very unhealthy now, and one is sure to get malaria if one stays there during the rains. The two rooms over our kitchen and store-rooms are quite done now, and we use them. We shall be able to bring some of our bookshelves from the Garden, as there is more room here now.
I suppose you have left Cambridge House for good now. Is Miss A. L. there still, or has she left?
I am not reading anything now, except articles from the Revue des Deux Mondes. I have just got hold of L’année terrible, by Victor Hugo; I had written several times for it from the Calcutta Public Library, but the invariable answer had always been, ‘Out, sorry to say!’ But the librarian got tired of my perseverance, and I have received the book at last. It is much inferior to Les Châtiments. It has for subject the late war of 1870 and its suites. In one of the pieces, the poet addresses General Trochu thus:
‘Participe passé du verbe Tropchoir,’&c., &c.
Some verses entitled ‘A l’enfant malade pendant le siège’ and addressed to his little grandchild, Jeanne, are exceedingly good. Have you read Mrs. Gaskell’s Life of Charlotte Brontë? It is a very, very interesting book. I was lately reading a review of it, in the Revue des Deux Mondes, which interested me very much.
All the bigwigs are still up at Simla. I believe Lord Northbrook, our Governor-General, will go to Bombay in November, to receive the Prince of Wales there. Our new Chief-Justice, Sir Richard Garth, has been entertained at dinner by the barristers of Calcutta at the Town Hall. He seems to have pleased everybody by his warm and hearty manner.
Our second crop of mangoes is now come in, and we get some every day; but they are neither so plentiful nor so good as those which come to season first. To-day, the durwan from our Garden reported that a large snake had been seen in the room where the poultry used to be kept; but they could not kill it, as it escaped through a hole. The fruits we now get are delicious: pineapples, custard-apples, of which I am very fond; pomegranates, large and fresh, and the native almonds, very like newly-come-in and green walnuts, plantains, guavas, and the large jack-fruits which we get from our Garden.
One of my cousins, Varûna, only four years old, is fond of us, very much. He sometimes comes and stays the whole day with us. He is very intelligent and has a wonderful ear for music. You would be delighted to hear him sing some of Moody’s and Sankey’s hymns:
‘Hold the fort! for I am coming!’
He sings that standing, with his little hand raised in a most imposing attitude! He is very fond of firearms! Give him a gun or a pistol, and he will do anything for you. His love for watches and medicine-chests seems in no wise to have diminished.
July 23rd. I received your letter, dated the 22nd of June last. I am glad to see you are well, as I was getting a little anxious about you. I am sorry to hear about the Fishers. Poor girls! it must be trying to them to live so far from home. Is Mary the one who is a little shorter than the other two, and is she the eldest of the three? Where shall you go in September? I shall continue to write to your address in Cambridge. I shall be so glad to get a likeness of yours, when you are taken in Cambridge. Please do not forget to send me one.
Yesterday, Jeunette was put to harness with a mare of my cousin’s. As she had several days’ rest on account of Gentille’s lameness, she was very fresh, and went splendidly, plunging and so fiery that Papa was afraid of some accident. She came back quieter, but still full of spirit and fire. It reminded me of Browning’s description of a horse in a poem entitled ‘How they brought the good news from Ghent’:
‘With his nostrils like pits, full of blood to the brim.’
Gentille is quite well now, and I shall be able to use her in a few days. We sold off some guinea-pigs, keeping only four. As to the birds dear Aru brought from England, only two pairs of canaries and one goldfinch are alive.
I was reading some French translations of Henri Heine’s poems in the Revue des Deux Mondes. I liked them very much. ‘Le Négrier,’ ‘Soucis Babyloniens,’ ‘Les fiancés prédestinés,’ are very good, and also some ballads of a lighter vein.
‘Polly’ has learned a big sentence now; she says ‘Toru, dear, give me some bread’ quite plainly now; she says it to me whenever she sees me with any fruit in my hand.
I must bid you good-bye now, dear. With best love to yourself and kind regards to your father and mother.
Calcutta. September 10, 1875.
Many, many thanks for your very interesting letter, dated the 9th August last, which I received this morning. So you have left school at last! How glad your dear mother must be to have you all to herself now! She used to miss you so much when you went back to school after the holidays. The small piece from your father’s pen, I like very much; Papa also was pleased with it.
Your description of Sir Samuel Wagtail of Wagtail Hall, Berkshire, or Barkshire, is very funny. I laughed so much when I read it.8
Calcutta is now looking forward to the proposed visit of the Prince of Wales to India. Preparations are already being made for his reception. A committee has been appointed by the native community to consider the best way of showing the loyalty of his Indian subjects to the Prince. Papa was asked to be one of the committee; he is going to-morrow to a meeting, which is to be held at the British Indian Association Rooms, to consider how the Prince should be fêted and received by the Bengali community of Calcutta.
We have brought all our books here from the Garden, and I have been very busy arranging them. We shall go to the Garden and stay there as soon as the rains are over, which will be about the beginning of November. Our French books have arrived. Littré’s Dictionary, in four large volumes, is splendid; it is very good and instructive reading too, and I have been reading it often. The quotations and the history of each word are very interesting. Besides Littré’s Dictionary, we have received Alfred de Musset’s works, Alfred de Vigny’s poetical works, Mme Desbordes-Valmore’s Poésies de l’enfance and Soulary’s Sonnets and Vert-Vert, ou, Les aventures d’un perroquet, by Gresset. We have sent for some more books.
Gentille is now quite well, and I go out for an evening drive very often. I went yesterday to the Strand along the river, which is the fashionable ‘drive’ of Calcutta.
You promised to send me a likeness of yours; I expected that I should find it in your letter; your father’s poem made the letter feel hard to the touch, as if it enclosed a carte-de-visite. I suppose you have not had yourself taken yet; when you have, please do not forget to send me a copy. You know how I shall value it, dear.
Baguette has got two kittens, and Pinoo one. Baguette’s kits are very pretty: one is white, with a small black mark on the forehead and the tail black; the other is dark grey and white, intermingled. They are so full of playful tricks, it is quite amusing to watch their funny antics.
My cousin has sold off that frisky mare of his, which ran away and killed a poor old woman some time ago; he has now only a beautiful black mare. Just now I saw his brougham pass in the street opposite our window.
A great epidemic lately broke out among our ducks and geese; from two to four died every day, and out of twenty only eight are now living. We kept only three guinea-pigs and sold off the others, but yesterday, on going into their room, I saw the number increased to six! Three little ones had been born overnight. The four canaries and the goldfinch are thriving. The young bulbul which I had in the Garden has grown into a very fine bird now. The fruits in season now are custard-apples (I am very fond of them), Batavian oranges, green almonds, Indian plums, and plantains of course.
We lead a very quiet life here, and so I have very little news to give you. I get up at half past four, prepare two cups of chocolate, one for myself and one for Papa, then I go to dress, and by the time I come out from the dressing-room, Papa and Mamma get up, and I find the former smoking his morning cigar. Then I go to the roof of the house; it is very cool, early in the morning, up there. After that I give Baguette and Pinoo their morning pittance of fried fish. I come down and install myself in the window of this room, below which Gentille and Jeunette take their feed of gram and bran, and a delicious drink of suttoo (flour of oats), and water, which is given to horses in India, to keep them cool during the very hot months. Then we go down to breakfast. After breakfast we have prayers, after which Mamma goes to her household duties, I either take up a book or play for a quarter of an hour with the kittens, and Papa reads or writes or pores over the Indian Daily News. At twelve, we have our lunch, after which I read or write till three, when I take either a custard-apple, or a slice of Batavian orange. At five, we dress, and go out, I generally for a drive, and Papa and Mamma to my uncle’s garden. At seven, we have dinner, and at half-past eight, a cup of tea, and at ten to bed. I must stop here for the present, for breakfast is ready.
We had a sharp shock of earthquake five or six days ago. We were then at prayers, and we all felt it plainly; the punkah swung backwards and forwards; the water in the tank at the back of our house rose and fell, like waves of the sea; and all the clocks stopped. My uncle, who is rather nervous about earthquakes, was up in the third storey, when he felt the shock; he rushed downstairs and stationed himself at the front door, for fear the house should topple down! I laughed at him so much, but he declared that he felt the shock more plainly, being in the third storey, than we possibly could have felt it in the second.
September 14th. My grandfather and grandmother came to see us yesterday and they brought Mamma’s brother’s eldest wife with them; for my uncle has two wives, as many Hindus here have the right to have three or four wives, which is not at all contrary to the Shastras! My eldest auntie is very good, she loves us very much, and was very glad to see us: it is more than a year since she had seen us.
We went to the Garden two or three days ago and met some of our cousins, who had gone there before, with Papa’s permission, to angle. They insisted on our taking a middle-sized roheet that they had caught, so we had fresh roheet fried for dinner.
Mamma had an attack of her pain some weeks ago; it was a very sharp attack, and after that she had a little fever, but she was quite well in two or three days. Papa and I are both quite well now.
We go to the Old Church every Sunday; it is very far from our house, that is the only inconvenience.
There has been a great deal of cholera up at Simla, where the Governor-General goes usually with his staff and officers during the hot season. Of course he was obliged to déguerpir as soon as the cholera broke out.
I shall address my letters to you at Cambridge, though I suppose you will probably be somewhere near the Lakes for five or six weeks.
Mrs. Baker has not written to me yet, but I hope she will soon.
Why don’t you go to the Continent for a tour? I am sure you would enjoy yourself immensely. I should like to go down the Rhine and also to the Pyrenees; there is such a nice piece in French, descriptive of the scenery round the Pyrenees, by Napol le Pyrénéen (Xavier Navarrot), a protestant pasteur; it is the only poem he wrote, but it is a beautiful one; his critic, M. Charles Asselineau, thus speaks of the piece: ‘Ce n’est pas un pays deviné, rêvé, recréé, pour ainsi dire, par l’imagination puissante d’un poète grand magicien, mais un pays vu, compris et admirablement rendu en quelques coups d’un savant pinceau: la vermeille Orléans, Limoges aux trois sveltes clochers, l’Aveyron murmurant entre des pelouses pleines de parfums, les grèves pensives du Tescoud, le Tarn fauve et fuyant, la Garonne aux longs flots, aux eaux convulsives où nagent des navires bruns et des îlots verdoyants, parleront à l’œil de quiconque a suivi le même itinéraire. Tout le reste de la pièce, écrit d’un mouvement rapide, comme la course du voyageur, ou comme le galop des chevaux de Muça-el-Kevir, étincelle de vives couleurs et de traits brillants qui sautent à l’œil. C’est: Toulouse, jetée comme une perle au milieu des fleurs; les blancs chevaux à la crinière argentée, dont le pied grêle a des poils noirs comme des plumes d’aigle, c’est encore Fénelon le cygne aux chants divins,
Qui nageait aux sources d’Homère!
c’est enfin, à la dernière strophe, les armées, passant par Ronceveaux:—soldats, canons, tambours, chevaux, chants tonnant dans l’espace, &c.—Voilà bien l’art de 1833.’
I’d better stop here, I am afraid you are yawning!
12, Manicktollah Street, Calcutta. October 12, 1875.
I received your most welcome and interesting letter, dated 29th August, from Keswick, last Monday. I delayed answering it in hopes that something new might turn up, about which I could write to you and which would interest you, but as my hopes have been frustrated, you must content yourself with my usual long rigmaroles. Now that the modest preface has been written, I feel relieved, as you have fair warning of all the dull things that are to follow. How I should like to be with you now! What a pity you did not see the ‘four fraternal yews’! When Papa heard it, he was scandalized; he said he should not have thought you capable of such a thing!
Papa has been suffering from another small abscess, but he is now quite well. So are we all for the present.
I have bought a splendid book about horses, with beautiful large coloured illustrations. Papa has bought for me Mayhew’s Illustrated Horse-doctor, which I have wanted long to have.
Papa has hired a piano and I am practising away all the morning. Varûna, my little cousin, has a great ear for music. He knows almost all Mr. Sankey’s hymns and sings them in English, though he does not know the language. Play the first bar of any of Mr. Sankey’s hymns, he immediately catches the tune, and sings it to the last line, in perfect measure, keeping time with his foot. He is more and more attached to me, and the reason is, I let him play two or three notes on my piano when he comes!
13th. I have just come in from the small garden; I have been leading about Jeunette and Gentille there, while the grooms were busy at something or other. Jeunette is so very fond of bread; I have been giving her some every morning; she searches all my dress, pokes her nose into my pockets for a slice.
The last batch of French books arrived by last mail; they are Fleurange by Mme Augustus Craven; Anthologie Française, a collection of small poetical pieces from the oldest times to our days; and Le nouveau seigneur, and another book, I forget the name; the two latter we did not ask for, but they were sent in place of the Critiques et caractères contemporains of Jules Janin, which we asked for and which is unfortunately out of print. Fleurange is a very interesting and readable book; if you read it, I am sure you will be pleased. Le gentilhomme pauvre, by Henri Conscience, recommended by our French master, M. Girard of St. Leonards, is very sentimental, dull and worthless. Au coin du feu, by E. Souvestre, also recommended by M. Girard, is good in its way, but meant more for children than adults. Gazida, by Marmier, is very nice but inferior to his other work, which I liked very much, namely, Les fiancés du Spitzberg. Germaine, by M. About, is very readable but not very moral. M. About does not know how to be dull, for from the driest subject he can easily bring forth a generous supply of amusement and interest. Enough of books has been said, so I had better drop that subject.
Our winter is coming in rather early this year; the weather is already pleasanter and the mornings are fresh and cool. Of course the punkah is yet a source of comfort, but very soon it will be no longer so. I want to go to the Garden for the winter, but Papa is rather averse to moving again, when we have just settled down here with our books. I hope Mamma and I shall be able to persuade him to dislodge. We went to the Old Church last Sunday. Our pastor, Mr. Welland, was absent; I think he has gone to the North West for a change, and so Mr. Clifford conducted the service and gave the sermon.
The Doorga-Poojah holidays have come, and all business men have left town for a change. Last Sunday was the day that the Hindus throw the goddess Doorga into the river, after a three days’ worship! The streets were crowded to excess, processions, with the goddess, I mean with her image, borne in a triumphal throne and with music, marched towards the river. We thought we should be able to escape all the noise and crowd by going to Baugmaree for a day or two, but somehow we were prevented.
I have nothing to write about, so I will copy out for you one of my latest translations of French poetry. It is taken from the Anthologie which we received a fortnight ago and the author is M. Eugène Manuel, a poet of our times.
THE HISTORY OF A SOUL
In secret from among the throng God sometimes takes a soul, And leads her slow, through grief and wrong, Unswerving to her goal.
He chooses her to be His bride, And gives her from His store, Meek tenderness and lofty pride, That she may feel the more.
He makes her poor, without a stay, Desiring all men’s good, Searching the True, pure, pure alway, But still, misunderstood.
Beneath a weight of pains and fears He makes her often fall, He nourishes her with bitter tears, Unseen, unknown of all.
He spreads the clouds her head above, He tries her hour by hour, From Hate she suffers and from Love, And owns of Each the power.
God’s rigour never, never sleeps: She waits for peace? In vain. She struggles or resigned weeps, He strikes and strikes again.
In beings that she loves the most, He wounds her till, half mad, She wanders like a restless ghost! A problem strange and sad.
Thus stricken, reft of joy and light, God makes her fair and clean, Like an enamel hard and bright, A sword of temper keen.
Subject to Adam’s debt below And every curse and pain, The Judge inflexible would know If she will staunch remain.
Will she fight on, ’gainst every ill? Brave every storm? Stand fast, Her lofty mission to fulfil With courage to the last?
And when He sees her ever true, Like needle to the pole, Upon His work He smiles anew— Thus forges God a soul.
Do you like it? I have not given the original because it is long. If you are not tired, I will put in a piece of Mme Desbordes-Valmore’s, the original and the translation.
ROMANCE, ‘S’IL L’AVAIT SU’
S’il avait su quelle âme il a blessée, Larmes du cœur, s’il avait pu vous voir, Ah! si ce cœur, trop plein de sa pensée, De l’exprimer n’eût gardé le pouvoir, Changer ainsi n’eût pas été possible; Fier de nourrir l’espoir qu’il a déçu, A tant d’amour il eût été sensible, S’il l’avait su.
S’il avait su tout ce qu’on peut attendre, D’une âme simple, ardente et sans détour, Il eût voulu la mienne pour l’entendre. Comme il l’inspire, il eût connu l’amour. Mes yeux baissés recélaient cette flamme; Dans leur pudeur n’a-t-il rien aperçu? Un tel secret valait toute son âme, S’il l’avait su.
Si j’avais su, moi-même, à quel empire On s’abandonne en regardant ses yeux, Sans le chercher comme l’air qu’on respire, J’aurais porté mes jours sous d’autres cieux. Il est trop tard pour renouer ma vie; Ma vie était un doux espoir déçu: Diras-tu pas, toi qui me l’as ravie, Si je l’avais su?
Translation
If he had known—known what a soul he has wounded! O heart, if thy tears had been seen but to flow, Or if thou at his step less wildly hadst bounded And guarded the power thy deep feeling to show, He could not, he could not so lightly have altered, Proud to nourish a hope now hurled from its throne, By a love so profound, he, touched, must have faltered If he had known.
If he had known what might be hoped and awaited, From a heart in its candour, deception above, For mine he had longed, with a joy unabated, And as he inspired, would have felt also love. Mine eyes bent down ever, concealed my emotion, Guessed he nothing from that? was’t shyness alone? A secret like mine was worth search—and devotion, If he had known.
If I had known—I—of the empire he wielded! Over hearts that lived in the light of his eyes, As one breathes a pure air—unconscious, unshielded— My steps would have sought other countries and skies. It’s too late to talk of love-sign or love-token! My life was a hope, but the hope now has flown! Wilt thou say when thou knowest?—‘Oh heart I have broken If I had known!’
I must close my letter now. I am sure you are quite tired deciphering it, by this time. I shall cover the next page and then close.
October 15th. All Aru’s pets are doing well. My bulbul too is in a flourishing condition, but unfortunately it has lost the power to fly; I wanted to set it at liberty, but it only hopped about; the reason is, I think, its being so very young when I had it and reared it by hand; it had been so long shut up in a cage that it had lost the power to use its wings, poor thing!
The Prince of Wales has left England, but he will not be in Calcutta till about the middle of December, just before Christmas. His carriages, nine in number, have arrived already in Bombay. I must close here. Give our kindest regards to your father and mother, and Papa’s and Mamma’s love to yourself.
12, Manicktollah Street, Calcutta. November 8, 1875.
Many, many thanks for your nice long letter, which I have just received and read with the greatest pleasure. The mail goes to-morrow, so I have sat down at once to write an answer and send it if I can, by to-morrow’s outgoing mail.
We are all doing well, including Jeunette and Gentille, cats and guinea-pigs, but sad is the news about the birds: two of the canaries have been killed by rats; how they got into the cage is a mystery, but there were the poor canaries, one half-devoured and the other with a broken wing. There now only remain two canaries and one goldfinch.
Several days ago, a snake-charmer came here to show off his serpents; there were three cobras, two pythons and three two-headed snakes and several smaller ones, also ten or twelve mountain scorpions. Of course all the serpents had their poison fangs broken; the men are obliged to break them at least twice a month; it must be dreadful work. One of the cobras bit the man’s finger so as to bring forth a few drops of blood, but of course it did the man no harm, as the poison tooth was broken.
There is a root called in Latin, Aristolochia Indica, which has a marked effect on the most poisonous snakes; the man held this to the serpents and it was marvellous how it cowed them at once: they tried to sidle away as soon as they smelt it. But I doubt very much whether it would have any effect when a cobra is wild and free and attacks one; it is then blind with rage and no earthly power will turn it from its victim.
Drainage works are going on near our house, just in front of our coach-house, so we have sent our carriage to the Garden. We went there yesterday; my grandfather is ill with intermittent fever and as Connaghur (where he lives) has become very unhealthy, he wants to stay in our Garden for a fortnight or so; we went therefore to the Garden to make things ready for him.
The Prince of Wales will arrive at Bombay to-day; as soon as the news is received of his landing, every fort in India is to fire a salute. He will be here about Christmas. Some of the papers say he will never return to England, that his grave will be in India: cholera, fever, tigers, poison, the poniard, all are to be feared. I hope the papers will turn out false prophets!
We know the Reverend Mr. Vaughan of Calcutta; he lately lost his wife and went to England some months ago.
I am glad you like Mill on the Floss; I like it very much too. Have you read any of Thackeray’s? I like his books immensely. Esmond is the best, and Newcomes and Pendennis are excellent. His books make me laugh, cry, smile, look grave, by turns; after having finished one of his books, one remains thoughtful for an hour afterwards. Vanity Fair too is very good.
9th. The Prince of Wales must have landed at Bombay yesterday in the afternoon, for the Calcutta Fort (Fort William) fired a grand salute. Lord Northbrook has gone over to Bombay to welcome him. Among the suite of the Prince is Sir Bartle Frere, who was formerly Governor of Bombay, and whom we know very well. His daughters are very nice and amiable; many a merry day did Aru and I pass with them at Wimbledon. One of his daughters, Mary Frere, is the authoress of a book of Indian Tales, called Old Deccan Days; it is a very readable volume, and is illustrated by one of her sisters, I believe.
I am sorry to hear that Mrs. Hall is ailing, I hope she will soon be better. I trust your father too is quite well. I am sure you will be first at the French Lectures, if you attend them. We liked them very much; I suppose M. Boquel is the lecturer still. Do the Misses Hall attend them or have they left off? Do you see much of Mary and Lizzie Hall? If so kindly remember me to them and give our best regards to Mr. and Mrs. Hall.
As to our going back to England, it is still very uncertain, dear, but I hope we shall be able to go sometime or other, if not very soon. Instead of going to the Continent, as you purpose, what do you think of taking a trip out to India? It would be so nice, wouldn’t it, dear? Oh! I do long to see you again! How kind of you to think so often of me! ‘Eh bien! vous pensez donc à moi!’ said I, when I read that part of your letter, like the old Sergent Trubert9 in one of Erckmann-Chatrian’s tales, when his host brought him a glass of kirschenwasser early on a cold December morning, while he was at his post on the watch for the enemy.
Papa says the mail-day has been changed and that the day is Friday now instead of Tuesday, so I shall have ample time to write my letter.
The cold weather has fairly commenced. The mornings now are exceedingly cool and pleasant. The dews are very heavy in Calcutta during the early mornings and the late evenings, and the mosquitoes become more troublesome as the cold season advances. Oranges are coming in season; I am very glad of it, for I am very fond of oranges.
I have not received any letters from Mrs. Baker yet, but I hope I soon shall. Please give my kindest wishes to her when you see her.
An exhibition of pictures is to be opened this afternoon by Sir Richard Temple, the Lieutenant-Governor, in Calcutta. All the pictures have been brought out by an enterprising man, I forget his name, from England, and are the works of the most celebrated artists, past and present; viz., Lely, Gainsborough, Landseer, Reynolds, Delaroche, &c. Our Lieutenant-Governor is a little bit of an artist in his way, and is very fond of paintings. Have you ever been to the Royal Academy in London? I remembered how we enjoyed the pictures all the three seasons that we went there during our stay in England. I am exceedingly fond of pictures, though I cannot draw the easiest cottage, if I tried. Aru used to draw beautifully though she never learned drawing; she did flowers and fruit exceedingly well.
My uncle Girish and my aunt are going for a day’s trip on the river in a boat to-morrow. They wanted us to accompany them, but as my grandfather and his family will arrive to-morrow at the Garden, we thought it better to go there and see them settled comfortably.
A few days ago, Jeunette ran away from the groom, while he was giving her the usual hourly exercise in the morning. This is how it happened. Jeunette is exceedingly fond of Gentille, and the moment Gentille is taken away from her sight, she begins to grow restless, fret, and paw and neigh in a state of great impatience. Well, the other day, they were both at exercise, but Gentille was a little ahead, and a turn of the road hid her for some time from Jeunette, who at once grew restless and at last broke from the groom and came galloping through streets and by-lanes straight to our house. She would have been off again, but our porter caught hold of the halter and led her back to the stable. Fortunately no one was hurt.
How pleasant your trip has been! I see from your letters, that you enjoyed yourself immensely. I am glad to hear that the Fishers have also had their holidays, and enjoyed themselves. Please give my regards to them when next you write to them. How pleasant it must be to go down the Rhine! I remember one of the Reverend W. Lisle Bowle’s sonnets,—
—On the sparkling Rhine We bounded, and the white waves round the prow In murmurs parted;—varying as we go, Lo! the woods open, and the rocks retire, Some convent’s ancient walls, or glistening spire, ’Mid the bright landscape’s track unfolding slow.
I am glad you took some sketches, during your trip, of the scenery round you; it will be very nice doing them up when you are at leisure.
I have not been reading much lately, except Reviews and Monthlies. My book of French poetical translations is almost finished. I have only to translate three or four pieces more and then I shall be able to print the book if I like.
Some days ago my uncle Girish and my aunt had fireworks in their compound: we all went of course to see them, they were very pretty. There will be grand fireworks on the Maidan on the 24th December, when the Prince of Wales will be here. When the Duke of Edinburgh came here, in 1869, I think, they spent more than £9,000 in fireworks. Was it not literally converting money into smoke and ashes?
Papa says he will take me to see the races on the Maidan, which take place usually in December. I should like to go very much.
Baguette, my pet cat, has got two very nice kittens, just like two little Persian kits; they are very playful; Mamma has named them ‘Day’ (abbreviation of Daisy) and ‘May’ respectively.
I have no news that would interest you, so I copy below two of Heine’s smaller poems, translated by himself into French, and by myself into English.
‘LE MESSAGE’
Allons, mon écuyer, en selle! Plus rapide que l’ouragan, Cours au château du roi Duncan, Pour me quérir une nouvelle!
Parmi les chevaux glisse-toi, Et dis au valet d’écurie: ‘Quelle est celle qui se marie, Des deux filles de votre roi?’
Et s’il te répond: ‘C’est la brune,’ Viens vite, et me le fais savoir; Si ‘La blonde,’ reviens ce soir, Au pas, en regardant la lune.
Entre en passant chez le cordier, Prends une corde et me l’apporte, Ouvre bien doucement la porte, Et ne dis rien, mon écuyer!
(Translation)
To horse, my squire! To horse and quick! Be wingéd like the hurricane, Fly to the château on the plain, And bring me news, for I am sick.
Glide ’mid the steeds and ask a groom, After some talk, this simple thing— ‘Of the two daughters of our king, Who is to wed, and when, and whom?’
And if he tell thee—‘ ’tis the brown’, Come sharply back and let me know: But if ‘the blonde’, ride soft and slow: The moon-light’s pleasant on the down.
And as thou comest, faithful squire, Get me a rope from shop or store, And gently enter through this door, And speak no word but swift retire.
‘NI HAINE NI AMOUR’
J’ai connu plus d’une inhumaine Parmi les filles d’alentour, J’ai beaucoup souffert de leur haine Et plus encore de leur amour.
Elles ont dans ma coupe pleine Versé du poison chaque jour, C’était tantôt poison de haine, C’était tantôt poison d’amour.
Mais celle qui m’a fait la peine La plus déchirante, à son tour, N’a jamais eu pour moi de haine, N’a jamais eu pour moi d’amour.
(Translation)
Of girls unkind, though fair and stately, This neighbourhood may count a score; From their hate I have suffered greatly, But from their love, oh more, still more.
In my brimming cup they have lately Their poison shed as oft before, Hate-potions sometimes, and then straightly Love-philters that distress me sore.
But she whose name I love innately, Who gave the wound that struck the core, Moves tranquil on her way sedately, Nor hate, nor love, she bears or bore.
Which do you prefer? Heine, you know, is a Jew by birth; he wrote a great deal in German: a French critic says that ‘nul écrivain depuis Goethe n’a façonné l’idiome germanique avec cette puissance magistrale; on dirait parfois de véritables tours de force’.
The Poojah holidays are over; yesterday was a holiday; there will be no more holidays till, I think, about Christmas.
Is Mr. Steinhelper, the German Lecturer, still in Cambridge? I suppose you never see the Cowells?10 How are the Misses Oakes and their mother?11 Please remember me kindly to all of them, especially to ‘Aunt Emily’ as Mr. Smith used to style her. We are akin, ‘Aunt Emily’ and I, because here I am styled by everybody, ‘Sister Toru’; my grandfather calls me so, and all my uncles and aunts, as also my cousins, and Papa sometimes, too, calls me ‘Sister Toru’.
My letter must appear very dull to you, I am afraid, but I have tried my best that it should turn out the contrary. I have made it long, you see; I hope you are not tired making out my scrawl, are you?
Our pastor, Mr. Welland, has been in the North West for a change; so Mr. Clifford had to do the whole service last Sunday.
It gets very dark soon, now that the winter is coming on; before six it gets pitch dark and the heavy dews begin to fall. In the morning all the grassy compound and all the green leaves are glistening with big drops of dew like pearls;
‘Là, tous les diamants de la rosée en pleurs’
as says a French poet, M. le comte de Gramont.
I must bid you good-bye now. Papa and Mamma send their love to your dear self and their kindest regards to your father and mother. Please give my love to your mother and my best regards to your father, and with the very best love to yourself.
Calcutta. November 23, 1875.
I did not receive any letter from you by last mail. But I am writing to you now that you may receive this by Christmas.
We are all well here, the weather is beautifully cool and pleasant, real Indian winter weather. I suppose it is now beginning to be very cold in England. I wish I were there! You are aware how fond I am of the snow; you, I remember, dislike it very much.
The Prince of Wales has been highly pleased with the reception he has met with at Bombay. He is now out shooting near Bombay, he will have fine sport and no end of it in India. He will not be in Calcutta till about the 23rd December.
My grandfather and his family have settled down comfortably in our Garden, we went to see them yesterday and passed the whole afternoon with them.
Papa and I are going to begin Sanskrit in December; Papa says as there is no good opportunity to learn German now, we had better take up Sanskrit instead of doing nothing. I am very glad of this. I should so like to read the glorious epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, in the original. I shall be quite a Sanskrit Pundit, when I revisit old Cambridge! Ah! I so long to be there, and like the Poet Laureate hear
—————Once more in college fanes, The storm their high-built organs make, And thunder-music rolling shake The prophets blazoned on the panes.
and catch
—————Once more the distant shout, The measured splash of beating oars Among the willows—————.
I was reading the ‘Siege of Corinth’ of Lord Byron lately; it is very beautiful; my uncle says it is the most complete of his smaller poems. Byron’s ‘Lines written on attaining my thirty-fifth year’, are very pathetic: they were written only three months before his death.
A great many people have died from cholera and fever lately, in Calcutta and the suburbs. One of our cousin’s daughters, a girl of nine, died from cholera about a week ago; her father is a Hindu; she was taken ill on a Saturday morning and she died during the following night.
I have finished my book of French poetry translated into English; it is to be entitled A Sheaf gleaned in French Fields. I hope you like the title, do you? It is to be printed if I like. The concluding sonnet I shall copy out for you; it is not from the French, but is original.
SONNET
‘A MON PÈRE’
The flowers look loveliest in their native soil Amid their kindred branches; plucked, they fade And lose the colours Nature on them laid, Though bound in garlands with assiduous toil. Pleasant it was, afar from all turmoil To wander through the valley, now in shade And now in sunshine, where these blossoms made A Paradise, and gather in my spoil. But better than myself no man can know How tarnished have become their tender hues E’en in the gathering, and how dimmed their glow! Wouldst thou again new life in them infuse, Thou who hast seen them where they brightly blow? Ask Memory. She shall help my stammering Muse.
Do you like the sonnet? Papa does very much. There are 165 pieces of poetry in the volume, besides the notes affixed to each and all of the pieces. I have now nothing to do, so Papa and I are going to take up Sanskrit. It is a very difficult language and it is hard to learn it perfectly in less than six or seven years; but I will try my best. My grandfather, Papa’s father, used to know and understand Sanskrit like a pundit; and he only learnt it for two or three years when he was forty-two or forty-three years of age; so I hope my case will not be hopeless.
November 29th. We went to Church yesterday; and on our way we were stopped by a great crowd, with shrieking musical instruments in a narrow lane. It was some Hindu Festival. Jeunette got a little frightened and excited, and threw up her head and shook her silky mane in a manner that filled Papa’s heart with terror and mine with admiration: Jeunette looked so handsome. If the carriage had been stopped in the midst of all this babel of noise a few minutes longer, I doubt if Jeunette would have stood it; but the cries of ‘Khupper-dah’ (or ‘gare’ in French) cleared the way in a trice, and we arrived at Church in safety.
My grandmother is very ill with fever; we shall go to see her to-day; my grandfather is quite well now, I am happy to say. It is pretty cold here now, like English spring weather, and the mornings are almost sure to be ushered in by a slight mist which puts me in mind of Longfellow’s lines:
And resembles sorrow only, As the mist resembles rain.
December 4th. I have been rather busy for the last few days. On Saturday, Miss Ada Smith, a friend of ours, arrived in Calcutta from England. She came to see us on Monday; she is very nice and amiable; she has come here to teach in the Zenanas. We know her cousin very well, Mr. Algernon H. Smith, who was curate to Mr. Hall of Cambridge; he is now Rector of a parish in Tunbridge Wells. Papa passed three or four days at Miss Smith’s uncle’s house in Kent; Mr. A. H. Smith took him there and he enjoyed his stay with them immensely, and speaks even now about it. I like Ada very much. We took her on Friday last to our Garden. She was very pleased to see my grandmother and aunts, and was lost in admiration when my youngest aunt showed her her ‘casket of gems’. She was charmed with the Garden and said she wondered we long to return to Europe when we had such an earthly paradise to live in and enjoy. She took me to be twenty-nine years old and my uncle to be twenty-six only! She herself is twenty-nine years old. I showed her your likeness and told her what a dear good soul you are. I am going to take her for a drive on Monday evening. It is a great pity that she is not going to stay in Calcutta; the Secretary of the Society has chosen Amritsar for her destination; he says that there a great field is open for Zenana teachers and that there are not half so many teachers there as are wanted. Ada is to go there by the middle of next week. I feel rather sorry at this; I like her so very much; she is like a whiff of the free bracing air of dear old England.
We have begun Sanskrit: the pundit is very pleased with our eagerness to learn, and hopes great things from our assiduity. It is a very difficult language, as I said before, especially the grammar, which is dreadful. It is not so difficult to read and understand it, for one who knows Bengali.
December 6th. My grandmother is now quite well, but she is quite worn out by watching by my uncle and grandfather during the night: my grandfather had a recurrence of fever for the last three days, and on Saturday he was seriously ill. He is better now, I am happy to say. My uncle Genoo (that is my mother’s brother) was taken ill four days ago; he is also in a fair way of speedy recovery. I hope he will soon be well, for my poor grandmother is in a sad state of perplexity and trouble. We went to see them yesterday, and very glad they were to see us. We met three of Mamma’s second cousins there: one of them praised Jeunette and Gentille highly, and of course won my esteem at once! He admired their action and speed (he had seen me on the Maidan, he said), and how they were always up to their bits and how beautifully they carried their heads. He came out on the verandah when we left, to see them go. I am sure if I wanted to sell off my Gentille and Jeunette he would be the first to come forward as a purchaser; in fact he almost made an offer to buy them! I am so happy, I like my horses to be praised and deservedly too.
A few days ago a small cobra was killed in my uncle’s garden. My aunt is very much frightened; she wants to have a snake-catcher and have the reptiles caught, if there are any more in her garden; but uncle Girish says, it would be great folly to try such a thing, for if the snake-catcher was bitten by a cobra, sure death would follow, and that such things had better be left alone. But my grandfather says, that he is sure that no such things would happen. He has seen the most venomous snakes caught alive by these professional snake-catchers and not one of them has he seen killed or bitten by a snake. A few days ago a cow in our Garden was killed by snake-bite; it was well and hearty overnight, but early the next morning, when it was brought out, the cow-keeper found it quite dull and foaming at the mouth; the floor of the cow-house was half covered with froth: the poor animal made a few steps, then tottered and fell and had frightful convulsions before it died.
The Prince of Wales is in Ceylon now; he has been enjoying himself heartily; he has had good sport around Bombay; he has ordered all that he has killed to be stuffed—from a crow to a tiger—to be borne home as trophies when he goes back to England.
I have nothing else to write about, and as the mail goes to-morrow, I had better close my letter. Please give my kindest regards to your father and mother, and with best love to yourself.
P.S.—Do not forget to send your likeness when it is taken. Papa and Mamma send their best regards to your father and mother and best love to you. I hope you will be able to read this scrawl. The ink is execrably bad and pen ditto. A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you and yours.
12, Manicktollah Street, Calcutta. December 13, 1875.
On our return from Church yesterday morning, I received your most welcome and interesting letter. I first felt it when I was holding it in my hand, with my fingers, to see if it enclosed your photograph, and I was disappointed at not finding your likeness within your letter. Please have your likeness taken, dear, as soon as possible; you do not know how anxious I am to see it. I will send you the three different views taken of our Garden House and Garden at Baugmaree; I hope you will like them; our Calcutta house has also been photographed, but the photograph has turned out such an ugly one that I do not care to send it to you. You need not pay for the postage, dear, I hope I am not so reduced in circumstances just yet!
We are very very sorry indeed to hear of poor Mrs. Hall’s serious illness. We liked her very much, and dear Aru and I were very fond of her good motherly ways. It will be indeed a hard blow for her family, especially for Reginald, her only son: she is so fond of him and he of her. God help them all.
I do not know Mr. Haldar personally himself, but I know his father very well, for he is our family doctor; that is, it is Dr. Haldar whom we generally call in if anybody is ill in our house. He is now treating my grandfather, who is still very ill; indeed the doctors gave up all hope; there was no pulse and the limbs and feet were clammy; Papa went at midnight to see him. He got over it however, and we hope he is out of danger now. I shall tell Dr. Haldar that you met his son; I am sure he will be glad to hear it.
Your account of your drive with the C.’s and your horror on discovering who would drive, put me in mind of one of John Leech’s sketches.—Scene, Greenwich: the last train has gone, and the senior party, under the impression that the vehicle was a brougham, has accepted the offer of a lift to town.—Senior Party. ‘Dog-cart! Good gracious! But you are never going to drive?—Junior Party. ‘Not going—a—dwive? Why not going—a—dwive? Jus—ain’t I, tho?’—You should see the picture, it is a masterpiece.
Great preparations are going on to welcome the Prince. Up-country Rajas and Maharajas are coming down in great numbers. Every day we see one or two of these Rajas with mounted retinues, all in gold and purple, pass along the broad streets of Calcutta. All the thoroughfares through which the Prince of Wales is likely to pass are almost blocked with building materials for arches, &c. The fort and the barracks have been newly painted. Even the lamp posts are re-painted a bright green. The Prince is only going to stay a week here. Some Raja or other has had an upper garment made, all studded with pearls and precious stones, which he means to wear when he meets the Prince, and which has cost him fifteen lakhs of rupees! Another will spend thirty lakhs during the three days the Prince will stay in his dominions.
During the Prince’s sojourn in Bombay he visited Lady Sassoon, a Parsee lady: her husband is very rich, and they have bought a house and lands somewhere near London. On the landing of the Prince, Parsee maidens, daughters of rich and influential men in Bombay, went before him, scattering flowers and singing a welcome. One day when the Prince was out driving, a Parsee lady came out of the door of her mansion (I forget her name, she was the wife of a rich merchant and we used to know some of her kin, when we were in Bombay), and stopping the carriage, presented the Prince with a gold-embroidered smoking cap, made by her own fair hands. Of course the Prince accepted the present with many thanks and much grace, as befits a gallant gentleman! The Parsee ladies are far ahead of our Bengali ones.
I have not read anything lately, so busy am I with my Sanskrit. The grammar is awfully difficult, though in reading and understanding we get on pretty swimmingly. I have not read Middlemarch. I have read many reviews and critiques on the book, both in French and English, and of course that gives me a good idea of the work. You should read Wives and Daughters by Mrs. Gaskell; it is a highly interesting and well-written work; I am sure you would like it.
All my pets are doing well; Jeunette and Gentille are quite well and sprightly; they are both exceedingly fond of me and have come to know even my step when I come downstairs; they prick up their ears and Gentille neighs and Jeunette paws with pleasure at my approach. They are beautiful trotters, especially Gentille; they will trot their fifteen miles within the hour easily, without sweating. I am so fond of my horses!
Miss Ada Smith, of whom I wrote to you in my last letter, is going to stay here till the 20th instant, and then she will leave for Amritsar; I am very glad of this delay; I shall see more of her.
So you are not going to have any more ‘bald-headed darlings’ just now! Papa laughed at that so, and declared what a dear little soul you were and what a good memory you had to remember all our little doings amongst you! O Mary, I do so wish to see you again! I hope we shall be able to sell off the Garden soon, and then set sail for England! So Miss A. L. is making quite a sensation, and is the ‘toast of a’ the town’. Please give her my love, when you next write to her.
I hope you like M. Boquel. He is rather rough with ladies, but he has a great sense of justice and wrong, and gives every one her due among his lady-pupils. We liked him very much indeed when we used to attend his lectures. Many funny incidents happen during the lectures; is it not so? I remember how everybody was amused when a certain young lady translated, ‘Quel beau barbe!’ into ‘What a beautiful beard!’ when it ought to have been, of course, ‘What a beautiful Barbary-horse!’ What books do you read at the lectures? Are there many pupils? Do you have dictation? Do Mary and Lizzie Hall attend the French lectures still? I want specially to know what French books you read at the lectures and from what French books M. Boquel gives the dictations. I am sure they will be very nice and interesting books and very healthy in their tone too; I should therefore like to read them; we used to have Le Philosophe sous les toits by Emile Souvestre and Le Roman d’un jeune homme pauvre by Octave Feuillet. They are both very interesting and readable books. I suppose you do not take any music-lessons now, do you? Does Dr. Garrett give the lectures on Harmony still? Why do you not attend the German lectures too? I suppose you have hardly the time for them.
It is very cold here now, that is, very cold for Calcutta; in England this would be considered nice pleasant spring weather. The oranges are in full season now; I wish I could give you a taste of our oranges, they are so delicious! Even the celebrated Maltese oranges are nothing compared to ours. Then we now get the beautiful pomegranates from Afghanistan, and the grapes and the pears from Cabool. The grapes are not larger than the English ones, only they are of a different shape, being rather longer than the English ones, which are round and far better than our grapes. The English grapes have a luscious flavour, mixed up with their sweetness, which reminds me of very good wine; our grapes, or rather those that we get from Cabool, are only very sweet; they have no tempting flavour like the English ones. We get very good cauliflowers, cabbages, peas, carrots, &c. I mean to give a feed to Jeunette and Gentille daily of carrots, when they are cheaper. Horses are very fond of carrots.
The Christmas holidays will not begin till about the 18th. I do not think we shall have any Christmas tree here this time. We generally used to have one in our house every Christmas. We used to go all together on the morning of Christmas Eve to the Garden-House and choose out a goodly, immense, and leafy branch, which the gardeners used to hew down in our presence; we used to place it on the top of our carriage and bring it home amid triumphant and happy laughter. ‘Hélas! le bon temps que j’avais!’
December 15th. We are just come in from a drive and from shopping. Mamma did not go with us. Only Papa and I went. Papa showed my book of French translations to a publisher here; but Calcutta publishers are a very timid class of people, not at all enterprising, and they are besides more given to the sale of books than publishing new ones. The publisher referred Papa to another one, who, he said, knew more about these things, and was a better judge in such matters. Of course he praised the translations very much, and was half willing to take them and publish the book.
Calcutta is extremely busy with the preparations for the welcome to the Prince. As we went to the European quarter of the town we saw the preparations going on.
I must close now; a merry Christmas and a happy new year to you and yours. I have written a letter to you by last mail, so I shall not make this one longer.
The late Mr. A. M. Bose, barrister-at-law, first Bengali Wrangler. ↩︎
The son and eldest daughter of the late Rev. H. Hall of St. Paul’s Church, Cambridge. ↩︎
The proprietors of Regent House, where the Dutts lodged in Cambridge. ↩︎
The school at Malvern Wells where her friend Miss Martin was. ↩︎
Afterwards Sir Richard Claverhouse Jebb, Public Orator; Fellow of Trinity; Professor of Greek, Cambridge. ↩︎
William Webster Fisher, Downing Professor of Medicine. ↩︎
Mademoiselle Verry, Miss Martin’s French governess, who resided for many years at Park Terrace till her pupil went to school at Cambridge House, Malvern-Wells, in 1872. ↩︎
This was an allusion to a dog belonging to a friend of Miss Martin. ↩︎
Written in 1876. ↩︎
Professor Cowell and his wife. ↩︎
Cousins of the Martin family. ↩︎