Hazy Remembrances.

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"Was it larger than the one you saw in the Peredynia Gardens, near Kandy?"

"Did I see one there? Oh, yes!-that was a large one, too. I had forgotten that."

"Where did you see your first fakir ?"

"Let's see-was it at Madras, or Benares, or Delhi? Neither place; it was at Lucknow-the man had claws for nails, and had not been washed for twenty years.”

"I remember the beast, and can almost smell him at this distance."

Of such like will be the speedy traveller's hazy remembrances of his Indian journey.

Of the trouble to travellers the most annoying is the utter inability of the Hindoo to understand a word of English. It may be shouted at him in the manner in which words are always sent at the heads of those who do not comprehend them, or it may be repeated slowly and distinctly, as was the request for the loan of a gridiron made by the Irishman to the Frenchman, but all to no purpose. The Hindoo is as stupid as one's self, and only knows his own language. One is put to endless inconveniences by it which should have been thought of beforehand. In time I get used to it, as one gets used to everything that is irksome at first. As I go about in the gharries, I sit beside the driver, as the best seat for looking round. He talks to me often enough, and never seems to be annoyed at getting no sensible answers. He is pleased, perhaps, at having so good a listener, and all the talk to himself. He has been told what course to go on starting, and there is no further chance of our exchanging ideas-even supposing that either of us happened to have any. We get on very well until the return journey begins, when I perceive that he is going over the same ground travelled before. He has only one notion of doing anything. I therefore clutch the reins and bring about a stoppage until some probable interpreter comes in sight. Generally that arrives in shape of a Parsee, whom I identify by his style of hat. I explain matters to him, and he to the driver, and

then another road is taken, and trouble finishes. I do not recall meeting with any Parsee who did not speak English. In that respect they are on an equality with the Dutchmen in Java.

To please Western-world eyes I had rather that the mild Hindoo would put additional covering on himself, and have respect for his word, or for the memory of others as to what were his words. He is still the man of the East who is regardless of the terms of his bargain. "Did I not agree with thee for a penny?" has to be said to him now as it was of old, and will be for ever. He first denies any agreement whatever, and secondly the amount agreed upon. When the evidence of others is produced against him, he has various ways, contrary to ordinary common sense, of wriggling and wrangling. Not succeeding in his claim, he is eloquent on the subject to all around; while I, for want of words, can appeal only to conscience for approbation, and don't always find it the help that Shakespeare asserts it to be.

India is claimed by its people as the oldest of peopled countries. It has always been foremost in the world's history, and, it is likely, will so continue. There is vitality in the ceaseless industry and producing powers of its toiling millions. To get the honey that such a hive of human bees produces will be always a fight amongst the nations of the world. The Egyptians have possessed it, as also the Grecians, the Syrians, and the Turks. The Tartar has had it, and the Persian. The Portuguese and the Dutch had a finger in the fat pie, and the Frenchman also. The best of all nations has best part of it now, and is doing the Hindoo inhabitants more good than any of the slave-driving barbarians who have hitherto overrun the land. That England may long keep its rule over India, may be desired in the interest of one's nationality equally with the best interests of the Hindoo. He is less ill-used by Great Britain and its people than he was by any other of the owners of India. He is being educated all over the land. The schools established throughout the country are something exceptionally praiseworthy on the part of a country that can

Benefits of Our Rule.

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only hold, but can never colonize, India. It is adopting the Hindoo into the British family, and providing him with that education which the children of Europeans have, for health's sake, to seek in other countries. He has hospitals erected everywhere for him, and cheap railways to carry him on his many holy pilgrimages. He gets justice, too, and cannot be robbed of his savings with impunity as of yore. He cannot be improperly beaten either, or if he is, he can go to the court for a summons like a European, and that he knows. The notice "Visitors are requested not to strike the servants," which appears in some hotels, is daily getting of less import. When Europeans don't get their requests understood, they are now learning to believe themselves and their ignorance partly to blame. In old days the native's ignorance of English meanings was thought to be improvable by the process of kicking, but that was of the time when other fallacies, similar to that of ill-using mad folks, were indulged in.

An annoying habit of the Hindoo is that of his utter carelessness about sleeping quarters. He is dog-like in that respect, and so always in the way. Europeans never think of providing sleeping accommodation for a native servant. It is difficult to walk about after dark and not stumble over his dusky body. He has no undressing to do, and any surface suits his convenience for a snooze. Along the footways he sleeps in front of the shops, and is to be dodged in every verandah, and tumbled over in the house-passages and on the landings. Opening the bed-room door in the dark, I fall over one who lies along outside, and on to the stomach of another who sleeps against the door opposite. I envied rather than pitied them, and would have exchanged beds with them to have slept as soundly.

This believing Hindoo has but as little hold on life as a rabbit. His sickness is of the briefest duration, and no attempt is made at a struggle with death. One of my guides did not come next morning at his appointed time. He was quite well the preceding evening, but had died during the night.