sahib has arrived." All in a flurry I brush the dust off hair, beard, and
the rest of myself, and as I go to receive him in the drawing-room, I try
to look as respectable as if I had been reposing there comfortably all the
afternoon.

I went through the shaking of hands and conversed with the magistrate
outwardly serene; still, misgivings about his accommodation would now and
then well up within. When at length I had to show my guest to his room, I
found it passable, and if the homeless cockroaches do not tickle the soles
of his feet, he may manage to get a night's rest.




KALIGRAM, 1891.


I am feeling listlessly comfortable and delightfully irresponsible.

This is the prevailing mood all round here. There is a river but it has no
current to speak of, and, lying snugly tucked up in its coverlet of
floating weeds, seems to think--"Since it is possible to get on without
getting along, why should I bestir myself to stir?" So the sedge which
lines the banks knows hardly any disturbance until the fishermen come with
their nets.

Four or five large-sized boats are moored near by, alongside each other.
On the upper deck of one the boatman is fast asleep, rolled up in a sheet
from head to foot. On another, the boatman--also basking in the
sun--leisurely twists some yarn into rope. On the lower deck in a third,