It has been extremely wet since I last wrote. On Saturday we could do
nothing except laze indoors and play billiards and Friday was the
same, with a dull dinner-party at the end of it. It was very nice and
cool though, and I enjoyed those two days as much as any.
On Sunday we left Government House in order to be with Guy Coles
during his three days' leave.
It rained all the morning: we went to Church at a spikey little chapel
just outside Government House gate. It cleared about noon and we
walked down to the Brewery, about three miles to meet Guy. When he
arrived we had lunch there and then got ponies.
We had arranged to take Guy straight to a picnic with a nice Mrs.
Willmott of Agra, who comes here for the hot weather. So we rode up
past the lake and to the very top of Agarpatta, one of the humps on
the rim of hills. It took us over two hours, and the mist settled in
just as we arrived, about 5, so we picnicked chillily on a misty
mountain-top; but Mrs. Willmott and her sister are exceptionally nice
people, so we all enjoyed it. They have two small children and a lady
nurse for them. I never met one before, but it is quite a sensible
plan out here.
We only got back to this Hotel just before dinner, and there I found a
wire from Major Wyatt asking me if I would command a draft and take it
to the 4th Hants in the Persian Gulf. This is the exact fulfilment of
the calculation I wrote to you in April, but it came as a surprise at
the moment. I was more excited than either pleased or depressed. I
don't hanker after fighting, and I would, of course, have preferred to
go with the regiment and not as a draft. But now that I'm in for it,
the interest of doing something after all these months of hanging
about, and in particular the responsibility of looking after the draft
on the way, seems likely to absorb all other feelings. What appeals to
me most is the purely unmilitary prospect of being able to protect the
men, to some extent, from the, I'm sure, largely preventible sickness
there has been in the P.G. The only remark that ever made me feel a
sudden desire to go to any front was when O'Connor at Lahore told me
(quite untruly as it turned out) that "the Hampshires are dying like
flies at Basra." As a matter of fact, they only had ten deaths, but a
great deal of sickness, and I do enjoy the prospect of trying to be
efficient about that. As for fighting, it doesn't look as if there
would be much, whereon Purefoy greatly commiserates me; but if that is
the only privation I shan't complain!
I'm afraid your lively imagination will conjure up every kind of
horror, and that is the only thing that distresses me about going: but
clearly a tropical climate suits me better than most people, and I
will be very careful to avoid all unnecessary risks! both for your
peace of mind and also to keep the men up to the mark, to say nothing
of less exalted motives.
I know no details at all yet. I am to return to Agra on Saturday, so I
shall only lose forty-eight hours of my most heavenly fortnight here.
I got this wire Sunday evening and Purefoy sat up talking on my bed
till quite late as we had a lot to say to each other.
_August 4th._ On Monday morning it was pouring harder than ever,
quite an inch to the hour. I walked across to the Telegraph Office and
answered the Major's wire, and got wet through. After breakfast I
chartered a dandy and waded through the deluge to the station
hospital, where the M.O. passed me as sound, without a spark of
interest in any of my minor ailments. I then proceeded to the local
chemist and had my medicine-case filled up, and secured an extra
supply of perchloride. There is no Poisons Act here and you can buy
perchloride as freely as pepper. My next visit was to the dentist. He
found two more decayed teeth and stopped them with incredible
rapidity. The climate is so mild that though I was pretty wet through
I never felt like catching a cold from being operated on. He was an
American with a lady assistant to hold one's mouth open! I never feel
sure that these dentists don't just drill a hole and then stop it: but
no doubt teeth decay extremely quickly out here.
Then I went back to the Telegraph Office and cabled to Papa and got
back in time for lunch after the moistest morning I ever remember
being out in.
This hotel is about the worst in the world, I should say, though there
are two in Naini reputed to be worse still. It takes in no newspaper,
has no writing-paper, only one apology for a sitting-room, and can't
supply one with fuel even for a fire. However, Moni Lal is resourceful
and we have survived three days of it. Luckily there is an excellent
custom here by which visitors belonging to another club, _e.g._, the
Agra Club can join the Naini Club temporarily for 1s. per day. So we
spent the afternoon and evening at the Club and I spiflicated both
Purefoy (giving him forty and two turns to my one) and Guy at
Billiards.
On Tuesday (yesterday) we got up at 7.0 and went for a sail on the
lake. Guy is an expert at this difficult art and we circumnavigated
the place twice before breakfast with complete success and I learned
enough semi-nautical terms to justify the purchase of a yachting cap
should occasion arise.
After breakfast we were even more strenuous and climbed up to
Government House to play golf. It came on to rain violently just as we
arrived, so we waited in the guard-room till it cleared, and then
played a particularly long but very agreeable 3-ball, in which I lost
to Guy on the last green but beat Purefoy three and one. We got back
to lunch at about 3.15.
As if this wasn't enough I sallied out again at 4.0 to play tennis at
the Willmotts, quite successfully, with a borrowed racquet, my own
having burst on introduction to the climate of this place. Mrs. W.
told me that there was a Chaplain, one Kirwan, here just back from the
Persian Gulf, so I resolved to pursue him.
I finished up the day by dining P. and G. at the Club, and after
dinner Purefoy, by a succession of the most hirsute flukes, succeeded
in beating me by ten to his great delight.
I went to bed quite tired, but this morning it was so lovely that I
revived and mounted a horse at 7.0 leaving the other two snoring. I
rode up the mountain. I was rewarded by a most glorious view of the
snows, one of the finest I have ever seen. Between me and them were
four or five ranges of lower hills, the deepest richest blue
conceivable, and many of their valleys were filled with shining seas
of rolling sunlit cloud. Against this foreground rose a quarter-circle
sweep of the snows, wreathed and garlanded with cloud wracks here and
there, but for the most part silhouetted sharply in the morning sun.
The grandest mass was in the centre: Nanda Devi, 25,600, which is the
highest mountain in the Empire, and Trisoul, over 22,000. There were
six or eight other peaks of over 20,000 ft.
I got back to the Hotel for breakfast, and from 9.30 to 10.45 we
played tennis, and then changed hastily and went to Church for the War
Anniversary Service. The station turned out for this in unprecedented
numbers--churchgoing is not an Anglo-Indian habit--and there was no
seat to be had, so I sat on the floor. The Bishop of Lucknow, Foss's
uncle, preached.
After the service I waylaid the Revd. Kirwan and found he was staying
with the Bishop, who immediately asked us to lunch. So Purefoy and I
went to lunch--Guy preferring to sail--and I extracted quite a lot of
useful information from K. Incidentally the Bishop showed me a letter
from Foss, who wrote from the apex of the Ypres salient. He isn't
enjoying it much, I'm afraid, but was quite well.
When we left the Bishop, it was coming out so fine that we decided to
ride up and try again to see the snows. So up we rode, and the cloud
effects were lovely, both over the plains and among the mountains; but
they hid more than half the snows.
We rode down again to Valino's, the nutty tea-shop here, where we had
reserved a table on the balcony. Guy was there before us and we sat
there till nearly seven listening to the band. We got back to dinner
where Purefoy had secured one of his innumerable lightning friends to
dine with us, and adjourned to the Club for billiards afterwards:
quite a full day.
_Thursday: Government House._--Another busy day. It was fine again
this morning, so we all three rode up to Snow View and got an
absolutely perfect view: the really big snows were clear and
cloudless, while the lower slopes and hills and valleys were flooded
with broken seas of dazzling cloud. I put it second only to the
Darjeeling view.
After breakfast Purefoy and I came up and played golf. Guy took fright
at the chance of being asked in to lunch here and went sailing again.
A shower made us late in starting, and we only got through twelve
holes, after many misfortunes. I ended dormy five.
Lady M. had been in bed ever since we left, but is up to-day, looking
rather ill still.
To-night there is a dinner party.
_Friday._--The dinner party was uneventful. I sat next a Mrs. ----,
one of the silliest females I ever struck. Her only noteworthy remark
was that of course the Germans were well equipped for the War as they
had been preparing for it for arcades and arcades.
It is wet again to-day. No mail has arrived. I start for Agra after
lunch. I have had a delicious holiday. My address now will be:
"Attached 1/4 Hants Regt.,
I.E.F. 'D,' c/o India Office, S.W."
and post a day early.
* * * * *