Page:An American Girl in India.djvu/233

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I MEET AN A.D.C.
223

hood's pictures of the Bible. At last we reached our own camp, and swung in between two pillars innocent of gates, but supported by two smart native sentries, who made one feel delightfully important by saluting as one passed. I suppose one gets accustomed to being saluted and salaamed to in India, but at first it gives one a nice comfortable feeling every time it happens. One passes on feeling that, after all, one really can't be quite the despicable worm one sometimes half-suspects one is.

Our tents were just a revelation of what a tent can rise to if it tries. Mine was just fascinating. First of all it had a fireplace—which one didn't expect of a tent—with a delightful nice red fire of glowing logs that threw out a welcome at you as you entered straight away. I just fairly hugged that fireplace in joy and gratitude. Then the walls were not left bare like the walls of a common or garden tent, but hung with nice warm-coloured purdahs of Cashmir work that made the place real cosy. The boarded floor was an added luxury, and the thick red dhurri that covered it completed the right-down laughing cheerfulness of that tent. Never before or since have I seen a tent to compare with it.

Of course. Aunt Agatha would not have enjoyed it a bit for fear of its catching fire. Aunt Agatha is one of those people who never enjoy anything for fear of something happening. Now I think that is such a mistake. As I said before, I always go on gaily so long as it is light, and there are people about. It is only when it is dark, and there is a