Page:Letters from India Vol 1.djvu/183

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LETTERS FROM INDIA.
175

FROM THE HON. F. H. EDEN, FOR A FRIEND.
June 30.

I want another letter from you, dear, sadly. I wonder whether I shall ever get it. I just now discovered a monster of a fishy-looking insect inside the glass of that print of you, beginning to eat you up. Insects, here, have a real love for pictures; if I had not discovered that greedy, and I may say, malicious creature, in three more days you would have been eaten up.

Now here’s a thing! I thought four of the aides-de-camp looked pale at breakfast this morning, and it appears that there is a report that the Chitpore Nawâb was not asked to the ball we gave last week in honour of our beloved Monarch’s birthday. You must at once see what a thing that would be. I dare say it has never happened to you, to overlook a Chitpore Nawâb. I’m sure I never missed one when you gave a party. You do things so cleverly. I hope that Chitpore won’t declare war upon us; in fact I hardly know what to hope, or what to fear; for I don’t know where Chitpore is. Probably we have taken possession