maces were all tossed anywhere and the packet torn open, and we all began screaming, ‘That’s ’s hand,’ and ‘There’s Robert’s,’ and ‘This is from Maria to me,’ and then came ‘What’s the date?’ ‘Is it the May overland packet?’ and then we all looked, and there was ‘November, 1835,’ at the top of each letter, and Captain Champneys began reading his, which was an elaborate excuse from a man at the Calcutta Custom House, saying that by some odd mistake these letters had been lying there four months, and had only just been discovered. They were answers to our Madeira letters; the second set you all sent off for us, which we have always given up as lost at sea—which we were starving for—which would have been worth their weight in gold at the time—and which, as it is, I have read all through with considerable interest, though I said out of spite that I would not. But it is provoking, is it not?
We came back early to Calcutta. No letters. Sir H. Fane has been very ill to-day. George and I rode, and went to his house to ask after
