neglected; and there was even found a buyer for a patent Dipthong washing and wringing machine, full of wooden skittle balls and rollers, and capable of washing a thousand dhoturs in six hours at a cost per piece of 2 annas 3 pies for soap, washing-soda and fuel, and needing only three able-bodied men and a boy to work it.
Cotton and its machinery filled a large department; for the time when America should contribute her full share of this staple to the world's market seemed then distant; and cotton was the prime cause of the prosperity of Ajaibgaum.
The Exhibition was, however, only the centre of a host of attractions which the capital of the South-West Provinces then presented. Lawn-tennis was not in those days; but there was cricket, badminton and archery with picnics, dances and dinners and field days of the Ajaibgaum Tent Club and a race-meeting—to say nothing of fire-works and tumashas for the native population, The hospitality of the place was boundless; for though there were but few good houses, each was surrounded by a mushroom crop of tents. Sir Rupert Boldick inhabited a canvas town, fortified with lines of picketed horses and mounds of elephants and camels. In His Honour's Camp a distinguished Member of Parliament was hard at work making notes for a volume of travels. He was deeply interested in the natives, and shook hands with such as were presented to him with effusion; but when an Englishman was introduced he raised his eye-glass slowly, put his hands behind him, and bowed frigidly.
All this, after months of plodding in the Oracle office, was new and fresh to me, and I felt that I was really seeing India at last. I regarded the stalwart men who strode about in knickerbockers, and the young civil, police and military officers in neat riding trim as they cantered along in the cool morning sunshine, with a feeling of envy. Why was it not given to me to live in a tent with rifles, hog-spears and hunting-crops hung about the walls and to be a ruler of men, instead of a pale bondslave to that insatiable Daughter of the Horse-leech—a daily paper?
I felt my deficiencies sadly when Mr. Twitchley Crowdie presented me to Sir Rupert. The great man was most kind; and indicated at some length the points of interest to which the attention of the readers of the Oracle might be directed. He was about to pay a flying visit to Brinjalpur to see the famous
