“I wonder”—­the match would not light, and he struggled a moment with another.  Then he blew a great cloud of smoke, and sat down in a different chair—­“I wonder whether a fourth would act as a fly-wheel,” and he looked straight at me, as if asking my opinion.

I had never been in direct relations with a Mussulman of education and position.  To be asked point-blank whether I thought four wives better than three on general principles, and quite independently of the contemplated spouse, was a little embarrassing.  He seemed perfectly capable of marrying another before dinner for the sake of peace, and I do not believe he would have considered it by any means a bad move.

“Diamond cut diamond,” I said.  “You too have proverbs, and one of them is that a man is better sitting than standing; better lying than sitting; better dead than lying down.  Now I should apply that same proverb to marriage.  A man is, by a similar successive reasoning, better with no wife at all than with three.”

His subtle mind caught the flaw instantly.  “To be without a wife at all would be about as conducive to happiness as to be dead.  Negative happiness, very negative.”

“Negative happiness is better than positive discomfort.”

“Come, come,” he answered, “we are bandying terms and words, as if empty breath amounted to anything but inanity.  Do you really doubt the value of the institution of marriage?”

“No.  Marriage is a very good thing when two people are so poor that they depend on each other, mutually, for daily bread, or if they are rich enough to live apart.  For a man in my own position marriage would be the height of folly; an act of rashness only second to deliberate suicide.  Now, you are rich, and if you had but one wife, she living in Delhi and you in Simla, you would doubtless be very happy.”

“There is something in that,” said Isaacs.  “She might mope and beat the servants, but she could not quarrel if she were alone.  Besides, it is so much easier to look after one camel than three.  I think I must try it.”

There was a pause, during which he seemed settling the destiny of the two who were to be shelved in favour of a monogamic experiment.  Presently he asked if I had brought any horses, and hearing I had not, offered me a mount, and proposed we should ride round Jako, and perhaps, if there were time, take a look at Annandale in the valley, where there was polo, and a racing-ground.  I gladly accepted, and Isaacs despatched one of my servants, the faithful Kiramat Ali, to order the horses.  Meantime the conversation turned on the expedition to Kabul to avenge the death of Cavagnari.  I found Isaacs held the same view that I did in regard to the whole business.  He thought the sending of four Englishmen, with a handful of native soldiers of the guide regiment to protect them, a piece of unparalleled folly, on a par with the whole English policy in regard to Afghanistan.