very far beyond the reach of the large towns, a small ice-machine is kept at work day and night to increase the supply while you sleep, and to maintain it while you wake.  In the connat or verandah of the tent, long chairs await you after your meal, and as you smoke the fragrant cigarette and watch the stars coming out, you feel as comfortable as though you had been dining in your own spacious bungalow in Mudnugger.

It was not long before all was ready, and having made many ablutions and a little toilet, we assembled round the dinner table in the eating tent, the same party that had dined at Mr. Currie Ghyrkins’ house on Sunday night, with the addition of the little collector of Pegnugger, whose stories of his outlying district were full of humour and anecdote.  The talk bending in the direction of adventure, Kildare, who had been lately in South Africa with his regiment, told some tales of Zulus and assegais and Boers in the Hibernian style of hyperbole.  The Irish blood never comes out so strongly as when a story is to be told, and no amount of English education and Oxford accent will suppress the tendency.  The brogue is gone, but the love of the marvellous is there still.  Isaacs related the experience of “a man he knew,” who had been pulled off his elephant, howdah and all, and had killed the tiger with a revolver at half arm’s length.

“Ah yes,” said the little collector, who had not caught the names of all the party when introduced, “I read about it at the time; I remember it very well.  It happened in Purneah two years ago.  The gentleman was a Mr. Isaacs of Delhi.  Queer name too—­remember perfectly.”  There was a roar of laughter at this, in which the collector joined vociferously on being informed that the man with the “queer name” was his neighbour at table.

“You see what you get for your modesty,” cried old Ghyrkins, laughing to convulsions.

“And is it really true, Mr. Isaacs?” asked Miss Westonhaugh, looking admiringly across at the young man, who seemed rather annoyed.

And so the conversation went round and all were merry, and some were sleepy after dinner, and we sat in long chairs under the awning or connat.  There was no moon yet, but the stars shone out as they shine nowhere save in India, and the evening breeze played pleasantly through the ropes after the long hot day.  Miss Westonhaugh assured everybody for the hundredth time that day that she rather liked the smell of cigars, and so we smoked and chatted a little, and presently there was a jerk and a sputtering sneeze from Mr. Ghyrkins, who, being weary with the march and the heat and the good dinner, and on the borders of sleep, had put the wrong end of his cigar in his mouth with destructive results.  Then he threw it away with a small volley of harmless expletives, and swore he would go to bed, as he could not stand our dulness any longer; but he merely shifted his position a little, and was soon snoring merrily.