‘When we first used these rooms, during occasional visits to Batala,’ writes Miss Wauton, ‘they were largely haunted by owls, bats, and rats; and it was a long time before these occupants understood that they had notice to quit the premises. Then it seemed impossible ever to make those huge, weird, gloomy-looking rooms at all cosy and home-like. However, we did our best with matting, screens, and furniture, to make it look habitable. And in Miss Tucker’s eyes the very strangeness and romance of the place made up for its deficiency in warmth and comfort.’ Mr. Clark also, referring to this large and somewhat dreary palace, says of it: ‘The winds blew through many chinks in the uncurtained doors; and the house was once likened to Eden, because four streams flowed through it.’
Two days after her arrival she wrote to her favourite sister:—
‘Batala, Dec. 8, 1876.
‘Do not connect Batala with any idea of self-sacrifice. I am astonished to find myself in such a beautiful home. It is more suited for an Earl and Countess than for two lowly Missionaries; and yet our rent is only a little more than £20 a year! Certainly, we have had to make that very necessary article, a fireplace, and to build servants’ huts; but the house is grand! It seems unnatural to be the lady of it.
‘We do not intend to furnish the room in which I am now sitting,—till the fireplace is finished in our smaller room we use this fine apartment,—but its length is about thirty-six feet. Poor Shere Singh! little he guessed, when he built the fair mansion, that he was but to sleep in it for one night, and then be murdered at Lahore! He never dreamed of Mission-books, Bibles, etc., being stored up in those most convenient presses in the walls, which add exceedingly to one’s comfort. For really the native house is not only stately, but wondrously comfortable. It seems to me to be decidedly warmer than Amritsar bungalow—a matter of real importance to me. It is a great deal lighter, and I suspect that in summer it will be cooler also, at least in this room, which is splendidly protected from the sun.
‘Another advantage as regards both health and cheerfulness is that we live on the first floor, and this first floor is a good height from the ground. One first ascends five steps to the substantial platform on which the house is built, and then twenty-nine steps to our apartments. Florrie and I have each a nice, light, airy bedroom, with bathroom attached. We shall soon have a pleasant sitting-room, to which this splendid unfurnished apartment will serve as a vestibule.’
‘Dec. 9.—I have just come from the City,—we live more than half-a-mile out of it. O, my Laura, a wide door is open before us. I was told that Batala is a place where we could not read the Bible: but I have copied a great deal into my Bible picture-book; and there is no let or hindrance that I can see in showing the pictures, and reading the descriptions, which are God’s own Word.... I find that a good way to begin, when I enter a house, is by showing off my Zouave.[56] ... Every one is delighted with it. A good large group of women and children assemble.... It is harder for me to understand the women, than it is for them to understand me,—they sometimes jabber so; and if they mix Panjabi, I am all at sea. In the evenings I intend to do a little Panjabi with Florrie; and in return I teach her to play the guitar. I have begun to learn the alphabet, which has thirty-five letters. We hope next week to have an Urdu Munshi; but I only intend to have one hour and a half with him [i.e. daily]....
‘In nine days we hope to make a day’s itinerating tour to two villages. There are little schools in them,—not of course Christian. The poor women here seem inclined to like me, for which I am thankful. Florrie told me to-day that she thought she would have gone into fits of laughter at what was said of me. My being elderly and unmarried seemed to be giving an impression that I was a kind of saint or faqir,—perhaps my being thin and wearing my faithful old green dress added to the impression. One woman asked me whether I had eaten anything that day. Florrie thinks that it was from a courteous wish to feed me, if I had not.
‘I arrived here on Thursday,—-this is Saturday. Yesterday I saw poor, dear B—n at the house of the Catechist. He looked sad; not as he looked in the Amritsar church. I suspect that his Cross is still very heavy....