I am aware that one swallow does not make a summer; but, taking into consideration the palpable improvement mentioned above, only one deduction could fairly be made as to the beneficial effects of sea air.
The average time spent by me in any one place during the two years I had been in Burmah was about four months; the next three years this increased to seven; and the year afterwards it fell to a week.
A rolling stone may gather moss, but is almost sure to drop it again; in my second nomadic stage, a clear sweep was made of all that I had accumulated, and, by this time, the surface had probably become too slippery for any to cling to.
But it is not my intention to enter into the particulars of the next three years, for my book has already swollen like a mountain stream, and I have more to relate about the part of our dominions I was now leaving. The curtain falls; and, after the manner of the dramatic author, I must ask the reader to imagine an interval of nearly four years before it rises again upon the land of Gautama the contemplative.
And, as the audience are looking round the house, I may as well finish this chapter by forging a few connecting links.
Those mean “bacilli,” mixing with my pure blood, hurled me from a happy position and forced me to encounter not only cloudy weather, but a hurricane of angry passions dark as Erebus. The first cloud was comparatively no larger than a man’s hand; but it rapidly spread, soon blotting out the azure vault of heaven.
Instead of returning when my leave had expired, I was persuaded in some unaccountable manner—still perhaps under some subtle influence of the fever—to join a regiment, with which I marched for six weeks through a country the monotony of which is not to be described.
Having obtained “Privilege leave” for a month, I should have a fortnight for looking about, leaving a week for the journey either way.
Instead of carrying this programme into force, I found myself—oh, irony of fate!—marching in a diametrically opposite direction. The destination had been depicted in glowing colours, and I found it commonplace, not to be compared with Rangoon or Prome.
Two years afterwards the sky cleared again for a period of six weeks, after which it became darker than ever; for no sooner had I settled down in a comfortable manner with a young wife, than the Mutiny burst upon us in all its fury, scattering everything to the four winds, ourselves included.