On emerging from the hills, we marched over an almost uninterrupted plain, which preserves the same smooth features almost to the very foot of the Himalayahs.
After an uninteresting and monotonous march of four hundred miles, which occupied about six weeks, always halting on Sundays, the first military station we reached was the sacred city of Benares. Here we crossed the Ganges, above whose muddy waters we descried the minarets of the holy places towering in the cloudless sky, and, from their lofty relief, rendering more apparent the insignificance of the low mud and brick dwelling-places clustered around their bases.
The cantonments lie about four miles from the city, laid out with strict military precision: most of the officers' bungalows thatched with dry grass, standing in the midst of their square compounds, enclosed by a high mud wall.
Even the native soldiers are different looking beings from their unenlisted brethren, and stalk along with the conscious importance of improved condition.
The roads, which are made of concha,[1] are broad and excellent, and everything wears an air of starch discipline.
Near the cantonment lived a Madras rajah, who, having been deprived of his power and estates in that presidency, had been transplanted here and pensioned by government. With the customary adulation of the East, he readily licks the hands of his oppressors, apes English manners, and courts English society.
I accompanied a brother officer, who had been previously acquainted with him, to the rajah's mansion, which was a comfortable residence, without any attempt at magnificence. The room into which we were ushered was adorned with pictures representing the victories of Wellington, Nelson, and Napoleon. After keeping us some time waiting, his highness at length made his appearance. He was a tall, sallow-complexioned man, attired in a white frock coat, black silk handkerchief, brown silk pajamas,[2] and red morocco slippers. Supposing the principal means of entertaining Englishmen to be the satisfying of their appetites, he lost not a minute in introducing us to the supper-table, where he begged us to be seated, setting the example himself—at least, if his might be termed an example, for he perched himself most uncomfortably on the extreme edge of a large arm-chair, and with the assistance of its arms and his own, managed to preserve a very precarious equilibrium.
As it is very difficult for a person to feel at ease when he perceives that his companion is not, I hoped every instant to see him glide from the chair, and squat on the floor, in the position natural to his countrymen, but he did not, in this instance, gratify us or himself.
Supper being over, we adjourned to an inner room, where, to my surprise, we were presented to his wife and daughters. The former was about thirty years of age, glittering with jewels, and retaining visible proofs of having been a beauty in her day. Her eldest daughter, about thirteen years of age, (advanced womanhood in India,) was the most perfect dark beauty I have ever seen: her figure was slight, yet round and elegant—as are those of most Indian women of high caste; an invidious veil covered the greater portion of her glossy hair, but her clear olive complexion, and lustrous black eyes—too dazzling to be looked on with impunity—were a chef-d'œuvre of Nature. Never, till that night, did I bitterly repent my neglect of the Hindustani tongue.