Palanquins were novel objects; the bearers go at a good rate; the pace is neither walking nor running, it is the amble of the biped, in the style of the amble taught the native horses, accompanied by a grunting noise that enables them to keep time. Well-trained bearers do not shake the pālkee. Bilees, hackeries, and khraunchies, came in also for their share of wonder.
So few of the gentry in England can afford to keep riding-horses for their wives and daughters, that I was surprised, on my arrival in Calcutta, to see almost every lady on horseback; and that not on hired hacks, but on their own good steeds. My astonishment was great one morning, on beholding a lady galloping away, on a fiery horse, only three weeks after her confinement. What nerves the woman must have had!
Dec. 16th.—The Civil Service, the military, and the inhabitants of Calcutta, gave a farewell ball to the Marquis and Marchioness of Hastings, after which the Governor-general quitted India.
On Christmas-day the servants adorned the gateways with hārs, i.e. chaplets, and garlands of fresh flowers. The bearers and dhobees brought in trays of fruit, cakes, and sweetmeats, with garlands of flowers upon them, and requested bakhshish, probably the origin of our Christmas-boxes. We accepted the sweetmeats, and gave some rupees in return.
They say that, next to the Chinese, the people of India are the most dexterous thieves in the world; we kept a durwān, or porter at the gate, two chaukidārs (watchmen), and the compound (ground surrounding the house) was encompassed by a high wall.
1823. Jan. 12th.—There was much talking below amongst the bearers; during the night the shout of the chaukidārs was frequent, to show they were on the alert; nevertheless, the next morning a friend, who was staying with us, found that his desk with gold mohurs and valuables in it, had been carried off from his room, together with some clothes and his military cloak. We could not prove the theft, but had reason to believe it was perpetrated by a khansāmān (head table servant) whom we had discharged, connived at by the durwān and chaukidārs.
March 20th.—I have now been four months in India, and my idea of the climate has altered considerably; the hot winds are blowing; it is very oppressive; if you go out during the day, I can compare it to nothing but the hot blast you would receive in your face, were you suddenly to open the door of an oven.
The evenings are cool and refreshing; we drive out late; and the moonlight evenings at present are beautiful; when darkness comes on, the fire-flies illuminate the trees, which appear full of flitting sparks of fire; these little insects are in swarms; they are very small and ugly, with a light like the glow-worm’s in the tail, which, as they fly, appears and suddenly disappears: how beautifully the trees in the adjoining grounds are illuminated at night, by these little dazzling sparks of fire!
The first sight of a pankhā is a novelty to a griffin. It is a monstrous fan, a wooden frame covered with cloth, some ten, twenty, thirty, or more feet long, suspended from the ceiling of a room, and moved to and fro by a man outside by means of a rope and pullies, and a hole in the wall through which the rope passes; the invention is a native one; they are the greatest luxuries, and are also handsome, some being painted and gilt, the ropes covered with silk, and so shaped or scooped, as to admit their vibratory motion without touching the chandeliers, suspended in the same line with the pankhā, and when at rest, occupying the space scooped out. In the up country, the pankhā is always pulled during the night over the chārpāī or bed.