The Major grunted.
“I know,” he said. “Some of you diplomatic people think British soldiers ought to be kept shut up in cages until they are wanted to fight. Don’t you criticise me, sir. I have had a good many years with my lads, and they are pretty well in hand. If you come to criticising, you will set me doing the same with your methods. I shouldn’t have let that French chap—Count, as he calls himself—go off so easy as you did the other day.”
“What could I do, sir? He is a friend of Rajah Suleiman, and his guest. I communicated with the Rajah, and he answered for him at once, complained of his arrest, and demanded that he should be allowed to return to the Palace at once.”
“Palace!” growled the Major. “Why, my lads could knock up a better palace in no time with some bamboo poles and attap mats.”
“The natives are accustomed to simplicity in the building of their homes,” said the Resident coldly.
“Oh yes, I know,” growled the Major; “but I want to know what that fellow was sneaking about our cantonments for in the dead of the night.”
“My dear sir,” said the Resident, “his explanations were quite satisfactory. He is here studying the natives preparatory to writing a book about the manners and customs of these people, and he is collecting various objects of natural history, as he showed us.”
“Yes; half-a-dozen moths with all the colour rubbed off their wings. Do you mean to tell me that that chap is catching those insects for nothing?”
“I am not ashamed to say that when I was young I used to collect butterflies, and if I am not very much mistaken, our friend Maine here has done the same thing.”
“Oh yes, lots of times,” said Archie.