We cannot take upon ourselves to reply, yes or no. The cantonment is by no means scrupulously clean. The bazaar is at all times unpleasant, and, during the rains, dirty in the extreme. Making all due allowance for the difficulty of keeping any place where natives abound, undefiled, still we opine, that the authorities might be much more active, in promoting the cause of cleanliness, than they are. But, if report speak true, the local government is somewhat out of temper with her hill protégée, for spending her rupees a little too freely.
There go the promenaders—stout pedestrians—keeping step in parties and pairs. Equestrians ride the fashionable animals—a kind of horse cut down to a pony, called the Pegu, Arabs being rare and little valued here. And invalids, especially ladies, “eat the air,” as the natives say, in palanquins and tonjons. The latter article merits some description. It is a light conveyance, open and airy, exactly resembling the seat of a Bath chair, spitted upon a long pole, which rests on the shoulders of four hammals, or porters. Much barbaric splendour is displayed in the equipments of the “gang.” Your first thought, on observing their long scarlet coats, broad yellow bands round the waist, and the green turban, or some other curiously and wonderfully made head-gear, which surmounts their sooty faces, is a sensation of wonder that the tonjon and its accompaniments have not yet been exhibited in London and Paris. Much hardness of heart is occasionally shown by the fair sex to their unhappy negroes. See those four lean wretches staggering under the joint weights of the vehicle that contains the stout daughter and stouter mama, or the huge Ayah who is sent out to guard those five or six ponderous children, whose constitutional delicacy renders “carriage exercise” absolutely necessary for them.
Two things here strike your eye as novel, in India.
There is a freshness in the complexion of the Sanitarians that shows wonderfully to advantage when compared with the cadaverous waxy hue which the European epidermis loves to assume in the tropics. Most brilliant look the ladies; the gentlemen are sunburnt and robust; and the juveniles appear fresh and chubby, quite a different creation from the pallid, puny, meagre, sickly, irritable little wretches that do nothing but cry and perspire in the plains. Another mighty pleasant thing, after a few years of purely camp existence, is the non-military appearance and sound of Ootacamund. Uniform has been banished by one consent from society, except at balls and parties. The cotton and linen jackets, the turbaned felt “wide-awake,” and the white jockey’s cap, with its diminutive apron, intended to protect the back of the head from the broiling sun, are here exchanged for cloth coats and black hats. Morning bugles and mid-day guns, orderlies, and order-books, the “Officers’ call” and “No parade to-day,” are things unknown. Vestiges of the “shop” will, it is true, occasionally peep out in the shape of a regimental cap, brass spurs, and black pantaloons, denuded of the red stripe. But such traces rather add to our gratification than otherwise, by reminding us of A.M. drills, meridian sword exercises, and P.M. reviews in days gone by.
And now, advancing along the gravelled walk that borders the lake, we pass beneath a thatched cottage, once a masonic lodge,[152] but now, proh pudor! converted into a dwelling-house. Near it, we remark a large building—Bombay House. It was formerly appropriated to officers of that presidency. At present they have no such luxury.[153] Taking up a position above the south end of the Willow-Bund, we have a good front view of the principal buildings in the cantonment. On the left hand is the Protestant church of St. Stephens, an unpraisable erection, in the Saxo-Gothic style, standing out from a grave-yard, so extensive, so well stocked, that it makes one shudder to look at it. Close by the church are the Ootacamund Free School, the Post-office, the Pay-office, and the bungalow where the Commanding officer of the station transacts his multifarious business. Below, near the lake, you see the Library, the Victoria hotel—a large and conspicuous building—the Dispensary, the subordinate’s courts, and the Bazaar. Beyond the church a few hundred yards of level road leads to the “palace,” built by Sir W. Rumbold, which, after enduring many vicissitudes of fortune, has settled down into the social position of a club-house and place for periodical balls. Around it, the mass of houses thickens, and paths branch off in all directions. In the distance appears the wretched bazaar of Kaundlemund—the haunt of coblers and thieves;—a little nearer is the old Roman Catholic chapel; closer still, the Union hotel—a huge white house, which was once the Neilgherry Church Missionary grammar school,—bungalows by the dozen, and several extensive establishments, where youth, male and female, is lodged, boarded, and instructed. On the southern side of a hill, separated from the Kaundle bazaar, stands Woodcock Hall, the locality selected for Government House, and, in 1847 at least, a most unimportant place, interiorly as well as exteriorly.
We will conclude our ciceronic task with calling your attention to one fact, namely, that the capital of the Neilgherries is growing up with maizelike rapidity. Houses are rising in all directions; and if fickle fortune only favour it, Ooty promises fair to become in a few years one of the largest European settlements in India. But its fate is at present precarious. Should the Court of Directors be induced to revise the old Furlough and Sick-leave Regulations, then will poor Ooty speedily revert to the Todas and jackals—its old inhabitants. On the contrary, if the status quo endure, and European regiments are regularly stationed on the hills,[154] officers will flock to Ootacamund, the settlers, retired servants of Government, not Eurasian colonists, will increase in number, schools[155] will flourish and prosperity steadily progress. The “to be or not to be” thus depends upon the turn of a die.
The chilly shades of evening are closing rapidly upon us, and we know by experience that some care is necessary, especially for the newly arrived health-hunter. So we wend our way homewards, remarking, as night advances, the unusual brilliancy of the heavenly bodies. Venus shines almost as brightly as an average English moon in winter: her light with that of the lesser stars is quite sufficient to point out to us the direction of “Subaltern Hall.”