Pinjore, Sunday, Nov. 3, 1839.

YES! we are in for it now. All the old discomfort, and worse; for we left the nice autumnal air blowing at the Fir Tree, with the fern waving and the trees looking red, and brown, and green, and beautiful—and now we are in all our old camel-dust and noise, the thermometer at 90° in the tents, and the punkah going. We received the officers of the escort and their wives, after church, which was hot work, but I am rather glad we have so many ladies in camp: it makes it pleasanter for the gentlemen, and at the different stations it is very popular. Last year there were only F. and me. In ten days, when we shall have a fresh cavalry regiment, there will be at least twenty, and about twelve of them dancers, which is lucky, for we hear of an awful number of balls in prospect.

They were a ladylike set that we saw to-day; one of them a striking likeness of you—a thing that I deny to everybody else, but still I do see it; and perhaps it is better than nothing.

Munny Majra, Monday, Nov. 4.

We began riding part of the march to-day, and the horses go very well, considering they have had a rest for seven months. My horse is such an angel! I really like him with a sort of minor Chance sentiment.

Umballa, Thursday, Nov. 7.

E. N. and Mr. G. met us this morning, and rode in with us, and in the afternoon we went to see E. N.’s house, which he has furnished very nicely, quite in his mother’s style.

A Captain B. arrived from Cabul, with one or two others, and are to march with us to Kurnaul. They all deny the report of the army ever having suffered further distress than a want of wine and cigars, and they are all looking uncommonly fat.

Captain D., of G.’s body-guard, brought back three of the sheep with which he left us last year, and the 16th are bringing back in safety their pack of foxhounds. That does not look like having undergone great privation. Captain B. brought me two shawls from Sir W. C., very pretty ones—at least we should have thought them so, before we were spoiled by plenty.

Shah-i-bad.

Mrs. B. arrived last night to meet her husband. She did not know he was come, so she went straight to E. N.’s bungalow—the usual method with ladies travelling dÂk—and he found her there when he went home from dinner.

He said he had given up the house to her and gone into a tent, and that the two little children had arrived with their dear little stomachs much discomposed by the journey, and had spoilt the sofa whose cover I had admired in the morning.

This was the place where I bought my little girls last year, and it is a curious coincidence, that their nominal father, who went to the PunjÂb and took service with Shere Singh, has left him, and arrived at this place last night, found Rosina’s tent, woke her up in the middle of the night, and the little girls too, and cried and sobbed and kissed the children, and wanted very much to have them back again. They are so afraid he will carry them off, that they will not lose sight of Rosina for a moment. Shere Singh gave this man a rupee a day to teach his cook English cookery like ours. The man had only waited at our table, so his imitation of an English cuisine must have been faint and nasty.

Thanjou, Saturday, Nov. 9.

The dear overland post came in just as we came off the march, and were sitting in front of the tents, sipping gritty tea, dusty up to the eyes, and with a wretched ‘up-before-breakfast’ feeling, which evinces itself in different manners: X. and Z. sneeze at each other; W. O. smokes a double allowance; F. suffers from hunger; I yawn; G. groans and turns black; the doctor scolds C. because the road was dusty, and A. rushes off to business; but this bad bit was cut short by that packet.

I know so well all you say, dearest, about these weary feelings of life; not that you have any right to them, because you have so many young lives growing up round you—first volumes of novels that you ought to carry on to third volumes.

I have a right to feel vapid and tired and willing to lie down and rest; for during the last four years my life has been essentially an artificial life; and, moreover, from my bad health it is physically fatiguing, and I feel I am flagging much more than I ever expected to do. I should like to see you and to be at home again; but I have no wish to begin a fresh course of life—not from any quarrel with it, for I know nobody who is in fact more spoiled, as far as worldly prosperity goes. I never wish for a thing here that I cannot have, and G., who has always been a sort of idol to me, is, I really think, fonder of me than ever, and more dependent on me, as I am his only confidant. I feel I am of use to him, and that I am in my right place when I am by his side. Moreover, his government here has hitherto been singularly prosperous and his health very good, so that there is nothing outward to find fault with, and much to be thankful for. Still, I have had enough of it, and as people say in ships, there is a difficulty in ‘carrying on.’

‘My blood creeps now only in drops through its courses, and the heart that I had of old, stirs feebly and heavily within me.’ It is the change from youth to age, and made in unfamiliar scenes, so that it is the more felt. I never had any opinion of

and never wanted the caution,—

The dregs never held out any promise, but the first sprightly runnings gave a good deal more happiness than people generally allow. I am quite sure that you and I feel unusually detached from the future, from having enjoyed our young days so eagerly.

They were very happy lives; and very often, when I am too tired to do anything else, I can think over particular days, with nothing but high spirits to recommend them, that are still quite refreshing. Days when we were making rush-mats in the garden; then your first ‘coming out’ at Oxford, with Lady Grenville; the day Mr. C. gave me my parrot, in what we called a gold cage; then, later on, visits to Longleat, and a sort of humble adoration of Lady B. and Lady G.; and then, of all the fortnights in life I should like to do over again, that fortnight at Burgh; —— —— meeting us on his little black pony, as you brought me back from Thames Ditton, and giving me some heath and some bluebells; and then the fun of peering out of your window, to see him on the lawn. I could draw his picture now quite easily. Then there were some good passages at Neasdon, when T. and E. were such dear, little, small things; so stupid of them to grow up—they should never have consented to pass four years old. However, it is of no use going over these things; only, when you say you are rather tired, I merely answer—so am I!

God bless you, dearest. In two days we shall be at Kurnaul, where we shall halt the rest of the week; such a dusty, hot place. I never meant when I started in life to march three times through Kurnaul. However, it is all on the way home.